Bye-bye, Selfie Girl!

I live in a nice apartment with a small backyard. Unfortunately, a two-story row of other apartments looks over my backyard, so I rarely go out there (except to feed stray cats and water the four plants I have), primarily because of one particular person.

For the past year or so, a 20-something woman has lived in one of the apartments overlooking my yard. Before Wuhan, she would have friends over and they'd hang out by her front door, smoking, and she herself came out front whenever she'd want to smoke. (I once saw her mother and grandmother come over for a visit, which is why I assume she never smoked inside.)

Post-Wuhan (mid-March), this girl started sitting outside of her front door ALL THE TIME. I could not  even open the blinds of my back sliding-glass door because THERE SHE WAS, looking down into my apartment.

She never sat outside with a book. Nah. She always had her smart-phone in her hand, and she was always posing for selfies. No, not looking down at the phone as if she were looking for information, but... holding up the phone to POSE FOR SELFIES, constantly. Day after day after day. (Didn't her Internet friends get bored with same "front-door selfie shot"??)

A couple of months ago, I went outside and saw her yet again sitting there. I finally said -- fake jovially: "You're STILL out here!" Her: "Yeah, Covid."  Me: "Yeah, it gets boring being at home all the time." (When in reality, I wanted to say: "GO AWAY! STOP STARING DOWN AT ME!")

Anyway... Today I woke up to movers taking the Selfie-Girl's stuff away! Thank god! Yes, I know that any new neighbors could be worse. But, for the time being, I can now open my back-door blinds and go into my yard without seeing a slacker Millennial sitting on her ass and posing for pictures and staring down into my apartment 12 hours a day.

What a relief this is! Seriously, I have not been able to open my back-door blinds, and now I can! I feel very happy!

Journey - Faithfully (1982)

Officially, I hate Journey after Jonathan Cain joined in 1980.
However, I'll make an exception for this great 1982 Cain song! : ) 
"I get the joy of rediscovering you..."

George Jones: Come Home To Me (1991)

Lyin' here thinkin' and a half-empty bed
Blamin' myself for the things that I said
Hoping that you can forget and forgive
My life without you ain't no way to live.

Come home to me, come home to me
It just won't be right till you do
Come home to me, come home to me
I can't take one more night all alone
Come on home.

Baby, you left a hurtin' only your love can heal
And I understand now how I made you feel
Well, my life without you would just fall apart
Right from the body of my lonely heart.

Come home to me, come home to me
It just won't be right till you do
Come home to me, come home to me
I can't take one more night all alone
Baby, come on home.

The moon through the window
Is my shade of blue
As I'm holding your pillow
Longin' for you, baby.

Come home to me, come home to me
It just won't be right till you do
Come home to me, come home to me
I can't take one more night all alone
Come on home.

Come on home

Tavern Choir: George Jones and Jim Lauderdale (1988)

Sting - Russians (1985)

In 1985, artists were more intelligent and thoughtful.
Post-2016, I have not heard any artist but Kanye West express an original political opinion.

A house without a black cat named Moonie...

...is just a house full of gray cats running around. Seriously. I have 5 cats, 4 of them gray of some sort, and having one black cat in the family anchors them all, especially since she was the runt of the litter, and is the most affectionate while not being "heavy" (Pete!), and the most weird and subtly interesting (though when she was a kitten, she was the last to be litter-trained and thus the first that I was planning on giving away to a shelter).

Tuesday,  the best sound in the world to me was the sound of kibble crunching...and the sight of Solomon Grundy munching on it. And the sight of Newly eating part of a leaf off a palmish plant (and then finding poop with that big strand of leaf in it). And hearing a growling sound, to find Nolomon protecting one of her favorite rainbow-colored balls from brother Pete, then seeing that all 4 of the collected rainbow balls had been scattered around the living room.

Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday... All I saw was clear vomit across the floor, with a few chunks in it. I thought my baby was dying, and that I'd have to contact a vet to get her cremated, just like I had to do with Gracie back in New Jersey in 2009 (though it took Gracie 3 months to die).

And I also thought of something I'd thought so cavalierly back when I finally decided to keep all 3 kittens in May 2019 (and then #5 Cinco in December 2019): "Well, with so many cats, one or two might die, and it really won't affect me." Well, the thought of Solomon dying really did affect me. And also made me think of people living 100 years ago who had numerous kids and were mentally prepared to see one or more go at a young age...but sometimes the one that went was a favorite, and it messed them up psychologically (for instance, George Jones told of a favorite sister who died young---driving his previously hard-working father to drink and violence).

Not that Solomon's death would have affected me as deeply as the death of a child, but... I know that her death would have at least cast a pall over my everyday doings. (As did Gracie's death in 2009: I felt cursed for a long time. And did not have another cat until Mama Hennessy found me in 2019 and had her kittens in my neighbor's backyard.)

And, this is terrible, but I also thought about which of my five cats I would miss the most:

(1) Solomon (adore)
(2) Mama Hennessy (love; a feral cat I'd been feeding outside since July 2018; she'd sit on my fence with the wind blowing her hair, and jump up on my leg sans claws whenever I'd come out to feed her; her three kittens born in neighbor's yard in April 2019)
(3) Peter-Pat (love; Pete is so affectionate and sweet and downright BIG and hearty and handsome and fun to play with---he and Solomon/Moonie, and sometimes Mama, are my primary playmates)
(4) Sasha-Susie (like; I pet her every day, and she loves to roll over to have her belly petted, but she's usually stand-offish. I respect her lady-like behavior and give her her space)
(5) Cinco (like; she still won't let me pet her, after 6 months in my house!)

I survived another 4th o' July!

I can't claim to speak for all singletons living in apartment complexes during the 4th of July and New Year's Eve, but for me, these two days of the year have been both sad and angst-ridden for the past 20 or so years.

I had a couple of good July 4s during this time: when I lived in NYC and/or Weehawken, especially in the year that the city moved the fireworks display from the East River over to the Hudson River---a one-minute walk from my apartment to the Hudson to watch the magnificent display!

But usually it's been me just hunkering down at home, not invited anywhere, just bracing myself for whatever fireworks my loud, young neighbors would be exploding in the streets or parking lots adjacent to where I lived.

One of the worst times was 2017 in my current apartment complex, when a group of constantly loud and ill-behaving neighbors set off fireworks by the pool, right in the middle of where we all lived. (Luckily, other people complained and this group was kicked out soon after.) Another particularly bad year was in the early 2000s, when I was renting a house in East Austin: After hours of explosions from a neighbor's yard, I finally had to go over around 3am and outright lie: "My baby is sleeping. Can you please finish up soon?" (No, I've never had a baby!)

This year: Heard a few ongoing muffled explosions from 9:30pm to 2:30am, but nothing aggressively close/within the complex itself.

Happy about this year's low-key fireworks. But also sad, as usual. I wish that "4th of July" for me meant cookouts with family and/or friends. And that "New Year's Eve" meant, also, time with family and/or friends. Nah. Just hunkering down and bracing for the worst. Then being grateful when "the worst" doesn't happen.

I fear my Moonie is dying

Thursday I woke up with my black Solomon Grundy cat (aka "Mini," "Moonie," "Nolomon Newly") sitting sluggish and catatonic by the water bowls. She moved around to various spots during the day, but never acknowledged me, though I stroked her. She had something white hanging around her mouth; and she threw up at least 3 times that I saw, a couple of times with small clumps of gray matter in mainly clear liquid. I couldn't tell what the "gray matter" was.

Friday, same thing.

Saturday, she finally jumped up on me while I was lying on the couch, and went to sleep on me and let me stroke her and sing her song ("Solomon Grundy / Met you on a Saturday / It was a rainy day..."). During the day, I tried putting food dishes right in front of her, and tried adding some tuna treats to her dish (while keeping the others away). She still didn't eat.

Today, Sunday, I saw her drink water. But not eat. And she's skin-and-bones. But she is affectionate with me, and she is now, finally, again acting interested in what the other cats are doing. A good sign. (And she just now jumped up in my lap as I'm typing.)

But you've got to eat, my Moons. Don't be that lamb in the Ted Hughes poem that just didn't want to live!

Top Hat (1935)

A couple of nights ago, I turned on one of my favorite cable stations, TCM. 1935's "Top Hat" (with Astaire/Rogers) was about to show. Host Ben Mankiewicz had to add his smarmy, irrelevant, Social-Justice-Warrior 2020 two cents: "How could they be so frivolous in the middle of the Great Depression?" Shut up, already. We're not Soviet Russia, creating only grim, strait-laced propaganda films. Gawd, I hate left-wing fascists trying to tell us how to think and trying to tell artists what is or is not "appropriate" to create.

King Of The Road (Julie London: 1965)

Jane Lynch: King of the Road

Just bought the Jane Lynch Christmas album!

You've Still Got a Place In My Heart (George Jones, 1984)

From "Daffodils" (Ted Hughes)

...Our lives were still a raid on our own good luck.
We knew we'd live for ever. We had not learned
What a fleeting glance of the everlasting
Daffodils are. Never identified
The nuptial flight of the rarest ephemera--
Our own days!

We thought they were a windfall.
Never guessed they were a last blessing.

Octopus's Garden (The Beatles: 1969)

Austin: 2020

 From my apartment complex's weekly mail:

"Hi i lost a package with a octopus skirt. If you have it please knock on [apt number]."

------------------





I lost a package with a octopus skirt
Eight arms to hold me, but no desert
Misplaced the article, but it can't hurt...

If you have it, please knock, and I'll let you in
The octopus knows where we've been...

Murdered

I have one friend that I used to be psychically close to. I predicted the death of her mother, and her pregnancy. (The death of her mother in the late '80s: I dreamt I was looking at a September calendar, with the dates "30" and "31" circled. There is no "September 31." Her mother died on September 30. The pregnancy in the mid-'90s: I'd dreamt she was pregnant and told her about it during a phone conversation; she laughed it off. The next month: She was pregnant.)

I haven't talked to her in years, but: Early this Sunday morning, I dreamt that this friend and I had gone to an Irish bar in New Jersey. I had left early and gone back to a hotel to sleep. I woke up with my friend not lying beside me. I then went back to the bar that morning to find out where she was. Police were there; her throat had been slashed. (Side-dream-crime-note: A former work friend of mine had also been at the same bar and had attempted to get away in her car; the murderer had caught her also and slashed HER throat. Quite a scene!)

I haven't been in touch with this friend for over 10 years. And I certainly don't wish her ill, so I don't think it was my own psyche at work. (Same with the addendum work friend who also got murdered in the dream----sorry, y'all!)

Posting it here as a psychic record, just in case.

Smoking

Yes, smoking is bad for you. I've been told for decades. But it's only now that the warnings are making sense.

Because of the Wuhan virus, I've been working from home since late March.

Normally at a job, my habit was to smoke two cigs in the morning before work, then one at lunch, then one in the afternoon, then one on my way home in the car (then a bunch once I got home if I was working on my Joan website that evening). A total of 15 to 20 cigarettes per day.

While working from home, though, I've been smoking like a proverbial chimney. About 15 cigarettes during work hours, then another 15 or more after-hours.

Waking up the next day coughing terribly, with great shortness of breath. This hacking has gone on for weeks now. It's embarrassing. One thing about me is my vanity: I'm embarrassed to be coughing and hacking like an old, decrepit woman.

This past Friday, I tried limiting myself: One cigarette only at the top of every hour. That lasted successfully during the day, and up until about 7pm... when the post-work beer kicked in and I also couldn't stop lighting a new cigarette at the very end of the last one. Woke up the next day again coughing terribly.

I've been chain-smoking for hours as I write this on a Sunday evening... But I KNOW I have to do something to curb the habit, or I'm going to come down with something terrible.

I'm in my 50s now, and my immune system isn't what it once was. People die from stuff in their 50s. I'm not quite sure what to do. I think the Friday plan was good---one cigarette per hour. But how to sustain that goal once you're drinking and feeling "high"?

Kate Bush: Wuthering Heights (1978)

Out on the wiley, windy moors
We'd roll and fall in dream
You had a temper like my jealousy
Too hard, too greedy
How could you leave me
When I needed to possess you?
I hated you. I loved you, too

Bad dreams in the night
They told me I was going to lose the fight
Leave behind my wuthering, wuthering
Wuthering Heights

Heathcliff, it's me, your Cathy
I've come home. I'm so cold
Let me into your window

Ooh, it gets dark! It gets lonely
On the other side from you
I pine a lot. I find the lot
Falls through without you
I'm coming back, love
Cruel Heathcliff, my one dream
My only master

Too long I roam in the night
I'm coming back to his side, to put it right
I'm coming home to wuthering, wuthering
Wuthering Heights

Heathcliff, it's me, your Cathy
I've come home. I'm so cold
Let me into your window

George Jones: You Must Have Walked Across My Mind Again (1983)

George Jones: "Hello Trouble" (1983)

Thomas Hardy Kick

A poll I saw a couple of months ago asked why people kept on living. "Learning New Things" was at the bottom of the list (but at the top of mine).

My latest interest is Thomas Hardy. In the past month have read "Jude the Obscure" and "The Mayor of Casterbridge." Am currently re-reading "Tess of the D'Urbervilles." ("Far From the Madding Crowd" next.) And just received bios and poems and a "Wessex" history.

Sad to say, I've never met anyone who wants to go on literary/historical tours of Britain or Russia or Germany with me. I'm OK by myself for the most part, but... I think when I die, I'll be most sorry that I never had anyone to travel with.

From "The Mayor of Casterbridge":

The pain she experienced from the almost absolute obliviousness to her existence that was shown by the pair of them became at times half dissipated by her sense of its humorousness. When Lucetta had pricked her finger they were as deeply concerned as if she were dying; when she herself had been seriously sick or in danger they uttered a conventional word of sympathy at the news, and forgot all about it immediately.

She had learnt the lesson of renunciation, and was as familiar with the wreck of each day's wishes as with the diurnal setting of the sun.

Bubba and The Noose

https://garyfouse.blogspot.com/2020/06/bubba-wallace-and-noose.html

Bubba and The Noose. Oh wait. As it turns out, the "NASCAR Noose Drama" was all invented. The "noose" was a handle to pull down the garage door. And it had been in the same garage before Bubba was assigned to it.

Dear Jussie, er, Bubba: If you want to drive with the big boys, then stop crying "racism" at the drop of a...non-noose. Shut up and drive. Just like the white guys do.

Chicago Homicides 2020

https://graphics.suntimes.com/homicides/

290 homicides in Chicago in 2020. How many just this past weekend, when a couple of 3-year-olds were shot? How many of these 290 were blacks killed by police? How many were blacks killed by other blacks?

Where are the marches, and looting, in memory of the black children murdered by young black men? There will never be peace until the Black Community acknowledges its own sociopathy.

Swinging Statues

If it were up to Leftists, the only statues allowed in America would be those of MLK, Barbara Jordan, Cesar Chavez, and Barack Obama. (Oh, but wait: In the '90s, Congresswoman Jordan recommended that legal immigration to the US be limited... Tear THAT statue down, too!)

My Heart Belongs to Hennessy

From: The Mayor of Casterbridge (Thomas Hardy, 1886)

And thus Henchard found himself again on the precise standing which he had occupied a quarter of a century before. Externally there was nothing to hinder his making another start on the upward slope, and by his new lights achieving higher things than his soul in its half-formed state had been able to accomplish. But the ingenious machinery contrived by the Gods for reducing human possibilities of amelioration to a minimum---which arranges that wisdom to do shall come pari passu [at an equal pace] with the departure of zest for doing---stood in the way of all that. He had no wish to make an arena a second time of a world that had become a mere painted scene to him.

Ilhan Omar: 1995 immigrant

Omar was a Somalian immigrant to the US in 1995. You'd think she'd be grateful, and awestruck at how in the world she ever got elected to the US Congress. According to Omar, the US is evil and racist. Yet... how did a 1995 African immigrant get elected to Congress if the country is so horrible? She doesn't at all understand or appreciate the open concept of our country. Which she is now taking advantage of in order to condemn the very system that allowed her rise. She is truly sick.

p.s. On a negative, but truthful, note: Wherever Somalians have been allowed into a country, whether the US or Britain, they've brought crime and chaos. Is that "racism" or is that "crime statistics"?

https://townhall.com/tipsheet/

This Wanting You (George Jones, 1999)

I almost wish that I could lose my mind sometimes
Then maybe I'd be free of memories you left behind
With every single thought I hate to face the truth
It's never ending, always there this wanting you.

Well, I go through my life with only one desire
Other arms have held me close but they can't kill the fire
This flame inside my heart has never burned so blue
It's never ending always there this wanting you.

You're in my mind all the time how long will it last?
Why can't I leave our love in peace, it's buried in the past
You let go so long ago but I still can't turn loose
Oh, it's never ending, it's always there this wanting you.

You Never Know Just How Good You've Got It (George Jones, 1999)

Last Call for Pier 1 Candles!

I've been buying Pier 1's lavendar and Asian spice candles (with the occasional rainbow or citrus or musk) for probably 20 years now. Now that the company's stores are closing, today stood in line outside the store to get in at noon to buy the last 11 lavendar/Asian spice candles they had, to tide me over for the next year, I guess. But after that?! (OMG! First-world problems! Hey---I've had plenty o' years when I couldn't afford ANY candles, so I'm glad to have finally earned the right to "first-world problems," thanks.)

Why is GWTW so threatening to fascists?

After writing my "Fascism 2020" post a couple of days ago re Confederate monuments being knocked down and "Gone with the Wind" being banned by HBO, I wondered afterward if I was being overdramatic or hysterical. I had a feeling that something was very wrong in the destruction/banning that was going on, but...was I overreacting by calling the perpetrators "fascists"?

Just tonight, though, happened upon an American Masters program on PBS about Margaret Mitchell, which included, of course, GWTW info. Turns out that the book was banned by both Nazi Germany and Stalinist Russia. And now the movie is banned by an American media giant like HBO. Hmmm... What about the book and/or movie is so threatening to certain powers-that-be?

Our Bed of Roses -- George Jones (1999)

The morning we moved in this house you said
Let's make a bed of roses
So hand in hand we found that special place
And I broke the ground
I wiped that delta dirt from your face
As you knelt there to sow them
Oh, I'd give anything a mortal man could give
If you could see them now

Through the kitchen window pane,
I can see the roses
The ones we planted that first spring are blooming
Like they did when you were here
Someone's always left behind
When the door of this life closes
So I sit alone and watch it rain on our bed of roses

Some days I sit for hours at a time,
Just staring at those roses
They seem so young and full of life,
But soon they'll face the winter chill
I don't know how long I can survive,
But one thing that I know is
Come spring time the roses will return,
But you never will

Through the kitchen window pane,
Lord, I can see the roses
The ones we planted that first spring are blooming
Like they did when you were here
Someone's always left behind
When the door of this life closes
So I sit alone and watch it rain on our bed of roses...

Fascism 2020

They came first for the Confederate statues of men who had built the state and University, and I only wrote a mild letter of protest to the President of UT. Then, nationally, they came for statues of Columbus and Jefferson, and I didn't speak up because I didn't live in those cities. Then they came for shops and streets in every city in America and looted them, and I didn't speak up because my own apartment complex and neighborhood happened to be untouched. Then they infiltrated the national media and banned TV shows featuring the police, along with the showing of films like "Gone With the Wind," because they did not correspond with current leftist propaganda... 

The US is in the middle of a left-wing fascist takeover. In the name of Orwell or God, somebody please do something. (Trump? Anyone?)


------------------------------------------

Martin Niemoller (1946):
"They came first for the Communists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Communist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist. Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn't speak up because I was a Protestant. Then they came for me, and by that time no one was left to speak up."

George Jones - When The Last Curtain Falls (1999)

The last song on George Jones's 1999 album "Cold Hard Truth." 

His third wife Tammy Wynette had died a year earlier, in 1998, after years of prescription drug addiction.

They had divorced in 1975, although Jones continued to obsess about her for years.

Is this about her? I don't know. Jones didn't write his own material (but I assume top singers got their pick of material). The educated sentimentalist in me says (but doesn't quite know for sure) that this, and several other songs on the album, if not the whole album, are in memory of Tammy.

Even though I still sting from the words that you threw at me
There's no pleasure at all from watching you fall to your knees
'Cause the tables have turned and I'm finally learning to live
And forgive and let go, there's no sweet revenge
At love's angry end and we all need to know

When the last curtain falls with a final goodbye
And the bitter cold darkness of night floods the days of our lives
With a silence so loud we can't feel at all
There's no reason or cause to cheer or applaud when the last curtain falls

The irony is that you're wearing the look I once wore
And in truth I've longed for this moment to settle the score
But it's not all that clear, now that I'm hearin' you echo
The thoughts of my soul, the justice of time
Is not really mine and I want you to know

When the last curtain falls with a final goodbye
And the bitter cold darkness of night floods the days of our lives
With a silence so loud we can't feel at all
There's no reason or cause to cheer or applaud when the last curtain falls
There's no reason or cause to cheer or applaud when the last curtain falls

I'm the Editor, dammit!

Everybody seems to hate, and to have always hated, my personality, so it was with great amazement and gratitude that I accepted some praise today at my work-from-home workplace!

There are 10 of us, plus our boss, all working from home. About 6 of the 11 were there before Wuhan; the rest of us were hired in April or later.

Today, one of the regulars asked me, via e-mail, a question about capitalization of a term and CC'd others on the team. I wrote back, and CC'd, with examples of what the answer should be and why. The regular then offhandedly dismissed what I'd suggested. I kind of expected such and just held my tongue/keyboard fingers (I'm still new; give me time).

But then...Three other people on the team e-mailed the group and completely supported what I'd suggested! One even saying, "Since that's what the Editor says, and she backs it up, then I'll go with that." !! Jesus----when was the last time anyone supported anything I had to say?? :)

The original regular who dismissed me, after reading what the others sent, ended the conversation with: "What do I care? I'm not the editor."

From: The Mayor of Casterbridge (1886 by Thomas Hardy)

The pain she experienced from the almost absolute obliviousness to her existence that was shown by the pair of them became at times half dissipated by her sense of its humorousness. When Lucetta had pricked her finger they were as deeply concerned as if she were dying; when she herself had been seriously sick or in danger they uttered a conventional word of sympathy at the news, and forgot all about it immediately.

She had learnt the lesson of renunciation, and was as familiar with the wreck of each day's wishes as with the diurnal setting of the sun.

Midnight Special (1973): George Jones and Tammy Wynette

Crawdad Song: George and Tammy (1973)

Apologizing for White Privilege

A perfect example of how weak white leftists have been brainwashed by the current media/academic communists----who have made this kind of horrible "apology thing" seem "OK." (p.s. I'm white, from a working-class background. Neither of my parents went to college or had money. I was smart, so I got into the University of Texas, with maybe $1500 in scholarships that lasted one semester. I'm currently still paying off more than $50,000 in student loans for both undergrad and grad school.)

Other examples of "White Privilege": I didn't get hired for a job a few years ago at UT, after 3 months of temping at the same job, because the Hispanic boss had only hired Hispanic assistants for the past 10 years. I once had a black woman chase after me as I headed to a dumpster in my neighborhood; I was throwing out recyclables such as old phone books, but they were in Budweiser boxes. The black woman chased after me to yell something about me corrupting her children and the neighborhood with my beer. (How she had such eagle-eyes to see the logos on the boxes, I do not know.) Same neighborhood, back when I didn't have a car: I could rarely stand at a bus-stop or ride the bus without some drug-addled black or white homeless guy up in my face. Usually harmless, but on three or four occasions when things got rough, it was a black man threatening me, and I was "saved" by a bus driver.

In short: How DARE you idiot leftists say that I have "White Privilege"? And: How DARE someone approach this woman in the video asking her to apologize? And, most importantly, how DARE this idiotic leftist woman kneel on the ground and apologize? If you kneel, you are complicit in your own subjugation. This terribly, terribly weak white woman may be willing to do so, but I'll be goddamned if I will ever do so. Don't push me. This creepily passive woman inspires me to buy a gun and shoot you in the face if you ever ask me to apologize for being white (oh, sorry: European-American).

Trump walks street to St John's Church | Nine News Australia

Australian coverage more accurate/fair than the communist CNN and MSNBC. What's happened to the US media?

Moments of Brilliance

Hardy / Shaw / Ibsen

Thank you for your intellectual honesty.

Just finished reading "Jude the Obscure" by Thomas Hardy---Story of my life! (Also check out Shaw and Ibsen for some similar truths re society vs. character vs. fate.)

RE George Floyd

A couple of years ago in Austin, a police officer shot and killed an unarmed naked man. As it turned out, the officer was Asian; the unarmed naked man was white. End of that story. Needless to say, there were no White Riots. I couldn't even find a reference to it online when I searched tonight.

Yes, there's occasionally a problem with police not acting as calm professionals despite their trying circumstances. Is it a prejudice against black people, or just a prejudice against criminals?

p.s. How many black people were shot in Chicago by young black men in the past year (or, just the past weekend)? The total is far, far greater than the total of black people shot by white police officers in the past year.

Kind of bizarre to me that a cultural sociopathy is being transferred onto the police. Post-1968: Look in the mirror before you blame "evil whites" for the majority of your problems.

George and Tammy: Lovin' You, Lovin' Me

Elvis Presley: Suspicious Minds (1970 in Las Vegas)

Sexy, horrifying, embarrassing, great.

Elvis Presley (1968): Wearin' That Loved On Look

Da Belle of da Ball!

I bought this T-shirt over a year ago---only tonight did some stranger (and his girlfriend) finally say, "Hey, great shirt!" Thank you, Stranger in Parking Lot! Yes, I'm a dork who buys T-shirts expressing my likes and gets satisfaction/validation from others' confirmation of my likes! (How people used to get validation pre-Facebook/Internet.)

p.s. Please excuse my hair--Wuhan/latenight.

p.s.s. Speaking of dorks: Just tonight on eBay, I also bought a $100 lot of George Jones stuff from his former "Jones Country" concert space/home in Colmesneil, Texas. Including buttons, photos, aprons (!), stationery, coozies, and some documents for the purchase of a back-hoe. (Thank you to the "Economic Impact Payment" of $1200 from President Trump! The libertarian in me was aghast; the former Democrat in me said, "I need to buy George Jones stuff on eBay!").

Jane Lynch does Nicki Minaj's 'Anaconda'

Discovered this on late-night PBS (yes, there is such a thing!): Jane Lynch at "The Kate": https://thekate.tv/artist/jane-lynch/

George Jones: "Finally Friday" (1992)

Merle Haggard - Footlights

George Jones "Take Me" & "House of Gold"

If you can get past the intrusive TV setting and host...

This kind of thing

After not speaking to my mother for over 3 years, I was feeling sentimental in early 2020 and, aside from sentimentality, was being realistic: My mother is in her later years. Do I really want to go to a couple of graves (mine and hers) having not spoken to her ever again? No, I did/do not.

Brought her flowers for Mother's Day. Sat and chatted for about 2 hours. It was fine. But at 54, having chosen who I want to be around, and what vibes I want to get, I can't get over some of the low-level ugliness that just can't help but ooze out of her.

For example: We were chatting re my teenaged nephew, who currently likes to shop at Goodwill. I mentioned that I don't like buying Goodwill clothes, but that I do buy used shirts on eBay, or buy from half-off sales on the Chico's website. Chico's shirts, I mentioned, were usually $60 to $80, which I had qualms about spending for a shirt. I happened to have on a Chico's shirt that I'd bought on sale, and pointed that out.

Mom: "THAT is a $40 shirt?"

I'd thought that my shirt looked nice. I tried to be cool and not start a fight: "Yes, this shirt was $60 or more to begin with, I can't remember exactly, and I got it on sale for half off. That's how much shirts cost now. When you go to buy shirts, how much are they?"

She admitted she didn't buy many new shirts. I added: "The only shirts for $20 are at Target."

Today, I spoke to her on the phone. Talk turned to getting older. My mom has a hunched back that's been in progress for over 30 years. I've never said anything about it, but it's a huge scoliosis C-curve. During our conversation today, she pointed out my own poor posture and said that because I also have a hunched back, I would be in pain the way she is... (1) My back isn't anywhere near as hunched as hers! (2) My back has never given me pain. Again, I tried to deflect by saying, "Well, my back has never given me pain so far, but I am worried about my cracked tail-bone, because it hurts in cold weather..."

I'd also mentioned that I was in touch with my uncle on Facebook, and I said how positive he was, and that I really liked him. Mom: "He was always sneaky."

There is ALWAYS something that she tries to make me feel bad about. It's insane. I used to think it was partly me. It's not me.

But I've made the acknowledgment with myself that I DO want to have a relationship with my mother, especially now during her later years. But even after 3 years of not talking to her, it is so incredibly strange that she is still taking jabs at me for no reason. I'm 54 years old! She's 79! It's so creepy, and the vibe is so immediately bad when she STILL says her weird, negative shit. I really am trying to be bigger --- this is, for sure, a test of any "growth in consciousness" that I might ever hope to reach.

RIP Little Richard

Eric Clapton "Running on Faith" Unplugged (1992)

Real Poetry Ain't Your Stupid Therapy

The below is by some random woman that I found online when searching for Sylvia Plath information. EVERY SINGLE POINT I DO NOT AGREE WITH. Just posted here to show how utterly ignorant some people are. Not to shame, but the below author deserves shaming: Julie Lomoe.

Here are her idiotic "seven reasons I love writing poetry" in brief. Not one of which has anything to do with poetry. In fact, every single thing she has to say is the absolute antithesis of real poetry and real inspiration.

Poetry is speedy.
Poetry’s a good way of catching ideas on the fly. 
Poetry’s a wonderful way of processing your emotions.  
Poetry’s highly subjective, and hardly anyone knows what makes a good poem. 
Poetry’s great for getting immediate feedback and applause. 
Poetry’s highly compatible with computers. 
Poetry’s a good way to hone your literary skills in other genres.

The lengthier versions of the above (yes, someone really wrote this):

Seven reasons I love writing poetry

Writing poetry is a wonderful way to jumpstart your creativity and hone your writing skills. A decade ago, I wouldn’t have dared write this sentence, much less declare myself a poet, but now I have no qualms about it. After all, who decides who’s a poet and who isn’t? Danged if I know.

I’ve written in many genres over the years, but poetry eluded me until the year 2001. As a member of the First Unitarian Universalist Society of Albany, I had the opportunity to submit my work to the Oriel, the congregation’s annual literary magazine, and I decided to give it a try. Since then, poetry has become one of my favorite means of expressing myself. I have no aspirations to fame and fortune as a poet; I haven’t even published a chapbook yet. But there’s something wonderfully satisfying about writing poetry. Today I’d like to share seven reasons I love this art form.

• Poetry is speedy. On average, once the words start to flow, it takes me about an hour to come up with a reasonably polished first draft – about the same time I spend on a blog post.
• Poetry’s a good way of catching ideas on the fly. Most of my poetic inspiration comes from immediate experience. There’s usually an “ah hah!” moment when I think “this would make a good poem.” If I’ve got a journal handy, I jot down a few preliminary phrases and ideas. This isn’t always possible, though. When I was skiing down Panorama at Jiminy Peak last week, the slushy spring conditions inspired me to think, “This would be a good blog post. No, on second thought, it would be better as a poem.” It wasn’t until later, when I was at the bar with my hot buttered rum, that I had a chance to capture the ideas on paper. You can read the results in Monday’s blog on skiing.
• Poetry’s a wonderful way of processing your emotions. I became intensively involved in poetry a few years ago, when I was depressed and discouraged about publishing my novels. Exploring my feelings through poetry became a vital way of coping with my depression. For many, poetry has been literally life-saving.
• Poetry’s highly subjective, and hardly anyone knows what makes a good poem. It’s a lot like the cliché about visual art, “I don’t know much about art, but I know what I like.” That’s how most people react to poetry.
• Poetry’s great for getting immediate feedback and applause. No matter where you live, there’s likely to be at least one poetry open mic near you. Many of my poems have been precipitated by the knowledge that there’s an open reading that night and I really ought to bring something new. Most poetry audiences are supportive and enthusiastic no matter what you read.
• Poetry’s highly compatible with computers. I do my best writing in Microsoft word, editing as I go. Some poets prefer longhand, but I love the flexibility of diving in with the first phrase that comes to mind, then playing around with the words on the screen.
• Poetry’s a good way to hone your literary skills in other genres. In poetry, every word counts. Part of the process lies in finding the best possible way to communicate your ideas in the fewest possible words, rooting out the clichés and discovering the most powerful images possible. The habit of writing this way carries over into other genres.

August 1953

50 Years Later: May 4 Kent State Shooting

Have been watching media coverage of the May 4, 1970, shootings of 4 students at Kent State by National Guardsmen. What I found out from extensive C-SPAN viewing though: In the days prior to the May 4 shootings, students protesting Nixon had rampaged through downtown Kent, smashing shop windows, and had set fire to the ROTC building on campus, burning it to the ground. Given this violence, the governor called out the National Guard in anticipation of the student rally scheduled for Monday, May 4, on the Kent State campus.

As media coverage would have it, the "fascist" government was trying to stifle free speech. As reality would have it, the violence of the students in the days prior called for some proactive protective response.

"No Show Jones"

George Jones - The Grand Tour (1975)

George Jones is the Thomas Hardy of Country singers. Unlike Willie, George isn't about groovin' or feelin' good at the moment. Rather, he sings about "emotion recollected in tranquillity" (Wordsworth). Like Hardy (and Wordsworth), the terrible made palatable for the rest of us to later experience vicariously. (If we've been through such a thing, we know, and nod in recognition of, what he's now dumbing down. If we're new to the experience, we get a sense of how bad, but don't have to go through it ourselves.)

George Jones - A Day In The Life Of A Fool (1971)

Off to work with no kiss or goodbye
Wear a smile on my face but I lie
Cup of coffee at the corner cafe
Catch the bus, read the news on my way
Go through motions the whole morning through
Start a day in the life of a fool

Sometimes I dial our number in hopes you've returned
But there's never an answer, guess I'll never learn
Hurry home, as tomorrow is through
Check the mail box, no letter from you
Then I rush up the stairs to my memories of you
That's a day in the life of a fool

Yes, I rush up the stairs to my memories of you
That's a day in the life of a fool...

Give an Azle girl a few extra dollars...

...and what does she immediately buy after 6 months of penury? Walmart bulletin boards and a huge set of hangers, bargain-priced! (Still too nervous to make any bigger purchases, like phone or couch!)

The Rabbit Catcher: Sylvia Plath

After reading Hardy's account in "Jude" of the screaming rabbit caught in a trap, I was immediately reminded of Plath's "The Rabbit Catcher," which was based on a real-life incident. As recounted later by Plath's husband Ted Hughes, they were out walking in the English countryside and she, horrified by the traps they were coming across, intentionally set the traps off, thus ruining them for the hunter. Ted, in recollection, mildly chastised her for spoiling the unseen trap-setter's livelihood. (Sylvia is Hardy's sensitive Jude; Ted, Hardy's realistic Arabella.)


The Rabbit Catcher

It was a place of force—
The wind gagging my mouth with my own blown hair,
Tearing off my voice, and the sea
Blinding me with its lights, the lives of the dead
Unreeling in it, spreading like oil.

I tasted the malignity of the gorse,
Its black spikes,
The extreme unction of its yellow candle-flowers.
They had an efficiency, a great beauty,
And were extravagant, like torture.

There was only one place to get to.
Simmering, perfumed,
The paths narrowed into the hollow.
And the snares almost effaced themselves—
Zeros, shutting on nothing,

Set close, like birth pangs.
The absence of shrieks
Made a hole in the hot day, a vacancy.
The glassy light was a clear wall,
The thickets quiet.

I felt a still busyness, an intent.
I felt hands round a tea mug, dull, blunt,
Ringing the white china.
How they awaited him, those little deaths!
They waited like sweethearts. They excited him.

And we, too, had a relationship—
Tight wires between us,
Pegs too deep to uproot, and a mind like a ring
Sliding shut on some quick thing,
The constriction killing me also.

_____________ [my/your name here] the Obscure

After at least 6 months of not reading a damn thing, I finally took the leap and opened Thomas Hardy's "Jude the Obscure." (I'd loved his "Tess of the d'Urbervilles" back in my college days, but hadn't explored much more Hardy since.)

"Jude" is Hardy's last novel, published in 1895. Until his death in 1928, he published only poems after that. Allegedly because of the harsh reception of the book's critique of marriage. (But perhaps also because Hardy had just shot his load, and had nothing else to say on his grand topics of his age's hypocrisy.)

I'm only halfway through. At the beginning, I completely identified with Jude and his yearning for "Christminster" (Oxford), and his efforts to get there. Reminded me of myself and my own youthful yearning for New York City and what I thought it would be. And then the appearance of my own "Sue Bridehead"! The local girl Arabella wasn't a problem---she, I thought, was only the problem of a 19th-century man such as Jude, and not that of a 21st-century bisexual woman! It wasn't like I was ever going to get anyone pregnant! :)  Although, wait, I did yearn for a local Azle girl for years, to the detriment of my scholarship!

But then came Sue! Dear god. What an uber-modern neurotic. Saying one thing on one page, then contradicting herself on the other. (Hardy offers a passage about Sue being very free-thinking in the abstract but very conservative in actuality. Jude also comments to Sue that she is much nicer when she writes than in actuality. This is both me AND someone I've known fairly recently! (Jude also posits that the first great effort of his life was derailed by one woman, and the second... by another woman! I can relate: I think Ginny messed up UT for me, and that Sandra messed up NYC.)

So still interesting up to this point.... But I've now just stopped where Sue left her schoolmaster husband (Jude's original inspiration for dreaming of Christminster) and has run off with Jude... After their pseudo-passions (touching hands and sharing intense feelings and radical ideas, and such), Jude thinks they're about to live together as man and wife... And Sue is now pontificating on why she STILL doesn't think of him that way... (She's already told Jude about a platonic male friend she once had, whom she once shared radical ideas with and who has since died---her ideal, apparently. Oh, Jesus: I'm Sue, remembering Ginny. AND I'm Jude wanting Sue, who is Sandra. And Sandra wants Jim---who is his own Sue when it comes to her. WOW, Hardy.)

I've already read the critical preface to the book and so know that it doesn't end particularly well: Everyone is true to their awful selves! Like in real life!

Thanks, Hardy, for your horrible/brilliant realism re human nature! :)

George Jones: Bring On The Clowns (1975)

Post 6 months of penury...

After a nice check from my new job on May 1, ordered from Amazon/eBay/Walmart:

Bath rugs
Cat toys
Small bookshelf
James Bond themes CD
Mail holder
Bulletin-board/Dry-erase set plus markers/eraser

Also went to the grocery store and bought salmon for $12, etc., and other stuff, just because I could, rather than just staples like beans.

Aaaaahhhh...glad to have some spare cash again.

Coming up with next paycheck:

A good desk-chair
My first smart phone

Coming up with paycheck after that:

A new sectional couch

George Jones: "Someday My Day Will Come" (1978)

George Jones: "Take Me" from "A Poem is a Naked Person"

Little River Band - Lady 1978

An example of a good song that I hated when it came out because the group was so horribly old and dorky-looking, and the music was so seemingly mushy. (On bus rides home from junior high basketball games, someone would usually lead off an a capella version of this song.)

"Feel for the winter but don't have a cold heart..."

Listening/looking today: The song is good; the musicians still look terrible. Nobody wants an accountant telling their life story!

George Jones: Shine On

George Jones: Loving You Could Never Be Better (1972)

Tammy is offstage screeching "harmony." And she's kind of ruining it. And George doesn't look happy. (Love Tammy, but not here.)

When Neighbors Have Really Loud Sex

I first experienced hearing others having sex in the early '90s, at my duplex on Rainey Street in Austin. The walls were thin, my neighbor's howls were loud. It was uncomfortable to listen to. (At one point, my own lover was on his way over, and I mentioned how loud my neighbor was and that I was about to bang on the adjoining wall... He gently admonished me: "Let them have their fun.")

Next, in grad school in San Francisco (1995), while in a one-room apartment next to another one-room apartment that housed the apartment manager and his angry-sex girlfriend. They were constantly screaming at each other and then loudly fucking each other. (Does a neighbor have the right to NOT have to listen to all of that?)

Most recently (like, TONIGHT): With the coming (no pun intended) of spring, a girl in the apartments across from me leaves her windows open. She's not there every day of the week, but perhaps once a week or so, the windows are open and she's laughing loudly until 2 am, and at the end of the hilarity comes (no pun intended) some loud sexual hollering.

Is it WRONG to be annoyed by hearing others having loud sex? Am I annoyed just because I'm jealous and not having sex myself (as has been posited by many)?

Personally, I'm not in the least bit turned on by hearing others having sex. (1) It's like hearing others' loud, intrusive music --- I'm not into what they're into at the moment. (2) I always judge the sounds of the women, which always seem overdramatic. If they're howling like they're howling, then I think they've probably watched too many porn videos and are vocalizing like they think they're supposed to be vocalizing. (3) That said: What if the guy they're with is actually making them howl that way? (Um... probably not.)

Getting My Shit Together

Post-estrangement/pre-Wuhan, my mother came over to my apartment in late February after we had had lunch. Frankly, I was embarrassed at the state of my "library," which had once looked nice but had since degenerated into a "storage room" of sorts: random boxes and bags and small bookshelves sitting everywhere, etc. In fact, my mother asked, "Are you using this room for storage?" NO! It's supposed to be my restful library!

Outside judgment, when it echoes your own thoughts, can be helpful. And so I spent 3 or 4 hours last week getting shit put away where it belongs!

Another thing: One wall in my main bathroom was completely barren and un-thought-out. I suddenly remembered the Klimt "Girlfriends" wall-hanging that I'd once had up in the bedroom of a former apartment, but since moving here had been stored away in a closet...It would be, and was, PERFECT for the bathroom spot.

"Girlfriends" and Solomon.

George Jones & Dolly Parton: Blues Man (2005)

George Jones - I Just Got Tired Of Being Poor (1972)

My life with trouble goes back to the candy

That I stole from Jessie Walker's country store

A penny separated me from choosing sides with honesty

And I just got tired of bein' poor.

Some folks eat their supper off of silver

And the only world they'll ever know is wealth

But I can't blame the rich folks for these big tall walls

This prison is the doings of myself.

Freedom ran away from me at twenty-three

I broke the lock on one too many doors

My hungry hands would not behave

When they got close to things they crave

I just got tired of bein' poor.

I remember Willie Jack who laughed at me

And the talking about the ragged clothes I wore

That's when Willie got a taste of all my knuckles in his face

I just got tired of bein' poor.

Some folks eat their supper off of silver

And the only world they'll ever know is wealth

But I can't blame the rich folks for these big tall walls

This prison is the doings of myself.

Freedom ran away from me at twenty-three

I broke the lock on one too many doors

My hungry hands would not behave

When they got close to things they crave

I just got tired of bein' poor.

I just got tired of bein' poor

Cleansing the Palate: George Jones: The Race Is On

Play loud. Survive the inanity of "stay safe" and "wear a mask."

Dolly Parton: Two Doors Down (1978)

Written and performed by Parton.

Dolly Parton: Tennessee Homesick Blues (1984)

Written and performed by Parton.

Lots of Dolly Parton on TV over the weekend (bios on A&E and REELZ), so I'm guessing she has something new coming out. Brief cynicism aside, Dolly Parton is just about the perfect performer, both deep and shallow. And she has, over the past 5 decades in public life, revealed absolutely nothing about her personal self or innermost feelings, except through her songs. (Very much a relief in today's idiotic tell-all world, where people rely, via social media, on photos of what they had for lunch or who they might've been raped by to "make connections" with others. My personal social-media-favorite "confession," aside from "#metoo": "I suffer from anxiety.") Old School = Their talent perhaps matches the exact thing you've been feeling but unable to express. And, no, not that you both just had a sandwich for lunch.

p.s. Dolly's singing here about NYC, but I personally found the city to be extraordinary and NOT phony. Phony places I've lived? Austin and San Francisco---wherever self-righteous PC people dwell. New York was/is too merit-based for such foolishness (despite the current media based there).

I Never Sang For My...

...Mother?

Friday night went to sleep on the couch, then had a vivid dream where I was literally flying to a house (dodging phone/cable lines in the air), where my mother told me that her house was sold, and then she tried to tell me about some money from a fund that was coming to me. I saw the graphics from the fund, and they made no sense, and I yelled at her that they made no sense. Disturbing.

After this dream, I woke up around 4am to "I Never Sang For My Father" on Turner Classic Movies. At the end, the elderly father, Melvyn Douglas, told his son, Gene Hackman, that he'd enjoyed listening to him sing a certain song when he was little. As it turned out, Hackman, as a small child, had sung the song with his mother at their piano. But whenever the father had come downstairs to listen, Hackman, as a boy, had immediately stopped singing. The latter-day Hackman told his aging father that he'd never sung the song for him. Douglas replied: "But I always enjoyed listening to it."

Kind of broke my heart.

Reminded me of a story my mother recently told me: In post-war Germany, she and a teen girlfriend were sneaking cigarettes. A hausfrau came upon them and expressed her disapproval: "Next, the Russians will be here." Fast forward to when I was an 18-year-old visiting Germany with my mother in 1983. We were waiting on a street-corner for a bus, and I lit a cigarette, and my mother let me know how disgusting I was. At the time, I didn't know that she'd ever smoked when she was a kid. All I knew was that she thought I was a scumbag for lighting a cigarette as an adult. (I immediately put my cigarette out; my German aunt later told my mother how respectful I was.) Point being: My mother had intentionally made me feel like a scumbag for smoking when in fact she'd actually smoked herself as a kid. Why? This same kind of thing happened over and over and over. I was always made to feel like I was doing something wrong.

Bobby Doyle Three: My Mammy

The recent death of Kenny Rogers reminded me of a former band-mate of his, Bobby Doyle. In the early '90s, Doyle used to play piano in a very small, dark Austin bar called "Ego's" on South Congress. Today, Ego's is a "hip" karaoke hangout; the young waitresses have nose-rings. Back in the '90s, though, the waitresses were 40-something, hair-sprayed, and as hard-core as the place. No karaoke, just the blind Bobby Doyle on the piano, his girlfriend sitting next to him, and Christmas lights illuminating it all.

Doyle died in 2006 in Austin. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bobby_Doyle_(jazz_vocalist)

Post-Wuhan

Saw a little chart on the news today. These things are apparently up during our Wuhan-quarantine:

Domestic violence
Drinking/drugs
Gaming
Porn watching

Though, really, the above sound more like what MEN are resorting to out of boredom. Wonder what women are doing more of?

Interesting to see stats 9 months from now: More divorces or another great Baby Boom?

Happy Birthday, Babies!

1 year old, either April 6 or April 7! Good job, Mama Hennessy, for getting them back to near my yard in the middle of those rainstorms!

Just born.

From left: Mama Hennessy, Sasha-Su, Solomon (Mini), and Mr. Pete.

Poor LIttle Fool: Ricky Nelson (1958)

To those of us who initially rejected this scenario...what did we get in return?

Wuhan Woozy

My hair looks like shit, I need a spring pedicure, I'm about to need toilet paper for real... (I got lucky with a 12-pack of TP 2 weeks ago; since then, no grocery store or drugstore has any...What are we supposed to do, use LEAVES, newspaper being obsolete.)

Luckily no beer or cigarette or Coca-Cola shortages...

Job-wise: I got REAL lucky while temping. The office shut down March 13, but the data-entry job I was doing happened to be doable from home. So I've had regular income (albeit less than 40 hours per week), enough to pay rent and bills. A real stroke of luck, for which I'm extremely grateful.

And the oddest thing: I had an hour-long permanent job interview a couple of weeks ago over the phone, right after everyone went on shut-down nationwide. And they hired me a few days later. And I'm starting next Monday, albeit "starting" means just driving to the office and picking up a computer so I can work from home. And it's $8,000 more per year than I was making at the job I quit last October! I still don't quite believe it; I guess I won't believe it until I actually meet some real-life people at the workplace!

Even more oddly: A few days before I was offered the above job, I was offered another job (which paid about $3,000 more per year than the job I quit last year). I accepted this one at first, but it fell through. Not only did it pay less than the job I ultimately got, but it also took an hour to get home in Austin traffic (although only 11 miles away). The job I finally got is only a few miles away from my apartment. At the time the first job fell through, I was panicked and desolate... but look how things turned out! A LOT more money, and a much shorter drive.

We'll see how things go after April 13...

In the meantime: THANK YOU, God, for the recent good fortune! I am very, very, VERY grateful. Things could have turned out a LOT worse.

Marty Robbins: Singing The Blues (1956)

George Jones - He Stopped Loving Her Today

Sung in the sunlight, beneath a beautiful blue sky, with hair flowing... It's almost like watching Willie... Well, except for the leisure-suit, angst, lack of groove (not necessarily a bad thing in this case), and non-stoned town-square audience...

Is George truly meant for daylight?

George Jones - Things Have Gone To Pieces

George Jones and Tammy Wynette - Milwaukee Here I Come

George Jones: Too Wild Too Long (1987)

The opposite of a poseur. Love this godawful cover, George! :)

"You always looked so good this time of night..."
"Sometimes I miss a family, sometimes I miss a plane..."

Sincerely

Every cable station that's coming back from break with coronavirus news, as well as every "we'll get through this" advertisement, plays the same saccharine/sincere music. To me, the aural equivalent of this "Three Men and a Baby" picture from years ago (which has always irritated me for some reason---I really hate it when actors, and news stations, try to act loving and sincere).

My Corona

The 1957 Asian Flu Pandemic

https://www.city-journal.org/1957-asian-flu-pandemic

Are we supposed to shut down our entire country EVERY time a global flu makes its rounds? (Which seems to happen on a fairly regular basis.) This current shut-down is getting ridiculous. I need to go to work. I need toilet paper. I need to get my hair cut. I need basketball on the TV.