World Without Murdoch

Dear Readers,

Did you see Jon Stewart and John Oliver's skewering Rupert Murdoch and his "news" empire?

And here's something even better, for your viewing pleasure: Fry and Laurie show what the world would have been like if Rupert Murdoch had never been born.

Enjoy, Dear Readers!

Best,

Madame L

The Sunday Book Review, July 10, 2011: A Continual Feast

"A Continual Feast," by Jan Karon, is a compilation of some of the favorite quotes of Karon's fictional Father Tim, the rector for the small North Carolina town of Mitford. 

Madame L found this book at the last-chance discount table at her local college bookstore and snapped it up. 

She has given it permanent place in her bedside reading collection, or, as she must call it if she were to be entirely honest, her bedside reading pile.

If you haven't read any of the Mitford books, you simply must. Begin with "At Home in Mitford," and continue through the end of the whole series. Enjoying these books does not require you to be of the same religious denomination as Father Tim, who loves everyone of every denomination, just as his mentor and Savior Jesus Christ taught us all to do.

Here are five of Madame L's favorite quotes from "A Continual Feast":

---Day by day we are given not what we want but what we need. Sometimes it is a feast and sometimes ... swept crumbs, but by faith we believe it is enough. --- Barbara Brown Taylor

---One of the most tragic things I know about human nature is that all of us tend to put off living. We are all dreaming of some magical rose garden over the horizon --- instead of enjoying the roses that (bloom) outside our windows today. --- Dale Carnegie

---Our real blessings often appear to us in the shape of pains, losses and disappointments; but let us have patience and we shall soon see them in their proper figures. --- Joseph Addison

---A ship in harbor is safe --- but that is not what ships are made for. --- John A. Shedd

---God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work. --- II Corinthians 9:8 (NIV)

The Worst That Could Happen?

Dear Madame L,

Hi, I'm the person who wrote about my bad/weird boss, and I want to let you know how that worked out. 

First of all, I didn't quit, which was one of the suggestions you made. What good would that do, anyway? All the time and effort I'd put into that project would have been wasted.

Secondly, I simply realized that while all life events change us, and working in an unpleasant environment for any period of time can change one, and did change me. Dealing with this difficult manager had turned me (temporarily, of course) into an extremely hesitant and anxious person. 

Here's an example: I sent this bad/weird/difficult manager/boss an email message a few months ago asking, in the least confrontational terms possible, for a reply to a message which I had sent him a week earlier. It took me hours to pick up my courage to write that email message, and then it took me another half an hour to get around to checking my email to see if he'd replied.

Talk about a lose-lose situation: If I write the email message, he'll be angry and defensive. If I don't write the email message, he'll tell me later, when everything goes south, that it was my fault for not reminding him.

So I asked myself, what's the worst that could happen? Either way, I set myself up for a nasty-gram. Thinking through it that way was what helped me get around finally to sending that message --- and then realizing that putting it off wouldn't soften the blow helped me get around to checking for a reply.

And guess what: No reply. Was I relieved? Not really. I was on tenterhooks again, as I had been all week since I sent the original message.

So, Madame L, here's the good news: I've learned to deal with this by going back to the more wholesome and fully rounded human I was before starting to deal with this person. I do the things I would be doing if all my interactions with him were finished, the things I had unwisely set aside for way too long.

For example, I called my Relief Society president a few months ago and asked if I could be a visiting teacher again. (I'd asked to be released from that calling when I was working long hours and most weekends on this job, and had let myself continue to be overwhelmed with feelings of being too rushed and busy to spend time with my sisters, and suddenly realized I needed their influence in my life.) And what a blessing it has been to spend time with my LDS sisters. I even carpooled with a group of sisters to the Portland Temple, got to know some I hadn't interacted with before, and renewed friendships with others.

And here's another wonderful example: I've hosted two little parties (so far) for my Primary class. At the first one, we ate pizza and decorated sugar cookies, and made Mother's Day cards and gifts for their moms. At the second one, we ate quesadillas and made Father's Day gifts for their dads.

Yeah, so, the worst that could happen? Hah! That already happened, and I'm over it now, and moving right along...But my point is that doing all that helped me gain some perspective about my situation and that bad/weird/difficult boss/manager. And getting that perspective helped me stick it out and....FINISH! Yes, I'm done. I'm out of there.

So, thanks for your advice, and most of all for reading and responding. Because that's mostly what anyone needs, isn't it, an understanding ear, a shoulder to cry on --- not necessarily some definitive answer.

Best (as you always write),

Over It Now

 Dear Over It,

Thanks for writing! Congratulations on sticking it out and finishing it. Please note that Madame L did not actually advise you to quit, but to finish as soon as possible, and that's what you did.

Good luck,

Madame L

Terrorists in Congress?

Dear Madame L,

I just read an article calling House Leader Boehner and other Republican members of the U.S. House of Representatives "terrorists" over the debt ceiling crisis.

Isn't that a little harsh?

Sincerely,

Worried

Dear Sincerely Worried,

Madame L does not think that word is too harsh, as it represents actions by those members of Congress that hold the U.S. Middle Class, poor, elderly, students, and children essentially as hostages to the greed of rich people and corporations.

If the U.S. Congress does not raise the debt ceiling by early August, the U.S. government will default on its loans. Other nations, looking to us for leadership, will stop trusting our financial institutions. Our national economy and the international economy will both falter. The American prosperity which was thrown into disarray by thte politically and economically disastrous actions of the Bush administration, and which Pres. Barack Obama had hopes of correcting, will be thrown into further chaos. The recession we might have started to come out of will get worse.

Madame L thinks the solution is simple, but does not think the Republican members of Congress will agree to it: Raise taxes on people earning over $250,000 a year, and close loopholes for large corporations (the 35% corporate tax rate is a joke, as major corporations generally pay less than half of that because of loopholes).

Cutting taxes has NEVER worked in our modern economy. It has not inspired corporations to create jobs, it has not helped money "trickle down" from the wealthy to the ordinary average citizens, it has not brought any jobs back from overseas, and it has never come close to balancing a budget.

What do corporations do with the tax benefits granted them through loopholes? They have never created jobs with that money. They have increased dividends for stockholders, increased pay for CEOs and board chairmen, and plowed money back into the company's coffers. 

What do wealthy people do with their tax benefits? The majority of them sock it in the bank, or, actually, they buy more stocks with it.

Salon.com's Joan Walsh writes convincingly about the ways that the Republicans in Congress are now holding us all hostage.  Jared Bernstein writes about how easy --- really! --- easy! --- it would be to "get to a trillion."

Newspapers and TV news broadcasts are full of stories (such as this one about $137,000 in Medicaid funds going to Michele Bachmann's husband's clinic) about Republican members of Congress who rail against government spending while gleaning $$$ millions $$$ for themselves and their districts. 

Read them and weep. And then write to your Representative and both Senators.

In sum, Madame L thinks that "terrorism" is a good description of the current behavior of Boehner et al. And it worries her, too!

Best,

Madame L

My Boss is a Jerk

Dear Madame L,

I work for someone who has a very hands-off approach to our work, except when he himself is under pressure.

I'm not the only one who struggles to produce satisfactory results without any input, being told when we do ask for some advice that the boss is "overwhelmed" but will get back to us later. That's understandable, and anyway he's the boss so what can we do?

But then, when that "later" comes around, the boss e-mails us that he has to put off our meeting until sometime next week because he won't be in the office that day. He doesn't realize (or doesn't care) that we all know he's going skiing.

When he is ready and rested, though, after a week, say, of skiing, the boss gets very upset if we're not available when he passes by our cubicles to check on our work.

He's the boss, though, so who's going to call him on it? Nobody, that's who.

Sincerely,

Frustrated

Dear Frustrated,

You didn't really ask a question for Madame L to answer, so Madame L is going to ask you a question or two:

Are you by any chance the person who wrote to Madame L earlier about not wanting to tell a potential new employee the truth about your boss?

You are, aren't you!

So, what are you still doing there? Madame L asks only because she guesses you need another push.

Sincerely, your friend and ally,

Madame L

The Sunday Book Review, July 3, 2011: White Pine (Mary Oliver)

What should a poem do? What are you looking for when you read poetry? Are there certain poets you can count on for whatever it is you're looking for?

Madame L knows a few poems and poets she doesn't like: The Song of Hiawatha, anything by Wordsworth, likewise for Shelley, Keats, and Byron, not to mention Walt Whitman and most other poets from before, say, 1940.

Madame L suspects that her dislike of these poets stems from the fact that she was made to read them at an immature and rebellious and distinctly non-poetic stage of her life.

In spite of her early dislike for the poets introduced to her early on, Madame L often looks in bookstores for poetry books. What is Madame L looking for? She hardly knows. Yet she often finds some she likes. One poet she has enjoyed reading recently is Mary Oliver.

Here's part of the poem "In Blackwater Woods," from Oliver's book "White Pine":

On the hottest day of summer

I thought of a place

on a knoll

and under some pines

where a breeze might come

flowing out of the bog

so I went there

but a beautiful woman

who had thought of it first

was lying casually

just where I'd thought to lie down

don't move I said

but she rose up

on her pretty hooves

at the sound of my voice

and heavily

and with sorrow and with panic

she vanished into the trees.

Assignment: Write an essay about what you like or don't like about this poem. (Madame L is only kidding, although she hopes that you, Dear Reader, found something to like about it, something you might have been looking for in it, as she did.)

Mary Oliver's poetry collection "American Primitive" won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1984, but she's still writing and publishing new poems, including those in "Why I Wake Early," 2005. Some of her  poems are available online. 

She also wrote "A Poetry Handbook," which Madame L has also enjoyed reading and which is available at Amazon.com for $8.15. Amazon.com has an entire page devoted to the life and works of Mary Oliver.

Driving Class: PNW

Dear Madame L,

I just moved to the Pacific Northwest, and I can't believe how atrocious the drivers are here. Do you have any helpful hints for me, so I can survive the bizarre driving habits of my co-travelers? This would be especially helpful as the Fourth of July weekend is upon us, followed by a whole summer of whacko nut-case driving.

Sincerely, 

Scared to death

Dear Scared,

Madame L has also noticed the driving habits to which you refer, and she infers that driving lessons in the Pacific Northwest (PNW) include the following:

---Drive really slowly, especially if you're in the middle or left lane. Don't move over to the far right or "slow" lane under any circumstances because you don't want anyone to think you're "slow." Even if you are.

---When you want to switch lanes, drive up really fast and cut in front of someone who is just a few feet back from the next car in front. Do this even if you're passing up 50 to 100 feet or more of space behind the car you're cutting in front of. Turn on your blinker, signaling that you're going to move into that lane, because that makes it okay. Then, swerve into the lane, even though there's not enough room for your car to fit there, cutting off the other car and causing the driver to slam on the brakes to avoid hitting you.

---If they honk their horn or flash their lights at you, shrug and move into another lane where they can't catch up with you to express their displeasure. Look straight ahead so they can't catch your eye, either. You don't want to force them to experience road rage.

---If you have any doubts about whether you should engage in this kind of driving, buy a big and/or expensive car. Mercedes and BMWs work the best. You're not really intimidating the other drivers, but you're showing how true it is that you're basically better than them, and thus deserving of their backing off and letting you in.

---There's more, much more, which Madame L will add to the list later. 

Dear Scared Reader(s), please feel free to write to Madame L with your own additions.

Also Scared,

Madame L