Category: Information

Friday’s Theme Music

My political ire is rising with the latest trumpshit. First is the jump out the gate questioning whether Kamela Harris is eligible to be POTUS. If you haven’t read the ‘opinion piece’ in Newsweek…don’t. Such garbage. Be a while before my respect for Newsweek returns.

That was just starter fluid for my anger. What’s going on with Trump and the GOP the destruction of voting rights is first class authoritarian play. Further infuriating me is the GOP obstacles arising by sabotaging the USPS. We as a nation have worked to find improvements in the USPS and how the mail is handled and delivered. Here comes the GOP, breaking the fucking system so they can undermine democracy to remain in power. It’s a scorched earth plan for victory. Sickening, sickening, sickening.

As it’s happened in the past whenever a political party dirties a nation, enablers turn their heads so they don’t see. In this instance, they’re burying themselves in misinformation.

Eventually, Trump, the GOP, and their users will follow the natural course to crash and burn. By then, judging from their current activities, the destruction they’ve wrought will be huge. Then people will stand and cry with shock, “Who knew?” 

That’s happened every damn time. Then they’ll shed croc tears and protest their innocence, “I didn’t know.”

All that at last takes me to a 2006 Pink song, “Who Knew”. Frothy and poppy in melody, it carries dark lyrics about things happening that’s not noticed until you awaken to events after it’s all over, when nothing can be done. Pink sang,

I took your words and I believed
In everything you said to me
Yeah-huh, that’s right

When someone said count your blessings now
‘Fore they’re long gone
I guess I just didn’t know how
I was all wrong
They knew better, still you said forever
And ever, who knew?

h/t to Genius.com

That’s where Trump supporters and enablers stand. They believe his lies, and that of his administration, rationalizing his morality as good, twisting logic and facts to fit their spin , and will profess to believe until it all comes crashing down. Then, when the air is filthy again, climate change is crushing our society, and the number of people starving and dying swells, they’ll whine, “Who knew?”

Yeah, that’s right.

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Thursday’s Tiny Tidbits

Is it redundant to say tiny tidbits? Are not tidbits tiny by definition?

There’s a bit of whinging in this week’s short stuff, because I, an American white male, am a champion first-world complainer, often suffering first world blues much like “The Princess and the Pea”. I play the princess (call me Princess M, please) and the pea is anything from entertainment offerings, food prices, and net speeds to ‘things I can’t do well with my broken arm’.

I think I’ll start there.

  1. Typing. Buttons. Holding things with my left hand. Showering. Washing my hair. Putting on deodorant. Opening cat food tins. Opening ziplock type bags. Tearing toilet paper. These have all been challenges with my left arm in a splint and sling. Went back and read the ER report from that night. I’d overlooked the damages noted to my elbow, wrist, and fingers. I thought it was just the broken radius and broken and displaced ulna, but there was more. That more explains the struggles. All getting better, though. Give it time, right? It’ll be a month tomorrow.
  2. One-handed typing slows my novel writing. I depend on muscle memory and typing proficiency to expedite learning the tale and telling the story. Using one hand requires more thought, which disrupts the writing flow. Progress is tedious. I shoot for a thousand words a day (yeah word count as a metric, carrot, and stick) but I’m usually lucky to achieve five hundred.
  3. Other things: one, food prices. They’re rising fast now. Experts are making dire predictions about shortages, food insecurity, and distribution chain issues next year. Like, brace yourself.
  4. Example of food prices rising. Went on a groc shop today. Twelve items. One bag, mostly fresh produce: $42. Passed on a pint of mission figs for $12.99, and a half pint of blackberries for $4.99.
  5. The stock market isn’t moored in reality. It certainly isn’t ‘the economy’. One, most stocks are international businesses, reflecting global activity. Two, the wealthiest individuals own most of the stock. As an example, I own stocks, and also have some in IRAs and a 401k. Because of that, I’m worth a chunk more on paper.
  6. Running short of entertainment offerings. Basically have been rationing season two of “The Umbrella Academy” while working through “The Last Dance” and other documentaries and filling up on Brit faves “Would I Lie to You” and “QI” (with that rand Scandi Sandi and Alan Davis), and “The Kominsky Method“. Have just discovered the “Russo Bros. Pizza Film School“, which I’ll start watching tonight. Last week brought an unexpected “Red Dwarf” treat in a new episode.
  7. “Red Dwarf” remains unabashedly silly and illogical after all these years. Love it.
  8. Excitement on the streaming front. “Hitmen” with Sue and Mel on Peacock is coming. (If you asked, “Sue and Mel?”, it’s probably not your cuppa.) New Frost and Pegg series on Amazon Prime, “Truth Seekers”, is coming…someday. The second year of “The Boys” is finally arriving Sept. 4, so I’ll start watching season one again.
  9. Saying the long good-bye to a friend. Brain tumor. He’s trying to hang on to vote for Biden and have one final Thanksgiving with his family. Eighty-eight and an accomplished physicist, he’ll be the one to tell you he’s had a good life, but he had a lot more to do. He’s the third friend lost to brain cancer/tumor in the last few years.

Tell me about your world – books, streaming, writing in progress. What’re you watching? Eat anything interesting lately? “Red Dwarf”: for or against?

Got my coffee. Time to do me best to write like crazy, at least one more time.

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Saturday’s Snippings

  1. John Muir and Margaret Sanger. These two are the latest to be addressed for their racism. In Sanger’s case, it’s more nuanced, regards eugenics, and is too much for my sprawled one-handed pecking for much detail here. I do recommend research. Muir, though, was an outright racist. We learn that people can be visionary and flawed. His damage to our society is deep. It’s sad and disheartening to learn these things. But they must be learned, and we need to be cognizant of the damage inflicted, and, yeah, make changes.
  2. Making changes like acknowledging past racism and its impact and then trying to fix it is just like the stages of grief, isn’t it? It’ll take a while to work through it. I can hear replies, how much longer must it take?
  3. Lovely to feel my arm healing. Strength is returning, range of movement is expanding, and the circle of pain is shrinking. Go back next week. The plan (if all is well) is to replace the splint with a short cast.
  4. Realizing that next week is August. July passed through with a sonic boom.
  5. I love the John Cheever quote I found this morning (posted elsewhere on the blog). It speaks strongly to my own writing drive. I always think, there’s more to our lives and reality than what we know. I’m agnostic about gods, and indeed enjoy tucking them into my tales, but I pursue the impression that we’ve only skimmed the surface of being. Writing helps me explore that essence.
  6. Drank a fantastic cup of coffee this morning. Right temp, flavor, and richness. A wow cup. Which made me immediately want to experience it again. Comparing it to drinking wine and beer, and eating food, and achieving things, I appreciated again the blend needed to brew something memorable that’s greater than its parts. Once, I’ve had it, I want more of the same. Not an epiphany, but a lesson learned one more time.
  7. Speaking of one more time, got a refresher cuppa coffee (yeah, it’s not the same, but it’ll do). Time to write like crazy…at least one. More. Time.
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A Few Things Friday

  1. Typing with one hand. Broke my radius and ulna on my left arm last Tuesday evening. (Yep, just two days after b-day 64.) Always appreciated having the requisite number of things in good working order. I appreciate two hands and arms afresh.
  2. Was a clean break. None of my wrist bones were damaged, and the wrist cartilage et al looked good. Broke this same wrist back in July, 1988. Required two pins to hold that in place till it healed. Having those pins removed at the end was an ordeal. One pin went through my hand bones, and the pin had become bent while residing in my bod.
  3. Time was passed at the ER by eavesdropping on others’ issues and complaints. Woman next door was 186 pound (hey, that’s what I weigh!), was less than five four (okay, a few inches shorter), and ninety-six years old (got me beat there). She was having problems breathing, her heart was beating too fast and out of rhythm. She also refused to wear a mask. They insisted: “Put it on or we cannot help you.” She was tested for COVID-19. Learned via a friend today that she was negative.
  4. Everyone was masked and social distancing was practiced, but one person wore it wrong. That happened to be my ortho surgeon.
  5. Didn’t require surgery. Lots of pain was involved in this (quoting my attending physician), “Gnarly trauma.” I was sedated, ortho doc reviewed the film, shoved my hand back in place, tweaked it some, splinted it, and put it in a cast. I’m on  a Percocet diet, one every six hours. Didn’t have any the first night, though. Not a comfortable night.
  6. Spent fours at the ER. Actual procedure consumed about four minutes.
  7. How’d it happen? Either it was a rock climbing incident, a doe defending her fawn, or something else. Yeah, it was a poor dismount from a high place at home while effecting a repair. Should be in the cast one to two months.

The curse of 2020 has gotten a little more personal.

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Wednesday’s Theme Music

After reading headline bullshit about more Trump lies (and other pols, but mostly the mano one) and general bullshit that’s out there, a 1984 Queen song entered the mental music stream.

I want to break free
I want to break free
I want to break free from your lies
You’re so self-satisfied, I don’t need you
I’ve got to break free
God knows, God knows I want to break free

h/t to Genius.com

“I Want to Break Free” wasn’t a big hit in the U.S., but I was travelling through Europe on mil biz that year, and heard it on their media. I thought the thingy ’bout the lies worked for this pandemic year.

Give ‘er an ear.

 

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Monday: A Few Things

Thanks to everyone for the birthday wishes, given here, or on FB, or in private messages. Although I’m not a celebrating type, your thoughts and comments are meaningful to me.

  1. Wore one of my favorite shirts yesterday. I bought it the year we moved to Ashland from Half Moon Bay, 2005. Shortly after moving up here in June, we went back down to the SF Bay area to address some issues, do some shopping, and visit with friends. We stopped in at an odd sale, where a convenience store on Middlefield had been converted to a sale of overstocked items. That’s where I found this shirt. It was bought on a hot day in July, 2005. As one of my favorites, I’ve been photographed in it at work and parties. I’m wearing it in this photo in 2010 with my little sister and her youngest daughter. I’m the one with the facial hair. I know, you can barely see the shirt.
  2. It’s always odd to me that Lee Greenwood lets Donald Trump use Greenwood’s song, “God Bless the U.S.A.”, at his events. The song has lines that refers to being free and the men who died for that right . Trump has denigrated many military members, past and present, in his speeches and remarks. He holds the statues of the Confederate States of America, which was a nation formed from states who broke away from the United States. After they broke away, they attacked the U.S.A., starting a war in which they killed many Americans. If that doesn’t say enemy and traitor, what does? Beyond that, the C.S.A was fighting a war to keep people enslaved. All of that is the antithesis of what Greenwood’s song is purported to be about. Yeah, makes me wonder. Yeah, me makes me sad and cynical, too.
  3. Ashland, the little town that I’ve staked out as home, cancelled July 4th fireworks and celebrations cause, COVID, masking, and social distancing. A few fireworks went off but I’m pleased that the town mostly observed it, making it the quietest July 4th in my memory. Meanwhile, we visited with friends in their gazebo, six feet apart and masked, except to eat cupcakes (still six feet apart or more) and consume root beer floats. We noted, though, two of the masks being used by others had valves. I thought they — the health experts — do not recommend masks with vales. One of the participants wore their mask above their mouth and another wore their mask below their nose. I didn’t call them out, the be respectful, but I stayed back, and we were outside. Made me sigh, though; why wear the mask if you’re not going to do it right?
  4. I’d welcomed July as a positive move, posting to friends, hey, don’t fear July just because the year has been a bit sucky so far this year. This might be the month it all begins turning around. Well, it was like 2020 said, hold my beer, as the next day, I read an article about the Chinese being worried about bubonic plague cases. A resurgence of the black death is all that we need, given how many in the U.S. dismiss the threat of COVID-19 as just another flu, a hoax or conspiracy, refusing to take precautions against the novel coronavirus. God knows what they’ll do if the black plague begins spreading.
  5. We watched Avengers: Endgame last night. Yeah, all three hours of it. Looonnnggg film. One, good thing we watched it at home, where we could pause it and take bio breaks, and where we could also google info. We were constantly wondering, “Okay, who is that character?” They brought them all back, and we’re not deeply invested in the MCU. After all the hype and reviews, I expected something better. Yes, I know, my cynicism (or my age) is showing. Some of the acting appearances were fun and surprising, but I liked Avengers: Infinity War, Guardians of the Galaxy, and Black Panther much better. To each, right?

Got my coffee. Time to write like crazy, at least one more day.

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Sunday’s Theme Music

So…

Contrary to world expectations, I’ve been, um, feeling good? How else can it be put, but I’ve been experiencing a rising sense of hope and optimism. It permeates everything I’m doing and thinking.

Rationally, I can’t account for it. I can say that I’m less stressed because I’m not out there socializing and fighting traffic. I can attribute it to kind weather gods; May, June, and July have been pleasantly mild for the most part, keeping anxieties about wildfires and smoke tamped.

But then there’s COVID-19 and what it’s doing to the world. And there was the death of a sweet, shy cousin, too young, just fifty-one, dead from cancer, leaving two sons behind, succumbing to the disease after a four year struggle. In my mind, she remains bright-eyed and smiling with an impish impulse.

And there was Dad, being rushed to the hospital mid-week, Dad who is rarely sick but has a full metal jacket of stents (installed a few years ago) and moderate CPOD. He is almost eighty-eight, though, so there’s always expectations and worries. We are talking about the life train. It always pulls in at the same final stop.

Writing, though, has been a wonderful escape, of course, taking me on an unexpected ride as the characters evolve and the story goes in directions that I didn’t expect. That’s always a pleasure, innit? A good writing day can propel you over many obstacles.

So…

Feeling good. Optimistic, hopeful, even joyous.

Against this backdrop, I’m hearing “Bell Bottom Blues” by Eric Clapton (1971). Two aspects of the song stay on a loop in my head: “I don’t want to fade away,” and “I don’t want to lose this feeling.”

No, I don’t want to lose this feeling. It’s too good. I wish I could package it and share for free with everyone in the world. Others should know these sensations. They’re powerful stimulants.

Enough of my babbling. Here’s the music, a later live acoustic version that I think does more justice to the song.

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Saturday: Four Things

There has to be four things today because it’s the Fourth of July, Independence Day in the U.S., right? 

  1. Best fourth of July celebration for me is the first one with my wife. She wasn’t my wife or girlfriend yet. I was fifteen and she was fourteen, and she was just a girl I’d just met a few days before. Yep, just a smart, long-haired girl who captured my attention from the first time I saw her. Fortunately, I had the same impact on her, she claims. Guess it was fate.
  2. I subscribe to the Hulu service with commercial breaks. I don’t like spending money on streaming services. They’re an indulgence, so I try to minimize the cost. I’m watching two shows on Hulu, “Cardinal” and “Justified” (again), so I don’t think it’s worth paying more for it. They’re like an awkward, gamboling puppy with their commercial breaks, erupting in odd points in a scene (butchering the tension or mood). They usually show two or three commercials, and they usually cut off , and then cutting off the last twelve seconds of the final commercial. If I was that advertiser, I’d be demanding better service. My cynical aspect (which occupies about ninety percent of my mind) suggest Hulu does their breaks deliberately to motivate me to pay a few more dollars a month to avoid commercial breaks.
  3. Watched Hamilton on Disney Plus last night. Had the captions on, and it’s a good thing. It’s a continuous flow of life, song, revelations, and relationships, and worth every damn piece of praise that I’ve read or heard. I recommend it to you so you can witness for yourself.
  4. Gonna be a mellow day in spirit. I’m going for a walk in a little while…after I write. A pair of jets did a flyby to mark the moment when the parade would’ve begun but there are no parades in town, although our friend and state rep did a singleton parade. Pam Marsh wears the Statue of Liberty outfit every year, has for years. The mask is new…so is the Black Lives Matter sign…and the coronavirus on a chain… We’ve watched the town parade from her front year for the past ten years. It’s a potluck where everyone attending brings a food or drink. We’ll miss the parade but Pam is carrying the torch for it (yeah, get it?). We’re fortunate to have such an intelligent, energetic, and concerned person as our friend and rep. Did I mention her sense of humor?Pam July 4

Yeah, got my coffee. Yes, it’s a holiday, and it’s time to write like crazy, at least one more time…

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Thursday: A Few Things

  1. Still walking. Sounds like I’m bragging, right? I’m talking about exercising. My progress goes up and down. My 28-day average is just 7.51 miles (sixteen thousand plus steps), with my best being last Thursday, ten and quarter miles. I try to get in more, but stuff. I’m in a heavily hilled area. Examining results with where I walk is interesting. My flights will increase to fifty to sixty a day, and my activity level will increase, but my miles decline. That’s because the steep hills really slow me down. Coming down is less of a physical exertion, but requires a lot from my legs to keep from just pitching forward. Great views, though, and getting the exercise outside is worth it.
  2. COVID-19. We have people who shunned masking, attending rallies (see Herman Cain and Tulsa), church, and parties, who are now testing positive and being hospitalized. Some, like Cain, had underlying conditions. Cain is seventy-four, and I guess he’s okay with getting sick, possibly going through what others have endured, and dying, but what about spreading it to others, and putting them through it? Yeah, nobody say this coming.
  3. COVID-19 Redux. Other crazy reports have one, teenagers trying to deliberately contract COVID-19. Let’s play a game and see who can get infected. (Alabama Teens Are Throwing Coronavirus Parties with Cash Rewards for the First to Get Infected.) Oh, the young… Proves that life can be stranger than fiction. Beyond that, some people who are testing positive are refusing to help with tracing. (Party Guests Wouldnt Talk After 9 Tested Positive.) Hit with subpeonas and facing fines of $2000 a day for not helping, they caved. Florida setting new records for their state with ten thousand cases in one day, a one hundred sixty-eight percent rise. Of course, commentators are blaming the protests or riots, and Gov. DeSantis has vowed that Florida wills stay open. Paul Krugman has an interesting threads based on Opentable reservations for Texas, Florida, and Georgia. After reservations rose with re-opening, reservations began declining as positive cases surged. Here in Oregon, cases are rising. Gov. Brown has declared masks mandatory inside businesses, but several sheriffs have declared her policy unconstitutional and have refused to enforce it. I always thought it was up to the courts to decide constitutionally, not the sheriffs, but they know better. Even Oregon State Police aren’t even masking as they enter businesses. To quote one officer who wasn’t wearing a mask, “Fuck Kate Brown.” That’s protecting and serving for ya. Shows why trust and support for police keeps declining; they’re deciding what laws they’ll obey and enforce, and mocking what they don’t like.
  4. I’m not good at celebrating. My sixty-fourth birthday is this week. As with every year, my wife asked me what I want to do to celebrate. I don’t have an answer. Parties don’t generally entice me. Socializing in general doesn’t entice me. She knows these things about me. I feel pressured to ‘do something’ to celebrate to mollify her.
  5. Still painting walls. We have high ceilings in the dining-living-kitchen combo. Three hard to reach corners where the walls and ceiling met. I’ve bought an extender that telescopes out to twelve feet. I have an edger, brush, and roller that can be attached. Control, though, is challenging, and a bit comical, and a strain on the neck, squinting up there at the wall from twelve feet away. Refreshing the paint on them is also an interesting process.

Got my coffee. Time to write like crazy, at least one more time.

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Monday – Three Things

  1. $.49. That was our electric bill for last month (May, 2020, for the calendar impaired): forty-nine cents. To break it down, we used $14.99 worth of electricity, and we were paid $14.50 for our solar panel energy. The rest of the bill wasn’t as good. Twenty-six and change for water. We had a wet June this year, so our water use was about half of what it was for the same time last year, even though we planted a garden this year and skipped it last year. Our utilities (gas is on separate bill), then, were about twenty-seven dollars. The one hundred dollar monthly bill’s remainder, about seventy-two dollars, were taxes and fees. Yeah, it’s a regular rant; I can’t save much on my monthly city bill because most of it is taxes and fees.
  2. WordPress Editor. I’ve returned to the ‘classic’ WP editor. Didn’t like the new stuff. Found it intrusive, counter-intuitive, and irritating. It was a change I didn’t want. And that’s okay, as I went back to the old way. No one’s rights or safety was threatened by my move back to how it was.
  3. I can’t keep up. My muses tell me the story too fast for my mind, and waaayyy too fast for my fingers. They don’t tell it in order and they’re always filling in the gaps. I get excited by what they’re telling me and their implications, and jump up to pace off my excitement. It’s a fun road that I follow, that struggle to write.

Got my coffee. Time to write like crazy, at least one more time.

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