Wednesday, November 05, 2014

Post Election Red, White & Blues

Patriotic Basket ID: 206570
When your team like the Baltimore Ravens beats the Pittsburgh Steelers, nothing in your life changes fundamentally, other than a temporary emotional response. And a discount on Papa Johns pizza, but I wouldn't call that a "win". When your team like the Ravens loses to the Steelers, the same holds true. Because that's sports.

Politics is played like sports. Team colors, trash talking and a really subjective view, especially when a flag is thrown and penalties are called on your team. But governing is not politics. It is not sports. And it has many impacts on our lives. And it isn't down to one leader (President, Governor, Senator), or body (Congress, Justice Department, DMV), but the whole dysfunctional system.

They don't read your Facebook posts, but they do read your emails, petitions, letters and phone messages. Regardless of your "side", which for many truly is neither, I like to think the team is all of us. So I'll continue to vote, and continue to write and call the many different people in the system. It may not make the change I want directly, but it does make a difference.

Thursday, September 11, 2014

9/11 Thirteen Years Later - I'm Listening

I shared the following on Facebook this morning. I thought it was worth sharing here.

The world changed 13 years ago today. A lot of innocents were lost in a moment. "Never forget" almost sounds insulting. How can anyone forget what happened that day? The days after? The months after? The years after?

For whatever reason, our timelines are peppered every single day with divisiveness, snark, anger, hatred. I would hope we can move back to face-to-face, one-on-one civil conversations over coffee, or juice, or Kombucha, or whatever your beverage of choice is and just talk to each other. And not just about the issues but the solutions. And, more importantly, each other.

We seem to spend so much time trying to be heard we forgot how to listen. I know I'm guilty of that and am trying to do better. I think that's the best way I can honor those who have fallen before me.

Saturday, June 07, 2014

Previously on Twitter - May 2014


I wanted to try something new. I love Twitter simply for the clearinghouse it offers my brain for jokes, especially the ones I'm not using in a script. But tweeting a joke is like pouring a Dixie cup of water into the Atlantic. They still make Dixie cups, right? I'm tossing 140 characters or less into a stream of millions of other tweets posting at the same time. So I decided to go fishing in my own Twitter stream (apologies), and paste some of those jokes here. With Twitter's embed feature, they look prettier than a copy/paste. And because they're embedded, I'll stick to a monthly post so it doesn't take too much time to load. Enjoy!


Jokes

On the Serious Side

From @midnight's Hashtag Game