I would just like to say that the colossal, monumental failure of medical advancement in our time is the lack of on/off switch for the uterus, installed at birth and activated in adulthood when a female actually wants to have a baby. Damn researchers have been screwing around with much lesser issues! 😁

Oh my gosh! I would pay money to attend a wedding with this in the vows! 😂😂😂

I am so sorry! 😭 And I too agree. I feel like this has brought out a very large, pro-Eugenics crowd in the U.S. who previously kept their horrific ideas to themselves. The worst thing is locally, the "throw away people with disabilities" attitude comes from the same group that spends a lot of time protesting Planned Parenthood! 🙄😠 So not pro-life, just forced birth people. It is maddening! I used to call it out when I saw it, but now I just stay away from these people's social media and their church websites because there is no advantage to continue engaging with them. They are gross people with gross beliefs and aren't going to change their grossness. Sigh.

My heart hurts for you! This.is.insane. I truly believe we need to have an emergency law created whereby, like traffic court, these kinds of people can be quickly "tried" in the magistrate's office so criminal courts are not tied up. Dh made the point that they don't probably even care about a night in jail. They will consider themselves "martyrs" for the cause. But what nearly all of them will care about is their pocketbook. Make the fines stiff, really nasty, and automatic with garansheed wages until paid. He said he honestly believes that the loss of money is what will make these kinds of people shut up, and put their masks on or stay home. If a few of them end up on the nightly ends with a $5000 fine and taken in installments from their paychecks, it may curb this behavior.

I hope ds and girlfriend just stay put!

Very good news! The 16 year old from my neighborhood who was expected to die of omicron has actually stabilized and is improving! Fingers crossed! I know this had happened many a time with covid patients only to have them die a few weeks later. And also the five year old boy is being released from the hospital. I am so relieved for him. Daddy says he has some trauma because at one point he was in a hospital out of state, and they were not allowed to be with him. They are a fundie "mental health is a get right with god" kind of family so I did not expect him to get any help for his son. He was telling me about it when I was walking Lewis this morning, and I suggested that he really consider getting a child trauma therapist for his little boy just as soon as he is physically strong enough to see one. He actually asked me if I knew of a therapist in the area!!! I put my calm professional face on and told him where he could find help, but inside I was just about bowled away! I was not expecting that. Typical....big, ignorant opinions about everyone else's problems until it suddenly touches his own life and then, hmmmm, the experts are needed. At any rate, for the sake of that precious little boy, I was not about to get snarky with his dad even if those beliefs make my skin crawl. If the man is willing to get help for his kid, I was ON BOARD with support! It was very nice to actually have good news to report here today.

From what I am reading, the previous MAB had no effect on omicron so it no longer has emergency use authorization for covid cases unless their sample is sequenced and found to be Delta or at least that was how my EKG/Lab Tech niece explained it to me.

This is what really concerns me. We have mostly only Wal-Mart, Meijer, and TSC in the tri-county area for cold weather clothing otherwise online only, and delivery is slow. Amazon Prime is 3-4 days. An order from LLBean, Columbia, or REI can take up to 3 weeks to get here, and 75% of the population cannot afford high end gear anyway. Stock has been VERY low from the very beginning of the cold weather shopping season at the local stores. Very low, and what they have had at Meijer and Wal-Mart has been so crappy that it really shouldn't be used below a feels like temp of 15°F. The Car hart stuff a TSC is good, but in low supply and the vast majority of families cannot afford the price tag these days. We have had two straight weeks of minus temps, double digit minus windchills. The schools are reporting that large numbers of kids (this area is very much low income) are in danger of hypothermia and frostbite. But they also won't cancel school. I worry about the young ones in particular so much. It is quite abnormal for us to have such low temps for so many days in a row. Climate change! Sigh. The clothing pantries are advertising total desperate need for cold weather clothing. I sifted through a box I found of the boys clothing, stuff that I really honestly thought had already been donated. I found three Columbia boys ski coats, 10-12, and two 14-16, and some youth size ski gloves rated for -10. I called the elementary school and asked if they want them or if I should take them to the clothing pantry. The secretary begged me to let her have them to give away so I have an appointment to drop them off. I told her someone has to come to the car to get them because there is no mask mandate in the school, no testing, no contract tracing, and no quarantine requirements. That building is nothing but a bio hazzard, and I refuse to enter. But she is more than happy to come out if I text her when I get there. These coats though, are a drop in sea of need. I am glad I found them. However, I am so worried about the lack of planning at the community, county, state, and federal level for the effects of climate change. Nothing is being done for our most at risk families, heating systems have not been upgraded in decades, cooling systems or insulating methods have not been added despite the fact that more weird, summer extreme temps are happening, no new filtration despite covid, no moves towards reducing dependency on fossil fuels, just nothing but heads in the sand, ostrich style. This will keep getting worse.

I have to tale my mother in law to the doctor on Monday. This practice was.closed foe two weeks and had to reschedule everyone due to the doctor getting covid. On the day of the appointment, it will be 16 days since the doctor tested positive. According to the receptionist, the doctor has not had symptoms in over a week, and did a 14 day quarantine out of an abundance of caution. But this New Zealand case makes me very nervous because I feel like it means the staff could still come down with it from exposure to him. Sigh. She is wearing an N95 at her appointments so I am just going to try not to think about it. Dh's brother's youngest child is getting married Dec. 2022, and she desperately wants to live and be in stable enough shape to attend his wedding. This is her one last heart's desire! But if she gets covid, I think it is all over but planning the funeral. And this appointment is a catch 22 situation because with her kidneys and PAD, she isn't going to make it to December without close monitoring. Canceling or rescheduling again is not an option. She is already a month overdue on kidney check because it is hard enough to get in with specialists here without this freaking virus interfering with everything. At least I convinced them that she is absolutely NOT sitting in their waiting room. When they are ready for her, they are to text me, and I will walk her in and turn her over to the nurse, then scoot back out to the car. The practice is in a hospital so unless a patient is a minor or obviously incompetent and dependent on their caregiver, they do not let any family members stay with the patient which is standard with covid so bad in Michigan, but not a good situation for my mother in law who is easily confused. Weary of the whole, stupid thing. I have made the determination though that if we reach December 2022 and are still in an epic covid mess, I am donning N95 and getting on the train and taking my mil to her grandson's wedding. If we look like idiots sitting there as the likely only masked people in the room, so be it. It will be a miracle to get her that far, and if I can make it happen for her, I am damn well going to do it. I would not be surprised if she kind of gives up after that and passes away. She really doesn't want to fight anymore except that she wants to go to his wedding.

This discussion reminds me of one of my roommates in college. She came from the D.C. area, and grew up without a significant snowstorm event in her childhood. So the first epic snow we received at college was a nice six inch dump at night. She was enthralled, and the next day skipped all of classes and did nothing but run around campus making snow angels and snowmen as well as throwing snowballs at her friends and classmates. There were very few of us who had not grown up with big snow so we thought it was pretty hilarious! Eventually we saw a photographer stalking her and asked "What's up, man?" (It seemed kind of creepy at the time.) It turned out someone from the admissions office asked if they could get some formal photos of her playing to put on school advertisements. It can be fun! But we have so many extreme snow and ice events now in places that used to have these things once in a decade, once in a lifetime, that it just reminds me how fast life is having to alter from climate change. I hope everyone can get their supplies and hunker down.

Oh yikes! Y'all be safe out there!

I don't have any advice! I find it all so confusing. But I wanted to say I am sorry you are a dealing with this. Damn virus!

I have had good results with fire. Definitely the smell is gone. There are however some other side effects that might not be desirable. 😁

I know. Thinking about my sister's celiac and my wheat allergy (which is getting worse). Note to self make sure dh and BIL know to speak up about this if we are ever unable to communicate.

That explains a lot about my hygiene attempts the last two days. I honestly think the hair on the right side of my head is still oily!

We were not part of a homeschool group so we didn't have group things to fall back on. For dd, we gave her a night in Detroit, the ballet (best seats in the house), four star restaurant, etc. She was accompanied by my sister and sis's fiancee. She wasn't dating at the time, and asked her older male cousin to go. They were very close. Cousin wore a tux, dd and sis had evening gowns, and fiancee had on his dress uniform (Army Captain). They made for a great looking group. We had very good photos taken. When she graduated, she wanted a special ceremony at home that was also her music recital. We invited 50 people, and had a buffet finger food reception afterward. When the guests had thinned out sufficiently, we had ballroom dancing. (With 50, there wasn't enough room so we started that later in the evening.) None of our sons wanted any kind of bells and whistles. It was hard to get them to agree to senior photos. But they did want to travel so each of them got a road trip. They are the three musketeers and wanted the others along so it ended with three road trips in four years with all three of them! The graduating senior got to choose the destination and activities from a list of financial possibilities that we proposed. We had a small dinner with just closest extended family so grandparents and aunts and uncles could celebrate. They are doing it again this spring. Two have graduated in the last three years but did not want to attend their commencements. Youngest graduates this spring. So as their combined college graduation gift, another big vacation together. E.T.A. We also took each one to personally visit each of the universities on their individual short lists.

That really isn't how it works in a nation with fifty states that all influence each other, and whose state laws have influence on neighboring states.

Yes.

Trophy! 👏👏👏 You nailed it.

😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂

Here is what really has me confused. I conduct left handed! Conduct! I can conduct a darn orchestra with my non dominate hand, and cue anyone on that side of my body!!! How is my brain or arm so confused that it can conduct Brahms but can't scrape a car window???? 😲

Getting threats??? 😠 At this point, I think we need to build some jails. We have q lot of people who need 24 hours or worse of lost freedom in order to appreciate that the rest of us are DONE!

I mean, I am a professional pianist, and my left hand does amazing things but apparently only when near a piano. And from the wrist up, the rest of the apparatus is utterly incompetent! 😠 Signed, The woman with the third finger of her dominate hand in a splint who discovers today that she is no good at the following things opposite handed: Securing a seatbelt Mopping the bathroom floor Scraping car windows Whisking scrambled eggs Slicing a bun (thankfully no trip back to the ER for running afoul of a sharp implement, but a near miss for sure) Loading the dishwasher - at this point I think that however I toss those dumb dishes in there left handed should be good enough!

Without a doubt, a better book and movie!!😂

This. The selfishness and entitled priss attitude is just gross, and makes my heart ache for people with disabilities!