Well what is the good news today??? China earthquake numbers are rising.
That disaster is of extra poignancy to me, because of my scholarly, friend, kin and longtime research interests there. I do have friends, professors, who live in Chengdu, Sichuan Province. There is no way to check if they are safe.
Sending our hopes for them and the thousands who are suffering or who have lost their lives. If you feel so called, make a donation to the Greater NYC Families with Children from China fund that will go especially for the Children's Homes in Sichuan Province. Donations can be made directly to www.fccny.org or by check to FCC Orphanage Assistance, PO Bos 237065 Ansonia Station, New York, NY 10023. If these homes are undamaged, which is not clear at the moment, there will be more children orphaned by virtue of the quake, in addition to children currently in care.
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After 2 very intense days, building up after months of meetings, emails, calls, and other actions, my daughter's middle school will reopen. It was closed last Friday due to asbestos contamination. It's a long story and one that can't be reiterated here, but I felt in need today of some funnies to lighten the (my!) mood. So below are some links to various funny sites and good news. And you are going to be treated to some family stories.
Log onto Walt Anderson's pokes at us boomers for some good yucks at our expense.
http://weblogs.newsday.com/news/opinion/walthandelsman/blog/2007/11/animation_baby_boomers.html
See this article in the New york Times that shows that our "senior" moments are really a longer brain processing time, because we have more memory to sort through when searching for a name or word. In other words, this processing is not just looking for a specific word, but is looking for that word in the context of associative memory and making corellations. One scientist concludes that is what we call wisdom. So be happy if you take a bit longer. That just means your brain is stuffed with LOTs of info! And as Martha would say---"That's a Good Thing!"
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/20/health/research/20brai.html?em&ex=1211428800&en=c4ac9065a0b095ec&ei=5087%0A
ig>Or go to Pittisburgh Boomer Ron Chichowicz article about reality shows in which he says the ultimate reality show would be to hang mirrors from the ceiling and watch ourselves!! Now there's a thought http://www.pittsburghboomers.com/July0406humor.htm
Or go to http://boomerbardo.com/ and contemplate whether we will be like Mick J. grooving to Rock and Roll while we are tooling around in our walkers?
Or http://www.c-boom.com/ where you can get funny stuff and other humorous things
Or http://www.humoretc.com/gcontent/geriatric.html for some good laughs and jokes.
OK now for a take on how my family dealt with the tough, sad stuff of life. My mom came from a family of 11 children, 3 child cousins and my aunt's best friend who moved in when she was 12 and left when she got married on the front porch of the house. I thought for years that my mom had 2 sisters. Well anyway..the cousins, three boys came to live there when both their parents died. In addition to the kids (14 in all) there were numerous elders and unmarrieds who lived out their final days with my grandparents. It was a rollicking, noisy, fun household by all accounts.
The two youngest Jack and Don, are the subject of side splitting stories told by my cousin Bob, a GREAT raconteur. I can't do justice to these stories. I hope to record them sometime and post them as Youtubes, but here is the flavor. One story pertains to my mother.
Kate, my mom was fourth from the bottom and the second girl. She was always trying to prove her self and so, being an ambitious dramaturge, set off in her early 20s in the late 1920s on the road, well on the rail, working for the Stewart Theatrical Company. She was the director of a company that traveled all over the south and midwest. They would arrive by rail, she would hold auditions, get the local civic organizations involved, rehearse with the locals (kids and adults in huge choruses) and then the principals would arrive a week or so later having completed the previous engagement in a previous town.
On this occasion, Kate arrived in Chillicothe, MO. where she met my future father, after a grueling several weeks traveling and in very bad weather.
She always arrived in a new town decked out in her best suit, shiny heels, jaunty hat and gloves. Remember no one had ever seen her before and there she was, as they say a mere slip of a girl, traveling alone with the reputation of the company represented by her in a time, when women traveling alone was suspect at best.
So as she decended from the train, eleganty clad, proud, but warm, kindly greeting the representatives of the major civic organizations who had come to meet her, her heel caught in the bottom step of the train car and down she went. Face down flat out in the mud.
As Mom told it, she lay there, wondering how in the h**l she was going to pull this one out and get up with any shred of dignity and credibility.
The civic reps were flummoxed as well and fluttered around her, attempting to help her up from the mud and getting mud on themselves in the process. But she shook them off and arising by herself (she always used that verb arise), she slushed off some of the mud from her face and said in her best May West voice, "Well boys, if you were worried that the show would be a flop, don't worry any more, you see I always put on a show that makes a splash!" 
So if you've had a bad day and feel that you are in the mud, just think of Kate making a "splash" instead of falling in the mud!
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