39 Comments
User's avatar
Romelle Samantha Smith's avatar

Another well done, Kiwi. WOW!

Expand full comment
Kiwiwriter47's avatar

Glad you enjoyed it!

Expand full comment
Romelle Samantha Smith's avatar

But, of course.

Expand full comment
Romelle Samantha Smith's avatar

I even enjoyed this a 2nd time. Thanks Kiwi.

Expand full comment
Kiwiwriter47's avatar

I’m glad you did…I’m just glad I don’t have to go to any more ice shows.

My brother is a big New York Rangers fan…we spent a chunk of Sunday watching them lose in the final seconds, 5-4, to the Colorado Avalanche, on TV. They gave four out of the five things I needed: the score, the puck, the fight, and the organ. They did NOT show the Zambonis, to my annoyance…LOL

Expand full comment
Romelle Samantha Smith's avatar

You make me chuckle. Chuckles are good for the soul. Thank you.

Expand full comment
Romelle Samantha Smith's avatar

Would you believe I still have my ice skates. Haven't worn them in 1,000 years but there they are sitting on a shelf in my daughter's garage in West Palm Beach. They were CCM's too The, best. And I thought it would improve my balance. It didn't. In fact, I fell and leave it to my clutziness, I ended up with a concussion and missed the first week of the new semester of the school term.

Expand full comment
Kiwiwriter47's avatar

Well, I still have crushes on Dorothy Hamill, Linda Fratianne, Kristi Yamaguchi, Debi Thomas, and Katarina Witt.

Tonya Harding…not so much. Admittedly, I probably would have had a chance with her, as she had bad taste in men, but I don’t think she would have had much interest in visiting Ypres or Normandy.

Expand full comment
Denise Heap (private)'s avatar

I’m currently in Lake Placid on vacation. 1980. Miracle on Ice. Eric Heiden. Watched middle schoolers play ice hockey on The Ice last night. My German friends skated on Heiden’s Olympic Oval.

I was last here in 2019. Sonja’s rink was empty. Only a concrete floor, no ice. I walked onto that floor and imagined the woman who changed figure skating.

This is a magical region.

Expand full comment
Kiwiwriter47's avatar

“Do you believe in miracles…YES!”

The turning point of the Cold War….

Expand full comment
Denise Heap (private)'s avatar

Such an amazing event! I feel lucky to have lived during that Olympics.

Expand full comment
Kiwiwriter47's avatar

Yeah, it was odd: the Winter Olympics, held in Lake Placid, New York, did not suffer from boycotts, even though the Soviets had just invaded Afghanistan.

Expand full comment
Romelle Samantha Smith's avatar

You don't even want to know the thought that keeps running back and forth in my mind right now. But I think you can guess. Every morning, I awaken hoping to see THE headline. My bad I know but I end every day at night praying for peace and comfort for the American people. Anxieties have become so much a part of my existence now and I don't like them. I always favored love above all else. Maybe too much at times. But it made me happy. Now with so much hatred in the environment I find it very disturbing. I just never looked at the current world in such a way. I thought those days were over. I guess the ugliness of hate is part of human nature and only those who are stable can control their emotions and know right from wrong. With DJT he either can't or chooses not to. He is a very disturbed individual. We must not have this in our lives. America deserves so much better.

Expand full comment
Kiwiwriter47's avatar

He is the sickest man ever to reach the presidency.

And I mean both mentally and physically.

JFK had to deal with Addison’s, FDR with polio, Lincoln with depression.

Nothing compares to the Bloated Yam.

Expand full comment
Romelle Samantha Smith's avatar

The other gentlemen may have been ill physically but mentally had it together and were gently souls. They were intelligent professionals who knew how to be presidential. Not a gruesome tyrant. The world doesn't want to die in a nuclear implosion. People care about living unlike DJT. He doesn't like himself.

Expand full comment
Kiwiwriter47's avatar

I would not say that about Dick Nixon or Andrew Johnson.

Herbert Hoover was disconnected, James Buchanan timorous, Franklin Pierce a drunk, and William Henry Harrison lasted only 30 days.

Expand full comment
Romelle Samantha Smith's avatar

Oops! I didn’t read fer enuf in history class. Thanks for correcting me. Sorry Subers.

Expand full comment
Romelle Samantha Smith's avatar

But you see by our government allowing this it makes America look as if we are a sick nation in as much as we enabled this to happen.

Expand full comment
Carole Roseland's avatar

My favorite way back when was Oksana Baiul, a Ukrainian in the Olympics. I think she did ice shows, too. Did you ever see her?

Expand full comment
Kiwiwriter47's avatar

No, that was after I was able to stop watching them.

I was aware of the name, though.

I was amused when Kristi Yamaguchi married an NHL star — the family that skates together stays together — and more so when she was a contestant on “Dancing With the Stars.”

Expand full comment
Carole Roseland's avatar

I was able to stop watching “Dancing” after the first time I saw it, so I never saw Kristie dance, just skate. But I did watch Tonya Harding and remember the assault on Nancy Kerrigan, as it happened not too far from me in Detroit. Tonya was talented but was so doomed from the start. She coulda been a contender!

Expand full comment
Kiwiwriter47's avatar

Never saw it, but heard about her appearance…I looked Kristi up on Wikipedia one time, curious to see what happened to her.

Expand full comment
Romelle Samantha Smith's avatar

Yep, he sure does it.

Expand full comment
Romelle Samantha Smith's avatar

All that's left to say is, "pray".

Expand full comment
Kiwiwriter47's avatar

Well, that would help if I believed there was a just, loving, omnipotent, caring God, but all we have it the one here on Substack, who is funny, but hasn't zapped the Bloated Yam yet.

The one the Evangelical Christians pray to seems more concerned with the outcome of sporting events than the future of humanity.

Or even His animals.

Expand full comment
Romelle Samantha Smith's avatar

I just realized that when one votes for a president one really doesn’t actually know just how serious this is. Just how much authority that individual has and that’s the problem. First, the public must be made more aware, educated, so to speak, as to exactly just how much power he does have over people’s livelihood, which, as you can see in this case now, is quite a lot. The DJT has too much control and for the cruel and selfish sort that DJT is he can be devastating to the American public. Therefore, he is unacceptable and is not looking out for all Americans benefits.

Expand full comment
Romelle Samantha Smith's avatar

They really only care about furnishing their BIG homes WITH EXPENSIVE FURNISHINGS. And driving fancy cars.

Expand full comment
Romelle Samantha Smith's avatar

I can’t seem to recover from nausea yet. I will let you know later. I think I dislike most everyone at this point.

Expand full comment
Romelle Samantha Smith's avatar

You too, kdsherpa?

Expand full comment
Romelle Samantha Smith's avatar

Yes!

Expand full comment
Romelle Samantha Smith's avatar

When I get nervous and scared, I talk a lot. I'm scared and uncomfortable like many other Americans are at this time. Fluffin Mop Head dictated he wanted his day moved indoors because of the weather. Who's he kidding? He'S just trying to stay out of the line of fire.

Expand full comment
kdsherpa's avatar

What a nice break from politics! Thank you!

Expand full comment
Kiwiwriter47's avatar

I figured my readers needed one…

Expand full comment
kdsherpa's avatar

Indeed we do! Perhaps your column gave me this idea: my daughter and I are going to go out to lunch around 11 AM on Monday, and then to the movies to watch "Wicked" at 1 PM. Apparently it lasts around three hours long, at 1 PM, so we will be in a safe cocoon all say. <3

Expand full comment
Kiwiwriter47's avatar

I’m told “Wicked” is a very impressive film. As a fan of acting and movies, I’m impressed by Cynthia Erivo, who is both talented and fetching. However, once again, I have developed a crush on a woman who turned out to be lesbian.

Expand full comment
kdsherpa's avatar

I think that straight women developing crushes on lesbians makes sense. They attract other women -- so other women, whether we're gay or straight, are attracted. (Does that make sense?)

Expand full comment
Kiwiwriter47's avatar

It makes some sense to me…it’s like how at the middle-school dances, the eighth- and ninth-grade girls wait for the boys across the gym floor to ask them to dance, and when the boys, being nervous, don’t, the girls start dancing with each other.

Expand full comment
kdsherpa's avatar

Yeah. Sorta like that.

Expand full comment
Miru Ginosko's avatar

"The sugar made them run around, brandishing their light wands and toys, screaming."

There is no proven connection between sugar and hyperactivity in childrenIn fact, multiple studies have found that sugar does not affect a child's behaviour or attention span

The idea that sugar causes hyperactivity is a myth.

It's based on a single study from the 1970s,

but many larger studies have since been conducted.

Meta-analyses of multiple studies have found

that sugar does not increase hyperactivity or disruptive behaviour in children.

Some studies suggest that sugar may actually have a calming effect because it produces serotonin, which contributes to a feeling of well-being.

The environment in which a child eats sugar may be more important than the sugar itself. For example, children may eat more sugar at parties and other social events, where there are usually more relaxed rules.

Expand full comment