Laughter is the Best Medicine
May 16, 2025 — Scott Johnson
I’m simultaneously laughing and singing along to THE FIRST TIME EVER I…Ammo Grrrll writes: A very long time ago in what feels like a Galaxy far far away, I was a teenage girl madly, deeply, insanely in love with the most attractive and interesting male person I had ever met up till then. And ever since, truth to tell, though I have been blessed to meet MANY awesome people. And
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May 15, 2025 — Scott Johnson
I turn again to James Freeman’s Wall Street Journal Best of the Web column — yesterday’s “A tourist tax to attract tourists?” — this time with a local angle. James draws on the reporting of the Star Tribune while performing the satirical work that the native reporters and columnists refuse to do (links omitted): * * * * * For those who have been thinking about visiting Minneapolis but for
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May 9, 2025 — Scott Johnson
Ammo Grrrll has serious reasons for asking WHAT IS A COMMUNITY? She writes: Among the many tortured and abused words used to lie or distort (“democracy”, “oppression”, “gender affirming care,” etc), “community” looms large. When I hear the word “community,” naturally, I think warm thoughts of the small town in which I grew up. Perhaps 5 percent of the residents had higher-than-average incomes – doctors, lawyers, the banker, the family
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May 2, 2025 — Scott Johnson
Ammo Grrrll draws on a favorite HBO series for THE FOLLOW HOME. She writes: When you have lived long and prospered as I have, among the many things you learn is that “crime” is not what it was in your childhood. If you live in a small enough town, “crime” per se is almost impossible. A thief cannot steal your car because everybody KNOWS what car everybody in town drives.
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April 25, 2025 — Scott Johnson
Why not Minot? Ammo Grrrll asks you to consider the MAYOR OF MINOT ND’S VERY BAD NO GOOD TERRIBLE DAY. She writes: Don’t get me wrong; I am very fond of Breitbart and usually go there second or third in the morning, after Power Line and Ace of Spades. But the good folks at Breitbart are unusually fond of lurid clickbait stories as well as the unhinged ravings of celebrity
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April 18, 2025 — Scott Johnson
We should be wondering about THE ONE THING BARBIE NEVER WAS…Fortunately, Ammo Grrrll knows. She writes: Barbie, the doll you could dress instead of feed and diaper, was introduced March 9, 1959. She became a marketing phenom, and eventually a marketing juggernaut for Mattel. Barbie, the movie, came out in 2023 and was also a big hit. I do not have a daughter or granddaughter and as a young girl,
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April 11, 2025 — Scott Johnson
Mamas, let your babies grow up to be RAISED ON COWBOY VALUES. Ammo Grrrll writes: As I have mentioned many times, our family did not get a television set until 1958 when I was already 12 years old. It got one station, an NBC affiliate, so those are the only programs I watched growing up. For example, I never saw an episode of I Love Lucy or The Ed Sullivan
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April 4, 2025 — Scott Johnson
Ammo Grrrll traces the trajectory of ENTERTAINING – THEN AND NOW! She writes: Ah, gone are the days when a kid’s birthday party consisted of a homemade cake with candles, a gallon of the cheapest vanilla ice cream, some Kool-Aid, as many balloons as Dad would blow up, Pin the Tail on the Donkey, and a few presents. Gone are the days when a kid was excited to own a
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March 28, 2025 — Scott Johnson
Ammo Grrrll is right on time with EIGHT DAYS EARLY! She writes: Some things that come early are good: Tax refunds that arrive before most people even get their payments sent off. Babies whose ninth month of womb life is in August deciding to give Mom a break from the heat and humidity and arriving a week before their alleged due date. Meeting your weight loss goal a month or
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March 21, 2025 — Scott Johnson
Ammo Grrrll identifies a few PHRASES AND “RIGHTS” I COULD HAPPILY LIVE WITHOUT. She writes: I will start with just two, and save some others for another column. First: You go, girl! Dear Lord, spare us from any more “firsts” for women. It was one thing when Sandra Day O’Connor became the first female Supreme Court Justice in 1981 (appointed by President Reagan, just FYI). She had faced actual discrimination
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March 14, 2025 — Scott Johnson
Ammo Grrrll is an old-fashioned grrrll. She is keenly aware of THE IMPORTANCE OF MANNERS. She writes: When I was a young teenager in rural Minnesota, the only magazine in our home was Reader’s Digest. It had several humor sections, including Humor in Uniform and Laughter Is The Best Medicine. It had a section meant to build your vocabulary. And very short and interesting little stories. I loved it and
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March 7, 2025 — Scott Johnson
Ammo Grrlll wonders why ONLY FIVE THINGS!? She writes: To me the most astonishing thing about the Sturm und Drang over being forced to email the DOGE Detectives 5 things you did IN A WEEK, is the minuscule nature of the demand. Let me get this straight. No, really, because it is impossible for me to believe. I started working full-time – summers — when I was 14. Not even
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March 5, 2025 — Scott Johnson
I’m so old, Trump’s address to the joint session of Congress last night was past my bedtime. That’s a joke, kind of, but it reminds me. A perceptive reader has called me out for lying in “Only yesterday” earlier this week. He writes: In his essay [sic] “Only yesterday”, Mr. Johston [sic] states that he “suffered PTSD reading Robert F. Kennedy’s Thirteen Days: A Memoir of the Cuban Missile Crisis.
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March 3, 2025 — Scott Johnson
“I”m so old…” is supposed to predicate an ironic reference to something that happened recently. I’m so old I find that an increasingly hard joke to make. As I am taking a vacation from the political news to cover the Feeding Our Future trial full time, I thought I would offer these unironic confessions of an aging political junkie. I’m so old… • I made my first friend during the
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February 28, 2025 — Scott Johnson
We have passed “Positively Fourth Street.” Danger up ahead. We are arriving POSITIVELY BEYOND PARODY! Ammo Grrrll writes: About a week ago now – a once-a-week columnist can NEVER be “current” – the Honorable Mayor of Los Angeles, Karen Bass, gave a news conference to address her whereabouts during the devastating wildfires in Palisades and elsewhere. Let’s recall just for starters that one of her election promises was that she
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February 21, 2025 — Scott Johnson
Ammo Grrrll sheds no tears for the diminishing job market in Race Hustling – A Dying Profession. She writes: Because Joe/Max and I have been downright giddy for a month now I try not to click on stuff that will only make me angry. But sometimes stuff just falls into my sightline and I am forced to look. Lately I have learned to resist any clickbait headlines that involve Cher,
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February 17, 2025 — Scott Johnson
Former Vice President Kamala Harris visited backstage with the cast and crew of Wonderful World on Broadway over the weekend. The New York Post helps with a transcription of a few of the quotable quotes from her remarks along with a great screenshot of Kamala in mid-flight. This is one of the quotes: “When we think about these moments where we see things that are being taken, but also let’s
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