Halcyon Kickball Days, and Frozen Tears

George Orwell, Some Thoughts on the Common Toad:

“After the sorts of winters we have had to endure recently, the spring does seem miraculous, because it has become gradually harder and harder to believe that it is actually going to happen. Every February since 1940 I have found myself thinking that this time winter is going to be permanent.

But Persephone, like the toads, always rises from the dead at about the same moment. Suddenly, towards the end of March, the miracle happens and the decaying slum in which I live is transfigured.”

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Vernalagnia- A romantic mood brought on by spring.

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Halcyon Kickball Days

March 21, 2010

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On this Day in 2020 a reporter asked the president, "What do you want to say to all the people who are scared?" 

He carefully weighed all of his options, and when berserk.

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Opening of a letter from Thomas Paine:

"The American Crisis: LANCASTER, March 21, 1778

TO GENERAL SIR WILLIAM HOWE.

To argue with a man who has renounced the use and authority of reason, and whose philosophy consists in holding humanity in contempt, is like administering medicine to the dead, or endeavoring to convert an atheist by scripture. Enjoy, sir, your insensibility of feeling and reflecting. It is the prerogative of animals. And no man will envy you these honors, in which a savage only can be your rival and a bear your master."

Does that remind you of anyone?

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I've heard it said that people thought the world have a new morning ritual- wake up, check to make sure Zelensky is still alive, make coffee.

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The Onion: Supreme Court Debuts New Spaghetti Strap Sun-Robes For Spring

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World poetry, puppetry, and down syndrome days.

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Excalibur

by David Brent

I froze your tears and made a dagger,

and stabbed it in my cock forever.

It stays there like Excalibur,

Are you my Arthur?

Say you are.


Take this cool dark steeled blade,

Steal it, sheath it, in your lake.

I’d drown with you to be together.

Must you breathe? Cos I need Heaven.

https://fb.watch/jpovG9Ai6e/?mibextid=irwG9G

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Carl Reiner - "The absolute truth is the thing that makes people laugh."

Well hopefully that's not the case with that poem!

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Gretel and Zuzu at the grave of my great-grandma's great-grandparents. (Don't worry, we were 6 feet away the whole time.)

March 21, 2020

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I played the best racquetball of my life tonight. All it took was new socks, a new ball, and actually eating a healthy lunch. Who knew?

March 21, 2019

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George W. Bush Senior Aide Pete Wehner just said that "Trump is a corrupt president, and a corrupt man, but it's not just the corruption, it's the ineptitude." OOF! Extraordinary times.

March 21, 2017

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Gretel keeps pointing to the rocking chair that her great-great-grandfather built and waving.

March 21, 2015

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On this day in 1556 former archbishop of Canterbury Thomas Cranmer was to be executed but deviated from the scripted sermon saying, "And as for the pope, I refuse him, as Christ's enemy, and Antichrist with all his false doctrine." 

Reminds me a bit of, "Russian warship, go fuck yourself." That still gives me goosebumps week's later.

On this day in 1800, from Wikipedia: "With the church leadership driven out of Rome during an armed conflict, Pius VII is crowned Pope in Venice with a temporary papal tiara made of papier-mâché."

A paper mache pope hat... a great image.

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On this day in 1943, Wehrmacht officer Rudolf von Gersdorff plotted to assassinate Adolf Hitler by using a suicide bomb. The plan falls through and von Gersdorff was able to defuse the bomb in time to avoid suspicion.

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On this day in 1952, Alan Freed presents the first rock and roll concert, in Cleveland, Ohio.

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On this day in 1963, Davey Moore died from injuries sustained in his boxing match against Sugar Ramos. Who is responsible?

https://youtu.be/us_yCFnP95I

I guess we're all responsible. Including Davey?

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The first Earth Day proclamation was issued by Joseph Alioto, Mayor of San Francisco, on this day in 1970.

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On this day in 1983, the West Bank fainting epidemic began. Israelis and Palestinians each blamed each other of a poison gas attack. It was later determined to be psychosomatic. The whole thing was in their heads.

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The Pixies released Surfer Rosa on this day in 1988, influencing a whole generation of musicians including Nirvana.

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Twitter was born on this day in 2006.

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Johann Sebastian Bach was born on this day in 1685.

Douglas Adams- "Beethoven tells you what it's like to be Beethoven and Mozart tells you what it's like to be human. Bach tells you what it's like to be the universe."

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Born in 1949, Slovak Zizek- 

"Humanity is OK, but 99% of people are boring idiots."

The consolation is that they think he's a boring idiot too. More boring idiot stuff:

"I despise the kind of book which tells you how to live, how to make yourself happy! Philosophers have no good news for you at this level! I believe the first duty of philosophy is making you understand what deep shit you are in!"

Ninety-Nine percent of the stuff he writes though strikes me as intentionally obtuse, but sure, it might be me.

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Other notable birthdays- Son House (1902), Russ Meyer (1922), Solomon Burke (1940), Matthew Broderick (1962), Rosie O'Donnell (1962)

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Died on this day in 1697, Pocahontas- "Sometimes the right path is not always the easiest.”

Of course we can't forget that sometimes the right path is also easiest. It's a good lesson- sometimes the easier, the better.

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Mass murderer, John List, died on this day in 2008. He murdered his family, gave reasons for nobody to check on the house, turned on a religious radio station, left town, assumed a new identity, remarried, and remained a fugitive for the next 18 years. He took all pictures of him from the house, and no other reliable pictures existed somehow. They only checked the house once the light bulbs started burning out.

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Another notable deathday- China Achebe (2013)

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Brando recounted in Listen To Me Marlon, the ballerina Galina Ulanova was asked what her dream would be. She replied , "If I could dance for one minute perfectly, that is all I'd ever ask." She left us on this day in 1998.

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Albert Einstein- "Dancers are the athletes of God."

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Buzzfeed- Dain Fagerholm's Amazing Hand-Drawn Stereographic GIFs

http://www.buzzfeed.com/richardofonesca/dain-fagerholms-amazing-hand-drawn-stereograp-321d

My kind of modern art.

March 21, 2012

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Yahoo News- Tomi Lahren Says 'Liberal Indoctrination' Starts In Elementary School

Let me guess, they teach them to share.

https://www.yahoo.com/huffpost/tomi-lahren-says-apos-liberal-171827186.html

March 21, 2017

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Happy World Poetry Day! A genius song South Park, made all the funnier by Cartman's indifference.  

https://youtu.be/4BRBnhdMhkw

March 21, 2020

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What do we want?

Low flying airplane noises!

When do we want them?

NNNEEEEEEOOOOOOOOWWWWWW 

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Harry Winogrand

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Werner Herzog- “I’m trying to find these rare moments where you feel completely illuminated. Facts never illuminate you. The phone directory of Manhattan doesn’t illuminate you, although it has factually correct entries, millions of them. But these rare moments of illumination that you find when you read a great poem, you instantly know. You instantly feel this spark of illumination. You are almost stepping outside of yourself and you see something sublime."

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Philip Roth- "Literature takes a habit of mind that has disappeared. It requires silence, some form of isolation, and sustained concentration in the presence of an enigmatic thing."

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Bukowski, Women- "Nothing was ever in tune. People just blindly grabbed at whatever there was: communism, health foods, zen, surfing, ballet, hypnotism, group encounters, orgies, biking, herbs, Catholicism, weight-lifting, travel, withdrawal, vegetarianism, India, painting, writing, sculpting, composing, conducting, backpacking, yoga, copulating, gambling, drinking, hanging around, frozen yogurt, Beethoven, Back, Buddha, Christ, TM, H, carrot juice, suicide, handmade suits, jet travel, New York City, and then it all evaporated and fell apart. People had to find things to do while waiting to die. I guess it was nice to have a choice."

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I ran an eventful three miles tonight. Right around the two mile mark, I saw a man screaming at a woman on the sidewalk. Nobody else was around anywhere and I was still about a half block away. He had violent body language and was screaming right in her face. She was calm and had her phone out, mostly ignoring him. I thought, "Well, here we go."

I started walking just to take in the whole scene, planning to walk past them to see if she needed any help. He was yelling, "Fuck you! I hate you! You can take all of your stuff and get out of here! I hate your family! Fuck you!" 

Once or twice he kind of walked away and there was a brief lull. I hoped to catch her at a moment that he wasn't paying close attention and tell her to walk with me.

I walked by slowly, but I didn't get my moment. He just kept yelling. Just after I passed, he started kicking the door. I couldn't tell if it was where she lived or if he locked himself out. She kept telling him to stop. Oh boy...

I walked back and asked if everything was okay, and if anybody needed any help. He quit kicking the door, then got right in my face yelling at me to keep going. "Keep walking! Go to your home! Get out of here. Go to your home!" There was a bit of froth around his mouth, he had been yelling for a while.

I backed up slowly saying, "Okay, okay, I was just checking. I'm leaving."

I looked around the neighborhood and saw everybody peeking through their windows, like we were in the wild west and some outlaw gunslinger just rode into town.

I caught someone's eyes, and motioned for them to call the cops. They nodded. I walked up around the corner and called the cops myself. 

It's like Chris Rock says, some cops are bad apples, and that's a job where there can't be any bad apples, just like airline pilots. 

We all know there are bad apples, but we still eat apples! We just throw the bad ones out. I'm so thankful that cops are around for stuff like this. We take it for granted. Without them, it's pure vigilante justice. Everybody on that block wanted that guy to stop what he was doing, but nobody wanted to stop him.

The cop assigned to the case called me tonight to get a statement. He said the woman was okay, and that the guy got arrested for a whole litany of things including assaulting her elderly mother, and assaulting of police officer.

Not long after Gretel was born, I felt a shift in my psychology. I always known that I had to be ready at a moment's notice to jump in to make things right in whatever unknown situation might turn up. I pride myself on it. One can't be a bystander to injustice. After she was born though, I realized that I was no longer living for myself, but for others. I asked myself what I would do if one of the situations arose, and I wasn't sure. Honestly, it bugged me.

Tonight, nine and a half years later, I guess I proved what I would do. The situation could have turned violent. Apparently it did after I left. But if I'm the type of person who is going to run from danger, what kind of a person am I? What kind of example would I be setting? Wouldn't it be better to die standing up for justice rather than turn a blind eye? Say that he murdered her and I hadn't done anything. I would be alive, but could I look my kids in the face?

I don't know. Every situation is different. I could have done more, and I might have got killed. I could have done less, and the cops might have showed up in time anyway. What was the best thing I could have done? Where's the balance between acceptable risk and likely outcomes? 

It's not like you can answer these grand questions in the moment. It boiled down to what Buzz said to Jim at a pivotal moment in Rebel Without a Cause, "You gotta do something." Well at least I did something, and I can say that I'm glad I did, regardless of the risk and outcome.

March 21, 2023

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John Waters- “Collect books, even if you don't plan on reading them right away. Nothing is more important than an unread library.”

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Giovanni Ribisi, in Richard Linklater’s SubUrbia- "It’s my duty as a human being to get pissed off… Not that it makes any difference in the first place. Nothing ever f—ing changes. Fifty years from now, we’ll all be dead and there’ll be new people standing in this same spot drinking beer and eating pizza, bitching and moaning about the price of Oreos, and they won’t even know we were ever here."

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Werner Herzog- “I despise formal restaurants. I find all of that formality to be very base and vile. I would much rather eat potato chips on the sidewalk.”

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John Burroughs, Signs and Seasons- "The smallest deed is better than the greatest intention."

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Ernest Hemingway, A Farewell to Arms- "The coward dies a thousand deaths, the brave but one'.... (The man who first said that) was probably a coward.... He knew a great deal about cowards but nothing about the brave. The brave dies perhaps two thousand deaths if he's intelligent. He simply doesn't mention them."

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Horace- "It is courage, courage, courage, that raises the blood of life to crimson splendor. Live bravely and present a brave front to adversity."


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