Me: It’s too cold to get out from under this blanket and go cook dinner.
Thoughtful Me: If I go cook in the kitchen, eventually the oven will warm up the whole house.
Decisive Me: Kids! it’s your turn to cook!
You might have read the other day that my BFF had to take off in an emergency kind of way to rush back east because her mom who had been ill and was probably going to be moved to hospice soon suddenly came down with an infectious respiratory disease and the docs weren’t sure if she would last the 10 days until BFF’s scheduled trip, or even 24 hours.
BFF’sM lasted almost a whole week, long enough for BFF to get back home and visit with her. At her most alert she only opened a single eye for just a short time, and gave BFF a hand squeeze, but she was made comfortable and she had her family about her. It was wonderful for BFF that she was able to change her flight plans & make it home with 36 hours to spare before that last time her mother opened an eye and was able to look at her.
It’s sad, of course. But there were so many things about her that I loved. There are, of course, too many to list here, but the one that makes me smile most is that she became an outspoken advocate for women her age sexually objectifying the asses of the hot, lycra-clad Tour de France riders every June. She also would attend MLS games & ogle the players.
There was something delightful about a white-haired New England church lady and school marm (she was a teacher for over 40 years) waxing enthusiastic about how TV was showing off hot man ass for a month a year now. So if you feel touched by anything I’ve written about her, past or present, you could do something nice for your library as she often did, or you could just go look at the hot man asses of professional cyclists for a few minutes & know that she would approve.
Okay, here it is:
Two people, one twenties or thirties, one preschool age, sit in a waiting area in the hospice. There is silence for several minutes. Both are deep in thought.
Preschooler: Is butter lettuce vegan?
Twenties or Thirties: Yes.
Both return to deep thought, and the waiting area is quiet again.
In case you’re curious about whether BFF had a chance to comfort her mom, the answer was no yesterday, mom was unresponsive all day. But today I got this text from BFF:
[Sibling] and I just visited her. She was asleep. Once she squeezed my hand, once she opened one eye. I brought stuff from her apartment that she isn’t going to appreciate, but I do.
Rage, says BFF, because it feels necessary. But it is likely the quiet gentleness that we will both remember.
The odds kept climbing that eventually I would know someone killed or seriously affected by COVID-19. That time appears to have come near.
Land O’ Lakes, still getting slammed.
Try this one, which fits my mood:
I did not realize kids were learning so many cool fighting techniques from anime.
Presented without comment:
Tweet from Conal Pierse
i want to write about some quotes that Columbia Journalism Review (CJR) and the Guardian US (GUS) collected from US journalism movers and shakers. The quotes are supposed to be about what the media did wrong in their 2016 election (especially presidential election) coverage. In practice, most of them aren’t about that. It’s sad, really, that communication professionals can’t even stick to the topic. Yet other aspects of what they said was far worse than merely undisciplined topic-wandering.
As I was writing about the larger series of quotes, I found myself writing a huge amount about just one. It’s far too much for a piece that analyzes trends throughout the quotes – it would bias the feel of the piece, making it feel less a piece about trends and more a piece about that one guy and some peripheral junk. So I’m dropping this preview of the other piece where I’m just shoving everything I wrote about that one guy: Steve Adler, the Editor In Chief of Reuters. Allow this to whet your appetite for the later piece.
The Attorney General of the USA has, helpfully, provided us with a summary of the Harry Potter books. Interestingly, it concludes that Voldemort was innocent.
William Barr publishes summary of Harry Potter series claiming Voldemort was “completely exonerated”
You really can’t know how badly I want to take credit for that. Purest genius. My favorite quote?
Those unfamiliar with how these things work will no doubt point to evidence of things like killing people as examples of wrong-doing, but the evidence is weak at best.
It’s short. You have no excuse not to read it in its entirety.
:sigh:
