I Hate Eleanor Roosevelt

Man, I started out 2018 with guns blazing, cranking out a post almost every week.  Dispatches From the Ranch was humming right along.  And then summer hit.  I knew there'd be a lull in my writing as hay season takes up a good portion of my energy.  But once fall rolled around I figured I'd jump right back into my old writing habits.  Nope.  Work, hunting (an upcoming post, for sure), and general laziness gave me the title of a measly once-a-month blogger.  December was looking pretty grim to even put a single post out into the ether, that is, until Grady came home from school and told us that he hated Eleanor Roosevelt.  Regina looked at me and said, "Well, there's your next blog."

Grant's not bad, but that Eleanor Roosevelt?
Just awful.

Of course, I couldn't let that one go unnoticed, even if technically he didn't tell us.  Grady, as many of you know, talks to us through a mixture of sign language, a few words, and in iPad app that he either types on or uses picture icons to put together words and sentences.  A great way for us to check up on his day at school is to look through his talking history.  It's an odd peek into his day and we piece the words and phrases he's used to paint a picture of what he learned that day.  I feel like a linguistic detective.  Grady's very into LEGO people, so their names often pop up in his history, as well as classmates, and random icons that he clicks because he found them interesting.  Harry Potter pops up frequently, as does Harry Styles (I'm still really not sure why the latter made the cut to even have his own icon, but someone in R&D must have been a big One Direction fan).  There's stuff that pops up from his science lessons, language arts discussions, and numbers from his math lessons.  And then there's always a few head-scratchers in the mix.  That's where "I hate Eleanor Roosevelt" comes in.  Eleanor Roosevelt?  Never mind where you stand politically, she was quite a badass (and was niece to a genuine badass, Teddy).  Eleanor was regarded as a humanitarian, a thoughtful diplomat, patient, and kind, and generally well loved.  No one hated her.  Until now, I guess.

Grady dismissed our questions about it with a shrug, so we may never figure this one out.  And while politics are usually not a favorite dinner table conversation, it's gotten really quiet since First Wives are off the table too.  I guess we can always talk about religion and sports.