DramatistDreamer

Looking at the first year of this show and honestly, Stephanie and Ridge are the only characters whose sartorial choices seem to hold up as looking stylish consistently all these decades later. Eric would have made it if not for that stupid belt/suspenders combo, which, for a designer, is beyond the pale. So far, Clarke hasn't been bad, except his apartment is hopelessly 80s with those balloon sculpture wall-hangings and that stark Miami Vice of the West decor. I won't even get into the others with big hair (Kristen), bigger earrings (Margo) and boxy suits (Caroline, Thorne) and whatever that mud color contraption they had Brooke in (although the first dress that Ridge gifted her could almost be stylish today (with a few modifications). Except for the wedding, where the Logan's all looked good, their choices are dull, lack style, which I guess is what privileged people think middle and working class always wear. Rocco, well, he is a walking MTV 1980s billboard, lol. Stephanie's wardrobe choices were highly stylized, but they work. There are those episodes where she's wearing white, and she looks like someone out of a "leisure" scene in The Great Gatsby. Stephanie/Susan Flannery just looks like those women who, even if their lives are a total disaster, always look put together, so elegant.

It wouldn't surprise me if Symone Sanders left to work for the Stacey Abrams campaign. I guess if true, we'll find out.

R.I.P. to Mrs. Jacqueline Avant who was the victim of a horrific shooting. There is a Netflix documentary on the life of music empresario Clarence Avant, her husband, which I watched a few years ago. This is so tragic.

Good! I also think, despite the millions in what is essentially guaranteed money in China, their human rights atrocities and repeatedly trampling civil liberties is making it harder and harder to justify doing partnerships with them. It's likely become a headache for the WTA. That coupled with the pandemic, forcing and ultimately showing Steve Simon to alternative tournament venues, has proven that the WTA has other options-- maybe not ones that are willing and able to pay enormous sums of money, but that atmosphere in Guadalajara...I can't remember the last time I saw a non-major have that level of crowd enthusiasm. China, while they began with a lot of enthusiasm (and relatively small crowds) has become stale even before this disappearance of Peng Shuai. I feel the same about Singapore as the site of the WTA finals-- it also got stale. Onward, hopefully to a fall swing that has match times more suitable for a good night's sleep for me.

Even just letting her hair "be" in its natural wavy state, instead of trying to brush it straight and into that Little House On The Prairie bun made her look fresher and more youthful. When I look at episodes on YouTube of how she was styled in the late 1970s and very early 1980s, it's unfortunate. That styling really made her look consistently dowdy.

Aww Kei. 😚 People are already speculating that the increasing insistence on vaccination is what finally made Konta decide to retire. IMO, injuries and a vastly changed Tour due to the pandemic, likely also factored into the decision.

Didn't we all suspect this on this board? I may be mistaken but it feels like we discussed this last year after that positive COVID-19 diagnosis was announced. He is as diabolical and amoral as we thought he was.

...when he lives in New Jersey.🙄

Serena posted this on her IG account.

With or without pay?

Alan Locher claims that he was trying to get Lisa Brown on his reunion livestream he doesn't appear to mention trying when he had William Fichtner and Martha Byrne on and that would have been the ideal time. If he mentioned it, it must have gotten lost in one of the technical glitches. Does anyone remember whether getting her on that particular reunion was discussed?

Once the show shifted Ellen into grandma status, her character seems to have become very staid. By the time Steve and Betsey became a couple, it seemed as though the character of Ellen had pretty much faded into the background.

😂 she sure has! Did the show even let her sing or was that lip syncing? That kook Dr. Oz is running for political office in a state that he is not even known to live in?

I. Told. You. So.

Congratulations to Barbados in casting off the Queen as head of state and becoming a republic-- likely the first domino to fall, as far as the Caribbean in the Commonwealth is concerned.

Just saw my own typo and corrected it in my original post. I meant unvaccinated, not undiagnosed. My bad. 😔

Your welcome. 😃 At this point, I am hoping that these pharmaceutical companies that have already developed vaccine will update their mRNA technology so that they can catch this and future variants. According to what I have read, for Pfizer, that would be about 2 months away and Moderna about three months. They may not have had this in mind last year when they developed these vaccines but this virus is still here mutating. Fortunately, the mRNA technology can be adapted with a fairly efficient turnaround time, so I have read. Good to hear.

The fact that Cuomo still has a job really says a lot about the country and the world we all live in and it's not good.

Wealthy countries and citizens take it for granted that they can have mobile vaccination clinics and vaccination pop-ups, pharmacies and the like but for much of the world, this doesn't exist. Even if drones drop off vaccines to isolated areas (e.g. mountain villages, which South Africa has), you still need people who have the necessary training to administer them, and as I understand, South Africa doesn't have enough of those people and neither do many of their neighboring countries in Southern Africa. Hell Europe and North America, with their much higher vaccination rates still got cases, but didn't get banned. Also, a ban is unlikely to do much anyway.

That's part of it, but not the full story. South Africa, like quite a few countries that are so-called developing are having a hard time distributing the vaccine. You have to remember there are rural and economically depressed areas that are isolated, not in any close proximity to health centers where mass vaccinations are taking place and people don't have access to safe and reliable transportation and the roads are perilous. People may not have the opportunity to travel to these centers, those who can afford the journey. Americans take for granted that they can walk, bike, drive, take a bus to a neighborhood pharmacy to get vaccinated. I asked family overseas about this option and they practically laughed in my face. This is not the reality for everyone. Yes, there is a deficit of trust between many South Africans and their government, but this is also a country where many people stepped up to test a still new vaccine before Americans did. Because they knew that this was likely the only way to get ready access to the vaccine. South Africa is experiencing the logistic difficulty of getting shots in arms, even to those who desperately want them. The fact is, there are elderly, poor people in isolated, rural areas who cannot safely get to these mass vaccination clinics and these health authorities don't have the manpower to bring the vaccines to them. The concept of a visiting nurse does not exist for some populations. The fact remains that Southern Africa alone was put on the banned list, when their countries weren't the only ones that had cases. South Africa, in particular found this variant before any other country (and it's pretty easy to see why, given their history of having to tackle viruses with little to no help from Western countries in the past), when it is unlikely that the variant even originates there. I think people confuse Johannesburg for all of Southern Africa. There are cities and there are the rural areas and even in some cities, you have economically depressed areas that are cut off from the wealthy areas where the majority of the amenities happened to be located. I bet if you took a look at where vaccine uptake is lowest and where it is highest, it would be fairly simple to tell which areas are which and well as how this contributes to low vaccination rates.

Tiger Woods spoke often of Lee Elders as a big motivating influence, especially earlier in his career.

Pretty much what I suspected since I read about the emergence of Omicron, but since South Africa has only faced alienation for their efforts at early detection, I suspect other countries may not step up to warn the global community in the future.

Escobedo then? Can't blame the others for not doing DC. Closer to home, likely more money, while Davis Cup is not even offering ranking points anyway. It makes it all the more questionable that Frances only get a belated call to play once the tie had already started. Marty chose a dude-bro team on first call and got the results he deserved.

This DC format is a mess. I keep forgetting to tune in because it's on several different platforms. I read that Sock had to retire from his doubles match or something. Both he and Isner can go. Mardy hasn't been smart in his choices. In what world do you call up Sock and Isner but you leave Tiafoe off the list? Whatever happened to Tommy Paul, Taylor Fritz, Marcos Girón, Brandon Nakashima? Bueller? Bueller? Beuller? Also, I thought Serbia lost their tie today, but they still advance?🤔 I'm too bored with this format to figure it out right now.

Frances flew in from vacation, after being called in at the last minute, won his singles rubber, only for Isner to lose and, are folks still laboring under the illusion that Jack Sock is still fit for play? Who is the captain of this U.S. squad?