Category: Everything Else

A Friday Round Up – What’s Going On?

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Short Notes About Different, Interesting Things Recently Catching Our Attention

A Friday Tradition

We lived for several years in the Washington, DC area. This meant that WAMU was our PBS radio station. WAMU had a flagship program called The Friday Round Up, hosted by the legendary Diane Rehm. It featured a recap of things from the last week or so that merited highlighting. It was a favorite program of ours for many years.

With a tip of the hat to Diane and her successors, today introduces the Agents of Reason version of The Friday Round Up.

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Valentine’s Day Is Different This Year

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After 2020, Celebration of the One You Love Goes Deeper

 

What’s the Deal With Valentine’s Day, Anyway?

Let’s be honest. Valentine’s Day as we know it is a creation for the most part by greeting card, candy, and flower vendors. It actually has a long and interesting history. It was originally a Roman holiday, dedicated to the coming of Spring and celebrating fertility. Young women and men were paired up around the holiday.

In the 5th Century, the pope followed what had become a frequent Christian policy of appropriating pagan holidays.

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Water – Essence of Life, Destroyer of Life

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Nothing is So Pervasive, So Important to Life, and So Challenging as Water

A Change of Pace

We have focused on political issues for the last six months. As well we should have. We will continue that path often in the months ahead, for obvious reasons. But this blog was always meant to be about more. We have spent time together reflecting on science, the arts, comedy, and more. Time to do a bit of that now.

We have earned a bit of a break from politics, starting today. Let us reflect a bit on something all around us and in us.

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Pillars for a Better America, Chapter 6

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A Series on Priorities for the Biden Administration

 

It’s Primary Day in Georgia

We are all tuned into Georgia now for sure. Who could have ever foreseen this turn of events? Certainly not I. It has been quite the roller coaster. How that set of races go will determine how much will be accomplished.

Too close to call and it still feels like a pair of Hail Mary passes, but it is at least possible. I have new respect for Tracy Abrams as an organizer. What they have done in Georgia is nothing short of remarkable.

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The Pick of the Litter for 2020 – Useful for 2021, Too

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You and I Shared 141 (!) Blogs This Year – Here are My Favorites (and maybe yours, too)

The Tradition of the Year End Review

Many writers and publishers do a Best of the Year publication at the end of every year. It’s a normal response to the turning of the calendar page into a new year. I have often suspected they did this to save the work of writing yet one more blog on the day the review is published. Having done this a couple of times now, I know better. It’s more work than one might expect going through your own work with an eye toward grading the outcomes.

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Tis the Season! Which Season? Pick One!

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Taking a Moment on This Day to Reflect Back and to Look Ahead

 

Whose Holiday is It?

Some years ago, a certain TV Network hit on a marketing ploy that gave them a lot of marketing juice. Thus the “war on Christmas.” Began. And it returns every year. But not here, not today.

In the land of this blog, we get it that many, many cultural and religious passages are noted by their respective followers. “Happy Holidays” or “Season’s Greetings” simply means the sender is celebrating a special time of year to them and they wish others to have the same experience,

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Pillars for a Better America – Chapter 3

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Pillars for a Better America – Pillars 7-9

 

As noted earlier, the list will run up until the inauguration. It is not all inclusive, nor is it presented in priority order. It offers important choices for the new administration to tackle.

This is a mix of domestic and international, of national and regional/local. This list exists in part to address our requirements and shortfalls. It is also exists to encourage dialogue about what we want to be as a country. We need t to get things done.

What Do We Have So Far?

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Time for My Inner Grinch to Speak

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The Choices Some of Us Make About Holiday Travel Endangers Us All

 

Hear Ye, Hear Ye

Thanksgiving has come and gone. Christmas is a few weeks away. An ideal time for my Grinch to speak out. The subject at hand: personal decisions about holiday travel.

What is at Play Here

Pandemics are interesting. They are so universal where they strike. Yet how much they spread depends to a great extent on individual, personal decisions. The current pandemic and people’s decisions about gathering are a classic case in point.

The variables are government (in)action,

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Thinking About Thanksgiving Through a 2020 Filter

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The Idea of Thanksgiving is Both Challenged and Reinforced This Year

 

It is Still 2020

Boy, is this ever a year we will all be glad to close the books on. In some ways Thanksgiving is no exception. Plans and traditions are disrupted for most of us for this most American of holidays. Still, it is not too much of a stretch to reflect on how very much many of us can be grateful for, even this year. Let’s take a small inventory.

You Can Be Grateful If…

  • You don’t have and have not had COVID 19
  • No one close to you has died from the pandemic virus
  • If you are working and you still have a job (and health insurance)
  • You have access to some technology that lets you see and hear those you would like to be with in person.

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Hope, Promise, and Fun from Science and Technology

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It Will be Hard to Avoid Politics for the Next Couple of Months. Let’s Take a Brain Break

Part of our Hey! Look at That! Series

We are in a time of challenge, tension, and reasons to worry. We have been here before in many ways, I note, on this the anniversary of the terrorism of 9/11. Still, even in times of risk and fear, there is also hope and good news. I thought we might take a one day break today to look at some of those things, take a deep breath,

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