Author: Andy Ludlum

A Disrupted Thanksgiving Leaves the Turkey Business Guessing

John Peterson, a farmer in Cannon Falls, Minn., is trying to anticipate what customers who travel to his family’s Ferndale Market for their Thanksgiving turkeys will want during a holiday changed by the pandemic. Credit: Jenn Ackerman for The New York Times

Without big gatherings, will Americans buy whole birds? Smaller ones? Just parts? Farmers and retailers are already placing their bets.

Source: www.nytimes.com

Police PR machine under scrutiny for inaccurate reporting, alleged pro-cop bias

Years after Nicholas Robertson was killed by deputies, a new video emerged contradicting the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department’s account that he had pointed a gun at lawmen. (Barbara Davidson / Los Angeles Times)

My note: I’ve always been concerned about a too-cozy relationship between reporters and PIOs – especially police department PIOs. This article from the LA Times supports some of my fears.

Amid calls to defund police, the public relations machine within law enforcement is coming under scrutiny.

Source: Los Angeles Times

Op-Ed: Kareem Abdul-Jabbar: Don’t understand the protests? What you’re seeing is people pushed to the edge

Protesters in Chicago on Saturday. (Nam Y. Huh / Associated Press)

The main concern of black people right now isn’t whether they’re standing three or six feet apart, but whether their sons, husbands, brothers and fathers will be murdered by cops.

Source: Los Angeles Times

Living With the Virus

People management at Costco to help regulate the number of shoppers at one time and to maintain social distancing.

It’s been just over two weeks since our daughter called us – I should say lectured us – about taking the virus threat more seriously.  Since then, we’ve stayed inside except to walk the dog and to quickly run essential errands.

It’s a strange feeling.  I’m retired so I don’t really HAVE to be anywhere. Through the wonders of Medicare,  I have a free gym membership which I was enjoying several times a week.  I play golf.  I have several volunteer activities and I was finding my retirement days were busy and full.

Until it all shut down. 

Continue reading “Living With the Virus”

Lithuanian independence

Kovo 11 means March 11, the day 30 years ago when Lithuania declared its independence.

I took this photo in June 1992 in front of the Lithuanian Parliament building. 

The barbed wire was from 1990-1992 when leaders of the newly independent State of Lithuania barricaded themselves in the building which was the “heart of Lithuania” and political center of the country. 

“Kovo 11” means March 11, the day in 1990 when Lithuania became the first Soviet state to dare to declare its independence from the Soviet Union.  “Islandja” refers to Iceland, the first country to recognize Lithuania’s independence. 

The Soviets grudgingly accepted Lithuanian independence a year and a half later in September, 1991.  The barbed wire and other signs of the barricades were still there when I took this picture 9 months later in a symbolic protest of the Red Army troops that were still stationed in the country.