Cost Effective

 The Oakland Athletics' final out in their final home game came coincidentally as school was letting out on the day that my principal returned from an "emergency meeting" about the district's budget. Those of us with any experience dealing with Oakland Unified winced in anticipation. The pop up was caught and the team stayed on the field, knowing that they would not be coming back here. There was nothing quite so immediate happening at school. 

Just that looming sliver of Oakland dread that things were not necessarily going to end happily.

This is about the time that a fourth grader came around the corner to let us all know that the boys' bathroom was flooded. I knew that our substitute custodian had gone home for the day. I knew that it would still be another two to three hours before the evening custodian would show up, leaving a gap of time during which half of the after school program kids would have to wade through the half-inch of water that had accumulated on the floor without a drain. 

I set my backpack down. I went to the custodian's closet and grabbed a plunger and a squeegee. I spent the next half hour making the boys' bathroom habitable once again for the boys who needed a place to go. Someone had to do it. 

Here in Oakland, that is the way things work. I can see that the deficit that has blossomed in the wake of creating a district jam-packed with small schools, charter schools, and every effort that had been made to increase the learning potential of the students in these classrooms was costing money we did not have. And that raise that we all got after our last strike? That was money the district did not have. But the negotiations for making things work for the kids of Oakland led us here, to a place where we cannot afford to do public education the way we had set out to do it. Declining enrollment was the biggest arrow people would like to paint pointing directly at the Oakland Unified School District. Anybody looking at the outside looking in will see that there are too many people doing not enough work for the price we are paying. This idea isn't lost on anyone looking at most anything happening in and around Oakland. Silicon Valley is not the fuel that keeps our fires burning. This is a port town. A swirl of diversity and ever-changing community that absorbs and evolves. This is the working class mirror of the city across the bay, San Francisco. 

San Francisco built a new baseball stadium for their Giants. They built a new basketball arena for Oakland's Golden State Warriors. Their schools are struggling to pay their bills. They might have to close schools. And I wonder who is cleaning out their boys' bathrooms. 

Final Score

 Dear John,

Sorry it took me a few days to respond to your letter. Thank you for taking the time to address us, the fans of the Oakland Athletics, and for giving us all your vision for the future, and the past. Thank you for making an effort to try and explain why after fifty-six years of baseball in this town you have decided to leave for the much more hospitable climes of the Nevada desert. 

Thanks for nothing. 

In your letter, you say that you have tried your very best to keep this team in Oakland. Yet each time some sort of compromise was worked out with the city, there were new conditions imposed and all the while you kept looking for other places to have your team, because you are the owner, play. To be clear, you have it in your means to build a new baseball stadium just about anywhere in the world. Three billion dollars would be a nice pot of money to put a diamond in that other city by the bay. 

But that's not the way you roll. You need the city to come up with the cash and the infrastructure to pay for your illusory temple to the Gods of Baseball. Rather than strike a deal that would keep the A's in Oakland until you can get any kind of sweetheart package in Las Vegas, you found the folks up in Sacramento willing to provide you with a minor league stadium in which you can field your team until such time as the greedheads in Sin City come around to your line of thinking. The line of thinking that anyone would be pleased and excited to be the recipient of the team you ground into the dirt over the past eight years. 

This is not the team you reference in your letter. This is not the Ricky Henderson, Reggie Jackson, Moneyball Oakland A's. This is not the twenty-game win streak A's. Around the time that everyone in organized baseball started using Sabermetrics to put a team on their field, the difference that made Oakland unique disappeared. The overriding issue returned to the obvious: money. You have to spend money to make money. You have to spend money to win games. 

John, you didn't spend the money. You priced yourself once again at the very bottom of the Major Leagues in payroll. By more than twenty million dollars. If you had been saving up to help get a new stadium built in Oakland, it might have made sense. Instead, you created a vacuum of talent. Vacuums suck. And even the most die-hard fans of the game were hard-pressed to find their way out to the ballpark. 

Now that Field of Dreams is dead. Your billions are safe, but not the weekly paychecks of the security, the vendors and all the ancillary businesses that were employed by the Oakland Athletics. Your fortune, handed to you by your father, is in pants. Not in baseball. Your future is secure. Your legacy as one of the worst owners in professional sports is secure. 

You made my son cry. I fully support his burning impulse to punch you in the head if he ever encounters you in some chance meeting. 

Thank you for your whiny excuse of an explanation. But it doesn't hold up. 

Thank you for nothing. 

Vanishing Point

 My wife imported a saying she attributes to her grandmother: "The house doesn't eat anything." We are not particularly sure if this is an accurate translation from the native German, but this phrase has served us well since the late twentieth century. 

Which is why the loss of my wallet was so infuriating. Not the initial loss of the wallet my wife brought me all the way from Italy. That one was "lost" a great many times, but turned out to be simply "misplaced." I set about preparing to replace credit cards and drivers license only to discover that this treasured bit of memory was lodged in the back of my closet, or stuck in the seat of my office chair. This was always a great relief because I don't carry a lot of money in my wallet, but I do carry the memory I spoke of earlier. There were parts of my history, ranging from photographs of my father to the receipt for my wife. The tiny slip of paper that showed that I had paid for our marriage license. Those, along with several other scraps of ephemera were under safekeeping as long as I could reach around to my back pocket to be sure that they were still there. 

On Sunday morning, it became apparent that the easy answers were no longer available. The night before, I had gone out to the ballpark with my family for one last look at the home team. When I awoke and started to put my day back together after a weekend of bouncing around, having fun, I realized I could not account for my wallet. I searched all the usual places. I looked in some unusual places. I called my son to see if it had made its escape into the back seat of his car. It quickly became apparent that the culprit was me. Or rather, my shorts. On any number of occasions my wallet has slipped from the back pocket of this particular pair of comfy cargo shorts. Please don't ask why, with all the pockets available I insisted on placing that most valuable fistful of leather in my back pocket instead of any of the Velcro-enhanced enclosures offered up to me by my odd sense of fashion. The best answer I can muster is "habit." 

So after a day of retracing and searching and researching, all of those prior preparations to replace missing items went into full effect. I canceled credit cards. I ordered a new drivers license. And the most difficult phase, I began to imagine a world without all those bits of paper that I had held onto for so long. 

The next evening, my wife went out to speak to a neighbor who, upon hearing about my plight, offered up her fifteen year old son's old wallet. Once again my wife came through in an odd pinch. The following day when my new credit card appeared via express delivery, I went to stuff it into this new tiny bit of luggage, but it was nowhere to be found. 

It was as if the gods were telling me that I was not ready to take on the responsibility of having a wallet again. Sorry, they said, but you're not grown up enough for this level of authority. Once again, I tore through the house, with the words of my wife's grandmother ringing in my head. Two hours of flipping over couch cushions and looking under furniture after the horizontal surfaces that made sense were exhausted revealed nothing. Had the gods vaporized this replacement gift to humiliate me further?

As I was brushing my teeth, getting ready to surrender to the circumstances, I decided there was one last place that had not been investigated. I asked my wife to help me toss our bed to see if the escaped wallet might have somehow ended up tangled in our sheets. 

The house didn't eat anything. It was right there where, I can only assume, the cat put it to wreak some sort of revenge on me for not giving him the attention he feels he deserves. 

A new age began the following morning. This slightly used wallet that now holds a replaced credit card and little else is the beginning of a new era, one that involves secure fastening of my back pocket. 

Cognitive Decline

 When you've lost Cronkite, you've lost Middle America. This was the opinion Lyndon Johnson shared with his advisors in response to Walter Cronkite's lack of support for the war in Vietnam. It was an acknowledgement of the importance of the voice of a generation. Most trusted news source back in the day? It wasn't even a contest. 

Which is what I was thinking about when I read that the candidate for "president" who has been convicted of thirty-four felonies whined at a MAGAt rally in Pennsylvania, "Where's Johnny Carson? Bring back Johnny." 

A couple of points here: First and perhaps foremost, Mister Carson retired from broadcasting in 1992. He retired from this material plane in 2005. Secondly, Johnny was famously apolitical in his monologues. But even that restraint was tested as Richard Nixon's presidency began to implode after the 1972 election. In 1973, Johnny's monologue included this bit: “President Nixon, according to his wife, likes to play the piano late at night in the White House. Did you see that in the paper? True. Plays the piano late at night. … The President is going to- is going to form his own group. Did you hear that Tom? Called the Watergate Five.” Later that same year, he let this one fly: “You know, it is really hard to believe how many people have resigned from the White House today. One of the reporters from New York Times called the White House today, and on the other end he heard, ‘Hello, this is President Nixon. I'm not home right now, but when you hear the beep, will you leave your name and address?’ It's getting very strange.”

So I suppose what I am suggesting here is that Johnny Carson must be seen as a very tame commentator for late night TV compared to the current lineup of Fallon, Colbert and Kimmel. Even Jimmy Fallon who famously gave the former game show host a pass just a couple months before the 2016 election, preferring instead to muss up The Donald's Do. Since then, the landscape of late night has changed to a much less hospitable place for the adjudicated rapist. He is the butt of most of the jokes being told after your late news, with those bits going viral thanks to social media and early bedtimes. Stephen Colbert is pulling no punches. Jimmy's still mostly playing nice, but the material is so abundant it's almost impossible not to fall into it. 

And then there's Jimmy. The Orange One saves special distaste for ABC's late night host. Jimmy Kimmel, the man who once suggested during last year's Oscars that he was seeing the twice-impeached former president's comments on social media and wondered aloud to those watching, "Isn't it past your jail time?" 

So the insurrectionist felon has lost the late night hosts. He can always savor the memories of Johnny Carson, who once described the MAGAt in chief in a series of monologues from the 1980s. 

Get Over It

 The Middle East is exploding. In bits and pieces. Sometimes very large pieces. 

Sri Lanka has a new president.

Russia and Ukraine continue the war that is now in its third year. 

Migrants feel "less welcome" as far-right groups surge in popularity. In Germany.

The world is full of problems, but Marge Taylor Greene's boyfriend and conservative journalist Brian Glenn chose to use his bully pulpit to explore the downfall of the salad bar at Jason’s Deli in Wilmington, North Carolina. Taking his highly developed investigative skills on the road, Marge's boy toy reported to anyone who cared to listen about how he was denied a second trip to the salad bar. He posted a video in which he whined, “When did Jason’s Deli start just doing one trip to the salad bar?” Glenn said. “Just one. It’s a big plate, a big bowl. But just one time. They told me it’s after COVID. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been to Jason’s Deli and I have gotten multiple salads, over and over and over." He closed, asking viewers to "let me know what you think.”

Well Brian, since you brought it up, here's what I think: I think you need a real job. I think you don't fully understand the ethos of a salad. Americans have long since forgotten that the initial notion of having "just a salad" was to limit their intake of food. It is a uniquely American notion this "all you can eat" thing. And Brian just happens to be, for better or worse, uniquely American. It is for him and his kind that the trough should be piled high and it's best to keep your hands and feet out of the way when the machinery is in motion. Even though he was open to the idea that in a post-COVID world making multiple trips to the same bin to get your fill of chickpeas doesn't make a lot of sense, Brian was still having a hard time accepting this change in his feed. 

There is currently a hotly contested presidential race going on right here in the good old U.S. of A, and one might imagine that there are more pressing issues than multiple trips to the salad bar. It's just a short hop over the fence to start complaining about how immigrants are getting first pick of all the neighborhood pets. 

Oops. I probably shouldn't say that too loud. Brian Glenn will be on the case. 

A Tale Of Two Cities

 We went to San Francisco last Friday night. To be more precise, we went to San Francisco's baseball stadium, also known as Oracle Park. Formerly known as Pac Bell Park, SBC Park, and AT&T Park, this was the venue our family went to see local punk heroes, Green Day. We have a history of making this trip, with the most recent being just two years ago. Before that, we have attended shows of theirs in many and varied sports arenas around the Bay Area. Green Day is something we can all agree on, even though my wife has on occasion expressed mild frustration with being hectored by Billie Joe to get her hands up in the air. Nevertheless, our fandom is a family affair, and we rocked into the night and stayed up way past the parents' bedtime. 

Somewhere along the way, the lead singers of one of the opening bands who also hail from 'round these parts, Tim Armstrong of Rancid, noticed a banner hanging from the stands that expressed displeasure with the pending move of the Oakland Athletics to Las Vegas. It was a pretty straightforward punk expletive directed at John Fisher, the owner of the baseball franchise directly across the bay. Not to be outdone, Billie Joe Armstrong included similar sentiments as he shared his feelings about coming home to celebrate the thirtieth anniversary of his band's major label debut and the twentieth anniversary of their epoch defining rock opera, American Idiot. Billie was happy to be home, but very unhappy about the A's moving away. 

As it happens, my family of three also had tickets to go see one of the last ever home games of those same Oakland A's the following night. We piled into our son's car and drove down to the Oakland/Alameda Coliseum, formerly known as Ricky Henderson Field as well as any number of corporate shills willing to pay for the privilege of having their name stapled to the scoreboard for a limited amount of time. We went to the ball game for a chance to see our team, the one with whom our son had grown up, one last time. For many years we had made a practice of attending at least one home game, my son and I, usually around Father's Day. It was always a treat to sit in the stands and wile away a day, having a hot dog and shelling some peanuts. And in all those years, we compiled a solid streak of attending games that the A's won. This isn't to suggest that we were lucky charms or anything, but in sports we know it's best not to mess with a streak. 

That streak came to a crushing end as we watched the Yankees dominate the home team ten to one. It was hard to get a full accounting of the attendance, but in a fairly full stadium, the Yankee fans seemed to outnumber those of us in our green and gold. It wasn't like in the olden days. It wasn't like with Brad Pitt and Moneyball. It wasn't like when the Oakland A's twenty game winning streak back in 2002. It was almost as if the ownership was trying to make it easy to just slink out of town unnoticed. 

We noticed. It brought tears to my son's eyes. It was the only baseball he's ever known. As we were invited down to the field with the rest of the faithful to watch the postgame drone and firework show, we tried to console him. This place would always be part of him, part of his story. Just like the music of Green Day. Just like the hills that rise up behind the stadium. Just like the bay around which we live. 

Welcome home. 

Chip Off The Old Block

 If your government should happen to shut down on you, it probably doesn't have anything to do with you. Don't take it personally. The nincompoops currently at the wheel of the ship of state certainly don't. As has been the case so often in the past, the political wrangling currently underway for control of the direction we go is nothing new. And has essentially nothing to do with printing Social Security checks or keeping our National Parks open. 

Nope. This one is another in a series of partisan wrangling being used for leverage to pass legislation that will keep the lights on and the doors open but will also attempt to squeeze in some suspect bits that would most certainly aid one side over the other. In this version of our story, Republicans of a certain stripe would very much like to attach the SAVE Act to the paperwork needed to keep the EPA inspecting our food along with a myriad of other services. 

Sorry. I forgot to explain the SAVE Act. It is a piece of work from a real piece of work known as Representative Chip Roy from Texas. Chip isn't his real name, but it certainly sounds more Texas than "Charles Eugene." He worked for such luminaries as Rick Perry and Ted Cruz on his path to becoming a lawmaker in his own right. He brought all that MAGAt baggage with him: denying climate change, an insistence on the existence of a "deep state," and the entrails of The Freedom Caucus.

Which of course means that the "crisis on our southern border" lives rent-free in his head 24-7. This, in turn, brings about his scribbling the SAVE Act: Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act. The main purpose of this attempt at reforming our democratic process is to require voters to provide documentary proof of citizenship at the time of registration. What's that? You wonder why this is necessary since being a citizen is already a requirement for voting in the United States? Well, this is Rep. Chip's fear-filled brain we're talking about, so if there is a way to keep Mexico or Haiti from stealing an election from the Irish and other decidedly less brown folks. If that sounds a little harsh, let's keep in mind that Rep. Chip is also the guy who said that the current state of border security would bring about "the end of Western Civilization." 

Of course, one might argue that shuttering the United States Government for any period of time might have a similar effect, since agencies like the Border Patrol will be impacted by this now somewhat commonplace game of chicken being played in Congress. A confusing set of circumstances, since it was this same herd of far-right sheep who followed their orange shepherd's demand to vote down the bi-partisan border bill that would have strengthened control down El Paso way. 

Timing is everything in government, I suppose. But time once again is running out. 

That's A Lot

 Friends and constant readers from Oregon sent me an article a short while back. It was about a study done by the Oregon Health and Science University which suggested that it is the "Prevalence of firearms, not mental illness, driving gun deaths in U.S."

This, I confess, was not exactly news to me. 

However, the very scientific apples to apples comparison of forty other countries with based on the prevalence of mental health disorders and deaths from firearms. If you're reading this blog for the first time, you might be surprised to discover as those scientists in Oregon did that the firearm death rate was eleven times greater in the U.S. compared to the other nations while the prevalence of mental health disorders in the U.S. was similar. And would you believe that over the twenty years the study covered, that the firearm death rate in the U.S. had increased, whereas it declined among the other nations.

Cancer stopped being the leading cause death among children here in our country. It is now bullets. Again, if you've been hanging around here for any length of time, you know that being shot is now the biggest killer of children in the United States. Which begs the question, "So is everyone in the United States mentally ill?"

Well, no. We just happen to have this ridiculous armory held by private citizens. Half of the world's guns are owned and operated by American civilians. Not the army. Not the police. Just your average, Second Amendment loving man or woman on the street. Some of whom happen to be mentally ill. It was important for Kamala Harris to mention in her debate with that other guy that she is a gun owner, and so is her running mate. No one is suggesting that we take away all the guns. Limit them? That makes sense. If there are mentally ill people, how about we all agree that all these guns away from them? 

It's horrifying to me that with all the great ideas in the Constitution of the United States that we seem to be focused on that one thing: Guns. Anybody else want to get all bunged up about due process? Illegal search and seizure? What exactly is the third amendment? Can you guess without looking? Nobody seems to be that worried about it these days, but come this November, it could be a big deal again. 

Which is suppose is just one more ridiculous reason for the NRA-rads to insist on arming themselves to the teeth. 

Sleep tight, America. 

Call Waiting

 As I have mentioned here before, cell phones are at times the bane of my existence as an elementary school teacher. Sorry, let me back up: "Smart phones" are the bane of my existence as an elementary school teacher. A mobile phone which could be used to contact parents via text or voice during an emergency makes sad sense in the world in which we currently live. That said, I do not believe that showing your friends video of how you took the Kylie Jenner Lip Challenge. 

This is the experience I had upon finding four fifth grade boys huddled just outside the bathroom staring transfixed at the images one of them had taken of himself with frighteningly swollen lips, achieved by sucking on a bottle until his lips were vacuumed inside, causing them to become engorged with blood. Never mind that this Tik-Tok trend is almost as old as they are, or that the damage that one in this brain-trust had done to him mouth was still apparent a day after. The fact that during what was for all of them time to be in their classroom and was instead being spent hanging around just outside the bathroom was the most challenging part to take in. Had they all been in class, perhaps they would have gained some particle of knowledge that would have sparked the synapse that would have told them that sucking your lips into a bottle was not on your top-ten best uses of your time.

Meanwhile, schools around the globe are attempting to restrict "smart phone" use. England is working on limiting the use of these devices and/or banning them altogether this year. School officials across the pond suggest in the most British way possible that they hope to gain "consistency to reset the social norm that there is no place for mobile phones in our schools all the way through the school day." The American equivalent of this would be a picture of a 1990s flip phone with a big red slash through it. We, as educators. understand that we as educators are far less interesting than anything on Tik-Tok, including watching educators experience those frequent and massive failures of authority. 

Like trying to limit cell phone use. 

But if you have stuck with me this long, you may be hoping for some resolution. You may have already anticipated my punch line. Last week in Lebanon and Syria, pagers, radios and other personal communication devices exploded. Israel is believed to have been behind the tele-terrorism, with targets primarily among Hezbollah. Which didn't mean they only blew up Hezbollah. Two young children were among the twelve killed in the attack. 

So maybe just to keep everyone safe, we'll round up all the phones. Safety first, after all. 

Without

 I have written here before about the screws tightening. It mostly had to do with public education and the constant request by those who work in the places that make decisions for folks like me to do more with less. 

Legend has it that there used to be a nurse who worked at our school. Full time. We had instructional aides, known by their professional title as IAs, who would push into classrooms and support teachers and students who with needs that stretched out past those who were certainly needy but not able to meet the standards. Those standards continue to shift and change while the IAs have disappeared along with the compassionate lady who administered band-aids and ice packs. 

Near the beginning of this school year, our head custodian's brother passed away. She took off for a few days to attend his funeral. Somewhere along the line, she broke three toes. That few days has now stretched out to a few weeks. Hopefully, she will return in early October. In the meantime, we have been gifted with a very industrious substitute, who is keeping us from being overrun by the filth we as a school generate each day. This was after a few false starts with a substitute custodian who never showed up and another who felt his job was more about monitoring the garbage than sweeping it up and taking it out. 

Add to this a Kindergarten teacher who fell ill and had now missed half of the first couple months of her students' school experience. We have had a series of substitutes come to fill the position, many of whom have said they were more comfortable with middle and high school students. Consequently we have not had a fully engaged teacher in that classroom for weeks. 

Drop into this mix the random assortment of days off taken by various other staff members and the scenario starts to become clear: We all have to do a little bit more with a little bit less. That squeaking sound you hear is that of the gears in our education machine slowly grinding down. Happily, the weekend comes and we go home to get ourselves back to a shape which will allow us to do it all over again. 

But it makes me nervous. Because those powers that be might be noting that we have kept the school open and kids are learning without many of those vital services. People have filled in. We have made do. And we continue the business of teaching children. What could we do without next?

Gut-Buster

 Comedy is hard, according to late character actor Edmund Gwenn. 

Comedy is not pretty, according to comedian Steve Martin.

Both of these sentiments might be taken to heart by billionaire wanna-be-funnyman Elon Musk. 

Shortly after Taylor Swift announced her support for Kamala Harris, Mister Musk tapped out this response:  “Fine Taylor… you win… I will give you a child and guard your cats with my life.” He did this from the relative safety of his bunker located somewhere in the hills of West Texas as he awaited yet another exploding rocket catastrophe. If he had made this comment in front of a live audience, he might have been able to gauge the relative wit of his attempt at humor. This is a man who has fathered twelve offspring with various mothers, and he probably had no sense of just how creepy he sounded in making his offer. 

This might be a good place to note that Ms. Swift's endorsement resulted in more than four hundred thousand people registering to vote. Musk's tweet resulted in a like number throwing up in their mouths, just a little. Hillary Clinton, who has been on the wrong end of more than her share of inappropriate suggestions said that the social media post was nothing more than “another way of saying rape.”

Not a funny one. 

But, comedy is an art form, so practice makes perfect, right? So the man who has presided over Twitter losing its name and more than seventy percent of the market value of his new toy decided to give funny another try. Picking his opportunity carefully, he chose to make the following reply after someone asked  about a second attempt on the life of his pal Don-Old. It went something like this: “Why they want to kill Donald Trump?” Musk replied, “And no one is even trying to assassinate Biden/Kamala,” punctuating his sentence with a thinking face emoji. 

After this massive failure to "read the room," Muskie deleted his tweet, but not before the rest of the cognitive members of society held their collective nose and stuck out their collective tongue in distaste. In his own defense, he fell upon the last bastion of the incredibly bad comedian: "It was just a joke." It should be further noted that Elongated Mush endorsed the man whose claims about immigrants eating cats, while eschewing those childless women who own them. 

Get it? 

Don't Panic

 I don’t know if it’s obvious, but I feel I should mention this:

It wasn’t a Haitian.

It wasn’t a Mexican.

It wasn’t a Guatemalan.

It wasn’t a rape victim.

It wasn’t an incest victim.

It wasn’t a black person.

It wasn’t Hannibal Lecter.

It wasn’t an Israeli.

It wasn’t a Palestinian.

It wasn’t an L.

It wasn’t a G.

It wasn’t a B.

It wasn’t a T.

It wasn’t a Q.

It wasn’t a +.

It wasn’t somebody from ABC News.

It wasn’t a woman.

It was a white guy.

A white guy with a gun.

A white guy who voted for Trump in 2016.

A white guy with a gun wandering around in an open-carry state.

A white guy with a gun in Florida.

Don’t panic. This is normal for Florida.

Riot Grrrls

 It's only rock and roll. 

And mostly, I like it. 

Last week's post-debate endorsement by Taylor Swift of Kamala Harris does not specifically amount to a surprise, but the timing was certainly an insult cherry on top of the injury sundae that was the convicted felon's evening. Not to be outdone, another of rock's queens let her feelings about be known about the possibility of an adjudicated rapist wiinding up in the White House. In case you missed it, Linda Ronstadt is against it. 

Which isn't to say that rock and roll as a community has not coalesced in the Harris/Walz camp. The other guys still have Rock in the forom of Kid. And apparently Kanye West, who may or may not be a musician anymore is a MAGAt. 

But let's face it: You won't expect to find many of those of the rock set hanging around with a would-be dictator. Sure, you could argue that millionaires would probably benefit from the policies of the potential oligarchy. Some folks wanted to point out how much money Ms. Swift stood to lose because of her choice. Add to that the all-caps post from the former game show host: "I HATE TAYLOR SWIFT!" I'm not guessing she's going to lose a lot of sleep over it. 

Or maybe it's marketing genius. Taylor's never gone bankrupt. 

Window Of Opportunity

 Science is good. It helps keep us safe. When disease comes and spoils our day, we can count on doctors and researchers to help us out, in a pinch. You might remember a little virus that made its way around the globe not too long ago that was on its way to eliminating the human race, but medical science jumped in and stopped it dead in its tracks. 

Mostly, anyway. 

Each day we are presented with new and exciting ways that we can live longer, happier lives because scientists are hard at work making it possible. 

Way to go science!

In keeping with this trend, I feel that it's important to pass along the research done by Dcotor Bryan Quoc Le. Doctor Bryan is a food scientist and author who would like us all to know that there is no such thing as a "Five Second Rule."

You read that right. When you drop that cookie on the floor but you scoop it up before you can get to five Mississippi, you're still going to die. According to Doctor Bryan, it does not matter if the Oreo is on the floor for five seconds or five minutes. Dropping food on the floor exposes it to bacteria. He cites a 2007 study in the Journal of Applied Microbiology found that Salmonella Typhimurium, a common cause of foodborne illness, can transfer to foods almost immediately on contact. “Bacteria, including pathogens, can transfer to the food within five seconds or less and grow on the food,” 

What if it's the last piece of pizza that you were saving for a late night snack and when you took it out of the refrigerator when no one else was looking and it landed crust side down? Research suggests that you're better off with a slice of pizza than a slice of watermelon, but there will still be contamination. 

So we're dealing with a risk factor here. You could eat raw steak or fish and be just fine. A swig of pickle brine from the jar you found but can't really place the time or date when you put it on the shelf probably won't kill you. 

And neither will the peanut butter and jelly sandwich that you snatched up with a second to spare. Just don't let Doctor Bryan catch you doing it. 

Boat People

 Unless your ancestors walked across the Bering Strait Land Bridge tens of thousands of years ago, chances are they were Boat People. 

You may recall this term being used in the mid to late 1970s as a derogatory epithet to refer to refugees from Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia. These were people who were fleeing their countries in fear for their lives and livelihood as their countries had suffered massive upheaval at the end of a war that had most recently featured the weapons and destruction of (checks notes) The United States of America. In attempts to free Southeast Asia from the grips of the tyranny of Communism, it seems we forgot to account for the massive wave of emigration that could occur in the wake of the departure of the American Armed Forces. 

So when those folks who fled their countries looking for freedom, they had their eyes set on the land of the brave and the home of the free. And did I mention immigrants? Oh yeah. There were quite a lot of those. With the exception of a small group of surviving Native Americans who had been scooped up and relocated to what I can only assume was ironically referred to as "reservations." The rest of us showed up in much the same way, fleeing oppression of one form or another, or in a bizarre turn of events as a part of oppression in the form of oppression called the Slave Trade. 

By boats.

From the 1960's through the mid nineties people fled the communist regime of Fidel Castro in Cuba. They faced the same hostile reception as their compatriots from Southeast Asia. It was easy to keep track of these interlopers because they looked different than the folks who came over in a boat called The Mayflower. It was around this same time that folks started to flee Haiti, making the somewhat longer trip to the shores of the United States in boats just as sketchy as those that made the ninety mile trip from Havana. 

Once a group of individuals arrive on our shores, they tend to do what most of us have done since John Smith stuck a flag in Jamestown: They huddle together in settlements where their culture and traditions can be shared in order to give the impression of homogeny, in spite of they way they look different from those surrounding their enclave. Chinatown. Koreatown. Little Havana. Little Saigon. And so on. 

Periodically these become focal points for xenophobia, in spite of the obvious hypocrisy. Meanwhile, those who continue in the vague tradition of the Bering Strait Land Bridge find themselves blocked not by a washed out span, but by fences, walls and armed checkpoints. How dare you try to find your way to freedom and bravery without a boat. 

Out

 One of the myriad of challenges of teaching games to young people with fragile egos is that of impressing on them the importance of a graceful exit. There is a great associated thrill in being able to climb the hill that leads to A square. Battling with your classmates all the way from the line, to D square, to C, then to B and at last: Valhalla. You have landed in A square. Now you control the game with everyone looking up to you and waiting for your serve. All it takes in Four Square is one extra bounce, a little slip, and then you're on your way to the back of the line. 

There are plenty of egos that can accept this kind of cycle. It is, after all, part of the game. The platitudes about sportsmanship are easy enough for most kids to handle. You win some, you lose some. It's just a game. You can't win 'em all. Which for most children is a simple enough lesson. The platitudes are unnecessary. 

But not for everyone. 

Some will cling to that chunk of asphalt in the same way they will hold on to their assertion that they were never tagged, never stepped out of bounds, never did anything that might mar their streak of success. Even when faced with the simple process of Ro Sham Bo, rock paper scissors, to decide the outcome of any dispute they insist that there is no reason for such a judgement. They did not lose. And if their peers surround them, waiting for resolution, if they pick rock and the other kid picks paper they will insist on doing the best two out of three. 

Sometimes I try and take the perspective of our kids who have this challenge. For many of them, being called out is a reminder of the place they spend so much of their lives: at the end of the line. Admitting to their classmates and the world that they are only as good as everyone else playing the game is a blow to their already fragile self esteem. Being the best at anything is a way to escape the struggle they face every day living so close to the edge of winning and losing. This might be their only escape from their circumstances, even if it's only for a recess or a PE class. 

By now, some of this might sound familiar to you. I would also like to champion those who understand that the game is more important than the arguments about the game. They take their place at the end of the line and look forward to their next chance. 

Joe Biden did that. Joe understood "out." He didn't like it, and if he had been left to his own devices he might have held on to the notion that he was in it to win it. But he didn't. He wasn't. He took his string of victories and a legacy of public service to the end of the line, where he could watch others compete secure in the notion that he had his time. Now it was time for another winner. 

As I said, not everyone understands this process. Instead they argue and dispute every moment, every decision. The game has to stop and wait for them. But not forever. 

Sooner or later, everyone gets out. 

Follow The Bouncing Ball

 I do not, as history will tell you, enjoy watching sports in real time. I tend instead to catch up after the players have left the field, court or pitch and catch the highlights at which I could not bring myself to stare. Field goals, no matter how hard I lean on my couch, do not alter their trajectory based on my wishes. Free throws go in or they don't, based not on my crossed fingers or hexes, but instead go through the hoop based almost entirely on the skills of the person throwing the ball in that direction. Or not. 

The belief that my watching any or all of these events might somehow alter the outcome of these contests is deeply ingrained in my American psyche and I have tried many times to shake it. Watching the random bouncing of balls does not bring me anything but more stress. This is why God created ESPN. 

This corollary of the Heisenberg principle was in play on Tuesday night when the candidates for President from the two major parties met for a televised debate. I explained my anxieties to my wife, who did not (to her credit) try and dissuade me from simply checking out and reading the memes the following day. But, brave little soldier that I am, I sat down and looked on as the future of our great nation was decided on the ABC television network. Coincidentally ABC is part of the same media mammoth that spawned ESPN. 

At some point, it became clear that this was not going to be a substantive discussion of policy, but rather an opportunity for one of the candidates to air the current stream of nonsense spouted at his "well-attended" rallies. Kamala Harris, at several points, seemed bemused by the performance of the gentleman to her right. The obverse could not be said of the gentleman on her right. He seemed committed to bringing the same bile and hate to the debate stage as he has to those assemblages of MAGAts.

Was it over when he started panting about Haitian immigrants eating dogs and cats in Springfield, Ohio? Maybe it was before that, but it was most surely a reminder of just how far off the track the convicted felon's trolley is when he flopped around and restated his claims that he had won the 2020 election. This was a return to form, but not necessarily in a good way for the twice-impeached former game show host. 

Across the way, it must have been difficult for Ms. Harris to not look to run up the score, finding more ways for the former "president" to dig himself a deeper hole. Back in June, I had watched the political career of Joseph Robinette Biden Jr.'s come to a somewhat unceremonious end. Try as I might back in those early days of summer, I attempted to piece together bits of meaning to the tired and slow responses to the hammering he took at the hands of this morally and financially bankrupt buffoon. 

Watching on Tuesday night felt like not just retribution, but a reminder of what a new generation of leaders looks like. 

Am I certain that our future is assured? Too many of the red-cap clan have already made up their tiny little minds. These are the ones who lap up and perpetuate the ugly racial stereotypes like the one about Ohio cats and dogs. The bright spot is this: The childless cat lady in chief, a (checks notes) Taylor Swift, has finally chosen to give her personal endorsement to Kamala Harris. 

I do not know if any of this sound and fury will change the outcome of the election. But I hope it does. 

Gravitas

 "dignity, seriousness, or solemnity of manner."

I believe that the Cable News Network might now be out of business if it weren't for the sonorous tones of James Earl Jones: "This is CNN." Not leaning in for what this station has to say would be a bad choice. There is an implied imperative in those three words. Thanks to the voice of James Earl Jones. 

Much in the way that we all learned about the Circle of Life. "Look Simba. Everything the light touches is our kingdom. A king's time as ruler rises and falls like the sun. One day Simba, the sun will set on my time here- and will rise with you as the new king. Everything you see exists together, in a delicate balance. As king, you need to understand that balance, and respect all the creatures-- from the crawling ant to the leaping antelope. When we die, our bodies become the grass. And the antelope eat the grass. And so we are all connected in the great Circle of Life."

For many of us, the story of Muphasa and his son was our introduction to Hamlet. James Earl Jones made the classics relatable. Like the story of Conan the Barbarian. Or that guy with a baseball diamond in his cornfield. Frightening or uplifting, if Mister Jones was saying it, it was important. Which is why George Lucas should probably have stopped making Star Wars movies once Darth Vader stopped being voiced by James Earl Jones. Hayden Christiansen take note: In space, no one can hear you whine. 

It was always a treat to discover that voice hidden in the mix of The Simpsons. Or anywhere else. He was bombardier Lieutenant Lothar Zogg in Doctor Strangelove. 

I discovered James Earl Jones not watching cartoons or some sci-fi epic, but viewing The Great White Hope. What was an eight year old doing watching the story of Jack Johnson and his ill-fated marriage to Etta Terry Duryea. Race relations in sports and relationships was a pretty heady mix for me, but I have my mother to thank for steering me through the experience. Things were not always black and white when it came to black and white. James Earl Jones showed me that struggle. 

Over the decades, his voice led me to places and ideas that I might have missed. And most importantly to me, he was not above making light of his own basso profondo. Which is why James Earl Jones will be missed. There is no doubt that he stomped profoundly on the Terra, and he made our lives a lot more interesting for it. He will be missed in the Circle of Life. 

Tales From The Crypt

 I get to work by seven each morning, and I start to work preparing for a new day. The bathrooms need to be unlocked. The cart with the PE equipment gets rolled out onto the playground. If it has been warm the day before, I prop open doors and windows to encourage air circulation. Before I go to my classroom to make things ready for the education adventure, I stop by the office to make sure that there are no large parcels in need of dissemination before the day begins. My principal and I confer about the challenges ahead: which staff members are out, who had a substitute, who does not, will there be a fire drill?

This is a quick peed behind the scenes of the hour before kids arrive at the gate, ready and for the most part raring to go for another day of school. 

That's when the busy-ness of my job really begins. Lessons in how to share the ball, using respectful words, and listening for the bell that means it is time to move on to the next part of the day. 

At no point during all this rushing about do I or anyone else on our staff have time to perform gender affirming surgery. I am not sure what dark recess of the brain of the convicted felon who is running for president came up with the scenario in which children who attend public schools. He asked a crowd in Wisconsin, “Can you imagine you’re a parent and your son leaves the house and you say, ‘Jimmy, I love you so much, go have a good day at school’ and your son comes back with a brutal operation?” 

No. I cannot imagine this. As a matter of fact, I am very uncomfortable with the type of mind that could come up with such a scenario. 

This is, of course, the same mind that conjured up "post-birth abortions." 

Not in the world in which I live and work. As a matter of fact, funding for health care in our schools is such that we only have a nurse on our site once a week. She is not performing any sort of operation or treatment. She is filling out the paperwork that allows us to keep her for the very limited time that we do have her on site. 

The lies have become more surreal and desperate. We have a little over a month and a half before we have to choose which version of reality we want to live in. The challenging future that is full of things we have to fix, or the terror-filled version from the lunatic mind of an adjudicated homophobe, racist, rapist and con man. 

I'll take the challenging future, thank you. 

Enough

 What was the AR-15 designed to do?

Some refer to these as "assault rifles." Others suggest "America's Rifle." Originally the AR was emblematic of the original manufacturer, Armalite. Back in 1959, the Armalite folks built a gun for military use that became known as the M-16. It was the automatic version, or machine gun, used by American soldiers in Vietnam. After the war, Colt took over production of a semi-automatic version of the gun for law enforcement and civilian use. For the rather transparent purpose of killing human beings. 

Authorities in Kentucky found an AR-15 in the woods near I-75. This was near the area where several motorists were reported to have been injured by gunfire. Law enforcement officals were searching for a suspect who may have taken his semi-automatic rifle out to the forest to take some potshots at passing cars. Which, in its own ludicrous way may have been a choice made because school is not in session on a Saturday. It was only a few days after somebody decided to take his AR-15, a gift from his father, to his high school to kill two fellow students and two teachers. 

If you're going to try and kill your fellow human beings, there is not a lot of questions about what your weapon of choice might be. There have been numerous studies that show just how destructive shots fired from this "sports rifle" can be. If you're not up to looking at the graphic details, I can just let you know that the results are horrifying. 

Of course, humans aren't designed to take a lot of punishment when it comes to bullets. Especially when they are fired at close range from high-powered weapons. Like the AR-15. What would banning these "assault weapons" do? Would the events of the past week play out any differently? What sort of carnage has to occur before it makes sense to human beings who seem to be the most likely targets for shots fired, quickly, in anger? 

Haven't we seen enough? 

No Accounting For Taste

 It is a failing, I suppose. 

I like what I like. My tastes run to the very pedestrian, suburban American fare upon which I supped as a child. It confounds my wife to a certain degree that when she is going out for an evening I ask for a TV dinner. 

But she buys me a Swanson's Salisbury Steak because it's what gets me through. 

There was a time, when I was very young, that I would only eat McDonald's when the family was getting fast food. This incensed my older brother whose tastes ran to the marginally obscure Arby's and Taco Bell. I was called "The Burger King," but not in a particularly affectionate way. There was a lot of eye-rolling on my family's part as we had to make a separate stop for "The Burger King." 

This narrow range of food intake lasted for many years, but somewhere around the time I was getting ready to graduate from high school, I decided to add lobster to my acquired tastes. My father looked on this development with some chagrin, wishing that I might have found something just a little easier to pick up in landlocked Colorado. 

Along the way, I have been offered a great many tastes and treats, specifically when someone hears that I have a deep and abiding affection for chocolate. They want to share with me the finest confections that they have sampled. Truffles and hazelnut chews. Gourmet infused bites of ninety percent cacao. And I take a bite. And I smile. And I wish I could have a Hershey bar. 

It makes me feel just a bit embarrassed because I'm a grownup now, and I really should appreciate the finer things. Like when they put arugula on my chicken sandwich. Or when they offer me pepper jack instead of cheddar. There I am, somebody's parent, looking at the kids' menu for inspiration before I order something with a garlic demi gloss. But I want to do it in such a way that I don't draw attention to my somewhat obvious infantile palate. 

It's called "comfort food" for a reason. I am not much of an adventurer. My parents raised me right. I know not to turn up my nose at whatever my hosts put on the table. I know how to present as an adult. It's just that when I'm at home alone, I regress. Macaroni and cheese. Chips Ahoy. 

And yes, the occasional Hershey bar. 

Facts Of Life - And Death

 Hot take: This is not a policy. “I don’t like that this is a fact of life. But if you are a psycho and you want to make headlines, you realize that our schools are soft targets. And we have got to bolster security at our schools. We’ve got to bolster security so if a psycho wants to walk through the front door and kill a bunch of children they’re not able.”

This was the response from the Republican candidate for Vice President, Jerry Donovan Vance, speaking the day after two kids and two teachers were killed at their high school in Georgia. The answer, for Jerry Donovan Vance, is to kill them before they kill us. Which sounds not just a little weird. 

It sounds psycho. 

But keeping in mind that his boss routinely mentions fictional mass murderer Hannibal Lecter in the ramblings he makes in front of rabid crowds, why not go ahead and swing for the fences? 

Or, you could propose has both stronger gun controls, such as banning sales of AR-15 and similar rifles, in addition to making sure classroom doors don’t lock from the outside. That is what our current Vice President has suggested. 

The line of Monday morning quarterbacks forming to find blame starts with those pointing at violent video games. Then the music that kids listen to. That awful rock and roll rubbish. If Frederic Wertham was alive today I am sure he would be pointing a finger at comic books. And ultimately the answer to guns is more guns. 

Which is horrifying, since the father of the shooter in Georgia insisted that the threats against the school could not have been made by his son, since at the time he was initially being investigated more than a year ago. It was shortly after that investigation ended that dad bought his boy the AR-15 that killed four people. At the high school he never would have imagined that he would do any harm. 

Keeping in mind that these kind of shootings are not "facts of life." They are facts of death. They do not happen only in schools. Parking lots. Churches. Theaters. City streets. That same guy who babbles on about the villain in Silence of the Lambs was recently the target of a kid with a gun. An AR-15. One might expect this would alter his views on assault weapons. 

Isn't that just a little bit weird? 

Back To School

Back to school.

Time to start shooting. 

A fourteen year old was taken into custody for the murder of two teachers and two fellow students. This time it was in Winder, Georgia.  Apalachee High School joins a long and seemingly endless list of places where "we never thought something like this could happen."

Time to change our thinking. Not as long as the weapon of choice continues to be so readily available. The shooter's father insisted that there was no way that his son would use any of the guns in his house "unsupervised." He was not allowed. The shooter, whose name is sadly ironic, Colt, apparently did not take dad's admonitions to heart. So much so that he was a known potential threat to the FBI a year ago after making online threats. Colt was not arrested at that time because there was no probably cause. 

Well, on Wednesday, they got it. Four dead. Nine more wounded. 

Hundreds more traumatized. Who wants to go back to school when every time you pass that room you see the blood and bullet holes? We prepare our students to duck and cover. How to barricade a door. We expect to be able to keep the children safe, with the exception of a band-aid here or there when they fall and scrape their knees. 

We are only moments away from the refrain from the nutjobs who insist that shooting back is the answer. 

We already know the sadly inevitable punchline: The shooter used an "AR platform rifle" to kill and maim the people at his school. 

Thoughts and prayers were tossed out as well, our best known defense against such things. Authorities said they would "bolster patrols" in the area, which should have the effect of making everyone who survived feel more secure. 

Safe? That's another matter entirely. As long as we continue to bury our heads in the collective sand pit of the "spirit" of the Second Amendment, completely unnecessary tragedies like the one in Georgia and all of those that preceded it will make it hard to sleep at night. For those with a conscience. For those with a soul. 

Now back to school.  

Still

 So, the convicted felon insists that he has "every right" to interfere with the 2020 election. 

It is September, 2024. 

Four years have passed since the twice-impeached ex-"president" and adjudicated rapist decided that he wanted to take on our nation's democratic process. He continues to try and stir up fuss about an election he lost by seven million votes. The Nile is not just a river and it runs through Mar-A-Lago. 

In addition to this continuing screed, the former game show host marvels that each indictment and conviction boosts his poll numbers. “Whoever heard you get indicted for interfering with a presidential election where you have every right to do it, you get indicted, and your poll numbers go up? When people get indicted, your poll numbers go down. But it was such, such nonsense.”

Nonsense indeed. Much in the same way that most everything that drips from the slit below his nose exacerbates the unprecedented amount of fabrication done by a single candidate. Brazenly suggesting that he would be "a dictator on day one," and that he would jail his political opponents, the very special world between his ears continues to be a dark and scary place. 

With millions of devoted followers. 

That, dear reader, continues to be the most frightening part. Even as the seventy-eight year old MAGAt in chief's slide into delirium, his red-capped legion continue to line up for his dissertations on bacon and wind power. Which wouldn't be as big a deal if the Supreme Court of the United States hadn't issued an opinion saying that the Orange Obelisk is immune from "official acts" as "president." 

I might suggest that in order to fall under the auspices of this decision, the guy who will be sentenced in New York soon for fraud would have to act in some way "presidential." 

And no, sneaking onto Arlington National Cemetery to make Tik-Tok video does not count. 

Drawn To It

 I drew a cartoon the other day. I have been doing more of this since my birthday. My wife gave me a sketchbook with the unspoken hope that I might fill it with "drawlings." Initially, the blank pages were intimidating, as they so often are, and I hesitated to pull the top off the pen to try scratching out a figure of some sort. Then I remembered: I'm not getting paid for this. 

Suddenly the creative faucet that had been frozen shut began to trickle. Not a torrent, mind you, just a steady drip or two. Enough that every day or so I had something to look at. I leave it open so that my wife will see what I have been up to. Sketch-wise. In this way, it is similar to this blog. I'm not writing a novel and my audience rarely exceeds double digits, but I was pleased to hiear that once while I was away at work my son dripped by and perused the first ten or so artifacts. He gave me his approval via his mother. 

Some of you out there may recall when I was more free with a pen. I scribbled on most any free scrap of paper, figuring that I owuld be way ahead in the exchange if every picture was worth a thousand words, an illustrated bundle of my cartoons would be a major opus. These are not, however, works of high art. Instead, they are whiims that happened to have enough substance to give them lines enough to fill  most of a page. They remind me of the talent that sleeps quietly beneath the surface, waiting for me to be entertained enough by an idea that I would want to capture it. It's also a reminder that once a year I get to trot out my "best work" in the form of the family Christmas card. I don't expect that this year will be very different, but I would imagine that I will have more practice before crunch time. 

Meanwhile, I continue to make these pictures with no specific intent. That cartoon I mentioned at the beginning was not terribly different from many that I have generated over the years. It's a scruffy headed individual, pointing to himself, asking "Could you imagine having to draw me seven days a week?" Because that's where I, if you'll pardong the expression, draw the line. Endless repetition of the same characters for the sake of syndication leaves me cold. "Why don't you make a book of those cute pigs you draw?" is the question I have batted away for decades now. The answer is simple: Because I don't want to have to do it. I'm very happy when these flights of imagination appear before me without having to consider anyone but myself. 

I am, after all, my favorite audiene. 

Hostage Situation

 Somewhere around the third or fourth song of their set, I used the arena's wi-fi to find out just how old The Electric Light Orchestra's Jeff Lynne was. Seventy-six. This number played in my head along with the band's greatest hits as I watched the guitar tech come in from the wings to drape another instrument over the neck of this apparently frail old gentleman. This impression was further reinforced later in the show when Mister Lynne introduced the guitarist and "musical director" of the band who then proceded to introduce the rest of the band by name. Was there a doubt that the nominal leader of the band might not remember the names of his band? 

Yes. I admit that I am spoiled by having watched Bruce Springsteen age so gracefully by comparison. Please understand that I thoroughly enjoyed seeing the Electric Light Orchestra. These were the sounds of my youth, faithfully reproduced by a group of very capable musicians. And there, center stage in the spotlight was the man who composed produced and brought so much of that music to life. Wunderkind and the only surviving Wilbury, I was bookending an experience I began forty-three years ago when I first saw ELO in concert. This time I brought my wife and son, to share in all the nostalgic joy that was bound to issue forth. 

I got that. Greatest hits and lasers. At times I was swept up in my reverie, but I couldn't shake the image of this old guy giving thumbs up to the audience after each number, thanking the crowd but seemingly detached from the actual experience we were all sharing. This was the "Over and Out" tour, as clear a message as any that this would be the last time we would be seeing Jeff Lynne playing in front of a paying audience. For most artists, there is a moment when they address the crowd: "How ya doin', San Francisco?" There was none of that. Just the music. And the lasers. 

Wasn't that enough? 

It got me to thinking about reports that Frnakie Valli, now ninety years old, is currently on tour, struggling to effectively lip-sync to the Four Seasons' greatest hits. Frankie's rep had this to say: “Frankie is doing what he loves to do at ninety. We should all be so lucky.” 

Ironically, it was back in 1981 when I first saw Jeff Lynne perform that the knock against him and his band was that they were often not playing but just pantomiming to pre-recorded tracks. 

We should all be so lucky. 

Over and out, ELO. 

Lying Around

 I believe that once the former game show host and adjudicated rapist started complaining that Kamala Harris never worked at McDonald's we may finally have reached a level of desperation only felt in those who fell into those apocryphal quicksand pits in movie serials. 

Specifically: Outside of someone like me who takes ongoing and questionable pleasure in discussing their time behind the counter of a fast food restaurant, there aren't that many people who choose to highlight that point of their resumes. It is not the kind of thing that one might choose to show off when attempting to get into college. Or when interviewing for a law firm. 

It's the kind of experience that is best saved for blog entries, and the occasional Democratic Party acceptance speech. Vice President Harris is, and I'm sorry if I sound like a killjoy for mentioning this, attempting to relate to the common folk as she does this. Which is pretty solidly the take we should all get from her choice of the Helpful Hardware Man as her running mate. To this point, I can only say that very little can shake my belief that Tim Walz has recently been on an extension ladder checking his gutters before autumn descends. 

And yet, investigations continue into the veracity of Kamala Harris having a job at McDonald's. Is the conceit behind this detective work that somehow a trend will become apparent, consistent with the notion that "if she'll lie about making fries, she'll lie about anything?"

Well, for just a moment let's say that Kamala Harris never worked at a McDonald's. She was lying. Much in the same way that Barack Obama was lying about being born in the United States. Certainly one should be disqualified for lying about anything when one considers running for President. Like having multiple affairs outside the bounds of marriage, including one with a porn actress while another in a series of  wives was pregnant with another in a series of your offspring. Or the story about how you almost died in a helicopter crash with Willie Brown, except it wasn't Willie Brown. Or how violent crime is making our streets unsafe for everyone, except that violent crime has actually been trending down. 

But this much we can be sure of: The ex-"president" and convicted felon never held a job at any fast food restaurant. He never made his own french fries. He is suspicious of giving those folks who make his Big Macs a living wage. 

Watch out for that quicksand!

Missing You Already

 The text came to me late on Friday. It said that my younger brother and his wife were relocating this month to a bungalow in Pasadena. He said that he they were moving to be close to his wife's mother. 

Which is nice. Because his mother-in-law likes him a lot. And he is a ray of sunshine on most any occasion. 

Which is the part of this exchange that, for me, was not so nice. 

My younger brother has lived less than an hour away from me for nearly thirty years. When I initially moved out to California, I was on one end of the state, and he was living on the other. I was up north. He was down south. Then he moved to Minnesota. Then he moved back to California. Just up the road apiece from me and my new family. 

Somewhere in the mix was this phrase that came to us both from my mother. Something about not wanting "to be underfoot." We tended not to insinuate ourselves into one another's lives in spite of our relative relativity. But every time we connected, we picked up right where we left off. My brother. My friend. My companion through space and time. The one with whom I hiked the hills around out mountain cabin. The one with whom I shared my comics. After I was good and finished with them. We went to most of the same schools. Had many of the same teachers. Had many of the same experiences. 

Like the time our dad died. 

And the time our mom died. 

It was so good to have him there as a reminder of the strength of our family. Kin. Blood. 

Now he was relocating. To Pasadena. Which is more than fifty minutes away. Which is okay because I know where he is. I know that when we need each other, he'll be there. Or I'll be where he is. 

But I can't escape the feeling that somehow I missed a bundle of opportunities to engage more fully with that blood. My brother. 

I will hold those memories of playing Rock Band in our living room, or the collage parties in our kitchen, or the visits to his apartment when I would make a point of kicking the head of his panda rug. Birthdays and holidays and every days. But I still feel like I cheated myself. 

I want more memories. 

I guess I'll just have to make more of a point to find my way to Pasadena. 

What I've Got

 So when I got the jury summons at the end of July, I didn't wince as much as I have in the past. Rather than simply beginning to dread the experience that was still all potential. There was no certainty attached to it. 

It was, upon closer inspection, a potential disaster since it fell on the week of school during which I would begin teaching my full program. I would be calling in a substitute to take over for me before I had even met all the kids as a class. That would not be optimal. 

Once the week arrived, I did my assigned duty of checking the web site on Friday evening to see if I was needed the following Monday. The magic jury duty eight ball said, "ask again on Monday at five." I went to work. I set up my expectations with one group, and prepared myself for the next day by looking once again at the county's web site.

And so it went. Each day. I was poised to make arrangements for a substitute to come and fill my spot while I went to serve my community in a way other than keeping a school open and running. This particular week more than others, since our head custodian was unable to come in. Which left the few of us who know where everything is to pick up, move, clean and sort before the bell rang each morning. We kept up, but we didn't do the job like someone who knew what they were doing. We survived.

And each evening, I sat down in front of my computer and pressed "refresh." Part of me figured this might be the true test of my own convictions. Would I actually leave the folks at my school to do my civic duty? In the past, I have sat in the jury box, being asked questions about my relative responsibilities. There are those who insist that I am indispensable, but I know that each one of us believes that we are here to pick up the slack. Those of us who are on that short list called "leadership." 

Finally, Thursday night came, and the message let me know that my jury service was complete for the year. I had managed to work my job and then some, while maintaining the possibility that I could at any moment be swept away into an episode of Law & Order that could take days, weeks, months to unravel. Instead, I just did my job, with the continual distraction of what might have been. 

I passed the test.  

What's All This Fuss?

Julius Domingus Vance would have us believe that the scene at Arlington National Cemetery last week was "a little disagreement." Specifically, he insisted that “It is amazing to me that . . . some staff member had a little disagreement with somebody and the media has turned this into a national news story." 

For the record, the media is reporting that "Two members of Donald Trump's campaign staff had a verbal and physical altercation Monday with an official at Arlington National Cemetery, where the former president participated in a wreath-laying ceremony." The photo op that the ex-"president" was creating took place in the cemetery's Section 60, where only Arlington staff are allowed to take pictures or film. According to the National Cemetery's media policy, photography and video are not authorized “for partisan, political or fundraising purposes, in accordance with the Hatch Act.” Which would seem to suggest that a presidential candidate showing up without specific authorization or clearance for the purposes of taking a few "candid" shots with grieving families is a violation of that policy. Which is why the convicted felon's minions felt it would be a good thing to release this statement: "The fact is that a private photographer was permitted on the premises and for whatever reason an unnamed individual, clearly suffering from a mental health episode, decided to physically block members of President Trump's team during a very solemn ceremony." 

Wasn't this the same guy who had police tear gas protesters so that he could stand in front of a church, holding up a bible? Excuse me: Wasn't this the same guy who allegedly had police tear gas protesters so that he could stand in front of a church, holding up a bible? Sorry. Wasn't this the same guy who allegedly had police tear gas protesters so that he could stand in front of a church, holding up a bible upside down? The bible, not the ex-president. Was upside down. 

This time, instead of holding a bible upside down, the convicted felon posed grinning, with his thumb up, over the graves of fallen soldiers. Very familiar to those who recall the victim of bone spurs that seem to have healed as quickly as his ear and his treatment of our veterans. Once is a mistake. Two is a trend. A lifetime? I'm beginning to believe that The Orange One has issues with our military. 

That's a national news story.