Final thought for 2014

Wrong. Delicious and wrong.
Take a buttery croissant, some slices of creamy havarti and add...bologna.
Like I said. 

Great before-the-end-of-2014 Idea

You know when you are at a new job, and you don't know anyone? You're meeting new co-workers every day, forming opinions, learning who's who. Eventually you get a little more comfortable with some of them. Then somewhere down the road you find out that two of them are married. Or siblings? And you have an oh-crap moment while you try to remember, did I ever say anything in any way negative to one about the other? I'll bet you've had that moment.

That's why there should be - say, inside the employee directory - an identifier indicating people who are in some way related to each other. Maybe between their names and their email addresses. Wouldn't that prevent some awkward and regrettable moments?

Yeah, it would!

Challenge of the Week

You know what's hard to do? Cry and floss your teeth at the same time.

Don't lose the comma!

Please, don't let ignorance of its correct implementation let comma use fall by the wayside. A direct address is the perfect place to use one. I'm talking to you, Blog Readers! (See what I did there?)

Just use it after the greeting, before the person you are talking to, and we'll be good. Ya feel me? Thanks. I feel better.

Maybe this will help

I don't blame Hillary Clinton for avoiding the question of whether she's running for president. Every day she delays saves her money for a campaign. I don't even know whether I would vote for her.

Then the other day I was at an event for women, waiting in line in the ladies' room. In this day and age, this is ridiculous. Then it occurred to me that if the U.S. had a woman president, I'll bet they'd be building more ladies' rooms before inauguration day.

Notice the increase in minorities now represented on tv and billboards since Barack Obama was elected? That's no coincidence, my friends.

So, if electing a woman president will finally improve the separate and very unequal restroom situation, I'm willing to do it on principle.

As long as it's not Sarah Palin.

Ribbon MisRepresentation

Warning: Half baked theorizing ahead.

I heard a very old song the other day during aqua aerobics..."Tie A Yellow Ribbon." Remember it? It's about a guy coming home to his sweetheart after a long time away, having written a letter hoping that she will be waiting for him. And she is. Awww.

And as a result of this song, we have ribbons and, subsequently, car magnets and lapel pins that help us express our feelings for those causes and people we feel so strongly about, like soldiers, diseases and death. All good, right?

Until you listen closely to the lyrics, it could be reasonably assumed that the man is returning from fighting a war. But not so fast. The guy was actually in prison. And he was returning from serving time, not his country. [See/hear the lyrics here: http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/franksinatra/tieayellowribbonaroundtheoleoaktree.html]


We don't know what this guy did wrong but he could have dodged the draft, given someone a disease or even killed a person. And now there's a ribbon for it. How's that for irony?! (Pretty good, actually.)

Whose Beeswax is it Anyway?

First: Robin Williams, RIP. At least I hope he does.

It is now universally known that Robin Williams committed suicide. And how he did it. And what room he did it in.

When did our society decide that we are entitled to know everything we want to know, no matter how personal or whose business it really is, and when did the media agree to supply us?

Just vile.

UPDATE: Apparently, California law considers such details public information, but that doesn't justify announcing it at a press conference (or at all).
http://pagesix.com/2014/08/14/why-sheriff-released-robin-williams-death-details/