Science fiction, fantasy, mystery and what-not
As September bows and moves out of the limelight, the NY Times announces in an editorial that they support Kamala Harris for President in 2024.
Part of me shrugged. It’s considered a liberal paper; many will dismiss its opinion. Another voice in me said, “No, this is good. It will help the Undecided make a choice.” Maybe, I replied. Easier understanding my cats’ meows than it is to follow the Undecided’s reasoning sometimes.
The NY Times invoked some of the Undecided’s reasoning. Kamala Harris is not being specific enough in her plans and policies, they complain.
Trump supporters will pull out the pieces of good the paper cites for Trump and say, “See? Even that librul rag says Trump was good.”
“In particular, he broke decades of Washington consensus and led both parties to wrestle with the downsides of globalization, unrestrained trade and China’s rise. His criminal-justice reform efforts were well placed, his focus on Covid vaccine development paid off, and his decision to use an emergency public health measure to turn away migrants at the border was the right call at the start of the pandemic”.
They’ll dismiss where the NYT opines, “Yet even when the former president’s overall aim may have had merit, his operational incompetence, his mercurial temperament and his outright recklessness often led to bad outcomes. Mr. Trump’s tariffs cost Americans billions of dollars. His attacks on China have ratcheted up military tensions with America’s strongest rival and a nuclear superpower. His handling of the Covid crisis contributed to historic declines in confidence in public health, and to the loss of many lives. His overreach on immigration policies, such as his executive order on family separation, was widely denounced as inhumane and often ineffective.”
The NY Times then continues to tear Trump a new editorial asshole over his many failures.
Trump supporters will disagree about those.
In the end, it’s a recommendation and much of it is about how Trump is unfit to be President. As the Times announced in 2016.
And even back then, someone demanded in the comments to the Times 2016 recommendation, “But why should someone vote for Clinton? Simply because she’s “not Trump?” She flipflops more than most politicians (just in the last year or so: Keystone pipeline, TPP, gay marriage). She’s consistent only on one thing: She never met a Middle East war she didn’t like, a Middle East war that she thinks the US should steer clear of — and yet her supporters have the audacity to insist that Trump would be more “dangerous.” If Clinton were President right now, we’d probably have ground troops in Libya and Syria, and maybe even the Ukraine. How that qualifies her as the “peace” candidate escapes me.”
For many, the dilemma remains strangely unchanged despite the history of Trump’s relentless lying, criminal convictions, flipflopping, weird and bizarre statements and behavior, and Project 2025.
And that’s the problem we still face as a nation.
Play the taps. It’s that time. Another tee shirt is being retired.
The apparel in focus is a black tee shirt with Michael Schumacher in an F1 Ferrari in the rain at Spa. Bought in 1996. Not so much that I’m a Ferrari or Schumacher fan — I was rooting for Damon Hill in the Williams — but I liked the shirt’s colors and action. Its style.
I wore it for playing racquetball. Used to play three or four times a week back in the you know. Then it became part of casual Friday work clothes while toiling for start-ups. Spent the last ten years as yard work uniform and then sleepwear.
I’ve gotten my use out of it.
One underarm yawns with a huge hole. Otherwise fine. The hole appalls my wife, who is sensitive about worn clothing.
I won’t throw the tee away. Sentimental attachment. It’ll join a few other aged worn tees in my bottom drawer. Let ’em toss ’em after the flames feast on my body.
Mood: Postsunday
Proceeded through the morning essentials. Complained to Tucker (pronounced Tuck-ah) about the stench of some of his essential. Both floofs begged release from the house to the rear yard. I headed out with them.
September 30. 2024. Monday. Cold autumn morning. Even the rising solar orb gave a little shiver. Cats sought sunshine arrangements for grooming. I launched back into the house, thinking, cold now but will cap at the mid to upper 80s F today. No clouds effing with today’s blue, either.
This is it. September’s last shout. Like other months this year, September of this year will be able to brag to historians about disasters, politics, and violence. History will give it a glance and reply, more of the same but intensifying. Probably ask, “Couldn’t the people see the direction they were heading? Did they not give a fuck to try to change it?” We’ll defensively huddle together and reply, “Well, it’s complicated.” If MAGAs and the GOP ever emerge from their holes of irresponsibility and weirdness and wash the cult off, will they be able to understand how they contributed?
The Neurons offer a slice of song from the South Pacific musical: “Gonna wash that cult right out of my hair and send it on its way. Get the picture?” I thank them for the mild snicker they induce.
Moving on to music, thoughts about waiting and patience impell The Neurons to move on from “Bali Hair” in the morning mental music stream (Trademark sinking) because they kept on going with South Pacific tunes (once they’re on something) to a 2003 Audioslave song. The melancholy rock song, “Like A Stone”, is about waiting for the afterlife, patiently at that, where they’ll hope to be reconnected with someone. Doesn’t purely translate to today’s situation ‘cept for that idea of patiently waiting for some of this mess of 2024 to clear up, patiently waiting, as it’s sung, like a stone.
Be positive, patient, and strong. Test neggy and lean forward. Vote blue. Coffee has washed down the breakfast components. Here’s the music part of the post. Cheers
Thinking about my coffee evolution today in honor of National Coffee Day.
I began drinking coffee when I was around twelve. Maxwell House. *shudder*. Only drank a cup at a friend’s house once in a while, loaded with sugar and cream. I stopped doing that before I was fifteen and didn’t resume drinking coffee until after I was twenty. Leaving the military after my first enlistment was up, I bought a restaurant and ran it while going to college, so I drank coffee, but not much. I remained indifferent to it.
I re-entered the military. Working night shifts, I would nuke the leftover cold coffee from the huge office urn and doctor it with sugar. Nasty stuff.
Wasn’t until my NCOIC, Bob Totten, and my buddy, Jeff, at Kadena AB, Okinawa, Japan, that I really became a coffee drinker. I was working as a back-office warrior by then as the Command Post training NCO. Bob would invite Jeff and me to informal staff meetings at the Base Exchange cafeteria upstairs. Even then, I didn’t think much of coffee. But I was going to school and evolved into drinking it at home as I geared up for evening classes.
Then I discovered ‘good’ coffee. I found that I like French and Italian roasts best. I didn’t like cream or sugar in my coffee. I bought my beans and ground them myself. I only made sufficient coffee for my needs and only drink fresh coffee.
Of course, by then, I couldn’t stand our military office coffee. Too weak and American for me.
At subsequent assignments, I would take over our office ‘coffee fund’. Darker roasts, better coffee markers, and better brands were my requirements. I levied that on the rest. My offices in Germany and California became known as a good place to get decent coffee.
Field conditions were horrible for coffee, of course. Weren’t no good brands out there. Gird my loins and quaff the evil brews available to fight the cold off or endure the heat. Bad coffee, bad food, bad sleeping arrangements, and nasty latrines – holes in plywood in tents.
Retiring from the Air Force, it was the same sort of thing as I went to work for civilians. Except I ended up working with an engineer, Janet, who liked yet stronger coffee. She used to complain that my coffee was too weak! I was appalled. By then, I was in the SF Bay Area, purchasing Peet’s coffee and bringing it in, making my own pot. Of course, people other than Janet liked my coffee, so there were often several brews going besides decaf.
Eventually, I was working for IBM, but remote, working from home. My wife and I saw a Keurig at Costco and purchased it. For a while, I continued making my coffee using beans, a grinder, and a drip style coffee maker as I didn’t like any of the pods that I tried. But then I tried the Costco SF Bay French roast pod.
That worked, and that’s where I’m at now, drinking that at home in the morning. When I was going out to write at The Beanery for several years, it was a different story. I drank a nonfat double Mexican mocha for my writing. Alas, The Beanery went away. Now, I order Americanos wherever I go. I like espressos but they’re consumed too fast. The Americano works.
And that’s my coffee tale. It’s been a grind. Happy Coffee Day.
Weird one, where I had myself and another me. We were identical in every aspect, from age and size to clothes being worn. But, we were in two different locations.
We were much younger, like in our late twenties. Wearing off-white cargo shorts with a light blue button-down shirt. Brown hair military short.
‘I’ was supposed to be doing something to pave the way for the other me to arrive. But, panic in dream land! I had no idea what I was supposed to be doing. Wasn’t there something about pressing buttons and changing settings and selections? Yes, I was half-sure that was right, but what was I supposed to be setting? Was it the printer, television, home computer network?
None of that sounded correct and time was running out. Looking out across time and space, I saw my other self entering the room where he was supposed to be. Oh, no, but I’d not done anything yet. What was going to happen?
I awoke looking for the answers in the room. But this wasn’t the right room? What was this room?
Why, it was my bedroom. But was that where I was supposed to be? I didn’t think that was right. I was supposed to be doing something, setting things up for my other self…
As anxiety unspooled and seeped out, I calmed and remembered, oh, that was just a dream. A very real feeling friggin’ dream.
Mood: Sundaylazing
Autumn covered us this morning with a familiar old comforter. Sunshine on changing leaves, cloudy, hazy blue sky, crisp weather ranging from the upper forties (Fahrenheit) at night to today’s high in the low to mid 70s.
Today is Sunday, September 29, 2024.
It’s National Coffee Day in the United States! Like many holidays, its provenance is a little iffy. Coffee is a staple in the United States. Lot of coffee drinkers like me swear by a daily brew or two. The only thing I drink more than coffee is water, and the only drink I enjoy more than coffee is beer. But coffee has less calories and is fat free! Woo hoo! While it has some potential benefits, it comes with potential risks. IMO, the coffee person relationship is more individualized. Either your body works well with coffee or it doesn’t. Think I’ll celebrate as I do every other day, with a cuppa coffee.
BTW, since there’s a coffee-inspired holiday, there are coffee-inspired deals available. USA Today provides a list.
Over on my brain’s political side, my spouse refocused me on a USA Today opinion piece. Written by the notorious Kevin Roberts, it’s titled “Opinion: Harris is wrong about Project 2025. Our plan is good for America.” His final paragraph cracks me up:
“What should be a scandal is the vice president’s attempt to avoid discussions of substantive policy issues. Americans want and deserve a real debate, not vibes.”
Yeah, baby, year, real debate, not vibes. Real debate as Trump and his surrogate, J.D. Vance, spread acknowledged lies about Haitians eating pets in Ohio. Let’s debate that, Roberts.
Will Trump debate the ‘stolen election’ claims he continues to make, even after admitting that he lost the election? The stolen election claims that were thrown out of court over and over again? The efforts to overturn the election that he’s been indicted for?
Let’s have a debate over Trump’s healthcare plan. The one he installed when he was POTUS. *Chortle – yeah, that didn’t happen.* Vaporware has more substance than Trump’s current ‘concept of a plan’.
Let’s debate Trump’s declaration that he’d protect women after the fucking disaster of the Trump-stacked Dobbs decision and its afterbirth on women, their rights, their bodies, and their health. You know, the women who he refers to as ‘bimbos’. The ones he’d grab by the pussy, and Jean Carroll.
Remember this exchange?
Donald Trump: You know and I moved on her actually. You know she was down on Palm Beach.
Unknown: She used to be great. She’s still very beautiful.
Trump: I moved on her and I failed. I’ll admit it. I did try and f*** her. She was married.
What respect he shows! Such a protector! (Yes, that last was late-morning, coffee-fueled snark.)
Yes, let’s have a debate between Trump and Vice President Harris, Roberts! Oh, we can’t because Trump refuses to debate Harris again because she trounced him the last time so badly that Trump’s feelings remain hurt.
Moving on.
Today’s music was inspired by another’s blog post. Tom MacInnes mentioned April Wine in his fabulous series about rock music. I’ve only featured April Wine here once, six years ago. But after today’s post, The Neurons were stirred to drop “Roller” from 1979 into the morning mental music stream (Trademark limited). I had a Canadian friend serving in the U.S. Air Force with me on Okinawa. April Wine was one of his basic “we’re going to play their music” groups. If you were at his house listening to music, you would hear April Wine sooner or later.
Funny, but thinking on that, several such connections exist through my years of friendships. With Jeff, it was Culture Club. Randy could be depended on to bring out Van Halen, although Boston also came out at his place. Rich in Germany was a Chris Rea advocate while Bobby was apt to crank up Cream. Gene, being more old school, frequently invoked the Grateful Dead. Robert was always bringing in Rush. Such a group of characters. Of course, I was likely to turn up a piece out of Pink Floyd’s catalog.
Stay positive, test negative, remain strong, and lean forward. While you’re at it, could you also vote blue in 2024.
Michael Seidel, writer 