I am a person who suffers from first world blues. Viktor Kravchuk’s insights about the war in Ukraine, lifted from Jill Dennison’s blog, helps me with an attitude adjustment about slow net speeds, poor customer service, terrible drivers, and writing difficulties. Mr. Kravhuk’s comments commend an attitude that is too often lost, that it’s easy to despair and give up, but what’s the point of that? Better to pick up and keep going.
Munda’s Wandering Thoughts
Here’s a hodge podge of things I’ve been thinking about this morning.
Food & Friends. We did our deliveries this morning. Half the route was canceled. That’s always worrisome. We don’t know what happened to those individuals. Fingers crossed, they’re okay. Okay is always a relative expression and has its own spectrum of meaning.
As I drove around, I wondered about the Big Beautiful Bill’s impact. The future is murky. Food & Friends is financed by a combo of state, local, and Federal coffers. Fed picks up the brunt, 65%. Fundraisers, private grants, and donations augment these monies.
From KFF and other online sources, F&F’s funds come via the Older Americans Act (OAA). This is administered through Health & Human Services and an agency called ACL, the Agency for Community Living . This is where it gets disorderly and messed up. Under Trump, the funding was withheld. H&HS is being reorganized. 10,000 positions have been terminated. I dislike using that euphemism, ‘layoff’. They were fired; terminated.
As with most things, the enshittification under Trump is striking here. “According to a recent HHS press release, ACL is releasing over $1 billion of Fiscal Year (FY) 2025 funding for Older Americans Act programs to state, local, and Tribal grant recipients – funds that had already been appropriated by Congress but withheld by the Trump administration.”
Researching my gall bladder issues, I realized I must give up yogurt and cheese. Sob. I’ll miss them more than steaks and burgers. Alas, I must also say farewell to pizza. And doughnuts. Lunch meat and bacon have been long gone. Butter is now gone, too. The list of what I can eat is getting short. I can still eat fruit and veggies, which I love. And nuts, as long as they’re unsalted, as my edema/lymph edema requires a low sodium diet.
A radio weather report said that thunderstorms were coming. We all reacted, “Oh, no.” Even the announcer was worried, adding to the report, “Hopefully, we won’t have a bunch of lightning strikes and fires.” Exactly. We’ve been fortunate so far this year.
Looking out the window, my wife said, “There’s not a cloud in the sky.” It’s a different picture, sixy minutes later.
‘Back home’ in Penn Hills, PA, a new plan has emerged for Mom. Mom is 89. She has multiple health issues. Trips to ER are regular as seasonal decorations being put up. She lives with her boyfriend, Frankie the Hand, 95 years old. At that age, he has problems of his own.
We the children have been agitating for her to move into assisted living and sell her home. Frankie’s children have been advocating the same. They have been adamant about not moving. Part of the issue is that Mom’s 1940s era home is three stories with narrow steps with steep rakes. A glide chair has been place between the main level and the upper bedroom level. To address that, Mom will move into the main level. The back deck will be converted to a bedroom. My brother-in-law, a plumber by trade, will do most of the work, aided by construction and electrician friends. Pat began the work today. It’s expected to be done in three weeks. It’s a noble plan but extremely flawed. It’ll buy some time but the fact is that Frank has cancer, he’s losing weight, suffering dizzy spells, blind in one eye, and getting deaf. That’s not a good description for a care-giver. We’ll see what happens.
As with everything, time will tell.
Thirstdaz Theme Music
Another sunny summer day has been born in Ashlandia. We shall name this day Thirstda, July 24, 2025. Temps right now are moderate at 83 F but if you stand in that sunshine and let it beam down on you, the sweat comes fast. Today’s high will peak at about 92, 93 F, I think. Clouds, dust, or smoke hazes some of the sky’s blue, but I don’t smell smoke. The ol’ schnoz seems unafflicted by particulates today. Yea for me, I guess.
Hulk Hogan has passed away. I greet that with a shrug. Ozzy Osbourne passed a couple days ago. I mourn him more, but it’s remote mourning. I’ve been expecting him to pass. Thanks for the music and entertainment, Oz.
A net friend, Annette, posted a reflective post about family, wealth, and change. It melded well with my mood and thoughts after long exchanges with my sister about my mother, Mom’s health, and her living situation. Life, mortality, and death seem to be draping themselves all over me as I observe others’ situations and reflect upon my own. Make hay while the sun shines, right? Because storms can crash in and change everything in an eyeblink.
Over on the political spectrum of my existence, I grimace to more news about the enshittification of things. Yes, it makes me unhappy. Reading opposing opinions about things like cuts to NPR and public broadcasting, the celebration of their potential demise depresses me. Others are scornful and dismissive of any positive impact they may have on people, communities, and civilization. Some things seem to be strictly defined through a narrow scope of costs, profits, and losses, as if this is what life is about. The debt, the debt, some scream, we must do something about the debt! More tariffs! More tax cuts for the wealthy! More tax write-offs for the ultra wealthy. Less help for the states! Less help for the poor! And so it will go until they need help from other states, need help from the poor, say, in a war, for example, or to work. Yes, I’m disgusting by the right-wing tilt going on. I think it counterproductive to common goals and needs. The tilt benefits a few at the expense of the nation.
Today’s theme music is both homage to Ozzy’s memory, my own life, and how I view the current world situation. Yes, it’s “Crazy Train” from 1980. I told others while commenting on Ozzy last night that I’ve been on the crazy train. I’ve seen my family on the crazy train, and friends. A friend replied, “I think we’ve all spent some time on the crazy train.” Now I think the world is climbing on the crazy train.
Crazy, but that’s how it goes
Millions of people living as foes
Maybe it’s not too late
To learn how to love and forget how to hate
Mental wounds not healing
Life’s a bitter shame
I’m going off the rails on a crazy train
I’m going off the rails on a crazy train
(Let’s go)
I’ve listened to preachers, I’ve listened to fools
I’ve watched all the dropouts, who make their own rules
One person conditioned to rule and control
The media sells it and you live the role
Mental wounds still screaming
Driving me insane
I’m going off the rails on a crazy train
I’m going off the rails on a crazy train
I know that things are going wrong for me
You gotta listen to my words, yeah, yeah
Heirs of a cold war, that’s what we’ve become
Inheriting troubles, I’m mentally numb
Crazy, I just cannot bear
I’m living with something that just isn’t fair
H/t to AZLyrics.com
Coffee has infiltrated me again. Time to rock another day, even if it’s only a gentle rock, just a little more than a nudge. Hope your day fulfills you in ways you need. Cheers
Twosdaz Theme Music
We’re rejoicing and celebrating another coolish day in Ashlandia. 76 F, sunny with lurking peripheral clouds stretching arms over their heads, we expect 86 F today and 61 F tonight. Good stuff, IMO, though smoky particulates are noted in the air by my sensitive proboscis.
Household conversations this morning was about some decor changes, vacation plans, and, “Is Trump dying?” Well, as Sen. Joni Ernst likes pointing out, we’re all dying. With the mango sloth, we were talking about how bad he appears, the swollen ankle thing, the make up on his hand, and the aspirin he’s been talking regularly. Aspirin for cardiac prevention only works if you have a pre-existing condition. Our questions as concerned American citizens, voters, and tax-payers, is this man healthy enough to safely lead the nation? Did the physician lie to us about Trump’s state of health in April?
*gasp* Is the Trump Regime lying to us about Trump’s health? Is there a cover up going on?
Because, gosh, they are so darn concerned about the last POTUS and what was going on. Should we not be more or equally concerned about the current White House resident and his health? Good for the gander and all that.
And while my wife and I discussed the mango sloth’s health, I stumbled over a terrific Alternet opinion piece by D. Earl Stevens about Trump’s health, This White House lie shows they know Trump is in trouble | Opinion. I highly recommend it for more insightful thinking about Trump’s health than I can offer.
The Neurons offer Mark Knopfler in today morning mental music stream. Something being said in the kitchen during a conversation with my wife caused me to say, “Boom, just like that.” I don’t remember the precursor to those words being uttered, but The Music Neurons took that as an open door to introduce Mark Knopfler’s 2004 song about Ray Kroc into the morning mental music stream, “Boom, Like That”.
And with that, I’m in pursuit of coffee in my body and words in my novel. Hope your Twosda offers you the joy, comfort, and success which you deserve, along with some good stuff to eat. Here we go. Cheers
Sunda’s Wandering Thoughts
It was a fascinating little play. Two young girls entered the coffee shop. Each in shorts and tank tops. Brown hair over their shoulders. Eleven and twelve, I thought with a measuring glance as I typed. They zipped to a table, pulling out chairs and sitting. One had a phone. She said, “Wait. Let me ask Mom.”
Deftly she thumbed a message into the phone. The younger child gazed around the shop as the older did this. In about a minute, the other said, “Mom said we can have ten dollars. She’s sending the money now.”
Seconds more came and went. “Got it,” the young girl in the red shorts said.
The two girls rose as one, passed to the counter and put in an order.
Modern life. Much different than what I’d experienced, back when I was eleven or twelve, collecting glass soda bottles to turn in and buy a treat. But then, look further back, to before there were glass bottles. Before we had stores offering ‘treats’ for sale. Before we, as children, wandered on such missions, which even now, is beyond starving children, even starving adults, elsewhere in the world.
Life really is a continually evolving spectrum of different existences even as we co-exist, together but apart.
Sunda’s Wandering Political Thoughts
News and views from across the newsphere.
Sunda’s Theme Music
Sunda, July 20, 2025, has entered the play. 73 F, summer is currently riding the norms in Ashlandia. A high of 90 F is expected and the sky is cloud-free blue. Smoke scents surf the wind, enough to be a smelly irritant but not enough to change the air quality or discolor the sky.
This is the Apollo 11 moon-landing anniversary. One giant leap, all that. Seems like it was last night that I sat in our Penn Hills wood-paneled basement game room, watching the news on the big color television as a 13 year old. Then I went outside and looked for the moon again. Seems like we progressed for a long time after that, but now as a nation, as a world of people, we’re falling backwards. Bummer to consider as my body curves into its 69th year. Of course, history slides on its own spectrum of peaks and valleys as nature and political wins and losses bend the trajectories. Time will tell what we’ll be remembering as history in 2075, and how a person like me will look back on it.
I perused this morning’s news with sighs. Flooding and deaths in South Korea, questions about Trump’s state of mental health, death and disaster in more places, lawsuits, etc. As far as Trump’s worsening gibbering, I don’t expect his loyalists to do anything about it because that would disrupt their power trips. That’s what it’s all about for enablers like Noem, Biondi, Kennedy, and the whole Project 2025 gang.
We went dancing yesterday. An annual thing, a troop of fifteen humans and one dog met on the shores of the Lake of the Woods Resort at 3 PM. Chatting, dancing, eating, we enjoyed being outside in sunshine, cooler air, smoke free air, enjoying Lisa & the Dynamics as they ably covered pop, rock, and country hits. Nice being away from the routines and the news for a few hours.
Today’s song comes from yesterday’s outing. “Everyone just have a good time,” was said and The Neurons said, “Kick it.” So, this morning has “Party Rock Anthem” by LMFAO from 2011 in the morning mental music stream. The song was a pretty big hit back then, was frequently heard via television and radio while I was traveling and running errands, but I haven’t heard it in a few years. Synth music, it’s made for dancing and has simple lyrics.
Back to Sunda I go. Hope you have the best day possible. That’s what I’m gunning for. Cheers
The 11/22 Dream
Young, I was outside at a gathering surrounded by friends and many other festive souls. I was waiting to begin a trip, but I didn’t know any details. Seated at a small white table with matching chairs, people would come by and say hello or they’d pass and I’d call out greetings. It was all very carefree and relaxed. At one point, I decided to make some of my hair light blue. Then, tiring of it, I’d wiped the blue hair almost completely out, leaving just a streak of light blue.
On the white table were three tall glasses with ice. I knew that these had been Long Island Ice Teas, and I’d consumed them. A fourth glass was 3/4 full with another Long Island Ice Tea, but I’d decided not to drink it. Besides those was a flat white napkin thick with light blue; that had been my hair before I wiped it off.
I’d met a new person, a young man named Robert. We chatted and got along. I started calling him Rob or Robby. Then I heard someone called him Bobby. I asked him about it and he said, “Yes, I prefer Bobby.” I said, “Why didn’t you tell me?”
Bobby was going away, to the same place where I was going. But Bobby had all of his details about when he was going and how, and he was leaving the next morning. People asked me, “Why does Bobby know but you don’t know. That doesn’t make sense.” I shrugged it off but it began to bother me.
Several things I did know was that I was leaving on 11/22, and that was a week away, and I was flying, and someone else was making my arrangements. I decided to try to find out more. I brought out my laptop and then inserted my hard drive, which I’d removed for safety. But then, I lost interest in knowing, thinking, they will tell me and there’s no hurry.
Dream end.
Figs!
My spouse is a fignatic, a figinista, a fan of high magnitude of figs. She loves figs. Through her, I’ve come to enjoy them. Knowing this, a friend has been supplying us with figs. I snapped this photo Wenzda; we have three bowls of figs like this. Or had, as we’ve eaten a few.
This is the second go round from this fig supplier. These are huge beauties. So delicious, so nutritious, and a good source for calcium, potassium, vitamins C, A, K, and B6. We just eat them rare, although I’m cautious, as they’re high in oxalates, and can cause kidney stones. I already have that issue.
Figs been hard to come by at the stores and have become expensive. The last pint we purchased was $11 and had five small figs. None were in good shape, so my friend’s largesse is happily accepted.
Good to have friends like this.
