Category Archives: Politics

7 Quick Takes: Non-Traditional Thanksgiving

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7 Quick Takes

Everyone is talking about how thankful they are for food and family and stuff like that today. I’m thankful for all those things as well but I’m also thankful for some more… non-traditional things today. 😉

— 1 —

Priests who start impromptu Godspell singalongs after Thanksgiving Eve Eucharist. Worship was already done acapella (and done beautifully) because our organist had the night off and we were trying to find Thanksgiving hymns to sing. Someone suggested “Day By Day” out of the 1982 Hymnal and Rev. Helen said we should do it to the tune from Godspell. Okie dokie. Then we started singing parts of the finale and went on to “Prepare Ye the Way of the Lord”. It was awesome.

— 2 —

Evil twin brothers who restrain small children so that their moms can clean the black Sharpie pen off of their faces, arms, hands, necks, feet, and toes. Let’s just say that Daniel went for the Maori tribal look and leave it at that. 🙂 Rubbing alcohol prep wipes are what gets it off well. I think we went through 40 of them? He was also chill with Sean (my evil twin) restraining him while I worked on him. I’m sure the purplish color from the ink/alcohol mixture will leave my nail beds eventually…

— 3 —

Coffeeshops that are open on Thanksgiving for emergency latté runs. I had a migraine this morning, OK?

— 4 —

Soft grey chest kittehs. This is especially true of ones who prevent their humans from doing anything other than watching the season premiere of The Big Bang Theory.

— 5 —

Those who create Biden memes. Y’all make America a greater place to live.

— 6 —

Mythbusters marathons. Because science.

— 7 —

Accounting problems that balance. My homework is refusing to balance right now so I’m thankful for times when things have worked correctly.

For more Quick Takes, visit Kelly at This Ain’t The Lyceum.

The Simple Woman’s Daybook: November 20, 2016

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For Today… November 20, 2016

Simple Woman's Daybook

Looking out my window… dark. It was chilly today with some scattered showers and temperatures in the 40’s Fahrenheit. I am really hoping my boots arrive from L.L. Bean before the snow comes!

I am thinking… about some of the political news and how to deal with it appropriately.

I am thankful… for the chance to spend time with my brother and sister-in-law later this week when they come up for Thanksgiving. There will be football involved as the Apple Cup is happening on Friday and there are some inter-family rivalries between the UW and WSU. My cousin Sarah is the president of the WSU Marching Band and my parents are UW alums so Facebook should be really fun this week!

One of my favorite things… Daniel calmly curled up asleep. I’m enjoying the quiet time to blog before I go back to sleep.

I am wearing… my Online Debate Team shirt and black capri sweats. (In other words, my jammies.) Church clothes from this morning were the usual shirt from Old Navy (charcoal today) with my black slacks and cardigan from Kohl’s. When I got home, I switched out the slacks and cardigan for jeans and a light grey hoodie.

I am creating… Excel files for my Practical Accounting homework and Access forms for my online class. Whee!

I am watching… The Big Bang Theory re-runs.

I am hoping… the advising thing I have to attend tomorrow isn’t a brain-numbing waste of my time. I’m going because it’s a hoop I have to jump through in order to register for classes but I’m not happy about being forced to do it.

I am learning… about employer taxes.

In my kitchen… we chose to just get some pizza for Sunday dinner tonight with my aunt, my uncle, and my grandmother.

In the school room… Daniel’s speech is exploding.

Post Script… someone shared this 12-step program for responding to president-elect Trump.

Shared Quote… I wrote one of my college admissions essays on this fragment of an Enya song:

My life flows on in endless song
Above earth’s lamentation
I hear the sweet though far off hymn
That hails a new creation
Through all the tumult and the strife
I hear the music ringing
It finds an echo in my soul
How can I keep from singing
— “How Can I Keep From Singing”

A moment from my day… I love this Audrey Assad cover of “How Can I Keep From Singing”.

Hosted by The Simple Woman.

How to Deal With Trump’s Decisions

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My friend Ann left me this comment:

Just read all your “this, this, and this” links, and it all makes me want to cry. I just feel so discouraged and horrified and frustrated and sickened by all of those stories. Feeling rather depressed and hopeless about the next 4+ years. As I watch news coming in about his appointments and White House staff, it just gets worse and worse. I kept hoping he would find intelligent, capable advisors to temper things a bit, but that clearly isn’t happening.

So much empathy, Ann! It is really depressing to see all these decisions being made and the fact that Trump has no clue (and possibly no desire to be clued in) about how they’re affecting people.

The good news: you’re not the only one who feels this way.

With regard to Bannon, there’s a planned postcard avalanche to denounce him. (Details are here.)

There’s also a planned Women’s March on Washington on January 21st that has local events all over the nation. To find them, search for “women’s march on washington – [insert your state]”.

THe biggest thing you can do is something I know you’re already doing with your girls. Teach them to be kind and to show respect to people who may be different from them. Teach them to say, “no, that is not appropriate” when they see someone making fun of another person because they’re different or when you see a story in the news like one of the ones I linked. If you start teaching them now to speak out against racism, sexism, homophobia, transphobia, and all those other things, they’ll grow into young women who will stand up for those who need it. Trump and his advising choices are all bullies. Bullies hate when people stand up to them. If enough people stand up to them and say, “no, you are not doing this to my country”, they may eventually back down.

7 Quick Takes: Dead Exhausted Edition

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7 Quick Takes

— 1 —

Dead exhausted. My sleep debt now is substantial enough that I’m spending any spare time trying to catch up. Daniel is having sleep issues and that’s meaning that I’m up at weird hours during the night and it’s really messing with me. It’s bad enough that I skipped Mary’s Guild yesterday morning to nap and that’s usually the highlight of my week!

— 2 —

Political and faith links. Here are two wonderful pieces courtesy of my friend Laura of Coptic Dad and Mom. She didn’t write the first one but she did write the second one.

— 3 —

*facepalm* Just a head’s up from a conversation I had today with a classmate: clean water is a necessity, not a privilege afforded to the victors of a war. The Standing Rock Sioux tribe has a right to object to the pipeline being routed through their land because of the risk to their water supply… just as the people in Bismarck had a right to object to it going near their reservoir. The rights of the white people in Bismarck do not supersede the rights of the Sioux.

Also, interrupt my conversation with a remark like that again and you *WILL* feel my wrath, you weapons-grade spoon!

— 4 —

Mad computer skillz. The program I use for assessments for my online class and my laptop do not get along so I usually go do assessments at school in the computer lab. Well… in the process of doing my 15-minute assessment, I froze three of the computers in the lab and my professor’s computer. We finally pieced a score together for me, but I.T. will have to update the Adobe Acrobat plugin on Chrome on every computer in the lab now because the failure of the Acrobat plugin trips up the program I use for my assessments. (Granted, the program is already pretty catty so it’s not like it takes much to piss it off and make it lock-up a computer.)

While we were waiting for tech support to try and fix things, I showed her the Excel spreadsheet form I had created last night which involved a bunch of things we learned in Excel this quarter. She was impressed.

— 5 —

Mad tenor skillz. The high schooler who sings tenor was on his own last night (not that he needs another person — dude can cantor and hold the men together) and wasn’t feeling good so I sang a little bit of tenor with him on one of our pieces. Apparently, he was pretty impressed that the lower part of my range is tenor quality. I’ll be switching to tenor for part of our anthem on Sunday to give him and his dad (the other tenor) some support on a note that requires helium for them to hit with any measurable volume.

— 6 —

Some music for this week. I heard this tonight and it’s resonating with me. Enjoy!

— 7 —

Cold weather. It’s supposed to get down to freezing temperatures tonight!!! I am so excited!!! I’m kind of hoping that the snow doesn’t fly until my boots arrive but I’m looking forward to my first winter in six years where I get to experience four distinct seasons.

For more Quick Takes, visit Kelly at This Ain’t The Lyceum.

The Simple Woman’s Daybook: November 13, 2016

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For Today… November 13, 2016

Simple Woman's Daybook

Looking out my window… grey and rainy. It’s quite delightful, actually.

I am thinking… about the news that Donald Trump named a white supremacist as his counselor and chief strategist. This jerk and his followers attacked Kristen of Rage Against the Minivan, doxxed her, and sent some of the most vulgar tweets I have ever read. I was one of the people going through her Twitter account and reporting this profoundly sick people to Twitter for harassment. We’re talking tweets about nasty things these men wanted to do to her daughters, calling Kristen and her family sickening names, and a whole lot of things that will require me to take more Ativan if I speak of further.

I am thankful… for IRIS being inundated with calls asking how to help out with their immigration and refugee services. (I know someone who works with them and she reported this on Facebook.) It’s good to know that not all of the country have lost their minds.

One of my favorite things… worship today at St. Paul’s. I love being part of a community that is so alive.

I am wearing… a charcoal shirt from Old Navy and black jeans from Fred Meyer. Church clothes were the shirt with black slacks and a black cardigan from Kohl’s.

I am creating… a chapter outline for my Practical Accounting class and a blog post about political stuff.

I am listening to… chamber music on one of the Dish Network channels.

I am hoping… Trump finds better advisors than his current band of jokers.

I am learning… about employer earnings and deductions.

In my kitchen… Dad made garlic shrimp pasta for Sunday dinner.

In the school room… Daniel came home smelling like Old Spice because they were doing OT stuff with shaving cream on Friday.

Post Script… Do me a favor and read the following links and tell me if I’m overreacting to Trump being elected: this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, and this. Keep in mind that this is just the tip of the iceberg as to what I’ve seen on Twitter and Facebook.

Shared Quote…

“Empathy challenge: Imagine if we’d just elected a man who said he’d shut down churches and force Christians to register with the government.” — Rachel Held Evans

A moment from my day… One of the many Joe Biden memes going around.

*snickers*

Hosted by The Simple Woman.

Addendum to the Pep Talk

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One thing I forgot to add to the list:

[+] Start listening. I absolutely suck at this right now but we need to learn to listen to each other right now. Talk to your friends who are Muslim, GLBTQ, people of color, refugees, immigrants, and even your friends who voted for Trump (if you have them — I have relationships with a handful of people who did). One thing this election (and the acts of violence against people of color/Muslims/GLBTQ folks/immigrants in the last 8 years) should have taught us is that there is an undercurrent of racism, homophobia, and misogyny in this country and that undercurrent votes. We need to share our stories, affirm each other’s self-worth, and tell each other that we believe people when they report stories of sexism, racism, and bad behavior.