A high school couple were seated beside me at the coffee shop. I began by writing, ‘a young high school couple’, but isn’t that redundant? It does stimulate a story beginning: ‘An old high school couple sat beside me discussing their course workload and death choices.” Don’t know where it advances from there.
This HS couple rose to leave. She made a comment about Pink Floyd. He, looking directly at me, replied, “I know. Dark Side of the Moon is such an amazing album.”
I thought, funny, but I was about their age when that album was released. About their age when I went to a concert and witnessed Pink Floyd performing songs from Dark Side of the Moon.
I said nothing back, but I was pleased. It’s good to learn that appreciation for some things goes on.
Autumn is in through the door. The temperature slipped to the upper 40s. Even stoic Papi came inside to slip, nesting in the living room Malabar chair, where a pillow case is draped over the cushions as a fur collector. 74 F, we expect 86 F as today’s upper limit in Ashlandia. Summer will not go easily. Trees are shedding leaves though. The ones hanging onto the branches are leaving their greens behind. This is Munda, September 22, 2025.
I’m off to a late posting start. We did our monthly Food & Friends delivery this morn. Then my wife wished for breakie so we went to a restaurant for that. Back home, it was 73 F in the house with sunshine streaming in, but she was cold and cranked up the office space heater, poor dear.
Right-wing insanity offers me deep reasons for new headshaking. We have a Catholic cardinal comparing Charlie Kirk, spreader of hate and bigotry, to St. Paul. Even as that ‘say-whaat?’ is processing, I read an excellent Daily Kos piece about Nebraska, Arkansas, and Tennessee FAFO farmers lamenting Trump’s tariffs and their impact on their soybean crops.
Just as Trump and the GOP are claiming free speech for them but not for thee, meaning anyone who opposes their right-wing authoritarianism, these farmers want their safety nets for them but not for everyone else.
Today’s theme music is born from thinking about MAGA et al. “Hey You” by Pink Floyd from The Wall from 1979 was brought into the morning mental music stream by The Neurons based principally on a few lines: “Hey, you! Don’t tell me there’s no hope at all. Together we stand, divided we fall.” Enuff said.
Back in the saddle again. Time write and roll. Hope grace and peace find us, and soon, damn it. grumble grumble old man mutterings, etc. Cheers
I was hoping for a sunny day outside my window. But it’s raining again. And there ain’t no sunshine.
It’s October’s final Monday. The month’s 28th day. Still 2024 for just over two more months.
Rain keeps a light, steady background staccato to the morning rituals. Clouds from mountain to mountain rule outside my window. Mountain tops wear gothic lighting as they fade behind sullen gray moisture-bearing behemoths. While it’s 42 F now, it feels like 48 F, which is the day’s hopeful high. This is this week’s weather prototype.
The cats send mixed signals about the season’s new weather setup. Papi the ginger blade goes out and endures on the covered patio in his carpeted condo. Tucker (pronounced Tuck-ah) goes out for a test and nixes an extended stay, arthritically humping back into house’s warm offerings. Eventually Papi will beat on the door and return inside and then head to a sleeping position to pass the day. That’s become his new pattern.
Fun fact: on this day in 1886, the Statue of Liberty was unveiled. Yeah, I didn’t know; just saw it in my feed.
He also lamented poor Abe Lincoln’s loss of Ted during Lincoln’s presidency. Ted: the forgotten Lincoln boy. His supporters of course, insisted that we give him a break, because he was close enough to knowing that it was Willie who died while Lincoln was in the White House.
That’s his supporters’ style: give him a break for being ‘close enough’ to things. Meanwhile, they demand perfection of Kamala Harris. Hypocrisy’s stench covers the GOP.
The Neurons are feeding me Pink Floyd as the gray light floods and stills over the day. They have “Brain Damage/Eclipse” looping the morning mental music stream (Trademark cut). I’ve always had a fondness for these songs, the first about the lunatic, the second about everything under the sun.
They do go hand in hand with thoughts of Trump these days. He’s always talking up hating, enemies, and destroying, along with everyone he meets, while we speak of all that he begs, borrows, and steals. He’s the con of the deal, the madman on the stage, offering trinkets to support him, riffing on fake history, making vainglorious claims. Really, though, the enemy within is the enemy in his head.
The cats are in and my coffee is snuggling into my body’s systems. Be strong, remain positive, and vote blue. My wife dropped off our votes at the ballot box this morning. Here’s the music.
It’s Saturday morning. October 26, 2024. 51 F, 73 F on the horizon. Yesterday’s clouds slipped away to do other things, depositing a clear sky afterwards. We still have that blue sky, and the sun has come up to light everything up and warm us a bit.
While I was out yesterday, I heard someone through the coffee house glass calling another. “Hey. Hey.” My mind began buzzing with a little of Pink Floyd’s “Hey You” after that incident. If you remember, that song came out on their album, “The Wall” in 1979.
Then we headed to Empty Bowls. Arriving fifteen minutes after doors opened, we discovered a packed place. Almost every seat was taken, and the food line circled around three sides of the place. I was told that they’d originally reduced the tables from 12 to 9 but then put the last three back in at the last minute. Good thing. Not only were they needed, but additional tables were put on the stage. In my years of attending this thing, that’s the first time that happened.
I sample two soups and enjoyed both. A pianist played in the corner, offering slow piano versions of rock songs like “Free Bird” and “Running On Empty”. BTW, myMy wife and a friend created the centerpieces, with gorgeous results.
By luck, we ended up sitting with the same guy from last year, Benjy, a data analyst for Harry & David who lives in Talent. We were at the same table, too. Such a coincidence.
As we talked, he mentioned how we — liberals, progressives, Democrats — needed to fight for the Constitution with this election. That comment cemented “Hey You” in my mind, and now it’s playing in the morning mental music stream (Trademark not free). That comes around from the combo of ‘hey you’ and the other line, ‘don’t give in without a fight’.
Coffee and I have reach an agreement whereby I’ll allow some to stream down my throat and it will give me energy. Stay positive, be strong, and vote blue. Here’s the music. Cheers
Note: Returned home to discover a technical glitch in The Neurons resulted in a failure to launch.
Mood: understated
Good day. Please come in, come in. Welcome to May 26, 2024. It’s 65 F now, sunny with blue sky outlining a fleet of sulking white clouds. Thunderstorms are possible.
Thunderstorms struck yesterday
Today is part of the middle of the Memorial Day weekend. Take a mo’ to recall all those who lost their lives trying to support the United States’ ideals of freedom, equality, justice, and independence. I know those ideals have always taken some shots. Written by white men, it was mostly written to white men’s benefit. Females and other races were eventually ‘given’ the same rights and benefits as white men.
Well, that’s what it said in the words and documents. They’re based on ideals and logic. Emotions are harder to wrestle. People who don’t like those changes are hostile members of our nation and are regularly rolling over our ideals while bizarrely claiming to be promoting our ideals through their abhorrent behavior. It’s a headscratcher.
My sisters and BIL and I went to the Pitt Floyd show in Oakmont last night. It’s a beautiful old theater, and we had a good time. Most of my good time was because I was with family. The sisters and I laughed and acted silly, and BIL gave perfect support.
The music was okay, as were the accoustics. The show could have used a good sound engineer to balance the notes and volumes, but we can’t have everything. Hearing the collection of PF songs fired a spectrum of emotions. Their early music came out while I was a teenager. Their music was part of my life as albums came out and I went to their shows and cheered the new stuff. They aged, of course. Several members died. This is life. I thank them all for their talents, and thank last night’s musicians for their talents, too.
I had a bizarre incident after I left the show. I’ve been having an issue with my right foot. A matter of pain, motion, and support. Those facets all wax and wane, sometimes limiting my effort to properly walk but generally ceasing after a few minutes.
Well, last night, we left the show. Encountering the band’s female vocalist, we complimented her for the show and her talents. Then, walking across the street, I made a step and turn.
Snap, went my right foot. Crack followed. My foot released its support. My right leg felt like it was kicked out from under me.
I caught myself before I went over. Pain burned through my right foot. Righting myself, I hobbled to the car. By the time I was home, agony has established a home in that foot. Diclofenac Sodium Topical Gel was liberally applied. I slept with my foot on a pile of pillows. It was an uncomfortable night. As a 68 year old man who drank two beers earlier, I had to pee twice. Fortunately, I found an unused cane.
I stayed home this morning, eschewing writing, instead icing, exercising, and massaging my foot. I can’t see any swelling or discoloration. It’s not working right, especially when standing on it alone as I put on my underwear, and going down the steps. Especially the down part. I will live, however.
With Pink Floyd’s songs ringing in my brain and thoughts of the nation’s founders mixing in my head, The Neurons dropped a Pink Floyd tune into the morning mental music stream (Trademark censored). Mom and I had been talking about political news and she commented, “I wonder what the men who wrote the Constitution would say about what’s going on.”
Boom! The Neurons plugged “Wish You Were Here” in. What would John Adams et al say about our current situation? I think they would need to be updated about history, like the American Civil War, the Civil Rights Movement, the ERA, Roe v. Wade and Dobbs decisions, and the other wars which shaped our nation and world.
I don’t know what those guys would say. I’d hope that they’d condemn Trump’s lies and hateful propaganda. I hope they would chastise Trump’s supporters for their appalling ignorance and hypocrisy. I hope they would lecture the corporations for their greed, newspapers for doing a poor job of informing the citizenry, and come down on we citizens for not being being more involved in our nations affairs and our poor voting records.
Enjoy your day. Be strong. Vote Blue in 2024. Gotta go. A cookout calls.
Thursday, November 9, 2023, has come to have its say in what happens and how it happens with little clear explanation about why it happens. Many people like muddying the clarifications about why things happen because they dislike those explanations. Angers them because they can’t grasp the explanation, so if they can’t understand, why should anyone else? Shut it down; hide it; don’t teach it. Make it a mystery, so they can smugly say, “Nobody knows.”
Down to 34 last night in Ashlandia, where the schools are first rate and the arts and athletics are above average, it’s forty and foggy now as frost covers the bare ground and glazes some grasses. Don’t you worry, though; partly sunny skies will see us through to 57 F by daylights end. The remains of the day will deliver us back into darkness and 37 F.
When I awoke this morning, I opened a window blind. Soft dawn was crawling white through the trees and across the yard. Among the denuded poplar branches, a hummingbird hovered for a few seconds and then zinged away.
The hummingbird’s appearance surprised me. Cold, mid-autumn, winter hustling toward us, I figured hummingbirds would have better places to be.
Meanwhile, Tucker the magnificent (which is the mixed long-haired/short-haired cat’s official title) rose, ate, used the litter box, and went back to bed. Papi, the ginger blade feline floof, went out, declared it too cold, came in, declared himself bored, went back out, declared it too cold, came in, declared himself bored, went out, declared it too cold…get it?
I was outside at midnight last night. Clouds and moon were absent, letting the stars and other celestial bodies take a turn at shiny. Beautiful and serene with clear fresh air, but the black night was hugely cold to my body, driving me into my shelter after just five minutes of standing outside and thinking.
Somewhere in the night, I thought about the GOP – Right Wing – MAGA approach to governing and education. Limitations are the key the their approach. They will not accept anything being taught except what they like and understand as history, which is very, very narrowly defined. Their version of history must not show our nation or white people in a dark light. Our nation is good, because, come on, it’s christian, you know, one god, and all that, as the Founding Fathers so ordered, amIright? In their view, slavery was a good thing: sure people were locked up, traded, and beaten, but they were taught trades and given food and shelter. Surely that’s enough, so don’t dare teach that slaveowners were cruel bastards who often raped slave women and treated slaves worse than animals, unworthy of human rights.
It seems like they take the same approach to anything other than two sexes, male and female, whether it’s in gender or sexual preference. That’s what the bible says, they say, so they must be right.
They only want – no, they only accept – one religion, their version of christianity, and their god, a white, benevolent man who knows everything and is the only deliverer of knowledge, justice, and love. Such a god can’t have ideas about other religions and philosophies, so they can’t be taught because they’re not in their religious book, and their tiny minds can’t brook anything other than what their little black book says, even if they only follow the parts of the little black book that THEY like. Screw the rest of that silly, ancient black book, they decide by action, even if they won’t say it. Like, what’s that whole thing about loving thy brother, turning the other cheek, and that whole thing about bankers and rich men being in the temples and entering ‘the kingdom of heaven?’
“No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money.” But, but, capitalism! We are a christian nation, and can’t have rules and regulations which limit our abilities to exploit others and grow wealthier. We’re Capitalists!
“Command those who are rich in this present world not to be arrogant nor to put their hope in wealth, which is so uncertain, but to put their hope in God, who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment.”
I’m sure wealthy Americans plan to do that after they die, right? Until then, they will donate to charities which support their principles to grow wealthier, as long as it’s tax deductible.
Meanwhile, it’s not the government’s job to take care of anyone else, not in our christian nation. No! That encourages laziness. If they’re lazy, they won’t work for others for low pay so companies and the wealthy can make more money. No, no, no. And if companies pay them too much, then the companies will make less profit, and the shareholders will make less money, and the rich executives won’t be able to collect larger bonuses and buy more beautiful, pretty things for themselves, like mansions, vacation homes, jets, cars, and yachts. So pay for the lower classes must be kept low, for so it’s written in the bible…innit?
It all falls back on education then. Limit what is taught or don’t teach them at all beyond the basics of following instructions. That’s all that’s needed.
All that has me and The Neurons singing Pink Floyd’s mashup from The Wall in the morning mental music stream (Trademark unavoidable). See, the way it goes in The Neurons’ view, the Right Wing dictates and limits what will be taught in school, threatening the school systems and teachers with punishment if they don’t adhere and obey (exhibit A: Florida; B: Texas; C: Wisconsin. Etc.). They want perfect little white children (some blacks might be acceptable, as long as they adhere to the doctrine), all male or female – and nothing else because the bible! (And then they descend into lies about what those ‘other’ so-called sexes do, and how evil they are.) Because, see, they don’t understand. And if they don’t understand, they can’t accept. And if they can’t understand and accept, why should anyone else?
Under the GOP plan, aided by the misnamed “Moms for Liberty” who are all about censorship, which as Matthew Perry imight have said as Chandler Bing on Friends, “Can anything be more anti-liberty than stopping what other people read?”, schools become mills to turn out perfectly ignorant, intolerant, non-thinking little images of their white, bible-thumping masters. And the teachers will be the ones molding these little monsters of tomorrow, so long as the teachers adhere to the doctrine, don’t think, and obey the rules, which they will, or the GOP will beat, intimidate, and incriminate the teachers.
Because anything other than the GOP curriculum is ‘woke’, and that’s communist, socialist, thought control.
See how they turn it on its head? It’s no wonder that the GOP and its christians put its greatest faith in trying to build walls.
Stay positive and woke, be strong, and lean forward for others’ rights and freedoms as well as your own. Coffee is now at hand and warming my innards. Here’s the video.
Rain! Rain for sale, precious rain available. Come on and all, get your rain whilst it lasts. Will trade rain for sunshine.
It’s Saturday, May 6, 2023. The clouds have overtaken Saturday as the sun shows reluctance to be here. The sun is all like, “I was just in Ashlandia a few days ago.”
Sunrise was about six hours after midnight. Dawn began an hour before, I saw as Papi changed locations from inside to out again. Sunset is after twenty hundred hours. We’re seeing 46 F with our rain right now, little wind, with an expected peak temperature of 53 F. A sort of dreary day out there.
It’s been announced that the COVID-19 pandemic health emergency will end May 11 in the US. Don’t know if parties are being planned. We’ll probably continue wearing our masks in grocery stores for a little longer. Play it by ear, see what happens.
Love that expression, play it by ear.
The weather and morning’s general feel brought The Neurons to the song, “Comfortably Numb” by Pink Floyd. A personal fave, it’s found itself in the morning mental music stream. A net search brought up a gem of a recording from Remember That Night from 2006. David Gilmour, PF guitarist and vocalist, was doing a solid act, but with several members of the Pink Floyd team, including one of the founding members, Richard Wright. Guest starring as a vocalist for “Comfortably Numb” was David Bowie. It’s a terrific and well-executed guitar solo which steals the show, though.
Stay pos. Coffee up and get it on. If it helps, play “Get It On” by T-Rex. Here’s the theme music. Cheers
Thursday’s raised itself out of the Earth and declared, “I am April 13, 2023.” A sun sprinting over the horizon concurred and cast a wide net of shine and warmth over the land.
That was at 6:34 AM. It was 30 degrees F at the time. Faint, indifferent white clouds said, “Yo.” Rain and snow didn’t fail. The spring and winter yo-yo continues.
Sunset in Ashlandia, where the beer is excellent and the children are above average, will be at 7:50 PM. The weather messengers spread word, high will be at 55 F, nice, but a little disappointing. Sunday’s high of 73, with spring buoyancy, spoiled us. There is sunshine, though, so the cats are out there sopping it up.
We toasted friends with beer last night and chatted about the weather. Snow fell outside. It cleared. Then it rained but the sun shined still, converting each raindrop into a falling diamond. What is with the weather this year echoed from person to person.
Politic watching again this morning. Eyeing the Trump trials and tribulations, wondering, what will come? Reading of the GOP’s legislative efforts to protect Trump and the Manhatten DA’s lawsuit against Rep. Jim Jordan. Following the spillage over Justice Thomas and his relationship with a wealthy sponsor, and the emails between his wife and others. Thinking about Connor Sturgeon’s murders and his mother’s frantic 911 call that morning.
Wonder and thought, speculations and reflections.
Then there is the Pythia’s Oasis, fifty miles off the coast of Newport, Oregon.
Oddly quiet on the dream front last night. The Neurons ply me with Cheap Trick and “Dream Police”. That’s been used, I scoff. And it’s so obvious. What else you got?
The Neurons responded with “One of these Days” by Pink Floyd from 1971. Basically an instrumental. Just one line of words: “One of these days I’m going to cut you into little pieces.” Nick Mason delivers it.
Stay positive, endure, and overcome. Here’s the music. I’m going to go overcome a cuppa joe. Cheers
My Dad and I were together. Both younger than RL, we were out hanging out, talking and walking by a wide, busy road.
We ended up at string of used car lots. That pushed us into reminiscing about cars which we’d owned, Porsches, Mercedes, Cadillacs, Chevies, Corvettes, BMWs, and so on.
We came across a red C4 Corvette, a series produced in the 1980s and 90s. The car was on display, hood and doors open. Dad had a blue one of those, so he chatted about it. Somehow, he talked himself into buying it for my older sister, Debby, because he thought she would like it. Well, it was a car and a Vette, and in excellent condition, so she probably would, I agreed, though I didn’t think it a car she’d buy for herself, a grandmother with three children and seven grandchildren.
I met with Debby later and asked if she liked her car. She didn’t know what I was talking about. Thinking that I might be spilling a surprise, I tried not saying anything but finally confessed that I’d been with Dad when he bought her a red Corvette. Then I gave her giving some details about the car. She laughed as I spoke, asking, “A Corvette? Why did he do that?”
I told her, “I don’t know. It was a whim. He thought you’d like it.”
She just laughed.
Dream end.
The next dream found me in a house. The large and luxurious house was mine but not from my RL existence. My wife and I, younger than RL, were home when the power went out. I went downstairs to the garage to check the circuit breakers. As I entered the garage, the power came back on, so I went back up. Then I thought I heard a noise from the garage and went back downstairs. I found some doors open. At that point, the power went off again, but I heard the circuit breakers being thrown. Someone is messing with me, I decided, and called the police.
The police immediately arrived. Angry at that point, I told them what transpired and they looked around. Nothing was found and they left. I then installed an alarm. It immediately went off. I didn’t know if I’d installed it wrong or it was due to an intruder, so I went into the garage to investigate. Someone ran out through the back door when I walked in. I ran over but it was night, they were in black, and I couldn’t see them. Cursing them and muttering about security, I closed and locked the door.
A third dream found me worrying about cats. Outside, in a patchy lawn by an old house, I’d see a kitten and then go try to find it. Most were tabbies but there was also one black kitten. Sometimes I saw them and chased them around. Frustration and irritation joining hands and skipping through me, I said, “Screw this, I give up.” With that, I sat down on a block of white cement. I’d tried, I told myself.
As I sat there, the kittens emerged. Coming to me, they climbed my legs and settled in my lap. Then they looked up and meowed at me, which is where the dream terminated.
The final remembered dream had me at a relative’s house. They were people I didn’t know but some of my family was there. I was a young man in my early twenties, home on leave from the military.
More relatives who I didn’t know arrived. I went downstairs into a small family room. Newcomers followed me down. Male and female, they ranged in ages from around five to seventeen. I don’t know how many were there. Intensely curious about me, they peppered me with questions. Trying to distract and entertain them, I suggested we listen to music. I then showed them a stereo system. I told them, “This is my old system. I replaced it so I brought it here and installed it so that they could use it.” It was the actual system which I now own.
I played a song from Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon album, “Wish You Were Here”. The oldest male told me that they also had a stereo system there and showed it to me, located exactly opposite mine, and I hadn’t seen it. He then played an AC/DC song, “Highway to Hell”. As this played and we talked about music, I realized that there were four stereo systems in the room, which I thought was funny and amusing.
They were still asking me questions, like they were interviewing me. I sprawled out on a sofa and answered. One of the young girls asked if she could lay on me, then did so without me answering. I was uncomfortable with this, shifting my body away from her. She put her head on my chest and said, “I can hear your heartbeat.”
Inspiring sunshine scored the morning clouds, lighting the valley and the house’s eastern face. I put my face to it and breathed in cold, fresh air, admiring birds, squirrels, and chip monks as they took up business.
This was 7:30 AM, just after Tuesday’s sunrise at 7:12 on this 27th of September, 2022, in the Common Era. Umbrellas are called for this day as clouds have taken over and rain scents pepper the air. 55 F now, they tell us not to expect anything over 60 today. Yet I’m in shorts. Wear jeans, back to shorts today. Not like they’re glued or stapled to me. I can always swap my shorts for pants before sunset at 7:09 PM, if needed.
Mom had a rough morning. So did her partner, and my sisters, and me. That’s how it rolls. Diarrhea caused as a side effect of her antibiotics debilitated her. That all happened before 6 AM. She was to see her cardiologist but he went out sick. They still wanted Mom to come in and see the cardiologist’s nurse, but she convinced them that she was too weak, and the appointment was cancelled. They’ll reschedule after the cardiologist returns. A health care nurse is coming by at 2 to check on her, per a schedule set up yesterday.
My younger sisters vent a lot to me. This has impacted them, along with their children. All regularly visit Mom as they live in the area. I act psychologist to them, listening without giving advice. Seems to help.
Their thoughts about change and mortality prompted The Neurons to pull up a favorite song of mine. “Breathe (In the Air)” by Pink Floyd was part of the monumental album, “The Dark Side of the Moon”, released in 1972. I saw the group perform the album in concert. It felt like a transcendental experience. I’ve since seen them in concert several more times. I originally had the album on 8 track, then got it on cassette tape, vinyl, and finally, a digitally remastered CD. Yes, I like the album.
So life seems to be for so many, dig a hole, and then dig another, metaphors for work, work, work, work, work.
Hope you enjoy it. Stay positive, test negative, take care of yourselves and others. I’ve had coffee, thanks. I am ready for lunch and will have leftover chicken tortellini soup which my sister made and brought over yesterday. There’s plenty, if you care to have some.
Michael Seidel, writer 