A Clever Ruse?

This year, Jen turned 46. Yup, it’s official, she’s not a kid anymore. In fact, she’s now middle aged. Wow! They get big so quick. //sniff//

I can’t help but recall my own 46th year—it was a big one. That was the year my hearing winked out. It was the year of my last mondo brain fry up which left me at the very bottom of Recovery Mountain.  I needed a walker to get around. For six solid months I had crazy ass double vision. My mouth didn’t work so good anymore—I couldn’t drink from a glass without spilling all over myself. Still can’t. I slept more than I was awake. And, oh yeah, I was stone deaf.

Lucy & Seamus

That was 11 and a half years ago. I’m much better now, thanks.

In contrast, our heroic Jen is just about brimming with good health. She’s survived breast cancer, shoulder surgeries and, perhaps most impressive of all, she's withstood 23 years of BFF-ness with yurs truly, MOI.

Yea Jen!

Me and Birthday Girl

Erin, Jen’s bébé sister, was throwing our hero another surprise celebration. My job was to get her outta the house and keep her out until noon. Easy peasy, eh? I told Jen that we’d be doing Saturday morning brekkie at Starzzzz in Hingham and then hitting Nantasket for a long beach walk.

Problem. Though it warmed up to 43º yesterday, at 9:30 AM when we hit the beach, Nantasket was a mega blustery and chill 23º. //shiver// Yup, we ixnayed the walkie. What could I do to keep her away from home for another two and a half hours?!

Oni and Bridget

Do you mind if we stop at the crafts shop? I want to pick up some kite string and beads for light catchers. You know, like the ones we saw at The Surgeon’s House out in Arizona. ‘Member those? Hey, maybe you’d like to make some too, huh?

Well, that killed 45 minutes. Now what? Lowes! I need to pick up a humidifier for our bedroom. TAB got a bloody nose last night from all the dry air. Oh, while we’re here, let’s look in the kitchen counter department. You know, inspired by yours, I’m thinking about redoing ours.

30 minutes later, Jen sez I gotta get home. Oni and I need to run errands.

Shit! Time to get creative.

Mother Donna, Uncle Bob and Erin

Ah no can do and please don’t panic BUT Ignatz (our newest porch visitor cat) has taken TAB and Oni hostage. Not sure what he wants but there was, possibly, demands of Fancy Feast and safe passage to Jamaica. The hostage negotiators are workin’ their sweet ta tas off, trying to get Iggy to settle for catnip and a gross of flounder. The sitch is just far too delicate for us to return home now. 

Decorations!

 

TAB and Oni are OK, the hostage negotiators are making progress but we need to steer clear until, say, noon.

She bought it! Alright, I think she was a bit suspicious but, apart from one archly raised eyebrow (I’m SO damn jealous—I wish I could do that!) and a no, rilly, we were good.

As we neared Valhalla, Jen spied her mother’s and uncle’s cars. No, no, no, those belong to the negotiators. Don’t be silly.

I think she was onto my ultra clever (no?) ruse when, as we passed under her kitchen window, she spied her young nephew Patrick.

Ah well. She seemed surprised anyway.

Mercy, Mercy Me

Ricardo Klement AKA Eichmann's passport

Adolf Eichmann’s request for mercy has just been made public.

Why does his plea for lenience offend me so? Don’t we all deserve understanding and compassion?

At his trial, Eichmann put out that he was no more than a simple, low-level travel agent. A grunt who merely arranged train travel for society’s unwanted.

In October 1940, Eichmann and the office IV D 4 organized the deportation of nearly 7,000 Jews from Baden and Saarpfalz to areas of unoccupied France.

Hey, France is nice, right? Oh wait. Yes but...

From his position in RSHA section IV B 4, however, Eichmann played his central role in the deportation of over 1.5 million Jews from all over Europe to killing centers and killing sites in occupied Poland and in parts of the occupied Soviet Union.

You can read Eichmann’s full bio at he Holocaust Encyclopedia. His wartime gig was arranging transportation for more than 1.5 mil Jewish people, humans, to their horrific deaths. Faced with judgement—execution for his crimes—Eichmann felt he deserved sympathy and forbearance. Emmmmmmmmmm. I'm having trouble with this.

Working with other German agencies, he determined how the property of deported Jews would be seized and made certain that his office would benefit from the confiscated assets.

I imagine they were thinking this, possibly.
Hey, before we snuff out these lives, slowly and mega painfully, what say we pillage and ransack a bit. After all, the poor bastards won’t need all their earthly possessions where they’re going. Waste not want not and shit..

In the letter, Eichmann repeated the defense offered at his four-month trial in 1961: that he was a low-level functionary following orders and that he should not be held accountable for the crimes of his superiors. He wrote that the judges who convicted him were “not able to empathize with the time and situation in which I found myself during the war years.”

Oh yeah, it was different back then, man—EVERYone was killing the Jews. It was a thing, ya know. Honest!

Eichmann as bro. I can so see it—can't you?

“It is also incorrect that I never let myself be influenced by human emotions,” he added, noting: “Specifically after having witnessed the outrageous human atrocities, I immediately asked to be transferred. Also, during the police investigation I voluntarily revealed horrors that had been unknown until then, in order to help establish the indisputable truth.”

Nazi Bro at his trial

That’s nice—after getting a better look see at the spectacularly barbarous crimes against humanity that he was a big part of, he requested a transfer. How heroic of him. And, when they lost the war and were caught, he ratted out his bros in outrageous depravity. Yeah, he should get good doobie points for that, right? (WRONG!)

“I am not able to recognize the court’s ruling as just, and I ask, Your Honor Mr. President, to exercise your right to grant pardons, and order that the death penalty not be carried out,” he concluded, before signing his name in blue ink on lined paper.

“I am not able to recognize the court’s ruling as just..." Oh puh-LEEEZE motherfucker! Where, you giant puddle of diseased rat vomit, was the justice for the 1.5 million Jews whose torturous deaths you facilitated? Hmmmmm?

He felt he was entitled and yet, none of his fellow humans—the ones he sent to death—deserved the same?

The subtitle of writer/philosopher, Hannah Arendt’s book Eichmann in Jerusalem is A Report on the Banality of Evil. Evil doesn’t come in looking like Freddy Krueger or Darth Vader. Nope. It’s the Gordon Gekkos and Eve Harringtons that we need to look out for.

Again I ask, don’t we all deserve mercy? Why can’t I imagine sparing a shred for Eichmann or anyone else of his stripe?

Mercy, Mercy Me—Marvin Gaye

Results Are In

Such as they are.

The Amazing Bob and I spent the day at MGH yesterday. We saw his brill cancer medic (Doctor Abramson) and got the results of the latest CAT scan. There’s a spot on his pancreas. The good doc says it may be nothing but we’re scheduled for another scan in two months time. If there’s no growth, great, boom, done. They just want to keep an eye on things. If the spot's any bigger though, it’ll be biopsy time in the old town again.

This was, of course, not the news we’d hoped for. We wanted to hear: Your scan was clean as a sparkling new baby’s! Go, get outta here—we’ll see you next year for an annual check up. 

Nope. No such luck.

Later, while we were in the infusion department with the bag of booster serum dripping into his system, TAB, utterly deflated, sighed “Every time I think we’re done, in the clear, they drag us back in.”

BUT this may well be nothing. I suggested that we hold off on panic, the rending of garments and gnashing of teeth until we’re certain of the score. Good plan, HARD to do. Also…SHUT UP, I sez to meself, I’m busy freaking out here! Yes, I spoke those words, that recommendation for me too.

Jen, who’s gone through this shit already, commiserated—yes, it’s a big time, awful roller coaster ride.

*sigh*

So then, what I’m puzzling over now is this—how do I keep our spirits up and strong over these next two months while we wait, wait, wait for the next CAT scan? CAKE is lovely and helpful but that alone won’t do the job.

Idiots with Guns

First, they want the federal government to relinquish control of the wildlife refuge so "people can reclaim their resources," he told CNN early Monday. And second, they want an easier sentence for Dwight Hammond and his son Steven, ranchers who were convicted in 2012 of committing arson on federal lands in Oregon.

Oh yeah and they wanted an end to the government’s “tyranny.” Someone ought to buy them a dictionary or maybe just electro shock treatments along with years of talk therapy.

Tyranny noun, plural tyrannies.
1. arbitrary or unrestrained exercise of power; despotic abuse of authority.
2. the government or rule of a tyrant or absolute ruler.
3. a state ruled by a tyrant or absolute ruler.
4. oppressive or unjustly severe government on the part of any ruler.
5. undue severity or harshness.

"At the heart of this is a complaint that the federal government owns so much land, and that feeling is typical in a lot of Western states," said Heidi Beirich, a lead researcher with the Southern Poverty Law Center. "But that land doesn't belong to them. It belongs to all of us and the government is working to preserve it.

"And I don't know where they get off thinking that the land doesn't belong to those who originally had it," she quipped.

 Essentially, they wanted the land for themselves, free of charge, and were putting this ginormous FREE-DUMB justification spin on it all. Do they honestly believe the monster, whack-job bullshit they spout or are they bunco artists with guns and a spectacularly ill thought out grift?

Jim Wright of Stonekettle Station has a brill post up about these cretins. The briefest of snippets here:

These are not patriots.

They do not believe in democracy.

They do not believe in the republic.

They do not stand with the rest of us against the fall of night.

They believe in guns and violence and brutality. They are a howling mob and nothing more.
~~~
A gun doesn’t make you a patriot.

I’m very happy this whole shit show’s beginning to close down. Yes, there are more brain-deaders left at the reserve but, without their heroic scam artist leader, will they really continue their Red Dawn cosplay?

It is unknown how many militants remain at the refuge. Fewer than a dozen have been seen on the live stream, but the camera is in a stationary spot. Despite pleas for cooler heads, the men and women at the refuge seem intent on going down in a firefight with law enforcement.

Let’s hope they reconsider and lay down their weapons to surrender.

Perhaps they will if they understand that, unlike the movies, you don’t get up and go to lunch when the scene ends. Of course, these folks may all be radically suicidal. Suicide by Cop.

The characteristics for classifying a suicide by cop incident become clearer when we look at four basic criteria:

1.   The suicidal subject must demonstrate the intent to die.
Check.
2.  The suicidal subject must possess a clear understanding of the finality of the act.
Unclear.
3.  The suicidal subject must confront a law enforcement official to the degree that it compels that officer to act with deadly force.
Gettin’ there.
4.  The suicidal subject actually dies.  (If the subject survives, this becomes an attempted suicide by cop).
So far, only Finicum, who really seemed just so with his loud, proud, delusional militia “poetry.” When asked if he would die for the cause, he replied:
“There are things more important than your life — and freedom is one of them,” he said. “I’m prepared to defend freedom.”

It’s fascinating how his very white, extreme right wing defenders are going all Hands Up, Don’t Shoot now. Finicum’s daughter, who was on the floor of the back seat of the car, says he was on his knees with his hands up. That’s disputed by Finicum’s fellow overthrowers of TYRANNY who say:

“He was not on his knees, none of that,” McConnell said. “He was none of that nonsense. You know, that was a miscommunication on somebody else’s part. But he went after them. He charged them. You know, LaVoy was very passionate about what he was doing up here.”

So then, suicide by cop.

Asshole.

You can read Jim Wright’s take on Finicum's exit strategy (well worth the click) here.

Meanwhile, here in beautiful Valhalla, the temps will get above 40º later. Yes, I’m getting my trike out from under it’s winter sanctuary and I’m gonna have a nice long, mind clearing ride. I’ll momentarily forget that paranoid, blindingly selfish, gun wielding idiots like this exist.

The Big Three Oh

Last year on our anniversary, The Amazing Bob and I were hunkered down at MGH in the midst of an all-travel-verboten blizzard-a-thon. Yes indeedy, we do know how to celebrate. This year, today, will be WAY more low key.

By the by, this is our 30th anniversary. Can you believe that shit? Yeah, us neither.

What’s the secret of such a long happy union?

• A shared love of bad puns? (bad pun—yes, that’s redundant)
• Cats and the acceptance that we are, at best, merely their servants?
• The frequent, yet judicious, use of the powerful, pacifying Yes Dear?
• Shared goals (CAKE!)?
• Giving each other space (the final frontier) to stretch and be who we is?
• Taking turns with big illin’ events? (it just wouldn’t do for me to have a brain fry up at the same time that he’s heart attack-ack-acking or vice versa)
• Weed?

Em….beats the fuck outta me.

We've joked that O. Henry wrote The Gift of the Magi about us. All I have to add to that is...yup.

What do we fight about? Eh, we don’t—that’s such a buzz kill and why would we even want to slaughter a perfectly sweet, innocent buzz? How about, what do we disagree on? The number of cats we can have living indoors. He wanted just one. I wanted a thousand. We compromised. Two.

There’s probably something else but I just can’t bring anything to mind.

Today's major league jubilation action will involve running errands, hitting the book/music store and then to Froggies for lunch. This evening we’ll have dinner with the kids (i.e., Jen and Oni).

Yup, chilled out—it’s how we roll.

About That Town Hall

This is what happens when three adults discuss issues aimed at helping the average American as opposed to the clown car of Republicans pouring out to spout off absurd talking points for cheap applause.
~Allen Clifton (the rest of his assesment at this link)

Jim Wright of Stonekettle Station had an Open Forum—a space for folks to talk about what they thought of the event. Commenter Patricia Crawford had this to say and yes, I agree with her.

They all did great, this is a nice format. Hillary seems to have gotten the message that her attacks on Bernie were not widely liked. She said more nice things about him than not.

It seemed to me that she tried to up her energy level, maybe to match Bernie's strong demeanor, she seemed like she was yelling as she spoke. I noticed that but not because a woman being fiery isn't comfortable to me, that's been an issue for her all along though—for all women. When men raise their voices they are seen as 'strong', when women do it they’re called bitches. It wasn't that though, it was because it was different from how she is normally, so I noticed.

I thought she missed a few good chances to make some important points. Such as when a young man asked about his friends saying "she isn't honest" or maybe he said she wasn't 'trustworthy,' but you get the idea. She should have used that to hammer home a point she and Bernie's followers never talk about, how that impression of her is media driven (she touched on this) AND how Bernie will be on the receiving end of the lies if he wins. Nobody seems to talk about the role the media is going to have if Bernie wins the primary. It's why I think he could lose the Presidency.

We already know how Hillary handles this issue—she’s been lied about and attacked for 30 plus years. Those many, many attacks in the media are, in my opinion, why so many see her as ‘untrustworthy.'
"Surely there must be a kernel of truth if they keep saying bad things? Right? And she isn't warm and cuddly, so......."

I don't think Bernie realizes what's ahead.

Everyone keeps noting polls that show him winning against a Republican. Sure, that’s because FOX isn't talking about him yet. I don't think the middle of the country even knows who he is yet. If he wins the primary FOX is going to go full blown Benghazi!/White Water!/Emails! on him and the frothing taking heads will be bugling "TAX INCREASE!" and "SOCIALIST!" all day and all night. How Bernie polls now has zero bearing on how he would do in the actual election after half a year or more of FOX's scalding light.

The big difference between Hillary and Bernie for me is their willingness, or unwillingness, to see the reality of how our government system works. I believe they have the same goals in mind. Hillary wants what Bernie wants too. But Bernie is promising the lobster on a golden platter and Hillary, who's seen the kitchen, is saying We can achieve a nice seafood stew with some lobster in it but straight lobster isn't going to happen right away. And if we keep asking for lobster when there simply isn't any, we are going to get thrown out of the restaurant.

And over at HuffPo:

Noam Chomsky, the noted radical and MIT professor emeritus, said the Republican Party has become so extreme in its rhetoric and policies that it poses a “serious danger to human survival."

“Today, the Republican Party has drifted off the rails,” Chomsky, a frequent critic of both parties, said in an interview Monday with The Huffington Post. “It’s become what the respected conservative political analysts Thomas Mann and Norman Ornstein call ‘a radical insurgency’ that has pretty much abandoned parliamentary politics.”

That's all, just wanted to share what I've been reading

Yur welcome.

Kevin Tudish—Author, Fashion Designer

Remember my friend, the author Kevin Tudish? In addition to writing he enjoys drawing. Occasionally he posts his creations on Twitter.

His flower studies put Xavier Casalta’s illustrations in mind only Kevin’s are looser, more flowing. They feel alive. In contrast, Casalta's, gorgeous as they are, have more of a static, wallpaper-y feel.

In any case, Mister Tudish has been discovered! A rep from the clothing company VIDA saw his work and contacted him.

I came across your artwork online and absolutely love what you are doing - your work is elevated, unique, and creative.

I am writing today with the hope that you will consider collaborating with us…

WOW!

Kevin wrote that:

VIDA seems like a cool organization. They partner with makers in Karachi, and provide literacy programs to those makers. As I understand it, the sales of items on their site have a direct impact on literacy in Karachi. So, it's nice to see my art in a new venue, and to have it also function as a delivery mechanism for literacy.

“We believe it’s time to rebuild commerce - for the mindful, global citizens of the modern world.”

I can share my art in a new context, and let that work provide literacy opportunities for men and women half a world away.

What an amazing opportunity.

See my collection at http://shopvida.com/collections/voices/kevin-tudish (scroll down to see the selections) 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

By the by, if you've not read Health, Happiness, Love, Longevity, Peace, Prosperity, and Safety: Surviving the Luxury of Silicon Valley yet...well, boyhowdy, do it. It's witty, engaging and charming as all hell.

Dazed and Confused

Sure as hell glad that, in my Words with Friends games, I’m not asked to define the morphemes I play.

I could score a paltry (but better than all alternatives) 20 points with Fundi. Yeah, yeah proper names are not permitted but HEY, I gotta try anyway. I was thinking of The Bay of Fundy actually. That and those awful christianists—the fundies. Fundi worked—yea! But what does the word really mean.

Fundus
noun, plural fundi
the base of an organ, or the part opposite to or remote from an aperture.

Oh. That's very different.

Douma—I was thinking of those huge cathedrals in Italy (em, that's duomo). Oh, sure sure, foreign words aren’t cool but I had to give it a shot!

From the Urbam Dictionary:

Douma—A crap, usu. large. See deuce. Oh, god I gotta drop a douma!

Dictionary.com tells me that Douma is a variant of duma:

1. (in Russia prior to 1917) a council or official assembly.
2. (initial capital letter) an elective legislative assembly, established in 1905 by Nicholas II, constituting the lower house of parliament.

Huh. That's very different.

Adz—I truly, honestly thought this referred to those reliably lame ass pop up commercials that appear on line. Really. Nope, it’s a carpentry too. Hell’s Bells, I was even off the mark with the Urban Dictionary.

 Cloque—a varient spelling for cloak. Right!?
No. Cloque, noun—an embossed or quilted fabric.

I'm batting far less than a thousand here.

Toque—ummm, I had that song playing in my head. You know the one one that goes (sing along with me here!)

One toke over the line sweet Jesus
One toke over the line
Sittin' downtown in a railway station
One toke over the line
Awaitin' for the train that goes home, sweet Mary
Hopin' that the train is on time
Sittin' downtown in a railway station
One toke over the line

Brewer And Shipley? One hit wonders but, man, great tune.

Oh right, back at the word. Emmm, figured toque could be an alt spelling. Nope. It's a brimless hat. You know, spring fashion for the balding hipster set.

K. That's very different.

Ho—I was thinking, ya know, that's slang for whore! I was a bit surprised that Word With Friends accepted it (they won't accept most swears—damn them!) but, em, whatevs. And then I remembered, Santa does the ho, ho, ho thing and there's Land ho! and What ho.

It’s an interjection and shit. Got it.

Gault as a noun versus going galt, a verb. Not really a verb. It's just a silly, empty threat. Once again I was figuring on accepted other spelling action. Nope, gault is a stiff compact clay or thick heavy clayey soil.

 Floc—I’m thinking this is the word for wallpaper with those raised fuzzy Victorian-ish patterns. This is what I found at dictionary.com under floc.

Floc
1. Also, flock. a tuftlike mass, as in a chemical precipitate.
verb (used with or without object), flocced, floccing.
2. to amass or collect into flocs. 

Now I’m confused.

 Roquet, not Croquet, is a form of croquet played on a clay or hard-surface court surrounded by a low wall off which the balls may be played. 

Oh, I thought roquet was that dish was served in the high school cafeteria back in the 70s. You know, Chicken Roquets? No, that’s Chicken Croquettes.

I was close. Kind of. Sort of. OK, not really.
Dazed and Confused—Led Zeppelin

It's Happened Once More

I passed by his sad, chubby, little corpse countless times this morning before I noticed him laying there...dead. Poor dear.

The Amazing Bob said that, in the tiny hours of the AM, he heard our Princess Coco. She was on a tear—performing complex acrobatics, spinning and thrusting and running a marathon or three down on our first floor.

Knowing that she was having mondo fun and in high gear he, wisely, remained abed. Never smart to get between our girl and prey.

I feel just awful for this tiny, sweet looking mouse but, at the same time, I know that I'm now safe and de-verminized. Who knows, he could been one of those cereal killer type rodents (I hear they've quite a thing for Frosted Mini Wheats), a con in Topo Gigio guise or, even worse, a militia mouse! *gasp*

Knowing that Coco and her incomparable ninja super powers are on the case will help me sleep much easier tonight.

Killer Queen—Queen

Spared

Yesterday afternoon I attempted to go out for a nice long walk only to be pitched sideways by the intense wind. I was trying to capture some of the cool white cap action that was goin’ on and figured I’d only need to hold onto the railing for support. Nope, this was, most def, a non-starter.

Snow-wise, here in Valhalla we only got about 3”and I’m mega thankful that was all. Yup, like everyone else around here, I’m still suffering from Post Traumatic Snow Disorder.

West Virginia won the snow lottery yesterday with 40 inches. There’s close to 30 on the ground in Central Park this morning—I bet that’s stunningly gorgeous. I wish I was down there with my camera RIGHT NOW! Gotta be quick to get the good pics though. Temps down there will be well above freezing for the next week. By February first this’ll all be just a memory, a hoary tale to share over pints.

In contrast, Boston didn’t see the last of it until mid July last year. Granted, this was at the snow farms but still the wet, white shit was with us well into spring. This pic, at right, was taken in our yard on March 12th (!!!) of last year. I was going a bit stir crazy and tried to dig out the grill.

Yes, I've a great deal of sympathy for those to the south of me who've been buried. I'm just blindingly grateful that the storm crapped out, mostly, before hitting us.

In lieu of more Snow Trash Talk I give you some tunes.

Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds—Fifteen Feet of Pure White Snow
Etta James—Stormy Weather
Led Zeppelin—Immigrant Song

We come from the land of the ice and snow,
From the midnight sun where the hot springs blow.
The hammer of the gods will drive our ships to new lands,
To fight the horde, singing and crying: Valhalla, I am coming!
On we sweep with threshing oar, Our only goal will be the western shore.

Why yes…

Gus

Trixie

Gaston

 

Now that you mention it, it IS Caturday!

I was feeling all sentimental and shit last night. I was thinking about Trixie and how Coco had gargantuan objections to her moving inside. (Trixie now lives with a very nice, lucky woman in Portland, Maine). There was Gus. Jen and Oni still miss that fuzzy little Eddie Haskell terribly (now in a lovely forever home elsewhere in town). Gaston (AKA Loud Boy) and how much I miss him—I seem to be alone in this. G-boy just stopped showing up. I dearly hope one of his other feeder/cosseter/suckers took him inside.

Now, visiting but not living on our porch, we have Ghost Cat, Fritz and Ignatz. None of our new kittens are keen on humans. They don’t yet know that I’m their friend and doormat. I leave a bowl or two of food out at breakfast and dinner and then make myself scarce so as not to scare them. Jen’s gotten a better look see at Fritz and Ignatz. She tells me that Fritz is a mondo Maine Coon Cat—just enormously furry. Ignatz is big too but not as much of a wooly mammoth.

Sargeant Rocco

Princess Coco

Meanwhile indoors: Rocco remains a big ol’ ferally sweetie boy—running into the depths of our closet the minute anyone comes inside (he's a schmooze monster with me though and sometimes he'll allow TAB pat him). He sticks to the second floor for the most part and Coco reigns supreme on the first. That is, unless they’re in passive aggressive mode where they sneak food from each other’s bowls or take strafing run slashes in the opposing team's litter box.

Rocco overslept this morning. This was concerning (he’s not a young thing anymore) until I realized that he likely had a tuna hangover. He and Coco each had a big plate of it last night for dinner. Conversely, our relatively youthful princess was zooming all over the joint. She was bouncing off the walls and zipping up and down the basement stairs.

Tuna. Quite the heavy drug. Clearly.

Black and orange stray cat sittin' on a fence
Ain't got enough dough to pay the rent
I'm flat broke, but I don't care
I strut right by with my tail in the air

Stray cat strut, I'm a (Ladies' cat)
I'm a feline Casanova (Hey, man, that's where it's at)
Get a shoe thrown at me from a mean old man
Get my dinner from a garbage can

Meow
Yeah, don't cross my path

I don't bother chasing mice around, oh, no
I slink down the alley looking for a fight
Howling to the moonlight on a hot summer night
Singin' the blues while the lady cats cry
"Wild stray cat, you're a real gone guy
I wish I could be as carefree and wild
But I got cat class, and I got cat style" 

Meow 

Stray Cat Strut—Stray Cats

Just In Case You Weren't Sure

When someone, me for example, says to you, I’m deaf, this is what it means. It means that I’M DEAF! The hearing’s kaput! You can talk as much as you want but, if I've never conversed with you before, odds are, I’m not gonna understand what you’re saying. N.B., Lipreading's one of those Jedi art forms.

Yesterday I had not one but TWO people who, while seemingly sentient, failed to understand what being deaf entails.

The first happened while The Amazing Bob and I were at MGH for his CAT scan. We’d finished up and were leaving the imaging department, a rabbit warren of office, exam and procedure rooms. We each stopped off at the bog before the inevitably long ride home (Wednesday evening it took close to two hours to drive the 14 miles from town to home. Thursday morning our commute was 90 minutes).

While I was waiting for TAB, a smartly turned out, pleasant seeming woman came out of her office (so this was a medical professional and shit) and started talking at me—rápidamente too. I stopped her speech flood and smilingly said Hi, I’m deaf so I just missed everything you’ve said. This barely slowed the woman’s talk torrent—she charged on with more words. This time, I put up the crossing guard stop sign and said Hi, I’m deaf. This means that I’m unable to hear the words you’re saying. I’m standing here waiting for my husband to get out of the can. When he’s done, we’ll be on our way. Look, there he is now!

I get it, the lady saw me, not a doc or nurse, standing around in the hallway and figured I was lost. She’d come out to see if she could assist. That’s dandy. More better dandyness would be in knowing how to communicate with folks who don’t understand your language.

The next incident was in the pharmacy parking lot when I went to fill a ‘script. I came out to see that a giant horking “mini” van had parked tight next to my poor baby Bix. So close in fact that, had there been time, I would’ve joined Weight Watchers so’s I could more easily slip into the driver’s seat.

I very carefully opened my door but, while wriggling in, my door made VERY soft contact with the van. Inevitable and, honest to Bast, it was a touch NOT a hit. The woman leaped out of her monster vehicle, raced to my door, demanding that I open. I did. A flood of angry words were coming from her. Great. Again I said Hi, I’m deaf so I missed all you just said. Obviously unfamiliar with the word "deaf," she kept talking and then pointed at her side door which I’d, supposedly, decimated. I looked. There wasn’t even a scuff mark. OF COURSE there wasn’t! I’m driving the auto equivalent of a cotton ball!

At this point, driver babe notices that her tank’s finish is showroom perfect and spews some more lexemes in my direction. I pointed out that she’d parked part way into my space, well over the lines and then apologized for, possibly, touching her car. And then I shut my door and drove off.

Twat.

I believe I’m going to have cards made up for future occurrences. They’ll look like this:

 

Want more communication tips? Here!

The Old Yankees Were Right: Payback Coming Due for December’s Warmth

a post by The Green Miles
Lifelong New Englanders will often lament during exceptionally pleasant weather that we shouldn’t enjoy it too much because we’ll be punished for it later. There’s no reason to believe Mother Nature keeps a Puritanical ledger ensuring that we experience a minimum amount of suffering during the year.

But this year … this year the old Yankees are being proven right. All those days of shorts weather in December are about to come back to bite us. A major winter storm is expected to hit the East Coast from DC up through New England this weekend, and as Eric Holthaus explains at Slate, it’s forecast to be fueled by that December heat still stored up in off-the-charts-warm Atlantic waters:

The same atmospheric forces that have contributed to the exceptionally warm winter so far will help steer tremendous amounts of moisture toward the coast. Climate change and El Niño have pushed water temperatures in the Atlantic to near record highs right now, which could offer something similar to the boost a landfalling hurricane sometimes gets when traversing the Gulf Stream—a rapidly strengthening storm, though with snow instead of rain.

Mashable’s Andrew Freedman also points out this storm will coincide with a full moon, raising the flooding threat. Warmer water adding fuel to storms is one way global warming weirds winter weather and there’s evidence our region’s snowfalls are growing more extreme.

Next time certain commenters are telling us to stop worrying and enjoy global warming, I’ll be over here doing my impression of Ned Stark from Game of Thrones (itself a global warming parable): Winter is coming. Better go buy the stores out of milk & bread before the white walkers come!
Crossposted at Blue Mass Group

Picture Day

The Amazing Bob and I are off to MGH for his follow up CAT scan. Naturally I asked "which cat?" No one laughed. OK, TAB grinned and chuckled. That's one of the many reasons I love that man—he likes my bad puns.

The scan will show whether that bastard cancer is still gone, gone, gone. It fucking well bettah be! We'll get the results next week.

So, in lieu of blathering for me, PICS!

The Force Could Use Another Hour of Sleep

It’s a Heffalump kind of a day. Or maybe it’s a Mr. Snuffleupagus day.

What does that even mean? I’m moving mega slow this morning. I’m lumbering and logy. Why? I was up and out relatively late last night. Jen, Oni and I went to see Star Wars: The Force Awakens. Yes. Again. The flick just blows me away. Mostly it’s Rey and the actress who plays her, Daisy Ridley. She brings tremendous depth to a character who could easily be played two dimensionally. She’s the real hero of the show.

I wish I’d had such strong celluloid champions when I was a kid. Nope, the only sci fi film with a woman as more than just a minor player was Barbarella. Yeah, a trippy sex farce.

It wasn’t until Ripley in1979’s Alien that we chicks got to be anything but ornaments and sex toys. Sheesh. I’m happy as hell that my grands get to see women on screen who are solid, capable and heroic. It’s about damn time.

Rey is a character for an age that is replacing feminism-as-a-movement with feminism-as-a-way-of-life.

YES! That quote is from a brill post up at The Atlantic—very much worth reading.

 This was my third time seeing it on the big screen. We saw The Force Awakens on the weekend before last, at one of those IMAX theaters. Yeah, the mammoth screen was awesome BUT there was no closed captioning. I knew this going in and thought No biggie, it’s an action movie. I won’t really miss the dialogue. Ah nope. The talking’s not a complete throw away. Also, without sound I ended up focusing on odd bits like, did ya notice how Leia moves her lips, how she speaks? Tiny, bird-like mouth movements, as though she had loose fitting dentures. Distracting from the main events, is what it was.

In any case, the one thing that bugged me last night, more than in past viewings, was General Leia’s pleas to Solo to bring back their son. She was so damn certain of boychik's inner conflict, that he could be persuaded to return from the Dark Side. I know, I know, it’s her child BUT, seriously now, she’s a fucking general. She's been 'round the block with the Dark Side before—has she not learned? Her utter conviction that her Ben’s really a good boy (despite all, extremely contrary, evidence) and will respond to a well placed word from his old Da, smacks of ridiculously hamhanded plot device.

Gee, we need to have one major character die in this. Who could we off? Ford doesn’t want to be in the next installment, we’ll get rid of him.

I wonder though, does motherhood destroy the ability to view your progeny realistically? After the kiddle pops out the chute, are new mother’s issued a pair of mondo blinders? Leia always seemed to have a totally solid grasp of reality. I’m pissed that she was turned into a My worlds destroying kid is really a peach sort of a mother.