Dear Editor, I happily reside in Canada. I am (shhhh) an American! My dad’s work (he was a home builder) led him to move our family up to Sarnia, Ontario when I was 6 months old, and I’ve been a landed immigrant ever since. My close friends know this about me. and to date, I have not been shunned. Instead, I have been shown great sympathy for myself and my family still living in the U.S. I am deeply embarrassed by the Americans who can’t see the destruction that Trump has wrought upon the country of my birth, and upon her neighbours and allies. But the 51st State??? DON’T GET ME STARTED!!! Canada has earned some of its clichés – we are very polite overall AND we can be dastardly wild drivers. Although we remain proud of our country, we have the usual complaints about the government, the roads and the cost of living. Yet life is generally pleasant here. Canadians say "hello” while out walking our dogs. We say “excuse me” if our grocery cart is coming up on another in the vegetable aisle. And then comes the Big Bad Orange Wolf. And it seems that honesty and common decency have been thrown out the window in the States. I don’t delve deeply into politics...usually...but the President of the United States has sparked a patriotic flurry of activity from average Canadians. I, the American, am also incensed. Canadians are furious that the U.S. thinks it can invade Greenland OMG, or annex Canada. My husband and I always taught our daughters to “play nice in the sandbox.” We heard that phrase from every elementary school teacher our kids had. It became our Parenting Phrase with the girls, rather than “CUT THAT OUT” or “DON” T BE A BULLY - it was our Teach-Our-Kids-The-Golden-Rule moment! But we also taught them that bullying is unacceptable behaviour from others. Are you listening, Mr. President? Canada is not interested in hanging out with a bully. The 51st state does not and never will exist. Canada is standing strong. Going to the grocery store is an entirely different experience now. Cherries from Washington State? Nope, not happening. Florida orange juice? Not around here! Canadians are taking a firm stand. The grocery chains have put up clear “Product of Canada” signs throughout their stores. We even have some fabulous new local entrepreneurs who are now in business growing spinach and lettuce hydroponically here in Calgary – it’s joyful (and tasty!) to “source local.” Sorry to the people of the United States! I know it’s not your fault, but you’ve got to replace your top leadership to win back our food dollars and our travel dollars. Canadians are a practical people. They absolutely despise the callous behaviour in the States – the illegal deportations, the cruel rhetoric, the threats against fellow human beings. We cheer when AOC speaks, we boo Tesla vehicles (I actually saw my FIRST Tesla in the city yesterday, and I booed... politely), and “Elbows Up” has become a commonly used phrase that doesn’t refer to just hockey anymore! Friends are making summer vacation travel plans east or west this year, instead of heading south. Trust and relationships take years to develop; sadly, only moments to destroy. Canada’s best friend has turned on us, discounted and threatened us. But Canadians don’t paint the entire U.S. as cruel, although the cruel ones seem to be the loudest. We see hope in the Everyday Man and Woman participating in the No King Protests we saw all over the country. And our fervent prayer is that it is not too late – that the momentum will continue; that the midterm elections, and continuing grassroots protests will turn things around. The pendulum can swing back, and the U.S. can be our friend and neighbor once more. And perhaps in the bargain, the American people will guide Donald Trump onto his pretty Air Force One plane (maybe with his buddy Pete Hegseth), and send him off to McDonald Island, where Trump ordered tariffs placed upon the penguins living there. Wouldn’t that be a quaint ending to his rule? Canadians miss our kind neighbours to the south - stay strong and we’ll see you on the other side! Debra Perron / Calgary, Canada Debra is enjoying Life-After-Covid’s-Early-Forced-Retirement. Finding a new path forward after 40 years of employment in legal firms has become an exciting life chapter, as surprising new interests have abounded. Life is full with gardening, classical guitar lessons, training a bouncy Bouvier puppy, and being a better-educated consumer in these crazy times. Her current favorite phrases are “Buy Local” and “Thank you for your kindness” – both of which go a long way in making this little corner of the planet a bit more welcoming!

By Andy Borowitz  July 23, 2025 Xiangkun ZHU on Unsplash WASHINGTON ( The Borowitz Report )—Donald J. Trump offered on Wednesday to end his war with Harvard University if it admits him to its freshman class. “Harvard blew their chance to admit Donald J. Trump in 1964, and now they can fix that,” he posted on Truth Social. “Or else.” Detailing plans for his undergraduate career at Harvard, Trump said, “I will major in art.” But his offer got a cool response from Harvard president Alan Garber, who said that admitting Trump would be “Harvard’s biggest mistake since we admitted the Unabomber.”

By Andrea Kwok / New York City The author avoiding hiking injuries at Castell de Capdepera in Majorca (2019) With summer sizzling, vacation season is in full swing. While most travelers return home with photos and souvenirs, an unfortunate number return with new aches, pains and injuries. As a physical therapist, I see a fair share of travel-related injuries each year. Some common ailments include shoulder or elbow strains from lifting luggage; neck and back pain from long rides in uncomfortable seats;  tendinitis from an increased amount of walking; and fractures from falls on cobblestone streets. One of the appealing things about travel is that it offers a break from our monotonous daily routine. However, that same sudden change in activities and surroundings also creates a potential for mishaps. That’s not to say you should dump your travel bag of miniature toiletries just yet! With a few precautions when planning and packing for your trip, you may be able to reduce the risk of injuries while traveling. There are three major factors I have noticed that contribute to travel injuries. The first is an acute increase in physical activity. This can be upper-body tasks like carrying luggage or lower-body activities like daily walking. The average American takes around 5,000 steps in a typical day, but that number increases to 15,000-30,000 daily steps while on vacation. The second is divided attention. “Sightseeing” is a ubiquitous vacation activity, whereas “ground-seeing” is rarely mentioned. When we are so focused on looking up at gothic architecture that we neglect our footing on the historic cobblestone paths, disaster can strike. Other distractions I have heard mentioned are looking down at a map or phone for directions while walking, ignoring surroundings while taking a photo, or seeing vehicles driving on the opposite side of the road. The third and most prevalent risk factor is fatigue. Whether it be an eight-hour time change or just exhaustion from traveling itself, we often do not arrive at our destination bright-eyed and well-rested. Just one sleepless night has been shown to double the number of processing and memory errors made by healthy individuals. So what can be done, short of retreating to the safety of your hotel room? If you have taken a commercial flight lately, you have probably noticed that each airline has crafted its own dizzying set of rules for luggage: allowable dimensions, weight limits, extra fees for carry-ons. Annoying as this may be, it would not be such a bad idea to take inventory of your own ability to pull, carry, and hoist so that you can decide what your personal luggage limits should be. Maybe this means splitting your belongings up into two smaller bags rather than one very heavy one. Maybe it means asking the flight attendant or the strapping young traveler next to you for assistance placing your luggage in the overhead bin. Maybe it means pausing to brace your core and lower your center of gravity before yanking your overstuffed duffel off the belt at baggage claim. Know your limits, and don’t be afraid to ask for help. Additionally, most airports offer mobility assistance for those who need it. Utilize the resources available to avoid pushing past your abilities. As far as increased walking, planning can save you a lot of pain while exploring. First, research the areas where you are traveling in advance. What kind of surfaces will you need to navigate? Are there many stairs and do they have railings? How available are benches or public seating if you need to rest? Second, plan your footwear wisely. Comfortable shoes that are supportive and meant for walking are imperative. Those brand-new, barely-there sandals you bought just for this trip may not be the ideal choice for your nine-mile trek. Reliable shoes that fit properly will always be the best accessory; save the fashion-over-function shoes for shorter outings like shows or dinners. Where fighting fatigue is concerned, this will vary for everyone. Getting sufficient sleep in transit can be difficult but staying hydrated while traveling is easy and will always help. Try your best to adjust your seat to a comfortable position and use a travel pillow to support your neck if you plan to sleep in your seat. For any time spent awake in transit, get out of your seat periodically to stretch your legs if possible. Standing or walking will help minimize postural strain and improve circulation. Even with all of that, you may still end up feeling stiff or drained on the first few days of your trip. Pay attention to your body! If you don’t have the energy to spend the day hiking to that lookout point or traversing sprawling palace grounds, take the day to enjoy a more leisurely activity. This goes hand-in-hand with divided attention; the more alert you are, the easier it is for you to spot hazards and react in time. Travel is an enriching experience that can serve as a powerful reset for our minds and bodies. Taking measures to protect our health and safety while traveling allows us to enjoy each trip to its fullest and might make the post-vacation slump a little more bearable. But alas--at present, I have no advice for reducing the discomfort of a four-hour flight delay. Andrea Kwok lives and works as a physical therapist on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. She enjoys running, traveling, cooking, and an occasional game of pickleball. She has no formal education or experience as a writer outside of medical research papers, and she is grateful for the opportunity to train a new muscle.

Greetings to our friends in the Insider community!   We haven’t seen you for exactly two years (July 26, 2023), when we published our last issue and declared the pandemic over (A few weeks later, I finally got Covid for the first time. So much for my sense of timing.)  It was our honor to publish over 1,600 stories for you.   We decided to have our own little reunion and put out a three-part commemorative issue. This is the first of the three. The other two parts will run the next two Fridays (August 1 and 8). The pandemic was truly a once-in-a-century event. There were more than 100 million confirmed cases of Covid and over 1 million deaths, making it the deadliest disaster in U.S. history. We tried to do our small part in informing, entertaining, and providing a sense of community in a truly isolating time.   Please allow us to toot our own horn for a minute. From its inception in 2020 until we closed shop in 2023, The Insider had nearly 50,000 unique visitors, from countries as far-flung as Rwanda and Australia. We even had our turn in the media: https://www.freep.com/story/news/local/michigan/2021/02/19/insider-magazine-covid-19-pandemic/4514181001/ https://nypost.com/2021/03/18/indie-publishers-buck-virus-with-new-titles-acquisitions/ https://www.theinsider1.com/post/the-insider-makes-the-news https://www.thejewishnews.com/culture/arts/veteran-journalist-and-oak-park-native-starts-pandemic-publication/article_458e8932-60b0-5967-983c-469c59ce8160.html   Thanks again to the more than 100 writers who made this labor of love a reality. Some were journalists; others were writing for publication for the first time. All were a pleasure to work with. So was I, I hope (but doubt). And a special shoutout to Matt Nadelson of Computer Camaraderie , our gifted tech consultant and co-pilot, who truly made this journalistic journey possible.   We hope you enjoy this week’s installment of The Insider and will stick around for the following two!   All best, Andrea Sachs (Occasional) Editor-in-Chief   P.S. For next week's issue, we would love to publish YOUR in-the-rear-view-mirror reflections about the pandemic. For example, did you get Covid, or lose any loved ones to the disease? How did the pandemic change you, if at all?  Do you keep up with the latest Covid booster?   Please send us a few lines or a dissertation to editor@theinsider1.com and we will run them next week. (Messages will be gently edited for space and clarity.)

By Joel Dzodin / Holon I am a former Detroiter who emigrated to Israel in 2005. At different times, I've been an archaeologist, IT Help Desk guy, and taught English online to an international clientele. Photography has long been a major passion and I often concentrate on the small, unexamined and seemingly mundane details of everyday life, such as the beauty of minute water condensation that forms on cold bottles in the hot Israeli weather or the color of a tiny insect's eyes. During more normal times, I love to wander the fields and trails of Israel, stumbling over and connecting with prehistoric and historic evidence of previous human settlements strewn across the landscape.

By Jessie Seigel / Washington, D.C. Under Donald Trump’s administration, the nation’s government has been turned into a full-fledged criminal enterprise. The law has become something Trump and his minions step around, ignore, or crush under foot. While a number of district and appellate federal courts and some state courts are trying to hold the line against Trump’s lawlessness, the Scotus Six (John Roberts, Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanagh, and Amy Coney-Barrett) are, in calculated fashion, issuing every backhanded opinion they can to aid and abet the Trump regime’s destruction of the Constitution. Their actions make them a knowing part of that enterprise. The latest game of the Six is to ignore violations of the Constitution and, instead, prevent lower courts from stopping them. Thus, they enable the Trump regime to continue its illegal actions—in particular, enforcement of blatantly unconstitutional executive orders--for an interminable interim while the real issues concerning constitutionality ostensibly continue to be litigated. Numerous district courts have issued injunctions to prevent the Trump Administration from carrying out actions that appear to violate the Constitution because it is likely that irreparable harm will occur if the action is not stopped until its legality is determined. For example, deporting people before a court determines whether or not the government has a legal right to deport them, thus denying those deported the due process required by the Constitution’s Fifth amendment. For the survival of democracy, last week’s majority opinion in Trump v. Casa is the Court’s most egregious limitation of injunctions. It enables Trump to negate the Constitution’s definition of citizenship—the core of what makes America America. The Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution, in its very first section clearly states: All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. This straight-forward language has also been upheld in Supreme Court case law for more than 125 years. Everyone born here, except for Native Americans, has ancestors who were born elsewhere. By definition, America is a nation of immigrants and the children of immigrants. To negate that is to deny America’s essence. Nevertheless, on January 20, Trump issued an executive order that falsely claims “the privilege of United States citizenship does not automatically extend to persons born in the United States.” His order denies citizenship to children born in the U.S. whether their parents entered the country illegally, or legally on temporary work and tourism visas. If the country permits that game, it will open the door to denial of anyone’s citizenship. Was your mother an immigrant? How about your grandmother? Your great-grandmother? District courts issued injunctions preventing Trump’s executive order from going into effect. Those injunctions applied to the whole country. On appeal, the government cleverly avoided arguing the legality of Trump’s order. Instead, it asked the Supreme Court to find the lower courts’ orders could only apply to the particular individuals before them. This would leave Trump free to apply his order nationwide to anyone who is not a party to those particular cases. Without even a sly wink, Justice Coney-Barret, writing for the majority, found for Trump, maintaining the court was not deciding whether the executive order was constitutional, but only whether a single judge has the authority to issue universal injunctions. In her dissent, Justice Sonya Sotomayor correctly assessed the majority’s stance, writing: “The gamesmanship in [Trump’s] request is apparent and the Government makes no attempt to hide it. Yet, shamefully, this Court plays along.” She added: “Until the day that every affected person manages to become party to a lawsuit and secures for himself injunctive relief, the Government may act lawlessly indefinitely.” More broadly, Sotomayor warned: “The rule of law is not a given in this Nation, nor any other. It is a precept of our democracy that will endure only if those brave enough in every branch fight for its survival. Today, the Court abdicates its vital role in that effort.” Justice Ketanji Jackson wrote a separate dissent in which she warned even more strongly of the demise of our democracy, stating: “I have no doubt that, if judges must allow the Executive to act unlawfully in some circumstances, as the Court concludes today, executive lawlessness will flourish, and from there, it is not difficult to predict how this all ends.” Jackson added, “Eventually, executive power will become completely uncontainable, and our beloved constitutional Republic will be no more… this Court’s complicity in the creation of a culture of disdain for lower courts, their rulings, and the law (as they interpret it) will surely hasten the downfall.” Jackson has spoken to the heart of the ongoing battle for democracy and the side the Scotus Six have taken in that battle. It is refreshing—finally—to see the Court’s minority put aside an artificial collegiality and openly expose the majority’s actions for what they are. To Ketanji Brown and Sonya Sotomayor, I say: Welcome to the fight! Jessie Seigel’s journalistic career began with the political Washington Whispers column, written for The Insider . Since The Insider ended its run in 2023, Seigel has continued the column as My Washington Whispers, www.mywashingtonwhispers.com . In addition, Seigel has had a long career as a government attorney, has received two Artist’s Fellowships from the Washington, D.C. Commission on the Arts and Humanities for her fiction, has been a finalist for several literary awards, and has had two professional staged readings of her play Tinker's Damn , with another play, The Three Jessies , forthcoming in September. More on Seigel can be found at  https://www.jessieseigel.com .

Willa, Olive and Sienna Beck Tour Brussels Summer Camp Cometh! By Willa Beck / New York City This summer marks a milestone in my life. Not because I’m traveling to countries I’ve never been to before or to ones that I’ve been to on the other side of the world  or because I’ll be playing piano in front of 150 people at my aunt’s wedding, or even my approaching first year of middle school—all of which are true and exciting. But there is nothing as exciting as my first time at sleepaway camp!   If you look up  sleepaway camp in the dictionary, the definition should say, “see ‘nervous’ and ‘exciting.’”   I am going to spend 11 days at a camp called WriCampia—without my parents, from whom I’ve only been away for one night—while at the same time, I hope I’ll be making new lifelong friendships and having the time of my life!   I’m going to a place where all my favorite things are mushed together: fun activities, even some academics in the writing category, and other new beginnings coming my way! I’m excited for everything, from writing with new people and making films with the instructors and other campers, to going on and on about how bad the camp food will be, and even early wakeups, which I usually hate. I’ll be sleeping in a new place. Or, being in a new place, period.   Camp Danbee is three hours upstate from Manhattan, where I live.  There’s the con; really the only con. I’m only a phone call or email away, and I’ll probably be having too much fun living my first un-parentally supervised experience and doing whatever I want to do! However, I won’t be living alone. I will stay in a cabin, or whatever there is in WriCampia, with 7-13 other girls and two counselors. But in total, there will be so many kids, coed, from rising fifth graders through rising twelth graders!  And at least one of them has to be the one to make my summer camp experience shine brighter than all my other summers.   In a way, this will feel a bit normal for me because I go to WriCampia’s annual after-school program, Writopia, which is all writing. In my years of writing for The Insider,  my mind has never wandered far enough to even think about going to sleepaway camp for the summer. But as I’m writing this article, all I can do is sit and imagine what new chapters await me! Willa is a rising sixth grader in Manhattan. She loves writing stories but loves reading them even more. She enjoys traveling and taking more pictures than an iPhone allows. Willa likes being alone and bored because she gets her best ideas then. Hot Times in the Tropics By Olive Beck / New York City When I went to Barbados, one of my favorite things was the bar. you would sit and order. My favorite was either a chocolate milk shake or lemonade. We would tell my parents first then off we went. Another thing I loved were the shows at dinner. One act was of a girl called the "Queen of Fire." She would set everything on fire and do crazy things. The heat   outside was intense, like 98-99 degrees F and to top it off, it was humid. Cats were all over the resort and one I named Stripe. He (or she) had a stripe down the back.   At dinner, we were called up to dance. Let's just say my mom  humiliated  me. She would shake her butt, and my face was super red. The cats were super smart and covered their business in sand on the beach. We also fed them. So so so so so so cute. We saw my cousin Carly who was going to medical school there. There were so many bugs, small and big. There was a monkey hiding in the trees. As soon as it came down, a white cat started chasing it all over the resort. In conclusion, those were the only things worth mentioning. Olive is a rising fourth grader in Manhattan.  Her favorite color is pink and she has a huge sweet tooth.  Olive enjoys writing fantasy and loves reading.  She also loves having alone time away from her two older sisters but still loves them.  My Poetic Pandemic in Haiku By Sienna Sachs Beck / New York City Four long, grueling months Spent isolated, lonely, No new companions Following that time Two school years spent online Seeing only faces. Relying solely, Entirely, on writing Filling pages’ worth I missed company Someone my (eight-year-old) age Wanted normal life I came back to school Fully masked and so nervous And really bossy Paranoid i'il me Yea, always going around Fixing people’s masks For two years At my new school (fourth and fifth) No one saw my face Around this very time, I wrote for The Insider (Monthly columnist). I wrote what I saw I wrote what I heard, what I read Pouring emotions It has been two years Since last article came out I miss reading them And so, dear Andi, I’m so happy for new issue, Congratulations! Sienna Sachs Beck is a 12.75 year old going into the eighth grade at Booker T. Washington MS54 in Manhattan. She loves to travel the world with her family, having most recently been to Uzbekistan and China. Sienna has been writing since she was really little, and has always loved reading books. She recently had her third play in four years performed in the Worldwide Plays Festival. Sienna has recently been into poetry, and she is so excited to share this collection of haiku with the readers of The Insider!

By Dr. Nancy Fishman / Morgan Hill, Calif. Gray matter is an essential type of tissue in your brain and spinal cord. It plays a significant role in mental functions, such as memory and emotions. Gray matters are the physical and emotional issues of aging, experiences that occur across all cultures and socioeconomic strata. When I was much, much younger, my husband told me he had a dream of me with long, flowing gray hair. He hoped I would grow old gracefully. Since then, I have walked gracefully into the hair salon, had my hair colored, and walked gracefully out! I always thought there would come a time, maybe in my 70s or 80s, certainly in my 90s, when I would feel compelled to go gray. When Covid shut us all down in 2020, it created a period of time when experimenting with gray hair was not only possible, but for me, preferable to buying a do-it-yourself product online. I opted to let my freak flag fly! Long, flowing gray hair it would be! Well, not exactly. It wasn’t that lovely dream. Instead, the white hair around my face washed me out so badly, I resembled a Covid patient. I look around at family and friends and see most of them living with white or gray hair, free from the obsession or expense of the cover-up. Alas, I am an aging sinner, caught between envy and vanity. Oh fiddle-de-dee! What does it really matter anyway? There are certainly many more issues around aging that matter more than the superficial ones. We talk about some of them openly, while we suffer private wars with issues we are less comfortable sharing. When was the last time you had lunch with lady friends and the topics discussed were facial hair and dry vaginas? How often do men talk about balding and boner pills? Aging is an insidious kind of phenomenon; it creeps up on us when we’re not looking in its direction. However, it seems there is an in-between time, transitional perhaps, when we begin to make more thoughtful and cautious decisions for ourselves, choices that are more age-appropriate, which will keep us safer yet still in the game. It’s that “gray area," somewhere between the pickleball court and the ER. One day, we’re climbing Mount Kilimanjaro and the next we’re climbing the stairs to the orthopedist’s office. When I was thirtysomething, I began playing a game I call “the efficiency of time and movement." How many tasks can I accomplish in the quickest way with the fewest number of steps? Today, everyone is conscious of getting their “steps” in. We wear Apple watches, Garmins, or other activity trackers to reward us for achieving optimal numbers. I’m in the gray area here! Do I continue to enjoy my game, or do I join the ranks of my gray-haired friends and see how many steps I can add to my daily routine? The other day I was thinking about Mrs. Bookman, the little old gray-haired lady who tried to teach my three sisters and me how to play piano. She appeared at our home every week in a smart wool skirt, a crisp blouse, sensible low heels, and an armful of classical music. She may have been 45. If 40 was middle-aged back then, she was over-the-hill. When did 60 become the new middle age? I am acutely aware of people’s preoccupation with age once they turn 60. At first, I thought they were merely counting down until the day they could collect Social Security. Now, I don’t think that’s it entirely. People in their 60s seem to want to reassure themselves they are still in good shape. They take 100-mile bike rides through Italy and hike over the Pyrenees Mountains on pilgrimage. If they are not taking three exercise classes a day and playing pickleball, they must have Covid. Some claim to be having the best sex of their lives, but…hush, hush…does it count if Viagra and vibrators are involved? So, if 60 is the new middle age, does this mean we are expected to live to the ripe old age of 120? “Old” is the operative word here. I actually struggle with that word. It can be confusing and difficult to calculate. My hips are 9 and 2 years old, respectively. How do I love them? Let me count the ways. While contemplating my navel, I came up with three categories of aging: Old, Older, and Oldest. Old is that state-of-mind, regardless of your chronological age, when you define yourself as being way beyond shelf life. Older is when your chronological age is past middle age but your body is still cooperating and your spirit is light and young. And Oldest is when you no longer want to play these silly games--you throw your hands up in the air and declare you are proud and thrilled that you have lived as long as you have. (Sigh) These issues of aging! The ones that slap us in our wrinkled faces and remind us we cannot stop that skin from sagging. One thing we can be sure of: We are all walking, running or hobbling in the same direction. Dr. Nancy Fishman moved to Santa Clara County in 2016 from Michigan, where she was a practicing psychologist. Currently, she is a strategy consultant to individuals, families, businesses, family law attorneys and their clients--working on coping, managing, reorganizing, pivoting and innovating. She is the founder of Forgotten Harvest, one of the nation’s largest food recovery operation, and is also the creator of Silicon Valley’s A La Carte food recovery and distribution initiative. Nancy lives on a family compound with her husband, sisters, brother-in-law, and a pack of dogs. NancyFishmanPhD.com ForgottenHarvest.org

By Alan Resnick / Detroit Like many Americans, I’ve found the six months following Donald Trump’s inauguration to be confusing, depressing, horrifying, and terrifying. For me, though, there is an additional stressor. I conduct a weekly current events discussion group at a senior living facility not too far from my home. It’s great fun, the participants are extremely appreciative, and it forces me to keep abreast of local, national, and international events. But it is a Sisyphean task trying to prepare each week under this administration. Preparing for my weekly session was a snap when Joe Biden was in office. Each day I would invest about 20 minutes reviewing headlines from Reuters, AP, the Washington Post, the New York Times, and a couple of news aggregators. I’d click on the stories I thought would generate discussion, then cut and paste a synopsis of the main points into my notes. And, if it was a political story, I’d search for comments from people on the other side of the aisle so as to offer an opposing perspective. The flow of information out of the White House was stable and manageable. Unless there was a natural disaster like the catastrophic flash flood of the Guadalupe River in Texas, an assassination (or an attempted one), or a major mass shooting, the headlines from Wednesday still were relevant into the next week. So, when Tuesday morning came around, I’d simply organize the stories into an order that I thought made sense, find a “fireman saves mama duck and ducklings from drain” good-news story, and add opening and closing jokes. (The group has a decided preference for blue humor.) I attempted to maintain this routine for about three months after Trump returned to office, but it was futile. I could barely keep my head above water with the daily deluge of news pouring out of the White House. To be sure, there have been many stories that have been in the news for weeks, if not months. We’ve engaged in important and spirited discussions on topics such as the ongoing wars between Ukraine and Russia and between Israel and Hamas, the bloodletting of civil servants driven by Elon Musk and DOGE, deportation without due process, the administration’s ongoing attempts to control the hiring, curriculum, and admissions policies of universities, and countless executive orders. Then there are stories that continue to be newsworthy but change daily due to the President’s mercurial decision-making style. Think back to April when Trump first announced his decision to impose tariffs on the countries he believed were taking advantage of the United States. Countries come and go from his hit list, the products that will have a tariff imposed on them fluctuate, the amounts of the tariffs bounce up and down, and the dates the tariffs begin keep getting moved forward. I sympathize with the manufacturers who are complaining about the need for predictability in order to run their businesses. But my biggest preparation problem by far has been all the stories that are front page headlines or evening news leads one day and vanish the next, because there is another story or announcement from the administration that is so outrageous, sinister, or frightening that it “trumps” yesterday’s big news. Here are just a few examples of stories that, to me, would have made wonderful and important discussion group topics. But they either never made it into my final list of topics or never got discussed simply because of the news glut. We never got the chance to talk about Thomas Fugate, the 22-year-old, one-year-out-of-college newbie who is now a Department of Homeland Security official overseeing the government’s main hub for terrorism prevention. He replaced an Army veteran with 20 years of experience in national security. We never got around to conversing about Trump asking Congress to wipe out funding for public broadcasting. And I wish we could have spent some time chatting about Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth’s ordering the Secretary of the Navy to rename the USNS Harvey Milk, and his alleged review of ships named after Black and Hispanic civil rights leaders and prominent women. We also never had the chance to talk about turning the front lawn of the White House into a Tesla showroom or turning the Office of the President into a profit center. Some analysts have speculated that the never-ending tidal wave of announcements from this administration represents a strategic plan designed to overwhelm and subsequently numb the populace into ignoring the news and accepting a new, lower baseline for normalcy. Others feel that the chaos simply reflects Trump’s impulsivity and need for attention, power, and retribution. My guess is that it’s a combination of both. What I can say with certainty is that half my daily prep time devolved into deleting notes I had typed from one or two days before, as the stories that seemed noteworthy yesterday had become passé. So, after burning through what seemed like a ream of printer paper and a couple of Epson XL 200 black ink cartridges, I’ve developed a new preparation plan that seems to be working. I now invest no more than 10 minutes each day scanning my preferred news sources. All I do is clip links to headline stories. I don’t even read what I’ve clipped on Wednesday or Thursday until at least Sunday or Monday, when I can better assess what likely will be in the news on Tuesday. This minimizes my need to rewrite any previous notes. It’s not a perfect system, but it is an improvement. And it certainly has given me a much greater appreciation of the headache that reporters and editors who cover this administration must be experiencing. Alan Resnick is a retired industrial psychologist. He and his wife Anita have been married for almost 23 years. In addition to leading a weekly current events discussion group at a senior living facility, he is on the Board of Directors for the Michigan Jewish Sports Foundation and the Oakland County Selective Service Board. Alan enjoys photography, is continually aggravated by golf, and is currently learning the ins and outs of using the pellet smoker he recently purchased.

By Emmy Serviss / Boston Do you remember the 21st night of September? Turns out that I always will, since that was the date in 2024 that my boyfriend Charlie chose to propose. It had nothing to do with the Earth, Wind & Fire song. That was just a funny coincidence. We had talked about getting engaged for a little while, and we got to a point where he was openly teasing me about the impending proposal, refusing to give me any hints or answer any questions. And I knew better than to ask my friends, because those whom he did confide in were sworn to secrecy. The only thing I knew with fair certainty was that it would happen before October. My rationale was that since Halloween is my favorite holiday, ideally we’d be engaged before October started, so I could enjoy all my regular festivities without pre-proposal panicking. The last photo of my ringless left hand I started to have an idea of when the engagement might happen. I was planning on having a board game birthday party in mid-August, after I returned from a trip to the Midwest. But then we had to cancel the party, due to my being exposed to Covid at the tail end of said trip. Charlie and I decided we could do a joint birthday board game party in September instead. As the days in September ticked away and we were still just boyfriend and girlfriend, it started to dawn on me that our board game party might be the big day. The couple of weeks leading up to the party, I picked up on a few clues… Clue #1 : There were only nine days left in September, so logically there weren’t many possible days left. Clue #2 : Charlie’s best friend Rachel offered to buy us a birthday cake. Clue #3 : I had created an online invite months ago, so we had already invited our closest friends to the gathering. Clue #4 : Friends that weren’t able to attend seemed really sad they were missing it. Clue #5 : My good friend Courtney said I should get a manicure sometime soon, just in case! The day of the party, I tried to be as calm and normal as possible. Inside, I was absolutely freaking out. When Rachel dropped the cake off in the morning, I tried to test the waters by asking Charlie if I could see the cake. I thought that if he wouldn’t let me see the cake, that would definitely be a big tip-off. But he let me take a look at the cake, and it was indeed our birthday cake. We bought  these mysteriously numbered candles since our combined age was 72 Since the cake didn’t reveal anything helpful, I told myself that I had to go into the party assuming that it was just our board game party, so that I wouldn’t be disappointed if the proposal didn’t happen after all. The party started at 3 pm and we decided since there was a ComedySportz match that night and several partygoers had to leave early for call time at the theater, we would cut the cake at 4 pm. This made perfect sense to me and didn’t imply anything. However. If you’ve ever thrown a party, you know that people don’t usually start showing up until at least 30-45 minutes after the official start time. So when every guest arrived by 3:15 pm, I knew something was up. Fast forward to 4:03 pm, and Charlie says, “We should cut the cake now, huh?” About five minutes later, we were engaged. My best friends Angela and Andrea bombarded me with hugs, as I tried to stop crying long enough for a photo Thank goodness there are plenty of pictures and video from the actual event itself, because I essentially blacked out in my overwhelmed emotional state. I remember we blew out the candles together and out of the corner of my eye I saw him get down on one knee. It’s kind of a blur after that, but the video shows me crying and nodding and flapping my arms like a little frightened bird. The funniest part was after I finally nodded my “yes” to the question, and Charlie asked if I was okay and I squealed, “NO!” Charlie laughed, and immediately turned to our friends and clarified, “She said yes! She said yes! She didn’t say ‘no’ to the thing!” It was an amazing night, and certainly one that I’ll remember forever. And then six weeks later, Donald Trump was elected president. Again. Suddenly my optimistic bride-tinted-glasses were as shattered as the windows on Kristallnacht. After Trump took office for the second time, it became clear that the fears of the Left were not unfounded. Things went from bad to worse really quickly, and wedding planning seemed like a pointless and frivolous waste of time. I’m not religious, but being Jewish is an important part of who I am. I want Charlie and I to sign a ketubah - a Jewish marriage license. I want to get married under a chuppah - a traditional Jewish canopy. And I want Charlie to break a glass as we get married - a symbol of the fragility of our relationship and a reminder of the care we must take to protect it. One thought keeps bubbling to the surface, over and over again. An insane irrational thought, but I can’t help it from racing through my mind. Since Charlie was raised in a (somewhat) Christian household, and I was raised in a (moderately) Jewish household, our marriage would taint Charlie's "pure" blood. By Nazi standards, anyway. And since we're basically living in a Nazi regime, I can't help but wonder... ...how long before it’s illegal for Charlie to marry me? Would I be thrown into one of the new and improved "NOT" concentration camps? Would he be executed for being a blood traitor? The thought is so crazy, my friends and family reassured me that it was ridiculous. And yet we watched human rights get stripped away, we watched the Constitution get trampled by congressional jackboots, we watched ICE agents kidnap women and children off the street, and we watched as Republicans built actual concentration camps in the Florida Everglades. And they laughed. They laughed. “Alligator Alcatraz” is a concentration camp and no one can convince me otherwise I go back and forth between two thoughts. The first is that it feels absolutely ridiculous to be planning a wedding right now, when the world is on fire and drowning at the same time. And the second is that we need to find joy wherever we can. So we’ll tally our RSVP cards, build our bouquets and count the days until the wedding on October 25. And we'll continue to pretend desperately that we don’t live in a fiery hellscape, while counting the days until the midterm elections. Looks like I’ll be phone banking on my honeymoon. “Never again” is NOW Emmy Serviss is a Boston-based writer, actor and improv coach. When she's not binge-watching old TV series with her fiancé, you can find her at The Rozzie Square Theater performing with ComedySportz Boston and coaching the  ComedySportz Boston Minor League team. When not on the stage, Emmy enjoys playing D&D, stressing out about her upcoming wedding and counting the days until Halloween.

By Matt Nadelson / New York City The date was March 19, 2020. I was working at a client’s home in Brooklyn Heights. The appointment was routine, but the news was anything but. Covid aka coronavirus was raging in Europe and it felt inevitable that it would eventually come to our shores. When I walked out of that appointment, I walked right into quarantine. On-site IT support was the bread and butter of my company, Computer Camaraderie. How would it continue to exist in a world where I might not be able to set foot in a client’s home or workplace for many months or years to come? After just a few weeks of mainly fruitless efforts trying to convince our clients to try our IT services remotely, my prayers were answered. Enter Andrea Sachs, an accomplished Time magazine reporter who had started a pandemic newsletter she was distributing among friends but hoped to turn into something bigger. It was the type of project that under typical circumstances would land in my inbox three to four times a year.. Aspiring writers, bloggers, and novelists are often looking for ways to use technology to get their creative projects out to the public. But it turned out that Andrea was no typical client. Where most of our clients tend to ease online slowly, Andrea wanted to jump right into the fire. It was clear almost immediately that her goal wasn’t to have a small side project to fill her time in quarantine. Once she learned what was possible technologically, Andrea had a clear vision: The Insider was going to be a full online pandemic publication, complete with a regular publishing schedule, regular contributors and sections, and even a digital counter showing international Covid infections in real-time. It also became abundantly clear that Andrea’s vision included a larger role for me than I ever would have expected. One where I not only would help to build the platform, but actually help to publish the stories. It developed in to a role that led me very far away from my job description as a “tech guy,” but not far at all from another passion I’ve always had­: writing. I’m so grateful to Andrea for making this all possible. And so proud of The Insider’s success. While there are many fulfilling projects that come along, there are very few in which the quality of the people, the work and the finished product all line up to make one hell of an adventure. Thank you, Insiders! Matt Nadelson is the founder and president of Computer Camaraderie Corp., a full-service IT support firm based in New York City that specializes in the unique needs of home and small-business users. 833-IT-RESCUE (833-487-3728) Email: matthew@ccc4me.com Facebook: @CCC4ME Website: http://www.ccc4me.com

I thought about writing some gassy screed for this, the final issue of The Insider, with ruminations about pandemic journalism. Then I read all of these beautiful stories by our contributors, and I decided to keep quiet. Res ipsa loquitur, baby! Thank you to the many fine writers who made this publication possible. I watched you get better and better, experienced journalists and newbies alike. You wrote with more verve and ingenuity in each succeeding issue. I know from personal experience that it’s not easy. As the old maxim goes, Writing is easy–you just open a vein and bleed. A special shout-out to The Insider’s gifted film critic, Laurence Lerman, who wrote “Reel Streaming,” our longest-running column: 131 weeks ain’t chopped liver! Thanks to the hundreds of people who agreed to be interviewed by The Insider over the past 3½ years. I am overwhelmed by the number of folks who participated in frank interviews about having Covid. Your disclosures were truly the first draft of the history of this modern-day plague. I owe a special debt of gratitude to our technology manager, Matt Nadelson of Computer Camaraderie, who is one of those rare folks with both tech and English-major talents. Matt and I spent thousands of hours piecing together the digital pages you saw every week, all while gossiping and arguing about politics. His work ethic is legendary: It’s 3 a.m. and you need computer help? No problem! And a collegial toast to those journalists at other publications–The New York Post, The Detroit News, The Detroit Free Press, The Detroit Jewish News and The Silurian Press Club News–who gave us a publicity boost by writing colorful stories about The Insider. Your articles helped bring an increasing number of eyeballs to our site (50,000 unique visitors in all), and this sister journo is beholden to you. Most of all, I would like to offer an enormous thank you to our loyal readers, whose suggestions, comments and enthusiasm have been all-important. Those treasured folks who have been riding with me since Lilly’s Little Libels (my first publication, in law school, in the mid-1970s), please know you’re in my will. All of you made this veteran print journalist’s vague digital dreams real. Love you dearly! Andrea -30-