Sideswipe: December 28: Covid tracer cake

That takes the cake

Adrienne writes: "Every year my husband paints our Christmas cake. This is what he painted on our cake this year. Maybe this cake will go 'viral'? Our teenager was disappointed it wouldn't work when he tried to scan it with the NZ Covid tracer app."

Letter to Ronald Regan

Dear Mr. President,
My name is Andy Smith. I am a seventh grade student at Irmo Middle School, South Carolina. Today my mother declared my bedroom a disaster area. I would like to request federal funds to hire a crew to clean up my room. I am prepared to provide the initial funds if you will provide matching funds for this project. I know you will be fair when you consider my request. I will be awaiting your reply.
Sincerely yours, Andy Smith

And the President replied: Dear Andy: I'm sorry to be so late in answering your letter but, as you know, I've been in China and found your letter here upon my return. Your application for disaster relief has been duly noted but I must point out one technical problem: the authority declaring the disaster is supposed to make the request. In this case, your mother.

However, setting that aside, I'll have to point out the larger problem of available funds. This has been a year of disasters: 539 hurricanes as of May 4th and several more since, numerous floods, forest fires, drought in Texas and a number of earthquakes. What I'm getting at is that funds are dangerously low. May I make a suggestion? This Administration, believing that government has done many things that could better be done by volunteers at the local level, has sponsored a Private Sector Initiative Programme, calling upon people to practise voluntarism in the solving of a number of local problems. Your situation appears to be a natural. I'm sure your mother was fully justified in proclaiming your room a disaster. Therefore, you are in an excellent position to launch another volunteer programme to go along with the more than 3000 already under way in our nation. Congratulations. (Source: Letters of Note)

Making kid food fun 70s style

Tiny love stories

"My skin knew on our second date. It warned me that our connection was too quick, too intense with red, peeling patches across my cheeks and chin. (Dermatitis, dermatologists said, unsure of the trigger. Stress, maybe, or some unknown irritant. I dismissed it with prescription desoximetasone.) My skin knew the week before our wedding, swelling until my eyes shut tight, so puffy and pink and full of panic. My skin knew the moment it met my wedding band. The rash on my ring finger only left when I did, two years later. My skin always knew. Underneath, I did too." — Jessica DeFino