We slipped out of the house into the cool morning with a ladder and a few pint containers. Our objective is unchanged since 2007, our first spring and summer in this house: cherries!
Our neighbor has a cherry tree. At their insistence, the yield from any branch on our side of the fence belongs to us. Most years, the cherries are ready around July 1st. But blessed with the right weather, the neighbors picked their side earlier this week. We did our picking today. Cool and pleasant air, warming sunshine, a quiet neighborhood, and sweet, fresh, dark red cherries.
Suming continues in Ashlandia. It’s a spring base with heavy summer nuances today, Munda, June 2, 2025. Presently 60 F, we’ll pop through 80 before the sun declares fini.
I’m in a bit of a hurry this morning. Time again for us to do Food & Friends deliveries. After that, it’s back to the writing routine and then beginning of month chores. I also pruned trees and bushes around the yard, and now must cut it all down and put it in the green bin for pickup tomorrow.
Haven’t heard back from Mom in days. I’ve regularly texted her. I do know she’s okay. Little sister’s youngest just turned 17. I saw Mom in FB photos of he bash. The lad, named Michael because one can’t have enough Michaels, is the youngest of the nieces and nephews. The next generation of them are nipping on his heels, as they’re sixteen. All are impressive examples of human beings, so far; we know how people change as they age, don’t we? Well, not everyone. But many inevitably shift into someone else who may be better or worse.
My wife bought a book this weekend called A Short Stay in Hell. It’s very short but thought-provoking. We both read it and then discussed its ideas.
With my nephew’s birthday in the rear view, it should be no surprise that thoughts of generations and transitions are occupying The Neurons. They dug out The Who with “My Generation” from 1965. Love the video of the era. The basics of people walking, dancing, and working aren’t much different from what we’d see in a video produced today. Shoes, clothing, and hair styles would be the most notable aspect of the differences, along with cars and vehicles. Since there’s no sound, we’d miss the other facet of change: how talk has changed. But of course, any video of people on the streets today would be peppered with folks on cell phones., right?
Time to make it a Munda, just as so many generations before me. I’ll start with coffee. Cheers
Clouds have overtaken Ashlandia again. It’s a cool summery start to June, this being Sunda, June 2, 2025, and a pleasant way to ease out of spring, that being the current rotation, as we’re north of 0 degrees latitude.
Did you read about the mutation which they believe give orange cats their color? Scientists track down mutation that makes orange cats orange. The story comments, “It took researchers a century to find the genetic glitch that causes orange coloration in cats.” Turns out the Arhgap36 gene was involved. Go figure, right? They weren’t able to find any explanations for the orange personality, though.
Today’s song is in honor of PINO TACO. TACO, which means, “Trump Always Chickening Out”, has become PINO Trump’s favorite nickname. *snark*. The Neurons came up with it as I was breaking my fast. Into my morning mental music came “Macho Man”, the 1978 Village People song. But instead of the song’s original lyrics, The Neurons were singing “TACO, TACO man. PINO Trump is such a TACO man.” And so on. The revised lyrics don’t make a lick of sense, but it’s a rock parody, and it’s fun singing that PINO Trump is such a TACO man.” Heh.
Now, I must press on. My oven igniter replacement DIY project is underway. It’s been fraught with issues. Blood pressure has probably gone higher than any mountain. So, onward once again. I think I’ll start with some tacos. Some reason, I’m craving them.
And reminder, this is Jun 1. Big demonstrations planned for Jun 14. Be there or be a MAGAt. Cheers
We’ve made it through another cycle, and we’re set up to repeat it again. I mean the week, of course. Today is May 26, 2025. The month is singing its last notes. Many associate Memorial Day in the U.S. with the beginning of summer. I’m a traditionalist, though, and recognize summer’s start with the June solstice, as we’re north of the equator. The weather doesn’t care what we’re calling the season; it’s gonna do as it wants. Today, it looks like it wants more cloudiness baking with some sunshine. 60 F now, we’re be roaming the seventies through the late afternoon.
My bright mood has expired. Darkness has soldiered in. That’s my standard cycle. I just need deep breaths and patience to survive it, and then more normal moods will rotate in, and it’ll be up and down again for a while. That’s me.
“With each new Republican administration, it is the same promise. With each round of tax cuts, it is the same result: vast benefits for the wealthiest Americans and a pittance for everyone else. There is little growth but widening inequality and an even starker gap between the haves and have-nots.“
Reagan promised tax cuts in 1981. Bush Senior was forced into tax increases to address the damage done by Reagan’s cuts. Dubya promised tax cuts, and then Trump in 2017, and now Trump in 2025. Each time those cuts came, the economy did not do better. It took Democrats in charge to clean up the economic mess and get the economy on track again. And here we go again. Will it work this time when it failed every other effort? Time will tell.
But as Mr. Bouie writes of this latest effort:
We are now looking at another round of Republican tax cuts. Yet again the claim is that this will benefit most Americans. “The next phase of our plan to deliver the greatest economy in history is for this Congress to pass tax cuts for everybody,” Trump said in his March 4 address to Congress. But as Paul Krugman points out in his Substack newsletter, this latest package is both a shameless giveaway to the rich and a ruinous cut to safety net programs for lower-income and working Americans.
Today’s song comes from reading about the viral corruption spreading under the Trump Regime. Out of that GRRRRRRRRRR news review, The Neurons dropped “Perry Mason” by Ozzy into the morning mental music stream. Perry Mason is a fictitious lawyer of high repute. He saved the innocent and delivered the guilty for a serving of justice. He came onto the scene in a series of Erle Stanley Gardner novels in the 1930s and joined the pop culture as a television show starring Raymond Burr in the 1950s and 1960s. Yes, I know of the later series. Anyway… Ozzy Osbourne put some words to music by guitarist Zakk Wylde and keyboard player John Sinclair. The song’s chorus goes,
Sunshine is available in Ashlandia, today. It’s Thirstda, May 22, 2025, in Ashlandia, where we’re again luxuriating under comfortable spring weather. We’re rising through the mid-fifties and will give the thermometer a pause at 71 F. Now it’s cooler than yesterday, which hit 78 F, but this is still fine weather. A variety of thin, high clouds are stretching their white fabric over the sky in several different directions, keeping us cooler. But a warming trend is in evidence for Memorial Day weekend for us, with Saturday cresting at 83 F.
In other trends besides the weather, Donald Trump told more lies. He’s lying and bragging again. Let’s call it trumgling, cause it really needs a word because it happens so often. Today’s trumgling is that gas in many states is $1.98. He never specifies which state, right? No, not his way to present evidence. I wouldn’t be surprised if some red-state pure blooded MAGAt owns a gas station and lowers prices, just to give Trump a boost. As it stands now, it’s pure fabrication. This might be part of his dementia, but Trump has demonstrated a lifetime of lying, especially when he’s bragging and spreading falsehoods about how wealthy he is or how great he is.
What’s sick and tragic about Trump’s lying is that it’s called out in the press but many people dismiss it for whatever reason suits their thinking. But the White House usually just shrugs it off. Or his surrogates insist without an eye blink that he’s telling the truth. Evidence is not provided.
Some try passing off the constant trumgling as misunderstandings. Some say that Trump is misunderstood. Either way, because of that thinking, The Neurons dug up “Misunderstanding”, the 1979 Genesis song, and have it playing in my morning mental music stream. I’ve always enjoyed the song as a power rock ballad with throwback vibes.
Coffee has been consumed and I’ve assumed the writing position. The day is going mighty fine, despite the “Big Beautiful Bill” passing in the House. Lawrence O’Donnell labels it a ‘suicide pact’ for the Greedy Ol’ Trump Party due to its eagerness to reward the wealthy with more wealthy while making it more challenging for the poor and underprivileged to survive and advance. O’Donnell figures that once voters realize what Trump and the GOTP have done, a revolt will follow. I don’t know. I’ve lost faith in many of my fellow citizens and their willingness to get involved, pay attention, and vote. Many seem bent on a self-destructive path just to ‘own the libs’ or some shit. What will happen? Time will tell.
Sunshine and blue skies are beckoning me out in Ashlandia today. Supposed to be 78 F today, but it’s gonna have to climb from its current 52 F. Feels like the local weather has it in it to do so, though.
This is Wenzda, May 21, 2025. May is splitting past me faster than forked lightening. I’m astonished by its speed. They tell me that time goes faster for you as you age. If I reach 80, I’m be blinking away in the morning and getting ready for bed at the same time. Maybe it’ll just feel like it is.
I’m in a very good mood today. Don’t know what nutrition and hormones and factors out of my dream network and thinking network brought me to this zenith of eagerness and satisfaction. It’s a periodic thing, though. I wrote almost the same words not a few months ago. How the world seems like it’s getting thrown into the garbage disposal and the water is on and the switch is about to be thrown, taking many good things down the drain and into the past. I hear of Trump’s “Big Beautiful Bill” and I just want to puke with disgust and anger, yet here I am, with high spirits and happiness. Probably a high from editing myself. Reading the novel again to fix what’s wrong, I’m happy and pleased. I wrote what I like to read, and I’m enjoying it. Just like that, it’s all about me. Really is a surreal existence.
Today’s music is a ZZ Top cover. Isaac Hayes and Dave Porter wrote it. Sam and Dave recorded and released it. Then along came ZZ Top with their version of “I Thank You.” I do like ZZ’s version best; it just better suits my sensibilities. Why the song has settled into my morning mental music stream is only The Neurons to know. I’ve been reading about recent research on dreams and how they’re made. I was interested because I dream a lot. They speculate now that it’s a network working together using many more functions than originally guessed, and not housed in one specific place, like the hippocampi. Reading that, I wondered if some similar network worked to produce the songs that land in my morning mental music stream.
Going to the music, I’ll give you Sam and Dave and ZZ Top’s offerings, because we all don’t have the same musical tastebuds. Both are terrific.
Coffee is lifting me higher. I’m ready for another day, at least for the moment. Hope you have a great one. Here we go.
Sunda, Mai 11, 2025, has arrived, per schedule. Happy Mother’s Day to all you mothers who celebrate it on this day. Happy Mother’s Day to all mothers even if you don’t celebrate it on this day.
I ordered Mom’s Mother’s Day present in April. It was delivered before the requested delivery date. I wasn’t overly concerned by that, except that Mom’s house was victimized by a wind storm that took out her power and caused her an electricity-free week plus of suffering and coping. I reported to my sister that Mom’s package was delivered, and if she has a chance, see if it’s there. I also told Mom, and repeated that message today. I didn’t call Mom but texted her. I didn’t call because she tends to drop into free verse laced with bitterness, anger, and suspicions, and doesn’t like talking on the telephone any longer because she can’t hear. Frustrating situation, as anyone who’s experienced things like this can attest.
I reminded Mom about how it used to be in my texts. Back in the day when travel was easier and less expensive, before the enshittification of so many travel aspects. I would have loved to go back there for Mother’s Day. We used to take her for brunch. She had her favorite places. In her later years, about the time she turned 70, she started eating dessert before main course, surprising me, cracking me up.
I haven’t heard back from her.
Ashlandia’s weather pulled a Trump on me.Flip flopping about the weather, one thing was promised and another thing was delivered. In the weather’s case, spring promised sunshine and warmth. Instead, we find the wind has fashioned wintry inflections. Instead of hyping “Summer is coming,” it’s singing, “Winter is coming,” ala Game of Thrones. Although it is 57 F outside right now, clouds are gathering and darkening, encouraging the wind. Today’s high will be a meager and un-Ashlandia May temperature of 64 F, if that.
Papi started today’s music. His nemesis came around last night. Gray and white, with a sneering attitude and chunky body, the interloper wasn’t moved by Papi’s loud demands for the other to surrender or leave. I went out and encouraged Papi to return inside. Papi loathed doing so. When Gray & white trotted away, Papi wanted pursuit. Finally, he surrendered to me and returned to the house’s safety.
Happening at pitch black AM, recalling the confrontation this morning invited The Neurons to add music. The music was “Surrender” by Cheap Trick. The song came onto the pop rock scene in 1978, when I was but twenty-two. It’s kind of an odd rock song as it addresses who his mother was before the narrator came on the scene versus who she is now. Then, reveal, Mom and Dad still have a wild streak that’s bared toward the son’gs finish.
But why that refrain? “Surrender, but don’t give yourself away”? Doesn’t it seem contradictory? Yes and no, to me. I think the surrender part is about giving up on some puzzling matters but leave your core values intact. But hey, it’s music. It’s rock. It doesn’t always necessarily make sense as long as it sounds good.
Coffee has been served and drunk. Shopping is on the horizon for my wife and I. Hope you have plans. Remember, doing nothing is still doing something. Cheers
Sunshine and warm air is spilling throug Ashlandia once again. 61 F now, Thirstda, May 8, 2025, will overtake the gorgeous day known as May 7, 2025. 80 F will be bestowed on us. Sure, it’ll be windy, that but’s okay.
The cat is happy, if I’m judging his tail right. Standing upright, like a sundial gnomon, we could use it to tell the time but he won’t stand still long enough. After eating, visiting, and grooming, he resumed his back fence residency.
Being out back depressed me. Wasn’t the sunshine. No. That’s fine and welcomed. It’s the lack of bees and butterflies. No humming birds, either. Also missing were the regular Jay visitors. All have desserted us. I hope they come back soon.
We discussed politics last night at the beery thingy. Like, re-opening Alcatraz. Such a gennyus move…not. Only a simpleton would think it is. Right now, simpletons are running the nation.
I’m late to posting this because of computer issues. I suspect it’s update stuff but basically, I’ll be busy doing stuff and thump, the computer gets
Four songs hover in the extended morning mental music stream. A common theme threads through them: small towns.
From 1975: “My Little Town”, Simon & Garfunkel. “Billboard described the song as “a good, nostalgic Americana style song that builds throughout.”[4]Cash Box said it has “catchy piano beneath historic harmony growing into a brass hook ending” and that “you’ll remember the melody by the third time you hear it.”
From 1985: “My Hometown” by Bruce Springsteen. This was a sad reflection on the demise of small towns in the United States, the end of mills, the end of jobs, stores closed up and boarded up. Reflected in the lyrics are the tensions experienced in the 1960s over segregation and integration and the violence which resulted.
1985 also brought us, “Small Town” by John Mellencamp. “”I wanted to write a song that said, ‘You don’t have to live in New York or Los Angeles to live a full life or enjoy your life.’ I was never one of those guys that grew up and thought, ‘I need to get out of here.’ It never dawned on me. I just valued having a family and staying close to friends.” h/t to Wikipedia.org
Then, from 2023, “Try That In A Small Town,” performed by Jason Aldean and written by a committee. In a review of Highway Desperado for Allmusic, Stephen Thomas Erlewine stated “All its success was based on how the single and video deliberately pushed cultural buttons; strip those away, and ‘Try That in a Small Town’ is just another in a long line of crawling, glowering, arena-country from Aldean.”
Chris Willman of Variety called it “the most contemptible country song of the decade [and] the video is worse”, saying that the song “is close to being the most cynical song ever written about the implicit moral superiority of having a limited number of neighbors” and is “a list of hellishly dystopian tropes about city evils that seems half-borrowed from Hank Williams Jr.‘s ‘A Country Boy Can Survive‘, half-borrowed from the Book of Revelation“. He said that the video “conflates the act of protesting with violent crime”.[7] Marcus K. Dowling of The Tennessean wrote that “online critics highlighted the following song lyrics as emblematic of songs heightening pro-gun violence and lynching sentiments upon many in his rural, small-town fanbase”.
Tennessee state representative Justin Jones tweeted “As Tennessee lawmakers, we have an obligation to condemn Jason Aldean’s heinous song calling for racist violence … What a shameful vision of gun extremism and vigilantism.”[24] He explicitly referred to the song as a “heinous vile racist song” which attempts to normalize “racist, violence, vigilantism and white nationalism” in a later interview on CNN.
Kevin M. Kruse, professor of history at Princeton University specializing in 20th-century America, called out the song for “calling for people who aren’t law enforcement to mete out violence against people who haven’t broken any laws,” a callout to “law and order” that is “actually lawlessnness.” h/t to wikipedia.org
For me, the subject of small towns arose as my adopted small town copes with growth and development, rising costs and diminishing prospects. We’re wrestling with the need to change but can’t agree on how to change. As with many small towns, few want to abandon ‘what worked before’. That leaves us stymied about what to do and how to do it. As exhibited in “Try That In A Small Town”, the professed preference is to gut the other side.
I’m aware I do that a lot about the MAGAs myself. We don’t see eye to eye. We lack agreement about what are facts and history, and cause and effect. The polarization depicted in the last of these four songs is becoming the norm. Part of the background noise is about gun violence. As part of the left, I’m tired of hearing about thoughts and prayers and the need to arm teachers and increase security at schools, fairs, airports, malls, and other places whenever another mass shooting takes place. Put forward is this video is the threat to escalate violence.
How do we bridge these gaps?
It’s interesting, to, that the right wing is pushing to return to the values of previous years. To what year do they want to return? To the 1960s, when civil unrest and protests swept the nation and the small towns’ death rattles began? To further back, like the 1950s, when the United States entered into trade and defense agreements and taxes were high on the wealthy? Or earlier, when lynchings of Blacks were not uncommon, women lacked rights, and deaths from back street abortions were high, and the young died from measles and other diseases.
Let’s pause, perhaps, and remember how those big box stores, like Amazon, Walmart, Lowe’s, Home Depot, grand supporters of Trump and the GOTP, drove a spike through many small town businesses. Yes, and Starbucks and Costco, too.
The day is ending. Hope it was a good one for you. It was pretty good for me. Let’s do it again tomorrow. Cheers
A cold night surrendered to blue skies and warming sunshine. It’s 62 F now. The sun is promoting a high of 76 F. It’s said that we’ll see 81 F tomorrow. This is Munda, May 5, 2025 in Ashlandia. This is spring in Ashlandia.
Our trip last week gifted us a few things. One, my sciatica kicked in on Saturday. Too much time in a car seat. I’ve been dealing with it off and on since I was 20. I can usually feel it developing and head it off with stretching exercises. My early warning system failed me this time. I didn’t medicate but my wife suggested a Salon Pas. I slapped that thing on. I couldn’t believe the ensuing burning. I was in a recliner watching telly. The heat grew so intense, I pulled the patch off. On a whim, I popped it on my belly.
Well, call me Steve if I wasn’t surprised by the results. I suffer belly bloat. That Salon Pas patch remarkably reduced it. So I did it again yesterday. Same result. I was truly astonished and impressed and put another one on today. Only drawback from the patch at this point is hair. Yes, I’m a hairy boi. Getting that patch off required scissors and delicacy. The end result was a belly Brazil.
That’s my side. My wife could hardly get out of a chair on Friday night. She’d been complaining about pain and using different methods to address inflamation and pain. Epsom paths. Salon Pas. Valtaren. Red light therapy. Bed rest. Diet. But her weakness scared me. She’s better today but related that when we were on vacation, she worried about getting out of the bathtub. Fortunately, handles were available. Here an home, she reported a similar problem.
Her problems dig into my psyche as my sister peppers me with updates on Mom. “Mom is really debilitated. She’s confused about dates and other things.” Mom went and stayed with sis. “Mom said that she had to pee. Then she stood and began peeing. I went to help her, asking her what she needs. Mom said, I’m going to fall. I dropped everything and rushed over and caught her, keeping her from falling.” There are good answers about what to do but none are simple. Guilt spreads through me because I seem to recover. My sciatica did a quick and silent goodbye while Mom and my wife both endure. I can do little for either.
Politics again inspired The Neurons for today’s music. A conversation with my wife was the catalyst. She was reading about Conservatives complaining that the root of all of today’s problems in the USA is letting white women go to college and having the right to vote. Apparently, all those women going to college are getting liberal arts degrees and daring to think, and college screws up their thinking.
Like, WTF, seriously? Do those men really believe that? Pretty damn galling to that these people, these obviously sexist and biased shallow thinkers, think they have the right to deprive others of rights.
Included in the responses was a woman being interviewed. She said she could never vote for a woman to be POTUS. Because of hormones. What? Yes, because of hormones. If they’re going through menopause, their mood will change and they’ll go off and start a war.
The male interviewer responded, “But haven’t all the wars been started by men so far?”
The woman went wide eye and still. The video ended.
Talking about this thread of crazo thinking, we remarked, so many people underestimate others’ contributions. Maybe they learn and forget.
And that encouraged The Neurons to begin The Who and “Eminence Front” in the morning mental music stream.
Drinks flow People forget That big wheel spins, the hair thins People forget Forget they’re hiding The news slows People forget Their shares crash, hopes are dashed People forget Forget they’re hiding
Off to drink more coffee and employ my neurons in some writing. Hope your energy is up and pulls you safely through another day. Here’s the music. Cheers
Sunshine has found us again. It’s Twosda, final Twosda of April, the 29th day of the month in the year of 2025. Next to last day of April. 49 F temp. Upper sixties will win the day.
My cynicism is running strong this morning. News that Amazon is going to show the true price and then show the added tariff amounts has Trump shouting, “Treason!” Just an itemized listing to me. You know, transparent. I see why Trump is shouting about it. Like many vermin, he prefers operating in darkness. Light and transparency are his enemies.
Trump is always claiming that tariff is a great word. A beauiful word. Why is against his beautiful word being on display?
Trump also loudly and repeatedly said that foreign governments pay the tariffs. So what if Amazon shows what foreign governments are paying. You see this repeated on several right wing sites. “Why are the Democrats (or Liberals) so upset about tariffs? Foreign governments pay it.” Right. So why your your prezzi be upset by that information being displayed? Unless — gasp! — the tariffs are paid by the importing company, who passes it on to the customers, which causes prices to rise and volume to drop, further causing greater scarcity and shortages, which result in empty shelves and low stock, further increasing prices.
No way, right? No way.
The other aspect to consider is the ‘treason’ part. Anything that is against Trump is labeled as nasty, corrupt, and treason. But it’s not against the nation; it’s against him. He thinks he is the state. Trying to make it so. And the GOTP is trying to shore him up.
“My Heads in Mississippi” by ZZ Top is in the morning mental music stream. As the Eagles sang, “I can’t tell you why.” I do have clues. Like reading news about Mississippi that had me head shaking. But then it got buried by other news and more information. That could be it.
One other thing I read about are the projected coffee price increases. I’ve stocked up and will stock up more. But every time I brew or buy a cup of coffee, I’ll remember why my coffee price is increasing. One, climate change. Which Trump disavows. Says it’s fake news. Won’t allow it to be said anywhere in ‘his government’. That doesn’t change facts. Climate change is happening. It’s affecting produce and products. Such as coffee. And he won’t do shit about that. Two, tariffs. They unnecessarily increased coffee prices. Because of Trump’s ignorance, the GOTP’s complicity and spinelessness, my morning fix will be more expensive.
On the other end of that, MAGA will blame Democrats for the tariffs, for the scarcity etc. Probably declare the ‘Deep State’ is behind the shortages and price increases. Will laugh to one another and talk about ‘owning the libs’. All they’re owning is one another.
On to my low price coffee. Hope your day works out well. Hope mine does as well. Let’s get rockin’. Cheers
Michael Seidel, writer 