Just a couple thoughts and an invitation to discussion: First, the first “relief” bill has already been passed — it offers 2 weeks paid sick leave to everyone, and a total of 12 weeks at 2/3rds pay for parents whose kids are home from school or daycare. There are a couple quirks. First, it only provides benefits (federal benefits paid through a mechanism of refundable, advanced tax credits to employers) to workers at companies with fewer than 500 employees. This... Read more
Folks, I am now convinced that we should all be making — and wearing — facemasks. Here are some links, which I will be updating as I see more: Why? A New York Times article which says that the US took a strategy of discouraging masks, in order to protect the supply for healthcare workers, when the reality is that mask-wearking by the general public is one part of the general strategy of those Asian countries which have controlled Coronavirus/COVID-19:... Read more
I have a sewing machine. Regular readers will know that I lament not being able to put it to good use very often, especially as my days of making homemade Halloween costumes are over. Periodically I contemplate actually putting into action the maybe-someday offer of making a cosplay costume for a friend who cosplays, but it’s logistically challenging as said friend lives in another city and we only really know each other through a Facebook group. And I periodically contemplate... Read more
So yesterday I ranted (and I’ve temporarily removed the post as it was a bit too ranty), as it seems this blog is becoming a platform for expressing my frustrations in this new social-distancing world. (Narrator: she social-distanced before social distancing was a thing.) But here are some more thoughts: At the debate yesterday, one, or both, of Biden and Sanders — I don’t recall the particulars — claimed that every American would be made whole for every financial impact... Read more
Let’s back up to Wednesday, when my husband drove up to my son’s college, a couple hours away, for a wind ensemble concert. He gets there and finds out (a) the concert has been cancelled and (b) classes are cancelled for Thursday and Friday, and after spring break (which was already scheduled for this coming week) classes will resume online only until Easter. So my son starts packing and they get back here at midnight. Somewhere along the way, my... Read more
First: In the news today: Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology are urging students to stay home and will conduct classes online as the number of coronavirus cases grows in Massachusetts. MIT said all classes are canceled for the week of March 16 through March 20. Online instruction, which some units are already experimenting with this week, will begin for all classes on March 30, and continue for the remainder of the semester, MIT said. Undergraduates should not... Read more
Folks, I haven’t blogged nearly as much as I’d like, and, in particular, my ambition of creating a mini-cookbook doesn’t have much to show for itself (by which I mean that I’d like eventually to pull together all the recipes which are scattered across multiple cookbooks and photocopied in a binder, into a single spot). But I have landed on a new favorite for the Instant Pot, from, in fact, one of those cookbooks, with, of course, the usual sorts... Read more
So last weekend, when hubby and the boys were all at a Boy Scout outing, I took advantage of the warm weather and the museum “free day” to go to the Field Museum. It’s a funky sort of museum in that it’s a combination of a true “natural history museum” (dinosaurs, animals) and what the Europeans would call a “museum of ethnology” — and my interest generally lies in the ethnology side. (The evolution/dinosaurs display has a recreation of a... Read more
So we’re leaving Afghanistan, with a partial, then ultimately a complete withdrawal. The Taliban has promised to behave themselves (that is, not to support Al-Qaida), or maybe they haven’t, really (is the extent of the promise really just to not provide aid for any planned attacks on the US?). I could read, and attempt to parse the so-called “peace agreement,” but I doubt it really matters. Its purpose is not to ensure that the Taliban enter into the Afghan government... Read more
It’s 8:30, the day after Ash Wednesday. And I’m pleased to report some early success with Lenten weight loss: I’m down half a pound after yesterday’s, well, half-a**ed fast. OK, so actually, there’s some context there: having gained weight during the summer and more weight during Halloween/Thanksgiving/Science Fair Season, I had already been dieting since New Year’s. (Yes, the norm is to gain weight in the winter, not the summer, but summer is not just the season of being more... Read more
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