I visited with Temecula Mayor Maryann Edwards yesterday. Unless you've been locked away somewhere, you know that swine flu is the hot button topic. She promised me an update from the Riverside County Office of Emergency Services, and I'm sharing it with you:

County of Riverside / Riverside County Operational Area EOC

SITUATION SUMMARY #1

Date / Time:         4/29/09                 1800 hours

Prepared By:       Riverside County Fire Department - Office of Emergency Services

Situation Assessment:

The County of Riverside responded today to the discovery of 4 “probable” cases of Swine Flu.  (1- Corona, 2 - Riverside, 1- Indio)

A Proclamation of Local Emergency in Riverside County was declared at 1000 hours today

The Governor has issued a Proclamation of Emergency for the State of California

The World Health Organization has elevated it’s Pandemic Threat Level to #5, indicating the possibility of an “imminent pandemic”

EOC / DOC Activations:

The Riverside County Public Health Department Operations Center remains open and active from 0700 -1900 daily

The County Emergency Operations Center is activated to Level One Status from 0700-1900 daily

The City of Indio activated it’s Emergency Operations Center at Management Watch Level

The City of Corona activated it’s Emergency Operations Center at Management Watch Level

The City of Riverside activated it’s Emergency Operations Center to Level 1 from 0800 to 1700 hours and Management Watch after hours

The CalEMA Southern Region EOC is activated from 0800 – 1700 hours daily

Incident Related Closures:

3 Schools were closed on advice of the Public Health Department, until May 7^th due to the Swine Flu outbreak:

Indio High School – Indio

Lee Pollard Continuation School – Corona

Mission Bell Elementary School / Headstart – Jurupa

The City of Indio closed indefinitely, it’s Teen Center and Senior Center as a precautionary measure

Miscellaneous Information:

A Public Health Information Hotline (951) 955-2000 is open from 0700 – 1900 hours daily. Additional information and referrals can be found at www.countyofriverside.us

A Press Conference was held today, in the Board of Supervisors Chambers at 1330 hours today with Chairman Stone and Public Health Officials

Murrieta Real Estate Expert – Tom Plant, REALTOR® - Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage – Active Rain Ambassador  (951) 907-9701

It would be my honor to show you the incredible Temecula Valley, a place I’m very proud to call home.

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image courtesy of photobucket

Don't get the wrong idea. I'm not implying that one is better than the other. Rather, I believe blogs can complement twitter  and vice versa.

One of my favorite people on activerain, Gary Woltal, wrote a post about twitter on March 7th -

Why You Won't Find This Cowboy On Twitter (Yet) 

At the time, I had had a twitter account for more than a year, but I was on the fence at best. I had about 200 followers on twitter back then, and I believed with Gary that twitter was a time waster. Fast forward to April 21. Yesterday I passed the 1,000 follower mark on twitter. I follow twitter on a program called TweetDeck, which allows me to categorize the people I follow. I don't have to be glued to twitter - I can visit it as I please, and take what I want from it.

I met a 13 year old boy named Jason O'Neill and interviewed him for a blog post -

13 Year Old Temecula Boy Makes His Mark With Pencil Bugs

This young man is truly an inspiration. I have connected with Pat Kitano and Kevin Boer and have begun taking webinars with them on how to integrate social media - blogs, Facebook, LinkedIn, twitter and more - to build your online referral network.

I can't write a post like this on twitter. You're limited to 140 characters. I can, however link to this post with a single tweet and thus instantly expose it to potentially millions of readers.

I see tweets from people like Dustin Luther, Ardell Dellalogia, Teresa Boardman, Todd Carpenter to name just a few. I heard about ReBarCampLA on twitter and because of that experienced a great day of learning and saw fellow rainers there like Ginger Wilcox, Laura Monroe, Marlene Bridges, Ricardo Bueno, Jeff Turner, Jeff Dowler and many, many others.

The beauty of twitter to me is its immediacy. I would have to search for hours here to find what I can find there in seconds. On the other hand, I can do things here I could never do there. That's my point... each complements the other. Do you need twitter? Maybe not. Is it worth checking out? Absolutely. Let me know what you think. You can follow me @TomPlant.

P.S. Follow @nik_nik and you'll be introduced to Nicole Nicolay

Murrieta Real Estate Expert – Tom Plant, REALTOR® - Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage – Active Rain Ambassador  (951) 907-9701

It would be my honor to show you the incredible Temecula Valley, a place I’m very proud to call home.

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Thirty nine years ago today, the very first Earth Day was celebrated. I realize that some reading this weren't even born thirty nine years ago. Nearly 20,000,000 Americans participated with the primary goal being to create a sustainable environment. Nearly forty years later, Earth Day has become a global phenomenon.

What does Earth Day mean to you? To me, it's a time to focus on our mother earth and see what steps all of us can take to preserve and even improve the quality of life and preserve our precious natural resources. Here are a few simple steps you can take.

• Recycle - It's so easy and it makes such a difference. If it's paper, plastic, glass or metal, don't throw it away, recycle it so it can be used again.
• Use flourescent bulbs - They cost a bit more initially, but consume 75% less power and last ten times as long as conventional light bulbs.
• Enjoy the outdoors and share you stories and photos. Clean up if you see trash. Nature.org

Do a little research. Learn how you can make a difference. Riverside's Press Enterprise has put up a wonderful site called Green Riverside with all sorts of useful tips on going green. Thanks for pitching in.

Murrieta Real Estate Expert – Tom Plant, REALTOR® - Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage – Active Rain Ambassador  (951) 907-9701

It would be my honor to show you the incredible Temecula Valley, a place I’m very proud to call home.

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Laura and I attend the Center For Spiritual Living in Temecula. Yesterday, 17 year old Jake Matthews shared a video with us about the Malawi School Project and told us he will be traveling there this summer to help build schools. The group made their first visit to Malawi in 2007 with the intention of building four schools. They built 10. We need more young men like Jake. I hope this video inspires you as much as it inspired me.

Murrieta Real Estate Expert – Tom Plant, REALTOR® - Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage – Active Rain Ambassador  (951) 907-9701

It would be my honor to show you the incredible Temecula Valley, a place I’m very proud to call home.

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The Temecula Valley Wine Country is growing. The chateau above is the Churon Winery on Rancho California Road. I've had a couple of  interesting experiences over the past few weeks I thought I'd share with you. The other afternoon we were at Keyways Winery. There was a woman sitting next to us with a unique voice. I asked her if she'd ever done any voiceover work and she told me she had. Not only that, she's an interior designer and an artist. Let me introduce you to Janie Bowers.

Janie paints beautiful acrylics. She's holding "Winter Princess" here. She is totally self taught. I think her artwork is exquisite. She also paints wine bottles. I took these shots at Robert Renzoni Winery and watched her put grapes on bottles with colored glue.

She's truly one of the most creative people I know. Finally, I paid a visit to Alex's Red Barn. Alex and Lise Yakut run  this boutique winery and offer a variety of wines as well as a cream sherry. Their Grenache is quite tasty.

Murrieta Real Estate Expert – Tom Plant, REALTOR® - Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage – Active Rain Ambassador  (951) 907-9701

It would be my honor to show you the incredible Temecula Valley, a place I’m very proud to call home.

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One of the many reasons I love living where I do is its proximity to so many wonderful places. Easter Sunday, Laura and I took off for Lake Arrowhead and in less than an hour and a half we were there. There's a different feel to being in the mountains. The air is crisper. The trees are taller. Everything feels fresh.

We had a noon reservation for brunch at the Lake Arrowhead Resort. Since we had some time to spare, we strolled through Lake Arrowhead Village and checked out some of the cute shops. We found a wonderful wine store called Vino 100.

After brunch, we browsed the village again and picked up some treats for Laura's dog "Money" at Three Dog Bakery. We drove down the mountain and now we look forward to a return visit.

Murrieta Real Estate Expert – Tom Plant, REALTOR® - Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage – Active Rain Ambassador  (951) 907-9701

It would be my honor to show you the incredible Temecula Valley, a place I’m very proud to call home.

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I want you to try something. Do a Google search on "Jason O'Neill". Pick your jaw up off the floor - yes, he's thirteen. I visited with Jason and his mom this afternoon at Starbucks. He is one amazing kid.

I found Jason on twitter. You may know I was on the fence for quite some time about the value of twitter, but I'm a true believer now. I saw that Jason was from Temecula, which is right next door to Murrieta, where I live. I contacted him via twitter and asked if I could interview him. I then wound up arranging the interview through his manager, his M.O.M (Mother Of Me).

Jason told me he's been interested in making money since he was five years old. He sold lemonade and hot chocolate and got into recycling (which he still does). A little over three years ago, his mom and grandmother were doing a project for a crafts fair. Jason asked if he could help them and share the profits. Mom told him no. If he wanted to do a crafts project, it would have to be his own. It was then that Jason gave birth to Pencil Bugs. He made 24 of them and put them up for sale at the craft fair, thinking that would be the end of it. They sold out quickly. He started making more, and they now make them, at home, hundreds at a time.

It wasn't long before Jason started gaining attention. They put up the website and started getting orders from all over the world - Denmark, Africa, Egypt and Canada to name a few. He was a contestant in 2007 on NBC's short-lived 1 vs. 100  game show as was called "The Kid Mogul". Forbes.com named him one of the Top 10 Role Models Under 18. Forbes magazine will be doing an article about him. He received "Young Entrepreneur Of The Year" award in 2007 at age 11. It was a contest designed for those 16 and older. He speaks at various events and has hooked up with Mark Victor Hansen, co-creator of the Chicken Soup For The Soul book series. Mark is including Jason in an upcoming book called The Richest Kids In America. Did I mention he's thirteen?

So many things impressed me about Jason. He's got his head screwed on straight. Mom Nancy says the priorities they have given him are "school, being a kid, and then business". As he told me "You're only a kid once". His school mates just don't get it. They think it's a little hobby he's doing. Make no mistake, it's a full fledged business. In addition to Pencil Bugs, Jason has bookmarks and greeting cards. His future plans include board games, video games, cards games, a cartoon and maybe even a movie. I wouldn't bet against him. He works now not because he has to (he's thirteen), but because he wants to. He wants to work as an adult because he wants to, not needs to. Jason also believes in giving to charity, as long as all the money goes to kids, not salaries or administrative costs. He has given to Hugs Foster Family in Temecula and to Rady Children's Hospital.

Jason hopes to encourage other kids to stretch, adding if you sit on your ideas, you don't know what you might miss. Jason set up his twitter account in December of last year, and now has more than 1500 followers. You can follow him @pencilbugs. I do. His tweets are worth reading.

Murrieta Real Estate Expert – Tom Plant, REALTOR® - Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage – Active Rain Ambassador  (951) 907-9701

It would be my honor to show you the incredible Temecula Valley, a place I’m very proud to call home.

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I first met Rosie Boorman last year at The Wine Company. She and her associate Val were pouring samples of wine from their winery in La Cresta, an area adjacent to the Santa Rosa Plateau. I saw Rosie and Val again a few weeks ago at Francesca's where they were holding a wine blending party. Guests were given four varietals of wine and asked to create their own wine blend.

I was intrigued and asked Rosie if i could come visit their winery and see what she and her husband Todd were doing there. Temecula is renowned for its wine country, but I wanted to see what was going on in La Cresta. When I arrived, Rosie was dipping the tops of the bottles in food grade plastic and then handing them to Val to cool in water.

It's a labor intensive process, but so is everything they do at Boorman. I spent nearly an hour and a half visiting with Todd Boorman. He told me how they had moved to the area from Orange County in 1986. They wound up purchasing the land they now live and work on. There were already Cabernet Sauvignon grapes planted, but Todd knew nothing about grapes. He spent the first four years landscaping and building their home. He then started taking extension classes to learn how to take care of vineyards. He eventually began taking care of the grapes by himself, buying a sprayer and then a tractor.

Todd became interested in the process of making wine and soon began making wine from his own grapes. His first release was the 2000 Cabernet Sauvignon. He also bottles Cabernet Franc, Merlot and Pinot Noir and purchased 800 of the first 2000 Petit Verdot vines made available from France which he uses in his Metaphor blend.

I left incredibly impressed with Todd's committment to producing a quality product. In his words: "wine is an art that's being lost to commercialization." He also told me "I just want to make good wine." He's doing exactly that.

Murrieta Real Estate Expert – Tom Plant, REALTOR® - Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage – Active Rain Ambassador  (951) 907-9701

It would be my honor to show you the incredible Temecula Valley, a place I’m very proud to call home.

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What would I do without my dear active rain pals? Don't get me started! Pat Kennedy tagged me with this recently. Stay tuned to see who the next victims are.

1. Type out all the questions below and answer each with a picture.

2. Tag 5 people and spread the love out.

It's that simple. 

1. Age at my next birthday:

2.  Favorite movie or TV character:

3.  Place I want to travel:

4.  Favorite Food: 

5. Favorite Place:

6.  Nickname:

7. Favorite Color:

8.  Favortie Sports Team:

9.  Favorite Hobby

10. Bad Habit:

Now I will be passing this Meme tag on to 5 people. Be sure you come back here and leave a link to your Meme in the comment section and let the people you tag know they have been tagged!

Ok - Fran White, Elaine Hanson, Ricardo Bueno, Joey Aszterbaum and Tom Braatz - it's your turn!

Murrieta Real Estate Expert – Tom Plant, REALTOR® - Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage – Active Rain Ambassador  (951) 907-9701

It would be my honor to show you the incredible Temecula Valley, a place I’m very proud to call home.

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The baseball season must surely be upon us. Spring training is drawing to a close. Across the country, fans are gearing up for opening day. Teams, both minor and major league are getting ready to welcome the crowds. What sorts of promotions can you expect to see this year? Well, In Lake Elsinore, The Storm has a unique idea for their Tuesday night games. In addition to all you can eat for $13, the first 250 fans will receive their very own Subtle Butt.

Listen, you can't make this stuff up, really. If you think about it, an all you can eat promotion does carry built-in hazards. At least The Storm is thinking about its fans. Play Ball!

The Storm's mascot - Thunder.

Murrieta Real Estate Expert – Tom Plant, REALTOR® - Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage – Active Rain Ambassador  (951) 907-9701

It would be my honor to show you the incredible Temecula Valley, a place I’m very proud to call home.

 Subscribe in a reader