OFFICIAL CHEERS for our local officials. This week saw a panel of 10 local governmental folk sit down with The Advocate for a couple hours to answer questions. The participants included Corvallis Mayor Traber, all three Benton County Commissioners, the two heads of our two peace keeping forces, the School Superintendent, and managers of housing, sustainability, and economic development. It was quite the chatfest that you can go back and listen to at will. [BTW check out the beginning where our lovely publisher looks strangely into the camera possibly checking if the nose-hair trimmer worked, then find minute marker 2:10:37 where self-same publisher confuses Covid and AIDS in a “got’cha” journalism moment he’ll never live down because we who run The Advocate will make damn sure he doesn’t… Muwa hahaha]
BATED BREATH as Oregon colleges, universities, and [of course] K-12 schools lose the masks that have been tasked with keeping the air particles of all our children inside… well… our children. This is going to test how well these younger versions of ourselves can stay safe in school settings as we work on taking the pandemic down to an endemic. [With fingers crossed, we move on…]
CHEERS for Eugene. [yeah, yeah, we know, y’all still hate them, moving on…] Our neighbor to the south is hosting the World Track and Field Championship this July… which is going by the name Oregon 22… which is good for all of us’all. Over 2,000 athletes over 10 days and all of them staying in UO dorms [sucks to be them, are we right]. This is the first time the event will be held in a U.S. city [pretty darned cool, that].
GASPING JEERS for the already dry weather beginning in Klamath County. Gov. Kate Brown [or as our Assistant Editor likes to call her Our Fearless Leader… we hire weird people…] has already issued a drought declaration for our southerly friends. The declaration is a month earlier than last year. And she’s just trying to get it in before things in the drought department get too busy. As 2021 left itself behind in favor of 2022 taking over, meteorologists were hopeful as the snowpack was above average, but that was followed up by “almost record low precipitation” which is generally a really bad thing… especially after three years of drought.
HEADS HANGING for two Portland youths who died from fentanyl overdoses. Both were high schoolers, and they each had pills known as “M30s” on them. Now police are looking for where they got the pills in fear that others will also die. Fentanyl is incredibly dangerous, so officials strongly urge anyone who finds a blue pill with an M inside of a square on one side and a 30 on the other side to not even touch the pill. Just call authorities if you see one.
Stepping out of Oregon for a moment…
WELL-STRUNG CHEERS for the peaceful cellist you know as Yo-Yo Ma. This week, Ma made a stand by sitting down outside of the Russian Embassy in D.C. and playing. He was joined by a pianist and violinist, but since they’re not as famous we see no reason to mention their names… [okay, the boss says we have to mention their names… the pianist is Emanuel Ax and the violinist is Leonidas Kavakos] The embassy is behind a wall and fences, so the trio sat by the gate. The first song they played was the Ukranian national anthem.
PALM TO FOREHEAD SLAP for Florida and Texas.
The former has passed a new rule for their schools colloquially called the “Don’t Say Gay” bill [called so by those who sincerely believe that those in the LGBTQ+ community are not bad, wrong, broken, or evil]. The “Don’t Say Gay” bill will limit talking about sexual orientation and gender identity in Florida schools. [Note: If you read the linked to article about this bill, be prepared to be offended, outraged, and just generally pissed off for about a week.]
Meanwhile, in the latter state, well… it’s Texas, right? So Texas [not wanting to be outprejudiced by Florida] has made it illegal to help a trans-juveniles be themselves through gender-affirming care. They are prepared to file child abuse charges against parents and doctors who support these kids. [Note: If the story above makes you angry, this story will make you want to cry.]
We encourage all of you parents who have healthy and happy kids – whether they are trans or cis or nonbinary, gay or straight or pan – to give them a hug and be thankful we live in a state that accepts your child however they are.
Do you have a story for The Advocate? Email editor@corvallisadvocate.com