Today I discovered that Klara has something called “a cubby” at the daycare. And that is where her artwork is being held. I’ve been wondering why the teachers weren’t giving me her art pieces because I think the copyright falls with me as her legal representative. And the teachers were probably wondering what kind of a freaky mother I was not to want to pick up her baby’s art.

People should not assume that “a cubby” is a concept that is equally easily accessible to everybody. I generally have trouble with spaces that are not open to view. It never occurs to me to try to open them. 

The local Down Syndrome Clinic cancelled the appointment of a colleague’s little girl with Down Syndrome who has been with that clinic since birth.  Four days before Christmas this happened. I don’t need to explain to anybody why a Down Syndrome child really needs to have her appointments in a timely manner.

This is happening because of our insurance not paying doctors. I feel so bad for the colleague and the little girl that I think I will cry.

P.S. Rauner is a fanatical pro-lifer, by the way. But the people who choose not to abort a Down baby end up in a situation where they can’t provide care for her even though they make their insurance payments faithfully.

Merkel now says that if the perpetrator is indeed a refugee, “this would be extremely hard for us to bear,” and it “would be particularly repugnant for all those Germans, who toil daily to help refugees”.

Why?? Take any random group of over a million people and you will undoubtedly see a fair percentage of criminals, crooks, crazies, serial killers, and sociopaths. Because human beings tend to have such freaks among them. 

This is what I say about not seeing refugees as human beings. In the Madonna/whore dichotomy, those who see women as idealized, saintly Madonnas are just as bad as those who think all women are whores. The refugees aren’t Madonnas. That shouldn’t be extremely hard to bear. Don’t ask people over if you’ll keep them to a ridiculous standard of inhuman goodness. 

Klara refuses to share her teething cookies with me. Instead, she hides them, brings them to daycare, and tries to feed her little friends. Which is not allowed because everybody is afraid of allergies. But it’s still super cute to see how the first thing she does when she arrives at daycare is to try to stuff the cookies into her friends’ little mouths. 

Are people seriously talking about who’ll perform at Trump’s inauguration? And that’s the same people who just lost the election? 

What a great way to make Trump look like the only adult in the situation. 

In practical terms, Obama’s ban on drilling in the Arctic will help Putin a lot more than Trump’s impending removal of sanctions and the appointment of pro-Russian Tillerson. Russian economy isn’t tanking because of the sanctions. Sanctions are nothing. It’s tanking because of the drop in oil prices.

However, practical terms are a lot less important than emotional and psychological factors.  People are impacted not by what is but by what they think is. The realization of “We bent Americans to our will” that Trump provides and that the removal of sanctions will cement will help Russians not even notice what’s happening in their economy.