Saturday, April 13, 2024, has emerged through timid sunshine and mild, sporadic showers. 51 F degrees now, the thermometer’s advance will end somewhere around 60 F. That’s life in April.
The cats and I were spoiled by that burst of warm sunshine, though. We want it, we cry. Papi the ginger warrior is particularly vocal about it. “Screw this wet stuff,” he cries. “Give me the shine.”
Tucker has magnificently recovered from his surgery. While still an old boy, north of 14 years old, we believe, his personality has re-asserted itself after bearing pain for several years. I’m sorry I didn’t help him sooner but I was really leery about having all of his teeth removed.
I’m feeling Saturitis today. It’s a blend of it being Saturday and the need/desire to get some work done that is also conflicting with the idea that it’s Saturday, let’s do something fun! Undermining the Saturitis mood is the weather, which doesn’t seem overly conducive to either end of the Saturitis spectrum.
Mom seems to be doing better. Hospitalized, enduring pain and discomfort, going through physical therapy. She said she’s there for another ten to fourteen days. Also said she’s doing alright. “The food is terrific.” That’s always welcomed. She had meatloaf with peas for lunch with banana cream pie for dessert.
An odd song was summoned to the morning mental music stream (Trademark showing) today. The Neurons somehow pulled up “Enola Gay” by Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark (OMD).
This song was released in 1980. It’s about the Enola Gay, the American B29 Superfortress which dropped the atomic bomb, called ‘Little Boy’, on Hiroshima, Japan, in August, 1945.
I didn’t learn about the song until I was helping my wife with a Hiroshima/Nagasaki vigil she was setting up in conjunction with WILPF – Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom – around 2006. She asked to help brainstorm some music. I came across the anti-war song, “Enola Gay”. The techno-pop tune was rejected as too silly and lost to the standard American anti-war and pro-peace pop/rock offerings.
I don’t have good insights into why The Neurons brought “Enola Gay” forward today. Maybe they just confused April with August. Hard to say with them.
Okay, stay positive, be strong, and Vote Blue. Coffee has found its way into my body. Here’s the music. Please give it a chance. Cheers
Greetings Worldlings. Welcome to Ashlandia, where it is Sunday, February 4, 2024.
We’re tangoing with the wind and rain today. Dark out there, like the sun called in sick. 41 degrees F now, that wind slices the heat right off ya. Riding that wind, the rain slashes like millions of kitten claws, shockingly sharp pricks to the system. Were supposed to shuffle up to 46 F as today’s high, but shade me dubious that this will happen.
And somehow, I’m now thinking of dinner. Chinese food fits my mood and weather in my mind, so I’ll propose it to the household’s other human and see what transpires.
I’ve been reading about the politics and facts about the southern US border and immigration for the past several days. A NYTimes article the other day recapped efforts to fix the situation since the Dubya’s time as POTUS. Does it surprise anyone that when deals were reached, the GOP’s hard right often put a stop to it? Yes, this is the same hard right gunning to stop legislation again. Different people, same MO: their way or nothing. (Yes, it was also once moderate Dems who killed the legislation.) So we’ve had nothing for twenty years while they bitch and scream for someone to do something. Same thing is happening this year, with former POTUS DJ Trump urging his congressional supporters to shut it down. Otherwise, President Biden and the Democrats would get credit for doing something about the border situation, and the GOP would lose one of their fear planks.
Without further surprise, one states’ rights constitutionalist governor, Abbott of Texas, is flouted federal law and the recent SCOTUS ruling against it. Reminds me of the 1960s and 1970s, when racism was being battled, and those red state governors fought against discrimination laws and integration. Reminds me, too, of those ‘pro-life’ states forcing women to carry to term regardless of the woman’s situation. These are the small government folk who decry the Democrat’s government philosophy because they find it too invasive. Damn hypocrites.
Jill Dennison inspired The Neutron’s musical choice for today. Jill’s blog is a regular stop, although I sometimes board late. She’s often charming, sometimes humorous, frequently political, regularly snarky, and always absorbing. I read her post about her music choice yesterday, “Lady”, written by Lionel Richie and performed by Kenny Rogers. Released in 1980, it was a crossover success in the US but also charted well in Canada, Europe, Australia, and New Zealand.
But when I saw, “Lady” as her title, I wondered, “Oh, is she talking about the Styx power ballad?” Then The Neurons launched “Lady” by the Australian group, the Little River Band, which remains in the morning mental music stream (Trademark coming in two weeks) today.
“Lady” by the LRB was released in 1978. I’ve written ’bout my late friend Randy a few times. I met him in 1992, when he came to work for me. An Atlanta Braves fan, regular cigarette smoker, and fan of the rock groups Van Halen and Boston, he really loved “Lady” by Little River Band, and yes, he declared love. Whenever this song came on when Randy and I were together, he announced that fact, no matter what else was happening. Then you’d see his lips moving as he silently sang along.
BTW, I really doubted it would be the Styx song as Jill’s choice. Their rock and roll style isn’t her style, IDT.
Stay positive, remain strong, lean forward and vote. Coffee is being served and consumed, hot and black. Just keep it coming. Thanks for reading and have a good one. Here’s the music. Cheers
Light rain and gray clouds sang in Tuesday’s entrance on January 9, 2024. Snow is gone from the valley floor. Fog veils the mountains and ridges so I don’t know what the situation is up there. Gloomy is the word, the word that you heard. It speaks to the day’s general malaise, weather-wise. It is 39 F now, humming along to a 44 F high. My floofs are nestled into comfortable niches where they can sleep in warmth and safety.
Pretty much as expected, Republicans are descending into tit-for-tat politics, talking about trying to remove President Biden from the POTUS ballots in several states, reflecting their deranged approach to politics. “Because you removed Trump!” they whine. “Because look at what Biden is doing to the border,” they declare. “And his birth certificate. I mean, her emails. I mean, Hunter Biden.”
They’re descending into a new low level, setting themselves up as a punch line in history books. “Look at how they used to act,” people will say, discussing the GOP of this era. “How did they become so lost and confused about what was going on? What happened to their principles and leadership?” We in this era reply, they became consumed with desire to be in power. “Power tends to corrupt,” Lord Acton wrote in a previous century, summarizing what others had observed. Power tends to corrupt. That seems to be what we’re seeing in the GOP as they corrupt their values and principles to stay in power, no matter how they malign the ideal the founders established, no matter how far their behavior guides them from the principles they claim to uphold.
Of course, their hold on what is ‘supposed to be’ regarding our founders’ intentions are as nebulous as a kitten’s grip on their own tail. Can you imagine what the founders would be saying to Lauren Boebert after she declared that she was tired of this separation of church and state junk?
I can’t honestly say, though. I only wonder. I don’t know how they, the founders, would say to multiple arguments of this modern era. What would they say to the “Moms of Liberty” for banning ideas and books? How would they respond to Republicans like DeSantis declaring what parts of history should not be taught? And I don’t know how the founders would stand regarding the mass murders with automatic weapons that happen so routinely in the US in this ‘modern age of reason’. I like to think that the founders would be horrified and take action to stop it, but then, I thought the GOP, the ‘pro-life’ party as they call themselves without irony, would be horrified by the murders, deaths, and sorrows, and take some action. I just can’t gauge the depths of the GOP’s corruption, hypocrisy, and cynicism. Each time that I believe they’ve hit bottom, they go lower.
And of course, pundits are wondering, what will happen if Trump runs for POTUS in 2024 and loses? Will the GOP peacefully support the result, accept defeat, and continue with governing? Or will they go full-blown rebellion and insurrection? There is enough darkness glimmering in the MAGA base frothing at Trump’s whiney ‘campaigning’ that there is serious reason to believe they’ll go Jan 6 once again but escalate it to new levels of violence.
Meanwhile, a fragment of them will say the Pledge of Allegiance, loudly enunciating, “Under God”, and then talk about how they hate Democrats, and want to kill them or send them to another country. Do they have any self-awareness?
Beyond all that, The Neurons have the Eagles singing the 1980 song, “I Can’t Tell You Why”, in the morning mental music stream (Trademark separated). The Neurons had caught on with my thinking — they can be sharp at times — about not being able to comprehend and explain things. I can’t tell you why Republicans let Justice Clarence Thomas remain in office as revelations of his relationship with wealthy Republican patrons generate concern about Thomas’s ethics. I can’t tell you why they let Thomas remain involved in cases regarding Trump as POTUS in the face of revelations about his wife’s role. I can’t tell you why they turn a blind eye to Trump’s bullshit. I can declare it’s politics as usual, but it’s not the kind of politics seen in this nation for several decades. I thought, and it seems I was naive, that we as a political body, no matter the party, had evolved past that. Of course, I never foresaw what social media, AI, and web bots would do to our political discourse. I never foresaw people who weren’t being treated for mental issues clinging to insane conspiracy theories, and I can’t tell you why they cling to them. All I can do is make up my own theories.
Ah, well, time to shuffle news and politics aside and rebalance myself. Coffee helps, of course. Stay pos, be strong, and keep leaning forward. Don’t let yourself get too wrapped up in the minutiae of trying to understand and explain why. Keep your eye on our own shared goals of freedom, justice, democracy, and equality, and the idea that we should all enjoy them. I once read that those are pretty good ideals to chase.
Here’s the music. Admire the Eagle’s youth seen in this video, and remember. Cheers
June of 2023 is slip sliding away. It’s already 6/27, fer gosh sakes. Temptation Tuesday, too. Temptation Tuesday is always recognized as the last Tuesday of June. It’s so-called Temptation Tuesday because people north of the equator on summer or bathing suit diets often lose their will to keep going on their diet. See, they’d been making progress, looking good, feeling better about themselves. Don’t they deserve a little reward?
Gonna be 84 F here in Ashlandia, where the cats are chubby and the dogs are barky. No significant change from yesterday. Change is a’comin’, though. Big heat heading for northern California. We’ll get some runoff from that, with highs climbing into the nineties. Not expected to break 100 F, knock on plastic.
The Neurons are playing “Tom’s Cabin” by Suzanne Vega with music by DNA. Always enjoy this song about a woman in a cafe on a rainy day thinking about someone else and observing the minutea around her. Have no idea why Der Neurons are playing in the morning mental music stream.
Stay pos and keep reaching for the heavens, or something like that. We have coffee at hand. Here’s la musica. Cheers
Feeling under the weather this AM. The old nautical expression has always amused me. We never respond, “I’m feeling over the weather” when someone asked and we’re feeling pretty good. One of those expressions used that don’t have a corollary to it. It’s interesting how expressions like this shift from being used out in a ship or boat dealing with bad weather and feeling its effect to land folk getting out of bed and experiencing illness. People began using it on land, and it spread, becoming commonplace, and here we are.
It’s the last day of May of 2023. Feels more like the normal weather for the last day of April out there. Springy, with a 51 F temperature that will muster the will to hammer itself up to 73F. Cloudy as hell. The comparison with the antipodes of heaven is another of those expressions that entices me. “Angry as hell.” “Hungry as hell.” “Thirsty as hell.” “Poor as hell.” Hell really is the worse, isn’t it? But could it be one of those old Greenland/Iceland tricks. “It’s really so nice here, but we don’t want it to become overcrowded, so we’ll call it hell and make it out like it’s really bad to dissuade others from wanting to come.”
I asked the Bing’s AI chat where hell comes from.
“The word “hell” refers to the nether world of the dead or a place of torment for the wicked after death. It comes from the Proto-Germanic *haljō, meaning “concealed place” or “one who covers up or hides something”. It is related to the Germanic mythology of Hel, the goddess of the underworld. It has cognates in other Germanic languages, such as Old Frisian, Old Saxon, Dutch, German, and Icelandic. It originated in the Anglo-Saxon pagan period, around A.D. 400 – 1100 1.”
So there we have it. It’s a concealed place. Of course, Hades and the underworld gets involves from other religions and myths. How we express ourselves and what we believe are interesting blends and adaptations.
All that hell thinking so early AM has AC/DC singing “Hells Bells”. Released in 1980 as part of their comeback effort with a new singer, the bell tolling and song was a direct response to their lead singer’s earlier that year.
Alright, off to do other things like chug coffee to see if that lifts me. Stay pos, okay? Here’s the music. Cheers
Ashlandia’s sprummer continues. Yesterday’s report can be recycled for today’s status — 64 F now, heading for the mid 80s, sunshine, blue sky, maybe thunderstorms will visit later.
Tucker, my wonderfloof, cracked me up in bed this morning. I was dozing, going through the dreams, when he joined me. After he prodded my hand, I shifted my position and petted him. I was on my side. He reached out and tapped my unengaged left arm. I moved it. He tapped, I moved, again, again, until I brought my arm down by him. Then he laid his head down on it. What a character.
Also on the cat front, 11:30 PM hits. My wife has retired and I haven’t seen the cats for a while. I open the front door to let in some cool air and the cats. Both cats and the air duly enter. Feels so good, I also open the back door to maximize the cool air’s access to our warm house — about 78 F inside. Then I go about doing some tidying, brush my teeth, so on.
I come out of the bath to find Tucker by his food pool, turned, looking at the slider. The screen is closed but the door is open. He just sitting there, looking. I go over, glance out. Nothing. But Tucker is freaking me out. I’m going all Suzanne inside, worrying about cougars, bears, people sneaking around the back yard.
I decide to go close the other door. As I do, I find Papi sitting in the living room, fifteen feet from the open door, watching it. Now I’m really troubled. Picking up the flashlight, I turn on the back lights, and turn the flashlight on. I step out, closing the door behind me, and listened. That’s when I saw it. Nothing. No critters or people. I went along the sides of the house. Zilch. Listened. Nada. WTH?
I go back inside. Papi is where he was. I close the door. Tail down and curled up between his legs, he skulks closer toward it, leaning forward with his nose, stopping when he’s five feet away. Then he backs up and sits. Still freaked, I close the front door.
Don’t know what was going on in the cats’ heads. Maybe they were just screwing with me. I think floofs like to do that to people.
Today’s music emerges from the cat incident and The Neurons thinking about mind games and mind control. They emerged with Steely Dan’s 1980 song, “Time Out of Mind”. Mark Knopfler does guitar work on this and weaves interesting notes around the main threads. I had a metallic brown Pontiac Firebird. Bought brand new just a few months before. Living in San Antonio, TX, assigned to Randolph AFB. I remember playing this album on the car’s tape deck as my cousins and I headed for Austin. Both of those cousins have passed away so I’m happy to play this memory.
Stay pos. Take over Saturday like you’re the dragon, master/mistress — whatever works for your pronoun — of the realm. The coffee drinking has commenced. Here’s the music. Cheers
“I love the smell of snow in the spring. It reminds me of winter.”
Yes, snow continues in Ashlandia’s April on Wednesday, Apil 19, 2023. Just another inch. Sort of fun, interesting, and unsettling for the cats, who firmly believe winter was supposedly over and sunshine was expected to be ruling. They go and seek it each day in their own way. Papi the young ginger fellow dashes out, finds the sun disappointing and dashes back in. Not trusting just one result, he duplicates his efforts at least three or four times to validate his findings.
Tucker, the black and white low-haired dude with the thick layers and big paws, strolls out, takes the sun he finds, tests the air with his nose and then grooms in the sun until a nap takes over.
Here in Ashlandia, where the coffee is made of ground roasted beans and boiling water, sunshine arrived without an entourage at 6:23 AM and will abandon our valley before eight PM strikes. If it doesn’t get out in time, the sun turns into a car shaped like a pumpkin and stays in Ashlandia giving floof rides. Weather scribes tell us — drum roll — it’s 30 F now, will reach about 50 F, and we can expect rain. Not much change from the last few days.
Today’s theme music is by Bob Marley and comes via The Neurons to the morning mental music stream from a streaming TV experience called Ted Lasso. “Three Little Birds” was released in 1980. I felt like a relaxing and hopeful song was essential for what could be a hump day for so many people.
Stay pos. Take a coffee break now and then. Think I’ll take one now. Here’s the music. Cheers
Read enough news this morning to irritate me for a month of Saturdays. Do videos help? Sure, the truth emerges. Man, though, the truth gets ugly. Of course, some dismiss the videos and dismiss the truth and the ugliness. Turn away, pretend it’s not there or didn’t happen, or rationalize why it happened. I’m sure you know the score.
We’re on the cusp of a new month of the new year. How long can we call 2023 ‘the new year’. At what point does it just become the year?
So far, there hasn’t been much change in 2023 over what was happening in 2022. Is the U.S., is the world, heading in the right direction? It reminds me that calendar notations like years and months are convenient for record keeping. The periods of changes and shifts, rise and fall, define themselves. We just use the calendar to remind ourselves what happened when. Think about if we lacked calendars and what it would be like to refer to the past without one.
Anyway, it is Saturday, January 28, 2023. Heard a little girl call it Sat’day in a store yesterday. Dad corrected her, “Sat-ur-day.” She seemed about five years old. She and her father were chatting and shopping. I assume it was her father. She called him daddy. “Daddy, can we get some fish? I think I would love some fish.” I was looking for miso paste. Never did find any.
Sunrise today came in at 7:30ish. Cloudy conditions marred the viewing. Some blue is squatting to the northwest but we’ve been warned, gonna rain at 4 PM and then snow at 8 PM. Not much of either on this day. It’s trending toward being a cold day, especially with the sun’s mitigating effects being squashed. It’s 38 degrees F at my house, reaching for a high of 40.
The big chill is on its way, arriving a few days earlier than they originally thought. But it’s not as bad as initially forecast, with lows dropping to 23 tonight.
I have Devo with their 1980 new wave song, “Whip It”, in the morning mental stream. It’s all about, “Crack that whip.” “Move ahead. It’s not too late. To whip it. Whip it good.” Those might not be the lyrics but it is how I remember them. All about working harder, but in a satirical manner. I’m trying to whip my novel into shape. I cracked the whip but the pages didn’t change at all. The computer was pretty pissed about being whipped, urging me, “For cryin’ out loud, print it out and whip it.” Which made sense.
That expression, “For cryin’ out loud”, is one that Mom often used while growing up. I asked her, what does that mean? She responded, “It just means I’m exasperated.” But why? Why those words? Along with, “Oh, for goodness’s sake.”
Alright, got coffee. Got to power up and get a move on. Those expressions, I understand. Stay positive. Hope you understand. To a happy Saturday and some kinda change. Here’s the tune. Cheers
“Overture! Hit the lights! This is it, the night of nights.” That’s the Bugs Bunny Show theme music. The show was my favorite Saturday morning show for several years. I have not seen it in decades and I don’t know if it’s still broadcast. I suspect it is.
Yes, it’s 2022’s final day. The song is over. Fog in the morning, issue a warning. Rain and fog are again the day’s ruling roosters. The sun tapped in at 7:39 AM, bringing up the light to see the fog. Temperature then was 41 F; it’s now 42 F, with a 50 degree high projected and rain. Sunset is 4:48 PM. Then into New Year’s Eve. We’ll be dining out with friends and then to a local hotel for dancing until Midnight. A local band, who are also friends, will provide the music. We will be masked although a friend reports health authorities find no COVID in our town’s wastewater. There is the flu surging around here, though. Restlessness and the desire to do something is pushing the evening agenda.
The last time we saw the new year in like this was back in 2019, I think. Our companions then were the same as the ones going out with us tonight. They packed it in about an hour before midnight. If you’ve seen one new year, you’ve seen them all, is this gang’s opinion. Sadly, though, the night marks the final night of the restaurant where we’re eating. They’re going out of business after twenty-five years. It’s Thai food and I’ve only eaten there three times since I’ve lived here. Two of those times was on New Year’s Eve.
A Boz Scaggs song called “Breakdown Dead Ahead” is in the morning mental music stream. Do Der Neurons know something that they’re trying to tell me with this 1980 musical choice? They always give me the feeling that they know more than they’re letting on to me. It sometimes feels like they’re deliberately withholding information to make me look or feel inept. I think I’m going to keep an eye on them. I just don’t feel like I can trust them, you know what I’m saying?
Coffee time. (And now The Neurons have substituted coffee time for hammer time and are playing that melody. They’re loony tunes up there in my head.) Stay pos, test negative, and enjoy the holiday as you can. Do you have big plans?
Till next year. Yes, it’s a law that the joke be put out there as often as humanly possible. At least, that’s what The Neurons are telling me. Cheers
White frost rules the shadows. As sunshine finds it, steam rises. The temperature is balking from going up, hanging on to that overnight low of 26 F (-3 C). Steam rises as sunshine finds the frost and melts it away. A hazy blue sky and low gray clouds on the western horizon tells us little about what the weather has in store for us today. 46 F is the expected high.
It’s 12/7/2022, Wednesday. December 7 remains vivid in US history as the day Japanese naval air forces attacked Pearl Harbor. Despite that history, the sun rose and it will set, with respective times of 7:26 AM and 4:39 PM.
AC/DC rules the morning mental music stream. The Neurons heard “Shoot to Thrill” (1980) on the radio yesterday and decided they remembered that they liked it. The down under band always knows how to rock it, though they’ve felt the effects of life forces as death took the older of the rock guitarist brothers who founded the band. That was a few years ago. They still thrill us via technology.
The song has a lot of sexual overtones to it. But it’s all about a drug scene, inspired by tales of dealers providing housewives with drugs. It’s hard rock of the finest kind, part of the album, “Back in Black”, released after their lead singer died. The album lifted AC/DC to new commercial success.
Stay positive and test negative. Stay warm if you inhabit cold climes, and stay cool if you in the hot zones. Enjoy an inspired Wednesday. Speaking of inspired, where is my coffee?
Michael Seidel, writer 