It really was a swell bash and a lovely party, and lots of friends and family came to my sister Timmy’s house to help Mom celebrate her 90th birthday, which we celebrated last Saturday. There was lots of great food, and clearly shown in this picture, plenty of drink (well, boxes of wine are kind of an inside joke in the family). I’ve uploaded all the photos (even the action-shotty ones) as a set on my Flickr page. There was even a fun game to play – some sort of “ring on a string” thing where a metal ring was…
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Okay, I’ve bloviated My Important Thoughts About Current Events enough for the week. Time I got back to basics and wrote about stuff I probably know more about – silly, mindless, entertaining drivel about my favorite things. So tonight being Friday, we’re parked in front of the TV watching Stargate, Atlantis, and then my husband David will be watching Battlestar Gallactica. Tonight for the first time, though, my geek cred goes up slightly; I’m using my “new” laptop (which is really David’s old one). Slowly I’m moving stuff over to it from my own “old” computer, like photos and other…
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CBS News | Brown Plucked From Katrina Duty | September 9, 2005?13:24:54 This was breaking news just a couple of hours ago; Michael Brown has been removed from running FEMA (Correction: from running the Katrina rescue/recovery effort. Expect his final departure soon though). The Google link for all the stories is here. Since then, rather a lot has happened. His replacement: Coast Guard Vice Adm. Thad W. Allen, and also in command of Task Force Katrina is General Russell Honore. I saw both in a rather hectic-looking live press conference earlier today – the closed captioning concluded with a slightly…
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The family cabin up Lamb’s Canyon in Utah was in use when we drove up for a look around last weekend; I was happy to see that almost everything is still maintained in the traditional way. That is, aside from the modern abominations of electricity (EE-LECK-TRICITAH!). One of my younger cousins had some guests “up” with her so we walked around, took photos, then drove back down. The pictures may not look like much, but that’s because the memories that crowd into the corners (along with the friendly ghosts) are not so easily digitized. The horseshoes hang on the wall…
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The former First Lady’s remarks were aired this evening on American Public Media’s “Marketplace” program. She was part of a group in Houston today (Monday) at the Astrodome that included her husband and former President Bill Clinton, who were chosen by her son, the current president, to head fundraising efforts for the recovery. Sen. Hilary Clinton and Sen. Barack Obama were also present. In a segment at the top of the show on the surge of evacuees to the Texas city, Barbara Bush said: “Almost everyone I’ve talked to says we’re going to move to Houston.” Then she added: “What…
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Top FEMA leaders short on experience – Yahoo! News Michael Brown, who heads FEMA as undersecretary of homeland security for emergency preparedness and response, already has endured sharp criticism for comments he made last week that seemed to suggest he did not understand that thousands of victims of Hurricane Katrina had taken refuge at the New Orleans convention center. Before joining FEMA in 2001, Brown, a protege of longtime Bush aide Joseph Allbaugh, was commissioner of the International Arabian Horse Association and had virtually no experience in disaster management. An official biography of Brown’s top aide, acting deputy director Patrick…
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Gay marriage up to governor now / Landmark legislation clears Assembly by narrowest of margins on second try It’s been too long since there was good news to report on the issue of gay marriage. Good from my point of view, that is: I’m in favor of marriage for everyone who wishes to enjoy the bonds of matrimony, especially since yesterday was our 8th wedding anniversary. Just like last year and the year before, I’ll go on record and say this: “My marriage is not threatened if my gay friends and family get hitched.” TOASTERS AND USELESS SILVERPLATE SERVING FORKS…
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Bush breaks HIV funding promise The Replenishment Meeting was widely billed as the first significant test of the promises made by world leaders at the recent G8 meeting, during worldwide MakePovertyHistory protests. The 3.7bn US dollars pledged by donors will be just enough to sustain current programmes. However there is no funding for new prevention, treatment or care programmes for 2006 and 2007. It is suggested that 7 billion US dollars was needed to adequately address funding needs. The US contribution is just 0.6 billion dollars for the next two years. For the first time since the establishment of the…
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I ran across this article about the one thousand firefighters that FEMA had sequestered for training in Atlanta in the Salt Lake Tribune, and then finally this morning I heard a piece on NPR on how the highly trained firefighters have been deployed in teams of two to affected areas… where they’re handing out FEMA flyers and referring questions about other services as best they can. It still seems like they could have used these guys to do rescue and recovery work, and find another thousand or so faceless bureaucrats to run around shining people on with “information packets.”
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We’ve returned from our short but action-packed weekend in Utah; David’s parents were also there as a surprise for my mom and in fact are still there. They’ll return tomorrow, full of tales of excitement and thrills. Sunday, for example, the 4 of us went up to my cousin’s cabin in Lamb’s Canyon just to look around, then a few miles “around the corner” to Park City for lunch and window-shopping. On a whim, we all rode the “Town Chair” ski lift up the mountain, took pictures, wandered around in a featureless and stony wasteland devoid of shopping opportunities, and…