Tuesday, August 24, 2010

First Day of School and random thoughts.

OK, today is the first day of school - please to enjoy:


Given that the summer started like this, it's been an entire summer of me mostly looking forward to the return of fall. Of course, this was also one of he coldest summers I can remember, and yesterday it decided to get hot - 101 to be exact. I knew this was going to be the year that Halloween is over 100, and of course The Boys will want to be something heavily clothed and furry - a Wookie maybe? In the years where it is 50 degrees on Halloween, they want to be Michael Phelps...

Two days ago, in an apparent olive branch gesture, and a complete 180 from the 2nd day of summer break, The Boys got themselves up, and made themselves breakfast, cleared their dishes, brushed their teeth and got dressed. I was so stunned at the thoughtfulness of this simple act, that I thought I'd woken up in a parallel universe.

On to the random thoughts in my brain. A blog I follow had the most famous image of the effects of Minamata disease, and not knowing what that even was I looked it up here. One of the paragraphs that struck me was:
"When the first cases were reported and subsequently suppressed, the rights of the victims were not recognised, and they were given no compensation. Instead, the afflicted were ostracised from their community due to ignorance about the disease, as people were afraid that it was contagious."

If you keep this in mind for the next generations of the Gulf Coast of he U.S. you would do well. For although we do now know the effect of petrochemicals on humans and other living things, the company responsible is denying that there will be lasting impact, and has minimized the damage all along.
 
I was also reading Esquire this morning and contemplating the 11 people who lost their lives, and the article chronicling their lives so that we do not forget the first 11 to die from this disaster.
 
All this to say that you should celebrate your family while you can and not believe people who will only make more money by lying to your face.
 
Happy Tuesday all!

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

What a way to start the summer break! It CANNOT be as bad with the boys going back, even if there are cooler temps! But just to be certain - did you remove all deodorants, aerosal cans, etc from the house? ;)

I think that we are all dumbfounded re: the Gulf coast and the potential long term effects. Tragic, is all I can say!
xoxoxo

mizliz said...

You are so funny! I love your humor but more than that I love your heart. You are a good person Jeannine and I am proud to call you friend.