As we head into July and the dog days of summer the election process will be ramping up in the city as we have a primary for both the City Council and the School Committee. Will this year be the year we see change in our city? I used to be a political junkie. I used to love reading up on candidates and throwing my support behind candidates. I have been soured on this in recent years because of the…
Tuesday February 13, 2018. That was my day of clarity. I had a sleepless night because it was my first night with a CPAP machine. I had recently been diagnosed with moderate sleep apnea. During a sleep study just after the New Year I had stopped breathing 23 times an hour. So that Monday night was the first time I used the machine full time at home. It was an adjustment that I didn’t think I could do. Most importantly…
So I wake up this morning to see that a Comedienne Kathy Griffin was trending on Twitter. I couldn’t imagine why because I never really thought she was funny, and then she proved me right. The picture of Griffin holding a bloodied mask of President Trump as if she had just decapitated him is disturbing to say the least. Is this the new normal in American society? Presidents being burned in effigy or portrayed as targets are not new and…
By Nick D’Andrea In 2005, the Baseball Widow came home from work and said “Michael Graham just said something I thought was pretty cool”. She went on to explain to me the tradition that Graham and his wife had going to see the Oscars Best Picture nominees. I like movies and the idea and I said “Let’s do it”. That year, “Crash” took the award and we haven’t looked back since. The biggest mistake that the Oscars made was going…
Ohio University Online
By Nick D’Andrea Several weeks ago I wrote a post how we as a society needed to correct ourselves in light of what happened during the presidential election. In light of recent news regarding four people attacking another over what could be argued as political vitriol, is appalling. I am going to be very blunt in this statement, if anyone agrees or commends the four people who are now arrested, then something is seriously wrong with you. This…
By Nick D’Andrea I will open this up with full disclosure. I am a sports official. I won’t hide it and I am not ashamed of it. Since I got that out of the way, let’s move on. There has been a growing culture in sports, mostly at the lower levels, that the officials are incompetent and that they don’t know what they’re doing, they don’t know the rules and they should not be out there. You can…
By Nick D’Andrea Thinking in 3D It’s been a week since the election and I must say I am very disappointed in what I have seen and to be honest I have tuned out. I am not disappointed because I don’t agree with anything that is going on, but the fact of the matter is that people are saying some hateful things unprovoked and unwarranted and it flat out makes me sad. The big question over the past week is…
By Nick D’Andrea I am keeping up with tradition and posting a public thank you to military personnel that I have been lucky to come to know over the years. Most of the words have stayed the same but my feeling towards the military have not changed. Some people say that my appreciation to the military is sometimes over the top, my response that is “No it is not!, I can’t thank them enough” Our military deserves our support, right…
The election is over and I couldn’t be more relieved, but unfortunately this is not the end. I used to be a political junkie. So much so that I even ran for local office. The atmosphere surrounding our recent election cycles has soured me on the whole process. Every type of media has destroyed the political process so much that nobody even knows what the issues are. We only have ourselves to blame and we need to correct ourselves…