tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-46351425973936307592012-02-02T12:59:34.988-06:00LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.comBlogger3631100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-55705573751046347632012-01-07T09:43:00.001-06:002012-01-07T10:10:46.480-06:00

The Andrews Sisters A lot of my Facebook friends are sharing links to the number-one hit song on the day of their birth. Listening to the song can be disconcerting. One friend, after discovering his was by the Andrews Sisters, wrote, "Will someone spoon oatmeal into me for dinner?" (If you want to find your song, click here.) Mine was a song I'd never heard of - somehow I didn't pay much

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-4863742577022779292011-12-03T10:48:00.001-06:002011-12-03T12:36:45.668-06:00

Yesterday a provision in the Affordable Care Act went into effect: health insurers' profits must now be limited. In response, Rick Ungar, a journalist specializing in health-care policy, posted a feisty column on Forbes's Policy Page. Provocatively titled "The Bomb Buried in Obamacare Explodes Today - Hallelujah!," the article looks at "the provision of the law, called the medical loss ratio,

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-87355974617213078132011-11-28T10:32:00.000-06:002011-11-28T20:35:20.852-06:00

  The bishops have spoken, or at least succumbed. This weekend American Catholics began saying new words at mass. Well, perhaps new is incorrect - the aim of the revised liturgy is to bring back older words that are closer to medieval Latin. In a time when the Catholic church has been rocked by scandals of almost Renaissance proportions, this move is supposed to make American parishioners feel

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-69829421867849037862011-11-10T15:22:00.000-06:002011-11-10T15:22:21.524-06:00

Last week two articles highlighted America's split over health-care policy. One likened the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force* to a "death panel" and argued that we need more free enterprise in our health-care system. The other lamented the tens of millions of Americans who do not have adequate health care and argued that our inability to come up with "a health care reform law that we can all

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-71257555589014246492011-10-31T12:55:00.001-05:002011-10-31T13:07:26.718-05:00

Emailed response to one of my many complaints to the FCC I'm getting more and more annoyed at the alleged enforcers of the Do Not Call list and, for that matter, at AT&T. Like all 312,530,648 people living in the United States, I hate phone sales calls. All of them, without exception. Especially when they interrupt a nap or a meal or a visit with friends. Of course I have caller ID. Of course

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-86872630869589837582011-10-20T11:09:00.000-05:002011-10-20T11:09:34.677-05:00

Good food is usually simple. It is always beautiful. I wish people who devise recommendations for healthy eating would keep this in mind. My favorite food advice couldn't be simpler. It's from Michael Pollan in In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto: Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants. It's easy to add beauty to simplicity. Just eat by color: half brown half riotous colors: red, orange,

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-42363604937598734462011-10-14T20:31:00.001-05:002011-10-14T20:34:51.550-05:00

In August I spent five days as a patient at Cleveland Clinic, which advertises itself as "#1 in heart care since 1995." Following open-heart surgery for a congenital valve problem, I was put on their "heart healthy" diet. I didn't expect gastronomic delights from a hospital food supplier, but meatloaf? white bread? sugary yogurt? caffeinated coffee? And that was just my first meal. I am now

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-64642731845513431272011-09-09T17:19:00.000-05:002011-09-09T17:19:44.536-05:00

The T-shirt my daughters got me Three weeks ago I posted about preparing for open-heart surgery, and then I fell silent. Just a note to let you know that I survived, my recovery is progressing well, and it will be a long time - probably several months - before I feel perky again. I'm sure I'll be blogging again soon, though. In fact, several ideas are even now simmering on the back burner.

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-78711920669951732572011-08-17T19:46:00.002-05:002011-10-23T17:43:35.925-05:00

Heart and blood vessels (Leonardo da Vinci) I am scheduled to have open-heart surgery next week. They will open my chest, slicing right down the sternum, and they'll hook me up to a machine to pump my blood and keep me oxygenated while they mend my innards. I am told this will take from three to six hours. Fortunately, I will be sound asleep the whole time. And to prevent any operating-room

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-56388224012775797212011-08-09T09:46:00.001-05:002011-08-09T09:58:46.916-05:00

Everybody agrees - the U.S. immigration system is broken. Americans strongly disagree as to how it should be fixed. But there's one fix, desperately needed, that just about all of us can agree on. When people flee to the U.S. because staying in their home countries means almost certain torture and death, we need to help them. Alas, we don't. I became aware of how the U.S. treats refugees when my

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-5646602279386526262011-08-06T10:15:00.001-05:002011-08-06T11:29:44.568-05:00

I have to ask myself: am I part of the American majority who wants to scale back government expenses – as long as none of my personal benefits are touched? I confess: I will turn 63 next week, and I don’t want Social Security or Medicare reduced or – heaven help us – privatized. I have personal reasons. My husband and I have been saving heavily for 20 years, have paid off the mortgage on our

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-19091604643106841352011-08-05T19:07:00.000-05:002011-08-05T19:07:32.054-05:00

Yes, we have to do something about the federal budget. Yes, Social Security and Medicare cost a lot (about 1/3 of total expenses and rising, according to this graph). It's not surprising that politicians want to reform them, or redesign them, or cut them, or even get rid of them. But what exactly would we do without them? Folks, we can't just say we can't afford them. In 2010 about 13% of the

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-60662075418021867282011-07-29T13:19:00.000-05:002011-07-29T13:19:18.170-05:00

The other day the mail brought an advertisement for something I desperately need (or so the ad suggested, though I can no longer remember what it was). If I ordered it right now, the ad said, I would save a hefty percentage off the usual price. In vain I searched the flyer for the price. None was listed - not the total, not my monthly payment. I was apparently supposed to place my faith in the

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-46783477010436097862011-07-09T15:41:00.000-05:002011-07-09T15:41:34.517-05:00

Before our grandchildren could read, they listened to Harry Potter books. Their parents read to them. We read to them. Stephen Fry, narrator of the British audiobooks, read to them over and over. Monday evening our now-16-year-old granddaughter arrives for a four-day visit. At one minute past midnight this coming Thursday, she will be with us at the grand opening of the final Harry Potter film.

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-88807830138707799052011-07-07T10:25:00.000-05:002011-07-07T10:25:48.905-05:00

Margaret Sanger Margaret Sanger, founder of America's family planning movement, may be the most lied-about woman on the Internet. Wait - I'll take that back. A lie is a conscious untruth, with intent to deceive. Certainly liars are involved with the mishmash of falsehood, half-truths, and logical fallacies relating to Ms. Sanger, but many honest people are now passing this misinformation along

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-70122542516430772932011-05-25T18:33:00.000-05:002011-05-25T18:33:20.969-05:00

Can you tell an -est from an -eth? A thee from a thou? And what's ye* all about, anyway? If you want to make fun of turn-of-the-seventeenth-century English, or if you have the nobler aim of understanding Shakespeare or the King James Version, this short lesson may help. Contrary to popular opinion, writing like a Jacobean is not quite as easy as adding eth to every verb. But it's not all that

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-54441561869395624762011-05-11T09:27:00.001-05:002011-05-11T13:34:22.379-05:00

U.S. gas prices are soaring. The average for low grade unleaded is now $4.00/gallon, and the highest - $4.50/gallon - is right next door in Chicago (out here in the burbs, it's more like $4.39). Let us briefly interrupt our hyperventilating to consider how our gas prices compare with, say, petrol prices in the UK. To do this, we'll have to convert liters into US gallons, which, by the way, are

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-60407180414373396552011-04-30T09:34:00.000-05:002011-04-30T09:34:42.946-05:00

3-year-old Grace van Cutsem is not amused. Some of my friends apparently identify with the kid on the balcony. The royal wedding? How anachronistic: "Who giveth this woman to be married to this man?" How tiresomely patriotic: all British Empire and military display. How clichéd: "England's green and pleasant land." What a colossal waste of money - a  £50k forest in Westminster Abbey! Some of

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-82897830042065908942011-04-18T10:12:00.001-05:002011-04-18T10:24:31.002-05:00

Are you looking for a hospital that provides gowns that actually cover your rear, that lets you stay until you feel well enough to return home, and that - get this - gives you excellent food three times a day? My friend Lilliam Hurst is currently being treated at the Clinique Générale-Beaulieu, which not only does all of the above, but also offers breathtaking mountain views from her window.

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-43180325866534381052011-04-02T10:52:00.000-05:002011-04-02T10:52:19.668-05:00

Quotation of the Day from "Today's Headlines," an e-newsletter from the New York Times: "My Medicaid card is useless for me right now. It's a useless piece of plastic. I can't find an orthopedic surgeon or a pain management doctor who will accept Medicaid." --NICOLE R. DARDEAU, a nurse in Opelousas, La.,who needs surgery for herniated discs in her neck.I found this especially interesting since

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-51211423635446456722011-04-01T15:35:00.000-05:002011-04-01T15:35:25.946-05:00

Kathy Magliato belongs to one of America's tiniest and most elite groups: she is a female heart surgeon. It's been exactly 50 years since Nina Braunwald, Ann McKiel, and Nermin Tutunju became the first women certified by the American Board of Thoracic Surgery. Since that time, writes Magliato, only about 180 additional women have been certified. None of them, I discovered, are practicing at the

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-67924911693747355932011-03-25T21:25:00.001-05:002011-03-25T21:27:00.915-05:00

Our fourth grandbaby, due September 9, is a boy. His parents saw his anatomically correct picture yesterday, and his father posted it on the refrigerator. His grandfather and I have taken to calling him Cholmondeley (pronounced Chumley), which goes very well with his last name. Naturally, I’m thinking about gender. We’ve been keeping track of Cholmondeley for three months, ever since he was the

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-41549157598330185192011-03-10T16:54:00.001-06:002011-03-10T17:05:18.055-06:00

Like you, I have friends who lean left and friends who lean right. Sometimes we all get along just fine, sometimes we annoy one another, and sometimes we de-friend each other on Facebook. I've been thinking about what makes the difference, and I decided to try to write something that we all might confirm - unless, of course, we would really rather rant than communicate. Wouldn't it be lovely if

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-24276900731092294812011-03-05T11:21:00.003-06:002011-03-05T11:31:51.675-06:00

Back in the 70s, a little truck-stop restaurant in the wilds of Eastern Washington became locally famous because its French patronne did not mind insulting her clients. Order wrongly, and she would refuse to grant your request. Salt before tasting, and she would angrily remove the salt shaker from your table. When Mr Neff and I finally worked up enough courage to go to her restaurant, which was

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-34382882964082436032011-02-09T03:22:00.000-06:002011-02-09T15:21:18.322-06:00

In a speech to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce two days ago, President Obama appealed to some 200 business leaders to act responsibly. "I want to be clear, even as we make America the best place on earth to do business," he said,  "businesses also have a responsibility to America." Now, I understand the challenges you face [the president said]. I understand that you're under incredible pressure to

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-35814942444107367612011-02-01T15:02:00.001-06:002011-02-01T15:28:23.869-06:00

Lentil patties ISO compatible wine ... Forget the wisecracks - this is a serious question for would-be vegetarian wine-lovers. Cabernet sauvignon? Beef, of course. Pinot noir? Made for salmon. Sauvignon blanc and shellfish, chardonnay and chicken, zinfandel and grilled meats - what's a vegetarian to do? Well, there's always slightly fizzy chilled mineral water flavored with a soupçon of orange

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-71993913611078214182011-01-26T12:37:00.001-06:002011-01-26T12:38:41.706-06:00

Perhaps the President has been stung by Republican accusations that he does not believe in American exceptionalism: the belief that America is unlike, and superior to, every other nation on earth. Perhaps he was simply using good communication skills to keep his audience cheering at the nation's annual pep rally. Whatever his motivation, American exceptionalism was a recurring theme in last

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-35111116571739281132011-01-20T14:12:00.002-06:002011-01-20T14:13:26.897-06:00

Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives have voted to dismantle the health-care bill, whether by directly repealing it (which they can't do without the approval of the Democratically controlled Senate) or by chiseling away at its funding. They think they can improve on it. Fine. It's a flawed bill. Let the improvements begin. If we're going to start from scratch, here are my 10 wishes

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-45922053655336578872011-01-10T09:57:00.001-06:002011-01-10T10:00:13.040-06:00

Edward Hicks, Peaceable Kingdom A public figure is shot. School children are shot. A building explodes. A package explodes. And immediately we look for someone or something to blame: Republicans? The Tea Party? Democrats? Muslims? The National Rifle Association? White Supremacists? The devil? Mental illness? As Congresswoman Giffords fights for survival, perhaps we'll turn our soul-searching

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-3146616012113200712011-01-05T12:40:00.000-06:002011-01-05T12:40:43.036-06:00

My daughter and her grandmother "The Obama administration, reversing course, will revise a Medicare regulation to delete references to end-of-life planning as part of the annual physical examinations covered under the new health care law, administration officials said Tuesday." Thus begins a New York Times article citing "procedural reasons" and "political concerns" as factors leading to the

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-85807738079905227582010-12-29T10:47:00.001-06:002010-12-29T12:41:36.280-06:00

Here's just one example of why American health care costs so much more than anybody else's. My husband is going to have outpatient hernia surgery in a couple of weeks. His doctor told him he had to get an EKG before surgery. He suggested that he go to the local urgent care facility to have it done. Being consumer-oriented types, we decided it would be a good idea to find out how much it was

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-54979138655775182582010-12-16T10:14:00.002-06:002011-01-06T07:52:22.199-06:00

Last week a federal judge from Virginia ruled that part of The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act is unconstitutional, and now the legal battle is moving to Florida. Also last week a Bloomberg poll found that 55% of Americans would like to repeal the health-care law, while only 40% want to keep it as is (5% aren't sure). Now, I'm not sure what all of those 55% were thinking. I can

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-48159901046004975902010-12-13T11:36:00.001-06:002010-12-13T11:41:36.907-06:00

Several of my conservative Facebook friends responded to yesterday's post about Social Security. I commented that "my dad, who was born in 1910, used to thank God every day for Social Security. Beforehand, he said, Grandpa too often lived in a tiny unheated room in the attic." One of my friends responded, "LaVonne, I would be willing to bet money that your father would have done fine had he

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-17281390514930204632010-12-11T19:06:00.003-06:002010-12-11T20:27:21.350-06:00

Now that President Obama's people have sent out glowing press releases about how wonderful the proposed tax agreement is ("A Win for Women, Mothers and Working Families"), and Bill Clinton has hailed it as "a significant net plus for the country," and even AARP has signed off on it despite earlier misgivings, may I timidly suggest that the proposal contains one really dreadful item that should

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-12025646565778849772010-11-30T17:25:00.001-06:002010-12-01T09:45:45.860-06:00

A lot of us don't have as much disposable income as we had two or three years ago. Some of us have a lot less. But Christmas is coming, and we still want to give. "It is more blessed to give than to receive," Jesus said (Acts 20:35). Giving makes us feel rich. Giving is up in 2010, and for that we rejoice. But, warns an article in yesterday's Business Wire, "the small rebound hasn’t been enough

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-22292385374260816452010-11-15T10:30:00.000-06:002010-11-15T10:30:31.041-06:00

It used to be really hard to eat vegetarian while traveling, especially if you were traveling from Washington to Illinois with vegetarian children who refused to eat any food that might have been cooked on a griddle that may also have been used for hamburgers (I speak from experience). In the thirty years since that stressful trip, America's food tastes have changed. It's now almost easier to

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-63999774024143828362010-10-28T15:44:00.000-05:002010-10-28T15:44:20.604-05:00

Are you hoping to live to at least age 85? If so, there's good news and bad news. The bad news - If you turn 85 in the next ten years or so, you'll have about a 50% chance of getting Alzheimer's disease. The good news - Researchers have never been closer to finding a cure. The unfortunate news - Alzheimer's research is inadequately funded. The hopeful news - Last February a bill was introduced in

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-27385031226777230602010-10-20T10:21:00.000-05:002010-10-20T10:21:20.133-05:00

Today's news brings yet another scare for women of a certain age. "Breast Cancer Seen as Riskier with Hormone," trumpets the oddly worded headline in this morning's New York Times, which summarizes the JAMA findings also released today. No, this isn't old news, though it's based on the Women's Health Initiative study that was stopped several years ago because the estrogen-using participants kept

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-50334366277321877692010-10-16T10:21:00.001-05:002010-10-16T10:23:20.226-05:00

It's midterm election time. How are you going to vote? Well, it's obvious, isn't it? Your side - whichever it is - is the only one that will save America from utter financial and moral collapse. The other side - whichever it is - is full of liars and hypocrites controlled by unscrupulous cabals who, for financial reasons, are willing to ruin the common man. And woman. I am so tired of political

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-22194551774220495662010-10-05T16:56:00.001-05:002010-10-05T16:57:16.414-05:00

Are Barack Obama's policies ruining business? Some of my Republican friends think so. So I was interested to learn about financial reporter Charles Gasparino's newly published book, Bought and Paid For: The Unholy Alliance Between Barack Obama and Wall Street. I haven't read the book, and I'm neither analyzing nor recommending it. Its thesis interests me, however. A few lines from Amazon's

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-8382516717648243522010-09-28T10:18:00.002-05:002010-09-28T10:22:57.226-05:00

I'm a California girl and proud of it. My cell phone's ring tone is "California Dreamin'," and when winter comes to Chicago I start humming "Maid of Constant Sorrow" ("I'm goin' back to California, place where I was partly raised"). So I was interested in David Brooks's commentary yesterday about why the state that once "enjoyed the highest living standards in the country" - during most of the

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-27632754071796590042010-09-15T20:55:00.001-05:002010-09-23T19:24:40.037-05:00

This evening Mr Neff and I ate dinner to the music of Mavis Staples in her new album, You Are Not Alone, produced by Jeff Tweedy of Wilco fame, who also wrote two of the songs. Earlier in the day we'd been talking about Alan Jacobs' article in Big Questions Online, "The Online State of Nature."  Jacobs, a professor of English at Wheaton College, asks (quoting Thomas Hobbes): "Why has Internet

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-21769960355312440552010-09-06T08:59:00.000-05:002010-09-06T08:59:14.582-05:00

The midterm election season is upon us, the first since the Supreme Court's January 21 ruling that allows corporations to spend as much as they wish on political advertising - as long as they disclose their involvement. It seems to me that corporate disclosure isn't enough. I want an easy way to know who is buying my candidates, my member of Congress, my senators. Sure, I can go to the extremely

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-19540930976947399912010-08-25T22:06:00.000-05:002010-08-25T22:06:26.379-05:00

I am so tired of politics. And religion. Especially when they crawl into bed with each other and start shouting. So today I'm going to forget about them altogether and revolutionize English grammar instead. English-speaking friends, it is impossible to split an infinitive. Not that most of us care. If asked what's wrong with Star Trek's aim, "to boldly go where no man has gone before," we're

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-12045275440821498112010-08-20T11:07:00.002-05:002010-08-20T11:08:21.976-05:00

Here's an idea for people who are unhappy about having an Islamic Center near the site of the World Trade Center, especially if those people are Bible-believing Christians and/or defenders of the U.S. Constitution. What if American Christians got together and offered to build an interfaith memorial instead? Since we follow someone who suggested loving our enemies and forgiving seventy

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-50885268555672995552010-08-20T08:15:00.002-05:002010-08-20T08:37:20.299-05:00

"More evidence links pesticides to hyperactivity," says a headline from yesterday's Los Angeles Times, with similar articles in newspapers all over the world. Yet another good reason to be careful what we eat - and yet I've got to say it, righteous eating can be crazy making. Going to the farmers' market isn't good enough : we have to ask every farmer where the food is grown, what fertilizers

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-6544016805125850852010-08-12T05:00:00.015-05:002010-08-12T05:00:00.878-05:00

Kathy and LaVonne, c. 1961 As of today, Kathleen and I have been friends for 50 years. Our mothers were close friends before we were born, but Kathy lived on the east coast and I lived on the west so we knew each other only through Christmas letters. We finally met on my 12th birthday, in Kathy's aunt's house, and we talked all afternoon. We never stopped talking, though the topics keep

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-52218724748196188782010-08-09T12:25:00.000-05:002010-08-09T12:25:42.734-05:00

Starting now, my book reviews will appear on the new blog Mr Neff and I have launched, The Neff Review. We've already posted nearly 100 reviews there. (The one that appears in the box on the right is the most recently posted, but it may not be the most recently written.) Check it out!

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-26419262409804033502010-08-09T11:00:00.001-05:002010-08-09T14:28:58.365-05:00

A longtime friend recently posted this as his Facebook status: I really don't want to get into an acrimonious debate but I wonder if anyone, liberal or conservative, can calmly, and without inflamatory or deprectory language, explain to me why some people feel that same-sex marriage threatens or undermines heterosexual marriage?Right after reading his question, I read an article by a conservative

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-63317219256903823182010-08-07T10:06:00.002-05:002010-08-10T10:34:00.579-05:00

When my previous post about Missouri's health-care insurance vote and obesity rates was re-posted on Sojourners' God's Politics blog, commenters told me I was "a little unfriendly," "insulting," "trashing obese people," and lacking compassion for the poor. Among other things. I went back and reread my post, and I wish I hadn't used the word "fat." My "good luck, Missouri" remark was meant to be

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-65979391245479897682010-08-04T11:14:00.028-05:002010-08-10T10:37:14.355-05:00

Yesterday, by a 3-to-1 margin, Missouri voters passed Proposition C: "No law or rule shall compel, directly or indirectly, any person, employer, or health care provider to participate in any health care system." From the New York Times: “This really wasn’t an effort to poke the president in the eye,” said State Senator Jim Lembke, a Republican. “First and foremost, this was about defining

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-24596546009805376172010-08-03T09:46:00.001-05:002010-08-03T09:47:43.562-05:00

I like zoos. Good ones, anyway. When our children were very small, we lived near the San Diego Zoo and went there nearly every week. We now live within visiting distance of the Brookfield Zoo, where we used to take our grandchildren and where we once celebrated our anniversary, and the Lincoln Park Zoo, which we haven't visited in too long a time (anyone for a trip to the zoo this weekend?).

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-69819253051385623802010-08-02T10:14:00.005-05:002011-08-09T09:47:45.225-05:00

If I hadn't just read Moving Millions, I might not have noticed how many of this morning's news stories relate to immigration. Jeffrey Kaye, a freelance journalist and special correspondent for The PBS NewsHour, subtitled his book How Coyote Capitalism Fuels Global Immigration. It's a book that goes way beyond what I'm used to reading in news stories or op-ed pieces about Arizona's new law.

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-33188082090244313542010-07-28T15:51:00.000-05:002010-07-28T15:51:19.335-05:00

Thanks to my friend Beth Spring for recommending Little Bee (or, in the U.K., The Other Hand). It's the best novel I've read so far this year. First published in 2008 and now available in paperback, the story concerns a teen-aged Nigerian girl who calls herself Little Bee. Fearing imprisonment or death, she seeks asylum in the U.K., is intercepted at sea, and is thrown into an immigration

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-33268836974280757732010-07-26T12:24:00.000-05:002010-07-26T12:24:38.638-05:00

As soon as I read Jana Riess's beliefnet interview with Donna Freitas, I put a hold on both young-adult novels at the public library. The Possibilities of Sainthood looked like a sure bet. Riess notes that it "got starred reviews pretty much every place that fiction reviews can be starred: PW, SLJ, Booklist, and even snotty old Kirkus." This Gorgeous Game, I thought, might not be as good. The

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-23445685561878358702010-07-21T23:44:00.003-05:002010-07-22T00:24:01.924-05:00

What word first comes to mind when someone says Nigeria? If you have an e-mail account, the word may be scam (someone urgently needs your help to get money out of a bank account and promises great rewards if only you give them lots of personal information...). If you are Anglican, the word may be Akinola, the name of the primate archbishop who for several years has been in a doctrinal and power

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-74813727234919432022010-07-20T00:14:00.004-05:002010-07-20T09:21:31.636-05:00

What I find most interesting about The Bird in the Tree (1940), Book One of The Eliot Chronicles, is the fact that it was set in 1938. England, still suffering the aftermath of war and financial chaos, was about to plunge into a second great war. Elizabeth Goudge's more serious contemporaries were examining sin (Greene) and loss (Waugh) and politics (Auden), while the general public were enjoying

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-27419127985004076222010-07-15T08:49:00.000-05:002010-07-15T08:49:32.092-05:00

Follow the money. That could be the conclusion of an op-ed piece in yesterday's New York Times, "Economics Behaving Badly." People make irrational decisions all the time, say authors George Loewenstein and Peter Ubel, and the field of behavioral economics helps to explain why. Unfortunately, policymakers are misusing behavioral economics "as a political expedient, allowing policymakers to avoid

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-22670524832413386972010-07-14T08:49:00.001-05:002010-07-14T08:49:54.534-05:00

Memo to fans of Precious Ramotswe, Alexander McCall Smith's Motswana heroine of the Number One Ladies' Detective Agency series: Mma Ramotswe is magnificent, no doubt about it. But she is, after all, the creation of a man from Scotland. It's time to meet a real African woman, this time from Nigeria: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. Don't panic. You can pronounce her name, even if you've never set foot

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-81861048133080061032010-07-08T16:24:00.001-05:002010-07-08T16:42:44.880-05:00

I am a Michael Connelly fan. So far I have read or listened to 18 of his 21 novels, and I've loved 17 of them (I wasn't as thrilled with Chasing the Dime, a stand-alone thriller whose protagonist is just too foolish to be believed - but I still read the whole thing). The Lincoln Lawyer, published in 2005, is one of the best. Connelly's usual protagonist, Detective Hieronymus (Harry) Bosch, isn't

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-57452578690220987212010-07-05T16:38:00.000-05:002010-07-05T16:38:06.217-05:00

She had me at the subtitle. Dominique Browning lost her job as editor in chief of House and Garden when the magazine abruptly ceased publication; I quit my job as editorial director with a book publisher when I decided life is too short to spend three and a half hours every day commuting. She put on her pajamas and found happiness in less than three years; more than ten years later I - though

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-16890125641728875442010-07-01T13:13:00.003-05:002011-08-09T09:47:45.227-05:00

President Obama is getting no respite from contentious issues. Today, speaking at American University’s School of International Service, he tackled immigration reform, held hostage for decades, he said, by political posturing. “We will not just kick the can down the road,” he promised his audience of faculty, students, and select legislators, police chiefs, mayors, and evangelical religious

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-35087607548434550082010-06-25T18:06:00.003-05:002010-06-25T18:10:11.564-05:00

"The looming threat of industrial pig, dairy, and poultry farms to humans and the environment," says the subtitle. Marketing copy like that makes a lot of us decide to read, say, a detective story instead. We are tired of hearing about what's wrong. We don't want to add to our guilt over what we eat. And besides, this book is 492 pages long. So why read it? If you've already read Michael

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-8987386312487745662010-06-23T15:33:00.001-05:002010-06-23T15:35:54.652-05:00

You may have to be at least 50 to understand how a book could be about aging and death and troubled relationships and failing bodies and eldercare and loneliness and depression and alcoholism - and still be not only inspiring but often very funny. Of course, Best Love, Rosie is also about Ireland and New York and best friends and a good dog and silly self-help books, which lightens the tone.

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-11429644455958407412010-06-23T09:08:00.002-05:002010-06-23T09:10:23.551-05:00

Our British cousins have come up with an economic policy that could not be more different from what we Americans have been doing for decades. I rather like it. According to an article in yesterday's New York Times, "Britain Unveils Emergency Budget" (shorter and perhaps easier for Americans to follow than a similar article from the BBC News), "the government of Prime Minister David Cameron

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-89566719665452828572010-06-21T12:01:00.003-05:002010-06-21T12:55:29.167-05:00

I just sent a review of Nicholas Carr's new book, The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains, to Christian Century magazine, so I won't review it here. I will say, however, that the book is well researched and thought provoking, and Carr is an engaging writer to boot. If you're thinking you might want to buy or borrow it, you can get a preview by reading his Atlantic article, "Is

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-31648609811839240362010-06-13T16:17:00.005-05:002010-07-26T16:16:36.520-05:00

"Voter Concerns Over Federal Spending Propels Conservative Candidates, Analysts Say." This predictable headline comes from a Fox News piece by Jim Angle published  two days after the June 8 primaries. From the article: "Debt, spending and taxes. There is more unanimity in Republican and Tea Party ranks about those issues than anything else," said Larry Sabato, director of University of

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-55355347235218624602010-06-11T10:47:00.000-05:002010-06-11T10:47:26.415-05:00

Yesterday I wrote about the toll caregiving takes, especially on women. This is not news. For several decades we Boomers, shocked at the fatigue and messiness and expense and relational difficulties of caring for our parents, have been writing about it. And we have written truthfully: caregiving is hard work. We’re used to hard work, of course. We’re the generation that brought you the

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-50504643552782916042010-06-10T10:12:00.020-05:002010-06-11T10:52:21.238-05:00

A few minutes ago I got the news that my daughter’s mother-in-law has stage 4 cancer. I was still staring at the computer screen, trying to digest the information, when a friend forwarded me a report on a Canadian study with this headline: “Female Caregivers Face a Heavier Toll.” Yes, we do. My mother died almost exactly 15 years ago, four months after my father died. Both had Alzheimer’s

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-17763959745479854032010-06-01T08:05:00.002-05:002010-06-25T14:37:34.190-05:00

There are lots of good reasons to be 100% vegetarian. For one, vegetarians tend to live longer than meat eaters. For 10 others, see my May 7 post, "10 good things about being vegetarian." The list is by no means exhaustive. But there are also good reason to eat meat some of the time. I first heard the term part-time vegetarian in 2005 when I was traveling in Asia. Many Buddhists, I learned,

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-24512420379809678962010-05-29T18:22:00.000-05:002010-05-29T18:22:51.334-05:00

In April when I reviewed Ruth Reichl's Not Becoming My Mother, I didn't realize it had just been reissued in paperback under a different name: For You, Mom, Finally. With Mother's Day coming up, the publisher may have noticed that the original title was not going to get the book featured in any gift displays. The new title is more appropriate, really. Reichl often did not understand her

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-41283807342127938522010-05-27T09:23:00.002-05:002010-05-27T10:38:25.964-05:00

A healthful diet is usually colorful. A good meal always is. Eating vegetarian does not need to be dull. And in case you were wondering, Adam did not trade Paradise for an apple. It was an avocado. Breakfast (or lunch or dinner, for that matter) 1. Whole wheat waffles topped with slightly sweetened plain yogurt and fresh raspberries Lunch (or dinner) 2. Salad with arugula, black beans (hidden),

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-9178809933543529392010-05-22T17:27:00.001-05:002010-05-22T17:33:05.785-05:00

Most farmers' markets in our area (northeastern Illinois) open in June, but the one in our town brings produce from southern Illinois and southwestern Michigan in early May, and we are feasting. Here are 10 treats for vegans, vegetarians, omnivores, locavores, and everyone who likes unbelievably fresh food, even though it's still May. 1. baby lettuce leaves - no wonder the rabbits love them.

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-18554750878706447992010-05-21T09:48:00.002-05:002010-05-21T09:51:36.165-05:00

A couple of weeks ago I read Paul Greenberg's excellent review, "Hot Planet, Cold Facts," of Bill McKibben's newest book, Eaarth: Making a Life on a Tough New Planet. I immediately put a hold on it at the public library. It arrived yesterday, and I read it after dinner last night. I'm not an especially fast reader, but this is an especially readable book. McKibben is more than a prophet of doom;

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-45463868315381786122010-05-18T12:24:00.000-05:002010-05-18T12:24:10.554-05:00

"You want chicken poop with that steak?" Want it or not, says Animal Factory author David Kirby in an April 9, 2010, Huffington Post article - you're likely to get it. "Poultry excrement is loaded with urea, which bovine stomachs are adept at converting into lean, ready-to-grill protein," he writes. "We feed chicken manure to cattle because it's cheap; and because we produce far too much of it

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-46703769142673267142010-05-17T18:47:00.004-05:002010-05-17T19:15:03.019-05:00

"Are you trying to convert us?" asked one of my daughters after reading my recent posts on vegetarianism. Not to vegetarianism, I emailed back - just to mindful eating. I like Michael Pollan's creed : "Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants." I also like Nicolette Hahn Niman's advice at the end of her 2009 book, Righteous Porkchop: Do not thoughtlessly eat foods from animals. Know the source.

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-21592000844817479902010-05-15T10:18:00.003-05:002010-05-15T17:07:48.623-05:00

"Help! I just discovered one of my dinner guests is a vegetarian! What can I do?" Take a deep breath. If your friend has been a vegetarian for more than a few weeks, she is already quite used to fending for herself at meals where meat is served. A new convert to vegetarianism, on the other hand (like a new convert to almost anything), may go all righteous and preachy on you. Don't argue with

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-86322869719637347532010-05-14T10:11:00.000-05:002010-05-14T10:11:43.586-05:00

To most meat-eaters, a plate piled high with vegetables is missing something. It is no doubt beautiful with its red tomatoes and light green avocados and dark green spinach and white cauliflower and orange yams - but where's the beef? Get past the expectation of meat, two vegetables, and a starch. Try something entirely different tonight. Eat food that is neither North American nor Northern

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-85069645365390969502010-05-12T17:18:00.001-05:002010-05-12T17:20:39.126-05:00

Sometimes I like to make recipes that begin, "Four days before serving, ..." Most of the time, I'd rather pull stuff out of the refrigerator and be eating in less than 30 minutes. Here are some vegetarian ways to get a meal together quickly - with options for days when you have more time and inspiration. A few require more than half an hour's cooking time, but you can throw the ingredients

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-19030193183541530262010-05-11T11:51:00.011-05:002010-05-12T15:42:11.931-05:00

More and more fast-food joints are offering vegetarian fast-food options - it's just good business. I've listed 10; there are many others. The best: Mexican restaurants like Chipotle and Qdoba offer a fully customizable menu with a wide range of vegetarian ingredients.   The good: Many restaurants, such as Panda Express and Panera, offer a selection of plant-based items.   The tolerable: Most

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-12179144834439996502010-05-10T10:11:00.003-05:002010-05-12T15:43:50.011-05:00

OK, maybe your kids won't love all 10 of these meals. But there's bound to be something here that will work... 1.      Peanut butter and jelly sandwich, apple 2.     Cheese pizza, salad or fruit 3.     Egg salad (or fried egg) sandwich, tomato soup 4.     Macaroni and cheese, peas 5.     Vegetarian chili, cornbread 6.     Baked potato topped with broccoli, tomato, and cheese 7.     Waffles

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-15248934091860187302010-05-08T15:06:00.005-05:002010-05-12T17:51:20.191-05:00

Meat makes us happy. It must, or we wouldn't eat so much of it - 222 pounds a year per capita, not counting seafood. We are convinced it makes us healthy, too. Self-styled nutritionists (and the meat industry) urge us to ingest more protein in order to increase our strength, lose weight, cure cancer, manage diabetes ... well, you can find anything through Google. But in real life, are

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-91660466452241848872010-05-07T09:52:00.002-05:002010-05-08T15:08:07.683-05:00

Having just read Jonathan Safran Foer's Eating Animals, I'm in a vegetarian mood. This is not too difficult for me, since I was a vegetarian until I was 16. Since then, I've probably eaten less than 20 pounds of meat a year (the national average is 222 pounds), plus fish once or twice a week. Several years ago I decided that St. Benedict's advice, "Abstain entirely from the eating of the flesh

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-75331052237302918682010-05-06T16:52:00.001-05:002010-06-25T13:49:42.652-05:00

"On average," writes Jonathan Safran Foer, "Americans eat the equivalent of 21,000 animals in a lifetime." Alas, most of these animals came from factory farms, now the source of "99.9 percent of chickens raised for meat, 97 percent of laying hens, 99 percent of turkeys, 95 percent of pigs, and 78 percent of cattle.” Is this a problem? Safran Foer, best known for his novels Everything Is

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-4358405148632289632010-05-05T13:40:00.004-05:002010-05-05T13:57:52.899-05:00

In The Double Comfort Safari Club, the 11th installment in Alexander McCall Smith's No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency series, the suspense level is low. There are no murders, grisly or otherwise, and Mma Ramotswe's investigations have fairly predictable outcomes, though she sometimes engineers win-win situations that defy the laws of probability. But suspense is not the reason to read one of McCall

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-5666229934573001032010-04-29T14:39:00.004-05:002011-08-09T09:47:45.228-05:00

Arizona's Senate Bill 1070, signed by Governor Jan Brewer last Friday, has the nation's knickers in a knot. I agree with President Obama, who called the law a "misguided" piece of legislation that "threaten[s] to undermine basic notions of fairness that we cherish as Americans, as well as the trust between police and their communities that is so crucial to keeping us safe. "In spite of the

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-24913732444869208432010-04-28T17:54:00.005-05:002011-08-09T09:47:45.229-05:00

Last weekend my friend Ben Lowe was heading toward Chicago with three friends, all Wheaton College graduates, when an unmarked police car pulled them over. One of the cops explained to the driver that there is "a problem with Hispanics coming from the western suburbs into Chicago" and "carrying drugs in their vehicles." As it happens, none of the men is Hispanic (which is irrelevant anyway,

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-15017769757601782162010-04-26T12:51:00.002-05:002010-04-26T13:10:40.746-05:00

Ever since I discovered Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant, I've loved Anne Tyler's Baltimore, her offbeat people, her insights into what makes individuals - and families - tick. Most of all, I enjoy her ability to evoke a character in a few deft and often funny lines. Take this exchange, for example, from her newest novel, Noah's Compass: He said, "The divorce was Barbara's idea, not mine. I

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-37201019594659041742010-04-23T13:05:00.004-05:002010-04-26T11:14:19.909-05:00

Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world ...--William Butler Yeats, 1919 In today's New York Times, David Brooks laments the loss of the political center. "In the first year of the Obama administration," he writes, "the Democrats, either wittingly or unwittingly, decided to put the big government-versus-small government debate at the center of American life

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-75540822435114066712010-04-22T19:05:00.004-05:002010-05-29T18:26:11.960-05:00

 Show me a woman who has never looked in the mirror and gasped in horror at the sight of her mother looking back at her, and I'll show you a woman who can resist picking up a book called Not Becoming My Mother. I was alarmed the first time my mirror channeled my mom, and mortified when my daughters reported - in obvious panic - that their mirrors were channeling me. Some things a girl just

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-83923306594953061402010-04-21T15:29:00.005-05:002010-04-21T22:30:21.486-05:00

Note: If Facebook hasn't already sent you the pop-up message requiring you to link your personal information to Facebook pages, bookmark this Web page and come back to it when you need it. Once again Facebook has made changes that will open up more of our information to marketers and, presumably, scammers and stalkers. Potential privacy problemsMost of us include personal information on our

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-19219557818747384032010-04-17T10:06:00.004-05:002010-04-17T10:16:16.826-05:00

Even when I was very small I hated the Sunday-school song that begins O be careful little eyes what you see O be careful little eyes what you see There's a Father up above And he's looking down in love So, be careful little eyes what you seeThe song then advises the child to take equal care of his or her ears, hands, feet, and mouth. You never know when that all-seeing God, loving though he may

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-47295143845386748372010-04-13T16:32:00.002-05:002010-04-13T16:39:29.884-05:00

I am going through two cedar chests stuffed with family photos, letters, baby shoes, wedding invitations, condolence cards, and everything else that my grandmothers thought worthy of saving - and that escaped my mother's periodic purges. I am now the matriarch, the grandmother, the keeper and purger of memorabilia. It's a hard job, this sorting and labeling. Everything must be read, sometimes

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-38283798161117165722010-04-01T15:28:00.000-05:002010-04-01T15:28:48.421-05:00

"The Sabbath, I said, is not only an idea. It is also something you keep. With other people." - Judith Shulevitz If you read only one book about the Sabbath, it should be Abraham Joshua Heschel's 1951 classic. If you have time to read another one, I recommend a book that was published just last week: The Sabbath World: Glimpses of a Different Order of Time by Judith Shulevitz. (If you don't

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-47284951212299954092010-03-29T13:51:00.002-05:002010-03-31T12:41:07.473-05:00

According to Robert Pear in today's New York Times ("Coverage Now for Sick Children? Check Fine Print"): Insurance companies are already arguing that, at least for now, they do not have to provide one of the benefits that the president calls a centerpiece of the [new health-care] law: coverage for certain children with pre-existing conditions.[UPDATE, March 31: Insurance companies almost

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-39221655989394530372010-03-27T11:11:00.000-05:002010-03-27T11:11:23.927-05:00

Jim Wallis - founder of Sojourners magazine and current nemesis of Glenn Beck - would like to shift the nation's conversation from competing partisan ideologies to shared moral values. That's the theme of his newest book, Rediscovering Values: On Wall Street, Main Street, and Your Street, published this January in response to the ongoing recession. Without ever quoting Jesus' warning against

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-5943743197773892762010-03-26T12:21:00.004-05:002010-03-26T14:05:34.339-05:00

My friend Irene Groot decided to try the Lenten Experiment this year. "I recently sent off a couple of hundred dollars to a local soup kitchen," she e-mailed me this morning. "That's the money I saved taking up your challenge." Irene lives in a pricey Northern California city, so it couldn't have been easy. "Actually, I'd heard a local reporter trying to survive on $4.00/day so I figured that

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-41307859151376152422010-03-24T15:48:00.003-05:002010-03-24T16:14:03.808-05:00

Forty-two years ago today, Mr Neff and I publicly vowed to love and cherish one another "for better for worse, for richer for poorer, in sickness and in health, till death us do part." At dinner last Saturday night we joked about what we'd be doing in another 42 years, when he's 104 and I'm 103. In spite of the fact that his grandmother and several of my great-aunts made it past 100, we decided

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-63973912729796291912010-03-22T09:37:00.001-05:002010-06-25T13:57:39.061-05:00

Whew. The health-care bill passed. It isn't the complete overhaul we need, but at least it's a start. An editorial in today's New York Times rejoiced that, although "the bill does not quite reach full universality, ... by 2019, fully 94 to 95 percent of American citizens and legal residents below Medicare age will have coverage." Something about that percentage sounded familiar, so I got out

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4635142597393630759.post-30495728964655166872010-03-18T18:25:00.002-05:002010-06-25T14:41:18.059-05:00

Soon, they tell us, Congress will or will not pass a health-care bill. Detractors think universal health care will raise health-care costs, lower health-care outcomes, and dangerously increase the power of the federal government. Those are interesting theoretical positions, but let's take a final look at what actually has happened in countries who already have universal health care. These

LaVonne Neffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12662198791868400418noreply@blogger.com1