I Remember These Things

First a note to readers: If a paragraph makes no sense in any post, please be advised that Blogger did (and does) re-arrange words in an arbitrary manner.  Usually in a sentence where an image has been inserted.  I don’t know why this matters, I just know it’s true.  I didn’t realize this was happening until I was proofing a few posts online recently. From now on, after posting, I will re-read it online and attempt to correct what Blogger has messed with. Sorry for any inconvenience to your brain.

I Remember These Things.

I remember the time before Black Friday. It was a 4-day weekend usually spent visiting friends and family all the while eating more turkey than you would in the next 11 months.

I remember when there was NO sunday shopping. (In NOLA,  grocery stores were open, liquor was available 24/7 and pharmacies were open. However, back then they sold only pharmaceuticals - no toys, groceries, or any non-health related items.)

I remember when you couldn’t find products from certain manufacturers at competitive prices, no matter how hard you tried,  more than a few cents either way. I speak of price fixing by companies like Panasonic and Sony, which was finally addressed in the late 1970s. Though they were hit with huge fines the end result is that consumers lost out, as usual. 

I can remember walking into a store looking for an item and if you didn’t see what you needed, there was always more in the “back” stock room and employees knew where to find it.  It was called service back then...

I remember great customer service and care, even being on a first name basis with sales staff.  Not anymore.

If retailers wonder why the internet has taken over as King and Queen of retail, they can look at themselves, their greed, treatment of employees, and lack of care for the customer base. People eventually get tired of being treated badly or abused. Really, they do. Then they vote with their feet and wallets.

For the most part, we went elsewhere. When you get better service from a small online retailer than a big name store you’ve been shopping for years, it’s time to move on. No customer service or support to speak of? Why wait in long lines to get a problem fixed? Go elsewhere. All fixed usually with a few clicks in minutes or with a quick email.  At least that’s my experience.

A far cry from the older model of holiday shopping.

I am still amazed.

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Support Courage Campaign Institute - Shop Amazon

This only just arrived via email and since I do a lot of shopping at Amazon I think it's a great idea to help support the CCI. A worthwhile, progressive organization.

I don't give to charities much anymore. I give to St. Jude's Children's Hospital and The Ali Forney Centers and they are the only ones to get any cash. I find most others too wasteful for my taste.

Before I hear the Amazon complaints I'll just say that I shop with Amazon, not only for the prices and service, but because there are no viable brick and mortar stores within 50 miles of where I live and I will not shop at Wal*Mart.  There are other fave go-to-spots for specific items on the Interwebs, but in general Amazon covers the other bases.

Shopping local is my first priority, even if the price is a bit higher, but driving 50 or 80 miles to Malls is out of the question.  If I find it at Amazon (I'm already a Prime Member for books & movies) and two-day shipping is free, that's where I'll get what I need.

So, if you're not in the mood to hassle the long drive, or brave the crazies at the Malls, check out Amazon for just about anything and everything (I've learned this over the years) and get it within 3 to 5 days - 2-day free shipping if you're a Prime member. Make sure your purchase is eligible for the donation.

Here's the email:
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Dear Friend, At Courage, we hope that you support and shop at small businesses. But if you're planning to use Amazon.com for your holiday purchases and beyond, please use AmazonSmile -- a program that allows small, non-profit organizations LIKE COURAGE CAMPAIGN to raise money from Amazon purchases. At no cost to you, Amazon will donate a .5% of the price to Courage Campaign for every eligible purchase you make! So why not get some of your holiday shopping done WHILE supporting a good cause? CLICK HERE to support our progressive campaigns while shopping on Amazon. You can keep doing this all through 2015! Want to make it easy to use our AmazonSmile link in the future? Bookmark this link and save it as ‘Amazon.’ It's a simple and automatic way to support Courage Campaign every time you shop at Amazon. With your purchases, you'll be helping Courage continue to fight for progressive values, equality, justice, and accountability for politicians and corporations, while training and organizing activists to change their communities. And to top it off, the AmazonSmile Foundation will donate an extra $5 to Courage Campaign for each customer who makes an eligible purchase using this link, so get shopping! Thank you for your support and Happy Holidays! Paul, along with Annie, Eddie, Laura, Lindsay, Michael, Scottie, and Tim (the Courage team)

Courage Campaign fights for a more progressive California and country. We are an online community powered by more than 900,000 members. The Courage Campaign Institute is the educational arm of the Courage Campaign family of organizations. Our mission is to defend and extend human rights through innovative leadership development, training, strategic research, and public education. http://www.couragecampaign.org?akid=1373.654996.Ur-96Q

Thanksgiving 2014

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The Ring. That Time of Year, Again.

Every year at this time (usually earlier, hospital got in the way) I read The Lord of the Rings, again. I have done so since 1971 when the trilogy was still riding high with young people and in colleges around the world. 

It began innocently enough: like most others who had read the books, there was this feeling that we missed so much on first read that we had to read it again.  And, of course, that was very, very true. In fact, each year when I read the trilogy I find some new bit of text I could swear wasn’t there before - yet I am reading from the same old hard cover books I’ve had since 1974.

I do love the films and watch them from time to time, (all hail Peter Jackson and Philippa Boyens!) but there is something about submerging oneself in Tolkien’s written text and imagination and allowing it to wash over you that transcends the visual.  

So colour me Elvish as I spotted this story at the BBC about the social impact of the trilogy beginning in the 1960s.  It’s well worth the read and brings back a lot of memories from my early days in the anti-war movement and the gay rights movement. 

Truth be told - - I had a "Frodo Lives!" tee-shirt in 1969.

From the BBC:

Hobbits and hippies: Tolkien and the countercultureIt was a time of sex, drugs and rock ‘n’ roll. Not to mention protest against the Vietnam War and marches for civil rights and the women’s movement. Who would think a figurehead for this social upheaval would be a tweedy Christian philologist at Oxford? But during the 1960s, a time of accelerating social change driven in part by 42 million Baby Boomers coming of age, Tolkien’s The Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings became  required reading for the nascent counterculture, devoured simultaneously by students, artists, writers, rock bands and other agents of cultural change. The slogans ‘Frodo Lives’ and ‘Gandalf for President’ festooned subway stations worldwide as graffiti.
Middle Earth, JRR Tolkien’s meticulously detailed and mythic alternate universe, was created against the backdrop of two world wars.  As a professor at Oxford , Tolkien taught Anglo-Saxon, Old Icelandic and medieval Welsh and translated Beowulf, which inspired his later monsters. His fantasy vision, and his sense of evil looming over the good life, was shaped by his devout Catholicism and his experience serving in World War I, in which he lost all but one of his close friends.  “The Dead Marshes and the approaches to the Morannon owe something to northern France after the Battle of the Somme," he wrote in a 1960 letter. Frodo and Sam struggling to reach Mordor is a cracked mirror reflection of the young soldiers caught in the blasted landscape and slaughter of trench warfare on the Western Front.

For decades, fans have been obsessed with Tolkien’s Great War of the Ring, with its wizards and magicians, the legions of hobbits, dwarves, elves, orcs, giants, ents, the dragon Smaug guarding his treasure and the threatening Dark Lord. They were popular initially but sales of The Hobbit (published in 1937) and The Lord of the Rings (beginning in 1954) exploded in the mid-1960s, driven by a young generation charmed by Tolkien’s imaginative abundance, the splendour of his tales from a pre-Christian time and his obsessive cataloguing of the history, language and geography of his invented world. But deeper than this, certain aspects of Tolkien’s worldview matched the perspective of hippies, anti-war protestors, civil rights marchers and others seeking to change the established order. In fact, the values articulated by Tolkien were ideally suited for the 1960s counterculture movements. Today we'd think of Tolkien’s work as being aligned with the geek set of Comic-Con, but it was once closer to the Woodstock crowd.

Go and read the rest of it HERE.

Note: Even if these are available as ebooks, I wouldn't buy them. The thought of all the typos and other misspellings would haunt me for whatever time I have left on this earth.  So, there! My old Hard Covers are it for the next couple of weeks.

I am amazed

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The Post-Election Blues

Seems everybody’s got ‘em.  My mailbox has been crammed with whiney, sniveling messages from Liberal and Democratic groups about this being the end of the world now that the obstructionist Stoopids are back in control.

Two things here:

1.  It will take them less than the next 2 years to fuck up everything that has been good and positive for the country.

2.  Where were these pundits and consultants when Nate Silver warned of this happening as early as a year ago?  (click image to embiggen!)  No one chose to believe him, though his record speaks for itself.  He’s not an “I told you so” kind of guy.  He just does what he does best - numbers - and the powers that be chose to ignore him.  And, at their (our) own peril. 

Ah, and number 3:  Get ready for another war. One doesn’t need to watch TV to see that’s high on their agenda.

When I saw the crowds at the polls on election day I was alternately happy and worried; an off-year election after all and we didn’t have too much brewing in the pot this time.  I wasn’t surprised at the outcome. 

OK, Here’s the deal.  This election disaster is over.  Flush the fucking Pity-Potty and move on.  After a half century of activism I am most tired of saying this, but there is more work to do than ever. And, it is in our own party. It’s time to get fearless and fierce with those applying for elected office. 

If we don’t. If we choose to let it go and let others do it, well, we’re going to have to live in the world THEY decide we should live in.

Do you want that?  Think hard.  If not, then get your ass, head, and mouth motivated and move on. There is little time before the 2016 con-game bullshit begins to hit the fan.

If you’re miserable you have yourself to blame, if you’re into that sort of thing. So, STFU!!! Cut out the crying, whining, and hand-wringing - IT’S OVER - - FOR NOW!

Help me down off this soapbox.

More later.

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Just a Thought: Texting

I'd love to see this happen, just once.
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Just a Thought: Superhero

I totally agree.
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Neutrality Caturday

Kitteh has the right idea.

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September 11, 2014

Twitter/NYPost
h/t: JMG

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'Internet Slowdown' is Coming

This goes down tomorrow. You are hereby warned.

Top websites partaking in September 10 day of action in support of net neutrality. From Common Dreams:

Calling attention to the widespread disruption that will occur if Internet 'fast lanes' become the norm for wealthy websites, grassroots groups have organized a widespread Internet Slowdown Day on Wednesday to voice their support for net neutrality. 

A number of the Internet's largest companies including Etsy, Kickstarter, Mozilla, reddit, Foursquare, Vimeo, and Wordpress have announced that they will also join in the September 10th action by displaying an alert with a symbolic "spinning wheel of death" loading symbol and pushing individuals to submit comments to the Federal Communications Commission, Congress and the White House.
"As that wheel spins, the rules about how the Internet works are being redrawn," Amy Goodman wrote this week.
As Goodman explains, large Internet service providers, or ISPs— such as Comcast, Time Warner, AT&T and Verizon— are "trying to change the rules that govern your online life," by creating a two-tiered Internet where certain content providers will pay to get preferred access on an Internet "fast lane."
Current FCC chairman Tom Wheeler is currently weighing a new classification for the Internet that could be a "huge boon" for big cable companies, according to protest organizers Fight for the Future. Those participating are calling on Wheeler and the federal government to protect Internet democracy and reclassify the web as a telecommunications service under Title II of the Telecommunications Act, which will mandate that ISPs deliver all content at equal speeds.
The FCC is expected to issue a final rule as soon as the end of the year.

Feel free to pass this on, or at least the above link to the original story at Common Dreams.

And so it goes.
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Throwback Thursday: A Two-fer

Shot in the same hotel room 10 years apart. How strange is that?

1992: Washington, DC October weekend.  March on Washington for Equal Rights and the last display of the entire Names Project AIDS Memorial Quilt. It just got too big and fragile after so many years. Spent more time at the Quilt than in the march because that's where I was needed.

2002: Washington, DC October weekend. March on Washington against the War in Iraq. Dressed for the ordination of a friend which happened to be the same weekend. I offered the Prayers of the People during the ceremony.

Yep!  Same room, same hotel.  I never noticed it before now. What are the odds?

And so it goes.
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Just a Thought: Training

You're never too young to learn to live

in a Police State.

More later.
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Just a Thought: Want

More later.
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Just a Thought

More later.
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Results, Revolts, and Receiving

(The title could have been “Receiving Revolting Results” but that would only cover half of the post and confuse the reader.)

The Dermatologist removed the stitches from the punch biopsies this morning. Sites where he removed hunks of meat are healing well, if very, very slowly. Damned immune system!

Biopsy results show that the rash was the body’s revolt against the Chemo, but the cream (a one pound jar!) cleared it and mercifully stopped the itching. The other skin condition, also caused by the compromised immune system, is responding well to the shower/body wash.  I am nothing if not super clean and slippery! (Did I say that?) So, all is well on those fronts.

However, the 3rd Chemo cycle (there are 4, total) starts on Monday, so the staff at the Center and I will be more vigilant for signs of any new changes in the body - inside and outside. Another 7 days of double injections, then off for 21.

If today’s Tarot card (and the one drawn for the month) are any indication, August is going to be kind of a roller-coaster ride. I can deal with the downs, as long as there are a few ups in the mix, too. If you get my drift.

Stopped at the market on the way home to grab a few things before the weekend. All at once the butcher rushes up to me and says, “I hear you had a birthday last week, I have something for you.”  He goes into the back and comes out with a small package wrapped in butcher paper.  Scribbled in marker on the top is “Happy Birthday” and he gives me the package and a hug.

The butcher (very easy on the eyes, I might add) learned about my situation from the Deli manager, who I’ve known for years.  The butcher has been fighting his own battles - doing Chemo off and on for over 2 years. 

The gift turned out to be a beautiful Petit Filet. I am absolutely floored by this gesture. 

Other than the possibility of a dawn walk on the boardwalk, I’ve no plans for the weekend. Just girding the loins for the 7 days to come. Oh, and broiling that great looking hunk of meat.  The filet, not the butcher! Although…Hmmmmm.

And so it goes.

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Just a Thought: Stop!

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Review: PSB - A Man From The Future

There are few reviews of this performance from last week. A couple I read were written by persons who have no idea who Alan Turing was, or who Pet Shop Boys are.  I found this one to be the most fulfilling, musically honest, and firmly grounded in the essence of the project. It's a 50 - 50 decision here, I think.  But she does know her stuff. The reviewer complains of not enough of Chris Lowe’s synth input in the piece. I’ll wait and see/hear for myself. The fact that the piece was celebrated at all is indicative of the Brit’s love of PSB musically.

I do hope this performance (on my birthday) was recorded for later release, but with PSB, that’s always very iffy, indeed. From The Guardian:

Nomenclature can get tricky when you think outside the box. What are we to call A Man From the Future, the Pet Shop Boys' tribute to mathematician Alan Turing, elegantly premiered last Wednesday at the Proms? A pop oratorio? A classical audiobiography? 

It is narrated by Juliet Stevenson, unkindly housed in a shonky-looking plywood box behind the orchestra. Her steely, authoritative tones remain purposely impassive, a judge passing harsh sentence on an era, even when they describe the death of the Bletchley Park code-breaker's first love from tuberculosis. A lonely bell clangs for this boy called Chris. Later, it clangs for Turing himself, as the piece in eight movements draws to an intense close. We pop heathens do know not to clap in between them. 

Turing died young of cyanide poisoning, an assumed suicide, after the innovative mathematician suffered chemical castration and lost his security clearance in the wake of a conviction for gross indecency. (Some do wonder whether his death was in fact suicide .)  

His tale works as an operatic tragedy and this piece is extensively sung: by the BBC Singers, augmented by Neil Tennant, who frequently refers to a score housed in a large red folder. They function like a Greek chorus, repeating Stevenson's words theatrically, picking out phrases to drum home. "Can you feel what I think? Do you feel what I feel?" they demand, teasing out the elements of Turing's outer and inner lives. The Enigma code-breaker imagined a "universal machine" that could compute, as far back as the war; boxes, now called computers, that could think outside the box. Turing's innermost feelings, of course, ran painfully counter to the law of the day, and the discussion of his gay leanings gets a breezy, almost swinging treatment, full of longing. 

Mainly, though, this tribute is lavishly orchestrated. The BBC Concert Orchestra, conducted by Dominic Wheeler, is doing the heavy lifting tonight. As the piece is often stirring or sad, the strings out-rank the brass and woodwind; I would have liked to hear more from the less strident corners of the ensemble. PSB synth jockey Chris Lowe is hidden at the very back beside some sound guys, identifiable only by a pair of fat red headphones and a baseball cap. Magnificently diffident, clad in shades and jeans, he comes down at the end and doesn't bow. 

Turing's story is deeply affecting, and the telling of it by an establishment organisation (the BBC, which runs the Proms) in an establishment venue (the Royal Albert Hall) in an establishment idiom (classical) is cause for celebration. We have come far since sodomy and treachery were felt to be synonymous by the state. (Or have we? Gay men who weren't Enigma code-breakers remain unpardoned.) 

But we really could have done with more from Lowe, and modernity more widely. Turing was, after all, a man from The Future. Even given the operatic nature of his tale and the rarefied Proms setting, wrapping this man up in strings seems a contradictory impulse. The very best passages here recall Giorgio by Moroder, a terrific electronic narrative from last year's Daft Punk album, such as when Lowe's vintage analogue sounds, laptop emissions and some unexpected beats (from a man hitting his cello, an excellent touch) penetrate the swell of the classical players.

The rest is HERE.

And so it goes.

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Note: One of the two birthday gifts to arrive without the gifter’s name is a DVD recording of the Pet Shop Boys “Cubism” concert. A gift that I will be viewing this evening for the first time. The first of many more to come, I am sure.

Again, thank you, who ever you are. 

Just a Thought: Watching

Or, worse.

Just a Thought: Apple

Point taken.

GOP Self Destruction is Complete

From Ana Marie Cox (the original Wonkette) at the Guardian. This is one reason I read the European news outlets.  You wouldn't see stories like this one in the American press anymore:

Conservatives are stuck in a perpetual outrage loop. The reappearance of Todd Akin, the horror-movie villain immortality of Sarah Palin, the unseemly celebration of the Hobby Lobby decision – these all speak to a chorus of "la-la-la-can't-hear-you" loud enough to drown out the voice of an entire generation. Late last week, the Reason Foundation released the results of a poll about that generation, the millennials; its signature finding was the confirmation of a mass abandonment of social conservatism and the GOP. This comes at a time when the conservative movement is increasingly synonymous with mean-spirited, prank-like and combative activism and self-important grand gestures. The millennial generation has repeatedly defined itself as the most socially tolerant of the modern era, but one thing it really can't stand is drama.
Republicans were already destined for piecemeal decimation due to the declining numbers of their core constituency. But they don't just have a demographic problem anymore; they have stylistic one. The conservative strategy of outrage upon outrage upon outrage bumps up against the policy preferences and the attitudes of millennials in perfect discord.
We all can recognize the right's tendency to respond to backlash with more "lash" (Akin didn't disappear, he doubled down on "legitimate rape"), but it seems to have gained speed with the age of social media and candidate tracking. The Tea Party's resistance to the leavening effect of establishment mores and political professionals has been a particularly effective accelerant. Palin's ability to put anything on the internet without any intermediary has rendered her as reckless as any tween with a SnapChat account. Akin's whiny denouncement of Washington insiders is likely to make him more credible with a certain kind of base voter. The midterms are, as we speak, producing another round of Fox News celebrities, whether or not they win their races: the Eric Cantor-vanquishing David Brat, Mississippi's Chris McDaniel and the hog-castrating mini-Palin, Jodi Ernst of Iowa.

The rest is HERE.

More later.
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