Even for those of us who endure the coronavirus pandemic with a minimum of disruption, I sense we all live in some degree of “stuck.” Arguably, everyone alive right now is feeling “stuck” to a lesser or greater degree.

For years, when an infectious disease reared up in Spokane, there was a simple but important reaction: Call Dorothy MacEachern.

Everywhere you look right now, with the announcement that Spokane County can move cautiously down the road toward reopening the economy, you see people racing across the coronavirus finish line, arms raised, cheering. Which risks putting us back at the coronavirus starting line.

Gov. Jay Inslee, the presidential candidate, talked of nothing but climate change. Inslee, the candidate for a third term as Washington’s governor, has of necessity been talking nothing but COVID-19 for the past two months. He tied the two together while a panelist at a virtual town hall live-streamed at berniesanders.com on May 13. The event was titled “Saving Our Planet from the Existential Threat of Climate Change,” and fellow panelist Varshini Prakash, executive director of the Sunrise Movement, had just discussed the Green New Deal. Inslee was up next.

With video conferencing, courts are trying to fit an in-person process into a no-contact world and trying to balance justice with safety in unprecedented ways.

Fish Lake Trail is, at least for now, a misnomer. But a pair of efforts are underway to make the trail reach the lake on one end and to connect the current trailhead to the Centennial Trail on the other.

If I look at one more final exam I’m going to go cross-eyed. That’s how the final week of school always goes, but usually it ends with me getting to shake the hands of my seniors before they walk out the door.

A while ago – the exact year escapes me – I determined that someway somewhere in some manner or some fashion most of us in America had somehow lost our minds.

Have we already witnessed the last State B tournament in Spokane? It’s entirely possible.

“Make new friends, but keep the old One is silver and the other gold.”

A recent drop in driving is a sign that people were largely heeding Gov. Jay Inslee’s orders. But when people drive less, they buy less gas. And when people buy less gas, they pay less in gas taxes. And when people spend less in gas taxes, the coffers of the state Department of Transportation – not to mention those of local governments and the state Legislature – start running on empty.

The Rev. Deb Conklin writes, “This pandemic has brought home for me a commitment I made after Wall Street created an economic crash in 2008 – a commitment to work to create local economies that support healthy communities instead of multinational corporations.”

It may be a sign of age, but I can remember when the first thing a potential candidate did was hire a strategist and open an office. Now it seems the first thing is to put up a website, and sell merchandise.

It’s hard to say what is more startling, seeing Mike Tyson hitting a bong or watching him hitting the mitts in a boxing gym like he was getting ready to fight Evander Holyfield again.

For about 90 minutes almost every day, Mandi Ibarra-Rivera is a meal wrangler. Working from home, Ibarra-Rivera, a Spokane writer, contacts restaurants and coordinates orders from hungry families to help produce the home food deliveries that have been the core of Spokane Food Fighters – an emergency response system for the hungry that sprang to life on March 22, as the state shut down to thwart the coronavirus.

I am writing this week’s article in celebration of the life of Dawn Rae Anselmo, a longtime member of the Inland Empire Dahlia Society and a dahlia breeder known around the world. Dawn died April 10, leaving behind dozens of people she taught to appreciate dahlias. She was 80. Dawn served in many leadership roles in the Inland Empire Dahlia Society and the North Idaho Dahlia Society. In 1980 Dawn and her husband, Norm, introduced the Inland Northwest line of dahlias at the national show held in Spokane. At the 1992 national show, they received the Best New Seedling Award for Inland Dynasty, a huge, pale yellow dinner plate dahlia that went on to win the Stanley Johnson award in 1993.

While the retail price of beef has gone up, the price of cattle has dropped faster than a 401(k) during a pandemic. Price gouging or price fixing, either way it’s the consumer who picks up the check.

Spokane sports broadcaster Sam Adams is about to become one of the anchors for KHQ’s popular “Wake Up” morning show. It might sound a little crazy, but it’s likely a crazy-smart move, both for the station and for the affable Adams.