Category: Thinking, thinking

Mundaz Theme Music

Munda, November 11, 2025, has shown up in ugly shades of gray. Fog, rain, and clouds mix it up, leaving no room for sunshine to run. It’s 44 F, will get up to 46 F with rain coming and going.

Back from a follow up with the surgeon who removed my gallbladder. Was scheduled for 9:15. I arrived at 9. By 9:15, I was driving back home. My incisions all are healing fine, I’m reporting no issues, he’s noticing no issues.

Today’s music is “Vasoline” by Stone Temple Pilots. The song is about being stuck in a messed up situation. “Flies in the vasoline we are, sometimes it blows my mind, keep getting stuck here all the time.” Thinking that while reading of Trump craziness, I thought, “We’re going to be stuck here in this messed up situation for a while.” “I hear you,” The Neurons responded, and dumped “Vasoline” into the morning mental music stream.

Trump was calling the Epstein files a Democratic hoax. Claim there’s no there there. Ordered DOJ investigations into it to see what connections are there between Dems and Epstein. Twist and turn, twist and turn. Then, like a child, he’s pivoted. “Go ahead, release them, I don’t care. I’m taking my ball and going home.”

Then there’s the tariffs. On. Off. On. Off. They’re there for national security. To protect ‘Muricans. No, they’re there to pay off the national debt — which, BTW, is gaining bigly under Trump. A trumpzillion has been added to the debt since Trump took over. Next, there’s China. “They will buy soybeans.” China: “Soybeans? What are you talking about?”

The Trump Regime is announcing ICE surges, national guard deployments, and military operations. Twist and turn, flail and burn. Hence, the song, “Vasoline”. We’re stuck in the vasoline of Trump’s altered reality. If it doesn’t blow your mind, you’re not paying attention.

And ‘member that DHS raid of the Chicago apartment building in the dark of night on September 30, 2025? The Trump Regime crowed about those dangerous occupants. From Crooks & Liars:

Horrific DHS Raid In Chicago Was A Violent Propaganda Scam

Stephen Miller, a senior advisor to President Donald Trump and an architect of his “mass deportation” policy, said that the building was “filled with TdA terrorists” and that the raid had “saved God knows how many lives.”

Read that whole report. ProPublica followed up on the raid. No terrorists. Barely anyone with a parking ticket. Just another example of the TACO Regime attacking Americans, breaking laws, trampling the Constitution, instilling fear, and sowing chaos.

May peace and grace find us soon. Till then, I’ll coffee up and struggle through the vasoline. Cheers

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Sundaz Wandering Thoughts

A man and his companion sat down with their dogs on the coffee house porch. Both people had pastries which they sat down on the table. The dog immediately went for that.

“No, Curry,” the man said, lightly touching the dog. “Come on. Make good decisions.”

I laughed to myself. I bet the dog thought that going for the food was a good decision.

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Sundaz Theme Music

Sundaz has slipped in, wrapping an autumn day around its shoulders. Sunshine and clouds and shuffling and bumping one another. Temperatures are moldering around the low 50s with plans for the high 50s. We’re now halfway through the eleventh month of 2025, as it’s November 16, 2025. With 2025 slinking toward the end, we wonder, are we on the right path as a nation? My Neurons answer with a resounding, “Hell, no.”

My sisters reported on progress cleaning Mom’s house out. She’s lived there thirty plus years. Stuff accumulates. Bills and paperwork. Memorabilia. Clothing. Food, utensils, bowls, dishes. Three sisters reported for duty, taking what they wanted for themselves, otherwise tossing things, filling up the trash and recycling cans. Sad, depressing, normal.

Today’s music comes from being outside at midnight last night. (Yes, it was a cat thing.) I was looking for the moon, the northern lights, meteorites, alien spaceships, bears, cougars, etc. But The Neurons took it in a different direction, bringing up a cover of “Shame on the Moon” by Bob Seger and the Silver Bullet Band. I remember that song arriving on the radio scene and singing it to myself later as I walked at night, admiring the moon. It’s a mellow song for a mellow day when they tell us rain is on the way.

It’s Sunda so the news cycle is slow. I can’t pretend to guess what Traziness will strike. He’s retreating on tariffs, sweating bullets over the Epstein files, and continues to rule over Project 2025 chaos, inflicting dumbassery and cruelty wherever and whenever. The Trump Epstein Shutdown is over but the Trump Epstein Shitshow goes on.

Have a great Sunda. I’m gonna strive to do the same. Coffee is up. Here we go, one more time. Cheers

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Satyrdaz Wandering Thoughts

The honeymoon is over.

Sis is angry with Mom. Mom is angry with her. They are, as they have done for decades, growling at one another. Accusations sometimes come out about what’s going on. Sis thinks Mom is being obstinate. Mom thinks sis is being mean.

Growing experiences from the new living arrangements are certainly expected. Both are intelligent and know this. As with so many things, there are components of making these adjustments. It’s one thing to intellectually know something, yet something else to intellectually understand and accept it, and still requires some emotional and physical facets to adjust to make it all work. It’ll take time. Patience and anger will rise and fall like waves beating on the shore. The adjustments will be found.

I hope.

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Satyrdaz Theme Music

It’s the darkest of times, it’s the dumbest of times, it’s Trumpiest of times. Borrowed from Mock Paper Scissors.

Bold sunshine shoots the windows today, Satyrda, November 15, 2025. 52 F now, the other numbers are 65 and 42 F for the day’s highs and low. Sunshine and blue are dominating like an NFL team playing a high school JV team. Lovely to rest my eyes on the panorama and what remains of the colorful leaves after the wind tore through over the last several days.

I was walking yesterday evening. Sidewalks and paths are wealthy with discarded leaves. I kicked ’em up as I passed through them like I was six years old. I always enjoy making that ruckus among the leaves. Meanwhile, I deliberately summoned the music to “New York State of Mind” by Billy Joel. My lyrics were adjusted to “Ashlandia State of Mind” and our local streets, activities, and centers of interest. After singing it last night and gazing out on this morning’s view, The Neurons resurrected the song for my morning mental music stream.

The Trump Regime has made statements about demanding all SNAP recipients re-enroll. They believe the debunked myths that SNAP is corruption riddled. 42,000,000 are receiving SNAP. The huge effort to re-enroll them all will fall on the states and the recipients. Recipients who are often children, working poor, struggling lower middle class, elderly and disabled. If this doesn’t scream, THE CRUELTY IS THE POINT, what does?

With the Trump Epstein Shutdown ended after a record run, attention is swinging hard to the Epstein files and Trump’s place among their annals. Dizzy Donny is displaying deeply demented demeanor. Many like me speculate that he knows the terrible things the files will reveal. Here’s hoping for the best.

BTW, that idea about 50-year mortgages is crackers. Won’t do much for helping affordability. Folks still need down payments, need the income for paying property taxes and insurance, and insurance is going higher and higher in many regions due to more extreme weather — but please, let us not say anything about climate change. Heaven forfend the TACO Regime even thinks about doing anything about that. See, with mega AI centers being planned and built, pollution will go yet higher. Demands on water will go yet higher. As will demands on electricity, causing the price of everything to increase, crushing affordability, but never mind all that. Realizing those things and planning to address those things takes something other than greed, lying, and cruelty, and that’s all the Trump Regime has.

The day is calling and the coffee is singing. My hope remains that peace and grace lift themselves up with a mighty shake and come around to yours and mine. Here we go again. Cheers

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Fridaz Wandering Political Thoughts

Trump has been flailing, ladies and gennulmen. Besides dozy off in meetings, he looks haggard and tired. Babblings have been going up as Democratic election, approval to release Epstein files rises in Congress, disapproval to raise and apply tariffs seems to be shaping up, and terrible economic trends are growing apparent. The shutdown made a huge dent in the economy. It’s a dent it couldn’t take. Prices are up. Trump is backpedaling on selected tariffs (like coffee) to bring prices down but doing so also undermines his premise that he’s applying tariffs because ‘it’s a national emergency’. He’s losing control faster than a speeding car hitting black ice. The question is, where will the slipping and sliding take him, the GOP, and the United States and world?

I thoroughly enjoy Heather Cox Richardson’s posts. November 13th’s post was an especially effective summation of Dozy Donny’s current struggles.

Letters from an American

We are watching the ideology of the far-right MAGAs smash against reality, with President Donald J. Trump and his cronies madly trying to convince voters to believe in their false world rather than the real one.

That spin has been hard at work in the past few days over the economy. Trump is clearly worried that the Supreme Court is going to find that much of his tariff war is unconstitutional, as the direction of the justices’ questioning in its November 5 hearing suggested. On Monday he claimed that the U.S. would have to pay back “in excess of $2 Trillion Dollars” if the Supreme Court ruled the tariffs unconstitutional, and that “would be a National Security catastrophe.” He blamed “Anarchists and Thugs” for putting the U.S. into a “terrible situation” by challenging his tariffs. Hours later, he increased the number to $3 Trillion—the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget says the number was actually about $195 billion.

Yesterday, White House officials suggested they would never be able to release October’s jobs report or inflation numbers, blaming the Democrats. They did, however, claim that prices are “beginning to drop,” citing DoorDash, the delivery platform, as their source.

Yes, blame the Democrats. That’s all Trump can ever do. Lie, and claim things are a hoax. Lie, and claim everything is great. And lie, and blame the Democrats. The common denominator here is that things are going shitty for the Enshittifier-in-Chief, and his usual is not doing its usual any longer.

To continue from Ms Richardson’s post.

~snip~

Bloomberg reports that 62% of Americans they polled say the cost of everyday items has climbed over the past month and that 55% of employed Americans say they’re worried about losing their job. It also notes, as CNBC economic commenter Carl Quintanilla pointed out, that international stocks are outperforming the U.S. S&P stock index by the widest margin in 16 years. Yesterday the University of Michigan consumer confidence survey hit its lowest reading in 65 years.

Tonight Ana Swanson, Maggie Haberman, and Tyler Pager of the New York Times reported that the administration is attempting to lower food prices by preparing exemptions to tariffs, suggesting that some members of the administration are finally facing the fact that Trump’s fantasy ideology cannot defy reality forever.

~snip~

‘Muricans are waking up. (Yes, they’re becoming woke, ha ha.) Even MAGAts having FAFO moments are waking up. So are more hard-headed MAGAts. Of course, a large number of them will rally to cheer Trump on to further destruction and destabilization of the nation and world. It’ll take a few rounds to shake them out of their status as True Believers.

Now Trumo is sending ICE to Charlotte, NC. That will probably piss off another large contingent of United States citizens. He’s an absolute fool; does he not realize the optics? But of course, he doesn’t realize the optics, because he’s too deeply embedded in his altered reality to realize the optics. But Guard soldiers are speaking out, telling others that they’re mostly doing nothing on their deployments to American cities. They’re not seeing the destruction and violence Trump claims. The cities aren’t on fire as he claims. The soldiers report mostly being bored. As their narrative grows and spreads, Trump’s failures will accelerate, and supporters will start leaving him in droves. And as that happens, Trump will flail mightily, trying to use the same tactics which he always uses. Those efforts will fail. I predict it’ll even actually hasten Trump’s decline as more abandon him.

It’s just going to take some time.

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Fridaz Theme Music

Frida, November 14, 2025, has gracefully entered Ashlandia. Accompanied by an entourage of blue sky and sunshine, we’re at 50 F and expect 60 F. It’s appreciated that the wailing wind has taken its thrashing away. The calm is, well, calming.

Today’s music comes from touching myself. Oh, get your head out. I was touching my three surgical incisions on my abdomen. Just gently, because it’s been ten days and the film sealing them is beginning to darken and peel. Gross and fascinating, the process causes new sensations as the film rolls and pulls away when it comes in contact with my shirt. All this is to schedule, BTW. Anyway, while I pause to inspect them in the mirror and touch them, I told myself enough, get going. From those little moments, The Neurons came up with “Touch and Go” by the Cars for the morning mental music stream.

Predictably, Dozy Donny directed the DoJ to investigate Epstein’s connection with prominent and popular Dems.

So, first, Dozy Donny says he’s gonna release the Epstein files as soon as he’s in office.

TACO — Trump Always Chickening Out — backed off of that promise and tried yugely to command everyone to just pretend like there was nothing there. Forget the files is what he more or less said.

Then he pivoted and tried another tack. Lying Lame Donny claims it’s a “Democrat hoax that never ends.”

To which we all reply, then be a stand up individual and release all the files, as are, without the cost and distraction of new investigations. But Donny knows how bad he looks in those files. He had FBI agents combing it for mentions. Since that was done, he’s been more of a shambling wreck than over.

So the record-setting Trump Epstein Shutdown (TES) of 2025 has ended. Now the wreckage machine responsible for new levels of enshittification are the ones who are supposed to fix it. Hell, they can’t even get it together enough to release labor statistics that have been routine forever. Can’t get it together to keep their lies straight. They were firing people and then hiring them back after realizing the folks were needed. Now we’re expectin’ them to fix the shit they broke? And just in time for the holiday season to start bigly! Get the popcorn because this will probably be a mess. As it gets messier, Dozy Donny will want more distractions. “Look! Venezuela!” Hope Trump doesn’t kill too many as his regime flails and crumbles.

Got coffee. Watching out the window for peace and grace to show up. Here we go, another Frida is underway. Cheers

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The Writing Moment

I went to put in the changes in the manuscript which emerged after this morning’s dream review. I ended up instead reading the first 100 pages, fixing the odd typo. Astonishing experience. Like, I wrote this? It felt like I was reading a novel, and a lot of it seemed new to me. Yet, there was a yang part which remembered writing all of this. Fascinating experience. The other part, as I read, was how the main character changed and changed and changed, growing into the person I’m now so familiar with. Her voice changed. The novel’s voice changed. Just fascinating to reflect. Yes, just like driving through the dark, through a dark and stormy night of unfamiliar land, and then getting up in sunshine and looking back to see where you had been.

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Thirstdaz Wandering Thoughts

We had to buy a birthday card for someone yesterday. I’d not bought a card for about two months. We tend to buy cards early so we have them on hand and buy a plethora of cards at once for birthdays coming up in the next several months. Anyway, in the time since I last shopped and now, our favorite local greeting cards purveyor, BiMart, had rearranged their greeting cards offering. Further they’d reduced them.

My wife said, “Where are all the other cards?” My wife is a greeting cards fan. When we go on vacation, she visits local stores for greeting cards. She walked around in shock, checking other aisles. “They’ve really cut back on the cards.”

I agreed. “Guess it’s a business decision.” I was mentally shrugging. This didn’t fit in as one of my pet peeves and I wasn’t overly bothered.

Then we started looking for a card for a female, celebrating her 70. She’s a friend…

“What have they done?” my wife said. “There are no friend cards.”

True, I saw. No friend cards. There was a small selection for LGBTQA+. Moms and sisters dominated. Grandmothers and aunts could be satisfied. Daughters. But friends? No. The greeting cards had become weirdly overspecialized, at least in this chain store.

“Guess we have to go to CVS,” my wife huffed. As we were walking out, though, she offered comments about it to an idle cashier, complaining about how much the cards had cut back and how overspecialized they’d become.

I’d walked on, waiting for her at the door. It just wasn’t one of my pet peeves.

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