The Lord’s Prayer

This past week, all three Jeopardy contestants did not know the first line of a very basic religious and literary text:

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Our Father who art in heaven,
hallowed be thy name.
Thy kingdom come,
Thy will be done
on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread,
and forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive those who trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom and the power, and the glory,
forever and ever.

Amen.

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You don't need to be "religious" to know this. (Though, when I was growing up, all kids knew this by heart.) Aside from religion, it's also a basic tenet of literature.

Reminds me: Back in the mid-2010s, I was at a Christmas dinner with the family. As it turned out, my two nephews, born in 2002 and 2006, had no idea where the concept of "Christmas" came from---because neither their parents nor their schools had ever bothered telling them. (How odd! Such a major holiday, and no one today telling the children why we celebrate it...)

I don't care if you're religious or not---at least teach your kids that today's Christmas holiday is based on Christ. (If you're extra-fancy, you can add that the holiday is derived from earlier pagan Winter solstice celebrations.)

Old and Bitter Is My Fate?!

When I lived in NYC and was struggling for work in 2007 thru 2010, I was in my early 40s. I realize now that "early 40s" was a bit too late to try to make it in NYC, sans any connections. I didn't quite have the energy to make a HUGE effort. I applied to jobs and went to temp agencies. But I think now that I gave it only about 75% percent. I was too old to take ANY crappy job or to live in ANY crappy place. In short, at 40-plus, I was not willing to do ANYTHING to make it in my new environment. (At 40-plus, I had a definite sense of my work background and wanted something on that level; same with my living quarters. Though, once I was forced to return to Austin in 2010, I soon got a comeuppance when all I could then afford was a 400-sq-ft apartment for the next 4 years! Had I accepted this in NYC, perhaps I could have extended my stay there...)

Recently, I have been very lethargic and not wanting to strive for anything, and not particularly liking anything. Reminded me of a 50-something female co-worker I met in NYC, while working at Morgan-Stanley. She and I, along with two other guys, worked the night shift together. During down-times, I'd chat with the guys, learn about their lives. (One guy led mountain-climbing tourist groups in South America!) The woman never talked to any of us. At one point, to make conversation, I asked her if she was from New York... Her response, as she turned away from me: "It doesn't matter." I remember thinking how utterly sad this was... She couldn't/didn't want to converse about even the simplest, most basic of things with fellow humans...

Now that I'm in my 50s and feeling lethargic---what if that happens to me?! What if, from now on, I just don't feel like learning about anything or anybody? I've already noticed that I'm not as interested in food or music: I hardly eat at all any more, except when I know it's necessary. And once I finished adding items to my Joan Crawford website, I used to crank up music when I uploaded them, in celebration of hours of work---now, though, I don't; I just keep the TV on at its same low level while I upload.

I guess it's partially age---you're just not that excited about things any more. But I still hope I never reach the point where someone asks me where I came from and I respond, "It doesn't matter."

Whatever happened to...

Just looked up my first "suite-mate" in college. She's now selling on Etsy and just recently (in 2017) married an "immuno-suppressed" man. (Hey, I also just started selling on Etsy, but it's cool rocks, not crappy art---and I'd also rather die alone than ever marry someone just to marry someone. And I certainly wouldn't ever "brag" about his "immuno-suppression"---in the Olden Days, you kept whatever to yourself instead of weirdly seeking public approval for your and your mate's deficiencies.)

She was my first friend at my dorm at UT-Austin. While being fun and exuberant, and fun to go out with, she was also awful. Not attractive, she tried to make up for it by sleeping with just about every man she met. I'd go out with her to any club, and by the end of the night, she'd be fucking one guy while me and his friend were trying to converse politely in the other room. (She wasn't attractive enough to get the robust Texas frat boys she liked, so she usually ended up seducing Middle Eastern guys who had never had sex before. Me, I wasn't meeting anyone, so I'd tag along with her: Middle Eastern guys, Russian guys, old rich guys who owned pizza parlors in Austin...)

I was very young, I was bored, I was lonely, I needed a friend to go out to clubs with. So this continued for a couple of years... Going out with her was fun, but at the end of most nights, I found myself in many uncomfortable sexual situations that I didn't want to be a part of. As a wing-man when she went out with her 50-something pizza guy, he brought a friend...I ended up throwing up because I'd had too much to drink, but the friend still wanted to kiss me... He was that sad and desperate. 

On another occasion, she invited a foreign grad student up to MY room. I liked him, and was interested in talking to him, but... She soon stuck her foot in his crotch---which ended any sort of conversation we might have all been having.

When I graduated from high school in 1983, I was in love with a girl, and I thought that, though I'd lost her, I would "of course" meet someone else... I did not. Once I went to college, I was immediately tossed into a multitude of crude, creepy interactions that had nothing to do with the real me or with what I really loved.

Johns Hopkins defines a woman as a "non-man"

https://nypost.com/2023/06/13/john-hopkins-university-now-refers-to-lesbians-as-non-men-attracted-to-non-men/

https://www.newsweek.com/johns-hopkins-accused-trying-erase-women-its-lesbian-term-1806134

What in the hell is happening. The Woke, Marxist Academia has gone way too far. 

Transgendered people are transgendered people. Regardless of what surgeries they have or what hormones they take, they're never going to be what they mentally want to be. Sorry (not sorry). 

And the rest of us should never be forced to be a part of their mentally ill gender dysfunction. (As a gay person, I also don't agree with sports teams being forced to wear rainbows on their uniforms. Nor do I agree with drag queens---the gay/trans equivalent of sleazy showgirls---being allowed to read stories to school-children.)

p.s. I once knew someone online many years ago who was a male-to-female trans. "She" claimed to have had an abortion! This is all friggin' ridiculous! As the left-wingers like to say: FOLLOW THE SCIENCE.

Male-to-female transgendered people cannot have babies, they cannot have abortions, etc. And the latest addition to the Supreme Court of the United States---Ketanji Brown Jackson, a blatant DEI hire (Biden himself said that he was only going to pick a black woman)---could not even define what a "woman" was. STOP THE INSANITY!

George Jones: A Good Year For The Roses (1970)

I've posted this here before, but I always love it so. His voice is so powerful and amazing (as is that green suit and accompanying boots). And songwriter Jerry Chesnut is also great:

RE a half-filled cup of coffee: "But at least you thought you wanted it, that's so much more than I can say for me..."

John List Murders (November 1971)

In November 1971, a mild-mannered accountant, John List, shot his wife, mother, and three teenaged children to death, then disappeared for the next 18 years. Finally, in 1989, he was apprehended after his case was featured on a then-new Fox show "America's Most Wanted."

I'd vaguely heard about this case before, then just a couple of weeks ago, saw a "Forensic Files" re-run. For some reason, at my own later stage in life, I was now more interested in what would make a middle-aged, formerly mild-mannered, man suddenly go off like this.

I ordered a few books on the case: Righteous Carnage, Death Sentence, and Collateral Damage (written by List himself, with a co-writer war buddy). The letter he wrote to his Lutheran pastor the day of his murders was completely explanatory. I could not find online a complete exact version of the letter, but here's an excerpt from an AP story in 1990:

ELIZABETH, N.J. (AP) _ John E. List killed five members of his family 18 years ago because he could no longer support them and feared they would forsake their religion, according to a confession letter released Wednesday.

″After it was all over I said some prayers for them all - from the hymn book. That was the least that I could do,″ the devout Lutheran and former Sunday school teacher wrote in the 1971 letter to his pastor.

The letter was released after Superior Court Judge William L’E. Wertheimer allowed it as evidence in List’s murder trial.

List began the five-page letter by telling the Rev. Eugene A. Rehwinkel, ″I am very sorry to add this additional burden to your work. ...

″I leave my-self in the hands of Gods Justice & Mercy,″ List wrote. He wrote that God could have helped him in his time of distress, ″but apparently he saw fit not to answer my prayers.″

″This makes me think that perhaps it was for the best as far as the childrens souls are concerned,″ wrote List. In the letter’s final paragraph, List said he is assured of making peace with God ″because of Christ dying even for me.″

The judge released the letter after denying a defense motion that the document was protected by the priest-penitent privilege. Opening statements are set for Monday.

List argues that he is innocent because of his mental state at the time the slayings occurred.

Handwritten in script on yellow-lined paper, the letter was dated Nov. 9, 1971. It had been the subject of intense interest since police found it Dec. 7, 1971, in a filing cabinet in List’s Westfield mansion. Police read the letter and called Rehwinkel to the house, where they let him read it.

Also in the 18-room mansion were the bullet-ridden bodies of List’s wife, Helen, 45; children Patricia, 16; John Jr., 15; and Frederick, 13; and List’s 84-year-old mother, Alma.

The bodies of Helen List and the children were lined up on sleeping bags on the floor of the sparsely furnished ballroom, and Alma List was found on the third floor.

″I know that many will only look at the additional years that they could have lived but if finally they were no longer Christians what would be gained,″ List wrote.

″Also, I’m sure many will say, ‘How could anyone do such a horrible thing.’ - My only answer is it isn’t easy and was only done after much thought.″

List wrote that he shot his family members from behind because he ″didn’t want any of them to know even at the last second that I had to do this to them.″ He said he had to kill his mother because the other deaths ″would have been a tremendous shock to her.″

None suffered, but John Jr. ″got hurt more because he seemed to struggle longer,″ List said. Police said John Jr. was shot 10 times. List said he had planned to kill them on All Saints’ Day, Nov. 1, ″an appropriate day for them to get to heaven.″ But the day passed, he said, because his travel plans were delayed.

List opened the letter by saying his actions went against all he had been taught and that his account ″will not make it right.″

He then enumerated his reasons.

List, then a 46-year-old accountant who was selling insurance, said he wasn’t earning enough to support the family and was near bankruptcy.

″True we could have gone bankrupt and maybe gone on welfare,″ he said. But he feared the effects of poverty on the children.

He also worried about what Patricia’s aspirations as an actress ″might do to her continuing to be a Christian.″

And he was upset that his wife stopped going to church and said she wanted to leave the church.

″If any one of these had been the condition we might have pulled through but this was just too much. At least I’m certain that all have gone to heaven now.″

List then discussed ″final arrangements,″ asking for cremations and for Rehwinkel to keep funeral costs low.

List asked Rehwinkel to distribute books and other personal things from the house, and suggested the school or church library.

He signed it ″John,″ then added:

″P.S. Mother is in the hallway in the attic-3rd floor. She was too heavy to move.″

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

One thing I noticed in the above, and after reading the bios: List claims that God did not answer his heart-felt prayers for a new steady job, which partially led to the slaughter because he felt he could no longer support his family and didn't want them to go on welfare. But what the Righteous Carnage book pointed out: For a bargain price, List had moved into a large New Jersey mansion built at the turn of the century, though he couldn't afford its upkeep after he lost multiple jobs. But the stained-glass roof of the "ballroom" (where he ultimately dragged his dead family members) was original Tiffany glass. Prior to his writing to his pastor bemoaning God's failure to answer his prayers, List could have only looked up to possibly realize that the Tiffany glass itself could have been sold at that time (1971) for over $100,000---which would have solved every financial problem he had.

I'm only partially religious myself (am becoming more so with age and contemplation), but given John List's utter religiosity, I found the above fact about the Tiffany glass quite meaningful. In List's case, God did, indeed, have an answer to his prayers right above his head---which he failed to see.

I'm sure everyone is just dying for a photo...

 ...but, alas, I have none to share: Of my supposedly GORGEOUS graying hair!

Last month, a good-looking military guy at the work ID place told me that my hair color (blonde/graying) was something that women "would pay for." (Where he learned about what older women "would pay for" is unknown.) And today, my new hair-stylist told me the same thing! (And she actually said that she usually recommends coloring, but not in my case.) My stylist today had me look in a mirror to see the back of my head, and there WERE actually a few gray streaks that looked kind of cool! So it's not ALL "decaying dishwater blonde." Thank you, other people! I think my hair looks like shit, but if others insist on making kindly comments ... I'll take that! :)

George Jones: The Race Is On (Farm Aid, September 1985)

At the time I watched excerpts from this on TV, I wasn't thinking about anything other than my miserable "I wish I could watch this with Ginny..." As a 20-year-old, I barely knew who George Jones was then.

George Jones: Corvette Song (Orlando, Florida, 1985)

Tammy Wynette: Crying Steel Guitar (1974)

George Jones: The Rock (2001)

When you wake up in the morning and you wonder
Why no one's beside you where I usually lay
And you think you hear the sound of distant thunder
Well, that's just your old rock, just your old rock, a-rolling away...

Paul McCartney: My Brave Face (Live in Rio 1990)

Gloria Swanson on "Queen Kelly" (1966 on '28 film)

Part 2 of Gloria Swanson interview re Von Stroheim's 1928's "Queen Kelly" (1966 on NYC's WNET)
Despite her getup: She's actually really attractive and well-spoken!
Love also the funny comparison between tobacco spittle being dropped on her hand early in the morning versus after 5pm...

Time to Get Clean?

I had a horrible dream last night where some low-key creepy man gave me a supposedly recreational drug that swelled up my face and stomach horribly and caused the edges of the swellings to turn orange.

I haven't been feeling that well recently because I've been smoking too much: 10 years ago, I could wake up after a night of heavy smoking and drinking and have no after-effects---but today, I'm hacking like all of the 50-somethings I used to see/hear hacking years ago. I'm embarrassed for myself to have found myself hacking JUST LIKE THAT.  Just a recent thing, maybe started 2 months ago. I'm smoking no more or less than I have been for the past 30 years... Yet all of a sudden, the results are much more obvious and dire, both inwardly and outwardly. Obviously, I've got to stop what I'm doing (said as I suck on the 20th cig of the evening). In the past, it was always reading/hearing "Smoking is not good for you." And the warnings not meaning anything. But recently: Smoking has really been affecting my health---for the first time ever.

Tonight while on the Internet, for instance, I thought about it ahead of time and planned to only smoke one cig per hour... Wound up ignoring that and smoking as I pleased. Knowing that I'll feel like shit in the morning.

That's the dilemma: When you drink and smoke in the evening, you're feeling great---but then there's the morning to face. I understand that fresh-and-clean mornings can have a purifying effect---but then beer/cig-fueled evenings-into-late-nights can also be even more inspirational. Mentally, the booze/cigs win (drinking and smoking is fun). Spiritually, the clear mornings win. Physically, obviously my body is telling me something: Stop doing what you're doing. I can't just yet, but I get it, I get it.

Longview/Texarkana/Shreveport

Nostalgic for my youth and my roots. Have disliked Austin for a very, very long time; wouldn't mind going back here to live when I retire, or even before I retire.

As of my 50s, I've felt drawn to three geographical places in my life: East Texas, northern Germany, and New York/northern Jersey (specifically Weehawken).

I highly doubt that I'm, at this stage, going to make the effort to learn German and move there (though I do have dual citizenship because of my German mother); and Germany today is as ignorantly left-wing and Marxist as the US.

But East Texas and Joisey: Still possible! :)

 

No Longer Attractive

Boo-hoo! In my looks-prime (12 thru 40), I often felt annoyed by male attention---often self-conscious because I was being stared at and thus unable to be myself (much as my cats, when I look at them, will suddenly stop whatever activity they're doing and start cleaning themselves).

In my 20s and 30s, I often longed to be able to just go into a bar where music was playing and sit, anonymously, and enjoy the band. I saw guys doing this, and I wanted to be able to do this, too, so I tried it from about '95 thru '00. It never quite worked out.

Usually the band that I was seeing had some guy singer that I was attracted to. (I wasn't just going out randomly.) So if I went to a place and sat there by myself (which guys can do but girls can't), male patrons of the club would come up to me and sit down and chat, which was OK. But then when the guy I liked from the band would take a break and come over, and I'd be paying more attention to him, the "regular" guys would get pissed off. I wasn't trying to "score" or anything---I did go home with the "guy from the band" exactly twice, but this one particular guy was on heroin and disappeared into his bedroom, leaving me to chat in the living room with his roommate. Or else there was a minor "scene" when the guy, flatteringly to me at the time, DEMANDED that I come over when I was about to go home. At other times, when I followed this guy to his gigs around town, he ignored me or else asked for money (!).

So that was a side-note to my past early life, when a bunch of weirdness usually prevailed.

But my original point: From about age 12 to age 40, I had a bunch of guys constantly looking at me. Which made me uncomfortable at the time, but which I partially miss now, in my 50s, just in small ways.

Today, I drove across town to have an ID made for work. One of the two ID-making guys was VERY good-looking (the other a sniffling hippie-looking guy who went on a search for Kleenex at some point), and, yes, I hoped I'd get the good-looking guy instead of the sickly hippie! I DID get the good-looking guy---but when I commented right before my photo was taken about "How does my hair look?", I got a shock: "Sandy silver---some people would pay for that."

I was making small talk! I mean, his response was "kind" and all, but... It's the kind of thing this good-looking 30-something man would say to his elderly aunt! :)  OMG---reminds me of when I was in NYC as a 42-year-old and was in a store buying jeans---the young, friendly sales-girl said something like "I wish my mom looked as good in those jeans!" (And she was trying to be nice, not bitchy---it's just that I was still thinking of myself as a younger person, whereas younger people were/are, inadvertently and honestly, telling me that I was either middle-aged or old!) :)

What does it take to get a "professor" fired?

This adjunct professor wasn't fired because of her attack on this student table. She was only later fired from Hunter College after holding a knife to the neck of a New York Post reporter.

Sick to death of these "DEI" hires.

George Jones: I'll See You While Ago (1968)

George Jones: Things Have Gone To Pieces (1965)

And why Finland and Sweden should not join NATO.

Who the hell am I to say? It's like basketball player LeBron James making pronouncements. Except James has an uneducated BLM agenda, and I'm educated about history and have no agenda, other than common sense.

If you're a small country on the border of Russia, then stop poking the bear. Yes, I understand that you want US and International money. That's exactly what happened in the Ukraine---Western/US NGO money flooded in (including Biden support for the Burisma energy company), and then all of a sudden, Ukraine was demanding NATO membership. Well, of course, Russia wasn't going to have that from a former territory on its border.

Finland and Sweden: You should probably be aware of your surroundings and history and continue your neutrality. I highly doubt that the US is going to get involved in a war over you. But then again: Look at Sarajevo.

You should also probably take a closer look at your current leaders, selling you out in the long term for immediate tech money.

What happened to a people?

I just noticed this a couple of months ago:
The Prime Minister of the UK is Rishi Sunak (Indian).
The Prime Minister of Scotland is Humza Yousaf (Pakistani).
The Mayor of London is Sadiq Khan (Pakistani).

What happened to a people that they're no longer ruling themselves? Yes, the British were one-time colonizers of India (now India and Pakistan). Is this revenge? Is this Anglo-Saxon guilt?

While the USA has always been the proverbial "melting pot," the UK has a distinct ethnic history dating back thousands of years. And they're now allowing Indians and Pakistanis to rule them?

Quite bizarre. (Imagine today if a Brit were attempting to run India or Pakistan---I highly doubt that the populace would put up with this. Yes, I understand that the Brits were once colonizers of India---which is why I suspect this current state of affairs in the UK is purely "white guilt." Otherwise, why allow it? No rational country would ever allow it.)

Take your country back. I advise this for any country. UK, India, Pakistan --- Your country should be ruled by your own people. (Oh wait---India and Pakistan ARE currently ruled by their own people.)

GEORGE JONES: Old King Kong (1975)

GEORGE JONES: "I Don't Need Your Rocking Chair" (1992)

GEORGE JONES: Austin City Limits (1980)

Austin, and "Austin City Limits," used to be soulful and musically interesting like this.

Ram Dass: Be Here Now

Half of the book is on grocery-store brown paper and printed sideways, where you can't read the text near the spine unless you forcibly bend it. (Was this a test of some sort? "Wow---I'm so groovily non-violent that I don't even try to read what Guru tells me because I don't want to hurt a book or the tree that made it...")

Aside from the annoying physical composition of the book, the text itself is from 1971--- What perhaps seemed "enlightened" at that time is a bit dim-witted and obvious now that we've had 50 years to recover from what the media all told us was "profound." Here's a sample:

Lame, halt, blind, dying
We're all dying
At this moment
Your body is disintegrating
Before your very eyes
If you've taken LSD you may be
Seeing it do this   but you know
It's happening anyway
It's all a downhill trip   all the way

What this reminds me of is very bad poetry that I read when I was a sophomore in a poetry class in college circa 1985. A bad writer trying to explain what he/she was feeling; because of the bad writing, we couldn't feel anything that the writer was feeling.

Same with most of this "Be Here Now" text." "Ram Dass" (aka "Richard Albert," formerly of Harvard) was canonized among hippies in the late '60s/early '70s because he'd once been part of The Establishment and then left it after his collegiate LSD experimentation was verboten. Albert then went on to India and later to write this:

You meet another person & there are
qualities in that personality which of-
fend you & there are qualities which
attract you -- some qualities seduce
you -- some qualities repel you -- ...

REALLY? Sometimes you like your mate and sometimes you don't? No one ever knew this, Ram Dass? How did you figure this out?

In short: This text is of its time, but it's not actually very profound at all. Since 1971, I'm sure most of us on this planet have done drugs and had similar "insights." Maybe "profound" in 1971, but not so much 50 years later after every shallow club kid has been on exactly the same "trip." And what other non-drug-doing person on the planet has ever NOT had the experience of sometimes liking and then disliking their mate?

At the time that this book was released, there was so much left-wing worshiping press surrounding it---which transferred to me buying it last month in the hopes of perhaps discovering something, anything. Did anyone ever stop to think that what Richard Albert was expressing about relationships were things that his own parents and grandparents had already figured out---sans drugs---100s of years earlier?

I'm sick of all of these press-promoted "gurus" through the decades who have nothing to say that most of us haven't already figured out innately.

"Coast to Coast" + Autumn Sonata (1978)

I've had a bad relationship with my mother since about age 8.

In 2017, after she revealed that she was leaving 75% of her money to my brother and sons, and only 25% to me, I let her have it via multiple e-mails---the full range of my anger since I was a kid.

We made up in 2020; then it all flared up again a few months ago, when she accused me of being "brainwashed." At Christmas 2022, when I spent one night at her house, I went to sleep in the spare bedroom listening to the "Coast to Coast" AM radio show. I'd first discovered this paranormal show when I came back from NYC in 2010 and had to stay with my mom for 3 months before finding a new job. Every night after 10pm or so, when forced to go to my room instead of being allowed to watch TV in the living room, this radio show was an interesting solace.

This Christmas at my Mom's,  I opted to spend a night, thinking it would be pleasant and restful to be away from my apartment. But, as in 2010, I wasn't allowed to go to sleep with the TV on, so I again tuned in to a small radio by my guest bed to get me to sleep, seeking out the interesting "Coast to Coast" show that I'd known from years before. In this case, though, my mother subsequently claimed that, in the early hours of the morning, she heard---apparently through the bedroom door---some right-wing announcers on the radio. And therefore I was "brainwashed" and "full of hate" because the radio programs had gotten to me during the night, and that's why I liked Trump and disagreed with her politically.

Sigh. My mother is over 80, but she's always been smart and in good health. Where the FUCK did the above insanity come from? I won't be so shallow as to say she's become senile. I, of course, demanded an apology for calling me "brainwashed." Which I, of course, didn't get. And so we're again at odds, for the hundredth time.

It disturbs me greatly. The guilt is that we'll never come to an understanding before she dies, and, post-80, she could die any day now.

Woke up early this morning, 5am, with Ingmar Bergman's "Autumn Sonata" down low on TCM. I'd never seen it before, though I just last year bought a complete Bergman film set. Tried to go back to sleep 'til 7:30 or so, but ended up watching the whole thing... A film about a grown-up daughter's latter-day horror at her mother's earlier behavior. (Nothing overly abusive about the behavior, just pure neglect and then attempts at making up for it. A psychological problem rather than a dramatic one.)

Almost every time I watch a Bergman film, either on purpose or by accident, I come away feeling cleansed in some way. The crappiest of feelings that I'd been feeling toward my mother, which will probably never be resolved, appeared in Bergman's "Autumn Sonata." He is utterly honest and harsh, yet he also offers a humane resolution---though not any solution---to such psychological dilemmas.

I've felt the same way when watching his other films from the late '40s up until this point: Bergman is harsh but merciful. I've never come away from any of his films feeling that there is no hope.

Postcards from the Edge (1990): Meryl Streep “I’m Checkin’ Out”

Wow! What a great ending! Not intellectually or anything, but just a great feel-good ending. (Both because Streep is great here and because her character has found a great niche in her next movie despite failing previously.)

I wish wholeheartedly that this song (especially the last exuberant half) had been released as a Country single at the time---it's a really great song, and Streep is really great singing it. It should have been a public/publicity sensation at the time: "Meryl Streep Goes Country!"

Postcards from the Edge (1990): "It TWIRLED up!"

"I hate 'spunk'"! Mary's Job Interview

"The Best of Everything" title sequence (1959, Johnny Mathis)

Sorry the ending is cut off---can't control sloppy YouTube posters. But this song, and the opening sequence of the movie (city and working girls), are beautiful. (Rest of the movie is pretty stupid, but the opening is great.)

Today: I challenge any artist to try to make something even mildly interesting (much less "beautiful") out of the utter dump that NYC has become under Democrats deBlasio and Adams (2014 thru present). (There was also fairly recently a particularly inept interlude from '78 thru '93 under Dems Koch and Dinkins.)

Beautiful, special city---temporarily stifled in recent decades by its left-wing mayors blaming crime on "racism" instead of on the same blacks repeatedly committing the same crimes. Not locking up the repeat criminals is insanity.

I'm internally agitating for the city to come back, for the whole country to come back. Can't stand the current malaise as a result of things being run (and being represented in the media) by incompetents and/or DEI appointees who promote the criminals and degenerates instead of correctly seeing them as the real problems in our society.

As a kid, I used to have a "fanciful" notion that one should try to better oneself. Try hard. Not be an intentional fuck-up. Today, though, the goal seems to be that you should claim to be as victimized as possible, and to get as many reparations, and as many welfare payments, as possible. And if you're a drug addict, you shouldn't try to get off drugs---just buy/steal a tent and go live on the street and continue to do drugs and beg for money and steal things. When you have a violent freakout, feel free to threaten (verbally or physically) anyone else around you. If a sane person reacts and tries to stop you, THEY are the ones who'll be arrested, not you---YOU are perfectly fine and normal according to today's sick society.

 

RE sexuality: In the '80s, when I was in my 20s, the liberal college ideal was to be open to androgyny---NOT to deny your biology and claim that you weren't male or female if you were born that way and then force the rest of society to call you "he" if you were a "she." And today, even doctors are now being forced to say that THEY "assign a gender at birth." Correction: Doctors don't "assign" anything. You're born a male or a female. Follow the science.

 

And gay people once wanted to be allowed to marry, to teach in schools, and to visit their partner in the hospital---not to force the rest of society, including sports teams, to wear gay pride flags on their uniforms, or to force schools to have "Tranny Story Hour."

 

We have gone completely nuts as a society.

Mary Tyler Moore Show Theme (1977)

Mary Tyler Moore Show Theme (1970)

The ultimate theme song.
When I was a kid, I wanted to BE Mary and have her job and life and apartment.
Per later opening themes that varied slightly, I also wanted to stride like her along the river (or lake, or whatever it is that Minneapolis has)---I wanted to walk like this and BE just like this.

50 years later... My goal is still to be like this.

One Day at a Time Theme (1975)

The Bugaloos Theme (1970, with Martha Raye)

Welcome Back, Kotter Theme (1975)

With all of the sincerity in my pre-teen heart, I begged my mother to buy me a "John Travolta for President" T-shirt during this time period because I loved his "Barbarino" so.
Somewhere in a '70s family album, there's a photo of me sitting in a tree with this very T-shirt on!

H.R. Pufnstuf Theme (1969)

Oh, You Know My Name Is Simon... (1974)

Simon was too fey for me, but my little brother liked it/him for years. If I remember right, Simon was part of the "Captain Kangaroo" show, which my brother would watch in the morning before school. He would watch quietly for the most part, but as soon as Simon would come on, he would get very excited and call out for my mother to come watch with him!

Hong Kong Phooey Theme (1974)

One of my little brother's cartoons that I was forced to watch. I don't remember anything about it except for the great theme song.

SPEED RACER Theme (1967)

Mostly my little brother's cartoon, but I also watched... was this Japanese or something?
Speed (did he have a name?) seemed troubled most of the time...
But a GREAT theme song!

Gilligan's Island Theme ('64 thru '67)

The Jeffersons Theme (1975)

All In the Family Theme (1971)

Maude Theme (1972)

Lady Godiva was a freedom rider,
She didn't care if the whole world looked,
Joan of Arc with the Lord to guide her,
She was a sister who really cooked,
Isadora was the first bra-burner,
Ain't ya glad she showed up?
And when the country was fallin' apart,
Betsy Ross got it all sewed up...

(I spent a few minutes this morning trying to figure out: If Isadora (the dancer) was a "bra-burner," couldn't the writers of this song have more cleverly worked the "bra-burner" bit into the "Joan of Arc" line---you know, her being burned at the stake and all... But I don't get paid to come up with lyrics for 1970s TV theme songs...)

The Jetsons Theme (1963)

The Flintstones Opening/Closing

Yes, this is the opening/closing for a cartoon show... But if I remember every single image and word 50 years later... It probably was and IS brilliant!

Scooby Doo! Theme Song

I constantly watched this show as a kid.
Watching this video now 50 years later, I remember almost every single image that appears here.

Save Me (Aimee Mann; 1999)

You look like... a perfect fit,
For a girl in need... of a tourniquet.
But can you save me?
Come on and save me...
If you could save me,
From the ranks of the freaks,
Who suspect they could never love anyone.

'Cause I can tell... you know what it's like.
A long farewell... of the hunger strike.
But can you save me?
Come on and save me...
If you could save me,
From the ranks of the freaks,
Who suspect they could never love anyone.

You struck me dumb, like radium
Like Peter Pan, or Superman,
You have come... to save me.
Come on and save me...
If you could save me,
From the ranks of the freaks,
Who suspect they could never love anyone,
Except the freaks,
Who suspect they could never love anyone,
But the freaks,
Who suspect they could never love anyone.

Come on and save me...
Why don't you save me?
If you could save me,
From the ranks of the freaks,
Who suspect they could never love anyone,
Except the freaks,
Who suspect they could never love anyone,
Except the freaks,
Who could never love anyone.

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

I had to stop listening to this kind of sickly, submissive, sadistic thing around this time. It was too disturbing.

 
I had to either toughen up or go under. There was no one who was going to "save me." At some point in my young female life, I had to stop the Romanticism and start making plans for my own future. (Who writes songs about that?)

I remain too rational for the freaks and too weird for the straights.

George Jones & Tammy Wynette: "Golden Ring" (1976, the year after their divorce)

A couple of disturbing things:
One: They still look at each other like they care---I think George does, but Tammy does not or else doesn't yet know what she wants. (Both are pros, though, and know what the audience wants.)
Two: Tammy dramatically wipes her face a couple of times because George has apparently accidentally spit on her while singing. Extremely not cool to make a big show of it---I've seen this several times in concerts with George and Tammy: I highly doubt that George is intentionally spitting on her---it just happens when you're singing/emoting so close together. But, even knowing that the cameras are on, Tammy makes a big gesture of disgust. Absolutely no need for that; she's intentionally trying to humiliate him. (p.s. Note in this vid that George holds the mike further away from his mouth---because long ago, Tammy had complained that his voice overpowered hers when they were singing together onstage. He's being nice here.)

Sports Make the Year Fun

Growing up with a dad who liked the Dallas Cowboys, the games were on every week in our house, and I thus became interested in football and a life-long fan of the Cowboys.

As a student at UT-Austin in the 1980s, I became interested in the Longhorns.

While in grad school in San Francisco in the mid-1990s, I was utterly alone and had nothing to do but to start following pro basketball on TV for the first time. (Later, once back home in Texas, I became specifically a San Antonio Spurs fan---though today I dislike the leftist coach Popovich and wish he would shut up about his political opinions, AND do a better job of both recruiting and coaching. Post his very great luck at getting David Robinson and Tim Duncan, he sucks as a coach.)

As someone most often on her own, I look forward to games that are on during the week! September thru January means football. Then the exciting college March Madness basketball. Then April thru June are the NBA playoffs. (With Covid and the political BLM propaganda painted on the courts, haven't been watching in the past couple of years---but was happy to discover no propaganda this year and am into it---sans any San Antonio inclusion, hate Lakers and Warriors.)

I dislike those who snobbishly and off-handedly mock "sports." As if doing so makes them feel intellectually superior in some way. The two --- thinking and liking sports --- aren't mutually exclusive. I don't trust anyone who doesn't drink, and I don't trust anyone who doesn't follow any sport.

Random Thoughts

(1) RE Abortion: What species other than human murders their own babies?

(2) RE Climate Change: Before the last Ice Age, polar bears were simply "brown bears." When they migrated north, they became "polar bears" and their fur changed color. Once the climate changes again (as it does every 15,000 years or so), these bears will most likely either stay put or migrate back south; in either case, their fur will change again to brown. (I had to look these facts up after watching numerous TV ads from environmental groups claiming that polar bears were being decimated because of climate change---an utter refusal to believe actual science.)

(3) RE Gay Rights: The original goal of the gay rights movement in the late '60s/early '70s was to make sexual expression free and safe for everyone in their personal lives. The goal was NOT to empower Big Pharma and Big Medicine to encourage kids to get on hormonal drugs and to have mutilating surgery. The point was to be comfortable in your own skin and to be aware that sexuality was fluid and non-binary. NOT that actual biological genders were non-binary. And certainly not that we all should participate in anyone else's mental illness. Just because you've adopted avatars during your formative years online doesn't mean that the rest of us in the real world should be obliged to engage in your subsequent fantasies. Or that sports teams or corporations should have to have "Pride" events.

(4) Ukraine was for thousands of years part of Russia. Why wouldn't Russia get mad about the US sending in "advisors" and NGOs, and about talks of Ukraine becoming part of NATO? Ukraine is Russia. After the (understandable) Russian invasion of Ukraine: Why is the US now sending the Ukraine billions of dollars in military aid? What is our goal? The US has no business in the Ukraine whatsoever.

(5) Why is the US government under Biden allowing China to buy up thousands of acres of land in the US?

(6) Why has the US government under Biden completely opened our Southern border to anyone who wants to enter? Why is every other country "allowed" to maintain borders, but if the US attempts to do so, it's considered "racist" by its own "Deep State" administrators?

(7) Why, if blacks are only 13% of the US population, do they appear in 75% of all television ads and CNN/MSNBC panels?

(8) Why are drug-addicted and mentally ill people allowed to camp out and shit on the streets of our cities? Cities offer drug treatment and shelters---so why aren't these people being guided into them? Could it be that they don't want to go? Why are we all putting up with this? Get into a drug-program or a city-sponsored home---if not, then get the fuck off our streets! We've done all we can for you. Get your shit together.

(9) Oh yeah, re guns: When our country was founded, US citizens weren't allowed to have guns while the occupying British troops were. Our country's founders vowed that never again would we be subjugated because we didn't have guns and the occupying force did. So, yeah, that's why Republicans are so adamant about this issue to this day (as they should be). The solution: Don't allow criminals and mentally ill trannies and autistic kids and domestic abusers to buy/own guns. (Sandy Hook mom bought her mentally ill autistic son numerous weapons and taught him how to shoot---that's not society's fault, that's the dumb mother's fault.)

Merle Travis: Sixteen Tons

Writer and original singer of the song. About working people and how they're screwed over. None of the cheesy snapping posing and eye-rolling of Ford's Hollywood performance.

The Flamingos: I Only Have Eyes For You (1959)

Sixteen Tons: Tennessee Ernie Ford (1956)

Sandy Nelson: Teen Beat (1959)

100 Hits of the '50s

Since utterly creepy fascist kids today on social media sites are so quick to say "Die, Boomers!",
I must first say that I'm Gen X. (Jesus, how I despise anyone under 40.)

And then that I grew up in the '70s listening to AM radio in my father's car. And then when I got my own car in '81 or so, all it had in it was an AM radio. So I could listen to Oldies or sports or talk. I got hooked on Oldies. Discovered the Beatles there, as well as numerous other earlier songs.

And earlier, when I was little and about to start school the next day, I remember my father (born in 1940) belting out Chuck Berry's "Up in the morning out to school...!" And I remember the day that Elvis died (August 16, 1977): My dad went off to another room to be by himself. He was usually so constantly, overtly angry and mean. This was one of the few times that I found him to be sensitive and reclusive.

I received this 4-disc set tonight and have so far only listened to discs 1 and 4. '50s pop music is so exuberant and exciting: "I feel young and defiant and like the whole world is before me!" Compare to today's druggy, lethargic, sheep-like music. Rap and hip-hop started out exciting and interesting but quickly devolved into today's generic idiocy. I've been listening to the same auto-tuned singers and watching the same group-dancing for over 20 years now. I'm bored to fucking death with all of it.

George Harrison: Devil's Radio (Live)

Just watched the 2-part 6-hr George Harrison "Living in the Material World" doc (2011, directed by Scorsese) over the weekend.

 
To me, as a Beatles fan since 1980, George has never been very interesting, and this film kind of affirmed my previous beliefs. He had his heyday of creativity from around '68 thru '70---and that was about it.

 

Yeah-yeah-yeah, his much-touted-by-the-rock-press "spirituality"----but he didn't live it. His own wife said, in a VERY nice and kind way, that he often fooled around on her. 

 

(Speaking of GOSSIP, the theme of "Devil's Radio": An anecdotal story: In the early '90s, my two best friends in Austin had a visit from a Swedish girl whom they'd met during a trip to Europe a few years earlier. She was now a stewardess---very, very pretty [yes, just like Brigitte Bardot and Patti Boyd] and with a very calm and attractive demeanor. And she said that she had been on a flight with both George Harrison and Eric Clapton and that they had invited her over to one of their homes (can't remember whose)! She went... and since I was just a guest during the telling of this story, I was too polite to ask her if she had slept with either of them! But... p.s. We were all in our early '20s and didn't care anything about George Harrison or Eric Clapton, so she wasn't trying to impress us... Given her very-good-looks and her very-good-personality, I believe her.)

 

And his own friends/colleagues commented often throughout the doc that he was an angry person.

 

Guess what: If you're a truly spiritual person, then you're centered and calm and non-angry and you don't fool around on your wife. I have actually known a few honestly nice people like this. But if you're just a regular guy, then stop pretending to be otherwise---but I guess that was George's schtick and he was schticking to it!

Watching the doc, though, did remind me of how great the 1970 "All Things Must Pass" album is---it's truly great! "Beware of Darkness," et al. And then I went and listened to latter-day George---1987's "Devil's Radio" is probably the last good/interesting thing he ever did (Eric Clapton on guitar).

NOTE: When I first heard this song on the radio in the '80s, there wasn't any "online" or a place you could go to read the lyrics. I thought he was singing "God's in" or "Godsend"---I had no idea whatsoever what this song was about, but I liked the groove/energy then and like it even more now that I've read the lyrics. (And yeah, I think he was sleeping with the blonde back-up singer.)

Gossip, gossip
Gossip, gossip

I heard it in the night
Words that thoughtless speak
Like vultures swooping down below
On the devil's radio

I hear it through the day
Airwaves gettin' filled
With gossip broadcast to and fro
On the devil's radio

Oh yeah, gossip
Gossip, oh yeah

He's in the clubs and bars
And never turns it down
Talking about what he don't know
On the devil's radio

He's in your TV set
Won't give it a rest
That soul betraying so and so
The devil's radio

Gossip, gossip
Gossip, gossip
(Oh yeah) gossip, (gossip) oh yeah
(Gossip) oh yeah, (oh yeah) gossip

It's white and black like industrial waste
Pollution of the highest degree
You wonder why I don't hang out much
I wonder how you can't see

He's in the films and songs
And on all your magazines
It's everywhere that you may go
The devil's radio

Oh yeah, gossip
Gossip, oh yeah

Runs thick and fast, no one really sees
Quite what bad it can do
As it shapes you into something cold
Like an Eskimo igloo

It's all across our lives
Like a weed it's spread
'till nothing else has space to grow
The devil's radio

Can creep up in the dark
Make us hide behind shades
And buzzing like a dynamo
The devil's radio

(Gossip) oh yeah, (gossip) oh yeah
(Gossip) gossip, (gossip) gossip
Oh yeah, gossip I heard you on the secret wireless
Gossip, oh yeah You know the devil's radio, child
Gossip, gossip
Gossip, gossip

Did your parents ever forget to pick you up?

My parents presented themselves as good, responsible people. And I suppose they were, for the most part. However, there were a few times when they utterly dropped the ball.

When I was about 6, in first grade, I was a member of the "Blue Birds," which was a sub-category of the Camp Fire Girls. On school days when we had meetings (about once a month), we would wear our Blue Bird outfits to school and then attend the meeting and then assigned parents would drive us home. One day, my mother got the schedule wrong, and I wore my outfit to school when there wasn't a meeting. I felt stupid during the day for wearing the outfit, but no one in the school bothered to ask me how I was going to get home that day! So, at the end of the day, sans anyone to take me home, I started my long trudge along the highway. (I knew vaguely where my home was...) At some point, a random parent who happened to be driving along said highway spotted a 6-year-old kid walking by herself and picked me up, then drove me home.

When I was in Junior High, my dad was supposed to pick me up one day. He forgot about me. I sat there for over an hour in the school parking lot watching all the buses come and go, until there was no one left but me. I guess he finally showed up, because I don't remember having to walk anywhere.

During a summer in my High School years, my mother had dropped me and my younger brother off at a pool early in the morning, and was supposed to pick us up at an appointed time at the end of her work-day. She was only 1/2-hour or so late...

I have never had kids, and I realize that sometimes people are forgetful, but... I don't think I would ever "forget" about my 6-year-old kid and/or my Junior High kid. Or any kid.

I'm still that 6-year-old marching down the highway, relying on the kindness of strangers.

Tab Hunter: The Way You Look Tonight

Tab sings about himself.

Tab Hunter: Young Love (1956 record version)

#1 in both the US and the UK

Tab Hunter: Young Love (1956)

I saw "Tab Hunter Confidential" at the theater back in 2015, but forgot about it... Just saw it again last night on Turner Classic Movies. Hunter is actually very, very attractive!

And he ultimately grew old very gracefully (well, despite "Polyester" and "Lust in the Dust"---but those were actually funny and helped him out in his middle career). Despite his closet gayness and desperation for public attention, he still kept himself up physically and kept up his relationship with the Catholic church, as well as keeping up his riding. All of which sustained him after the spotlight had passed.

Interesting, also, to see the strong resemblance between his early '60s boyfriend Anthony Perkins and his latter-day long-time lover, producer Allan Glaser---Tab has a type!

I love late '50s and early '60s pop---and here's Tab Hunter's #1 hit (in both US and UK) from 1956: "Young Love." (Very off-key, but he's so cute while singing it!)

Part 2: Azle to Boyd, TX

Where I spent my formative years, baby! No escaping it.
(This is an unusual "drive" video that I just discovered---very interesting to me, because I used to live here! Though far off this main road.)

Abandoned Kmart - Azle, TX

These generic, nose-ring, backward-cap people totally have nothing to do with me. But... They ARE talking about the closing of the K-Mart store in Azle (2003), which was the 2nd job I ever had during my high-school years in the '80s. (First job: At age 16, I worked for 6 months at the local Revco drug-store. The newly opened K-Mart paid about 20 cents more per hour, so I went there.)

I hadn't known that the store had closed.

I used to have a turquoise jacket to wear, and I worked in the Women's Wear department, where I also occasionally got to do the announcements for the famous "Blue-Light Specials." As in (transcribed from memory):

"K-Mart shoppers, look up and around and you'll see that the blue light IS flashing in our Women's department, where we now have our nylon panties on sale for only 50 cents!"

Springtime in Sedona

https://5thdimensiontours.com/index.html

I've been curious about Sedona for decades now---first because of the Joan Crawford/Johnny Guitar connection, but later because I've read that this particular place has a psychic vibration of some sort. I just read in my local Austin paper that there was a Sedona tour available...

Usually, I'm OK with being alone and with staying at home, but the above was one thing that I would really be interested in.

There's a huge dis-connect in being alone: When you're living with another person, as most are, you can usually agree on going somewhere interesting. I'm totally stuck. I would feel very weird about signing up for such a Sedona trip by myself, whereas if I had a friend to go with, I would love to go.

A lesson from my earlier life: When I was young, I did not feel comfortable going to gay bars by myself. But after my break-up from my girlfriend, I forced myself to "be brave" and go to these bars by myself---which led to 5 years of unhappiness. So the online lessons of "you go, girl" were all wrong.

I would love to go to Sedona WITH someone. And I'm sad that I have no one to go anywhere with.

Madonna: Ray Of Light (1998)

Madonna's Last Gasp at Relevance
(I hate thinking in trendy terms like "relevance"; but Madonna was great in the '80s---and helped to define the '80s---and managed to hang on in the '90s, including with her "Ray of Light" album. But this album was a heavy-handed producer's work, not a work of Madonna and her personality. Any singer could have been inserted into either this song or this video.)

Madonna: Material Girl (1985)

Madonna: Like A Virgin (1984)

Despite how hideous Madonna and her plastic surgery are today... she was once great, and a momentary social force.

Madonna: Like A Prayer (1989)

Was reading today online about Sam Smith and his supposedly "satanic" stage show. The problem with Sam Smith is that he's fat and unattractive yet still trying to be provocative with cartoonish "devil" images. He's actually not provocative in any way. He's like Lena Dunham: A schlubby person trying very hard to be sexy (and social media also trying very hard to make the rest of us agree that fat, ugly people are sexy and that men are women... Sorry, but... "Follow the science.")

After reading about the Schlubby Sam Smith, I had to run some errands, and on my way back home the radio played Madonna's "Like a Prayer." Also controversial (back in 1989) for combining religious and sexual images---except that Madonna was attractive in 1989, and her race/religion tweaks were very mild though the media/publicists claimed they were "controversial." This song, over 30 years later---despite its video's mild attempts at controversy via race/religion (at the time, who actually cared about the re-hash, except for the fact that it was good artistically?)---is still very good. And when I cranked it up as high as it could go in my car today and rolled down my windows so everyone around me at stoplights could hear it, I got goose-bumps and felt very happy and mighty, a feeling that lingered for hours later.

p.s. Is the black Christ in the video the ex-husband of "Real Housewives Atlanta"'s Cynthia Bailey? Small world!

George Jones: Walk Through This World With Me (1967)

George Jones: Love Bug (1965 on "Hee-Haw")

George Jones: If Drinking Don't Kill Me (1981)

And I would bring this man his beer.

Paul McCartney: My Brave Face (Live in Rio 1990)

I like how he says "dirt" in the Liverpudlian way.
And Heather Mills was just plain crazy. 

I'm a feminist, but I would love to be around a guy like this: down-to-earth and witty AND a musical genius! (I don't at all have a problem with males being dominant---if they're actually dominant. What I've always had a problem with is inferior, weak males pretending to be superior to either me or any woman when they're clearly not. In Paul's case, though, I would gladly bring him his tea!)

If I ever killed myself...

First of all, I have no way to kill myself. The most usual way for women is pills, but I have no access to any doctor, so there's no danger of any overdose of a prescription. And I don't hate myself enough, nor am I ever crazy or violent enough, to ever buy a gun and blow my brains out or slice my wrists with one of the recently purchased pretty Amazon knife set.

I have, though, thought about the cats. Whatever I do or do not do, I would leave the back sliding-glass door open for about 12 inches. So they're not stuck in here! They started out stray, and I gave them a good 4 years of happiness and food and safety... Mama and Cinco were strays to begin with, so they might be OK, since they know about being on their own. The three now-4-year-old-kittens---Mini, and Pete, and Sasha---are going to be mightily confused. I think that the fat Sasha would follow Mama and possibly be OK, and I think Pete is aggressive enough to be excited about being outdoors for the first time and would actually catch and eat things. I'm afraid, though, that my little Mini might not survive.

This all isn't an actual plan, but it is a contemplation.

p.s. Thanks, Jesus, for the past Easter weekend! When you're alone, and you stop and think about it, and watch multiple historical docs about it... It's horrifying. Ah, family dinners on Easter make what actually happened seem so much nicer! Which reminds me: Maybe 10 years ago at Christmas, at my mom's house with my brother/sister-in-law and nephews, the question came up: "What is Christmas?" The nephews had no clue what the holiday of Christmas was based on. They're now grown men, and I doubt that they know anything more today---especially since the concept of "Easter" is a bit more complicated.

The Beatles: I Saw Her Standing There LIVE IN GERMANY

Swimmer Riley Gaines assaulted at SFSU

My grad school alma mater.

Radical freaks at San Francisco State University attacked Riley Gaines for "daring" to say that trans swimmer "Lia" Thomas (rated 80th as a male swimmer but 1st as a female) shouldn't be allowed to compete in the women's swimming division. After her speech, Gaines was trapped inside a classroom for 3 hours because the police were afraid to break up the radicals.

Bud Light: Trans-Woman Dylan Mulvaney Ad

I normally hate responses like "I'll never purchase this again" when upset, but this case is more serious. Anheuser-Busch (Budweiser) recently gave a public award (and created a special beer can) in celebration of Dylan Mulvaney's first year of "being a woman." You can watch Mulvaney on YouTube and see that this person is in no way a "woman." He's a female impersonator that broadly apes female characteristics, but in no way represents an actual woman or a woman's behavior.

As a gay person familiar with gay clubbing and gay lifestyles: Mulvaney is a regular trope on the gay scene: A female impersonator. Which is fine. But when did such impersonation cross over into mainstream people being forced to acknowledge such a clown as being an actual woman? Even people in the gay underground knew/know better.

Post-2016, I discontinued my decades-long subscription to "The New Yorker" because of their irrationality and unintelligence. Just tonight, I sent the below message to the Anheuser-Busch (Bud) website:

I'm a lesbian who's been a regular purchaser of Budweiser beer for at least 20 years now. However, I was extremely disturbed by your recent promotion of Dylan Mulvaney as a spokesperson for your beer, and as a recipient of a "special" beer can celebrating her alleged anniversary as a "woman." Mulvaney is a trans-woman. She's not a woman. "Trans-woman" and "woman" are two completely different things. The former is a "how I feel" choice involving surgeries and hormones; the latter is a biological fact. (Follow the science.) I'm completely repulsed and dismayed that both your company president and marketing department would sign off on such a ridiculous and ill-thought-out publicity campaign. I know it's "trendy" for people, when mad, to say "I'll never buy this product again." But in my case, I just bought a case of Coors from my supermarket for the first time in over 20 years. Didn't want to, because I've always liked Bud better. But I cannot, in good conscience, buy from a company that overtly calls a female impersonator like Mulvaney a "woman" AND, weirdly, publicly celebrates this person as a woman.
p.s. I'm not "right-wing." As I mentioned above, I'm a gay woman, and an Independent voter over the past 40 years (90 percent Democrat until recently).

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

Haven't yet drunk the Coors that I purchased---I'm hoping it's better than Bud. Because I really don't want to give Anheuser-Busch any more of my money.

A Tribute to MONICA VITTI (and the '60s)

Bobby Vee: Take Good Care Of My Baby (1961)

After watching early '60s stars in both music and film, I can see why there was some revolution needed. Well-crafted but utterly dead. Very much needed to be swept away.

Shaun Cassidy: Take Good Care Of My Baby (1977)

Song originally released 1961 by Bobby Vee (written by King/Goffin)

Shaun Cassidy's voice still gives me goosebumps today---His voice is very sensual and warm.

If--- (Rudyard Kipling, 1895)

If you can keep your head when all about you   

    Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,   

If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,

    But make allowance for their doubting too;   

If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,

    Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,

Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,

    And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:

If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;   

    If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;   

If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster

    And treat those two impostors just the same;   

If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken

    Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,

Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,

    And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings

    And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,

And lose, and start again at your beginnings

    And never breathe a word about your loss;

If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew

    To serve your turn long after they are gone,   

And so hold on when there is nothing in you

    Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,   

    Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,

If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,

    If all men count with you, but none too much;

If you can fill the unforgiving minute

    With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,   

Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,   

    And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!

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

Actually thought-provoking and inspiring. When poetry actually meant something to people.

A style of writing that went out of fashion post-WWI, when being neurotic---and describing one's neuroses in depth---became the "thing." But at least from WWI through, say, the mid-1960s, such description was done rather well by Eliot and Pound, then later by Stevens, Lowell, Plath. Now, though? Completely devolved into once-credible poetry magazines accepting poorly/dumbly written poems based on whether the writer is black or not, or was raped or not, rather than the merit of the writing.

I grew up admiring what I thought was the intellectual seriousness of such magazines. Have since been (as of approximately 2016) disabused of such naive notions.

NPR labeled "State-Affiliated Media" by Twitter

https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2023/04/06/twitter-npr-account-state-affiliated-media/11612530002/

Thank you, Elon Musk! NPR is not a news station, it's a Marxist mouthpiece that has promoted every single talking point of Marxists (and the Obama and Biden admins) since at least 2008. The economy, climate change, immigration, crime---every single topic covered by NPR (and PBS, for that matter) has taken the Marxist viewpoint: Capitalists evil, climate change a fact, illegal immigration good, crime just poor misunderstood black boys and the karens that report them.

Back in the day, I used to listen to NPR while going to/from work. Just wanted to avoid commercials on other stations. It was only 20 mins or so a day, so I never quite picked up on a trend. But I did have an awakening of sorts back when I moved into my current apartment in 2017. The cable company didn't get stuff set up according to schedule, so I had no TV (which I'm addicted to!) for over 4 days. Not wanting to sit around in silence, and wanting some voice from the outside world, I had my radio on and set to the NPR station. One thing that stood out was someone telling a story about a family picnic in a public park. The family was held up at gunpoint by a black man. But instead of getting "all mad" about it, they invited him to join their picnic! And made a friend! Jesus H. Christ. This one story was indicative of the general media presentations of delightful black families roasting marshmallows and illegal immigrant families knitting doilies and trannies who enjoy being around kids and poor polar bears forced to migrate south. A land where the mentally ill Greta Thunberg is considered a voice of reason rather than a screeching, neurotic, ill-informed teen.

EVERY SINGLE TALKING POINT of both International Marxists and the US Democrat Party is constantly promoted by NPR on a daily basis. Never once is any opposing viewpoint presented. That's not "public radio." That is, indeed, "State-Affiliated Media." And why should the US government---which consists of two parties and many views in between---continue to pay for this Marxist mouthpiece?

Shaun Cassidy: Right Before Your Skies (1978)

Places please
The lights go down
A brand new town
And we all look no worse for wear
Hiding on the stairs
Holding on to all we know
Surrounded by the protocol
I hear the place was packed last night
But last night's group played basketball

And suddenly
We're so far away
From yesterday
And tomorrow will be far from here
We just disappear
Living in disguise
Remember how it used to be
Right before your skies

We just disappear
Living in disguise
Remember how it used to be
Right before your skies

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I liked this song (written by Shaun Cassidy himself) as a 12/13-year-old.
Listening to it today, I still think his voice and thoughts are moving.
And one line that has always stuck with me since I was a kid:
"I hear the place was packed last night
but last night's group played basketball..."

Shaun Cassidy: That's Rock-n-Roll (1977)

My very first concert! In 1977, when I was 12 years old.
(Thanks, Mom, for taking me and my best friend Debbie!
At the Fort Worth Tarrant County Convention Center.)
This clip is from German TV, also in 1977.

As I watch this 45 years later:
Shaun Cassidy here is still cute and moves very well and has a very shapely ass (which I didn't notice at the time). And this song is still very catchy and good. No shame at all in Shaun being my first!

Oh wait, there's even more... (Incel Alert)

(Don't get excited, it's very, very minor. but it just bugged me.)

One other thing that mildly bothered me over the past week: Usually, I order cheap cat stuff from Walmart: Both jugs of litter and 16-oz containers of Temptations cat treats. The price for both is usually a lot lower at Walmart than elsewhere. Or else I get the Temptations from my local grocery store, where it's only slightly more.

This week, though, I ran out of Temptations early, before my upcoming weekend shopping. So before my cats freaked out at not having their 9pm treat, I went to the local CVS pharmacy (which I hardly ever go to) to get some Temptations. When I entered, I couldn't find the pet-food section, so I found one guy working there and asked him: He could barely speak, just grunted to go one aisle over. OK. When it came time to check out, there was no person at any register, just self-checkouts. Fine. But the machine read my first Temptations but then refused to read the second cannister. So I had to go find the non-speaking store clerk and ask him to come up to the checkout. His response to me: "So, are you scared of robots?" Insinuating that I didn't understand how "self check-out" worked... Grrr.

My ideal response, which I didn't think of at the time, was: "So, are you scared of human interaction, you creepy incel?" Didn't even get a bag when he reluctantly checked me out. To make matters worse to my thrifty German soul: 16 oz of Tempations cost $10.99 at this CVS. Whereas online at Walmart or at my grocery store, they're about $8.48. CVS has a HUGE markup! Kicking myself for not ordering ahead and avoiding the extra cost and the idiotic store clerk---who wasn't even in his 20s! This snarky guy was 30-something!

"6 Major Shifts Happening in 2023"

 The last week has been an unpleasant one for me, especially monetarily! 

(Plus I'm a bit disturbed by the banana-republic charges against Trump: “Show me the man and I’ll show you the crime,” said Lavrentiy Beria, who was Stalin's deputy premier and secret police chief from 1941 until Stalin’s death in 1953.) 

I've been on pretty much an even keel for the past 3 years or so (primarily upon making a ton of money at my current, soon-to-end job, and being able to work from home, which is VERY relaxing!), but the fact that the money train may soon derail is, indeed, kind of scary. I don't fear that I'll end up on the street or anything, but when I find another job that will almost certainly pay less than my current one, it's going to be bad for my ego---and for the sense that I'm "progressing," at least salary-wise. I'm also not looking forward to the highly annoying travel times to/from a new job, in case I'm not able to find something remote. And in the past 3 years of rolling off my couch the few feet to my work-desk, I've also discovered that it's a real pain to shower and get made up and dressed every day of the week! AND to deal with annoying people at work! (When you're all at home, everyone's a lot more palatable!) 

Luckily, I didn't make any large purchases in the last 3 years (like a house, which I went searching for in 2020; or a car; or even a couch), so I've got enough savings to last for a bit. It's just the "not knowing" what's going to happen!

Aside from the unsettling work news in the past week, there was also the fact that Best Buy took over $200 from my bank account last week without me even noticing for a few days! (See earlier blog entry.) It got worked out, which is a great mental relief, but it never should have happened to begin with.

AND WAIT, there's more! Over a week ago, I ordered a bunch of stuff from Amazon, about $150-worth of stuff (more crystals, and books about crystals, and bowls---lots of good stuff that I was really looking forward to). Delivery was supposed to be Saturday, April 1, or Sunday, April 2. I was home all day both days, just lying around, watching TV and movies and reading. And constantly getting up every few hours and opening my front door to see if the stuff had arrived yet. Nothing. When this Monday came, I finally checked my Amazon account and it said the delivery had been made at 1pm on Saturday. AND the driver had taken a picture to prove it! What the hell! I mean, seriously, I had my shades up in my living room the whole time, and I didn't see (or hear) any suspicious person making off with my packages in broad daylight. The photo did prove that the stuff had arrived, so I didn't really have a claim to make with Amazon. I just sat around feeling like crap at the loss of money and then paranoid about who the hell in my apartment complex was a friggin' broad-daylight thief! (There aren't really street people walking around the complex, and my apartment is in the interior, away from the road, so I'm pretty sure it was an "inside job.") 

Anyway, I decided to go ahead and contact Amazon Chat support about all the lost stuff. The guy's first question: "Did you see the delivery photo?" I admitted I had. So I thought that was the end of it and I was just SOL. But no---he then proceeded to list everything that I had mentioned, one by one, asking officially if I wanted a re-delivery or a refund!!! How nice was that! So I got my $200+ back from Best Buy, and now my Amazon stuff is being re-delivered this Thursday and Friday (and you can bet this time I'll be tracking the progress on Amazon AND peering out my front door every hour!).

So I got a little bit lucky. And at least my mind is a lot more at ease re these minor things. But, still, a lot of oddball stuff happening in the past week or so. I'd heard that weird things happened during "Mercury Retrograde," so I checked online astrological calendars about those dates---nope. No Mercury retrograde. I did, though, come upon this interesting astrological site with info on "6 Major Shifts Happening in 2023":

https://chaninicholas.com/the-6-major-shifts-happening-in-2023/

3. Pluto enters Aquarius

March 23rd, 2023

Pluto is the planet associated with wealth, power, secrets, mystery, death, and underworld journeys. When it enters Aquarius on March 23rd, Pluto will carry those themes into the realm of information technology, data, science, systems of power, and communal potency.

The last time Pluto passed through Aquarius was from 1777 to 1797, a period that witnessed both the French and American revolutions. Pluto in this systems-minded air sign will transform our understanding of the power of the collective. We’ll witness the value — and cost — of information, and maybe even attempt democratizing it in a whole new way. 

Pluto is a transformer. Whatever house Pluto tunnels into for you will be the source of awe-inspiring resources over the coming years. If Saturn in Aquarius clarified the challenges that now face the collective, Pluto reveals what needs to be revamped — on a personal and social level. Pluto will only linger in Aquarius for three months in 2023, but it will spend two decades in this sign when it returns in 2024. Think of this initial sprint as the foreshadowing of seismic shifts to come.

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With my new in-flux job situation, and with what's societally happening to Trump (love him or hate him, the current (il)legal goings-on by uber-partisan Manhattan DA Bragg---who upon election in 2021 publicly vowed to get Trump---are insane and truly indicative of a banana republic that persecutes political rivals rather than a nation based on impartial laws), I do feel that something's in the air.

I know, I know---a bit/lot ridiculous to conflate my unease about Best Buy/Amazon dealings with political events! But... I'm a long-time Independent voter with a sense of order. This current illogical chaos in the US (crime, border, economy, persecution of political rivals), I cannot stand.

Now...to catch that thief in my apartment complex! And maybe, according to Pluto's shake-up prediction, someone can truly Drain the Swamp in the next 20 years.

 

Beware of Best Buy!

A year ago, I bought a new computer from Best Buy. At the time, I had all the info from my old computer transferred over to my new computer. The fee for doing so at the time was apparently more than a year-long "Geek Squad" membership. So the store talked me into a yearly "Geek Squad" membership, which covered the transferral plus more.

A year later, I've continued to get regular Best Buy e-mails, as usual. Not paying any attention to them. But I just checked my bank account: Best Buy charged me over $200 for an automatic renewal of the "Geek Squad" service.

I had to go and spend a lot of time with the Best Buy site and with my bank to get this $200+ charge refunded to my account.

BEWARE of Best Buy scams! And please check your bank statements every month! (Back in the olden days, I used to check mine monthly---but not so much in the past few years, I'm ashamed to say. With today's automation, I somehow thought things were safer---this illicit $200 charge taken out of my account by Best Buy woke me up.)

Film and Photographic Glimpses of F. Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald

Thinking of this ill-fated couple's happy beginnings reminds me of what I found most happy in my early years:

Ginny (spring and summer of 1983)
Kathy/Kris (spring and summer of 1988)
Mollie (spring/summer/fall/winter 1989/1990)
Brian and "Trash Soup" (1991/1992)

After that, kinda just me thrashing about aimlessly and coming upon Internet people. As someone who lived a life pre-Internet, no one on the Internet is the equivalent of real-life people.

When you're young, you think that all that is happening to you is because of your "worthy soul." Nah---It's just because you look young and cute.

Bay City Rollers: Bye Bye Baby (Top of the Pops, 1975)

The Bay City Rollers were the first band that I ever loved. Would've been the first band that I ever got to see in concert, except their date in Fort Worth (Tarrant County Convention Center) was cancelled for lack of sales. (That "first concert honor" later went to Shaun Cassidy.)
Today, over 40 years later, I still like the BCR and still listen to their music at least once every month or so.
Which reminded me: My now-20-year-old nephew's first concert was Drake. Because Drake was the cool thing at the time. Will my nephew ever obsessively buy all of Drake's music or listen to him 40 years from now? I doubt it. He most likely went to the concert just because it was something to do, not because he got a teenaged thrill from his music.

If I was so obnoxious as to previously revel in my $68K salary...

 ...then I suppose I must also be so humble as to admit now: The Govt. contract that paid the wonderful salary is now GONE! (A contract that we've had for the past 7 years and that we thought was a sure thing has now gone to a "Small Disadvantaged Business." Meaning minority-owned---nothing to do with merit or on who's been working on the project for the past 7 years.) I've got about 2 months to find another job.

Damn. For the past 3 years post-Wuhan (aka COVID), it's been extremely luxurious to not have to get up and drive anywhere, rather, just roll off the couch and move a few feet to the computer! I've gotten spoiled. And my looks and clothes have also gone down-hill for the past 3 years---Do I ever go outdoors and get fresh air? No. Do I ever buy any wardrobe other than sneakers or sweats or T-shirts? No.

While I'm not looking forward to dealing with traffic or stupid office-people, it might, though, be nice to make some actual real-life friends in a new office! (I remember in the "olden days," actually going out for drinks after work...)