They call it sticker shock. My wife and I labeled it a friggin’ kick in the head.
We decided to make brownies for our annual Fourth of July gathering. To give it an Independence Day flavor, red, white, and blue chocolate M&Ms would be added to the top. I hustled to the store to buy said M&Ms.
First stop, Bi-Mart, didn’t have them. Second stop, Albertson’s, did. One size: 38 ounces.
38 ounces. Seriously? Who needs that many M&Ms? But if I need to…I guess…
$15.99. On sale. Marked down from $17.99.
Get out of here. What are these, organic M&Ms hand-wrapped by virgins in gold foil?
Neither price was acceptable to me. As a boomer, I remember M&Ms as something I bought a little bag of for a quarter. Last time that I bought a pound of M&Ms, they were like $5. Even a pound bag seemed more than enough, and this wasn’t that many years ago. What are people doing, spooning M&Ms into their mouths?
The world has gone friggin’ nuts. I really am channeling the old codger in me, aren’t I?
It’s Wenzda, aka humpday, but also July 2, 2025. Cooled down to a comfortable level last night some and the morning ingredients are calling birds, blue sky, sunshine, and 72F. High will be 83 F, a drop from what I saw yesterday at my casa, 95 F.
I realized this morning that I’m in a metaphorical holding-my-breath state. So many balls in the air. I scan horizons for ‘the next’ in six different directions. Out there is the One Big Beautiful Bill, known in some places as the Big Ripoff, the Great Screwed Up Give to the Rich bill in others. Trump was again idiotically blithering on TV like someone who shouldn’t be allowed out on their own again. Russia and Ukraine’s war continues. Iran and Israel are still out there glaring at one another. Israel bombed some more people in Gaza. Don’t worry: they’re ‘investigating’ how it came to be that they bombed a cafe and killed reporters and workers and such. Yep. Tariffs hang all over everything like toilet paper from trees after Devil’s Night. Supreme Court rulings have been issued and the storms building behind those will come out. It’s Hurricane Season. Europe is suffering record heat and it’s not that cool in ‘Merica, either. Wildfires burn and FEMA is ready to shrug because Trump says states should be doing it for themselves. DOGE has had access to personal data; can that be good? The U.S. measles outbreak has ‘plateaued’ according to the gov’t but has it really? And what will happen with all that new guidance from the science and medicine skewed HHS led by worm brain Kennedy? Killer Noem’s ICE Troops seem more reckless, sanctuary and blue states are being threatened by Trump, he has a new eua-du-shit out, and Musk and Trump have taken their insults to new levels. Then there’s the personal and family stuff.
Hold my breath. Wait to see. What. Is. Next.
Quickening to my mood and thoughts, The Neurons unleashed “I Will Wait” by Mumford and Sons into the morning mental music stream. The song came out in 2012. Led by Marcus Mumford, the band has a different sound but it works for me and enough others that they’ve established a solid career. Hope you find it okay for your Wenzda’s beats.
My follow up dental appointment went well yesterday. All is healing, no problems, no complaints. Biopsy showed nothing of concern from the cyst removed from my gum. Have another appointment, different dentist, for a cleaning.
Coffee-fueled energy is ascending. I’m off to early morning yardwork. Have the best day you can. Cheers
A new day, a new month, but it looks like the same ol’ times. It’s Twosda, July 1, 2025. Yes, we’re through half of 2025. Trumpification of the U.S. in which he brings his special brand of destructive failing shit to the nation and declares it’s wonderful.
The weather has again shifted, so today will be cooler than first forecast. We’re now in the low seventies in Ashlandia but we’re creeping toward the low 90s. Supposed to be in the upper 90s today but the thunder mass made an early stop, coming by Munda instead of Twosda. Some sources claim we’ll only kick the upper 80s today. Time will tell.
2 AM, I stepped outside to view the sky, check the weather, and say hello to the new month. Heat’s hold was softer but it was still as a frozen pond. Stars and planets and galaxies watched me but otherwise I felt unwatched, alone and comfortable. The Neurons took the moment to turn on a 1981 arena rock song by Billy Squier in the morning mental music stream, and “Lonely is the Night”‘s opening filled my headspace.
[Verse 1] Lonely is the night when you find yourself alone Your demons come to light and your mind is not your own Lonely is the night when there’s no one left to call You feel the time is right, say, the writing’s on the wall, yeah
[Verse 2] And it’s a high time to fight when the walls are closing in A-call it what you like, it’s time you got to win Lonely, lonely, lonely, your spirit’s sinking down You find you’re not the only stranger in this town
[Chorus 1] Red lights, green lights, stop and go jive Headlines, deadlines jamming your mind You been stealing shots from the side Let your feelings go for a ride
I was reading an account of a book about Trump and last year’s campaign and the shooting in Butler that had me doing early morning headshaking.
“They thought I had four or five bullets in me because there was so much blood,” the president said, referring to his would-be White House chief of staff Susie Wiles, future director of communications Steven Cheung and future deputy chief of staff Dan Scavino.
LOL. I bet they never thought that and never said it. Many people exaggerate things and their role and impact and others’ reactions. Some of that are honest errors and memory flaws. But Trump always does this to a hyper extent.
Here’s another quote from another individual that inspired some early morning weariness:
“Bezos said Trump’s instincts showed who he was, and he wanted them to have a friendship,” according to the book.
LOL, again. Anyone paying attention for the last ten years already realized that Trump the grifter, serial womanizer, and huuugggge liar had already shown who he is. Trump showed who he is with his eagerness to shoot United States citizens who were exercising their First Amendment rights. He’s shown it with his golfing hypocrisy, constantly golfing after saying in August of 2016, “I’m going to be working for you, I’m not going to have time to go play golf.” He showed who he is after calling military members loser for being a prisoner or for dying for their country.
But Bezos’s comments don’t surprise after that gaudy wedding display he put on. Bezos is becoming more Trump like with each new moon. Whereas he once showed a social conscience, he’s just another power hungry, greedy leech on society.
On to July. Hope your month brings you joy and satisfaction. Got my coffee. Carry on.
Sunshine hangs long and hot. The temperature rests at 95 F. The sky darkens, heralding a fleet of clouds. The fleet burgeons as more clouds drift over to see what happens. Darkening and darkening under added layers of clouds, the sunshine skips out on the rest of the day. So dark at 4 PM, we’re forced into turning on houselights. Thunder cruises through with long throat clearing. We look out, talking out our thoughts, “Looks lik it’s going to rain.” “It’s going to storm.”
Wind dashes around and through the trees. Then it sinks.
The day grows still and dark. Feeling bored, the thunder slinks off. The darkness stays, the clouds remain, and the temperature puts it hat on 87 F, and stays there. Tension builds as we wait and look, asking each other, looking outside for clues, surfing the net for information. Friends share on the net, “weird weather.” No one knows nothin’; we wait.
The coffee shop had net problems today. Shrugging that away, I told myself, “Just write and check the net later.” Two and a half hours later, I’d finished 2300 words and the story had progressed as if I had some notion of what the hell was going on.
The Hunger Band was on my stomach’s center stage by then, their first notes careening through the rest of my bod. Coffee shop net still down, I listened to the Hunger Band’s sorrowful lyrics about dying of starvation and decided, “Yes, I’ve written enough. Time to go home and eat.”
Now to explore the kitchen to see what the Hunger Band will find acceptable. Salad? Maybe. Burrito?
Boom, and it’s June’s last day n 2025. Boom, it’s another Munda.
Today is Munda, June 29, 2025. Boom, it’s gonna get hot again in Ashlandia. 99 F. 73 F at the mo. My friend in Melbourne, Australia is miserable with cold, wet rain. I feel for him. The weather rarely satisfies us for many consecutive moments, especially if you’re a prince like me, cognizant of every ripple casting anything less than perfection.
Despite a heavy load of dreams, today’s music comes from PINO Trump’s “One Beautiful Big Bill”. News outlets are generally roiling with disgust about the bill. It’s a grab bag for the rich and strips away help for the poor and sick, and shreds protections for our land, water, and air. The bill removes gun controls and taxes so it’ll be easier and cheaper for people to pay guns. This, in a nation already slathered with gun violence. Just this weekend, two fire fighters were shot and killed and others were wounded in an ambush in Idaho. People polled are heavily against the One Big Beautiful Bowel Movement, for just reasons.
Yet, this bill is the perfect bill for this nation at this point. Filled with what the fuck provisions, sponsored and pushed by a liar and a cheat (yes, that’s Trump), it’s a bill by a billionaire for a billionaire. One that encourages and rewards greed, violence, and selfishness. Perfect for the ‘Christian Nation’ visualized in Project 2025. I have always considered Trump a con man; now his con has come to full light, and his supporters are the main marks.
Today’s song, then, is “Nasty” by Janet Jackson. The Neurons popped the song into my morning mental music stream after I read about the bill and the GOP capitulation and hissed, “Nasty.” That was all it took, and I was hearing, “Nasty. Oh, you nasty boys.”
Just read that Trump is to visit America’s newest Florida funpark, Alligator Alcatraz. Maybe a gator will get ‘im. It’s good to have dreams.
Hope your weather fits your needs and your day works out beautifully. I’ll do my best. Give me a cuppa. Here we go. Cheers
This is from the ‘maybe-it’s-just-me’ book of thoughts.
When I read about the growing Wolf Fire in southern California, I immediately thought that PINO Trump’s response will be: “Let them burn.”
Which I think is totally wrong and an abhorrent way for the President of the United States to think. But it’s completely in line with the policies and behavior of the TACO Regime of the Disunited States of Chaos.
Infloofsion(floofinition) Animal act of wrongfully entering upon, seizing, or taking possession of something which they’re not supposed to have. Origins: First known use was in fifteen century bakeries, butchers, and fish markets.
In Use: “Like many felines, Domino quickly became infloofmous for his infloofsions, stealing popcorn, sandwiches, pieces of fish, and his favorite, cheese pizza.”
In Use: “Ramona Rex infloofsions after escaping her kennel amounted to a haphazard hoard of dirty socks, shoes, underwear, and shorts, causing Kylie to observe to her husband that it was ‘almost like the dog wanted to dress like a human.'”
June is going out on a heat wave in Ashlandia. Topping out at 99 F today, Sunda, June 29, 2025. It’s okay out there for now, 62 F but the sun is already flexing its heat. Went out there for my morning circadiam rhythm adjustment and the sun heat drove me into the shadows fast. It’s not to last; by Wenzda, we’ll see it drop back down into the mid and upper 80s.
Active dream night. From one of them comes today’s theme music. The dream was about delusions, illusions, magic, and tech. Hearing of that, The Neurons came up with a few songs for the morning mental music stream. First up was “Abracadabra”, a 1982 rock song brought into the world by Steve Miller and his band. It’s pretty standard rock radio fare. Diana Ross apparently partly inspired the song. From Wikipedia:
The song is said to have been inspired by the American singer Diana Ross, whom Miller had met when they each performed on the same episode of the pop music television show Hullabaloo in the 1960s.[3] The lyrics “Round and round and round it goes, where it stops nobody knows” are a reference to the spinning wheel segment from The Original Amateur Hour.
Speaking on The Howard Stern Show in June 2016, Miller said at first his record company Capitol Records did not see the potential hit it would become. “Capitol didn’t believe in it and didn’t want to release it. I had a different deal with Phonogram in Europe. When it came out in Europe, I cancelled my American tour because it was No. 1 everywhere in the world, except the States.”[citation needed] After seeing its success overseas, Capitol released it in the U.S. and it also climbed to No. 1.
Ah, good ol’ “Hullabaloo”! I remember watching that with Mom and my sisters.
But, as The Neurons will do as I’m busy humming “Abracadabra”, they thrust the Lady Gaga song by the same name from 2025 into the morning mental music stream. Jarring as a train wreck as the two songs are well different. But singing that abracadabra refrain with her is fun.
Got my hot coffee. Keep cool or warm, safe and dry, whatever need be, wherever you’re at. Here we go. Cheers
Michael Seidel, writer 