The Brits have saved my sanity during the pandemic, from the meditation app where a calm, lilting voice calms me down to the encouraging couple on my exercise videos exclaiming, “Blimey!” But the highlight has been British television, and it isn't just because those fabulous accents make even the tersest dialogue sound soothing. Nope, it's …
As we start new future, we must agree on facts
Condensed from my original column published Sunday, Jan. 17, in the Arizona Daily Star, which you can find here. I’d originally planned this week to pen a column about how British TV can save your mental health while you endure pandemic isolation as local officials write memos about how they’re trying to launch a mass …
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If COVID affected something other than lungs
My Sunday column in the Arizona Daily Star this week touched a tiny bit of a nerve, if my in-box is accurate. Most readers thought the column - which wondered aloud about a new virus that made a certain percentage of men permanently incontinent and impotent - was spot-on. Yes, those emails said, if COVID …
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COVID and politics got you filled with hate? Me, too.
... but I hope there's a better way. I know it is almost impossible to listen to someone who is spouting falsehoods, but in my most recent column for the Arizona Daily Star, I examine how hatred of the other is destroying me and how I want to find a better way. Part of that …
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College and COVID
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recently said young adults might be driving the increase in U.S. COVID-19 cases. The response of anyone who’s been paying even the slightest attention to the pandemic has to be: “Ya think?” Probably accompanied by a slapping of the forehead or eating an entire quart of ice cream. …
You want school amid COVID? Take it outside.
Everyone's clamoring to get back to school. Children want it, employers want it and parents are dying for it. Everyone wants it so badly that they're willing to take a huge risk with the lives of children and teachers - and by extension, their families. Set aside the fact that schools have become far more …
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#blacklivesmatter & where I’ve been
Nearly eight months ago, in October, I was in a bad car wreck. Not my fault, and although the other party was cited, perhaps it was all just a random "accident." Whatever it was, the result was a traumatic brain injury for me, from which I haven't recovered, despite numerous doctors, therapies, rehabs, etc. Latest …
Pet peeves & adventure list update!
Can we all agree that the following things are universally irritating: People looking at their phone when they meet you for dinner or coffee. People talking loudly in a movie theater during the previews. People blasting rap music out of their car. For once I'd like to hear The Beatles. Anyone standing behind a counter …
Yes, I do want all your guns
The line in the story Sunday about the mass shooting at an El Paso Walmart hit me hard: "Her 19-year-old daughter and 16-year-old son threw themselves to the ground, then ran out of the store through an emergency exit." This is what we've come to: So many mass shootings for so many years that an …
Separation of church and state, or why I hate patriotism in Mass
The 4th of July is a wonderful holiday, and you're not going to see me turning away a brat, baseball or fireworks today. Not to mention, I love me a good John Philip Sousa march as much as the next American. Indeed some of my happiest memories involve sitting in our neighbor's backyard in Denton, …
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Renee Wrote This 