What am I doing sitting inside instead of doing things like, for instance, riding in the Davis Bike Club’s fall century (looking at the site, I had the first twinge of regret that I’m not out there on my bike). Well, here are a couple of things:
–Listening to a great edition of “This American Life” from Chicago. This week, it’s all about a Chicago Public School that, with leadership from a great principal and imaginative work from a bunch of great teachers, turned around a failing school on the West Side, and how the arrival of new top-down thinking in the district has been killing the progress that’s been made. Heartbreaking stuff, and so similar to what Kate is going through in Oakland right now.
–Marveling at the spectacle, which led one of the local news shows here last night and is on the Chronicle’s front page this morning, of hundreds and hundreds of senior citizens lining up to get flu shots. So, yes, one of the manufacturers screwed up. But even so, how is it that the Number One wealthiest nation in the world (thanks, Visa and MasterCard and bond buyers in Japan and China!) forces its citizens to beg for such a basic treatment. The big local scandal, as the TV news reported, was the death of an older woman who fell and hit her head after waiting in line outside a drugstore for hours the other day. I also liked this bit: A credit-union manager in Fergus Falls, Minnesota, who had to turn seniors away after flu vaccine ran out handed out cans of chicken soup and packs of Kleenex instead.