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The Voice I Heard At Meijer's

11/16/2023

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The Voice I Heard At Meijer's

Last week while on my way to the Meijer's supercenter in Reynoldsburg, Ohio,

...I turned on the radio to NPR. As is so often the case these days, the news was beyond dismal. The radio host was interviewing a pediatric ICU physician, a woman with Doctors without Borders who has worked in Gaza and who was now in contact with fellow doctors there. The pediatrician told of suffering children, hungry children, dead children, destroyed hospitals, dead doctors. In the few weeks since the beginning of the war 190 doctors have been killed in the Gaza bombings, among them the pediatric ICU specialist who trained the doctor being interviewed.
There was no more food available for the medical workers in Gaza than for the rest of the population. Along with everyone else, medical workers were getting thinner and thinner. They were drinking non-potable water and getting sick from diarrhea illnesses.
The doctor quoted a fellow pediatrician in Gaza who wrote to her that, "We are on our way to collapsing from the horror of the scenes we see...and the world is watching as if we are in a movie theater showing a horror movie, and the viewers are silent." At that point I had to switch radio stations.
By the time I arrived at Meijer's my thoughts were no longer on Gaza but on my shopping list, and where to start.

I proceeded to the bread section where I strolled the long aisle of well-stocked shelves,

...until I found the special kind of bread that I like.

As I was tossing several loaves into my cart a voice from nowhere popped into my head and said, "The Gazans don't have bread. The bakeries have been blown up and the aid trucks can't get through." I recalled that I'd read that recently.
Next I headed to the produce section, where I roamed through the shelves of Roma tomatoes, one of the half-a-dozen varieties of tomato available, picking and choosing a bagful of the best-looking ones.

The voice returned. "The Gazans don't have fresh tomatoes," it said.
When I moved to the strawberries it added, "And they don't have any fresh strawberries, either. There probably aren't any markets left where they can buy any fresh food at all."

From there my brain went into an obsessive loop, the voice reminding me with every item I dropped into my cart, at every every shelf, refrigerated or frozen case that I passed, that I had easy access to all this food while the men, women, and children of Gaza were facing starvation.
"They have don't have vegetables," said the voice.

...or meat,

...or cheese,

...or eggs,

...or milk,

...or ice cream,

...or junk food.

"And what about their pets?" asked the voice as I passed the pet food aisle.

"And the children have no toys," said the voice,

"...nothing like these Squishmallows, that children love so much, to soften the sad, hard edges of their existence."

It being a couple of weeks before Thanksgiving, Christmas music was already wafting through the store. From now on our troubles will be miles away, sang the choir.
"Yes, terrible troubles are miles away," the voice said. "About 6,000 miles away."
I stopped pushing my shopping cart. "All right, Lord," I answered in my mind, "tell me what to do about it. Tell me."
But the voice went silent.

Reference
https://www.wbur.org/hereandnow/2023/11/09/doctors-without-borders-gaza

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Scenes From The Backyard

11/13/2023

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Scenes From The Backyard

This morning I was hit with a rare jolt of ambition and decided to clean out the fireplace.

While on my way to empty the ashes in our backyard compost pile,

...and passing by the remains of last summer's garden,

...it struck me that it was all nonetheless quite pretty and nice,

...in the way that late autumn is, in its mostly shades-of-brown color pallet.

I looked around and decided that I wanted to capture this particular morning in my backyard, so I went back to the house, grabbed my camera, and proceeded to snap up all the scenes that I wanted to hold on to.

After all, once autumn arrives, whether in one's garden or in one's life, one can't know if one will be given the gift of another such beautiful morning.

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The Highlight Of The Third Republican Debate

11/10/2023

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The Highlight Of The Third Republican Debate

In truth, I found the other night's Republican Presidential debate a pretty depressing affair, the general theme being all the wars we are involved and, if one of the candidates is elected, all the war-making we can potentially expect to be involved in: war in Gaza, war in Ukraine, bombing of Syria, getting tough with Iran, getting rough with China, building up a monster fleet of naval destroyers to send into the Taiwan Straight for a war there...and, of course, Republicans being anti-tax warriors as well, no mention of how We the People are supposed to pay for all that heavy duty death and destruction.
Fortunately, though, things lightened up when the hostilities moved to the battleground of the stage and the fighting words began to fly among the candidates. Seemed Nikki Haley was the target of the most memorable word-grenades,

...tossed at her by He of the Insufferably Endless Verbiage, Vivek "Motormouth" Ramaswamy.

But, oh, could the quick-witted former U.N. Ambassador lob 'em right back, and to her own advantage.
When Ramaswamy called Haley "Dick Cheney in three-inch heels" - frankly, I wasn't sure what he even meant by that, as is the case with so much of the bafflegab that rushes out of his mouth - she shot back that she wore five-inch heels, and not as a fashion statement but for ammunition.
I dearly loved that quip, but not nearly as much as the Haley-on-Ramaswamy smack down that followed when the subject turned to the banning of TikTok, a policy the Republican candidates generally voiced favor for.
When asked by the moderator how he'd ban TikTok since he used it, known TikToker Vivek Ramaswamy tried to whiff the question by again turning his sites on Nikki Haley. He quite self-righteously proclaimed that Haley's daughter also used TikTok and told Haley to take care of her own family first.
For Mama Bear Haley these were serious fighting words indeed, and she responded by going nuclear on Ramaswamy.
Fire in her eyes, voice, and body language, Nikki Haley told Vivek Ramaswamy, in no uncertain terms, to "Leave my daughter out of your voice."

Now, this language was to me reminiscent of Will Smith's infamous slapping of Chris Rock at the Oscars,

...after which Smith yelled at Rock to “Keep my wife’s name out your f***ing mouth,”

Nikki Haley did, thankfully (though I'm not sure how) resist the urge to march across the stage and give Vivek Ramaswamy a good Will Smith-style slap, though she did let him have it verbally,

...after which she looked out into the audience and, while Vivek kept yammering on, shook her head as if to say, do you even believe this #%*! ?

These were for sure some prime bits, but the absolute highlight of the whole show was the now famous moment when Haley glanced back at Ramaswamy - barely glanced, that is, as if she couldn't be bothered to look at him - and said, "You're just scum."
It wasn't just that she said it, but how she said it. And her expression.

And for this former top American diplomat, whose job required the ability to read people like a book and to carefully deal with the most powerful leaders on the planet with the utmost craft, delicacy, and savoir-faire, to just cock her head back at the still yakkity-yakking Vivek Ramaswamy and toss off, "You're just scum," dropping all finesse out the window and just calling the guy like she saw him...it was right down hilarious.
And how much funnier was the whole TikTok sequence after the debate was over and we saw that the daughter that Nikki Haley was, in Vivek Ramaswamy's estimation, being too permissive with in her social media use, was not a tender, impressionable tween, but a 25-year-old married woman.

Thank goodness for the comic relief.

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Glory Be! Vivek Ramaswamy And I Agree! (But Not Completely)

11/8/2023

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Glory Be! Vivek Ramaswamy And I Agree! (But Not Completely)

In truth, I did not imagine that Vivek Ramaswamy, the hyperkinetic Trump trumpeter and Republican Presidential contender with the Energizer Bunny mouth,

...and myself would ever be in agreement about anything. And now here we are, in agreement about something.
All it took for this accord between Vivek and me was the passage at the ballot box yesterday of Ohio Issue 1, which now makes reproductive health care, including abortion, a right under the Ohio Constitution.

It was as I was scrolling through the post-election news last night that I came across an interview of Vivek Ramaswamy by CNN correspondent Kaitlin Collins, who pressed Ramaswamy, an anti-abortion zealot, on his response to the overwhelming turn out by Ohio voters in favor of abortion rights.

What he had to say surprised me: He said that his camp needed to put more substance into what it means to be pro-life; that they needed to start walking the walk, so to speak.
Now, this caught my attention. I've always said that if I were a pro-life activist, instead of cutting off access to abortion, which is first and foremost a women's health care issue, I would rather campaign for making ours a society in which pregnant women never have to face desperation or hopelessness. Not that Ramaswamy went very far down this path. But he did take a few baby steps.
He said that the pro-life movement needed to put more emphasis on adoption; on the accessibility of contraception; on the availability of child care. He promoted codifying into law more sexual accountability for men. I wasn't sure precisely what he meant by that - though he did mention genetic paternity testing and financial responsibility - but, sure, I'm definitely in favor of more sexual responsibility for men, as well as better access to contraception and child care and even making adoption a compassionate option. And I think it's high time that the pro-life movement did, in fact, stand for something more beneficial to parents and babies than outlawing abortion.
But, Mr. Ramaswamy, instead of offering these little tip-toe tonics, how about stepping it up and leading the battle for really meaningful pro-life support? How about fighting for pre-natal care for all expectant women? How about fighting for affordable maternity care? How about fighting to making sure that parents of babies who need neonatal intensive care don't have to agonize over how they're going to pay for hundreds of thousands of dollars of medical bills? How about fighting for health care for babies and children and, for that matter, everyone? How about fighting for food security for families? For education? How about fighting for the welfare of children after they're born?
And while we're on the subject, Mr. Ramaswamy and all pro-life champions, the other day the report was released by the C.D.C. that congenital syphilis in newborns is reaching epidemic proportions in the United States, mainly because of lack of care for infected mothers.

So how about some pro-life lobbying for STD testing and treatment for all pregnant women as a national policy?
See, Vivek, that's one walk you and I could walk together.

References:
https://www.cnn.com/videos/politics/2023/11/08/vivek-ramaswamy-ohio-abortion-vote-reaction-sot-vpx.cnn

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/07/health/syphilis-babies.html

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High Ho, High Ho, High Carbs

11/5/2023

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High Ho, High Ho, High Carbs

Ours being I suppose what you could call a vintage suburban neighborhood, the sidewalks in some spots are beginning to show their age: a little crooked, a little uneven.
Such were a couple of sections of sidewalk in front of our house, which my mate Tom was finding vexatious and took a notion to repair himself if he could round up a work crew. To this end he put out a call to our son Tommy and nephew Randy to ask if they'd be up for being his sidewalk repair crew. Turned out they were indeed up for the job.
And so yesterday morning, it being perfect weather for rearranging an 800-pound concrete slab, Tommy and Randy arrived and soon it was off to work they went with their shovel, pick, and cheerful attitudes.

The first part of the job involved digging up the margins of the sidewalk.

After the digging was done came the more arduous task of lifting, maneuvering, and repositioning the slab.

While the men labored on the sidewalk, my job was in the kitchen putting together lunch.
The plan was for lunch at 1pm, at which time Randy's and Tommy's wives, Anusha and Emily, would come over and join us. However I received word that Randy's parents, Mary Jane and Ken, had decided to drive down from from Cleveland for a visit on this beautiful fall day, and so I invited them for lunch, as well. That would be eight for lunch.
I had decided to keep the lunch menu simple: Spaghetti, salad and hot rolls, fruit salad for dessert.
But of course, this meant making a pot of meat sauce for the traditionalists,

...and meatless sauce for the vegetarians.

Then there was the spaghetti for the pasta crowd,

...and spaghetti squash for gluten-free folks.

And, for the sake of variety, a pot of mac and cheese on the side,

...along side of which I made a couple of pans of fresh, hot rolls,

...and a couple of bowls of salad.

Around noon Mary Jane and Ken arrived, and they jumped right in to the work, Ken helping the guys finish up the sidewalk work,

...and Mary Jane pitching in with the kitchen work,

...as did Emily and Anusha when they arrived.

By lunch time the sidewalk was about finished and the hungry crew came in to eat.

As I looked at all the food set out on the table, I thought, Hello, this is a whole lotta carbs.

But the hard-working crew, as well as the not-quite-as-hard-working among us, were all happy to dig in.

For dessert we had the fruit salad accompanied by a bowl of "dessert popcorn,"

...which I made by mixing microwave kettle corn with Candy Pop.

The dessert popcorn went over surprisingly well with everybody.

After lunch the sidewalk crew finished up outside while the kitchen crew went to work on the voluminous pile of dishes, pots and pans. But, fortunately, multiple hands lightened both jobs.
When the jobs were done and the others had left, Tommy stayed for a while for a little post-job recap with Tom.

The sidewalk looked good now, nice and even and no longer a potential tripping hazard,

...much to the approval of the neighbors.

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How Do I Love Halloween?

11/1/2023

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How Do I Love Halloween?

With another Halloween come and gone, I'm here reflecting, as I often do, and as I imagine many of us often do on the day after Halloween, from the very young,

...to the very old (well, maybe not so very old),

...on how I love Halloween.
How do I love Halloween? Let me count the ways.
I love how as Halloween approaches the front yards turn seasonably festive and spooky.

I love how in our neighborhood the festivities begin the weekend before, thanks to two of our terrific neighbors,

...who have started the tradition of hosting an awesome neighborhood party with wonderful food and company, which they held this past Saturday night.

I contributed a couple of homemade pizzas to the pot luck table,

...while my mate brought one of his acclaimed apple pies.

I love how, compared to the stress, expense and work that generally have to be invested into Christmas, that colossus of holidays, to make everyone's Christmas dreams come true,

...which might not end up coming true anyway because everybody ends up too stressed out, broke and exhausted, all Halloween requires to make a good time is some candy,

...a costume,

and a walk around the block on a beautiful autumn night.

I love how on Halloween the neighbors sit on their porches to hand out treats, and everybody goes over to each others' houses to chat a little as long as we're all outside.