Tag: PINO Trusk

Thirstda’s Theme Music

The cat and I agree. It’s not as warm out as we expected from eyeballing the scene. The full sunshine just isn’t cutting the notorious north wind playing in the trees. Papi, ever hopeful, keeps making the trek out through the door, only to beat the window within ten minutes, his cat signal to get back in. I don’t blame him. That batting wind inspires a change in my dressing plans.

It’s Thirstda, April 17, 2025. 59 F and sunny, 72 will rise on the thermometer before the day’s end. I think the wind will have me rethinking how it feels, though.

Our city is going through some budget wrassling. Parks and Rec, as ever, wants to hire more people, buy more land for parks, develop more parks. A continuous battle has been transpiring between Parks and the City and citizenry for years. Parks wanted to be given all tax monies gained from the local sales tax. Oregonians are anti-sales tax. Ashland’s sales tax is often cited for reasons why others in the area won’t eat in the town. It’s only prepared food that’s taxed. Five percent. Outrageous, the anti-sales taxers cry.

Things came to a head last night with Parks and the City Council. Parks wanted $9 a month tack onto every household’s monthly utility bill to pay for more Parks stuff. They threatened layoffs, closures, and cutbacks if that doesn’t happen. The city itself is already planning cutbacks in services because of a budget deficit. The populace is already balking at a lot of this. Ashland’s water rates are already high. Hikes are planned to build a new water treatment plant. It’s a quite contentious thing.

Of course, the city’s plan for its new water treatment plant take a huge step backward this year. Trump cut FEMA plans and fundings. Ashland’s water treatment plant was due to receive a $50 million grant from FEMA’s Flood Mitigation Assistance Grant Program that was created by Congress as part of BRIC. Trump ended that program. “Wasteful,” declared the orange White House occupant.

Today’s music is from Bon Jovi. I’m not particularly fond of “Wanted Dead or Alive”. I think the lyrics are a little silly with lines like “a loaded six string on my back”. What is a loaded six string? Well, Jon Bon Jovi wrote the song. He explained that this song is about the rough rock star touring life. How exhausting it all is. His lyrics were inspired by comparisons with ‘wild-west outlaws’ and the Bob Seger song, “Turn the Page”. So I cut the song some slack.

Not caring about any of that, The Neurons have the song going in the morning mental music stream. I tried to pin them down on their reasoning. That’s like trying to get an explanation from the cat about why the food he loved last week is not acceptable this week.

I’ve had some coffee and I’m feeling alright. Hope some magic comes your way and makes good things happen for you. Time to work on making Thirstda real. Cheers

0

Wenzda’s Theme Music

“Meeyouow,” the cat says.

I shake my head. “I don’t understand what that means.” I guess, treats, water, outside, attention, scratching, Lassie’s in the well? Papi keeps talking. He’s a chatty cat this morning.

I’m less so but have been talking to my computer. My computer doesn’t say much but it’s a good listener. Never interrupts. Most of my words are sentences of disbelieving comments about some of the things I’m reading. There is some spirited cursing thrown in. Like, the thirty thousand eggs the White House is using in this time of high egg prices has me saying some things to my monitor. Poor optics, as if the man gives a shit ’bout optics. He wants the eggs.

“They were saying that for Easter ‘please don’t use eggs. Could you use plastic eggs?’ I say we don’t want to do that,” Trump said earlier this month during remarks announcing a new tariff policy.

Yes, so, there you go.

It is Wenzda, April 16, 2025, 64 F, and sunny. Yesterday clipped 79 F. That’s a good temperature to enjoy when it’s a hot sun and cool breeze. Nice combo. I’ll probably order that regularly once we’re living in virtual reality and ordering our weather. Snow still whitens some higher peaks and ridges, such as Mt. Ashland. The green trees and white mountains dazzle in the sunlit blue sky. I went out and pulled weeds. The front area is a weeded, cut and trimmed. The back yard is a tall grass, weedy, bee and pollinator paradise. We’re seeing few bees so far this year.

Today’s theme music is “It’s Good to Be King”. This is a 1995 Tom Petty song. My Neurons slotted it into the morning mental music stream after reading many of the things Trump said and do. Yes, he acts like the American King which our founders warned us about.

Coffee has landed in my gullet again. Time to rock on through another day, though it might be a slow-paced rock. Hope the best for you. Cheers

1

Munda’s Wandering Political Thoughts

Just a thought, but there should probably be a demonstration planned for June 14, 2025.

It is so funny in a haha not funny way, that as this nation wrestles with government cuts to save money, he wants to spend a huge amount of money to idolize himself.

That shows his true character. Those who cannot see it are deliberately blind.

3

Munda’s Wandering Thoughts

I’m just a Venn diagram. I’m at a point where massive disappointment in my nation fills me. I didn’t expect the GOP to fight Trump. It saddens me that I’m right. They just rolled over and became the Grand Ol’ Trump Party.

Pisses me off that the Trump Regime thumbs its nose at the law, treating elements like due process as something beneath them. Unfortunately, I predicted this when Trump was campaigning in 2024. So did many others. They laughed at us. But Trump said he would be a dictator on day one. We knew that wasn’t a joke.

Politically, I’m angry, disgusted, disappointed, and a whole dark rainbow of other negative energies about what’s going on from bullshit tariffs to the damaged economy to the ridiculous and unlawful gutting of the Federal government to — well, fill in the blank.

But it’s a sunny and warm spring day. Promise is in the air. I’m getting ready for beer with friends on Wednesday. They’re intelligent, good friends. I’m looking forward to seeing them. Preparing for a secular Easter brunch with friends on Sunday. That’ll have bittersweet toppings drizzled over it. Some of the regulars are gone. Others are in hospice.

Writing is fun and full of promise. That puts me in a very positive frame. A novel draft is finished, and so many other novels are lined up, eager to be written. But will that finished draft hold up in the next round of editing and revision? Then there’s the publishing game. That closes the damper on my enthusiasm.

Mom texts me and reminds me that she wants to be cremated. Do what we will with the ashes. Play Glenn Miller at her service. Hold it in the garden. She’s lived almost nine decades but she endures hourly pain and discomfort. Her quality of life can be categorized as miserable.

Down to one cat, my cativities are truncated from what they once were. An air of depression clouds that aspect of life.

Financially, my wife and I are okay. Viewing my health, I can be better or worse. Got all my limbs. They function well. I endure little regular pain on a daily basis. I’m not as strong nor limber as I used to be, and my hair is trekking away from my forehead. Memory still works for most of the time on most of the days.

My wife’s health is not as good. She searches for words more often and doesn’t find them. She’s developed a new habit of forgetting to turn things on or off. She’s bitter and angry with the world, especially with Trump, and the Roberts Court. She’s furious and anxious about women’s rights. Shoulder and back pain are building up their frequent flier miles with her.

So, I am here. In the middle of it all, happy and sad. Worried and hopeful. Bitter and angry. Joyful and loving. Loved and frustrated. I read of far worse situations for people. Like those in Gaza. Ukraine. Immigrants hunting a better existence for themselves and those they love. War and disaster refugees trying to find a home. People working hard and struggling harder. Sleeping in cars and hanging on for meals and help. Women and people of color hiding, living in fear, beaten and killed for who they are. People with a gender that doesn’t fall cleanly into male or female dismissed as less than equal, unaccepted by narrow-minded bigots. People starving to death as billionaires pile up more money and more property, self-pleasuring themselves with mindless greed.

We seem so far away from Star Trek‘s ideals and so much closer to Mad Max, Solyent Green, and The Handmaid’s Tale.

Life is one hell of a spectrum.

1

Saturda’s Wandering Political Thoughts

The Trusk Regime elitests are at it again. They’ve already well-established multiple double standards.

Like, there is one set of law, justice, and order for everyone except the wealthy. There’s another for the wealthy. Now Trump and the Grand Ol’ Trump Party has established that they put themselves above the law, even the law enforcement standard meant for the wealthy. Look at Trump’s Oval Office crowing about how much money he made his cronies after his tariff pause. Tsk, tsk, tsk, the people bellowed. Isn’t that illegal insider trading? Not if you’re part of the Trusk Regime.

How ’bout that pesky law that established that the Chairman of the Joint Chief of Staff’s requirements. The law said the nominee must have been a vice Chief of Staff or a chief of staff, of the Air Force or Army, Commandant of the Marine Corps, or Chief, Naval Operations. Besides those rules, he the nominee was commander of unified or specified command, that was accepted.

All of those are four-star positions or higher. Trump wanted a loyalist in there, so that law and its requirements were dismissed. Yet, the compliant Congress installed the retired three-star who Trump wanted. Yeah, that’s good news.

In the latest example of do as I say, not as I do, the Trusk Regime is requiring scientists, biologists, etc., to clean restrooms. If you recall, the Trusk Regime fired 1,000 national park service employees. That was a ‘money-saving move’. That meant that there was no one around to man the gates and clean the parks and clean the restrooms. So that genius called Trump and his surrogates decreed, hey, let’s have the high-priced professionals hired for their research skills go clean the shitters.

See, I wouldn’t have a problem with this, but I haven’t seen the Trump administration doing the same. How many White House staff has been cut? Why isn’t JD Vance and Elon Reeve Musk cleaning the West Wing toilets once a month? Why doesn’t Trump order noted drinker and partier Pete Hegseth or his three-star pet, John Dan Caine, to clean the Pentagon latrines? Peter Navarro should be put to work cleaning Mar-a-Largo’s bathrooms for Trump. Kristi Noem has time to cosplay as a border patrol agent on government time; surely, she can take time to clean some toilets, too.

Or is the Trusk Regime and his minions just too elite to do such work?

2

So Hilarious

I shared this with friends. Some replied, “I wasn’t really sure this was satire. Because, you know, Trump.”

Indeedly do, we do understand. Trump can be a nutter! He often says things that prompt many of us to respond, “Whhhaaattt?” Then we embrace the task of dissecting his crazy verbiage to understand what he’s saying and then struggle to pierce the insanity for truth, logic, and reason.

LucN over at Daily Kos gave us a pitch-perfect youarthere performance of the Donald, and it is so funny, I felt it incumbent to ensure others read and enjoy it.

Trump’s plan to introduce honeybee colonies to public school cafeterias goes spectacularly awry

So, read and enjoy! Laughter is good for you, you know.

0

Saturda’s Wandering Thoughts

“Easter is a week away,” my wife said. “You need to get a haircut.”

I just got one last month. Her observation annoys me. I spent twenty years in the military. Keeping your hair cut and neat was, like, an actual regulation. After being freed from military constraints, I’m not interested in being so neat and tidy when it comes to hair. I will lose this discussion, though, and cave. Being neat is extremely high on my wife’s list. She is also adept at being severe and disapproving.

“Want to hear my sister’s text?” I ask.

“Go ahead.”

I read my sister’s updates from Pittsburgh. She’s buying her daughter a new phone. Several features on her present phone are failing. Replace it before Trump’s tariffs add hundreds, she reckons. She used the same logic to replace her eight-year-old ride. She also cashed in her small 401K and put it into certificates in December because she believed Trump was going to trash the economy. She tells me about my other sister’s financial worries.

Four sisters share Mom. Two of them are extremely responsible. The other two are not exactly flighty but they seem to have many crises and make choices that cause more problems. I probably would make more choices that aren’t wise ones, but I’m married to a diligent person.

My sister also comments about how expensive everything is, and how hard it is for young people like her twenty-something daughter these days.

My conversation with my wife swirls into a new zone. “Mom should be using red-light therapy to help with her healing, injuries, and inflammation.” My wife and I both champion red-light therapy. It has helped us in numerous ways. Besides that, NASA, soccer leagues, and the NFL are all red-light therapy true believers.

My wife tells me that Jan approached her for help with another person. The other person suffers Renaud’s disease in her feet. She’s been warned that she might lose her feet if she doesn’t get treatment. The woman doesn’t like going to the doctor. Almost has a pathological fear about it.

Renaud’s has plagued my wife for years. She once showed me her finger. White as a candle, bent and misshaped, horrifying to look at. She aggressively applied red-light therapy and resolved the problem.

“I told Jan to tell her friend about red-light therapy,” my wife says. “She can at least buy a belt and try it.” Pros and cons are discussed for a few more minutes. My wife complains about friends who were told about it but haven’t tried it. She doesn’t understand their reluctance.

I text my sister to ask her if Mom has tried red-light therapy. Then I get online to make a haircut appointment.

There are some things which must be accepted and done.

0

Blog at WordPress.com.

Up ↑