Saturday’s Wandering Thought
While visiting in Pittsburgh for a wedding, we spoke with some rabid MAGAts. Common ground was found around three things:
- We don’t like the country’s current direction (but disagree on why, except inflation)
- Term limits are needed for US representatives and senators.
- A age limit is also needed for all Federally elected offices.
Unfortunately, we agreed, the ones most responsible for the mess are also the ones who can effect change easiest but passing laws for numbers two and three from our list.
We know that the final problem is, these elected representatives of, by, and for the people, will never pass laws which make them more responsible to the people.
So, really, we had five things we agreed upon in our search for common ground. None of us were real thrilled with most aspects of the media, too.
Saturday’s Theme Music
Mood: moody
My mood is sometimes up today, eager to get on with things. But I look outside. Smoke from wildfires filled our air overnight. A check of the indexes verify that we’ve gone into the unhealthy range. I can guess that; the light gray and white smoke obliterates views of the trees and mountains. Visibility is truncated at a few hundred yards. The smell, mildly chemical in this round, reminiscent of burning plastic, irritates my nostrils and eyes. My sinuses clog and spirits droop. I was planning to engage the yard with some cutting implements. That probably won’t happen with this smoke. Yes, I can make like a bandit, don a mask and get it done, but it’s not a critical task.
So begins Saturday, September 23, 2023.
Beyond the smoke, it’s 56 F outside, with a chance it’ll reach 76 F outside today. I’m doubtful about that, given the smoke layer blanketing it. The smoke keeps the sun out and chills the air. Sunshine is reaching the house’s backside, which faces the east.
Whenever smoke spills into the valley, like most, I search for the source. We especially worry that a new, closer fire has started. None appears on the map. With the lack of a woody smell to it, I suspected it’s a wind shift. Besides, we’ve not be warned by any government entity to get ready to pack up and go.
The smoke is snaking to us from the southwest, indicative of the California fires. This screenshot is a product of the Western Fire Chiefs Association website. Ashland, where I am, is directly north of the Happy Camp Complex.
My sister, L, is making a good recovery from her cancer surgery, but it’s early days. She received the flowers and expressed delight with them and the message. Fingers remain in the crossed position.
The Neurons are feeding the morning mental music stream (Trademark bogus) with music by Talking Heads and David Byrne. Today I’m hearing “What A Day That Was”. This song’s spirited beat and sound, and the stories conveyed, bolster my energy and optimism. The Neurons undoubtably chose this tune because of my reflections back on my nephew’s wedding last Saturday. Such a happy mood prevailed, bathing us with positive energy. What a day that was.
Stay pos, be strong, and carpe diem. I’ve carped the coffee; half a cup of the black sustaining beverage has been reduced. Here’s the tune. Hey ho, let’s go.
Two Dream Moments
I had two dreams last night which are remembered. Both were extremely brief.
In the first, I saw a large headline blaring on a screen, “FORMER PRESIDENT TRUMP IS DEAD!” Don’t know what media source it was supposed to be, but utter shock went through me when I saw it. Below the headline was a black and white photograph of DJT. Then I recognized that the screen was angled in green grass like a tilted tombstone. That was all.
Awakening, I thought about it for some time. When I mentioned it to a friend later, he said that someone had hacked Trump’s son’s X account and posted something about Trump being dead. I wondered if I’d heard or seen the story in passing without realizing, and it manifested as part of the dream. Of course, Trump being dead would launch conspiracy ideas and rip through the GOP’s structure like a Force 5 tornado. Guesses about the end results went all over the place when I spoke about it with friends, including prophecies of violence, and the impact on financial markets; would the US be viewed as safer and more stable with him deceased? It’s easy to speculate that it could go either way.
Of course, as it’s a dream, it could also just be wishful thinking in my head about how much the man bothers me with what he says. For example, I rose this morning and read the news that he’s urging his party to defund the parts of the legal systems which are taking him to trial, claiming that these are political persecutions. As others pointed out, such a spending proposal by the House would might difficulties finding their way into law past the Senate where Dems rule, or past President Biden’s desk. So his proposal is pretty empty but it stirs up the fires of his base, doesn’t it?
Second dream, similarly brief, had me walking outside through short, dark green grass. Shiny things in the grass hooked my attention. Drifting toward the first, I found a half buried silver dollar. I easily pulled it free from the earth. As I reckoned what it was, I saw several more. Collecting them, I realized it was hill full of half-buried silver dollars. As I collected them in delight, I wondered what I should do with them — keep them or turn them in somewhere — and how they got there. No one else was in sight, nor were buildings, cars, or paths. I concluded, they must have somehow fallen from the sky.
I was really excited, though, taking them for signs of impending good fortune. That lifted my energy and reinvigorated determination to do things. I guess I need to make it so, number one.
Fact Checking Trump
Scottie pointed me to ten bears’ fact-checking of Trump’s interview. We expected lies from Trump, and we got ’em.
Saturday’s Theme Music
Mood: bounding
This is it, W-day, the event planned for over a year, the wedding day for my nephew, David, and his GF, Andrea. Charming, intelligent, fun people. I wish them the best and I’m happy to be here to take part. He’s 35 and we were a little skeptical he’d ever marry. He had a steady GF for twelve years but she didn’t want children. So, the chasm was there and off they went, their separate ways.
Their wedding is so different from my own experience, just me and my wife, with two friends in a chapel on Wright-Pat with a self-described broken-down boxer officiating. That was over 48 years ago of ups and down, in and outs. We’ve come to a comfortable balance, forgiving one another for irritations, supporting one another, and making each other laugh.
I met her parents last night, learned how they met, and where they live, and what they do. They lean different politically than I do, as does most of her family who I spoke to. All are from the midwest, mostly from small cities. The bride and groom share my political philosophies and live here in PGH. Don’t know how much all that matters as far as relationships; we were all amiable last night.
One woman I met works for a gun manufacturer. She walks a tightrope, her words, to strike a balance between the two sides. She told me that when growing up, her father, a Vietnam War vet, didn’t allow guns in the house. He told her, he knows what they can do. He also seemed to worry that the sight or sound of a gun might trigger a reaction in him.
W-day weather is finely shining, coolly comfortable, with a cloudless embrace and teasing light winds. High: 72 F.
Still tracking what Lee is doing to the Northeast, following tales of Hunter Biden, Donald Trump, Kevin McCarthy, Elon Musk, Aaron Rodgers, etc. Once begun, the cycle goes on until it’s spun dry.
“The Load Out/Stay” with Jackson Browne is in the morning mental music stream (Trademark underwater). The Neurons put it in there as I talked to people’s mode to arrive here. Many drove nine to eleven hours to get here, accomplishing it over two days. Don’t like the airlines and the pain inflicted by travel — anxieties and irritations over flight connections, security, personal space, and the expensive ticket prices. I can understand that. Why, exactly, “The Load Out/Stay”? Because hearing them talking, I visualized loading up the car, just as I did when younger to go cross country, and what I still do for in-state vacations.
Stay pos, be cool, be strong. Coffee has been consumed; time to walk about, visit a part of Pittsburgh no longer familiar to me. Here’s the song. Cheers
Friday’s Theme Music
Posting note: once again victimized by WordPress; post went into autosaving mode and never left it. Had to start over, once again. And then, one more time. Sigh. Tech can be capricious but conversely, where would we be without the dang stuff?
Mood: variable, sunny to moody to frustrated to pensive
W-1. Wedding is tomorrow night. Tonight is the meet n’ greet cocktail gig. Don’t know who will attend, so anticipation has a ragged edge. Several sisters and their spouses bowed out. Bummer but they have issues they’re dealing with, such as preparing for surgery or dealing with a teenage son dealing with his newfound health issues. The son loved playing basketball; now, due to fits of dizziness caused by medication used to combat seizures, he can’t play b-ball. His weight has ballooned by twenty pounds and he’s of course, depressed. Not a good place for a fourteen year old or his parents and family.
We’ve moved hotels. The first, a Holiday Inn Express, was chosen for easy access to family and familiarity with the area, Monroeville and Penn Hills. Now we’ve shifted to the Hyatt House in Shadyside, where the wedding will be.
Weather here continues to be big sun and cool air, a pleasant, refreshing, relaxing combo. Sounds like a drink advertisement: “Drink weather, a pleasant, refreshing, relaxing flavor that your body and mind will love.”
Still reeling from the Libya flooding disaster. We just seem to pivot from disaster to disaster: within the past few weeks we surfed from Hawaii’s fires to Morocco’s quakes (over twelve thousand dead) to Hurricane Lee to Libya’s flooding (over one thousand dead) to the tropical storm formerly known as Lee, with some domestic and political drama (auto worker strikes, Hunter Biden’s legal issues, China’s missing defense minister) sprinkled over it to add depths.
Los Neurons have activated Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers with “The Waiting” (1981) in the morning mental music stream (Trademark unheard of). It’s fitting. Although well-practiced in waiting (I’m 67, been married over 48 years, and was in the military for over twenty years, things which all reinforced the need to wait for things to happen), I’m not good at it. After months of slow pacing toward the day, acceleration exploded this week. Suddenly days are falling off the cliff and the moment is here. But that sort of time change happens with many things we’re anticipating, doesn’t it.
Stay pos and be strong, and try to stay sober. I’ll do the same. Hand me that coffee, wouldja? Here’s the beats. Cheers
Thursday’s Theme Music
Mood: brisk
It’s W-2: two days before the wedding. The women have been comparing dresses and shoes for the event and talking about their hair.
Men have been complaining about how their clothes fit.
Nervous excitement is burgeoning.
It’s September 14, 2023, in the burgh of Pitts, Pennsylvania. Lovely fallish weather with a low 70s F high. Sweeet. Family visits have been fun. Instructional. We catch up on matters of health and recent experiences, with a common refrain about how conversational matter has changed through the years; we used to talk about many other matters. We still do, but the proportions have shifted. Mom looks good, better than expected from the daily text message complaints and updates she provides. My sisters and their hubbies look well, healthy, happy, but that defies some of the topics and details they go into.
My wife and I are enjoying a swell time, although sharing a bathroom demonstrates privilege and how we’ve taken for granted having two bathrooms to spread out and do our morning things. With one BR, regimenting and rationing time and functions is required. We’re used to two places, where it can all be done in parallel, without interference from the other.
For a while, The Neurons entertain me with the song “Sisters” by Irving Berlin from 1954 in the morning mental music stream (Trademark laughable). Both parts were sung by Rosemary Clooney. I know the words well because both Mom and my wife would sing that song, although I’ve never heard the two of them sing it together. It’s a terrific ditty about love and relationships.
But those those Neuron scamps brought up D. Bowie with “Changes” from 1972, because, you know, I’m driving around the old life zones from my youth around Penn Hills and Monroeville, spotting changes and differences, right?
Stay pos, be strong and brave, and keep pressing forward. I’ll try doing the same. Coffee helps me on my journey. Hope you got something that helps you, too. Okay, pressing on. Here’s the beats. Cheers
WTF, Again
It’s time once again for WTF, Again, also sometimes called WTF, America. This is a New Mexico edition.
A white family experienced an emergency when a speeding car hit their pet dog. Jumping into the car with the injured animal, they raced for the nearest vet in an attempt to save their beloved animal. Enroute, they sped past a police car, who gave pursuit and pulled them over.
William Albrecht was driving. According to KRQE’s excellent reporting, he didn’t expect what happened next.
“I imagined if he was going to pull me over for speeding, I’d pull over,” Albrecht told KRQE. “He’d say something to me and then maybe even help us get there. You know, I’ve heard of stories like that before, but that didn’t happen.”
No, that didn’t happen. According to video, the police showed no sympathy and little concern for anything except enforcing their police power. The officer ordered Albrecht out of the car at gunpoint and made him kneel. The officer wasn’t interested in what was going on at all. He just wanted Albrecht to do what he was told, reporting that he felt threatened because Albrecht seemed enraged and had clenched fists in the air.
Note that no video support the officer’s story.
More officers were called to the scene, of course, because this unarmed white man and his wife and son were so damn scary, and Albrecht was handcuffed, of course.
Albrecht was especially distraught because they always ‘support the blue’ and feel that they’d done nothing to warrant this police reaction. It’s easy to imagine that if Albrecht was black, he might have been shot, because it’s happened to so many others. I imagine, too, that the city and police force will stand behind the officer and the wall of blue, and many citizens will support the police, because they support the blue.
According to KRQE, ‘BPD’s policy does call for de-escalation, stating, “the level of force employed must be commensurate with the threat posed by the subject and the seriousness of the situation.”. Yes the BPD police officer was clearly working hard to de-escalate that situation, wasn’t he? His situational awareness was just top notch.
Sadly, the dog passed away, a young boy had a traumatic moment compounded because the officer showed no empathy or concerns, and a family has come to understand why fewer people ‘support the blue’. I’m sorry for the family’s loss.
