Anime Granny/Church Lady. Also, #pollworker Often found #Bloomscrolling.
This website from MA is offering some resources in a wider range of languages:
https://miracoalition.org/news/know-your-rights/
In other news, a church friend from Colombia was approached by an ICE officer in a supermarket parking lot because she was speaking Spanish on the phone. She had her green card with her, but she didn't know she didn't need to speak to them. Fortunately, she's fine.
My doctor's office sent a questionnaire about social indicators of health, asking me, among other things, if I'm worried about much, in 255 characters. Gonna have to enlarge that field, DB peeps!
Anyway, think about affirmative action and read this: Overlooked No More: Annie Easley, Who Helped Take Spaceflight to New Heights https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/01/obituaries/annie-easley-overlooked.html?unlocked_article_code=1.t04.KLga.hnRg7C4cFGli
No further news on the landscaping employee who was picked up by ICE. I can't be too pushy about it... trying to help doesn't extend to being a jerk.
But here's a few thoughts on AI from a wonderful comedian and author, Eleanor Morton!
When even the extremely kind get going...
But Lira, how does a church allow individual congregations differ from Policy?
We have churches that, for historical and cultural reasons, are nonconforming. For example, there is a Black church in Boston that won't accept a female priest. They are one of the oldest free Black churches in our denomination, and our majority-white leadership isn't going to kick them out if we want to stay.
So, this is apparently a thing now:
Some Protestants Felt Invisible. Then Came Bishop Budde. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/26/us/bishop-mariann-budde-trump-christian.html?unlocked_article_code=1.sk4.EE9V.z8tTd9tsXXV3
Just in case you decide to check out the Episcopal Church near you, bear a few things in mind:
1. We let our children parade around with fire.
2. We use the 1979 Book of Common
Prayer. It's very 70s.
3. While official policy is very inclusive, individual churches may not be. Check the website before you visit.
(1/2)
@trishalynn I know! So many websites I visit assume everyone has young eyes.
Stuff gets real... I have a landscaper (cuts the grass on my tiny lawn, helps me plant big things, shovels in winter) who employs immigrants. One of them got caught in an ICE raid at a local bodega, but even though he has papers he's still being held and no one knows why.
I'm trying to mobilize some stuff, but I need more information and his employer isn't getting back to me.
In the meantime, a useful link:
https://miracoalition.org/news/know-your-rights/
And watch out for "notario fraud." https://www.americanbar.org/groups/public_interest/immigration/projects_initiatives/fightnotariofraud/about_notario_fraud/
A small addendum to my last: the creator of the post Dan is critiquing in the video chose an image of Bishop Budde looking happily at the Crozier of the Diocese of Washington, D.C.
He chose it, because that particular crozier has a serpentine crook.
Wikipedia has a very nice image gallery of croziers, from the crooks and curliques of Catholicism to the two-headed snakes of Orthodoxy. Scroll down and click on one to see them.
Yessirree, the tone of this bit of Mastodon is definitely changing.
https://youtu.be/F8p_NaYyb-0?feature=shared
A note on vestments: it used to be that liturgical churches were the only places men could wear the most elaborate, colorful garb and be treated not only with respect, but with honor. Sorry, guys. We don't just embroider what you get to wear any more; now, we wear it ourselves.
Some of y'all know I'm an Episcopalian. I was very proud of Bishop Budde on the 21st.
So is this gentleman.
I'm an optimist by nature. I don't like to post downer stuff: other people do enough of that.
But as God is my witness, if they come for me there will be a *reason*.
How Tyranny Begins https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/22/opinion/trump-government-oppression-power-tyranny.html?unlocked_article_code=1.rE4.3rI6.8cgn7Qj7jeaJ
Share this anywhere, I unlocked it from the NYT paywall.
@LunarJade I open a book in three places and try reading a page or two. It's a good way to find out if you like the way a book is written.
Also, I did this with the first Game of Thrones book, hit three rapes, and happily ignored the whole phenomenon.
@retrosponge I should add that I've lived and worked all over the USA before returning home... at one point, I could stand on the roof of my condo building and see the hospital where I was born.
Have I mentioned how much I enjoy the comedian Eleanor Morton?
She has a whole series of shorts about C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien... here's the latest.
So, Lirazel, how did the elections go?
Very smoothly. All our translators (Mandarin, Cantonese, and Haitian Creole) had work to do, and yours truly helped a blind gentleman vote. We figured out a better way to process write-ins. 700+ ballots in 11 hours is a pretty good pace!
I had to reprove the bake sake ladies for loud political talk within 150 feet of a polling place, but otherwise, all was peace.
Not happy with the outcome, but that's different.
Not sure I'm ready to be more engaged yet... but I'm trying not to do this.
Don’t Let Donald Trump Drive You Into Internal Exile https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/25/opinion/trump-putin-exile-russia.html?unlocked_article_code=1.ck4.COKG.Y0g45r5onhyw
We went to the Child's Play Charity dinner, but YOU made this possible!
So, as it happens Greg had a health crisis and that, and a bunch of life events are delaying the book. But I've had three or four small projects, and possibly another large one on the horizon. My brain feels alive.
Not going to comment on the State of the World At Large, because... I don't have much to say that you haven't seen elsewhere or thought of yourselves. But I will ruminate on specific issues.
