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From Handle to Scramble

Ginnie was on me to fix the handle on her toilet. (We each have our own bathrooms.) I picked up a new handle at the hardware store, and installed it on Ginnie's toilet. It took me awhile to figure out that the handle has left hand threads. Well, duh! Her toilet seemed to be flushing fine with the new handle. We were reading on a Friday night when Ginnie heard my toilet gurgling. She went in, jiggled the handle and sat back down. Then she heard something in her bathroom, and went to investigate. I heard her scream. Thinking there was an intruder in the house, I scrambled to her ...

Let the public see what government boards see

In recent weeks, people from Cherokee, Des Moines and Ottumwa have contacted the Iowa Freedom of Information Council with concerns about the refusal of local officials to share documents distributed to city council and school board members before they meet. Typically, Iowa government boards ...

Rent control still doesn’t work

In 2022, politicians in Minneapolis and St. Paul voted for rent control. I said that would lead to bigger problems. Was I right? My update video reveals what happened. St. Paul politicians pushed rent control, saying rent caps would stop "unfair profiteering." But what the heck is ...

A message for men over 50

The diagnosis was not a surprise - well, yes it was, because like many men with a health issue we try to deny it, or delay treatment when everyone knows that "early detection" is critical to a cure. My PSA (prostate-specific antigen) had been slowly creeping upward for the last two years. ...

On nature: New climate technologies

Our climate keeps heating up with dire effects, but our governmental leaders seem incapable of finding solutions to get us out of this mess that we have caused. One possible way out is to find new technologies that reduce the emission of carbon dioxide that is driving climate change. Almost ...

Harry and Meghan. Who are these people?

It was a day of deep thinking and heroic typing, my brain so fried I could hardly call out for pizza. Then the news and social media feeds exploded with reports that Harry and Meghan plan to leave California and move back to England. What was that to me? I don't care that the royals moved away ...