The Cave

 There are few places on the planet more enlightened and forward thinking than Sesame Street. This is the place, after all, where they chose to deal directly with the death of Mister Hooper. In December 1982, rather than glossing over the fact that the actor, Will Lee, had passed away the folks at the Children's Television Workshop decided to mourn the loss of the neighborhood grocery store in an episode about loss and grief. The grown-ups came together to help Big Bird sort out his emotions about the departure of his good friend, "Mister Looper." 

Heartbreaking. 

But if you're looking for something really off center, one need step just a few years past mourning a beloved cast member and zoom in on the realization that after fourteen years of blissful ignorance, these same "grown-ups" could finally see Mister Snuffleupagus. After a decade and a half of simply ignoring Big Bird's insistence that he had a big brown fuzzy friend the size of a wooly mammoth, these enlightened New Yorkers finally opened their eyes long and wide enough to see the giant Muppet elephant in the room. 

Understand that I am not knocking the CTW or PBS or any of the powers-that-be for taking so long to reveal one of the most beloved characters on Sesame Street to the people who live on the street with this floppy Eeyore facsimile. It was a bit that played. "What do you mean there's a big brown elephant living on the street with us? You must be crazy, Big Bird." Cue sad trombone sound. 

But for fourteen years, Big Bird kept his feathers together while those around him treated him like he must be looney. Then, in just a few minutes of confronting the reality that had been there all along, Bob and the rest of the gang decided that "From now on, Big Bird, we'll believe you whenever you tell us something." Hugs and apologies all around. 

And this made it okay for everyone, including Mister Snuffleupagus, to live together in harmony on Sesame Street. 

I believe there is an allegory in here for us all to reflect on and share for the next four years. Reality is not always easily accepted by grown-ups. We're much better with death. 

Go figure. 

Evidence

 I watched a fourth/fifth grade confrontation unfold in real time thanks to the cameras we have mounted throughout the building. It happened on the playground during lunch, and the group of students involved seemed to be pretty savvy about where grownups tend to focus their attention during recess. 

The action began with a few girls lingering around the soccer goal at one end of the field. One of them broke away to rush to the cafeteria where we can only assume she was off to tell one of her "friends" about what was being said about. The "friend" came storming out shortly after, hands on hips, chin stuck way out. 

This entrance delighted the crowd of boys and girls who caught wind of this potential altercation and some of them were actually bouncing up and down in anticipation. This swirling mob continued to grow as the action moved toward the bathrooms. Progress stalled when the offended girl cornered the girl who was making the comments. 

There was no sound, but since this is where I actually made my way into what had become a fracas, I can tell you that the volume and the tenor of the discussion had reached very inappropriate levels. This is where and when the adults, including myself, stepped in. Layers of eager bystanders were peeled back until the central figures were found somewhere in the middle of all that blood frenzy. 

Disappontment rained down as the very heightened girls were escorted to the principal's office. 

The video only lasted a couple of minutes, but it told a tale that had been brewing for a week. Rather than accepting any of the advice given to them by adults, parents and teachers alike, the students in fourth and fifth grade seemed willing to sacrifice their classmates to the god of war. Fourth grade girls, it would seem, come from Mars. 

By the end of the week, after many phone calls and meetings had been made, the grudge seemed to be settled. But those images of how it all blew up will linger in my mind for some time to come. 

Signs

 I suppose I could blame myself. I don't have a lot of luck with yard signs. 

My wife and I did not choose to stick a metal stake in our lawn to support Kamala Harris, so maybe that's where this thing fell apart. Contrastingly, however, we did have a couple asking our neighbors and fellow Oaklanders to turn back the wave of recall elections stirred up by those who are unhappy with the state of affairs here in our fair city. Current results have called for recall elections for both our mayor and the county's district attorney. 

Pamela Price, elected in 2022, was swept into office along with a wave of progressive prosecutors looking to reform criminal justice across the country. A spike in crime has put the brakes on that movement in the East Bay. Turns out that maybe when it comes to crime, Oaklanders aren't as patient with reform as our liberal reputation might lead one to believe. 

Mayor Sheng Tao has experienced similar criticism after she fired Oakland's chief of police and California's governor was moved to send a phalanx of Highway Patrol officers to stem the tide of malfeasance. Add to that an FBI raid on her house as part of a scandal that has yet to be fully reckoned by anyone involved and the loss of the Oakland Athletics to (shudder) Las Vegas and you have the recipe for recall. 

Which is pretty tough news coming to an office who had just balanced an historically unruly budget and in the month of October, while those pro-recall voices were being echoed and amplified by yard signs on other people's lawns there were no homicides in Oakland suggesting that finally violent crime was on the decline. 

No matter. Now the city and county will be have to foot the bill for an additional election expected to cost in the neighborhood of ten million dollars. At a time when cash is tight across the region, including here at the Oakland Unified School District that is starting to make noises about closing schools again to save money. 

That sound you hear is the creaking of Oakland's politics and the seemingly impossible task of pleasing the profoundly diverse constituency and all of their interests. Loud enough, it seems to drown out the giggles of the people who seem to be the only ones making anything out of this distress: The makers of all those yard signs. 

Necessary?

 In a previous century, a very long time ago, I spied a T-shirt in a crowd at a rock concert that gave me a chuckle. It read, "Is Quincy Really Necessary?"

For those of you who were not alive/aware when this moment took place, there was once a television show, named for its main character, called Quincy M.E. The series starred Jack Klugman, late of Oscar Madison fame, as a Medical Examiner whose forensic talents made him indispensable to his local police force. Quincy was solving all manner of complex cases based on his experience with dead people. When there was no one else to turn to, the constabulary turned to the guy in the morgue. 

Which, for me, is where the humor arose. What sort of lame investigative force would one have to have in order to use the guy who deals with stiffs as your best and most trusted resource? Dead, as Doctor Fronkenstien would tell you, is dead. Cause of death? Sure. That makes sense. But the active rushing about town, car chases and the like? Leave that kind of thing to a really good cop. Like TJ Hooker. 

Now, at last I bring you to my point: What sort of Quincy does it take to unravel the death of democracy? Weren't we all watching it in real time? Didn't we all have at least a chance to participate? All of these pundits and talking heads doing post mortems on the most recent presidential election are possibly only marking time while they still have jobs. Those who are out there stirring a pot best kept for those we have only recently referred to as "nuts" are seemingly very anxious to uncover some kind of nefarious scheme that would make sense as to how things could have slipped off the rails for the Democrats.

It's really quite simple, and I offer up this clever bit as an analogy: Do you know why when you see a flock of geese flying in formation there is one side that has more geese than the other? Well, as it turns out, there are more birds over there. The geese on the long side happened to be MAGA. This is not rocket science, even though the incoming regime is bringing along Sissy Space-X. The other seemingly incalculable question is "where did those fifteen million Democrat votes go that were there from the 2020 election?"

You may not want to consider this, but every bit of math I can muster up suggests that these people did not vote. At least they did not vote for the Democratic candidate. More geese on one side. 

Is Quincy really necessary? 

Who's Sorry Now?

 I suppose many of you out there may be wondering what I thought or felt about the results of the 2024 Presidential Election. You may have come here Wednesday morning, hoping that I would have some solace or outrage for you. Instead you found me whining about the onset of my decrepitude. Maybe on Thursday.

Nope. 

You see, the reality of this blog is that it runs on the pre-digested thoughts and feelings of an obsessive individual. Hence, I write these things days in advance. Usually three. By the time you read my eulogy of Quincy Jones and yet another wide shot at Young Tucker Carlson and his lunatic ravings, you might be wondering what happened. 

Did I just straight up ignore how the United States as a squirming mass got in line to vote for the misogynistic, libelous, narcissist who used to have a TV game show? 

No. I did not. The words you are currently reading come straight from the early morning realization that we, as a nation, chose to give the convicted felon a chance to pardon himself and fully implement Project 2025, becoming the self-proclaimed "dictator on day one." The depth of this event will be felt over the next few months as the second Trumpreich lurches into action. All of those hateful, ignorant things that have been shouted form the stage in rallies across the country over the past few months are on their way to becoming policy. 

I don't blame Kamala Harris.

I don't blame Joe Biden.

I don't blame Donald Trump.

The blame lands squarely on us. U.S.

We elected the guy who announced years ago that he could shoot somebody on Fifth Avenue and his poll numbers would go up. Ignoring that warning and standing pat by letting him continue to "weave" his wicked spell over those he frightened and riled up was not, as it turns out, a good choice. Laughing at his antics while preparing a rational response was a bad choice. 

Who's laughing now? 

Demons

 Hey folks. I'm sorry to be the one to tell you, but stupid people have always existed. Like the genius who decided to glue that first square of toilet paper to the rest of the roll? They continue to exist, and it would seem that we are not supporting Darwin by giving many of these empty vessels their own shows on TV and other media. 

"I have never met a person who can isolate the moment when nuclear technology became known to man. So, where did it come from exactly? It's very clear to me these are demonic." Thus is the confused jabber that slithered out from the slit beneath Young Tucker Carlson's nose just a few days ago. It was part of a free-wheeling exchange with ex-convict Steve Bannon who resumed his podcast after being released from prison. Young Tuck's insistence of the existence of demons comes shortly after he shared an account of being "physically mauled" by otherworldly forces a year and a half ago. He claimed that he awoke scarred and bloody, with claw marks across his body.

The former Fox News Idiot was supporting his belief that "Nuclear weapons are demonic, there’s no upside to them at all, and anyone who claims otherwise is either ignorant or doing the bidding of the forces that created nuclear technology in the first place, which were not human forces obviously.” Which is not a series of viewpoints that I feel the need to argue with, until that last sentence. The forces involved in creating nuclear weapons were indelibly human. Finding new and different ways to obliterate is a time-honored tradition among homo-sapiens. Part of the way we prove our dominance over other smart monkeys is to pick up that jawbone of a tapir to club them into submission. 

Nuclear weapons just happen to live somewhere on the far end of the evolutionary spectrum from the jawbone of a tapir. 

Now, the next question might be, "Are there demons among us?" 

Sure there are. And many of them are former Fox News employees who have felt some inexplicable calling to the Word. Or maybe they just needed an explanation for that rough night they had a few months back and their spouses needed an excuse that sounded contemplative. 

Or perhaps Young Tuck is looking to take over for Robert Morris. 

Listen

 If you were to make a recording version of Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon, you could make it a lot harder by using someone other than Quincy Jones as the Nexus. 

Mister Jones passed away at the ripe old and seemingly indestructible age of ninety-one. Over a career that spanned seventy years, he worked with just about anyone of note in the music business. And he made everyone with whom he worked sound better. Even the Beatles, whom he once referred to as "the worst musicians in the world." 

Which did not stop him from working with Ringo on his Sentimental Journey album. And supplanting Mister Starr's drumming with a studio musician. Because he was a perfectionist, artists trusted Quincy to deliver their best work. From Frank Sinatra to Snoop Dogg, Lesley Gore to Chaka Khan, Quincy Jones' influence is a mile wide. 

If the only project he ever worked on was We Are The World, he would be one of the faces on the pop music Mount Rushmore. If all he did was produce Michael Jackson's Thriller, he would have access to the throne. If all he had had ever done was write the music that would eventually play beneath the opening credits of Austin Powers - International Man Of Mystery, his greatness could not be measured.

He did all that and more. He was a film and television producer. He brought Alice Walker's Color Purple to the screen. Twice. And once on Broadway. He has been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and was named one of the most influential jazz musicians of the twentieth century by Time Magazine. He nominated for an Oscar for the score for In Cold Blood. He ran out of space on his mantle for the Grammys he has won. Twenty-eight of them. Nominated for a Grammy eighty times. You can't win 'em all. But a pretty fair share. 

And now he's gone to that big recording studio in the sky. I'm guessing that the heavenly choirs will be just a little more in tune and sing with just a little more groove from now on. Quincy Jones stomped, sang, danced and paraded across the Terra. I would say that he will be missed, but you'll still be able to here him. 

Everywhere. 

Disintegration

 It does occur to me now that I have some decisions to make.

I have spent my adult life with those closest to me kidding about how "you'll never stop working, will you?" I chuckle, knowingly, and push the comment to the side. They understand something about me which I have not fully reckoned. 

One need look no further than this blog for evidence of just how correct this assertion is. What started as a lark nineteen years ago has become essentially an avocation. Eleven years ago I was interviewed for a documentary short about "megabloggers." At that time I said that the reason I kept on writing and writing was that no one had bothered to tell me to stop. 

Apparently, this is still the case. Which translates roughly into the realm of my chosen career. As yet, no one has come up to me and asked me to stop teaching. Part of my plan has always to be "value added." Sure, I can teach kids how to use computers and keep them from jumping off the top of the play structure, but I will also pick up the occasional rodent corpse and climb up on the roof to try and figure out where that last soccer ball went. As an elementary school teacher I have found that there is not much that is beneath me. This is how I believe that I have become invaluable. 

But to be honest, the last time I was up there, looking down on the playground, faces of children staring up at me, I heard their words more distinctly: "Mister Caven, what are you doing up there?"

Sixty-two years old, creaky knees and a growing sense of my own mortality at the top of a ladder that for some reason I seem to be the only person who knows how to use it. Plummeting from this precipitous height would probably not kill me, but the damage to my vintage frame would be significant. Perhaps enough to keep me from climbing back up on the roof.  

Because eventually I really should stop doing that. Like clambering up in the trees in our yard to mount our holiday lights, there will come a day when my part of this grand experiment will be that of consultant rather than the astronaut. As I find each time that I bend over to pick something off the floor, I discover that the ground has moved further away. I indicate this by making one of those not-so-discrete groans that have become more a part of my catalogue of sounds. 

Which doesn't mean I will actually stop doing any of these gymnastics. It just means that I can start to ponder how to cope with the appearance of those folks with the clipboards, wearing their sad faces and politely showing me the way to the door. 

Over? Did You Say Over?

 Election day. 

Finally. 

All that doom-scrolling and all that shock and all that dismay comes to a head.

At last. 

Except none of us really expects there to be a moment at which today's proceedings will result in a peaceful transfer of power. Four years ago, a new and despicable trend began to gain traction in this great land of ours: election deniers. It was an easy enough shift for many to make after the doubt that was sown by deniers of science in the wake of COVID-19. Those who were convinced that the pandemic was a hoax were easily nudged into the belief that a presidential election could be stolen. 

I was speaking to a friend over the weekend about about how quickly this flat surface became a slippery slope. I compared it to Richard Reid, the shoe bomber. Because this would-be terrorist decided to try and blow up a plane with the soles of his kicks, we have all been forced for nearly a quarter century to take our shoes off when we want to board an airplane. Because a former game show host and enfant terrible could not conceive that the second election he participate in would result in a loss, we have all been taken for a ride on the exception express, the one that says we can't trust the results of our democratic process. Because that former game show host can't do math.

Or understand science.

Or think of anyone but himself. 

So we sit. And we wait. For the storm to pass. 

And wait.

And wait. 

For a new day. 

Choice

 If you are reading this now and have yet to make your choice for who will be our next President of the United States, first of all, you must be new. Secondly, if you have been with me all along and perhaps been sitting on the fence thinking, "I don't know, there's so much good on both sides," then maybe you haven't been actually reading this blog so much as looking at the pictures. 

Ha, ha. Just a little Entropical Paradise humor there. This is the place where my thousand words tend to take up the space where a picture might be. For a sadly great majority of the past eight years, those words have been that of a warning: Warning against letting our country fall prey to the xenophobia and misogyny promoted by the big Orange Cabal. 

Which is not to say that I want you to simply vote against a convicted felon and his "concepts of a plan" to Make America A Dystopian Wasteland. I want you to vote for Kamala Harris, a woman who has spent her life working for the people. District Attorney. Attorney General. Senator. Vice President. There is an arc to her story that is precisely the kind that we hope to celebrate with our children when we tell them, "If you work hard and stay true to your vision, someday you could be President of the United States."

And let's be honest about just what that means: Taking over the reins of our troubled nation at this point will be a lot like being in charge of The Reconstruction after our Civil War. The divides that exist within our people and its institutions could not be more stark. But Kamala Harris continues to insist that those things that threaten to tear us apart are insignificant compared to those that bring us together. 

This is what I believe. This is what I believe Kamala Harris can do for our less-than-united states. The American Dream belongs to all of us, and yes it needs to be made available to those who seek to become a part of it. The contributions of black, brown, Muslim, female, LGBTQ+, left, right, white, red and blue are all significant and need to be brought together not in a literal snapshot of what our founding fathers imagined two hundred forty-eight years ago, but a living, moving panorama of possibility. 

We won't go back. 

Nor should we. 

As the poets from Akron once urged us, "It's time to go forward, move ahead, and give the past a slip."

Vote as if your life depended it on it. And your children's life. 

And your cat's. 

Whose Idea Was This?

 "I've got it!"

"What is it this time?"

"The perfect photo op."

"That's what you said about getting him into an apron inside a closed McDonald's and having him pretend to make french fries."

"No really. This one's going to be a huge hit."

"It had better be. That debacle at Madison Square Garden is all anyone wants to talk about right now."

"It's not about dogs and cats."

"Or geese, right?"

"Yeah, well I'm not the one who suggested that we get 'that guy from the Tom Brady roast' to come and make racist jokes about everyone we're trying to convince that we aren't racist."

"True. And maybe holding a 'white guys' rally at the site of the biggest Nazi rally in American history may have been a little short sighted."

"At least we kept the swastikas to a minimum."

"I'm pretty sure Elon was just a yelp or two away from shouting 'Sieg Heil'..."

"That's why this one is such a slam-dunk. It won't take any additional special guests. Just our guy."

"Okay, lay it on me."

"Picture this: Our guy is standing out on the tarmac -"

"In front of a big jet -"

"No, no, no. We want to appeal to the common man."

"So what do you have in mind?"

"We get him to stand out there and give a few minutes of 'weave,' then the truck shows up."

"Truck? The boss loves trucks!"

"Don't you know it. But here's the spin: It's a trash truck."

"Trash truck?"

"Yeah. With the logo painted big across the side."

"Where the trash goes?"

"Exactly."

"I don't know how this could miss." 

Tears For Teri

 I believe that Michael Dorsey should have ended up with Sandy Lester. 

If you are unfamiliar with those names, you might recognize the actors who portrayed these characters from Tootsie: Dustin Hoffman and Teri Garr. If you are familiar with the film, you know that the movie, as played on screens for more than forty years has Michael/Dustin finally getting a chance with the object of his desire played by Jessica Lange. He does this with one of the most ham-handed flurry of "romantic" dialogue committed to celluloid: "You don't have to. She's right here. And she misses you. Look, you don't know me from Adam. But I was a better man with you, as a woman... than I ever was with a woman, as a man. You know what I mean? I just gotta learn to do it without the dress. At this point, there might be an advantage to my wearing pants. The hard part's over, you know? We were already... good friends."

(retching sounds) 

And not just because it seemed like a completely fantastical leap even for a romantic comedy, but because of the way Michael/Dustin just casts his other friend Sandy/Teri aside in order to be with this ridiculous only in Hollywood longshot. 

Full disclosure: I love Teri Garr, and while I am impressed with the classic beauty and acting chops of Ms. Lange, I know that I would have made a different choice than Mr. Hoffman. I would have picked Sandy in a heartbeat, not just because of my not-so-latent affection for Ms. Garr but because of the sacrifices Sandy made for her pal and not-so-secret crush Michael Dorsey. 

I was familiar with Teri Garr from her numerous TV appearances, including appearing in an episode of the original series of Star Trek that might have become a spin-off. And she was Phoebe's mom on Friends. But mostly she was and will always be in my heart for her sweet and naïve turn as Froodrick Fronkensteen's lovely assistant, Inga. I was twelve, and I was smitten. 

She added just the right flustered feminist counterpoint to Michael Keaton's Mr. Mom. She was the reason I bothered to take a peek at Mom And Dad Save The World. Teri Garr's appearances on the David Letterman Show were appointment television. 

Teri went to her reward this past Tuesday. She stomped on the Terra, but I guess not hard enough to get through that thick skull of Dustin Hoffman's. She will be missed. Aloha, Ms. Garr. 

Show Stopper

 The quiet part isn't quiet anymore. 

The Republican Party, in their continued and impassioned mistake of going all-in on backing a convicted felon, has become in words of (checks notes) Hillary Clinton "deplorable." To be more specific, the former New York Senator, First Lady and Secretary of State once referred to "half" of Trump supporters as fitting a "basket of deplorables," while the other half are people who feel the government has let them down and need understanding and empathy.

Eight years later, I am not sure if that ratio still holds, and I don't know how much understanding and empathy I have left for the crew that put together the rally in Madison Square Garden last weekend. A parade of speakers showed up on the stage that was already being referred to as a "Nazi Rally" to confirm these assertions. One of the lowlights of the show was "comedian" Tony Hinchcliffe who let this one fly: “There’s a lot going on. I don’t know if you know this but there’s literally a floating island of garbage in the middle of the ocean right now. I think it’s called Puerto Rico."

In a city that more than half a million Puerto Ricans call "home," this little jibe was met with immediate blowback not just from those who live there, but across the country. And it wasn't just Puerto Ricans who were outraged. Human beings from across the rainbow of our great nation voiced their displeasure. Which didn't keep Tony from falling back on the lamest response possible: "Can't you guys take a joke?" 

Well, Tony, here's the deal: If it were a joke in the first place, then we might stand a chance of "taking it." And if on your way out you hadn't managed to tick off a list of other minorities to degrade, then maybe there would be some claim to "humor."  Another speaker said that Kamala Harris was managed by “pimp handlers” and said of Democrats that “we need to slaughter these other people.” Very former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani said, as did several others, that Democrats were behind attempts to kill Donald Trump. Another speaker called Harris “the devil” and “the antichrist.”

Stop it guys. You're just too darn funny. 

Get it? That was a joke. I was being ironic. I was suggesting that something was happening in the opposite way to what is expected, and typically causing wry amusement because of this. 

Counting the days.