Here in America, to get vaccinated for Covid-19, you must first get an appointment. Each state, each county, and even individual cities may have different online systems where you set up your appointment. The pharmacies all have their own websites too.

The appointments are in great demand and you’ve got to check back over and over again to find an opening. And they haven’t even opened up eligibility to all adults yet.

When vaccines first became available, many older adults had trouble deciphering the many online ways to find a vaccine. Often, when they tried calling a number, they were…

When the world shut down, and we were all forced to stay at home, I vowed to run more. It started off great. Going outside was one of the few things I could do, and running provided the escape I needed from my new reality.

Where I went wrong was all the baking. I needed something to do, and I wanted to cheer my child up, who was now stuck at home doing virtual lessons and missing end-of-year activities. So I baked up a storm. I made sourdough bread from a starter gifted from a neighbor, banana bread, homemade pasta…

I write for Newsbreak, and I rarely read the comments. If you have any experience with Newsbreak yourself, you’ll know why.

I recently wrote what I thought was an uplifting piece about food pantries growing gardens full of produce to help feed extra demands they’ve faced during the pandemic. I thought it was resourceful to have either started gardens or expanded existing ones.

The Newsbreak community does not share my enthusiasm. I broke my rule and read the following comment:

“What about crime? The city is a dump.”

I was lucky. That was merely a mildly negative comment. But it makes me think, what does this person want? Does he want me to write about crime? Does he want nonprofit food pantry volunteers to deputize themselves and hit the streets like Batman?

If you’re interested in writing for these lovelies, here’s my referral link (thanks for the idea Stephen Dalton!)

I don’t like naps. Don’t get me wrong. I like the idea of naps in theory, but in actual practice, they don’t usually make me feel any better. Instead, I get the opposite effect. When I wake up from a nap, I generally feel groggy and confused, and it continues the rest of the day. Then when it’s time to fall asleep at night, I find myself tossing and turning.

Therefore, I usually avoid naps unless I am sick or very sleep-deprived. Yesterday, I had a terrible headache and thought I should lie down and rest for a few minutes…

If Fox News thought conservatives could find an ally in their culture wars from the generation born from 1965 to 1980, they were terribly mistaken. It all began with an opinion piece by Matthew Hennessey in the New York Post, with an appeal to the slacker generation for help dealing with cancel culture.

“Gen X has a reputation of defending their freedoms,” he pleaded.

Senator Ted Cruz got in on the fun by tweeting a link to the story. And then Fox News picked up on it, and that’s when the fun really began.

Fox News, Matthew Hennessey, and Sen…

It was one of the first things that surprised me when I first moved here from Kansas. Throngs of people came out to watch the Chicago River get dyed the brightest green you’ve ever seen. This is not a subtle shade of green. This is a stunning, bright, cheerful color.

But nobody expected it this year. City officials stayed quiet and most journalists had reported since there would be no parade, there would be no river dyeing either. But, the city had a little surprise up its sleeve yesterday morning when the river was dyed its bright shade of green…

Elyse Pahler was a typical teenage girl. On the night of her murder, July 22, 1995, she did what teenage girls do all the time. She left her home in Arroyo Grande, California to hang out with friends. They planned to smoke marijuana in a nearby eucalyptus grove.

The teenagers Elyse left with, her killers, were three boys she knew well. Jacob Delashmutt, Joseph Fiorella, and Royce Casey. They were around her age. …

“I believe the road to hell is paved with adverbs.” — Stephen King

Almost every writer has heard that quote more than once. Chances are you have it memorized.

What is so bad about adverbs? King suggests adverbs are like weeds, if you let one go, the roots will spread and you’ll be overtaken. Here’s the full quote:

“I believe the road to hell is paved with adverbs, and I will shout it from the rooftops. To put it another way, they’re like dandelions. If you have one on your lawn, it looks pretty and unique. If you fail to…