Weekend potpourri: Local Politics, COVID ups and downs.

Venturing back out into the light post-COVID, it might not have been my first choice to spend a couple hours at the monthly Brookings County Republican meeting, but well worth my time. Here’s what I found out.

There is a lot of interest in the local city races. While there is local Democrat Ope Neimeier who is running, it appears that Republican and former police chief Jeff Miller is going to be the man to beat, and was very, very good in his first public appearance as a candidate. (I’ve known Jeff a long time, so I might be prejudiced, but he hit the buttons I like to see) Miller was authentic, inspirational, and an excellent off-the-cuff speaker.

There is another Republican who is apparently running for mayor, but.. well, he didn’t impress me enough to remember his name, and I was sitting next to him. Guy moved to town from Oregon some months back. Ok.  (Update, newspaper notes as Bradley Walker)

City Council candidates. There were two Republicans who spoke, Isaiah Crevier and Nate Holden. And Nick Schmeichel. I was wondering about Schmeichel speaking at the GOP meeting, as I’d noticed this week he had openly endorsed an indy candidates against the GOP candidates in one of the last legislative races, but he was up front about being an indy.

School Board candidates. Republicans Jade Withers and Kelli Books addressed the group with their speeches. Both had similar backgrounds, but as a businesswoman Jade gave me a better sense of independence and authenticity, while at least at first blush, Books seems tied to the status quo.

There are two seats open, and two Republicans, so it won’t be a challenging vote.. but given the amount of taxes the School Board has pushed in the past, I think following the community’s wishes are far more important than the School Administration’s wish list.

State Senator Brock Greenfield addressed the fairly good-sized group and spoke about his candidacy for the office of School & Public Lands – one of the early signs this race is off and running – so I’m sure we’re going to see more candidate appearances in coming months.

Big comment from members of the group was that a few are independently noting/hearing that Marty Jackley intends to be a candidate for office in the next election. The phrase bandied about was “something prosecutorial.”

And after that point, the legislators presented and had Q&A time.

Major point – in the Ravnsborg case, legislators are of the opinion that the gag order applies to them as well as other branches of state government. So we’re not going to hear anything from them on the topic while it winds through the process.

Despite all the issues facing the legislature, there were a few members of the audience who were more than a bit fixated on the whole boys competing in women’s sports/transgender issue.. which actually got a little heated, with one couple going on the attack against legislators for their vote… despite no indication that they had anyone in their family displaced because of a boy playing in girls sports.

I don’t currently have anyone in girls’ sports right now, and I can’t say that I’ve ever seen an election swing on that issue, so I’m in the “it doesn’t matter to me” category. Given this is moderate to liberal Brookings, at least at an at-large basis, I think it’s even more of a non-issue in any election here.

What else? COVID has been somewhat dominating my dance card this past month. And I’m actually feeling great this weekend on my return from COVID blahs.. My congestion and cough are abating, and as of Sat/Sun I feel like I have my energy back.

But why is my lower left leg swollen to twice its normal size for the third day in a row?

After hemming and hawing for about an hour, I make one of those “should I get this checked out” calls to my sister (a RN) in the Denver area. Our mom was a RN, and my sister followed in her footsteps as a nurse, so she’s the go to person when someone doesn’t want to be a bother. As the child of a nurse, you don’t go to the Dr. unless you’re dying, so even at this age, all of the siblings still want “the nurse sign off.”

She said one of the things they’ve seen on COVID is that “it does clotty things” to your blood, so no, I should not ignore it, and just go in.. because I enjoy nothing more than Emergency Room visits.

After laying there while they call in the ultrasound person, feeling kind of dumb… apparently it was not such a dumb thing to go in, because it exactly did “clotty things” in my leg.. and now I’m on blood thinners and wearing a compression sock.

I can live with a sock and a pill. And hopefully I’m done falling apart.

I would point out that if you’re harboring any goofiness about the COVID vaccine to rethink it, especially that for me, it has effectively wiped out a month of productivity while I’ve recovered. I would most certainly advocate that if you are eligible to get the COVID vaccine, make arrangements to do so at your earliest convenience.