A note to our readers

Hey --

Another Sunday.

Along with Dallas, here's who helped with the writing:

The Third Estate Sunday Review's Jim, Dona, Ty, Jess, and Ava,

Rebecca of Sex and Politics and Screeds and Attitude,

Betty of Thomas Friedman Is a Great Man,

C.I. of The Common Ills and The Third Estate Sunday Review,

Kat of Kat's Korner (of The Common Ills),

Cedric of Cedric's Big Mix,

Mike of Mikey Likes It!,

Elaine of Like Maria Said Paz),

Ruth of Ruth's Report,

Trina of Trina's Kitchen,

Wally of The Daily Jot,

Marcia of SICKOFITRDLZ

Stan of Oh Boy It Never Ends

and Ann of Ann's Mega Dub.

We thank them all. What do we have? Before we get to what we have, let me (Jim) note what we don't have. Ann just started her own site. For the month of June she filled in for Ruth (and helped here) and she filled in for Mike last week. Normally when someone starts their own site, we do an interview with them. Ann is really shy about herself, believe it or not. We asked, she said not to consider this "no" but not now. Meaning we might have an interview with her next week. She pointed out that she's only done one post at her own site. She said give her a week and maybe she'd have something to talk about. So we'll check next weekend and hopefully have an interview with her.

Now for what we've got.

Truest statement of the week -- Debra Sweet won hands down.

Truest statement of the week II -- The other serious contender here was Ron Jacobs. The first round of voting tied and the second rond saw Cockburn pull ahead by one vote.

Editorial: The lost land of Iraq -- Iraq, the lost land. We may need a Christopher Columbus to "discover" it because most outlets seem completely unaware it's still on the map. On the above and everything else all but Trina worked. Trina helped us out on two pieces and I'll note that when we get to them. This is a US State Dept map for the illustration, by the way.

TV: Meet The Fockers -- Ava and C.I. planned to review a weekly drama. And then in the roundtable a question came up, right? Wrong. What happened was we had to wait forever for Flickr uploading photos. As a result, Ava and C.I. said they'd grab Meet The Press. They weren't aware who the guests were scheduled or what the topic was. It ended up going with a question in the roundtable. Ava and C.I. did a really strong job here.

Issues effecting women veterans -- The photos in this piece are M-NF photos and click on them to get the photo credits. They're women serving in Iraq (alongside Iraqi women). The article covers the two hearings on women veterans in Congress last week. Ava, C.I., Kat and Wally attended the hearings and we're glad to grab this topic and cover it.

Roundtable -- This is our news roundtable, illustration by Betty's kids. (Why no new ones? For the last two weeks now? Her kids have been visiting their grandparents. They're back now and Betty's grandparents are here for two weeks as well. So we expect more illustrations.) We're covering a variety of topics including some raised in e-mails.

Music roundtable -- This is our music roundtable. Trina came into work on this and we thank her for it. Marcia would have done this if we'd picked another Mamas and Papas album. She loves the group but has never heard this album. If Dona and I had thought ahead of time, we would have realized that might be a problem. But we're always getting e-mails (thirdestatesundayreview@yahoo.com) requesting more music pieces so there you have it, an entire roundtable on music. And e-mails are also saying, "Provide the address more." The address is on our profile but we do try to provide it in pieces where appropriate.

Meet the new Ramen -- This is the other piece Trina worked on. This came up due to the music roundtable. Stan mentions Ramen. After we were done, Trina asked in passing if he still ate Ramen. He said no but, due to the economy, he's really started hitting the Patio dinners. Which led to Trina and us asking a few questions and then to a store run to get some for illustrations.

Theme of last week -- This is a short piece and we had three ways to go with this but we went with this one because it was the shortest. Dona wants to institute a real short feature so we'll be more likely to do short features.

Highlights -- Mike, Elaine, Rebecca, Betty, Kat, Ruth, Marcia, Stan, Cedric and Wally worked on this and we thank them for it.


So that's what we have and hopefully it includes something you enjoy. We'll see you next week.


-- Jim, Dona, Ty, Jess, Ava and C.I.