The view from Maine is summertime lovely, the sunshine shimmery, the sky the sort of nautical blue you never see even a quarter-mile from the shore. A solitary sailboat, bouncing on flukey breezes, creases the ocean. It is July, the month of our national holiday, and much of the nation is on holiday.
Dear Doctors: There is some folklore that diet pop is bad for you. I gave up sugar and most carbohydrates to help with weight and A1C control, but I continued to drink diet cola. What do the actual studies – ones that are not from biased sources and are peer-reviewed – say about diet cola?
DEAR HARRIETTE: My 25-year-old daughter showed up visibly drunk to our family dinner. I know that she is a grown adult, but we were at dinner with her conservative grandparents who don't condone alcohol consumption at all. She was loud and a bit sloppy, and I didn't appreciate it. Out of respect for the elders in her family, I think she should have at least tried to appear sober. Is it wrong to say something to her about her behavior, since she is now an adult? – Drunk at Dinner
Stephen Ayres was drawn to Washington, D.C., on Jan. 6, 2021, by Donald Trump's outrageously false claims that the presidential election had been stolen.
I had a big birthday, and it got me to thinking, as big birthdays will, about what would change and what would stay the same in the decade to come. I found my list of self-improvement chores much shorter than in previous years.
DEAR HARRIETTE: I feel like my kids as adults are losing respect for me. When your kids are young, they look up to you for everything and trust in you. My kids are all college age and older. They are leaving the nest and not looking back. They throw their bad memories as kids at me, saying that I was manipulative and a liar. But parents, we know what it's like when kids throw tantrums or when they get into trouble as teenagers and they just won't listen. I did what I needed to raise smart, strong kids, and I feel like I succeeded. All I want now is to enjoy a mature adult relationship with my kids, but they want nothing to do with me. I just feel like I gave my life to them, and now I am hated and alone. Was I a bad mother? – Miss My Kids
Between the Riverside Rumble Couples Golf Tournament and the OK Kids Coach Pitch State Baseball Tournament last weekend, things were hopping in Clinton!
Dear Editor,
The Hunter Biden story has always been a Joe Biden story. It has been clear all along that Hunter Biden, like some other relatives of high officeholders, spent years trying to cash in on his father's government position. And we've known for a while that Justice Department investigators are looking into whether Hunter paid taxes on the money he got from various overseas deals, and whether he fully complied with foreign agent requirements.
At a legislative hearing in Austin last week, lawmakers from both parties grumbled about the murky costs of Operation Lone Star, Gov. Greg Abbott's exorbitantly expensive election-year effort to crack down on unauthorized border crossers.