Month: September 2020

Sitting there in the dimly-lit, wood-paneled restaurant in Manchester, our Timberland boots crusted with ice, I reflected on everything that had happened up to that point. My grandma had died three weeks prior. I spent most of the week from Christmas Eve to New Year's Day under fluorescent lights at her hospital bedside. The morning after her funeral, I got on a plane to Des Moines, Iowa, to get back to work on CNN's caucus coverage. My team coordinates the logistics for getting election news on air, and 2020 was already shaping up to be an unpredictable year. I remember looking in the hotel mirror the morning of the Iowa caucuses and not recognizing myself. My hair had fallen out in clumps in the shower that morning. My face was somehow both bloated and sunken. My makeup no longer matche...

Troy Whittington received a letter this week telling him his mother had tested positive for COVID-19, and that she should isolate herself for 10 days. There was only one problem—she had been dead for nearly seven months. Whittington received the letter from the Shelby County, Tennessee Health Department (SCHD) this week, telling him that his mother had been tested on June 20, according to WATN-TV. However, Sandra Whittington died of COPD on February 16. The first case of COVID-19 was detected in Shelby County on March 8, according to a SCHD press release, two weeks after Sandra Whittington died. As of publication, Shelby County has seen 27,410 cases of COVID-19, and 393 deaths from the disease, according to the Johns Hopkins University Coronavirus Tracker. "I'm just having a hard time und...

This Labor Day weekend is the unofficial final grilling weekend of the summer, and the first weekend of National Food Safety Education Month, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In addition to practicing social distancing and wearing face masks when appropriate this weekend – and washing your hands regularly – you will want to be safe when it comes time to cook the big meal. Each year, 1 in 6 Americans, about 48 million people, are sickened from eating contaminated food. About 3,000 die and 128,000 are hospitalized, too, the CDC says. Even though there hasn't been any major ground beef recalls due to E. coli contamination concerns, you still want to remember that dealing with raw meat can be tricky, and cooking it improperly can be deadly. Save better, spend bette...