The things that excite gardeners ….
I planted two wisteria vines last year when I moved to DC and this year, as it’s grown, I’m training them up and across. What’s exciting is that several weeks after the last flowers fell, per usual for a plant of this size, I see a new bud!
My White Privilege
I turned 14 in 1979. I had one year to go before getting kicked out of my single parent "house."
At the time, I lived with my mom in a seedy cockroach infested motel room. She told me she didn't have any money to give me, so I'd be on my own.
This was her plan:
1) Take the California High School Proficiency Exam to get out of high school early (I was in 10th grade)
2) Apply to college and get financial aid to cover my expenses.
3) Live on my own, do what I want, enjoy life.
I took the test. It was so easy that I would have been embarrassed to get less than a 100 when I was in the 3rd grade. I no longer had to go to school.
After the test, I mentioned to another boy there, white like me, that I would be on my own in a few months. He invited me back to his place.
It was another seedy apartment occupied by a couple of kids a little older than me. I could stay with them if I wanted, but I'd have to work for my keep. My impression was that whatever that was, it was illegal, and I left.
I applied to Art Center College of Design, the most exclusive such college in the country. I was the youngest person they'd ever accepted. When I showed up for school, they took one look at me and said "you're too young. You have to be at least 17 to attend."
Santa Barbara City College let me attend there. I lived with my mom in her new apartment, a furnished studio. I slept on the tiny sofa in the dining room seen in this photo of me at my drawing table. My sister had gone to live with our dad, who had just been located after an interaction with the police.
SBCC gave me a stipend for financial aid. I used that to buy food for myself while my mom commuted to LA to work as a secretary. The money was enough for a diet of donuts and pop-tarts. I had a hard time walking up stairs because it made my heart pound.
One student noticed and started feeding me. The same for one of the teachers. Then the moment came: I had to go. My mom woke me up at midnight, threw my things into a duffel bag, and put me on a Greyhound bus at 2 in the morning. On the other end, I was going to meet my father for the first time.
I didn't finish high school. I didn't finish my studies at SBCC or anywhere else until decades later. I didn't have the money to do it, and as a caucasian, was ineligible for many forms of financial aid. Eventually, I earned my PhD from a prestigious university, but not because I was privileged in any way other than my own ability and work ethic.
🚨Alaska Accepts Ballots Up to 10 Days After Election Day🚨
340,981 votes were cast in the 2024 election in Alaska.
94,000 were counted AFTER Election Day.
55,329 of those were absentee ballots.
The ballot measure to oppose Ranked Choice Voting was DEFEATED by 743 votes.
Part of my workout this morning was planting three bright coneflower (Echinacea) plants from the nursery. I had planted roots earlier this year but squirrels 🐿️ dug them up. DC clay soil is tough to dig! Calla lilies and roses doing well!
In 2013, Amanda Nguyen was three months from graduating Harvard. She'd spent summers at NASA, hunting for planets. She was the daughter of Vietnamese refugees who once read the stars to find their way to freedom by boat. She had one dream since childhood: to go to space.
Three days after her 22nd birthday, a classmate raped her.
She did everything she was told to do. Hospital. Forensic exam. Rape kit collected as evidence.
Then she found out the evidence had an expiration date.
Massachusetts gave her 15 years to decide whether to press charges. But her state would destroy the rape kit in just 6 months — unless she filed a renewal request. Every six months. For fifteen years. With no instructions on how. She'd have to relive the worst day of her life on a recurring deadline, just to stop the system from erasing its own evidence.
She checked the other 49 states. The rules were a patchwork — some kept evidence for years, some for months, some charged survivors to even collect it. Justice depended on a zip code.
So in 2014, at 23, with zero legislative experience, she wrote a bill herself.
For two years she sat in congressional offices hearing "this isn't a priority" from staffers who'd never been asked to wait six months to matter. She kept showing up anyway.
In 2016, the Sexual Assault Survivors' Rights Act passed the Senate 89–0 and the House 399–0 — unanimous, in one of the most divided Congresses in history. President Obama signed it on October 7, 2016. Nguyen stood in the Oval Office. She was 24.
That law covered federal cases only — about 1% of assaults. So she kept going, state by state, helping pass similar protections in more than 40 states.
In 2019, she was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize.
And the dream she'd put on hold? On April 14, 2025, Amanda Nguyen flew to space aboard Blue Origin's NS-31 — becoming the first Vietnamese and Southeast Asian woman ever to leave Earth's atmosphere. She carried 169 lotus seeds from Vietnam with her, a gift of peace marking 50 years since the end of the Vietnam War.
When she landed, she said: "I want all survivors — or anyone who has ever had a dream deferred — to know: you will make it through."
She delayed her own dream for over a decade to fight for people she'd never meet. Then she reached for the stars anyway.
I have awful news...
Sadly, 4 people have passed away after widespread flooding in Kentucky collapsed buildings, flooded roadways, and trapped people in their homes.
Please pray for these people, this looks absolutely horrific.
I’ve referred Anthony Fauci to the DOJ for prosecution on 4 different occasions. Two under Joe Biden. Two under Donald Trump. We have another opportunity to hold Dr. Fauci accountable. I’m hopeful the DOJ will act.
Proud to be on the right side of history.
You’ll never see me side with the IRGC or any Islamic terror org for that matter.
Hopefully the Iranian people will break free from jihad soon.
On the morning of October 7, Hamas terrorists stormed the home of Hadar and Itay Berdichevsky in Kibbutz Kfar Aza and murdered them.
Their 10-month-old twins were left beside their parents' bodies for 14 hours, surrounded by blood. During that time, the terrorists returned to the family's home between murdering other Israelis - eating there, sitting on the balcony, and deliberately keeping the babies alive as bait to lure Israeli forces into the house.
After the terrorists were eliminated, a Golani unit entered the home, carried the twins to the kibbutz gate, and handed them over to paramedics.