1. Our new eight feet wide closet isn't a walk-in or anything. Shawn simply turned two small closets in two different room that were almost back to back into a single closet. Today, he finished putting the doors on -- maybe they are called bi-fold doors -- and now all that remains is cleaning up the mess of dried mud one of the guys who is no longer working for Shawn left on the floor. We've been storing our clothes in the basement ever since we moved into Mom's house and next week, when we return from Oregon, we'll be able to hang and store our clothes in the same room we sleep in.
2. As a day to day journalist, Elizabeth Drew strikes me as also being an important voice in the study of the Office of the Presidency, regardless of who occupies the office. Her primary concern, which reflects her understanding of the Constitution, I'd say, is that the Executive Branch be constrained in its powers. Richard Nixon -- and in this he's not unique -- sought to expand the power of the Presidency. This became especially true as he felt the pressure of his administration being investigated and worked to claim broader and broader definitions of concepts like national security and executive privilege.
Elizabeth Drew sees the Congress having oversight of the Executive Branch as a vital responsibility, a responsibility that gets both compromised and corrupted by partisanship. I've been fascinated to read Washington Journal while also reading Elizabeth Drew's contemporary reflections upon the presidency of Donald J. Trump. She's concerned about the Office of the Presidency growing stronger, with claims to increased powers, under President Trump and wonders who will hold President Trump accountable since the Congress is behaving timidly, acting as if it is a subordinate branch of government rather than an equal branch, Constitutionally charged with oversight of the Executive Branch. Elizabeth Drew develops these concerns in a recent editorial and you can find it here.
3. Pruned branches filled the back of Everett's pick up and I figured if I just put them in a couple of trash containers in would free up space to take more stuff to the dump. I gathered up more cardboard, bags of garbage that wouldn't fit in our full garbage cans, wood scraps from the remodel, and a few other odds and ends and loaded them up and made a trip to the transfer station. Nicholl is starting to roll her eyes when she sees me driving up, wondering why she bothers to check on my load since it's always appropriate stuff and since I know where to take things. But, she does her duty, we have a good laugh, and Christy and Everett as well as the Deke and I are once again free of the stuff that accumulates during a remodeling project, while doing yard work, and generally cleaning up.
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