In My Mind's Eye

  So, as it's Christmas Season, I work 4 days a week and spend the other three on schoolwork, and I can guarantee, unless something juicy happens that demands a full blog, this will be my last Small Bites of the year.  I really hope to do better next year.  My apologies. The news hit today the Brown/Raiders, Seahawks/Ram and Eagles/Team Formerly Known as the Redskins games will be rescheduled.  Anyone who thought the NFL was going to let any games be forfeited is taking some really good drugs.  At no point, and especially during playoff races, did the NFL ever have any intention of a game not getting played.  Also, their policy was specific in that it related to unvaccinated players, and not vaccinated players, and most of the 100 players currently in COVID protocols are vaccinated.  Apparently, the NFL is the number one proving ground for the idea, promoted not just by fringe "anti-vaxxers" that vaccinated people can contract and spread COVID.   If you want to throw that

  I know, I've been MIA for awhile.  Life gets crazy, you know?  I've actually discovered a better way to keep this blog going, so we'll see if that works. I've decided not to delve into the Afghanistan situation (I was going to say "debacle", but I'm trying not to come out swinging...all the time.)  First, it would take more than a paragraph, and second, my tear ducts simply can't take a rehashing of that event, when there are others here that will give them plenty of a workout. I'm not a big fan of Bob Woodward.  Frankly, I think the man has been churning out the book equivalent of tabloid magazines for years in hopes of reclaiming his Watergate glory.  Since his expose of that coverup, there isn't a President he hasn't tried to take down, and each time he claims it's far worse than Watergate.  It's not just Republicans either.  He's tried to nail them all.  Give him time, and he'll have some sordid tale about Joe Biden to

How do you raise a gender neutral child? That's the question I find myself asking today, as I read news that the American Medical Association wants to remove the sex designation from the public section of birth certificates. Ten states allow you to designate your child as "X" on their birth certificate.  My assumption is that is done so that parents can't be accused of misgendering their child, and can allow their child to decide, at some point, which sex they wish to be.  The other 40 don't allow that, but a full 48 states will allow you to change your gender when you discover whether you want to be a boy, a girl, or something else.  I'm not sure what that something else is, but let's go with it for now.  But still, I ask myself, how to you raise a gender neutral child?  What name do you give them?  What clothes do you dress them in?  What toys do you buy them?  What if by the age of 5 they still don't know what gender they are?  How do handle going t

  As anyone who reads this space knows, I generally stay in the political realm.  I have been known to branch off occasionally into football, but that's usually still connected in some way to politics.  Today I want to take a minute to focus on another sport that is as closely followed by people in my house as football.... gymnastics. There is no way to describe the disappointment we felt when they postponed the Tokyo Olympics to 2021. The Summer Olympics have been my favorite for most of my adult life.  I love volleyball and beach volleyball, swimming, diving, equestrian competition, and most of all, gymnastics.  Having followed gymnastics since Mary Lou won her gold medal in 1984, I am supremely aware of how hard the sport is, and how little the general public understands what it takes to be an Olympic Gymnast.  Thousands upon thousands of little girls join the sport with a dream, and at the end of the day, five are chosen.  That's it, five.  Imagine telling a class of colleg

  It's the flag, the one that represents our country.  Some people still fly it in front of their homes.  Some people actually have them flying from their cars.  I remember a time nearly 20 years ago when everyone was flying them, carrying them... it was a different time.  When I look around today, I start to think it was a different place.  "I am not going to stand up to show pride in a flag for a country that oppresses Black people and people of color." - Colin Kaepernick That's where it really all started.  Yes, there were a few people here and there who burned flags or danced on them or whatever, but for the most part it was Colin, kneeling on a football field.  I could spend time going into his reasons for doing so - what he said they were and what I believe they were - but that's not necessary for this post.   Colin further explained that much of what he was protesting was police brutality.  White police officers shooting unarmed black men.  Half the problem

I'm sitting here, at this moment, reading news headlines. Nearly 1/3 of Americans have been vaccinated against COVID-19.  Dr. Marty Makary, Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, believes nearly half of all Americans have developed natural immunity to COVID-19.  Now some of those who had the virus also got vaccinated, so there is overlap that does not allow us to calculate the actual number of immune individuals in our country.  I believe I had COVID before they had a test, or even knew the disease existed.  With recent news of three researchers being hospitalized with COVID symptoms prior to the Chinese deciding to report on the virus, it is even more likely my belief is correct.  A recent study has found that even asymptomatic and those with mild symptoms have the same level of immunity as those vaccinated, and the studies propose that people who have been infected could continue to make antibodies or the rest of their life.  I am choosing not to get vaccinated.  That is my choice, an

Project Veritas somehow managed to get a CNN executive to admit that they used COVID-19 trackers to induce fear, because fear sells.  For almost a year, they had their case and death counters up on the screen 24/7.  As I don't watch much CNN, I'm not sure if they are still doing that, but my guess would be that, now that Donald Trump is no longer president, they don't need to keep people living in fear of orange man killing them all.  Still, I don't know, so don't take my word for it. CNN may no longer be inducing panic with their tickers, but our president*, despite the fact that he's fully vaccinated, is still wearing one, and sometimes two masks.  Last week, he had a video climate summit and wore a mask... on a video call.  No other world leader felt it necessary to wear a mask on a call where the participants were all in another country.  I'm guessing ours is still trying to play up the pandemic, even though, by any sane person's best guess, he doesn

  So, I took an unexpected break.  I have bosses who need to use vacation time.  Vacation time for bosses, means more working hours for me.  I don't mind, I have great bosses, and they richly deserve all their time off.  However, when I'm working all those hours, I don't have time for much else.  I'm trying so hard to make this more regular, I promise.  On that note, here's your third edition of Small Bites. This week, a jury convicted Officer Derek Chavin of one count of second degree murder, one count of third degree murder, and one count of manslaughter.  The third degree murder charge, per Minnesota standards didn't even apply, but hey, whatever.  Derek Chauvin should go to prison.  I don't believe he was the sole cause of the death of George Floyd, but he was partly responsible.  What do I mean?  He didn't inject Floyd with a lethal overdose of fentanyl.  He didn't block his coronary arteries either.  He did however fail to address the obvious m

  I know, I'm failing.  I have bosses who have massive amounts of use it or lose it holiday/comp time.  They are being forced to take whole weeks off, which means, I have to step in and play boss.  This translates to Amy is not overly available for anything but work.  My poor chinchilla has had to postpone his moving plans (from a cozy cottage to the penthouse suite) because mom doesn't have time to put his new house together.  There's a 200 pound cage in my dayroom, still in the box. My middle daughter has had to pick up the slack, doing many things I should be doing, but can't, because well..work. So while I have a few minutes I thought I would take a moment to put together a post to tell you all about a new endeavor said middle daughter and I are trying out. We've noodled the idea around for a year, but have finally decided to give a weekly podcast a try.  We will most likely attempt to run it through Facebook or Youtube, but the odds of us getting jailed are pre

  As I stated last week, this will become a regular feature.  There are several reasons for that.  One is that I don't have the time to write up a full length blog on one subject every week.  I may still write one occasionally, but the research required for those is a lot harder than plucking a few headlines and writing a paragraph about each. This week Congress finally got around to passing the stimulus bill that was so important during the election.  They had to impeach the former President first for a riot he didn't start and then they had to take a short vacation.  Turns out there is less stimulus and more giveaways.  We are bailing out underfunded union pension funds, New York City and San Francisco, art museums (again), and various other things that have little or nothing to do with COVID and the American people.  That is not to say that some of these things shouldn't be taken up, as a matter of course, just that cloaking them in COVID relief is kind of...icky.  There

It's morning, and the odds of me finishing this post before I have to go unload a 420 case truck are slim and none.  I'm not even sure what I'm writing about other than the news tidbits over the last few days.  What I do know is that many Biden supporters should be scratching their head right now.  So let's take on just a few of the things in the news. Dr. Seuss, or at least some of his books, have been cancelled.  "I think I saw it on Mulberry Street" is going for the affordable price of $1600 on Amazon last time I looked, but my guess is, it will be banned from sale on Amazon like other books recently.  Want to make a book no one was talking about popular?  Ban it from Amazon.  Currently, "When Harry Became Sally" has a hold line longer than Harry Potter when it first came out at my local library.  If the goal was not to let people read the book, it failed.  I imagine in the next few weeks, Dr. Seuss books will be raking in the dough as people clam