Iow-age

Folks in Iowa are pretty straightforward. If you want hype and hoopla, well, go to some wild place like Minnesota. (Those party animals regularly stay up past the 10 p.m. newscast.)

So when it came time to change the name of the Iowa’s Department of Elder Affairs, the Legislature didn’t fool around.

Indeed; “Elder Affairs” needed to be plowed under. It was clunky and unIowan. Gosh, that’s like calling the PTA the Department of Childish Affairs.

Anyhow, the new moniker chosen for the agency was the very logical “Department of Aging.”

Until someone checked the initials.

DOA is not exactly an acronym you want to be tossing around people who lived through the Depression. (The first one, not this one.)

Can you imagine some bureaucrat stamping “DOA” in 3-inch-high letters on some senior citizen’s paperwork right in front of him? Not cool.

So the tension is mounting. The Legislature has approved the bill. It’s going to the governor. Lawmakers on both sides of the debate are weighing in.

Whatever the outcome, folks in Iowa can’t remember this much excitement since the spring thaw was two weeks late.