The end of the week, and what is there to say? “I’m tired.” True, but not really — had a great swim this morning, stuck to my eating plan, and here it is, the end of Thursday, and these feel like enormous accomplishments. Do doctors have days like this? Repaired a hernia, had a great hair day. #winning One wonders.
I got nothing right now, but I do have this, a profile with an uncooperative subject, i.e., the guy who took the Planned Parenthood sting videos:
Matthew Reeves, the National Abortion Federation’s medical director, also had an encounter with Daleiden, according to the lawsuit. He described Daleiden’s questions as “pushy” and “leading” and noted his “strange face-forward stiffness when speaking.” At the time, Reeves attributed this stiffness “to a personality quirk,” the lawsuit says, but he “now realizes [it] was because Daleiden was most likely carrying equipment and filming or recording the conversation.”
The lawsuit describes two women who attended the conference with Daleiden — actors, it turns out — wearing loose-fitting scarves that may have concealed recording equipment. And it includes photographs of Daleiden in black-framed glasses that he no longer seems to wear. Daleiden declined to say whether that was where he hid the camera.
The lawsuit seeks to have 500 hours of footage shot at two conferences turned over to the abortion federation on grounds that Daleiden signed a confidentiality agreement. A California judge has granted the organization a preliminary injunction, which for now prevents Daleiden from releasing those videos.
We’re coming to a turning point with these videos. Not just the Planned Parenthood ones, all of them. There’s a case working its way through the news cycle in Fort Wayne — can’t find the link now — where an employee of the city clerk taped her badgering employees for political work on behalf of her hand-picked successor. And then there’s the one that started it all, Mitt Romney and his remarks about the 47 percent. Sooner or later we’re going to have to decide whether what we learn from these incidents is worth the squickiness of how we find out. I don’t want to have to go around thinking I’m being taped by my enemies, anyway.
Maybe we can think about this over the weekend. I’m-a clean my house.
EDIT WHOOP WHOOP WHOOP THIS JUST IN: The story about my shop was posted today on the Columbia Journalism Review website. I’m in it. Read if you’re so inclined.
Wim said on October 16, 2015 at 1:46 am
I would say there’s a substantive difference between editing and distorting stealth recordings for propaganda versus recording what someone is actually saying and doing and presenting it verbatim. One’s a damned lie and the other’s an embarrassment. I don’t think you can lump them all together as ‘squicky’ and just leave it at that. Mourn for the privacy we once enjoyed; hope for indifference.
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Jeff (the mild-mannered one) said on October 16, 2015 at 7:14 am
I shrug at “edited videos” as a defense, since they also released in the same literal minute the complete videos. There’s lots in the longer material that’s just plain boring chit chat and functional everyday speech between people who’ve just met and are getting ready to figure out what each other wants.
Having noted that, I can’t imagine any given day I’d be happy to have my complete spoken statements released verbatim, in full or edited, and I speak in public “for a living” more often than not. But I can only imagine how cringe-worthy a transcript would read of me asking questions and making suggestions in mediations, or my staff interactions back at the church as I try to express what I’d like them to do or not do, or in meetings where I’m trying to offer a vision to the members . . . let alone my casual conversations with friends and colleagues in housing & mental health. I have no doubt I say stupid, insensitive, poorly phrased, or outright offensive things at least a couple of times a day. Tape me for a few days, and I’m sure someone could then come up with an all-too-accurate greatest hits edit of what a boorish moron I really am deep down.
Is that really me? Is that more truthful than the self-edited self I want to present? I sure hope not. How we could amend privacy law to reduce this sort of thing without blocking investigation and analysis that benefits the public good I don’t know.
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alex said on October 16, 2015 at 7:15 am
Mitt Romney in a moment of candor is such a rare thing that it needed to be documented.
I can see an upside. Ideally it should empower whistleblowers and compel public officials, police, etc., to keep their noses clean. Hell, it should make even wanton vandals and thieves think twice before acting. On the other hand, I agree that I wouldn’t want to be recorded surreptitiously by someone with malicious intentions. All I can say is I’m glad social media and video cams weren’t around when I was a kid or my childhood would have been a thousand times more humiliating than it already was.
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Jeff (the mild-mannered one) said on October 16, 2015 at 7:30 am
And not to derail an interesting conversation (but we do three or four conversations at a time pretty well here): I would dispute the headline of this article, but encourage reading it through.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/16/us/politics/outsider-presidential-candidates-prove-competitive-in-fund-raising.html
In fact, I think what we’re seeing is that the skills and tools for professional fundraising, and the people who possess them, no longer see an upside in staying tied to party apparatuses, and are perfectly happy to free-lance, where their capacity has no necessary connection to party resources. Which tells you that political parties, like so many other associative entities in today’s world with the internet, have lost any advantage they have over independent operators. They don’t have unique lists or leadership structures that make it beneficial to stay in their good graces — so why not just pick up a candidate whose narrative and arc is entirely within your ability to manage for maximum “development” capactiy?
In other words, political parties have the same problem denominational bodies have, not to mention other national “membership” organizations like the American Legion or Rotary or League of Women Voters — an affiliative group for a long time had the mailing lists and officers distributed across the socio-political landscape that made them the necessary partners for any major (or profitable) effort. Now, what little they still manage in those two departments are less useful than what you can scrape off the internet with some proprietary tools and social media capture, so they are irrelevant AT LEAST TO the other entities that are moving into that space. You may not know who the leading businesses are that do national fundraising . . . but they know who YOU are. And that’s the challenge for groups like Protestant denominations trying to be needed by congregations and needing their contributions to stay active: what are they offering that’s not being offered by someone who’s making direct and ongoing contacts with you in attractive packaging to boot? So our dollars go to non-denominational programs and services, which more and more aren’t offered by the denomination anymore, anyhow.
Likewise political parties, who have trouble keeping even rudimentary organizations “open” and donors are only interested in giving to candidates, with more and more focus on particular positions than giving through a more widely defined agenda. For me, at least, the parallels are fascinating — and reaffirming the importance of figuring out what the new denomination or affiliative body looks like on the national/general level.
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coozledad said on October 16, 2015 at 7:32 am
There’s a stark difference between what Breitbart and James O’Keefe tried to do to Shirley Sherrod, and Mitt Romney managing to stick his foot all the way down his own guts and leave it dangling out his ass. The key difference is the deceptive editing that ultimately led to Shirley Sherrod being handed a no doubt substantial out of court settlement, and hopefully, Breitbart’s coffin rupturing in an explosion of corpse gas.
Hillary Clinton was on point to name Republicans as the enemy. We’ve got to get away from the way they think and behave. It’s a cultural poison.
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basset said on October 16, 2015 at 7:42 am
As a government employee, i assume that every work-related phone call and personal interaction are being recorded and every email will be forwarded. And sometimes they are.
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Dave said on October 16, 2015 at 7:46 am
Wasn’t it Howard Dean who was the first to really, really stir up the potential of the Internet money machine? That changed, and is changing, all the rules. Focus groups with one issue, who won’t support a candidate regardless of their position on any and all other issues, are some of the ruination of today’s politics. That, along with a miserable Supreme Court decision, have led to the results that are continually discussed here at nn.com.
Deborah, with no wish to be insulting, but I can’t believe he fell for that, and so quickly, too. Get out of the site, turn the computer off, if need be. Hope the evil people, and that’s what they are, didn’t get a chance to do too much damage to your credit.
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Sue said on October 16, 2015 at 7:47 am
A quick little thread-detour here: Anyone carry a balance on a Macy’s card? It appears that the company doesn’t allow you to get away with just paying off the final balance and being done – the next month you get a bill for the ‘interest’ on the balance you just paid off. Yes, I got a bill from Macy’s for $2.00, a charge from the $39 balance I paid off last month. The first time it happened I called them because I thought it was a mistake. They explained that since I ‘carried a balance’ I was charged interest, but deleted the charge anyway. That was quite awhile ago (I don’t use the card much). Now it’s happened again.
Does this happen with other cards now, is this a coming thing does anyone know? I’d cancel the card in a huff and let them know about it but I’m not going to bother if this is the new thing.
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Deborah said on October 16, 2015 at 8:02 am
Dave, I know. I was bowled over too. He said he was right in the middle of doing important research for a project that he really needed to finish and was desparate to get his computer running again. But still. Usually he calls to me when he has a computer problem, I don’t know much but I know more than he does. He’s kind of a Luddite. He does most of his drawing still by hand and he does beautiful architectural drawings.
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beb said on October 16, 2015 at 8:11 am
Is “squickiness” a word?
I’m glad to hear that someone’s going after these video gotcha people.
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Suzanne said on October 16, 2015 at 8:16 am
Once again, you have great insight, Jeff. Church denominations &, I suppose, political parties struggle to retain membership partly because the Internet has given us an explosion of choices that previous generations did not know existed. That, coupled with constant marketing which has turned all but the most pious into consumers who, realizing it or not, are continually on the hunt for the next best perfect fit for them. It’s like walking through the sideshow at the circus with all the barkers barking at you 24/7. What is really at the heart of white Christian panic is the fear of loss of their market share in society and their gloaming on to someone like Trump is his marketing ability to (hopefully) bring back that share.
It really is an interesting time to observe the grand societal shifts. Scary as heck, in some ways, but nonetheless interesting!
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Jeff (the mild-mannered one) said on October 16, 2015 at 8:28 am
“their market share in society” — Suzanne, I’m stealing that line. Thank you!
My denominational officials are more and more frantic in their insistence that we really, really should send them money, and have less and less and less to say about what they’re doing as they cut back functions. We can be snarky and say “they’re just protecting their jobs” (which we all do, I suppose), but it’s really sad and awkward that if you need an actual congregational or pastoral support service, and call the office, they will point you to an external independent “fee for service” group or consultant. Which means . . . why go back at budget time and plead to increase, or sustain the giving to them? And I spoke for a county retired teachers’ lunch that I end up once a year sitting through a business meeting for every October or December, and their officers are increasingly sounding the same, as retiring teachers don’t see the point or value of “joining” and paying dues to an organization that just offers “services” you can get better and faster through direct means. Et cetera, et cetera. The political parties are almost non-existent in my area, and that’s as true for the “ascendant” GOP in Ohio as it is the moribund Dems: the candidates don’t really need them, the donors certainly don’t, so without precinct captains getting my son a summer job or block leaders helping me get yard signs (which I pick up and place myself), why would I write a check to the county party? Which then sends out mail saying “we need you urgently to support…”
Meanwhile, the big players, who are behind that whole NYT story about fundraising BUT NEVER ONCE MENTIONED are continuing to consolidate their hold on the process by becoming the gatekeepers for the fundraising, who have no ideological or functional connection to the political process at all. Hence the ridiculous, damnable power these charter & virtual schools & “colleges” have in the “political process.” They have money to spend, and no real mooring in the body politic whatsoever.
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Jeff (the mild-mannered one) said on October 16, 2015 at 8:29 am
Fun to read for the “swag factor”: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/in-campaign-money-race-democrats-vastly-outpacing-republicans/2015/10/15/794a1ee4-7352-11e5-8d93-0af317ed58c9_story.html
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nancy said on October 16, 2015 at 8:35 am
Just put this in the post, but for those of you who only come back for the comments, here’s the piece about Bridge I coyly referred to earlier. It’s in Columbia Journalism Review. I’m in it, along with my cooking skills.
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coozledad said on October 16, 2015 at 8:35 am
I wonder if this will change Cokie Roberts’ position on Hawaiian Statehood:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/there-is-a-type-of-fungus-that-can-instantly-induce-orgasms-in-women-with-its-smell-a6687611.html
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Julie Robinson said on October 16, 2015 at 8:50 am
Whoop whoop whoop yes. Journalists are going to be beating down the doors to apply, especially if they think they get apple cake every day. Very nice.
Sue, that’s one I haven’t seen before, but I’d cancel that card quick. Life is too short.
Many, many years ago I fell for a pop-up that said I had a computer virus and that was a mess to get sorted. Since then I’ve become much more savvy but the crooks have nothing else to do but figure out new ways to defraud us. Deborah, I hope you can get it fixed quickly without lasting damage, and hope your hubby doesn’t feel too awful about it.
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Jeff (the mild-mannered one) said on October 16, 2015 at 9:38 am
Great story, but I has a sad reading the staff “tripled to nine.” Versus cuts by the dozens all across the newspaper world . . . well, any lifeboat will do, but I wish we had a few more Carpathias sailing over the horizon!
Nice job on the apple cake, chief.
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basset said on October 16, 2015 at 10:11 am
And I see the CJR print edition has just cut back from bimonthly to twice a year.
Scams – Mrs. B had one on the phone the other night, came home to a message declaring “we’ve been looking for you!” and that we were about to be sued by the IRS, call this number RIGHT NOW to sort it out. Yeah, right.
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Julie Robinson said on October 16, 2015 at 10:19 am
Or how about the one from Microsoft Technical Services where they can’t even pronounce the words correctly? I just laugh at those and ask them what kind of a fool they think I am.
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Bitter Scribe said on October 16, 2015 at 10:22 am
The guy who recorded Romney being an obnoxious Richie Rich was not there for the purpose of embarrassing him with distortedly edited videos. He was a waiter who couldn’t believe what he was hearing.
If farm states can pass “ag gag” laws against people getting jobs on ranches and farms so they can video animals being abused, why should abortion advocates be subjected to worse?
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Bitter Scribe said on October 16, 2015 at 10:47 am
The absolute worst phishing scam I ever got was an e-mail that purported to be from Citibank or some such place, except that the guy put his own name, in Russian, in the “From” line.
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brian stouder said on October 16, 2015 at 11:10 am
Loved the article; more pics would have been nice! (that was a joke, but still – I was missing seeing a photograph of the apple crisp dish that qualified for the lead-sentence!!)
I’ve made it to the 700+ page number range (the end is near) in the Nelson Rockefeller bio I’ve been whacking my way through for the past 4 months (our household catastrophe derailed everything for a good chunk of that) – and the backstory about the founder of the parent organization of The Bridge was positively Rockefeller-ist, right down to the acquired art in the country house, and the repurposed lumber.
Regarding videos – there is a bright-line difference between the expectations of a major-party candidate for the presidency of the United States, delivering a speech at a black-tie fundraiser, and some doofus hoping to entrap a person who works for an organization he doesn’t like, and in an informal long-lunch at a restaurant.
Aside from all that – a non-sequitur I was reminded of by the talk hereabouts of internet/computer/credit card fraud (which shows I’m an out-of-touch old guy): my chin dropped and my eyes widened when I heard what the Kardashian-related basketball player paid, before going into a coma at the brothel in Nevada….and how he paid it.
$75,000 for 4 days there??!!? I honestly and literally cannot imagine how 96 hours in a brothel could possibly be worth that, to anyone.
And he paid this with a swipe of his Amex card???
Really??!!
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brian stouder said on October 16, 2015 at 11:11 am
sorry about the un-ending italics; and make that “Rockefeller-esque”
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coozledad said on October 16, 2015 at 11:12 am
Rick Scott, like his predecessor, Jeb Bush, is a criminal. Once the Bush family fuckpuppets legitimized torture, it was only a matter of time before we arrived at this:
http://www.rawstory.com/2015/10/human-rights-groups-urge-feds-to-investigate-torture-and-rape-in-troubled-florida-prisons/
They were killing inmates at Suwannee.
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Jolene said on October 16, 2015 at 11:33 am
I’ve been thinking of making that NYT apple cake recipe. Some of the comments on the recipe suggest substituting butter for all or part of the oil. Did you? And, if not, what kind of oil did you use?
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nancy said on October 16, 2015 at 11:40 am
I use oil — I liked the notes on one reprint of the recipe that referred to butter as “showoff-y.” I did cut the sugar from 2 cups to 1.5, and I add other stuff fairly freely — I may make it over the weekend and add fresh cranberries. The apple-cranberry pie I made — also for the office — earlier this week was fantastic. Lightened the sugar in that one, too. It really let the fruit flavor shine through.
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Deborah said on October 16, 2015 at 12:14 pm
Good on you and Bridge, Nancy. That was a terrific article. I wish they had something like that in New Mexico.
I had an eye Dr appt this morning and I do indeed have cataracts, worse in my right eye. For starts I’m getting glasses and then if that doesn’t help a little I will have surgery. My Dr said it could be a year from now or ten, it just has to be watched. The bummer is I will now have to have 4 pairs of glasses, clear lens glasses for driving at night, prescription sun glasses for driving during the day in NM, reading glasses (which I already have) and my bifocal sunglasses for walking etc outside (which I also already have). I’m off to a place here called SEE to look at frames.
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Sherri said on October 16, 2015 at 12:24 pm
I attended debates for local elections the last two nights, one put on by the local League of Women Voters and the other put on by the PTSA council for the school district. I was reflecting on the two organizations. I’m active in local politics, and I have no idea what the League does to attract new members. Most of the members I’ve seen are in the 70s or older. The PTSA here still maintains strong ties to regional and state organizations, and makes a big deal about their lobbying efforts to the legislature (most of the school PTSAs here have a legislative rep whose job is to find out the issues important to their school and pass them up the chain.) I haven’t seen much evidence that it has any impact. My local district party organization can’t get PCOs for every precinct, and their endorsements in local races don’t mean very much because they can’t provide manpower for doorbelling because they don’t have it.
I think these are organizations that have been left mostly irrelevant in the political arena by the relative importance of cash rather than votes in elections. Yes, votes are what we tally at the end, but most people don’t vote, and there aren’t any organizations left that can reliably even get a bloc of voters to even vote, much less vote for a particular candidate or measure. So money is what drives the process, because you have to have it to be able to get to the voters one by one. Maybe a state PTA used to have some clout, because parents were voters; now, voters aren’t the currency, and parents don’t vote reliably anyway.
It seems like some of the organizations our parents belonged to could still be relevant, but for some reason, they never managed to recruit even people of our generation, much less people younger than us. They’re aging out, and no one is replacing them.
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Julie Robinson said on October 16, 2015 at 12:40 pm
Deborah, they’re almost a rite of passage anymore, aren’t they? I’m waiting for mine to “ripen”, and my sis is having hers done before the year is out.
Re: Sandy Kennedy, the former FW City Clerk who resigned after being caught on video demanding campaign donations for her presumptive successor. The reliably Dem JG has now endorsed her Republican opponent, basically calling her tainted. Kennedy has been hospitalized and is claiming a medical condition made her say those things. Which you may take at face value, or not.
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Deborah said on October 16, 2015 at 1:04 pm
Sherri, I went to a few League of Women Voters meetings in Dallas, many moons ago when I briefly lived there. Those women at the meeting were the most intelligent women I had ever met, about half of them were black and most of the meetings were in their homes. I was very young and intimidated by their level of political knowledge. I was just a novice in politics, I was more interested in feminism at the time than politics but the two obviously go hand in hand.
Speaking of feminism, there’s an excellent piece in this week’s New Yorker about Gloria Steinem. I read it in the print edition, so I don’t have a link handy.
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Sherri said on October 16, 2015 at 1:22 pm
Deborah, I’m glad the LWV is vibrant somewhere. The two places I’ve encountered the League, they were very nice but aging white women old enough to be my mother.
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Sue said on October 16, 2015 at 2:11 pm
Wisconsin’s laws don’t require you to notify someone if you are recording a phone conversation. When a discussion starts going south I hit the record button. If I want to put the brakes on the discussion, I inform the caller. If I think that at some future point I will need to explain something or protect myself, I don’t.
I agree with basset, assume you are being recorded or that your output will be scrutinized. Oddly enough, for me that has a focusing affect and I am automatically thinking three steps ahead in any interaction.
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Jeff (the mild-mannered one) said on October 16, 2015 at 4:20 pm
So, my VISA would max out at two days stay. Good to know.
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Suzanne said on October 16, 2015 at 5:27 pm
Is there a link to the apple cake recipe? Or did I miss it?
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Dexter said on October 16, 2015 at 5:31 pm
This is my favorite Michigan weekend. The backyard brawl when both teams are really good. I have been to more than several of these contests and the rivalry is keen and sometimes mean, and the games are usually close and intense. All sorts of quirky things happen, like Cheatin’ Bob, the Michigan State clockkeeper who screwed Michigan out of a road win a few years ago. Charles Woodson’s one-handed interception in 1997 is still talked about… I was there and witnessed it and indeed I do still bring it up from time to time.
I can’t wait. MSU has dominated this series lately, maybe Blue can change the clod-kickers’ fortunes. Go Blue.
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Dexter said on October 16, 2015 at 5:34 pm
http://cdn.tegna-tv.com/-mm-/158886bf14933133356679d8070671b8054b4d98/c=0-0-429-242&r=x633&c=1200×630/local/-/media/2015/10/15/WUSA/WUSA/635805119929446564-Magic.jpeg
heh heh! Oh those crazy Michigan Wolverine students, they blued old Magic Johnson. Har!
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Heather said on October 16, 2015 at 6:21 pm
Well, my boss just dropped kind of a bomb on me today. I’ve been at the company for more than six years and they of course always talk about how they want employees to grow and develop with them, promote from within, etc. As part of that, I was working towards an initiative that was more interesting to me, that required me to use my journalism skills rather than merely repeating the same marketing blather in different ways. The blather has its place, but after six years it was lather, rinse, repeat until you want to stab your eyes out.
Well, today he basically said the company is only focusing on the boring blather stuff for the foreseeable future, and if I can’t be excited and enthusiastic about it, I should drop out. He was nicer than that, but that is basically the message.
I’m of two minds–I’ve known for a while I need to move on from the company as it is very corporate and I am not, but on the other hand I’m resentful that they seem to expect me to resign. I want unemployment at least if not a severance package.
I’ve been toying with the idea of going freelance or at least looking for something more interesting for a while, so this is kind of a cosmic kick in the butt and not necessarily a bad thing. Not even entirely unexpected. But of course I’m a little freaked out. If anyone has any ideas for how I should frame my conversation with my boss next week, I’m all ears!
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Jolene said on October 16, 2015 at 6:41 pm
Suzanne, here is the apple cake recipe.
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Jolene said on October 16, 2015 at 7:10 pm
Speaking of baking, is anyone watching The Great British Bakeoff on PBS?
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Sherri said on October 16, 2015 at 8:56 pm
Oh this is funny because it is too true: https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/compost/wp/2015/10/13/jennifer-lawrence-has-a-point-famous-quotes-the-way-a-woman-would-have-to-say-them-during-a-meeting/
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Deborah said on October 16, 2015 at 9:17 pm
Test
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Deborah said on October 16, 2015 at 9:18 pm
Sorry, I submitted a few comments that didn’t go through, so I was doing a test to see if they would go through now. THe comments seem to be lost, but no big deal.
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Jolene said on October 16, 2015 at 10:04 pm
Sherri, on Larry Wilmore’s The Nightly Show, two women–one of his writers and a comedian–acted out some of Petri’s translations. They were quite funny. Their interpretations begin at 5:20 in this clip. The initial five minutes is discussion of Jennifer Lawrence and the issue of gender and negotiation styles.
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A. Riley said on October 16, 2015 at 10:17 pm
I linked up with the local League of Women Voters a couple of election cycles ago and I just *loved* those women. The now middle-aged former hippie campus activist types who’ve made the people’s republic of Oak Park home are the core of the membership, along with their older and younger sisters. *Wonderful* people. Thing is, if you’ve got a full-time day job, it’s tough to keep up. I wish there were a way to do just a little, as time allows.
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A. Riley said on October 16, 2015 at 10:25 pm
Oh, and PS — I work for a denominational women’s organization. Love those women, too. Many of them are, as someone upthread said, “very nice women my mother’s age” — but dammit, those women are the backbone of civilization. Don’t scorn them. If we’re lucky, we’ll be them in another twenty years.
A couple years back, when I was suffering through a stint in the denomination’s marketing department (why a denomination needs a *marketing* department staffed by *marketers* I swear I don’t know), I got to interview a brilliant young pastor who ran a really effective and successful ministry to homeless men, based in his congregation. Brilliant & charismatic young man. So he was holding forth, telling us how his congregation supported this great ministry, and he said, “Yes, my best volunteers and my best donors are the little old ladies.” And he snickered. He snickered. And the two other marketers with me, young women both, snickered right along with him. For shame.
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Deborah said on October 16, 2015 at 10:38 pm
We just watched the last episode of season 4 of Longmire on Netflix. I think it was the best season yet. I hope there is a season 5, but you never know.
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Jolene said on October 16, 2015 at 10:45 pm
Deborah, I finished watching Longmire too. Was kind of hoping Season 4 would be the end, just so as not to have to wait for Season 5, but it definitely needs a finale.
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Julie Robinson said on October 16, 2015 at 10:54 pm
Heather, that’s awful and I think your take on it is right, they want you to resign. I don’t have varied enough job experiences to advise, except to let you know it sounds like a rotten deal. Which is most jobs anymore.
A Riley, we have some college friends up there in the people’s republic! They fought the Boy Scouts on gay leaders close to 20 years ago, and bizarrely enough landed in People magazine.
Our church’s best volunteers are almost exclusively little old ladies. I pray for their energy.
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Jeff (the mild-mannered one) said on October 16, 2015 at 10:59 pm
As Thomas Merton said about a particular contemplative convent near Manhattan, consider the possibility that the world itself would entirely cease to function without committed little old ladies. God bless ’em.
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alex said on October 16, 2015 at 11:53 pm
Heather, I did freelancing for about ten years and found that marketing whoring was about the only thing that paid the bills. It is what it is. Now I do a lot of very dry and objective reporting for a small audience and try to find it rewarding. 401K with $100K in it after 10 years — that’s what I mean by rewarding. At this rate I need to croak shortly into retirement, and the stress of having a sucky life might just make it happen.
Despite this, I could seriously take a haircut to do something I genuinely love. Sounds like you’re starving for the same thing too.
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Dexter said on October 17, 2015 at 1:57 am
Sucking the government teat ain’t too bad, Alex. With a tiny pension from the company, Social Security, and a medium range monthly military disability compensation stipend I always get the bills paid and have enough for, as Billy Joel sang, “comfort in my coffee cup, apples in the early fall…”.
Right now the only complaint I have is the skyrocketing cost of my wife’s insulin.
Medicare does not provide enough coverage for a year’s insulin costs, so she goes into “the donut hole”. The two types of insulin she is dependent upon take every bit of her Social Security monthly pension, plus a good chunk of my dough.
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Sherri said on October 17, 2015 at 4:36 am
I didn’t mean to scorn the little old ladies; I will be one myself someday. I just hesitate to join an organization that is mostly little old ladies, because I’ve seen what happens when someone my age does that. There’s a lot of work that needs to be done to revitalize the group to attract to new members, and the older members don’t have the energy to do it, but are reluctant to do anything a new way. A friend of mine has been pulling her hair out over the local historical society. A local Rotary chapter has tried to convince another friend of mine to come in and be their token young member (where young is barely under 50) to try and attract more younger members. There are approximately a zillion of these organizations, just waiting to swoop down on the new empty nesters women and have us bring new energy to their organizations. Rotary, Kiwanis, LWV, AAUW, Municipal League, Assistance League, historical societies, and so on. The problem is, generally, they haven’t done much to recruit us when we were soccer moms, and now it feels like they want us to come in and do all the heavy lifting to save their group. Maybe it’s just this area; it’s not as open to newcomers as it needs to be.
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David C. said on October 17, 2015 at 6:51 am
I’ve never been on the hiring end of things, but my perception is it makes no difference to them if a person was fired or quit of their own accord. If they wan’t you to move on, Heather, they should have the fortitude and class to say so and not play a passive-aggressive game with you. Make them make the move.
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Julie Robinson said on October 17, 2015 at 7:48 am
Sherri, I didn’t interpret it as scorn and indeed I know exactly what you mean. We have one organization that says they want young women involved (and at 58, I qualify) but they won’t change anything. After two years on the board I discontinued the monthly torture of the meetings.
Those kind of groups are going to go away, yes, but in my kids’ generation they are re-inventing community involvement. They’re starting their own groups and they look at a little different, but they’re engaging for change at the local level right now. Since that’s how our current President got his start, I have high hopes.
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Deborah said on October 17, 2015 at 9:11 am
Heather, I freelanced as a graphic designer for a couple of years. I didn’t like it because I missed going to a studio where you could plug in everyday with other designers and be inspired. It was isolating and I missed being part of the fray. Now they have shared work spaces where you can freelance, have your own desk but still have others around you who do what you do, or similar things. I wish they had those back when I was freelancing, I probably would never have gotten back involved in corporate design. On the other hand I think you are the only copywriter at your office, so in a way you are isolated from your people as it is. In regard to quitting or getting fired, I can’t really give you advice, I’d probably let them fire me if that’s the only way you can get unemployment, but I really don’t know what I’m talking about.
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basset said on October 17, 2015 at 10:03 am
Dexter, we hear you on the insulin… I’m doing two shots a day and Mrs. B. is on the pump, first part of each calendar year before we fill up the deductible can get kinda tight.
Heather, much as I hate to say it I think it looks like they’re trying to let you down easy… might be salvageable if you can convince your boss you’ll be into the boring stuff and provide something the others aren’t. previous comments made to coworkers can come back and bite you here, though. been there, done that.
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Brandon said on October 17, 2015 at 1:46 pm
“A couple years back, when I was suffering through a stint in the denomination’s marketing department (why a denomination needs a *marketing* department staffed by *marketers* I swear I don’t know), I got to interview a brilliant young pastor who ran a really effective and successful ministry to homeless men, based in his congregation. Brilliant & charismatic young man. So he was holding forth, telling us how his congregation supported this great ministry, and he said, “Yes, my best volunteers and my best donors are the little old ladies.” And he snickered. He snickered. And the two other marketers with me, young women both, snickered right along with him. For shame.” –A. Riley
I’ll understand if you can’t name these scoffers, but an update would be interesting.
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Deborah said on October 17, 2015 at 2:21 pm
Beautiful crisp, cool fall day in Chicago. I walked to the Lincoln Park Farmer’s Market, got leeks, apples and eggplants. The leeks are for the Risoto with scallops that my husband is making later. It’s for my birthday which was last Sunday but I was in Santa Fe then and he was here.
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Dian Planck said on October 17, 2015 at 3:49 pm
Hi Nancy,
Do you have the capability of changing my name as it would appear in the comments section to something else? I’m leary of posting some things that could be googled by my given name, on occasion. Email me please at dian6one24wg@yahoodot com. Thanks ever so much. By the way, good memory! Yes, the screenplay was titled: The Travelers Heart. I got to take the first semester of classes, before returning to Fort Wayne. Long story.
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MichaelG said on October 17, 2015 at 4:32 pm
A risotto with scallops and leeks. Somehow that just sounds wonderful, Deborah. What a nice husband.
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Jolene said on October 17, 2015 at 5:17 pm
Dian, I’m pretty sure you can use whatever name you like. At the top where it asks for your name, the “required” in parentheses refers to the requirement to provide a name, not to provide your real name. If you look at the names other posters use, you’ll see that there are quite a few that l’m aren’t real names. Some examples are Bitter Scribe, Little Bird, fat old man, bald-headed dork, coozledad, basset, beb, Crazy Cat Lady, Judybusy, and others.
The idea is, I believe, to choose a name and use it consistently so that we recognize you, though I don’t think there’s anything to stop you from using different names at different times.
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Deborah said on October 17, 2015 at 5:24 pm
Here’s a day wrecker for you http://gemsofwikipedia.tumblr.com It’s a tumbler of little known but fascinating facts. I love that kind of stuff. I just spent about an hour perusing it. I was directed to it by a Graphic Design blog I read called Swiss Miss, by (obviously) a woman, Swiss graphic designer living in Brooklyn for quite awhile now.
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Dian Kim said on October 17, 2015 at 5:33 pm
Jolene @61
Thanks for the prompt feedback. I’m not sure if this will go thru immediately or go to Nancy for monitoring. Either way, I’ll try til I get it right. Cheers and thanks for the help
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Sue said on October 17, 2015 at 7:18 pm
A perfect Saturday evening: I’m having a glass of Three Lakes Cranberry Rhubarb wine and some cheese & crackers and cashews, and reading Ruth Reichl’s new book. I love narrative cookbooks although I don’t always connect, but this one is special since it covers the year after the closing of Gourmet magazine. So, on this cool fall evening, eating food and reading about food all snuggly on my sofa waiting for the Cubs-Mets game to start. Oh gods they’re playing the Mets. Open another bottle of wine.
And, thanks to page 4, I know what I’m having for breakfast tomorrow.
Basset, I’ve tried in the past to get ahold of you to get an address to send you some of this wine for your wife, shall I try again? Maybe it went in your spam folder. It was awhile ago.
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MichaelG said on October 17, 2015 at 7:24 pm
Wow. I can hear the air leaking out of Ann Arbor from here.
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Dave said on October 17, 2015 at 7:39 pm
Jolene, you pointed out pen names without naming Prospero, who always comes to my mind first. Even he used to change his name every now and then, when he either felt hated or felt he’d gone too far, although I doubt he ever thought that.
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Deborah said on October 17, 2015 at 7:57 pm
My favorite pen name of Prospero was April Glaspie https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/April_Glaspie
My husband made the best risotto he’s ever made, very creamy (with no cream). Just chicken broth, cheap white cooking wine, Aborio rice, leeks, crimini mushrooms and scallops, with fresh basil and parm on top, yum. We had a great bottle of Italian wine that cost $39 on sale, we saved $25 on the wine. A great late birthday celebration.
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Sherri said on October 17, 2015 at 8:09 pm
Oh Dexter, that had to hurt.
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Sue said on October 17, 2015 at 8:19 pm
Son of a bitch.
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Connie said on October 17, 2015 at 8:21 pm
I did not like Ruth Reichl’s new book. She came across as pretentious and elitest.
As to the football game, all I can say is wow.
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basset said on October 17, 2015 at 9:09 pm
Sue, please do try again – our proprietress knows my real name and email and can share those with you, so does Joe K. Not watching the Cubs game but I did go to high school with a guy who was the Cubs’ pitching coach for awhile, believe he’s in the Cardinals system now. We were not close. In fact, we did not even inhabit the same planet – at my high school you were an athlete, a fan, or nobody, and I was less than nobody.
I just special-ordered two bottles of Oliver’s cabernet from our local (Nashville) liquor store, they carry Oliver’s but just the sweet stuff, Soft Red and so forth. I drank a lot of Oliver’s Camelot Mead when I was at IU, at the time it was a dollar-69 a bottle and sealed with a wax dip.
Just finishing a bottle of “Rib Shack Red,” a South African blend of 60% “pinotage,” whatever the hell that is, and 40% Shiraz. Went well with pounded, breaded, and fried venison steaks, some of the last of last season’s. Bow season’s been on here for several weeks, muzzleloader starts Nov. 7 and I am going to the range to practice tomorrow.
Dian, basset is indeed not my real name. Totem animal, not real name though.
Ruth Reichl pretentious and elitist? Well, wtf did you expect?
Football? Who cares? Not me.
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basset said on October 17, 2015 at 9:11 pm
“…a great bottle of wine that cost $39 on sale…”
I could not enjoy that if I knew what it cost. Not qualified to drink it – I bought a $15 bottle last night and am saving it for a special occasion.
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Julie Robinson said on October 17, 2015 at 10:36 pm
Here’s how much I care about football: I’m pleased that State beat Michigan because it will make my sister happy. The end.
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Dexter said on October 18, 2015 at 12:49 am
Hurt? I was sitting right beside Colorado coach Bill McCartney’s mother (just a coincidence—it was a ticket bought outside the gates that day)in 1994 when Kordell Stewart fired a 70 yard pass to Michael Westbrook for an upset win over M. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Nt6HjqtJt8
Now that one stunned me, but today was the first time I really, not figuratively, nearly vomited at the immediate ending to the Battle for Paul Bunyan’s statue. I was not OK for a few hours, but I was able to go out for a light dinner around nine o’clock. I kept playing options out in my head as to how M could have just salted that victory away, but , but…the way they lost (fumbled punt recovered by the pig-shit waders ran back to the house) was indeed sickening.
Then I switched sports and watched the Chicago Cubs totally dominated by the Mets’ pitcher Harvey and the Mets won easily. At least I didn’t burn my hand on the hot oven or fall down the fucking stairs…it’s a wonder, the way everything else went.
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David C. said on October 18, 2015 at 7:31 am
I must be the only agnostic in Michigan (well formerly in Michigan) when it comes to the Michigan-Michigan State rivalry. I though it was an exciting end to the game.
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alex said on October 18, 2015 at 7:54 am
So when did the Onion take over Think Progress?
http://thinkprogress.org/politics/2015/10/17/3713554/guide-to-whether-george-w-bush-was-president-on-911/
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Deborah said on October 18, 2015 at 8:50 am
Alex, it’s such a faux pas for Republicans to admit that 9/11 happened while Bush was president, no he did not keep us safe. When I mention this to my sister she gets real quiet and then changes the subject.
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coozledad said on October 18, 2015 at 8:53 am
alex: I never could figure out how 3000 plus dead was “keeping us safe,” but apparently it was good enough for NPR, David Gregory, Tim Russert, and the rest of American Pravda.
I guess it’s the same way an abortion isn’t an abortion if a Republican planted the baby in your ass.
http://www.rawstory.com/2015/10/former-prostitute-accuses-family-values-republican-of-impregnating-her-and-asking-her-to-abort/
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Jolene said on October 18, 2015 at 9:00 am
It could be worse, Dexter. You could be this guy.
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David C. said on October 18, 2015 at 10:27 am
Yeah, he kept us same in a sort of other than that how was the play, Mrs. Lincoln way.
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coozledad said on October 18, 2015 at 11:11 am
This isn’t even the Onion. This came out of Jeb Bush’s facehole today:
“Does anybody actually blame my brother for the attacks on 9/11? If they do, they’re totally marginalized in our society. It’s what he did afterwards that mattered, and I’m proud of him. And so are a bunch of other people.”
The people who blamed your brother WERE marginalized, through a massive media campaign enabled by the endless cash reserves of the people who installed him. This country was sick, puke sick with its worst element in charge.
When your brother’s criminal negligence is even starting to sink in with the dumbass hick demographic, it’s looking rough for your criminal family.
http://www.rawstory.com/2015/10/cnn-host-destroys-jeb-bush-you-blame-hillary-for-benghazi-but-insist-brother-blameless-for-911/
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coozledad said on October 18, 2015 at 11:21 am
Hahahaha: Keep digging through Hillary’s emails, you pathetic shites.
Den Haag, bitches!
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3277402/Smoking-gun-emails-reveal-Blair-s-deal-blood-George-Bush-Iraq-war-forged-YEAR-invasion-started.html
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Sue said on October 18, 2015 at 11:57 am
basset, I just sent you an email at the address I have for you.
Haha, Connie, of course Ruth Reichl is pretentious. I didn’t read Gourmet for down-home practicality. Here’s what Connie’s talking about: instructions for apple crisp – “Peel a few different kinds of apples, enjoying the way they shrug reluctantly out of their skins”.
Now that’s something that would be right at home among Yoko Ono’s hilarious, bossy, self-absorbed twitter comments. It also makes me hungry and wanting to make some apple crisp right now, using rare heirloom apples I’ve serendipitously found at a fantasy farmer’s market.
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beb said on October 18, 2015 at 1:48 pm
It’s sad how Jeb “I am my own man” Bush has turned into the defending of the worst president in American history, “W”. But then the whole meme that “He kept us save” requires an incredible mulligan for 9/11.
You know, if Paul Ryan does not want to be Speaker of the House, there’s one simple trick to get him off the hook. Just pledge that he will never accept attempts to blackmail the president. He would advance only a clear bill to raise the debt ceiling and would only advance “clean” appropriation bills. Since Republicans want to blackmail the president, Ryan would be dropped like a big pile of stink.
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Minnie said on October 18, 2015 at 5:20 pm
Ryan wants to run for President. Being Speaker would make his weaknesses all too visible.
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Deborah said on October 18, 2015 at 6:13 pm
I’m making the roasted eggplant, chick pea and tomato recipe again that someone here comment posted this past summer (JudyBusy? Jolene? Can’t remember who). Lord it was good the first time I made it, expecting it to be even better this time, as I’ve added a few of my own touches (wine!).
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basset said on October 18, 2015 at 9:37 pm
Got it, Sue, and I am looking for something appropriately local to share.
More of our Alaska fish today, we have something like eighty-five pounds of halibut for two of us to eat up before we go again. Deer season starts in three weeks, at least the parts of it I participate in, and we have a quarter of beef coming in early December. If you have a freezer under a tarp on the deck, you might be a redneck…
not quite there yet, but it could happen. I butcher… pardon me, “process”… my own deer and use a commercial processor for the stuff I’m not set up to do, usually summer sausage. Same place also makes deer bologna and “snack sticks”… they will turn a whole deer into Slim Jims if you want, that will definitely be a temptation if it’s a productive season.
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