The weather has pressed pause on the rain. Shards of broken sunshine are coming through but as soon as they broach the dark clouds’ defenses, a new mass of clouds rush in to patch it up.
A refrigerating breeze circles the streets with a load of petrichor. Like a madeleine for Prost, the petrichor delivers stacks of memories. I flash to being a boy in Wilkinsburg and Penn Hills, PA, a young airman in Korea and Germany, a tourist walking outside a tavern on a darkening day to visit with Dad in West Virginia.
I look outside. We have 100% cloud cover. “Maybe it’s been called for weather today.”
A while later, a blind person’s cane taps across the roof. Rain is falling.
It’s Thursday, April 25, 2024. 51 F, it’s not warming much more than that today. Good day for mellow indoors activities, such as reading, housework, writing, drinking coffee.
After reading news coverage of the SCOTUS consideration about whether POTUS can have absolute immunity, I want to engage in other things and pushed it into deeper realms of my mind. It’s a challenging question to consider. I agree with the civil limitations previously established by the Supremes. Now, though, can the POTUS be granted absolute immunity about everything? Should the chief enforcer of the nation’s laws be immune from those laws? That seems surreal.
I also am boggled that Justice Thomas wondered about why former ex-presidents weren’t charged and tried in some matters and brings up “Operation Mongoose”. That was JFK’s CIA efforts against Fidel Castro. As JFK was assassinated while in office, how the hell could this be relevant? More headshaking about Justice Thomas is undertaken on my end.
You know, Thomas is 75. If President Biden is too old for his job, what about Justice Thomas? Just sayin’.
The cats were ravenous early. Then they were eager for loving. Took a while to make them happy today. Probably the weather change. That’s my go-to reason for most of the cat’s behavioral matters.
Having conversation with my wife about going east to see Mom and to get her some in-home help. I’ve asked my sister about it for her opinion and history of the matter.
Back in the kitchen, making breakfast, The Neurons bring a mellow break up song from 1999 into the morning mental music stream (Trademark impeached). As “Never Meant” by American Football gains substance, I call on Alexa to play it for me. Coffee is sipped as I watch the rain drip out of the clouds and think about life, existence, and the whole tangerine. “Never Meant” is such a mellow song, it’s perfect for a quiet rainy day.
Stay positive and as sane as you can. Be strong and Vote Blue in 2024. As noted, coffee has been ushered into my system. Now for the music for your benefit. Enjoy. Cheers
The copter continues the watershed cleanup. I can watch him manuever through the kitchen window. Sounds give clues of his comings and goings. Right now, he’s resting in the air above the peak of a conifered-blessed mountain.
Looks like a good flying day out there on Tuesday, April 23, 2024. Sunshine gleams off windows and cars. Full-fledged green leaves on trees dapple lawns and houses with shadows. A few clusters of cloud islands hold steady on the western horizon.
It’s 17C outside, about 62 F. We’re heading for a 76 degrees F high. Rain has a chance but it’s less than 40% chance. Usually at those odds, we don’t see it.
Mom is supposed to be heading home today. She should actually be there, per the schedule, as she told me she was being released noon Eastern. Which was almost an hour ago. I find that most hospitals are optimistic about when things will happen. Like the military and DMV, there’s a lot of waiting at a hospital. I’m living on a hope that she’ll go home today and be relatively healthy and happy for a while and put some of these health scares to rest.
With that thinking, I tripped down the trail of what it used to be like back home, when I still held the flowers of youth in my appearance. The Neurons responded by conjuring a jazzy Stevie Wonder song that speaks to that essence, “I Wish”. The 1977 song is echoing through my morning mental music stream (Trademark drifting). I found an online offering of him doing the song live in 1982. Sweet. I hope you enjoy it.
Here we go. Stay positive and be strong. Vote Blue in 2024, and let’s see if we can stem the retreat of rights and sanity. Coffee is brewed and ready to be introduced to my body.
The choppers continued back and forth, up and down. Thwump thwump thwump thwump. We can hear them in the house, windows closed and all. Outside, they’re much louder. This is day four of their presence.
This is Sunday, April 21, 2024. Or with those choppers going in Sunday’s calm blue silence, Thwumpday.
The helicopters seem to start at 8 AM and go until later afternoon. They’re out there as part of the project to clean up the watershed mountainsides to make the area less attractive to fire. So yes, they are a good thing.
They’re driving my wife a little crazy, she claims. Always there, rising and falling in volume as they thwump about.
I don’t mind them. Reminds me of being on military bases. Makes me a little nostalgic.
Beyond the choppers, blue is the predominate impression with my outward gaze through the glass. Clouds are resting on the horizon but over me is sunshine and blue skies. It’s 48 F at the moment. Some rain is predicted. The high will be about 66 F, a drop from our recent forays into the seventies.
The floof boys don’t seem to mind the choppers. Seem to have adjusted to them. They don’t fly directly overhead. The first days had Papi suspicious. He’d go out there and look and look, as if he worried that they were coming for him. He has a mysterious past, you know. Who knows what mischief he did in his youth.
On to the theme music. As I perused the weather this AM, I mildly complained to myself about the lower high. We’d just been in the seventies. Now —
Want something from the seventies? The Neurons asked.
I was blank and confused. Before I could summon a response, they were playing “Whatch See Is Whatcha Get” by The Dramatics in the morning mental music stream (Trademark trending). The song was released in 1971. I always enjoyed it. It made a comeback in my mind when the personal computer age burst upon is. “What You See Is What You Get” — WYSIWYG — was a big thing with software. The Neurons would play The Dramatics song whenever I saw that on the software box or in a glossy magazine ad.
Stay positive, dress appropriately, be strong, and Vote Blue in 2024. Coffee is being choppered in. I hear it coming. Thwump thwump.
Mood: Sunflective (it’s sunny, and I’m reflecting on life, the universe, and everything)
It’s Marijuana Day, don’t you know. That is 4/20. Add a 2024 and make it a Saturday, and you have the full day/date situation.
420 is a reference to the time to meet and light up a doobie. That time originated with a group of U.S. high school students meeting up at 4:20 PM to search for a marijuana field. I originally heard it was police radio code for marijuana.
Another warmish spring day has touched down in Ashlandia, where the coffee is fresh and above average. It’s 70 F right now. Despite clouds breaking in over the horizons, today’s high has a few more degrees to go. You know the floofs are in full agreement with tasting some warm sunshine, don’t you.
Today’s music is about Dickey Betts. Lead guitarist (a job shared for a period with Duane Allman) and vocalist with the Allman Brothers Band, he passed this week, 80 years old. Man, when ABB came out with “At the Fillmore East” in 1971, I bought that thing and added it fast to the rotation. I’ve had a version of that double album from vinyl to digital ever since. Still play it once in a while when a nostlaxing mood strikes. Nostlaxing would be nostalgic and relaxing. You get it, don’t you?
Once while listening to “Whipping Post”, my wife, who’d come to embrace electrified blues, entered the room and asked, “Who is that playing guitar?”
“That’s Dickey Betts and Duane Allman,” I answered.
She listened a bit more. “Wow, they’re good.”
Yes, they were good.
But the song hooked in the morning mental music stream (Trademark sliding) is a better-known Allman Brothers tune. This is “Ramblin’ Man”, naturally. This live version from 1972 has Dickey on vocals and lead guitar. He wrote the song, as well. Dickey Betts, 1943 – 2024.
Be strong and lean forward. Vote Blue in 2024. Fresh coffee is flowing. Mine is black and sugar-free. Best way to imbibe it. Here’s the video. Cheers
Mood: Fribulent (It’s Friday so my spirits are up but news is bringing me down.)
‘Tis Friday, April 19, 2024. Spring continues an upswing. 66 and sunny after a cloudy, chilly start to the day, 73 F is expected to present as the high. Tomorrow is expected to be close to the same.
It’s lovely, energizing weather. I get out there and feel the sun and it’s like a double espresso has been downed. Lot of outdoor work is finally getting done.
Our hausfloofs, Tucker and Papi, agree. They managed to get much done in the sunshine, bathing themselves and guarding my wife as she lounged in the sun reading and sucking up vitamin D in an epic display of multi-tasking.
Despite these warmer temperatures down in the valley, some scattered snow remains in the mountains around us. The local ski resort, Mt. Ashland, is closed for the season.
Some local news has me down. Cougars are regularly spotted in town. People post their sightings on a website made for that purpose so we can keep an animals safe and avoid the area.
But a cougar was sighted 250 feet from a local elementary school about half a mile from my house yesterday. It killed a friend’s cat. Then the authorities killed the cougar.
Such majestic, fascinating animals, I hate seeing them disposed like that. I understand the aspects for and against. Doesn’t make me happy.
This wasn’t a spur of the moment matter. Brock, the killer, had received threatening phone calls from a man. He had time to call 911 and receive police assistance when the Uber arrived. The victim, Loletha Hall, couldn’t call for help because the killer demanded her phone before killing her.
Two kickers for me. One, the killer claimed that she was trying to rob him on his property. Her dashcam video shows the truth. Two, this only now seems to be becoming national news. It had happened in March. Maybe I was just negligent following the news.
No doubt they’ll show all the extenuating issues. I’m sure it’ll be argued that Ms Hall was a victim of circumstance, and that William Brock was a confused old man stressed by circumstances brought on by the scam phone calls. He, they will say, feared for his life, and that of his family.
Still doesn’t explain why he didn’t call the police before killing an innocent, unarmed, uninvolved person in broad daylight. Especially as he says he figured it was a scam. If he figured it was a scam, why did he shot and kill Ms Hall?
He has been charged with felonious assault, kidnapping, and murder.
“It just strikes me that more and more, nothing really works in America anymore,” Hawley told Fox News host Laura Ingraham. “I mean, our roads are falling apart, our bridges are falling down right in front of our eyes. Pieces of airplanes are falling out of the sky.”
Viewers and netizens point out that President Biden has been working on infrastructure plans and that Sen. Hawley “was one of 30 Republican senators who voted against a $1.2 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill in 2021, which contained money for upgrades to highways, bridges, airports and other major projects.”
The GOP are using the same gaslighting tactics that the use on immigration and the border issues. They bemoan a lack of progress even as they vote against any efforts to improve the situations.
They are miserable, miserable, miserable, lying, unprincipled individuals. Sadly, too many people tune into facts and will sit there, nodding their wooden heads as Hawley speaks, agreeing with what he’s saying.
Well, that felt good. Enough of soaking up news and becoming mired in anger and depression. Not letting that stuff rule my life. Sometimes, it feels like a wave rising up to overtake me. I just got to keep beating it back. Writing, friends, and coffee help.
The Neurons are filling my morning mental music stream (Trademark fumbled) with “Border Song”. Written by Bernie Taupin, performed by Elton John, “Border Song” came out in 1970 in the U.S., and was the first song to chart in the U.S. for Elton. When I first heard the song, I always thought its title was Holy Moses.
The question of why this song is playing today has been asked of The Neurons. They have not responded.
Stay positive and strong, and Vote Blue in 2024. Coffee is flowing, my friends. Help yourselves. Here’s young Elton John. Cheers
Sunshine is shooting into the valley. Seems like it’s coming from everywhere. The cats aren’t up on the weather report so they’re inside sleeping. But when they cotton on to the broad sunshine and rising temps, they’ll be out there.
Yes, it’s a blue sky day, a beautiful new day. Already up to 62 F, the high should top off ten degrees higher. This is Thursday, April 18 2024.
Yeah, reading the news. Trying to keep up, especially with developments in Gaza, Ukraine, politics, and Trump’s criminal trial. I mean, this is history, right?
Sure, them closed eyes and head nodding doesn’t mean anything. No, we’re the ones who aren’t sleeping, Sleepy Tee. We know exactly who you and what you are. You can lie about it and cast spells on weak individuals and enthrall them with your bulltrump, but we aren’t fooled.
With this weather, The Neurons have summoned ELO with “Mr Blue Sky” to the morning mental music stream (Trademark flooding). Multi-layered and tres pop, the 1978 hit can easily be mistaken for a late 1960s Beatle offering. What really stops you is the voice. ELO’s Jeff Lynne doesn’t have a Beatle voice.
Stay positive, be strong, keep leaning forward, and Vote Blue in 2024. It isn’t a lessor of evils; President Biden and the Democratic agenda is a better choice. Coffee is bubbling through me. Here’s the music. Cheers
Wednesday, April 17, 2024, began with blue skies and sunshine. Clouds have sailed in, blocking sunshine’s march. Shame, as it was a 34 F morning and the sunshine would be a nice warmer. My weather system says it’s 44 F out there. Others claim it’s now 46, 47, 49. All depends on location and how much sun they’re receiving, and air currents. 64 F or so will be our high.
Was going to write about politics news as a WTF America, Senate edition moment took place. News of a US Senator inciting American citizens to attack and torture or kill other Americans who are exercising their First Amendment right raises my ire. Way to go, Senator Cotton! Such a pillar of Christianity and Servant of the People! What an educated adult. And he proudly noted that’s exactly what the freedom-loving patriots of his his great state of Arkansas would do.
Yes, that was a heavy load of snark.
Cotton is a Republican, of course. Violence against other Americans and the Constitution is the MAGA GOP’s modus.
I would write about it, but Frank Vyan Walton at Daily Kos did it well, amplifying what Morning Joe said about Cotton’s remarks:
“This is extraordinarily counterproductive to any cause you’re pushing, but here we have a guy, Tom Cotton, that went to Harvard, undergrad and law school, served in the military, who is talking about throwing people off the Golden Gate Bridge, ripping their skin off. We had a United States senator go on a network, national network, suggesting that Americans rip skin off of people’s hands because they’re aggravated and take matters into their own hands.”
Sigh. Really, WTF, America?
Today’s music is floof-inspired. “Walk This Way” is one of Aerosmith’s best known songs. Released in 1975, when I was 19, The Neurons put it into my morning mental music stream (Trademark refreshed) this AM when I told Tucker, “Come on, if you’re hungry. Walk this way.” Which Tucker did.
Stay positive, be strong, and Vote Blue. Coffee is settling into the system. Let’s click this way and listen to the music. Cheers
Mood: Memsical: when musical memories preoccupy you
Monday’s been foisted on us and annointed as April 15, 2024.
This is Tax Day in America for some. Forges recall of past Tax Days for me, watching people get in line to mail it at the post office. There’d be lines. Sometimes, it was a line of cars as the PO set up to take them in and stamp the date. On and on the cars came as clocks approached midnight. Other times found people in line, snaking out of the PO’s customer service section, spilling out of the building and onto the sidewalk. Surreal scenes.
That’s less likely these days. I s’pose those folks are instead online somewhere, trying to get their forms posted and accepted.
Spring with wintry samples haunt Ashlandia today. It’s a dry, cloudy day. Our temp floats around 50 F. 60 F might be possible. It’s the air that brings up winter to my senses. Just smelled like winter this morning. I half-expected flurries to drizzle down around my head. Getting out where I could see the mountains, I scanned for white patches and tops. None were there. Guess it was all in my noggin.
Speaking of noggin, The Neurons cranked up Stevie Ray Vaughn and Double Trouble in the morning mental music stream (Trademark taketh away). The song was an instrumental called “Scuttle Buttin”. It amused me to little end that my wife suddenly became an SRV fan and a blues fan about 35 years ago. She was mostly a pop/dance person before that, although she gravitated toward female vocalists. She enjoyed Etta, Bonnie Raitt, Aretha. Suddenly, about a year before SRV’s death in a helicopter accident, he enthralled her.
I didn’t mind, mind you. I was always a rock and blues guy, oriented toward lead guitars and bent notes. Stevie delivered these and more. Once more, I find gratitude that we have technology that helps us relive our past.
Stay strong, be positive, and Vote Blue. I’m coffee’d up, and ready to rock. Here’s Stevie, burning up that guitar. Cheers
Today is Sunday, 4/14/2024. I’m late to the show. A friend needed some help, so the day was given over to that. She’s advanced in age. Neither she nor her husband can drive any longer so we took her shopping up the road in Medford. And since it was a long day, we stopped and ate out. Just soup and sandwiches.
Soup and sandwiches were perfect for this April weekend. Rain was Sunday’s main course. Temperatures hung around in the low fifties as the rain practiced speeding up and slowing down. It’s only now, as we cruise toward sunset, that the sun made a cameo, slipping out of the clouds’ protection to say hello before it says good night.
Being with my wife and our friend, listening to them chatting about friends inspired The Neurons. They quickly planted “With A Little Help from My Friends” in the morning mental music stream (Trademark helped). Yes, it was morning. We left the house at 9:30 AM and returned about 4 PM.
Although the song is a Beatle tune, I’ve always favored Joe Cocker’s cover. Coming out in 1968, he brings such soul and energy to it. Countering Cocker’s raw vocal energy are female backup singers pitching soft, precisely enunciated verses. Hammering away on drums is B.J. Wilson of Procol Harum. Searing along with the vocals is Jimmy Page of Led Zeppelin on lead guitar. Tommy Eyre offers that exquisite organ opening, gently mesmerizing but cajoling us on into a higher state. Sweet.
I was twelve when the song was released. Hearing it on my AM clock radio, the song cemented my sense of what I like in rock, and how rock carried me. Hope that makes sense.
Stay positive, be strong, Vote Blue. Hope you enjoy this music. I’ve had a day of coffee, thanks. Here’s the music.
Michael Seidel, writer 