I'm sitting here ruminating about life with a big ol' glass of Bourbon and noticing that I am spending way too much time not talking about my Jinni.  With her post-surgery regime of 12 weekly chemo treatments, she only has one more round of Taxatere to go, and you need to know some things before we are through with this episode in our lives.

Chemotherapy can become 'old hat' to everyone except the recipient of the cure.  When it all gets down to it, Jinni is the only person among us who is really having to suffer. 

Sure, we can all offer words of encouragement, meals of meatloaf, and acts of unselfish love to get her through this but the fact is; beating cancer is a one person performance.  The rest of us are merely stage hands. I have probably allowed complacency and the 'routineness' of it all cloud the fact that my girlfriend is a brave, strong but suffering woman.  You can see it in her eyes.... she is ready to get all of this behind us.  I am too.

Even with all of the wonderful support we have recieved since Jinni was diagnosed with breast cancer back in November of '04, the truth is that it all comes down to one thing - the patient's will to carry on.  Jinni has that... in spades.  But it has not been easy.  Case in point...

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Editing Note: This post got a little long so I moved it from the front page.  Continue reading "Cancer is a long hard road".

Related update:  Citing the cruelty descibed in the above post, Hardy Floyd says... "...When I was younger, I used to think that the greatest evil out there was racism.  I no longer think that...."

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Jim Rosenberg makes his triumphant return to the local print media with a column in this morning's N&R Life section (unposted).

It is a very funny debut sprinkled with political tidbits that promise to be a whole new reason to read the Sunday paper while spewing coffee all over it as future Rosenburg columns unfold.  He knows he will have no shortage of local material for our amusement... because...

"...We may not have a natural water supply, but Guilford County is the Garden of Eden when it comes to original political sin.  On a date uncertain, at a time unknown, the Lord did say to the people of Guilford, "Do not eat from the tree of local poitics that grows such beautiful apples, for you shall be cursed big-time if you do." (I'm paraphrasing here.)"

"In about 10 seconds, the sound of core-tossing filled the sweet Southern air..."

This is going to be both a hoot and a hollar.

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Our unrepentant State Representative Earl Jones continues to pimp for the payday lending industry.  Seymour's Purple Mind amplifies The Carolina Peacemaker's reporting of Jones' shameful promotion of predatory lending companies in North Carolina.

Update:  NC NAACP President Skip Alston had an uncharacteristically muted and possibly hypocritical response to Jones' promotion of loan sharks.  Especially in light of the fact that Jones' actions are diametrically opposed to the national NAACP's stance on predatory lending.  Or as Sue puts it...

"... And Skip Alston?  Here's his uncharacteristically quiet crit: He "...[h]opes Jones would agree with the organization's stance that payday lending is detrimental to the black community."

"And if Jones were white?"

If indeed...  With history as our guide, if Earl Jones were white, I'm confident Alston would be falling all over himself branding Jones a racist to everyone who might listen.

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There is an excellent piece of reporting in this morning's N&R's by Margaret Moffet-Banks but it seems to only been made possible by a mistake on the part of NC A&T University.  We can only hope that the N&R's obligation to report everything they know hasn't done irreperable harm to a very important project for Greensboro.

The article identifies an impressive list of possible corporate donors who are being tapped to make Greensboro's long-awaited civil rights museum in the old Woolworth building a reality.  These donors, which include the likes of Starbucks, Crayola, FedEx and many others, are being courted by Sit-In Movement, Inc. Executive Director David Hoard and staff.  However, in addition to Hoard's duties with Sit-In, he is also a Vice Chancellor for A&T.  As such, all of his commuications fall under the federal Freedom of Information Act.  This Act is a good thing for the public sector, maybe not so good in the private sector - because Hoard's duties are in both realms that arrangement now seems to have been proven problematic.

Citing Hoard's fear that naming possible donors might "harm negotiations" with them, the article says that he wouldn't talk much about who they were pursuing.  But his office inadvertently let the cat out of the bag, apparently for lack of a bottle of White Out.  From Banks' article...

"...The university attempted to mark out the companies being pursued, but their names remained clearly visible in the documents."

I can imagine that Hoard is burning up the telephones this morning doing damage control with the previously close-to-the-vest list of possible donors and partners that the N&R decided to publicly identify on their front page.  I can also imagine that the Board of Directors for Sit-In Movement, Inc. is more than just a little pissed at the News & Record because of possible damage they might have done to the organization's fundraising/partnering plans.

But we have the right to know.... right?

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Update: Gate City says, "...I am a fan of full disclosure, but I think that the GN&R should have left out the names of the corporations that are still considering making gifts." He has other insights on charitable giving in Greensboro as well.

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