Laura's Notes and Links
No big essay today
I woke up this morning with a sore throat and immediately took a COVID test. Negative. How many COVID tests have you taken this year? I don’t even need to read the directions anymore. Will these morning COVID tests, whenever we have allergies or a little sniffle, never go away?
I probably just have the usual bug that one gets from working with small children with fingers up their noses. Because I don’t have enough on my plate, I started subbing in the local schools once a week. The kids are adorable, and it’s nice to have one day away from the computer.
When I’m there, I run around all day with no time to check social media. Seven hours without taking a hit from the Internet bong is actually really nice. I’m surprisingly cool without being Always Online. Who knew?
Anyway, that’s a long way of saying that I’m not feeling super well today or very creative, so I’m just going to pass along some thoughts and links today.
All the tech layoffs are hitting the 20-somethings pretty hard. Actually, I’m hearing a lot of chatter from young people around here, who are getting laid off or can't find work in many fields. Is this a blip or something worse?
It’s Chinese New Year. Year of the Rabbit [edit]. We met up with friends for a fabulous meal in Chinatown last night at Hwa Yuan. Peking duck, long noodles, crispy beef. Totally yum.
Staircases are a huge motif in Hollywood musicals. The NYT has a great interactive article with clips of dancers doing their things on stairs. But it left out one of my favorites! I’ll Build a Stairway to Paradise.
SCOTUS Considers When Students With Disabilities Can Sue for Damages - I’m following this case closely.
“Guilt is the dark shadow of parenting. Most parents have a regret or two.” This week on my autism newsletter, I talked about tough parenting decisions.
Last weekend, we took Ian to one of the new mega-malls, where its more about entertainment and food than shopping. It was god awful. We live 30 minutes from Manhattan, which has the best entertainment and food in the world. I just don’t get this. Except Ian had a great time, and it was definitely a good destination for young families on a cold and rainy weekend.
This year, we planned a year’s worth of vacations and trips in January, because we wanted to prioritize those experiences and make a yearly budget. So far, we’re doing a ski trip in Vermont in February, taking Ian to Orlando for his 21st birthday in April, and traveling to Italy in June. Jonah will join us for the ski trip in Vermont, but it will be just Ian and Steve and I for the other trips. I might join Steve for a work trip to Chicago in May. That’s it so far. The rest of the year will be probably be small stuff – camping and day trips.
What happened when a South Carolina city embraced career education for all its students
American Religion Is Not Dead Yet: Participation in traditional houses of worship is in decline, but innovation and growth are happening elsewhere.
Steve’s homemade ravioli:
Cheap Food Items To Buy When They’re On Sale – Making big batches of beans in the slow cooker and then freezing them in freezer bags was a game changer for us. They taste much better than the canned kind. Nicer texture. And practically free.
GOOP is taking a lot of crap for her detox diet, but this salad looks pretty good to me.
Rich people at the front row of fashion shows are pretty awful. Can we make this stop?
Publishers know how to get books on the best seller list. Fun fact. They have to accept all the returns later on, where they gather dust in warehouses and are eventually destroyed.
Just to clarify; It's year of the rabbit. The snake was a few years back.