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Archive for November, 2019

I’m all for second chances. You need to warmup your arm before you serve a tennis ball. Or try making that cake again when the first one won’t come out of the pan. But we need to have a talk with Ohio; a fertilized egg that has jumped the gun and implanted itself in a fallopian tube is a done deal. It can kill its host and cause all sorts of problems. So let’s be perfectly clear, there is NO such procedure known to medicine as “re-implanting an ectopic pregnancy.” NONE.

“Ohio lawmakers have introduced legislation that would jail doctors for “abortion murder” unless they reimplant ectopic pregnancies in the uterus. Unfortunately, there no such procedure in medical science. Ectopic pregnancies, where the embryo is implanted in the fallopian tube, can be fatal for mothers. Legislators have been told in the past that this fantasy operation cannot be done. Ohio obstetrician and gynecologist Dr David Hackney wrote on Twitter: “I don’t believe I’m typing this again but, that’s impossible. We’ll all be going to jail.” The bill proposes punishing women and girls as young as 13 with “abortion murder” if they have an abortion, and creates a new law called “aggravated abortion murder” which would be enforced with the death penalty.” https://www.thedailybeast.com/ohio-bill-says-doctors-must-reimplant-ectopic-pregnancy-or-be-jailed-for-abortion-murder?

There have been times when I’ve felt like we’re approaching the Handmaid’s Tale, but seeing this pop up on Twitter made me question if we’re not already there – living in a dystopian future where extreme religious right legislation has codified a woman’s body.

Once legislators decide a fertilized egg is a “Person” – which it is NOT btw – well, then the government gets to decide your future. You’re a 16 year old girl and your step father raped you? Too bad, you either go to prison for trying to get on with your life, for wanting a second chance, or you have a baby and give it up for adoption.

Or maybe worse yet, you end up giving the baby to your mom and step dad to raise. Of course today, you could always keep the baby and live with a friend or relative, finish high school, get a job…. But let’s not forget our government cares less about child care for working families and single moms than it does about a cluster of cells.

Not everyone has an Aunt Bee child care story like Elizabeth Warren, and she was a law professor with a husband at the time.

The language politicians use around women is prescient, so listen very carefully. Mr T talks about women in a very gendered, “marked” way. He calls Nancy Pelosi “nervous Nancy” and added to his crude comments on a bus with Billy Bush, he specifically calls out their sex, usually followed by saying how much he “loves” women, implying they need his protection.

“Justifying his decision to oust her (Marie Yavanovitch), the president told Fox & Friends last Friday he heard “bad things” about “the ambassador, the woman… This was not an angel, this woman, okay? And there were a lot of things that she did that I didn’t like.”

Mr Trump added that his staff felt they had to be kind because “she’s a woman – we have to be nice.” Professor Marianne LaFrance, a psychologist at Yale University, says this remark is a prime example of gendered language.

“That referencing says she’s not an individual, she’s not a professional, she’s first and foremost a woman,” Prof LaFrance says.” https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-50563106

You have to be “nice” because she’s a woman? Mr T wasn’t happy with Ms Yavanovitch because she was actually doing her job for the American people, fighting corruption in Ukraine, making Rudy’s shady political dealing difficult. That portrait thing was just another lie.

Stop calling our candidates a “woman politician,” do we call men that “man politician?” Stop making up medical procedures for women that do not exist.                                     Stop calling for “personhood bills.” Stop the nonsense.

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This is the week we give thanks.

This is also the week we prep, cook, and bake like banshees for a few minutes around the Thanksgiving table. Like Columbus Day, this is another holiday deserving a second look – certainly Native Americans have a different point of view. And more and more families are trying out a plant-based diet, giving more and more turkeys the day off, or a pardon by the president.

Our family is staying put this year; the Big Chill has diminished from death and divorce, and all the grandchildren require our presence. In the words of a great American jazz singer Benard Ighner, “Everything must change” is one of those eternal truths… “the young become the old, mysteries do unfold.”  https://secondhandsongs.com/work/4541

A couple of friends have gone to Disneyland, FL, which is a fantastic idea. Maybe next year we’ll do Disneyland, CA?

Disney never disappoints. This past weekend, all 3 generations saw Frozen 2, like most of the families on this planet. Its opening weekend saw a total, world-wide box office toll of 350 Million – breaking the previous record for an animation release! I made some sandwiches to trade for the concession stand, and leaned over to remind the Bride that her brother composed one of the trailers while we settled into our reclining seats.

My daughter reached for my hand when Olaf and Anna were in the cave (spoiler alert), we both had tears in our eyes as the little sister held her snowman. All of a sudden, our L’il Pumpkin turned to us and said,

“It’s not the end, The end is happy.” 

Elsa, the big sister, knew that change was necessary; she had a suspicion that the origin story they were fed as children didn’t add up. It was time to do something drastic, so she sent Anna and Olaf out of harm’s way in a canoe. Elsa took charge, she went looking for that happy ending.

“You say you’re a king, who put you in charge?” Lyrics by the not-so-well-known Christian rapper NF popped into my mind as I listened to Fiona Hill testify. She had asked Ambassador Sondland,

“Who put you in charge of the Ukraine?”

My heart stopped a little. I mean come on, was anyone going to take the heat for this fiasco, this tempest of a “perfect call” vs “Quid pro Quo” aka bribery, abuse of power?

“The President,” Mr Sondland said.

“Hill is due process and righteous anger, brains and brilliance and fire and loyalty ready to be deployed for her country, now and forever.

It is not just that we are hungry for norms and qualifications. We are desperate for someone competent and principled to be in charge. We want someone smart to tell us it will be okay and that they care.

 

He who would be king seems to have been in charge of it all, like a bull in a china shop, Mr T continues to wreck havoc with our constitution.

If President Obama sent his personal lawyer to another country to shakedown political dirt on Mitt Romney, I wonder what Lindsay Graham would say? When will the GOP wake from this Trump the Grifter nightmare and realize this president in NOT the chosen one.

Tomorrow, at the Thanksgiving table, I will give thanks for Adam Schiff and his diligence in unfolding this mystery. I will think about our founders and their definition of high crimes, of their wish to keep royalty on the other side of the pond. I am grateful for all the selfless civil servants who toil without fanfare in their offices around the world, and I will pray for a “competent and principled” person to rise from the ranks of the Democratic candidates’ field.

Forget Mike Bloomberg – Bob Iger, any interest in running? Remember, it’s not over till we get the happy ending, or the blue cookie.

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Sure, I was bullied as a kid. But that one boy who tripped me up on my bike, when I fell and broke my arm, I got back at him. I pushed an ice cream cone right in his face, and I don’t remember being bullied ever again. Well, except by a teacher.

Over sushi I was telling the Grands about Catholic school. How we had to sit still with our hands folded in front of us all the time. One teacher made me stand in the corner for half a day, luckily she didn’t have a dunce hat. “Why,” they wanted to know.

“Because I was talking to a boy!”

And I swear, we all broke out in belly laughs. One of the worst moments in my young life seemed pretty comical now. I mean shaming a child, it just doesn’t compute or translate well in today’s world, or maybe it does?

I’ve been having an ‘on and off’ conversation with the Love Bug and the L’il Pumpkin about “bad people” ever since someone stole my wallet while we were having lunch at Panera. What should we do if we have to confront a bad person. Their parents have been telling them that everybody is good, that you turn and walk away from a confrontation, and I get that. You don’t want to color their young minds with horror stories – and yet, they already hate Mr T cause, well, we ALL do.

I was thinking about this after the Democratic debates in Atlanta. I was surprised at how much I like Andrew Yang. He seemed to be the only authentic person up on that stage, like he was talking to me. When he spoke about looking our kids and Grands in the eye, and leaving them a better future, when he shared that he had an autistic child, when he talked about keeping America safe:

While it was well into the debate before Yang spoke, his answers about some of the threats to American society once again, brought new ideas to the debate stage. Artificial intelligence, which he’s mentioned in previous debates, is a future threat that must be taken seriously. And setting up something like a WTO (World Trade Organization) for data? His ingenuity was astounding. Bold ideas suit Yang well — and, when well thought out and pragmatic, they get high points in a debate.  https://www.cnn.com/2019/11/21/opinions/buttigieg-yang-stole-the-show-debate-opinion-graham/index.html

A WTO for Data?!?! I mean, AI is coming, along with the Russians and China, and will we be ready for it? Then the Rocker sent me an article about Yang;  “As President, I will establish a Department of the ATTENTION Economy,” https://www.cnn.com/2019/11/18/perspectives/andrew-yang-technology/index.html

He wants to study what social media is doing to our kids. It’s like “Back to the Future,” will they become (expletive) or something? My kids didn’t have smart phones growing up, tech was in its infancy, email was a new thing. And the Grands don’t have a tablet or phone or anything YET; but they DO use tablets in school and see everyone else around them staring down into their hands. The Love Bug recently asked her Dad if they could have a “Device-Free” day because she’d heard about this from her teachers.

A young mind can become addicted faster than our old brains want to believe. And social media is simply another method for bullies to do what they do best – shame and humiliate. A 12 year old girl in Nashville just committed suicide after being bullied mercilessly. How many “followers” do you have? Did you see that picture of so-and-so on Insta?

Remember how inadequate you felt your Freshman year in high school?  Well, add a few years of comparing yourself to others on top of that. I walked straight outta Catholic school into a public high school, and was lucky to find a bunch of nerdy, pre-college kids to welcome me.

Running around the neighborhood on my bike was pretty care-free in comparison to today, even if a bully thought he could hurt me, I didn’t let him define me. I got even. My not-so-polite message is not to run away from a fight, not to make excuses for someone’s bad behavior. My Grands will eventually meet up with a real “bad person,” they will eventually have a smart phone in their hands or maybe a piece of Borg machinery hard-wired directly into their skulls.

Should we employ algorithms to cap a child’s screen time per day, or just boot them out the door to play? We are experiencing a “GLOBAL epidemic” of childhood inactivity, what do you think? https://www.bbc.com/news/health-50466061

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People never just “go” to the Emergency Room, they rush to the ER. And if you’re Mr T, you take your motorcade along, a helicopter would be too flashy. He wanted to avoid the “fake news” after all. The Bride caught wind of his “irregular” trip to Walter Reed on Saturday while she was working in her ER because it was blowing up in her private female MD social media group – I mean Twitter wasn’t even on the story yet. I wonder why Google hasn’t told us the reason for his visit.

According to most news outlets, the White House has a regular mini-clinic-hospital in one of its wings. So this unscheduled, outside of protocol trip to the ER is a mystery. Does anyone believe the press secretary’s line that Mr T was only fulfilling the first part of a routine medical exam? His BFF Roger Stone goes to prison and the impeachment witnesses are heating up reality TV, and rumor has it Ivanka actually observes the Saturday sabbath with her family, so he was all alone in the residence… and figured he’d get a check-up?

Naturally with two-too-many ER docs in the family, we try to avoid ER visits, unless it’s to deliver apple cider donuts. Last week, Great Grandpa Hudson was having a problem breathing, certainly a good reason to call an ambulance. Instead, two ER docs showed up to check him out and he was just fine. Thousands of Medicare dollars saved because a 93 year old man would certainly have been admitted for the complete work-up. His only problem – a salt-loaded free restaurant meal at a local restaurant for Veteran’s Day.

Maybe Mr T had one too many hamburgers? His cholesterol is rather high and his weight is an issue. Or maybe he thought he was having a heart attack, and it was only a panic attack!

I have a friend who went back to work years ago, and left their 3 month old baby with her husband who worked at home. He ended up in an ER with a panic attack that can mimic a full-blown MI – sweating, heart irregularities, a feeling like your world is coming to an end. I’ve had one or two panic attacks myself while I was trying to conceive a second baby and kept having miscarriages. I went into hard core OCD and didn’t want to drive over bridges.

Maybe the constant strain of being presidential, rising at 6 am and taking 3 hours of “executive time” to watch state-sanctioned FOX News, then starting your day at 11 am and ending with very busy Twitter fingers is taking its toll. I wonder if he has dinner with Melania, or if she eats early with Baron? Or is she even there? Then there’s all that golf on the weekends. It must be exhausting!

He left Walter Reed without a jacket, his shirt open, no tie. Sounds like it was a quick exit, the kind of patient who leaves an ER “against medical advice.” You know the type, and Mr T is certainly that type of arrogant, egoist.

He is back at Tweeting his agenda this morning – using middle school bullying tactics and name calling to intimidate his enemies. Nancy Pelosi is “Nervous Nancy.” The “Do Nothing Democrats” are at it again with “Fake News.” Mr Tweety T whines that he was only exercising his First Amendment rights when he live-Tweeted a threat to ex-Ambassador Maria Yovanovitch on Friday.

“Everywhere Marie Yovanovitch went turned bad,” Trump wrote. “She started off in Somalia, how did that go? Then fast forward to Ukraine, where the new Ukrainian President spoke unfavorably about her in my second phone call with him. it is a U.S. President’s absolute right to appoint ambassadors.”  https://www.vox.com/2019/11/15/20966716/impeachment-hearings-trump-yovanovitch-witness-tampering

I was thinking somebody should have removed him from office, or at the very least removed his not-so-smart phone from his tiny fingers. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing; an honorable woman who had been told to leave her post in the Ukraine quickly, “on the next plane,” was again being maligned in public, on TV, by our commander in comedy.

She talked about being “knee-capped,” like his administration is a cast from the Sopranos.

“According to the Department of Justice, intimidation of witnesses testifying before Congress is a crime under 18 U.S.C. § 1515(a)(1). However, in this case it is the president who is allegedly doing the witness intimidation and an OLC opinion (see Indicting a President Is Not Foreclosed: The Complex History – Lawfare) states that a sitting president cannot be indicted.”

It’s a shame really, or a sham that this president who sits around all day surrounded by sycophants cannot be indicted. Because he’s not just intimidating a witness, he’s projecting his insane policy of panic and chaos around the world.

In other weekend news, two ER docs and two writers went out for sushi with two adorable children. Can you find the redhead?

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Stop the presses!

You know how you have to initial a HIPAA form every time you go to a doctor’s office, or a hospital, or a car wash? We Americans like to think our medical records are sacrosanct, we deserve privacy, in fact we demand it. That boil the size of a baseball we had removed from our back in high school – nobody needs to know.

Until now.

Google wants to know our medical history! It’s bad enough they are already taking pictures of our backyards and listening in to our wants and needs, sneaking ads into social media like a flickering lightbulb to a moth. Google has cut a deal with Ascension Health to access troves of its patient data:

Among the data Google reportedly has access to under the deal are lab results, diagnoses, records of hospitalization and dates of birth.

Neither doctors nor patients need to be told that Google can see this information.

The Wall Street Journal reports that data access began last year and was broadened over the summer. https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-50388464

Ascension runs 2,600 hospitals, including St Thomas in Nashville.

Along with an overnight dusting of snow, this bit of news sent a chill down my spine. What’s worse is their data trolling started last year! While we’re busy attacking Elizabeth Warren about Medicare for All, this corporate giant stuck its finger in the cookie jar. “Ascension said the deal would help it to “optimise” patient care and would include the development of artificial intelligence (AI) tools to support doctors.” Sorry for the British spelling but I’m quoting the BBC.

Wasn’t I just talking about doctors and AI? I know this is the generation of solipsistic selfies, living their lives online, charting every meal, video taping every hotel room, uploading their songs to YouTube in search of InstaFame. Jumping onto Tic Toc which I don’t even understand.

I had an appointment with a retina specialist yesterday at Vandy, about my little West Nile incident 20 years ago, and people were sitting like zombies in a dark, crowded waiting room with dilated pupils staring into their smart phones. HGTV was on in the corner but everyone was glued to their tiny black mirror. I was thinking to myself, why not get rid of all the TVs in doctor waiting rooms, and what kind of neck problems will this generation have?

I still thought we had a right to our own medical records. And granted, this blog is a peek into the window of my soul, but do we no longer care about privacy… at all?

Send in the lawyers! Here is my lame attempt at a selfie in that old ice cream parlor.

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Since Bob has retired, I’ve found our roles have reversed. I was always the one in the know, collecting local news and crafting interesting stories that would eventually help light up the wood stove. Newspapers still sell, but mostly online today. Without my deadline, I write whenever I please about whatever I want, and I’m no longer constantly on the hunt for tidbits of local lore.

Bob, on the other hand, has been picking up garbage once a month with a dedicated group of neighbors, and has joined a few Nashville associations; he’s become a regular social activist!

Aside from catching up on all the development going on in North Nashville, including going to those dreaded zoning committee meetings, he’s signed us up for something called “The Villages.” And no, it’s not that place in Florida.  https://www.aarp.org/home-garden/livable-communities/info-04-2011/villages-real-social-network.html

This is a national aging-in-place movement that started in the Back Bay area of Boston – which is strangely enough where I started my college career at Emerson in 1966. We have a core group of people dedicated to keeping our community informed and helping our neighbors; almost like co-housing. Our weekly ride to T’ai Chi with a 93 year old friend, who stopped driving at 90, is one small part of this plan, which also includes pot-luck suppers. Mostly, it’s a way to stay connected, stay in our homes, and combat loneliness.

I’ve mentioned many times that our generation was going to age differently. After all, we brought you the Women’s Movement and the Civil Right’s Movement, so it’s only fair we bring you the Old Geezer Movement too.

Anyway, our Village has organized a day trip this weekend to Alabama. Why, one might ask would I want to go to Alabama just when the weather has dipped below freezing? The state that just might elect Jeff Sessions again to the Senate. The state with probably more Confederate flags flying than any other state in the union.

Because it’s the site of one of the prettiest Frank Lloyd Wright houses in the country and I LOVE Frank Lloyd Wright – and it’s in FLORENCE, AL! https://www.wrightinalabama.com/

“A genuine work of art—from the floors to the furnishings to the faucets—the Rosenbaum House grows naturally from its surroundings, cascading down a 2-acre lot facing the Tennessee River. It is one of the purest examples of Usonian design (named for the USA) with open floor plans and rooms that naturally flow from one to another. Built in 1939, the same year Wright delivered his treatise on organic architecture, this significant structure is cypress, glass, and brick and still has original hardware and furnishings designed by Wright.

Frank Lloyd Wright freed Americans from Victorian “boxes” and revolutionized art and architecture. He was born just two years after the Civil War and died two years after the launching of the satellite Sputnik and is considered to be America’s greatest architect. Originally built for $12,000 as an affordable, middle-class home, the house is the only Wright design open to the public in the southeastern United States.”

Call me excited! People fly in from all over the world to see this house! Our Rumson house had his Usonian style, and our home on a mountain in the Blue Ridge was designed with clean white oak floors and trim with lots of windows. I’ve been an Art Deco fan girl since forever and yet only managed to look from the outside at one of Wright’s homes in Minnesota once. Or was that St Louis?

Somehow, in all my trips from VA to TN, I never stopped at Falling Water in PA, and that’s something I’ll have to add to my bucket list now.

Note to self, don’t forget to Facetime with Aunt KiKi (my Daughter-in-Love) from Alabama since she is one super talented designer in California and working on many renovations of this vintage.

Happy Weekend Y’All! Oh and here’s an old pic of our VA not/so/big house. I do miss my little 3rd floor aviary.

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Today is election day! Here’s something everyone can agree should happen, whether you’re red, blue or purple – it’s time to pass the EQUAL RIGHTS AMENDMENT!

Wouldn’t it be lovely if the state that brought us so many founding fathers/presidents, the state who’s motto is “Virginia is for Lovers,” stood up for all of us and passed this long-suffering amendment to the Constitution? We only need ONE MORE STATE to ratify the ERA! Why do we still need this you may ask:

“Because women don’t currently have equal protection under the United States Constitution. By some estimates, 80 percent of Americans mistakenly believe that women and men are guaranteed equal rights, but the only right the Constitution explicitly extends to both men and women is the right to vote.

The E.R.A., a proposed amendment to the Constitution, would guarantee equal legal rights for all American citizens regardless of sex. It would also require states to intervene in cases of gender violence, such as domestic violence and sexual harassment; it would guard against pregnancy and motherhood discrimination; and it would federally guarantee equal pay.”

nytimes.com/2019/02/22/us/equal-rights-amendment-what-is-it.html

What? We know domestic abuse is a contributing factor in our country’s gun violence epidemic. Abusers could not escape over state lines. This is also why some work places may only grant very limited “Maternity” leave, and not “Family” leave. This why women, for the most part, make 80 cents to a man’s dollar. And I’ve already reported the case of Trans-women discrimination being considered by SCOTUS right now! https://www.businessinsider.com/gender-wage-pay-gap-charts-2017-3

Even though over half a century ago women were granted the Equal Pay Act, we are far from fulfilling that goal. At least we can still vote thanks to our Suffragette ancestors 100 years ago, when Tennessee was the last state to ratify that amendment, and we’re still bragging about it today!

So, what do you say Virginia? Earn a bit of bragging rights too. The rest of the South looks up to you, and you know it’s the right and proper thing to do! Here is the Bride in the Blue Ridge with her Flower Girl V, who was just visiting us yesterday!

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Our L’il Pumpkin just turned 5, so naturally the Bride and Groom threw him a party.

Nashville’s Adventure Science Museum is a hands-on wonderland for kids, and it proved the perfect setting for science experiments and birthday cake. But let’s talk about the logistics of an almost “holiday” birthday – Thursday night was Trick or Treating and a house party with a whole neighborhood, Friday night was a family dinner with the Big Four generations followed by a sleepover at Nana and Pop Bob’s, and Saturday we had nearly 20 kids at his kids’ birthday party.

In other words, it was party central here all weekend!

Isn’t it nice to know that White House staffers could bring their little ghosts and goblins to a Halloween party at the Eisenhower Executive Office that was hosted by Mike Pence? Did they bob for apples? No, they were given brick-colored card stock and told to write their names on the cards, oh and then paste their cards up on that wall over there in the hallway, under the big letters that said “BUILD THE WALL.”  https://news.yahoo.com/children-were-told-to-build-the-wall-at-white-house-halloween-party-153024720.html

What is going on in our country? Mr T shows up at a baseball game and the crowd chants, “Lock HIM up!” Then he goes to Madison Square Garden and gets Booed by Mixed Martial Arts fans… I’m surprised we didn’t see anyone dressed up as Mr T for Halloween. Or maybe an anonymous whistleblower…

It was just your typical crew of super heroes and princesses, followed by teenagers without costumes holding out plastic bags. I’m glad we don’t have Mischief Night in TN. Egging cars and teepeeing trees seems to be more of a northeastern tradition. There was even an enforced curfew in NJ, one both of my kids ignored!

I was hoping I’d wake up from my candy and birthday cake coma today and the Impeachment would be over. We could go back to expanding human rights and building bridges, but alas, that scary clown is still in the Oval Office. And worse yet, if he is removed, the VP of making kids create propaganda wall art will be in charge.

It’s a good thing we have a rebel star fighter and a black cat to fight for truth and justice!

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