It warmed up a little over Easter weekend, so I got to remove several baskets of leaves from the flowerbeds and toss the winter decorations from the flower boxes.
It’s supposed to rain most of the week, good time to Hollytone Peter’s tree, maybe. The contractor had planned to do the town water install, but the weather slowed him and the plumber down – seems like precip has thwarted our maintenance plans generally, including clean-up in Peter’s yard, which has been put off due to snow since January 11.
Less Is More
Lot of wisdom in this excerpt from CNN/Money:
Less really is more.
You have material desires like everyone else. But you recognize that those desires are fueled by an advertising-driven culture that encourages you to feel like you never have enough. You understand that the quest to possess can be never ending unless you consciously apply the brakes.
The true signs of a financial grown-up: Instead of ratcheting up your lifestyle every time you get a raise, you consciously live below your means, value the nonmaterial wealth in your life, such as family and friends, and resist the urge to buy the next big thing simply because you can.
In the end, says James Gottfurcht, president of Psychology of Money Consultants in Los Angeles, you know that you’ve reached money maturity when you realize that “financial freedom and success go not to those who have the most, but to those who need the least.”
Schiavo: One Woman’s Perspective
Actually, more than one of us women has wondered the following about the Schiavo case:
Far from reflecting an “angelic” repose, those home videos from 3 years ago are revolting and humiliating. Terri Schiavo evidently took great pride in her appearance. We’ve wondered if she’d be horrified that the whole world has been pummelled with images of that vacuous, hideous, infantile grimace which her parents interpret as cognizance.
Dress for Duress
The brouhaha about Desiree Goodwin, the woman who is suing Harvard for discrimination – based on derogatory comments about her manner of dress, she claims they’ve denied her opportunities for promotion 16 TIMES – poses an ethical quandry.
First, working in an office is stressful for the majority of people. Over 50% of American workers are unhappy with their jobs, and no wonder: their work environments are sealed deathtraps (e.g., 9/11) where, statistically speaking, one out of every 25 of their coworkers is a nutcase (see my post on sociopathy in the US).
Whacka Whacka
Read this, you decide if it’s time for House Majority Leader Tom DeLay to step down for reasons of insanity.
To clear your head, here’s a great article from William Saletan, Slate’s chief political correspondent and author: Culture Vultures: Terri Schiavo’s persistent legislative state
And, finally, this comment from “KCapitalist”, a Saletan reader:
If Hillary Clinton were in the same condition as Terri Schiavo, Tom Delay and Rick Santorum would have yanked the feeding tube out with their teeth, two elections ago.
Liberty: 3; “Christian” Wrong: 0
The darlings of the “Christian” Wrong, including Tom (“anything to distract the public from the Ethics Committee investigation of my campaign improprieties”) DeLay are certainly sinking deeper and deeper into the mire of the Schiavo case, aren’t they?
Math/Science Fair
Before the latest snowstorm started here in Arctic Circle south, I was lucky enough to attend a splendid Math/Science fair at Emmeline’s elementary school.
Cost of the Iraq War
This past Saturday, the second anniversary of the US war in Iraq, 8 year old Emme and I attended a peace rally in Hyannis.
Virtually no major media outlet in the US covered the protests, which happened in some 800 cities.
We’ve heard about the loss of life – over 150,000 including over 1,500 American GI’s – and the staggering financial costs – $210 billion by the US alone.
Child Predators
As regular readers of this blog know, I have 0 tolerance for people who hurt kids.
The latest mockery of our system of laws sits in a Florida jail tonight in the “person” of John Evander Couey, a piece of trash with a 30-year long criminal history ending in the sexual abuse and murder of a 9 year old girl.
The Sanctity of Marriage?
So, the Republican right considers marriage – between a man and a woman – to be the foundation of our society.
Then, why is it that they’ve trashed the wishes of Terri Schaivo’s husband, Michael?
And after some 15 separate state and federal legal actions concerning this woman’s medical care – including an appeal to the Supreme Court, which threw the case out – what is the rationale, aside from political grandstanding, for Congress to get involved?