The Blaisdell Blog

We have just completed a contentious election and while the lion’s share of the attention has been on the Presidency, I think what we really need to take a look at are the people who actually control the power of the purse.   The average salary of a member of the United States Congress is $174,000.   That puts them in the top 5% of income earners in the United States. Ninety-five per cent of you earn less than that, but no matter what your income, if you are a full time employee, you put in about 47 hours per week.   Unless you are a member of Congress.     Congress has put in a full week of work exactly 14% of the time in the last 36 years.   Since 1978, our legislators have worked two full weeks out of every 5 months!   If you piece meal their work day by day it amounts to less than half of the week days available.   This means they are being paid $608 per day, give or take.   I ask you, are you getting your money’s worth? ...

First published in 2012, this is still one of my favorite blogs.   Everyone has a favorite holiday.   Mine has always— always —been Thanksgiving.   As a child it meant the best food, unremitting talk, games and play.   As an adult it means ever so much more.             In my years of making Thanksgiving dinner I have come to believe that Thanksgiving is a feminine holiday.   I don’t mean that it isn’t enjoyed equally by both men and women.   I certainly don’t mean that the deeper meaning of Thanksgiving isn’t appreciated and revered equally by both men and women.   I just mean that the essence of the holiday is feminine.   It is a day centered on two things, the meal and the meaning.   These are feminine strengths.               Men are great cooks, but they aren’t likely to plan a meal for a week, get the baking done...

This column of mine  was published in the local paper The Monitor this Sunday. Over twenty-five ago, I started working out at my local YMCA.   I had been doing lap swimming for a few years but had hit a plateau and thought that building up my upper body strength would help.   So, a few years before it became a fad, I ventured into the weight room and started using the machines.   Over the years, other women caught on to the benefits of weight work and the YMCA improved and expanded it facilities.   One summer the “Y” closed the whole building for a week and we came back to a totally remodeled, clean, airy, comfortable, carpeted weight room with an array of state of the art machines.               But then there were those mirrors!   They covered one entire wall of the weight room from floor to ceiling.   Over the next weeks I noticed a very interesting human dynamic going on. ...

Everyone has a childhood memory that is so difficult to remember that it cannot be forgotten. My father’s story is not unusual for a man born in 1919.   He was the youngest of nine children and left school at the end of eighth grade to help support his family.   Dad found work he loved in the dairy industry, and life happened.   He married and had children, lost and found jobs, worked his way up the ranks.   Then he had a heart attack.   After that “come to Jesus” moment my father did two things.   He stopped smoking (cold turkey from a two-packs-a-day habit) and he started looking for a less stressful job.    He applied for an opening as a state dairy inspector.   Dad needed that job.   The money was better, the work more stable and less strenuous.   He had built up a legion of supporters and the job was his, but the law said he had to pass a competitive test.   The night before I remember my Dad pacing up and down th...