Yay or Nay??

For over 17 years I have been a three times a week workout guy at American Family Fitness in Short Pump. Or, at least I was until it was closed down back in early March due to COVID. When you’ve done something for that long it becomes an integral part of your life. The reasons that I have been so committed to working out three times a week are complicated. Yes, exercise is good for my health, but it’s more than that. For me the primary benefit is stress relief. I always go around 3 o’clock in the afternoon when the crowd has thinned out. I do 45 minutes of cardio, then some light weights, hit up the sauna and pool, then take a quick shower and head home. Takes an hour and fifteen minutes. Three times a week. For almost 18 years.

Back in March, April and May AmFam was good enough to forego my membership dues. But for the last two months they have started hitting up the checking account for the fee on the first of the month. In June, Pam and I were still in super cautious mode, not wanting to catch anything that might jeopardize Maine. In July, we were in Maine the whole month. Now that I’m back, it’s time to consider returning. To that end, I thought I would head over and check the place out yesterday afternoon, to see what changes they had made. They were gracious enough to allow me to take pictures, a practice they normally frown upon, since they knew that I needed to convince the COVID police, ie...my wife! Here’s what I found:

No steam room. No sauna.

No basketball.

Social distancing at AmFam is 10 feet, not 6 feet.

No more free water.

Literally every machine of every description has it’s own disinfectant spray bottle.

Upon entering the facility, everyone must take and use a blue wiping off equipment towel.

Don’t get too close in the locker room, fellas.

Only use the equipment without the red cones!!

I went over right around lunch hour which is normally a busy time. On the entire first floor I saw maybe four and five people. I asked Al, the manager, about the crowds. he pointed to the nearly empty floor and said, This is about how it is all the time...

So, what say you? Should a 62 year old man with more than his share of risk factors go back...or not?

The Wages of Fame

Since my return from Maine I have gotten back into the rhythm of my normal life, which includes a daily dose of news with my first cup of coffee. I’ve learned of Donald Trump’s plans to cling to office after the 2020 election, even if he loses. I’ve been brought up to speed on the 60 day protest lalapalooza that is Portland, Oregon. I have learned about the nine women who are being considered as Joe Biden’s running mate. I’m all caught up on the latest leaks from the Jeffrey Epstein case, including the shocking news that Bill Clinton was seen on the premises of Pedo Island with not one, but two underage girls on his arms. But, honestly, the story that has captured my imagination the most is the Fall of Ellen DeGeneres. Holy Crap.

Ellen has been on an unprecedented roll for what seems like decades now. The heiress to the vacated Oprah throne, Ellen had it all. She was funny and cute. Her show featured super fun stunts and gags. She was reliably progressive, famously lesbian, and all of the beautiful people adored her. What could possibly go wrong? I mean, seriously...if anyone in Hollywood was bulletproof it had to be her, right? Sure, Harvey Weinstein was powerful, but he was a man, and a Jewish one at that, in the age of #METOO. But, Ellen DeGeneres?? Untouchable, one would think.

Confession, back in the days before COVID when I was a three days a week American Family guy, I would find myself on the treadmill during the airing of her show, so I watched it quite often, sometimes with subtitles sometimes without. Either way I always found her incredibly charming and funny. I particularly liked her sign off line...be kind. Now, if I understand correctly, her show was a hot mess of racism, and sexual misconduct and Ellen herself was a diva-tyrant.

I have no idea what to think about it all. Does it really surprise me that a Hollywood type would wind up being an epic phoney baloney? Of course not. But on the other hand, isn’t this always the way? Isn’t this what we do to every big shot in this country? We love our stars...right up until the moment when we don’t. We applaud them during their ascension, then watch, transfixed, when they crash back down to Earth. It’s like a parlor game with us. Most of the faux friendships that Ellen cultivated when she was Queen vanished into thin air at the first whiff of scandal. She has become untouchable. That Quick.

Fame is fleeting, they say. But in America, too often, when it exits your body it leaves you with nothing.

I think I’ll pass.

Back To Church

On Sunday morning, March the 8th, 2020, Pam and I attended the 11:00 worship service at Hope Church. We didn’t know it at the time, but it would be the last time we walked through the doors of our church. The following week Hope announced a temporary suspension of Sunday gatherings because of the COVID outbreak. This morning, 21 weeks later, we are headed back to church. Much has changed.

For one thing, we had to RSVP online to secure a seat in this limited reopening. The gathering has a limited number of openings. The main auditorium is closed to the congregation, those attending will be gathering in three different spaces on the campus, watching the live service taking place in the main auditorium via Live stream screens erected in The Lodge, the movie room in the children’s department, and the multi-purpose room. Seats will be grouped for families and couples, but in a socially distant configuration. I’m not sure what the mask protocol is but I would imagine we will be wearing them. No physical offering will be collected. No coffee service.

It’s going to feel very strange. During this 21 week layoff Pam and I have watched many services on Hope’s live stream. Although they were better than nothing and they consistently improved week to week, we quickly grew tired of them. They were clunky and flat and I suppose they couldn’t possibly have been anything else. Our pastors didn’t sign up for preaching in an empty television studio, which is what our auditorium had been transformed into, and it showed. But, at least we could see their faces, hear a word from them. That helped. But something was missing...the rest of us, the church.

Today, I will see people, I will recognize pairs of eyes peaking out from the top of these accursed masks. I will strike up more conversations than I ever do on any other Sunday. I want to hear from others in my church. How have they been? Are they holding up? There won’t be any hugs on hand shakes. Will there ever be again? But I will elbow pump a few folks, air hug a few others. I will send my offering using the pay portal on the Hope app. Much has changed.

But today is a great day. I get to go to church. Inside a church building. Along side a collection of wonderful, kind, nervous, and flawed people who are, every one, just as wonderful, kind, nervous and flawed as I will be.

Can’t. Wait.

Friday Frustration

Yesterday wasn’t a good day in our politics, although admittedly, the bar is exceedingly low on that score. What would a good day look like?

First there was the absurd theatre of Mitch McConnell vs. Nancy Pelosi, two of the crustiest fossils on Capital Hill, negotiating over how many trillions of dollars the latest COVID relief package is going to be. Over the past four months in four different bills Congress has already spent 3 trillion dollars on Covid relief. This latest package will be between one and three trillion more, depending on which fossil prevails. Not one penny of these trillions of dollars was money that we actually...have. So, all of it was borrowed, a veritable geyser of red ink spewing forth from the Capital Dome. Thus we were treated to the preposterous assertion that Mitch McConnell’s one trillion dollar offer was miserly. 

How much is a trillion dollars, you ask? See, here’s the thing. You and I can’t fathom such a sum. We hear the word trillion and we think... a large sum, but we can’t comprehend such a number. Here’s how much one trillion is...if you went back to the year of our savior’s birth and began spending one million dollars every single day for the past 2020 years...you would still have over 250 billion dollars left. The United States of America currently has 24 trillion dollars of debt...before the two fossils come to an agreement over how much more to pile on top. How many of our leaders are troubled by this Mount Everest of debt and the every increasing percentage of the federal budget required to service it? None. Zero. In fact, our elected officials are busy coming up with even more ways to spend money we don’t have. There are serious people making serious proposals for free college education for all, a wiping out of student debt, universal health care, government paid daycare, even slavery reparations is now in the mix. I watch it all in a befuddled daze.

Then there’s this...yesterday, President Trump’s Twitter Feed—the inflamed canker sore on the lip of the Country—belched forth yet another towering pile of nonsense onto the body politic:

“With Universal Mail-In Voting (not Absentee Voting, which is good), 2020 will be the most INACCURATE & FRAUDULENT Election in history. It will be a great embarrassment to the USA. Delay the Election until people can properly, securely and safely vote???”

 

Where in the world to begin? Politicians of every stripe have always complained about the fairness of elections, especially the ones they lose. It’s an American tradition. Remember 1960 when John Kennedy inched out Richard Nixon? That was only because Democratic Mayor, Richard Daley saw to it that 9,000 recently departed Chicagoans pulled the lever for Kennedy, giving him the electoral votes of the great state of Illinois!! So, complaining about election fraud is nothing new. What is new is complaining about election fraud in an election that hasn’t taken place yet, when the one doing the complaining is the sitting President who hopes to be on the ballot!! Aside from Trump’s incessant need to be the center of every conversation, this Tweet had one purpose and one purpose only...to delegitimization an election that he believes he’s going to lose. If he can sew enough doubt in the reliability of the count, he will always be able to say in his dotage, “I never lost an election, I was robbed.” To their credit, Republican leaders were quick and unanimous in their rejection of this foolishness. This country, through pestilence, peril and even civil war, has never postponed a Presidential election, and we are not about to start now just to assuage Donald Trump’s fragile ego.

DISCLAIMER: Since this is a political blog post, many of you will be furious with the opinions expressed here and feel the need to engage me in debate about this point or that. However, it should be noted that this post was written not to persuade any of you, but rather to get a great deal of frustration off my chest. If you find yourself itching to rip my opinions to shreds, I have a suggestion for you....start your own blog.

What’s YOUR Plan Today?

On this morning, I am thankful. Everywhere I look people are suffering. I am not, and for this I am grateful.

I am thankful that my health is good, that nobody I am close to has come down with COVID.

I am thankful that my business has not been set upon by rock-throwing rioters, indeed, that I have a business that has been able to weather the disruptions of 2020.

I am thankful that I no longer have school aged children with all of the impending disruptions that virtual learning will visit upon those families.

I am thankful that my kids are healthy, employed and safe.

But, many of my clients haven’t been so fortunate. Many are hurting, their health and their fortunes are being compromised by things that they cannot control. Some have been furloughed, others have lost their jobs entirely. Seed corn which had been set aside for the future is being eaten now out of necessity.

My job, as I currently understand it, is to be on the lookout for people who haven’t been so lucky. Is there someone I will encounter today to whom I might be a blessing? Will God place someone in my path today who I am uniquely suited to help? If he does, will I be paying close enough attention to notice...and act? That’s the plan today. It’s the plan every day. Wish me luck.

All that is being asked of me at the moment, in exchange for all of this good fortune, is to wear a freaking mask when I enter a public accommodation.

I got this.

Something We Can All Agree On

It hasn’t taken me long to discover that we are still at each other’s throats. Despite all of the positive vibes I was sending out into the world while in Maine, America is still a nation at war with itself. I don’t even have to watch the news or read a newspaper. All I have to do is flip through my Facebook feed to see the hostility. We seem to be bitterly divided about...everything.

We can’t agree that wearing a mask in the middle of a pandemic might be a smart thing. Hell, we can’t even agree that COVID-19 is a pandemic. 

We remain stubbornly opposed on the subject of how or even if schools should reopen this fall. In this argument, many teachers find themselves disagreeing with parents, administrators and various elected officials.

The removal of Confederate statues and other symbols of racism throughout the country has done very little to assuage the appetite for protest in many American cities. Portland, Oregon seems intent on reinventing agitprop, creating all new ways to raise hell. Even here we are divided, some viewing these protests as blatant Marxist agitation, others convinced that the federal response is proof that Trump is at heart a Fascist.

Policemen have been cast as the enemy of the people by many, a tool of the establishment whose only real job is to protect property, this despite the gazillion dollars spent each year investigating murder and assault by police departments all over the country. Others view them as an unfairly besieged thin blue line of noble public servants who do ridiculously dangerous work for low pay only to be spit upon by rabble rousing malcontents. Many people view police tactics as severely flawed, far too violent and confrontational. Others believe that overly restrictive rules of engagement make it virtually impossible for them to do their jobs.

No matter what side people find themselves on in these fierce debates, we all seem to agree on one thing...it’s the government’s job to fix it. Those on the right want the government to crack down hard on rioters, and force schools to reopen despite health concerns. Those on the left demand the government continue handing out checks for every conceivable inequality that exists. 

So, maybe we have stumbled upon an area of agreement at long last....we all want the government to save us from...them.

Time For Your Vote

Y’all. The heat...

My first day back at the office was going pretty well, right up until the moment I stepped out to go get a much needed haircut at 11:00 am...

When I got home, I walked upstairs only to discover that my wife was already preparing my body for the viewing...

Don’t even ask me what the heck that is laying on the day bed in my house. It’s the sort of thing that a man doesn’t want or need to know when it’s 98 degrees outside. My nephew’s fiancé is living with us now. I assume that this body has something to do with her. 

Ok, while we were in Maine, my wife began just letting her hair go every morning. Instead of the hour it takes to blow dry, curling iron, and God knows what else she normally does in the morning, she just decided to go all natural. I LOVE IT. She’s not so sure. So, on our drive home she sent her pack of girl friends a side by side picture asking for their vote...

Her posse responded with a decisive landslide vote in favor of the lake house hair on the right. Which is better, Suburban Pam or Lake House Pam? Set aside for a moment the fact that Pam seemed far more interested in her girl friends’ opinions than mine. The real problem with this is simple...can anyone imagine a man doing this? How about if I sent a group text to a bunch of my guy friends saying something like, “Hey guys, trying to decide what’s a better look for me, this slim cut polo shirt or the fuller figure button down?” I just can’t imagine anything worse than how I would feel if one of my friends wanted fashion advice from...me?? I mean, how pathetic! But just for fun, I decided to give it a try...

On the left is button downed Doug, cotton dress shirt, silk tie, in my office. The dude on the right is in his kayak on the lake.

Or what about this shot, which admittedly has been manipulated to hide the extra vacation poundage of my gut. So which is better? Button down Doug or Lake Doug?