Thursday, November 18, 2010

Strange Times, Indeed

I'm feeling particularly blessed these days, and it really has nothing at all to do with the fact that Hallmark reminds me to remember that fact every November.  

Friends and family have sick children and spouses and parents without any more money or memory of who they are.  Friends have lost their jobs and been disheartened by second chances and panicked about future employment in a depressed economy as they relocate for love or prepare to finish their education.  A new dad is re-enlisting.  

And then, there's The Catcher, who took Tuesday off from work.  He never takes Tuesday off, but this week he did.  So, when the guy with the gun came in and asked where he was, he wasn't there.  The guy with the gun shot the girl who was there instead.  It was a little bullet so it didn't kill her but still......

I'm telling you, things are getting stranger and stranger out there.  Mr. 7 s having trouble sitting still in class and Mr. 5 can't seem to hike 5 steps without tripping over a rock or a root.  Kids dial a wrong number, think they've made the error of the century, and lie unnecessarily when a simple "oops, I'm sorry, my bad" was all that was needed.  Lessons are learned.

It was cold and rainy in Washington, D.C. on Monday when Donovan McNabb's Redskins lost to Michael Vick's Eagles (yes, that Michael Vick) by a score of 59-28.  That's a scoreboard from a high school basketball game, not a Monday Night Football game.  Commentators were falling all over one another wondering how they could be saying such complimentary things about a man whose past was so ugly?  Might it be that someone has actually been released from prison in a rehabilitated state?   Things are strange.

I can't make the water penetrate further than 12" for my newly planted desert willow.  I run the hose slowly for long periods of time, and instead of seeping downward, toward the center of the earth and, more important for my purposes, staying within the boundaries of the culvert I created (with great difficulty, I might add) around the root ball, no, instead it flows under the mulched barrier and spreads itself in a 2" puddle alongside the roadway.  The hole drained perfectly before I put the tree in it.  This should not be.

Nope, none of it should be.  Kids should be healthy and work should be available and anger management should be taught right after arithmetic but it doesn't seem to work that way lately.  The expert on NPR's piece on the cost of care for the long-term disabled (I can't find the link) said that we don't deny treatment to people because they can't afford it and I screamed "Yes, we do!" to my poor radio - a local patient was prepped and ready for his liver transplant when the public insurance program he was on was not renewed and the surgery was canceled.  It's true.

Pat Caddell, Democratic pollster and opinion-giver, wrote an article in Sunday's Washington Post suggesting that President Obama would best serve his country and his party by being a "one and done" president.  His thesis that the leadership would come together in a bi-partisan manner after this selfless act of patriotism is ..... oh, I don't know.... flaky? 

I'm telling you, these are weird times.




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