Lists, Non-sense, Bullseyes, Denny, Coldness, Giving F's and the Lady From Natchez, and Miscellany
Looks like there's going to be some sort of Pop Art Party today. I got a formal card and everything.
January 2, 2021
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Did you hear that the lawsuit giving Pence the power to pick the next president was tossed out? Whoever would have thought that a federal judge would hesitate to allow the VP's single vote to supercede 150 million citizens' votes? You know what be more fair than that? Deciding it by a coin toss.
What's next? Maybe if someone prays and believes God anointed Trump, that means Trump gets to remain in power. That's the level of sense we're dealing with here, i.e. non-sense.
January 2, 2021
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Zuzu was calling me Denny tonight as a hybrid between Ben and Daddy, but I also met Emma at Denny's so maybe she somehow ended up with some Denny's DNA. That can't be good.
January 2, 2020
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Thoughts and Prayers
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I'm watching a documentary on Ingmar Bergman and they show his film library from his house... and how in the hell did Ingmar Freaking Bergman OWN a copy of Ghostbusters???
January 2, 2019
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All right, I've been off work for most of the last 2 weeks and I've done a ton of genealogy. I became obsessed with it. Some key findings:
- I found the names of all of my great-great-great-grandparents, and all but one of my 4th great grandparents. I found the death certificate of her son. They were German immigrants... it listed the father but only said "don't know" for mother. What was the story???
-Those two were the only immigrants of any of my 64 4th great-grandparents. It might have only been the father who immigrated.
-Every single one of my 32 great-great-great-grandparents are buried in Lancaster County.
- I know where 50 of my 64 4th great-grandparents are buried, and all but two of them are buried in Lancaster County.
-My paternal grandmother's paternal grandfather was run over by a train. Goodness.
-I have a great-great-grandma who was still alive 4 months before I was born.
-At least one line traced back through some kings and queens in the Middle Ages and back into a few decades BC.
-It doesn't seem like I have any relatives who fought in the Civil War.
-My maternal grandmother's paternal grandfather's name was Isaac Newton Haller, and his father's name was Benjamin Franklin Haller. But they went by Newton and Franklin respectively. That's really strange.
-A few too many of my ancestors died from kidney problems!
It's crazy how much you can learn with just like 30 or 40 hours worth of work. If you are interested, go to familysearch.org with the birth dates and death dates of your parents, grandparents, and some great-grandparents and you can likely piece it together. If you get stuck there are a ton of people associated with genealogy groups that are very happy to help. (And I'm happy to help too.) If you live in Pennsylvania, you have access to all death certificates between 1906 and 1966. If you don't know dates, you can more than likely look them up on findagrave.com. Any questions, let me know!
January 2, 2019
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Dan Rather- "What can be said that has not already been said a thousand times? Except that it keeps getting worse and more dangerous. Do you ignore these ravings? Do you try to deprive a petty bully of his Twitter oxygen? Does the world take it seriously? Do they take the United States seriously? Will that help protect us from the sheer import of this perilous rhetoric? What does it say that we have to hope for restraint from a murderous dictator in return?"
https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=pfbid0Cym9az6xyGSTRAtNouWJST1iZC5PsTvU7FXX1B8UG3tkitkqGoh1xZf3M9cNn3dPl&id=24085780715&sfnsn=mo&mibextid=6aamW6
January 2, 2018
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Oh no, I gained negative 3 pounds over the holidays.
January 2, 2018
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Aiming for a very productive 2018. In fact I woke up at 4am New Years Day and got to work immediately trying to fix my broken furnace. A few thoughts:
-It's less than a year old... when you spend that kind of money you at least want no hassles for a calendar year, right?
-Good luck though... I nearly craigslisted our space heaters. We will live no matter what.
-Got to feel like a genius when I found the outside air intake clogged with frost. I thawed it out with a hair dryer and was all ready to go back to sleep but it wouldn't kick back on.
-Not fun reading technical manuals at 5am.
-Was wondering what the button with the big M stood for, and why there was no menu button. Why not just spell out "menu" with the same amount of ink???
-Got to teach Gretel that it's good when you are cold because it lets you be thankful when you are warm.
-Furnace guy came out and got the heat working on two of three floors. Not bad but still a D. Said there might be ice in the line somewhere and wished me luck and told me to call back tomorrow if I still had a problem.
-Got to feel like a genius again when I found ice in the line, along the back wall of the basement. Must have froze up almost right away when the furnace shut down.
-After setting up multiple heaters and the hair dryer and strategic spots, and buying heat tape at Lowe's (and tripping fuses several times) I finally got the hot water flowing again through the baseboards. 2pm on New Years Day and a huge victory already behind me.
Already looking forward to 1-1-19 when I beat the lung cancer I got from pulling down all the asbestos insulation to gain access to the pipes.
January 2, 2018
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Where did Joan Didion come from? I don't think I'd ever heard of her a few months ago. A book of hers turned up on a list of 12 must-read books by Sam Harris, my intellectual godfather. A Netflix documentary on her popped up. I was watching a Rolling Stone documentary and Cameron Crowe pulled out Slouching Toward Bethlehem, the copy Jann Wenner gave him as the example of how to write. Numerous Brainpickings articles, a site I've followed for years. She's on David Shields' reading list. Quotations of hers are turning up random places. How have I missed her until now??? Weird when that happens.
BTW, I don't think "pun" is the right term for calling Sam Harris an intellectual godfather. Anti-pun? Super-pun?
January 2, 2018
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To see the president in historical context, both sides need to look at him as objectively as possible. Here are the 11 variables history professors have use to rank past presidents. I included my current rankings along with comments. I'm interested in your thoughts.
Public persuasion- F (35-40% support with key legislation less popular, doesn't seem to want to persuade the majority)
Crisis leadership- F (Charlottesville, hurricanes in Houston vs Puerto Rico)
Economic management- C (Positive for him since he passed legislation, potential negative in that it seems destined to increase the cost of health care and is paid for with cuts to Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. Positive for him, maintained the growth from the Obama years, but potential negative if the stock market is on a bubble or he succeeds in deregulating the banks which played a big part of the last recession.)
Moral authority- F (likely the worst ever... if you need examples, please ask)
International relations- F (declining view of America worldwide, abandoned trade agreements with no replacement, fond of authoritarian strongmen, hyper-critical of allies, deep cuts to state department coupled with increased spending to already bloated military, taunts North Korea while shunning attempts at diplomacy, called for a new nuclear arms race, sacrificed America's role in Israeli/Palstinian peace process)
Administrative skills- F (turnover of key people, constant leaks later proven true, mean-spirited bully obviously not respected by large number of subordinates, surrounded by a few experts and a lot of toadies, follows his whims while ignoring expert advice from key top staff )
Relations with Congress- D (he did work together with Republicans in Congress to pass a terrible tax bill, often publicly castigated them by name and vice versa)
Vision / Setting an agenda- D (simply platitudes, but apparently platitudes that a third of us find inspirational)
Pursued equal justice for all- F (not even for himself, anti-free speech, transgender military ban, rollback of workplace rights for gay people)
Performance within context of times- F (refugee ban, pullout of Paris Agreement, coal is not the future, Artic drilling instead of focusing on green energy, cuts to NIH for research and development, taking back DACA... red meat thrown to the dinosaurs of the party)
Overall- F (destruction of norms, constant verifiable lies, threatening to lock up political opponents, thinks the mistake of Iraq is not taking their oil (a war crime), threatens to kill families of terrorists (would take justice back to pre-Magna Carta days which said in part that people are only responsible for their own crimes), public fights with families of fallen military members, attempting to erode institutions (Judiciary, Congress, media, intelligence, Bannon said that executive department secretaries were chosen to destroy their own agencies, etc), language often completely void of content, volatile temperment that could get us into an avoidable war, doesn't seem to understand policy or have interest in it, everything is a zero-sum game "I win, you lose" vs both sides winning, refusal to divest from his companies opening up likely monetary benefit from his own policies, estate tax as a gift to 1% over "the forgotten people" he campaigned for (who are likely to lose benefits as a result), it's always his own ego above all else, he acts in every way we teach our children to not act, believes he is above the law very literally, indictments of key former staff... and this is before anything having to do with Russian collusion or wrongdoing, which is currently unproven.)
What did I miss?
January 2, 2018
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It's very strange how Madagascar vanilla tastes better than regular vanilla. There's no way anybody could tell in a taste test. It's like a placebo effect for your tongue. Forget Bill Hicks, that marketer better have been given a bonus.
January 2, 2017
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Somehow my 6-year-old nephew hit two bullseyes out of three throws. One of the most remarkable feats I've ever had the pleasure of witnessing.
January 2, 2016
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Gretel, just a couple months old.
January 2, 2014
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Saw Django Unchained last night... no big whoop. Generally I really like Tarantino's movies but there are two things I've realized I can't stand. First are those piece of crap 70's B-movie songs. And second is an actor that shows up in all of his movies, the worst actor ever to grace the screen- Quentin Tarantino. He's being ironic, but he really is a distraction.
January 2, 2013
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Our cat snuck out tonight and bolted under a porch. It took me a half hour to coax him out, and all the while I was laying on a cold concrete path in my jammies with a zero degree wind chill.
January 2, 2010
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My New Years resolution is the same as last years- 1024x768.
January 2, 2010
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Big Bottom massacre took place on this day in 1791, in the Ohio Country, marking the beginning of the Northwest Indian War.
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The Bangles' Different Light was released on this day in 1986.
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On this day in 2004, Stardust successfully flies past Comet Wild 2, collecting samples that are returned to Earth.
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Barry Goldwater was born on this day in 1909- pro-segregation, yet he somehow he also represents a valuable piece of American politics that's now missing. After all, he marched down to the White House and let Nixon know it was all over. Maybe what's missing is that people can be absolutely dead wrong, and we can debate why they're wrong, yet there was still a sense that we do somehow all have to live together, and that seems that is fading.
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Drew Barrymore lighting Steven King's cigarette.
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It is believed that Isaac Asimov joined us on this day in 1920.
Tell me why the stars do shine,
Tell me why the ivy twines,
Tell me what makes skies so blue,
And I'll tell you why I love you.
Nuclear fusion makes stars to shine,
Tropisms make the ivy twine,
Raleigh scattering make skies so blue,
Testicular hormones are why I love you.
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Roger Miller join us on this day in 1936.
KING OF THE ROAD
Trailer's for sale or rent
Rooms to let, 50 cents
No phone, no pool, no pets
I ain't got no cigarettes
Ah, but, two hours of pushin' broom
Buys an eight by twelve four-bit room
I'm a man of means by no means
King of the road
Third boxcar, midnight train
Destination Bangor, Maine
Old, worn out suit and shoes
I don't pay no union dues
I smoke old stogies I have found
Short, but not too big around
I'm a man of means by no means
King of the road
I know every engineer on every train
All of their children, and all of their names
And every handout in every town
Every lock that ain't locked, when no one's around
I sing, trailers for sale or rent
Rooms to let, 50 cents
No phone, no pool, no pets
I ain't got no cigarettes
Ah, but, two hours of pushin' broom
Buys an eight by twelve four-bit room
I'm a man of means by no means
King of the road
Trailers for sale or rent
Rooms to let, 50 cents
No phone, no pool, no pets
I ain't got no cigarettes
Ah, but, two hours of pushin' broom buys...
What a time capsule!
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Tex Ritter left us on this day in 1974. Impossible to imagine that the person who sang the High Noon theme song do not forsake me, was also the father of John Ritter.
https://youtu.be/vTZ8MEi2yCo
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The great Bob Einstein left us on this day in 2019. Two genius jokes from Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee. It never even mattered what he was saying, just the fact that he was saying it made it funny.
https://youtu.be/eOwYVsYWpl8
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Another notable deathday- "Mean Gene" Okerlund who also left us in 2019.
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Raw Story- Dogs poop in line with the Earth magnetic field
What a scoop!
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/01/02/dogs-poop-in-line-with-earths-magnetic-field-says-study/
January 2, 2014
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NBC News- Kim Jong Un highlights his 'nuclear button,' offers Olympic talks
Huh. I'm fascinated by the complexity of the North Korea situation. This short article is the first thing I've ever read that seemed somehow hopeful. KJU is a menace and the world would be better off without him, but how do we get there? It's possible that sanctions getting lifted would improve the lives of the people and they would be less reliant on him. Lot of possibilities though. I have a thought I can't shake... that Trump has already ordered his assassination as soon as we know where he is, and it will result in the annihilation of Seoul. KJU is a bad guy. If he's a madman, I have no idea what to do. If he's rational (which the article suggests) the best option (the one that leads to fewer deaths) might be... to do nothing.
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/north-korea/kim-says-north-korea-s-nuclear-weapons-will-prevent-war-n833781
January 2, 2018
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Anne Frank, 1940
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The Atlantic- Trump Is Not Well
My #1 issue for the 2020 election- the person with the nuclear codes should have a stable personality. (And we should change our nuclear policy so that one person alone can't launch them.)
The author is a lifelong Republican:
"Donald Trump’s disordered personality—his unhealthy patterns of thinking, functioning, and behaving—has become the defining characteristic of his presidency. It manifests itself in multiple ways: his extreme narcissism; his addiction to lying about things large and small, including his finances and bullying and silencing those who could expose them; his detachment from reality, including denying things he said even when there is video evidence to the contrary; his affinity for conspiracy theories; his demand for total loyalty from others while showing none to others; and his self-aggrandizement and petty cheating.
"It manifests itself in Trump’s impulsiveness and vindictiveness; his craving for adulation; his misogyny, predatory sexual behavior, and sexualization of his daughters; his open admiration for brutal dictators; his remorselessness; and his lack of empathy and sympathy, including attacking a family whose son died while fighting for this country, mocking a reporter with a disability, and ridiculing a former POW. (When asked about Trump’s feelings for his fellow human beings, Trump’s mentor, the notorious lawyer Roy Cohn, reportedly said, “He pisses ice water.”)"
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/09/donald-trump-not-well/597640/
January 2, 2020
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The New Yorker- Revisiting Hitler’s Final Days in the Bunker
All too easy to make Nazi comparisons these days, and we can't minimize the Holocaust by joining in with the false equivalence. This article makes that point, and many other apt points on the nature of authoritarianism.
"Clear-eyed American readers may conclude that all those swastika-emblazoned, Gothic-type, black-white-and-red books have taught us exactly nothing about the fragility of democracy. Indeed, the pervasiveness of the Sonderweg school of storytelling—the idea that Germany was somehow genetically predisposed to follow a “special path” toward Nazism, dictatorship, and genocide—may have blinded us to our own anti-democratic drift. In 1935, Sinclair Lewis imagined a form of American Fascism in his novel “It Can’t Happen Here.” Crucial to the delusion that it can’t happen here is the conviction that it could only have happened there. Now German historians are ending their books on Nazism with thinly veiled references to an American Untergang."
https://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/revisiting-hitlers-final-days-in-the-bunker
January 2, 2021
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Gia
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Kipling- "Of all the liars in the world, sometimes the worst are our own fears."
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Unamuno- "That which the fascists hate, above all else, is intelligence."
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Salinger- "The mark of the immature man is that he wants to die nobly for a cause, while the mark of the mature man is that he wants to live humbly for one."
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Bukowski, Pulp- “Often the best parts of life were when you weren’t doing anything at all, just mulling it over, chewing on it.”
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Henry Miller- "I've lived out my melancholy youth. I don't give a fuck anymore what's behind me, or what's ahead of me. I'm healthy. Incurably healthy. No sorrows, no regrets. No past, no future. The present is enough for me. Day by day. Today!"
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Hitchens- "I have always found it quaint and rather touching that there is a movement [Libertarians] in the US that thinks Americans are not yet selfish enough."
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Sedaris- "After a few months in my parents' basement, I took an apartment near the state university, where I discovered both crystal methamphetamine and conceptual art. Either one of these things are dangerous, but in combination they have the potential to destroy entire civilizations."
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Vowell- "The true American patriot is by definition skeptical of the government."
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There was a young lady of Natchez
Who chanced to be born with two snatches,
And she often said, "Shit!
Why, I'd give either tit
For a man with equipment that matches.
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