Week-and-a-half Update

Starting with a shout out to Ryan and Marni for engaging in blog related discourse in the comments section last week!  Who will join them this week?  I'm lookin' at you, Chuck!  (I don't actually think Chuck reads this, its okay!)

So, some catching up to do, and I'm going to start off with real news.  I HOPE Christina has heard at least something about the mass kidnappings in Nigeria.  There is a range of information about this situation now, but it is hard to know what exactly to make of it. 

Related, but with a different perspective- check out this op ed about the treatment of Africa in the media.  What do you think? 

Arkansas joined the ranks of gay marriage states!  That makes this graphic totally outdated-- nice to think that progress is moving faster than website updates!

This is super interesting to me-- we've told Zoe it is unlikely there will be enough of a space program to allow her to be an astronaut, but maybe if we find Earth's twin?   (Don't worry, she also wants to be a doctor and a bear, so she's got backup plans!)

Oh, Obama.  I find this endearing. Remember when you nabbed the fly with your bare hand?  (Did you see that, Christina?  It just came back to me).  (BTW, there is another side to this story, too.)

And in other interesting issues to follow-- new progress in cancer treatment worth keeping an eye on.

And...get ready-- over the next 18 months there will be a lot of political headlines to keep on our radar in preparation for the 2016 elections-- and lots of ladies on the list!  Makes me wish we lived in Englandq--"There is no local television in England and it’s illegal to run individual candidate ads on the national stations."--...but we don't!