Category Archives: Uncategorized

Life in a “Horrible” City

Posted on June 14, 2024 | Leave a comment

The sun will be up earlier again today, 5:11 a.m. to be exact. With a herding dog (Miniature Australian Shepherd) who swears by routine, when the sun comes up a walk must be taken then breakfast (hers, naturally), made with all due haste.

After I dress and open windows (when it’s cool enough) to air out, and cover some artwork to protect it from damage from the blistering morning sun, we’ll set out on the morning routine.

We’ve a stellar view of Lake Michigan toward the northeast. A block away begins a string of County parks designed by Frederick Law Olmstead of New York’s Central Park fame. Or we can go down to the lake and watch the boats. Or walk up by the University. So many choices. Lulu doesn’t care as long as the morning walk is brief so she can get to the important stuff, like food.

But I like early morning walks, with the dew on the grass and another day to plan while breathing in the lake air and enjoying the respite being along the shoreline brings from the hottest weather yet to come this summer.

The City has spent months preparing for the Republican National Convention, here in just a few weeks. Back in 2020 we planned in the same manner for the Democratic National Convention, scheduled to be here but was mostly done remotely because of COVID. Cities strut out their best for the conventions, and businesses and political parties expect a financial benefit as well as the usual puffery about staging a successful national convention.

That’s why we were so shocked to hear Donald Trump call Milwaukee a “horrible city” yesterday. Out loud. And all the Republican elected officials in the State of Milwaukee made excuses for this inexusable slap in the face to his host city. Now Donald Trump says it’s all cities and it’s about crime. Aside from him visiting as a newly-convicted felon, serious crimes in Milwaukee have gone down by double digits since he was president.

Perhaps Donald Trump wants to start a crime wave in Milwaukee? So many of his work and campaign buddies are already felons. If so, he should stay home. I feel safe here. I walk alone with the dog, and she’d just as soon wiggle her butt (no tail on an Aussie) and get petted than protect me from a potential assailant. In my years as a temporary resident here, I’ve never been afraid in my neighborhood or what Trump thinks is its scary downtown near Fiserv Forum, where the Convention will take place.

Milwaukee is a beautiful city, especially this time of year. I’m a Great Lakes kind of gal, having grown up on Lake Erie. From my earliest years until recently, all I really had to do was switch from the Bills to the Packers, not a real stretch as the Packers were always my second choice in the playoffs when my Bills didn’t make it. There’s the same Northern spirit, with brutally cold, snowy winters contrasted with that much more-appreciated warmer seasons. There’s art and theater, even music at Summerfest, beer and brats. And cheese.

Shame on Donald Trump for denigrating his host city. One wouldn’t think he has to win Wisconsin in order to become president again, eviscerate the Constitution, send women back to the dark ages and make sure he doesn’t spend a day in the Big House (not the White House). Vote as if your life depends upon it. Because it does. Dee

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Our National Security

Posted on May 22, 2024 | Leave a comment

We as U.S. citizens pay intelligence gatherers and analysts to keep us safe. They provide raw data to be synthesized for decision-makers on going to war or moving troops to potential problem areas around the globe.

Politicians, generals, admirals and the like make decisions to send troops into battle based on intelligence. That information is sacred because it saves American lives. It should not be stolen and stashed (and re-stashed) in public ballrooms and bathrooms of a former president’s golf club.

Today, after all this time, Donald Trump and his fellow indicted associates are in court trying to prove: that this indictment is a personal and political attack on the former president; and that the search was illegally conducted by the FBI.

I guess what bugs me about all this is that everything is always about Donald J Trump. If it rains today, it’s a personal attack on Donald J Trump because he wanted to play golf. If traffic snarls because of his moronic and overblown entourage, it’s everyone else’s fault. If no-one shows up to cheer him on in an empty park across from the courthouse, it’s because Joe Biden kept his supporters from the area.

I’m sick and tired of everything being all about Donald J Trump. He stole classified documents, stored them recklessly, and obstructed justice when the National Archives had to stop bending over backwards to not offend Herr Schitzinpantz leader of the Fourth Reich and involve the FBI. Then the FBI bent over backwards before finally issuing subpoenas then, months later, initiated a quiet search.

This is about our national security, our spies, our soldiers who put their lives on the line for our safety. It has nothing to do with Donald J Trump and his insufferable ego. It has to do with stolen secret papers that are supposed to be continuously maintained by professionals in ultra-secure facilities.

Perhaps if Judge Cannon rules that the search was illegal and tosses the case, it can finally go up for review by more competent judges who weren’t all named to the bench by one Donald J Trump. While we’re on the subject of judges, allowing a private body to recommend judges for political bona fides and loyalty to Donald J Trump leads to rubber-stamping of incompetent and even dangerous judges. Being a judge is a serious job, a reward for a sound mind, fairness and adherence to the rule of law, not solely to the potential leader of the Fourth Reich.

I grew up knowing that the world didn’t revolve around me. Normal people pass that stage by about age five. Our nation’s democracy is at stake in a big way. We have to choose our leaders on what they’ll do to benefit all the people, not just themselves. Running for president just to stay out of jail is not a good enough reason for me. I know I’m not the center of the universe but hope that there are enough of us citizens who care about all of us Americans, not just one. Pass it on. Dee

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Space

Posted on May 21, 2024 | 1 comment

Yes, Trekkies, the final frontier. But not here, not today. I’d like to talk about kitchen counter space. As iyou know, there is only so much of it. If I could have everything my little heart desired, my home would only be kitchen and I wouldn’t be able to find anything.

So, we need to know what we need, what we use most and how to best access it. Over the years, I’ve come up with my own strategy. Yes, I’m biased based on some level of expertise (cooking school) and years on this planet spent cooking for myself, my family and guests.

Shortly after I graduated college, my mother gave me a glass punch bowl and ladle. She had to entertain a lot for Dad’s position in the arts and got a new silver set for weekly artist/donor receptions. Every year I trotted it out for the staff party at work and lugged it home to wash. Decades later, I no longer have it, don’t even remember to whom I bequeathed it. Some things you just don’t need for your lifestyle.

Now, if I were eating an Asian diet that required a number of small meals per day based on fresh rice, I would definitely have an electric rice cooker. Ditto espresso, but I might have espresso several times a year and I’d opt for a small stovetop model than a huge coffee/espresso maker with frother.

The kitchen counter is prime real estate, a place in which nothing can be unneccesary or out of place. All I can advise young cooks starting out in their first apartment is to consider what you like to cook and what you need to cook it. Then buy quality products. Many of mine I’ve had for decades.

I was instructed to purchase for cooking school a good 3-4″ paring knife, a 10-12″ chef knife and a steel honer. That’s it. Oh, knife guards to protect them and a case so I didn’t look like a serial killer on the subway. I still have and use all those knives and have added one ceramic and one santoku chef, a boning knife, a fish boning knife, two mid-size utility knives (for living with only two knives overseas) and several inexpensive paring and picnic knives. I do not keep them in a block, the ones I use every day are on a 24″ magnetic strip near where I prep food on my many plastic cutting boards (that are standing in a narrow cupboard below the counter)

Appliances include a KitchenAid two-slice toaster; a KitchenAid coffee/spice mill with washable container; a KitchenAid 12 cup food processor (no longer made, and 21 years later the lid is beginning to break down); a 5 qt. KitchenAid mixer that’s 35 years old and running strong; a KitchAid blender with glass vessel; and a KitchenAid electric tea kettle (sorry, fell in love living in England and Scotland). That’s it.

Otherwise I have two crocks, one for metal spatulas and utensils, and one for wooden spoons and spoonulas. Also a heavy stand for a roll of paper towels. That’s it.

Cooking stores will sell you strawberry hullers, cherry pitters, mushroom brushes and tons of stuff you don’t need. A paring knife has so many uses, and so does a heavy chef for pitting olives or cherries. I go to a hardware store for pastry brushes. I even bought a $4 curry comb (to brush horses) at a farm store to scale fish. But that’s another story for another day.

I love my current kitchen. Although the sink doesn’t have a view (unless I tile it with an Italian scene), my prep area does and I’ve plenty of storage for food, pots and pans, china and glassware, slow cooker et al. If you’re just starting out, consider what you really need and let your kitchen grow to be your very own. If you have too much stuff, use this as a guide to pare down. The kids can use some stuff, can’t they? Cheers and keep on cooking! Dee

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Nervous Nellies

Posted on May 20, 2024 | Leave a comment

Stick with me today. I do have a point.

I looked at my phone for the weather shortly before 6:00 a.m. to take Lulu (our Miniature Australian Shepherd) out on the first walk of the day. It said rain starts in four minutes. We hightailed it out the door. A few moments later a thunderclap came out of no-where. Pull pull pull, try to slip Martingale collar. Mommy, get me home NOW!!! In between thunderclaps, there still wasn’t any rain, we tried to go inside and back out several times to no avail. Every dog we ran into had the same issue, all were trembling and pulling the leash home to safety. An hour later, the storm had passed, Lulu came out from behind the toilet and lay by the window again as if nothing had happened. We eventually were able to venture outside for her to finish her business.

Dogs have the luxury (or not) of living in the moment. If the sun is out, there was never a thunderstorm and all is right with the world. Ditto fireworks. For people, we need time to regroup after exciting or stressful situations. A lull in the action.

Think of entertainment, movies for example. Alfred Hitchcock was the master of suspense, but he didn’t keep you on the edge of your seat the entire movie. In “To Catch A Thief,” John Robie (The Cat) had the “meet cute” with Francie, and delightful scenes with her sassy mother, before he got seriously involved in tracking the jewel thief. my favorite line is the last one in the film, “Mother will love it up here.”

Of course this takes us to one Donald J Trump. For the past nine years, he’s had to be the center of controversy, therefore attention, at every minute of every day. Furious that he lost the presidency, he’s been Joe Biden’s unwelcome backseat driver every day of this administration. It’s one thing to disagree with his policies, but Trump won’t even concede the election after sixty courts ruled that it was fair.

Joe Biden works behind the scenes, and really gets things done. Big things, bipartisan things that have brought this country 180 degrees out of the pandemic. As an added bonus, he shares credit with others who have been toiling in the salt mines with him. Including members of the opposing party.

Trump takes credit for everything, blame for nothing, and leaves no air for anyone else. As a nation, we deserve to be tired. In politics, every moment of every day need not (indeed, should not) be a crisis. Unfortunately, we cannot all think like dogs and convince ourselves that the first quiet moment is the beginning of a period of lasting peace and tranquility. Unless and until Donald Trump is safely out of the picture. Personally, I’m thinking Gitmo, but only if there is no cell service. Hope you liked the tie-ins as I have to go. Thunderstorms again, all afternoon, so Lulu has to go out again now. She said NOW. Ok, ok! Cheers! Dee

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Mr. Evil: The Next Level

Posted on May 12, 2024 | Leave a comment

Hey Brain Trust! I have something to add to my really old Rally Speech! Remember my dear friend Dr. Evil? He held the world hostage, threatening it with a nuclear warhead unless they paid ONE MILLION DOLLARS?

Maybe not for rallies. How about a FLASH SALE instead. Take this down:

SUMMER SALE! Want to deny climate change another four years? Give my campaign ONE BILLION DOLLARS and I’ll overturn every environmental law and regulation that Crooked Joe put on the books! Write those checks and executive orders at the same time and send them to John McEntee at home, please. I’ll institute the Executive Orders ON DAY ONE and put out of work all those Red State employees who have gotten good paying jobs since I left office. Who cares if we have clean air or clean water? Let’s just DRILL BABY, DRILL. But wait, there’s more, I’ll make your corporate tax cut permanent!!!

Attention THEOCRATS! For just TWO BILLION DOLLARS, I will overturn the Constitution of of the United States and the separation of Church and State will be gone. White men, take out your checkbooks! I will make sure that women no longer have the right to: abortion by any means at any time; plan for families through in-vitro fertiilization; travel between states if they are of childbearing age; sign a check without their husband’s permission; get a no-fault divorce; or protect themselves and your kids from proven violent gun-owning spouses. Look at how many pesky things I can do for you if you just get out your checkbooks and send a check to John McEntee, at home in Washington D.C., please. But wait, there’s more! There will be no more problems with racism as the Christian nationalists, the Proud Boys and Three Percenters will be installed at every level of government for your ultimate convenience.

No, we haven’t forgotten the LEGISLATURES and JUDICIAL BRANCH! For just FIVE BILLION DOLLARS we will make sure the Voting Rights Act is gone. There will be no more voting. Not really. We’ll just put up our friends for office and judgeships and they’ll toe the Trump Line and all will be well. No jail for rich people. Our friends (ONE MILLION DOLLARS each to … you know, at home, please) will hold office, get to have a great social media grift (SEVENTY PERCENT goes directly to me, through you-know-who), a decent salary until you get snapped up by a big lobbying firm, and great health insurance for life!

I’m still working on some other ideas but here’s a start. I expect to see it up on my campaign website during Mothers’ Day. The gift that keeps on giving.

Don’t laugh, if we remain silent it may come true. Cheers and please vote your conscience. I know if this matters to you, you have one. If not, the Overt Bribery Office is the gold-plated door down the hall on the left. Dee

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Two Kids from Queens

Posted on May 10, 2024 | Leave a comment

Donald Trump was born and raised in Queens, NY, in a very nice neighborhood and went to private schools. He was desperate to get out and take over the Manhattan real estate industry and be accepted by the elite society folk. He didn’t, and he wasn’t.

When he looked for a lawyer he didn’t look for a Roy Cohn, he got THE Roy Cohn. Accountants? How about Borgers, who his media empire just had to fire because the SEC has them on the hook for massive fraud. Choosing an accounting firm because of their willingness to commit fraud should be a major red flag for doing business with or buying this new meme stock.

I know another guy, born about fifteen years before Mr. Trump, in Ridgewood, Queens. Ridgewood was then a neighborhood of German immigrants. My grandfather fled the Hitler’s Brownshirts in the 1920’s, illegally entered the US where he met and married a Swiss emigré and they had my Dad, who grew up speaking only German in the home. Dad attended public grade school and Grover Cleveland High School and dreamed of being the first in his family to ever go to college.

He did that, played his fiddle and called square dances to get through college, got out of Queens and achieved a Masters and Doctorate, became a college president and nationally known non-profit leader. When he started his own consulting business at age sixty, his lawyer was a decent one who could help with client contracts and special projects, and his accountant was my Mom, who became a CPA having graduated college the same year I did. She graduated Summa cum Laude, me just Deans’ List. They raised four kids who do OK.

There are a lot of good people in Queens. People who live normal lives, teach school or work for the fire department, or own a local business. Their lives are lived on the up-and-up, crossing at the crosswalk, paying their taxes and raising families.

The so-called hush money trial going on in lower Manhattan the past few weeks is somewhat of a comeuppance for a guy who got too big for his britches and who, unfortunately, has never paid the price for a single misdeed. The details are so sordid and tawdry that it makes me blush, no, it makes me want to take a long, hot shower. A gentleman doesn’t ask a lady to dinner and answer the door in silk pyjamas. Ick. He doesn’t get undressed while she’s in the bathroom and block her from leaving, with his bodyguard outside the door, or seduce/coerce her into sleeping with him to get out of the trailer park. In the end, she didn’t even get dinner, just seventeen years of paying for one stupid mistake.

Lies, cheating, cover-ups, hush money. It’s no way to live a life. It’s no example to set for one’s children, and certainly not “qualities” that should define the president of the free (at least for now) world. Sad to say, I’m not shocked or surprised at Donald Trump’s panoply of nefarious deeds. I spent a couple of years in the NYC real estate industry (trade group) in the 80’s and no-one had anything good to say about Trump even back then. And these were his peers.

What hurts me, as a woman who grew up in the era of ERA and reproductive rights is the imperiousness, the intended cruelty, the derogation of ALL women by this deeply flawed, weak bully. To think that his misogynistic attitude has become mainstream and that all the rights women have earned are on the chopping block (abortion, contraception, interstate travel, privacy, no-fault divorce) even by the Supreme Court is unconscionable.

My German grandfather was an illegal immigrant, a fleer of Hitler’s upcoming dictatorship. My mother, a Canadian citizen and US Green Card holder for her last fifty years, has left me an option. I’d like to fight for my country and womens’ and voting rights but if we lose, I suppose I can learn all the lyrics to O Canada.

Just because I’m not shocked by Trump’s sordid deeds or gilt-encrusted life, doesn’t mean I understand or condone it. After all, what would my Auntie L say, the lady who reinforced etiquette and assured that I could walk across the room with a dictionary balanced upon my head? To simpler days… ahead. Cheers! Dee

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Judging Trump?

Posted on April 15, 2024 | Leave a comment

Could you do it? Could I? It’s not something to ordinarily take time thinking about.

I first became aware of Donald Trump in the 1980’s. I recall being impressed when he was able to re-open the Wollman Ice Rink in Central Park. Then chagrined when he took out full page ads in NYC papers calling for death for the “Central Park Five,” five young people who then spent over a decade in jail before DNA evidence found them all innocent. Since their exoneration, he has not recanted, perhaps because of the Trumpian “never apologize” modus operandum.

I have never voted for and will never vote for Donald Trump for president because I believe he is a crook and a danger to our democracy, our national security and to women especially. I also believe that the many indictments in multiple jurisdictions he is facing now are a kind of karma for his yet-to-be accounted for lies, scams and stiffing of regular Joes, employees and contractors for his entire business life.

That said, I’ve been called to jury duty twice in my life, in two different states 35 years apart. I’ve found it to be a sobering experience, one that is also awe-inspiring and evokes the duties of citizenship as few things can do. Voting is an overt act of citizenship but being led as a group from nondescript government hallways into a solemn wood-paneled courtroom tells a citizen that this is serious business. If my dear Auntie L was still with us, she would have me wear a hat and white cotton gloves as I did in Mass decades ago!

I was kicked out both times in voir dire, once because a question prompted me to divulge that I was staff to a committee that was in the process of writing landmark crime victim legislation of the sort that created a fund for victims and assured that they would not have to sit next to the accused in the aforementioned hallway if at all possible. The second time, I was prompted to speak of anything had happened to me that formed an early opinion of law enforcement officers and I told the court that a high-school friend of mine was murdered by a group of ex-duty cops on his way home from work one night (the cops were coming from a bachelor party). Yeah, I was a goner on both of those trials, but for the right reasons, as I didn’t try to get out of either for work or illness, though I could have.

Back in the 80’s and more recently, I’d like to think that I could compartmentalize my feelings about the defendant, pro or con, and concentrate on the facts to render a fair decision. I believe that I care enough for the truth and fairness and have much respect for the judicial system to give any defendant a fair chance.

Something about the weight of that courtroom. it’s a different kind of awe than seeing Michelangelo’s Pièta for the first time but it summons the best that is in us. It makes one want to be the best citizen one can be. I’d be interested in your thoughts. Dee

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Alert The Nest

Posted on April 12, 2024 | Leave a comment

My husband jokes with me that I always need a “nest,” a home base that is warm and comforting. Familiar pictures on the walls, the smell of focaccia fresh from the oven, and a home-cooked meal on the table. He says he could live comfortably in a hotel room without a scrap of his own “stuff” around save clothing and shoes.

There is power in a nesting instinct, ladies. We protect our own, perhaps even ourselves, God willing.

The writing is on the wall. Mitch McConnell can leave Washington forever with his legacy intact, messing with the Supreme Court so that for the next fifty years women and gays will lose their right to exist equally in the USA.

There’s a difference between politicians and true believers. Now that the conservative movement has “caught the car” in the reversal of Roe, the true believers are driving the car right off the cliff while the vote-desperate Republicans are yelling “Whoa, nelly” to no avail.

Historically, the conservative movement relied on racism to feed its base, until overt racism became politically unacceptable. Then they came up with a new issue, abortion, and proceeded to persuade the evangelicals (think Jerry Falwell) to get on board, making abortion a divisive political and now religious issue.

The Federalist Society Judge Mill fed candidates into the system but politicians only thought the fight for “pro-life” (which is nothing of the sort because they don’t care for babies or the women who birth and mother them at all) would be an eternal quest to gain money and political power. Not that they’d win.

Until Dobbs. Now come the true believers, some of whom have lifetime appointments to Federal courts. They don’t want abortion, mefipristone, IVF, or contraception. They want to erase our 250-year separation of church and state and don’t care if women die, are not permitted interstate travel (just in case an abortion is on the agenda this family vacation) or are sent to jail for having a miscarriage. They don’t even care if neighbors get bounties for telling on suspected violators of abortion laws.

Politicians like Donald Trump and Kari Lake are running around like chickens without their heads this week after Arizona resurrected an anti-abortion law from 1864. Heavens to murgatroid, we didn’t want that, in an election year! Just wait, Trump’s “keep it in the states” position today will turn into a national ban on abortion the second week in November if he’s re-elected. All he needs to do is get you to pull the lever his way thinking you know he no longer wants an abortion ban, to kill Obamacare and whatever his version is of “election integrity” which is just lots of goons at the polls intimidating voters and suing anyone at the polls who looks like they might vote for Biden as an illegal voter.

The politicians would like to get elected then vote against women every day of the week. The judges (Supreme Court Justices, supremely) lie to Congress during confirmation about precedent and settled law, then the latest three immediately reversed 49 years of a sacred civil right. Boom, done. What’s next? Contraception and same-sex marriage.

Politicians have found catching the car a liability in getting elected/re-elected. True believers won’t stop until women are back in the dark ages. Gone is a woman’s ability to choose for herself about her body, finances, travel, everything we assumed we had will be gone.

Alert the nest. Only women can change this. We have to vote for Democrats for the foreseeable future to right this ship for our families, for the future of our children. We have to convince our non-nester spouses to do the same. I’ve an idea. Perhaps a nationwide sex strike. No sex until you men fix this. You caused it. Fix it. Because the mess we’re in now really has nothing to do with abortion per se, it’s all about power and control. And men are still reeling from women who fought for the right to vote in the early 1900’s to the sixties and the sexual revolution brought about by the likes of Betty Friedan, Gloria Steinem and Erica Jong. This is payback. We must let them know that going back to 1864 is not in our playbook.

Joe Biden is a good man. No, he doesn’t send out provocative tweets at 2:00 a.m. or entertain us with fantastical lies at rallies. He’s Grandpa Joe, a solid, work-behind-the-scenes and get s*it done kind of guy. We forget how Grandpa Joe got us over COVID and back from the brink economically. How chaotic were the four years before Joe, years he’s had to clean up for with his predecessor as the eternal backseat driver telling his minions how to vote in Congress. Let’s take over Greenland! Drink bleach! Hate your neighbor! American carnage! Retribution for disloyalty!

Let’s get four more years of sanity with enough leverage to allow the righting of the ship that is our United States of America. Fix the Supreme Court, ban dark money in elections and resume ERIC to prevent interstate voter fraud, fix the abortion/IVF/contraception and same-sex marriage mess for good. Eliminate the Electoral College or find a way around it. Help reintroduce bi-partisanship and end siloing of ideas and communities. Begin to trust each other again. There’s so much that can be done that’s good.

I’m 65 and would like to keep my newly-acquired Social Security and Medicare (unused yet). I remain committed to my country and believe in its people. There is hope, if we mind the nest and help others to do the same, we women can make a huge difference. Cheers! Dee

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Second-Class Citizen

Posted on April 11, 2024 | Leave a comment

When Roe was decided in 1073, I was 14 and had just “become a woman,” whatever that meant to a young girl who didn’t even like boys yet. Well, I liked them to hang out with, play ghost-man softball games, build sandcastles and beat at ping pong (and Algebra). But dating was a far-off thing.

As an adult, my political philosophies started to gel, based on knowledge learned at home, school and, yes, Mass. There are certain things that need to be regulated by the government, such as rape, murder and thievery are bad. Sometimes there is a need to support equal opportunity/human and civil rights, and perhaps ban civilian purchase of assault weapons.

And then there are moral questions where as far as I’m concerned, live your life as you see fit, but don’t force everyone else to fit in your mold. I fear that’s what this faux-“Christian” nationalism, a pseudo-theocracy based on assuring permanent ruling of our realm by rich white men, is attempting to assert.

This is not a debate about abortion at all. If one looks at the goals, they are to do as Arizona just did this week, go back to the ’60’s, the 1860’s.

Supreme Court Justices Alito and Thomas already asked for cases to strike down the right to same-sex marriage and even contraception. The far “religious” right adds in the end of no-fault divorce and laws that prohibit a pregnant woman from getting a divorce at all, and these mysogynistic men have us right where they want us. Back in the kitchen, barefoot and pregnant, probably having lost the right to vote and work outside the home, and unable to get a proper education because there are only expensive all-male religious schools (public schools have been stripped of funding). And there are no more libraries where we could borrow books to gain knowledge because they’re not allowed to let us have any book the Book Nazis had deemed inappropriate.

Think about what the 2024 election means to this nation which has survived nearly 250 years until one man came along and tried to mess with everything its citizens hold dear. I’m not afraid of Donald Trump. All he can do is audit me or throw me in jail. And that’s only if we’re dumb enough to give him the keys to the White House for a second stab at ending democracy.

The rich men who are now kissing the flashy gold ring don’t know that if there’s a scintilla of disloyalty, say an ancient email, found by the new Goon Squad you’ll lose your business and reputation and all your money. Donald Trump doesn’t care who you are or that you gave to his campaign or bailed him out of jail. Are you willing to lose everything, including our democracy, for a few more years of big tax breaks? Know that Donald Trump cares for no-one but himself. Anyone who thought Covid was nothing because it would only infect the “blue states” is not presidential material.

And if you don’t care about that, what about our daughters? Thanks to the Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision, they already have fewer rights than I did when I got my first period in 1973. Republican elected officials are saying it’s “no big deal” for a woman to get on a bus and travel to another state to pursue needed medical care. They would never say that to a man. Hey, dude, can’t get your ED pills in your state? Hop on a bus for 14 hours two states away to get a few. It’s not an inconvenience at all. Quit yer bellyachin’.

These men are trying to disenfranchise people because of color, religion, and nation of origin. They’re now disenfranchising 1/2 of the population, women. And we keep electing them! Why? Frankly, I’d rather pay taxes and have that money used to further democracy here and abroad, feed the hungry, house the homeless, run free and fair elections and provide incentives for individuals to start businesses that help us all.

I don’t want to be a second-class citizen. We must not let fear get in the way of making our opinions known in our families, communities and at the polls. We worked hard to get where we are. We deserve the choice to live our lives and care for our bodies as we see fit. Think about it, and whatever you do, please VOTE! Cheers! Dee

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Weekend Round-Up

Posted on February 10, 2024 | Leave a comment

Wake Up!!!

We started, this morning, now 5 year-old dog Lulu and I, at 6:00 a.m. Her buddy Solly, a year-old pup was already out and about. He was already off leash and jumping on Lu so I dropped her leash so they wouldn’t keep getting tangled. First they ran 100 feet away and came right back. Then Lu clambered down a 50′ hill to a rail trail and they both disappeared.

So, it was an interesting adventure with both owners going around the long way to the rail trail, plus the involvement of a runner on said trail, and our security guard who stood on the bridge and pointed out to us where the dogs had gone. All is well but we’re not doing that again. When Lulu saw me she came running, and Solly followed her so we got them back just a few hundred feet from where they clambered down. Phew!

Unnecessary Things

I heard this week, unfortunately, that Hallmark is going to venture into Jane Austen territory. Frightful, indeed. I’ll stick to the originals, thanks very much.

Also, I’ve a library dedicated to cooking with the best of the best volumes from Julia Child, James Beard, Simca Beck, and many other chef/authors. Now I hear that Chuck E. Cheese is coming out with a cookbook. Is that really necessary?

The book club has taken a new turn. Go somewhere with a book, and read it. Be quiet, and don’t discuss it with others in the group because they’re all reading another book of their own choosing. One wonders the point of this exercise, OK if the purpose is just to set aside some quiet time to read. Otherwise it sounds bizarre and unnecessary to me.

Comey Redux?

OK, there will be no charges filed against Joe Biden for having some classified files in an office and a home garage. He cooperated, gave the Special Counsel his time, returned the files immediately and even came up with suggestions so this doesn’t happen to other officials leaving high public office. But no, the Special Counsel had to protect his MAGA-ness for a potential job if #47 happens to be Donald Trump. He offered unnecessary and over-the-top socio-psychological analysis of President Biden stating that he was old and forgetful, and worse. There was no cause for this verbal diarrhea except to cause harm. It was unprofessional and partisan for a non-partisan endeavor.

Enjoy your weekend. Cheers! Dee

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