1. I’m trying to put together another one of those lists that I write noting the crimes and immoralities of the current regime – it’s a target-rich environment, really, since every day Convicted Felon Donald J. Trump and his minions, lackeys, cronies and slaves (including Unelected Co-President Elon “Sieg Heil” Musk) hit rock bottom and continue digging. I’ll probably finish it in a day or two, but right now it is just a hassle. I think we can all take it as read that this administration is doing everything in its power to destroy the American republic, our national security, our economy, our civil society, global trade, and whatever respect the rest of the world may have had for us at the beginning of the year. It has been an absolutely horrifying time to be an American and it does not look to be getting any better anytime soon.
2. But life goes on. It does that.
3. Every year we put together our March Madness Bracket despite the fact that none of us here follow basketball at any level and only Kim has any real idea of how the game works. Lauren also does, but she is away at school and not filling out a bracket these days, at least not with us. I don’t know how Kim chooses her teams. Mine are based on a few simple questions – 1) Did I go to this school? 2) Did any of my friends or family go to this school? and 3) Is this school in a city or state that I would like to visit? (or, put in the negative, is it in a place that I or my family would not be safe visiting?). Oliver is the most thorough, as he looks up all the mascots and picks the teams that have the best ones. There is still another weekend to go with this and not even the basketball fans care because all four top seeds have advanced to the Final Four and straight chalk is boring. We have even less reason to care as our brackets are officially busted and no further points can be obtained, so we have declared Kim the winner on points and she will receive the Fabulous Prizes as soon as those can be determined.
4. I have completed my Instagram project and will now have to find another project to keep my mind off the sad state of the world. Not sure what that will be yet. Further bulletins as events warrant.
5. On Friday it was 76F (24C) here. On Sunday night it snowed. Today we had a tornado hit the northern part of the county after a day of drenching rain. Tomorrow it will get cold again. The rabbits were out for a few days, and now they’re back in the basement to ride things out until things stabilize a bit. The weather has gotten very science-fictiony of late – another thing that does not look to be getting better any time soon.
6. All of this has made it very hard to read – I’ve been working on the same novel for a month now. It’s actually a well written book, but my focus just isn’t there right now. Too many other pressing things that require more attention, I suppose.
7. We took our paperwork over to the Tax People last week even though the idea of supporting this particular version of the government leaves a lot to be desired. It took a few tries since there were random paperwork bits that had to be retrieved over a few days to complete the full set, but all documents have been delivered now and pretty soon the taxes will be done and then all I will have to do is sign the forms and either wait for a refund or write a check. No, I do not accept direct deposit for any refund I might get. Unelected President Elon “Sieg Heil” Musk and his crew of feral teenagers do not need my banking information on top of everything else. The government can just send me a check if it comes to that. I don’t expect it to do so – my income is so variable that it is hard to get the withholdings right and I prefer to err on the side of not lending money to the government interest free if I can help it. But there you have it. I tell you, though, having someone else handle all this has been just the most wonderful thing ever.
8. Is it just me or is everyone really tired about now?
9. It is a parenting win when your child messages you from the road to let you know that she has been listening to Woody Guthrie on the drive. Next up: Pete Seeger!
10. The rest of the old notes and notebooks that I took out of my little corner of the basement have now hit the recycling bin, which is kind of cathartic. I did find a few things that were worth keeping amid the paper, though. A small Scottish flag that had gotten tossed into one of the boxes. A couple of old books, including one on dinosaurs that my dad bought for me when I was about five. And a photocopy of a pamphlet-sized thing that I found tucked into a dark corner of the library at the University of Pennsylvania in 1987 or so – a work of revolutionary scholarship by one “P. N. Oak” entitled Great Britain Was Hindu Land. It’s a virulently nationalist and vibrantly stupid tract dedicated to the idea that a vast Indian civilization once ruled the British Isles in sharp contrast with the situation in recent centuries. It is a textbook example of how not to write history and howlingly funny if your tastes run toward laughing at idiots, and it sold for a mere rupee when first published. I skimmed through it this weekend. It has not improved with age.
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4 comments:
1. I have a new theory: the rethuglicans actually do have a plan to fix immigration. Simply turn this country into a shit hole that no one with an IQ higher than the temperature of my refrigerator would want to visit (let alone come here and set up housekeeping.
2. […]
4. How about revisiting your ‘About Me’ in the sidebar? Nowhere near enough snark for these times. 😉
5. I’ve given up on sports. Taking odds on the weather forecast is much more entertaining. The weather app on my phone sometimes gets the next hour right, but lately, it’s been wrong more than correct.
2. […]
8. It is not, in point of fact, just you. And I think the word you may have been looking for is ‘weary’ - it’s significantly closer to exhausted than ’tired’.
9. Remind me to tell you sometime about the day that our eldest discovered Jefferson Starship, and how I completely blew her mind when I pulled out my vinyl version of Jefferson Airplane’s Surrealistic Pillow.
2. … [Comment_fail] 😳
Lucy
1. Well, if that's their plan I have to hand it to them - they're succeeding beyond their wildest dreams.
4. Perhaps! Although there's plenty of snark in the posts themselves. But definitely something to consider. :)
8. Weary is clearly a better word for it. It covers exhausted but has a mental and perhaps even a spiritual overtone that captures a lot of the current zeitgeist.
9. Ooh - do tell! I will bet that was a red letter day for you. :).
Lauren discovered the music of my youth (i.e. the 70s and 80s) a long time ago, and it still makes me smile when I see them come up on her playlists. But I got into folk music in college and you just don't hear enough Woody Guthrie anymore. He was far more radical than most people remember these days. There's a reason why nobody sings all the verses of This Land Is Your Land anymore. It makes me happy that she's discovered him.
No matter who wins the revolution, the laundry ain't gonna take care of itself.
1. … or our worst nightmares.
4. I’ll grant the snark in the posts. I don’t remember if Blogger has a character limit for that section - but if it doesn’t, it really could use a, ahhh, a more, shall we say, colorful explanation as to why you aren’t going to argue your credentials. 🤣
9. It took some effort to convince her that Airplane and Starship were in every important way essentially the same band. She was stubbornly resisting the idea that this ‘new’ band she had ‘discovered’ was really a band that her mother and I had danced to when we were in high school. If there’s a bright point in there, it’s that she stared combing through my vinyl collection and listening to a fairly significant percentage of my library. 30+ years later she still appreciates a wide variety of music genres.
Woody, and don’t forget Arlo.
… Laundry? I’m much more worried about the trash - that ain’t gonna take care of itself, neither.
Lucy
It is a strange thing to realize your parents were once young. ;) And a lovely thing to pass on music.
I found Arlo long before I found Woody, oddly enough (grade-school exposure to This Land is Your Land notwithstanding). There was a time I could do the entire monologue of The Ballad of Reuben Clamzo and His Strange Daughter in the Key of A as well as The Motorcycle Song, and I can still do all of Alice's Restaurant. Arlo wasn't much fun in concert, in my experience, but he could put together a story. :)
One of the many things my dad taught me is that nothing good happens on its own. If we want this trash taken out, we have to take it out. It's just a question of figuring out how, is all.
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