The Loveshade Family Blog

A while back I was fascinated by this family photo of two young girls in fancy dresses with two artificial snowmen.  Somehow the image got transformed in my mind.  I imagined them wearing typical winter clothing as they built a snowman in the yard, and linked that image to how sexism begins at birth: "is it a boy or a girl?"

Yahoo was looking for poetry and asked for a poem that was inspired by a photo.  They just published my poem.  You can read it at www.associatedcontent.com/article/8309319/the_creation_of_snowman_in_two_parts.html

Posted by Alden Loveshade at 03:53 AM | Permalink | Comments (6)

options

Texas is a state that likes its barbecue, its high school and college football, and its guns.  No, that's not a "King of the Hill" stereotype.  I, like that show's co-creators Mike Judge and Greg Daniels, spent a lot of time in Texas.

Of course not everyone in Texas fits a stereotype.

Something that definitely does not fit a Texas stereotype is shutting down a prison.  Apparently, it's never happened in Texas before.

The Central Unit in Sugar Land, a century-old prison southwest of Houston, is closing along with three juvenile detention centers.  The reasons given are that rehabilitation works better and is cheaper.

As of the last report I read, about 60 percent of the people in Texas prisons were there for drug-related offenses.  Most of these are people who have some type of dependency.  Studies have shown for a long, long time that incarceration seldom reforms, but Texas has largely ignored them.

So forgive me if my suspicion is that the shut downs aren't being done primarily for rehabilitation, but to save money.  But whatever the reason, I hope it works.

Read more at http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/lookout/texas-close-prison-first-time-state-history-175703769.html

Image of the entrance to the Central Unit prison of Sugar Land, Texas, is by WhisperToMe.  This file is made available under the Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication

Posted by Alden Loveshade at 12:51 AM | Permalink | Comments (7)

options