Look at Me! Look at Me!

Look at Me! Look at Me!

If I could alter one component of my personality, it might be to tone down my tendency to function at extreme levels, and stay more to the center of life’s complex arena. I’d like my life to more resemble a baseball game, with its serene pace interspersed with frenetic action, than to look like “extreme sports,” which tend to be, well, more dramatic. 

I glom onto patterns of behavior that defy explanation, even to myself, who curiously enough, seems uninterested in getting to the bottom of any of this idiosyncratic conduct. Whether it’s music, footwear, writing, big pharma, sleep, tee-shirts, water or facial hair, I am going to be at the extreme end of the “normal” spectrum.

Earlier this summer. Interesting color of shirt...

What I haven’t figured out for certain, is either why-or how-I slipped into this mode in the first place. 

Out of the blue the other day when I opened Pandora, my sole method of accessing music, a message appeared relaying the information that in the last three months, I had accessed 9,747 songs. The communique went on to say that Pandora was quite pleased, and hoped that I would access another 9,747 songs in the next three months.

Not having any data off the top of my head, to compare how my listening rate compared to others, I took the numbers at face value, and kicked them around for a moment. Per month I would be listening to approximately 3,250 songs, or a little better than 100 songs per day.

You may see where I’m going with this. Take my sandals, for instance. After encasing my feet in conventional footwear the first sixty years of my life, I have since abandoned-ship on shoes and boots. My feet no longer wish to be so confined, I guess, though they have not personally conveyed that message to me.

I have drawn my own conclusions, based on the fact that in the past year, I put on boots only one time, refusing even to wear socks with them. My task at that moment was to haul rocks out of the creek-bed, and up to a worksite behind the house. There was no way I could go up and down the steep side of the hill to access the creek-bed, wearing sandals.

Even last spring, when I spent twelve weeks using a pitchfork to work the soil at three different sites on-farm, I wore only my sandals, though I wore through two pairs in the process and created some technical difficulties in my digging (right) foot.

My sister JT informed me that my metatarsal bones have an issue and that it would go away over time if I start wearing footwear with better support. Well, I have news for you: As soon as she told me that, the pain magically disappeared, relegated to that same part of my brain that the discomfort in my back from processing tomatoes or handling the weed-eater goes.

If I refuse to acknowledge that discomfort exists, then it doesn’t exist. 

Ties? Uncomfortable?

[Editor’s note: Cannabis may or may not have an influence here-the jury is still out back with the bong and some high-grade OG/SK, trying to ascertain whether there is any connection. They’ve been gone a week now.]

Sleep? Yes, there is that pesky issue of only getting four hours per night, and then getting up and letting my mind roam around for a few hours, though I keep a tight leash on that sucker, most of the time. You see, I get into trouble online because of my politically correct perspectives, which often clash with the more down-home approach of the locals.

Unfortunately, to solve that sleep issue, I would have to capitulate, and go with my VA doctor’s prescription for the meds big pharma is so happy to provide. I drove down that road earlier, until the meds caused me to crash and burn in the most hideous of styles.

Never again.

What the VA doctor does not have to prescribe is water, which I have found to my utter astonishment, to be a panacea for a bevy of physical issues. Per my custom I drink from six to eight liters of spring water every day.

For me water keeps my life afloat in so many ways, I am still figuring them all out. Water keeps headaches away; if I feel a headache coming on, I know I am not properly hydrated. Water reduces my incessant craving for sweets; even at that, I fall back on fruit rather than chocolate, the food of the gods.

If I am outside in March with a temperature of 34 degrees and the wind is howling, and my bare toes inside my sandals are cold, I know I am not properly hydrated. It’s immediate-I hit that water thermos, and my toes stop tingling.

Four inches of snow on the ground? No problem. It’s way more hassle to put on boots to go out and get an armful of wood, or feed the chickens, than it is to simply take care of business in my sandals. Were someone to ask me if my feet were cold, I would inform them that they were not.

Who needs to travel to experience the Grand Canyon?

If I were to guess, I would say it is because there are so many moving parts in the feet, and that blood keeps circulating at 98.6 degrees, keeping those feet warmed accordingly, but what do I know?

What I do know is that I am not a guy who likes to be uncomfortable, so if my feet were giving me grief, I would address the issue.

I hate tee-shirts with sleeves, so I either wear tank tops, or cut off the sleeves. I wore a buttoned-up shirt and tie for sixteen years, four days a week, and I guess this is my way of evening up the scales. 

And, of course, I have those goofy braids/dreds, more than a foot long by now.. As Annie is want to say, “Look at me! Look at me!” Considering I hate the spotlight, I have a funny way of showing it.

If you twisted my rubber arm, I might confess that I thought it was all related to my mood-spectrum disorder. Think of it as a passive/aggressive approach to being bipolar. I don’t take meds, relying on my Cognitive Behavioral Therapy and cannabis to keep matters under some semblance of control.

I don’t think of cannabis as medication, just as I don’t think of oxygen as medicine. Both are essential to my forward progress in life, just as are those extreme personality traits. By being able to manifest my bipolarism in enough socially acceptable situations, I seem to be able to manage the disorder more effectively.

I guess. Maybe. Who knows? My behavior is generally referred to as eccentric, which is how you like to think of retired folks, now getting on in age.

Hey, eccentric is better than bat-shit crazy…

Bridge-Burning-201, Advanced Studies

I'll have a Jameson on the rocks-better make it a double...

Bridge-Burning-201, Advanced Studies

How Liberals and Conservatives can learn to get along: A Step-by-Step guide to the complete idiot (that would be me, for one; the rest of you have to take stock…)

The first point of order here is that neither libs nor cons are right or wrong: They simply are, kind of like Jerusalem crickets and butterflies, dependent upon which side of the septic tank you happen to be representing. I, by universal definition, must be a Jerusalem cricket, because everywhere I go, I make people nervous.

So in order to be able to coexist with the butterflies I encounter, I must find a way to rein in those pincers that seem to be the problem. I must accept that I am the newcomer here, despite having lived on the mountain for almost 35 years. In most books, that makes me an old-timer, but not when it comes to politics.

I bring in with me different notions of how things ought to be, especially the concept of political correctness. I have been around for a spell, and have seen our culture go from referring to various ethnic groups as spics, wops, kikes, zips, and micks, all nice single-syllable words, easy to spit out, even by the mouthful.

There are others, so many others, that it boggles the mind at how creative we were back then. On the other hand, we drove around in vehicles at 70MPH without seat-belts or airbags. Go figure.

Liberals tend to look upwards and outwards from the immediacy of their lots in life, more globally as it were. Conservatives tend to focus more on what is right around them, as their grandparents and multiple generations going back into the depths of time, have done.

Both are admirable sides of the septic tank of politics, from which to view life. When occasion calls for the intermingling of the two sides, unspoken truces go into effect, baseball is played, church is attended, the school field trip takes place and we all enjoy a good cup of our favorite hot beverage at Pour Girl’s, in the ‘Ville.

Until the election comes along.

Instead of being able to keep those truces in effect, as we do when we are face-to-face, we (I mean me, of course) tend to let that broader side of our socio/economic background take over, and that’s like trying to mix cannabis oil and beer: It’s never going to happen smoothly. 

Better to drink your beer and eat a brownie with it, than to try and mix the two.

Though I personally do not support either of the major party candidates, I find myself drawn into debate because of my inability to understand that I am clearly out of my league. 20,000’s worth out of my league.

I am so politically naive, I never actually realized how much animosity I could incur, by simply asking a clarifying question of someone. It makes no difference what the question(s) was, only that I was incapable of recognizing how vast the chasm was/is between us. 

I appealed to what I thought was human nature, and found out that human nature can be viewed by different people, in amazingly different ways. Again, specifics are unnecessary-only the recognition that they exist.

So, what to do?

Well. there is the weeping, wailing and gnashing of teeth approach to the situation, or a daylong excursion to Boomer’s, to drown my sorrows in good Irish whiskey.

Oops, probably not Boomer’s, due to my controversial approach to the whole Colin Kaepernick/respect-for-flags conundrum. Judging from some of the posts coming out of the saloon, I would be as welcome as, well, a Jerusalem cricket.

One strategy is avoid all political exchanges period, recognizing clearly the futility of once again, being put through our paces by a master plan far more complex-and probably devious-than any of us can imagine. Nothing is too outrageous.

Another strategy is to find neutral ground, preferably of a humorous vein, and then go that route. Not only is the humor infectious, there is a certain lightness to the exchanges that lends more weight to them, as in, “We are rising above that septic tank and meeting somewhere else, kind of like we do in reality.”

The reality is Annie and I like to stop at Pour Girl’s on the way through to get lattes; it’s an incentive whose worth is immeasurable.

When it comes to blowing up bridges, I am a demolition man...

The question is, “Have I obliterated this bridge over the chasm, or can it be repaired?”

Ask me after the election, when I no longer have a swath of black bands running down my back

.

Sleep Well

Yummy. Too bad you can't both have it, and eat it.

Sleep Well

One thing is certain: This volatile election is taking its toll on personal online friendships. Time, distance and philosophical differences render the process of maintaining any degree of closeness challenging enough as it is, without tossing in a national election, as divisive a tool as has ever been invented.

The liberals versus the conservatives. Those who view President Obama as a knight in shining armor, and those who view him as black, period. Those who are so disenchanted with corruption in high government places, that they seek a maverick such as the Republican candidate. 

[Editor’s note: I have yet to be able to convince my fingers that this is all real, by actually typing the letters to this man’s name. I’m working on it.]

As ancient as the hills is the old axiom about not discussing politics or religion, if you want to remain friends with folks. Religion rarely enters the arena for me, simply because I have absolutely no interest in either participating in any form of organized worship, or prattling on about it. 

Politics, unfortunately, is not so easy to ignore, because this year’s election has so many features never before witnessed on the national stage. Racism, sexism, morality, values… They are all being bandied about like so many ping-pong balls waiting to be selected in the upcoming bingo game.

The difference is that each of the ping-pong balls in a bingo game

is exactly the same, except for a random number. The issues being bounced around for this election, strike much deeper at the basic components of our society, creating this polarity between “liberals” and “conservatives.”

I see the blatant racism the exudes from every pore of the Republican candidate, and it sickens me to the core of my existence. Over my life I have seen the full circle of desegregation, beginning with the civil rights protests and continuing through to the present, where political correctness reigns supreme.

How our nation, the land of freedom and equality, can embrace a candidate who clearly does not see all citizens as equal, defies explanation, and I simply will not go along with his agenda. If someone supports the Republican candidate for President, then that individual is also accepting this candidate’s beliefs as far as racism go. You cannot have it both ways.

"I am a star so i can get away with it."

By definition, even if you are voting for your guy because the opposing candidate is inordinately corrupt, you are supporting a racist agenda. You may not like that element, but you cannot deny it. Protest until the cows come in, explain your rationale thoroughly, but the fact remains that you are going along with a racist agenda.

I can’t even discuss the sexist component of the Republican candidate, without grimacing, but once again, if you are a supporter of this man, you are also a purveyor to the rape culture of this country. This is the culture which allows a college athlete to commit rape, and then draw a twelve-week “sentence,” because the judge did not want to wreck a perfectly good life, by holding the perpetrator accountable for his actions.

Get used to it.

You can once again explain to me why you are voting for your guy, and rationalize away his agenda as being a “necessary evil,” in order to avoid corruption in high government, and I may nod my head accordingly. But I will not agree with you.

You can’t have your s'mores and eat 'em too. If corruption in high government bothers you more than having a racist/sexist President, then knock yourself out at the polls.

Just accept the fact that you are supporting a racist/sexist agenda, and then sleep well at night. That way you will  never notice that you have one fewer "liberal" friend on social media.

But hey, we are bound to run into one another at Geiger's some day, or even better, the post office, and we can pretend to be friends for a moment or two. We'll smile brightly and exchange hugs.

And then go about our business.

How sad.

President Wanted: Club G.R.O.S.S. of 'Merica

President Wanted: Club G.R.O.S.S. of 'Merica 

Dear (The) Donald supporter,

As enjoyable as the entire experience has been, I must now remove myself from the political arena, because I am obviously not smart enough to recognize what you and all of your NASCAR friends have been able to see: The Donald is the Answer. 

Hell, I can’t even figure out the question.

Gosh, does that make me feel inadequate. Y’all do doublespeak so effectively, I am left on the tarmac, flattened by your rapier-like wit. I am not the fastest Formula One on the track.

I ask you how you can support a man who has such a low opinion of women, and you tell me it’s because Bill Clinton had his lollipop licked by an intern.

I ask how you can support a man who feels that women have no value past age 35, because, well, you know, fun is fun, and sagging breasts and droopy buttocks are such a turnoff to men, especially white, powerful men. You respond, “Because Hillary is a crook.”

I stay the course, and ask how you can support a man, who has to continuously restrain himself from “grabbing a little pussy?” You enlighten me that that comment was made ten years ago, and besides, Bill has done what The Donald only talked about.

Huh? Seriously, I repeat-for emphasis, in caps-HUH?

I find it the most challenging experience in the world because every single point of contention about The Donald, is rerouted back to Hilary or Bill, whose name(s) I never mention.

It’s like asking someone what time it is, and having her tell me that it is Sunday. It makes as much sense. I ask her, "What difference does it make if a man makes a comment like The Donald did today, or ten years ago?" The contempt and revulsion I feel for this man and his sexist attitude, is immeasurable.

Please, when I ask you a question about The Donald, respond with an answer that addresses the question. It's a small thing but would make me happy.

The Donaldo is the kind of individual who creates an uphill battle for decent men everywhere, who are as repulsed by this alleged candidate for the nation’s top office, as clear-thinking women. What if The Donald should be in the midst of a debriefing with a female world leader, and feel so compelled to grab a little something/something, that he can’t control himself?

What if his star status isn’t enough to get him a free grope, and she has the unmitigated gall to snivel about it? To the media? What then?

My personal objection to The Donald is that he represents the America that I detest. Like America, and its earlier innate belief in the right to all land “from sea to shining sea,” he takes what he wants. A lot of ‘Mericans like his style.

He is loud, he is vulgar and he is a star.

Supporters have bought The Donald's party line that all Muslim immigrants are ISIS soldiers in disguise, and that these immigrants are slinking around STEALING benefits more rightfully due veterans, and that has all the Donaldo’s supporters in a lather.

As if there isn’t enough money around for both.

The Donald is, of course, a guns rights kind of guy; guns are good for business. The Donald keeps his words short, he repeats them a lot and he doesn’t worry whether or not the words are true.

It is a proven fact that if you repeat something often enough, and everyone around you agrees, that it must be true.

Repeat after me, “The Donald would make a great President!”

OK, here goes, “The Donald would make a great president... of Calvin and Hobbs’s G.R.O.S.S. club: “Get Rid Of Slimy girlS.

That’s the best I can do.

Sincerely,

Markie

"I'm Outta Here!"

"I'm OUTTA here!"

"I'm Outta Here!"

Though HappyDay Farms is spread out over two parcels, and has significant gardens in five different locations, we all manage to converge for the midday meal, served at the original farm house, the one in which the boys were raised.

What we really need is one of those steel triangles, like the one used in the western film “Lonesome Dove,” to summon all ranch/farm hands to the feed trough, in our case, the dining room table. It would be heard everywhere; of that there can be no doubt.

As it is, circumstances dictate the time of the meal, based on market days and however many warm bodies will be at the table, and Annie goes with the flow. A meal such as yesterday’s, a Mexican-styled barbecued chicken salad, with its aesthetically appealing appearance battling with our taste buds for attention, is a classic example of Annie’s vast experience in these matters.

Looking at this pic, one would NEVER suspect.

Too busy to be able to simply prepare the meal on a more conventional schedule, she started the barbecue about 7:30 yesterday morning, in order to prepare the boneless, skinless chicken breast meat for the salad. I was out back, dead-leafing, when I smelled the smoke.

Upon investigation, I found the barbie already fired up. While the coals were burning down, she was able to chop and dice the rest of the ingredients for the meal, and whip up the dressing. This is where the Mexican part of the salad comes in, because the dressing is a cilantro-based recipe, a white blanket of goodness that simultaneously cools matters down, while igniting an explosion of flavors in one’s mouth.

Having fresh salad greens heightens the culinary adventure, one already so infused with deliciousness, that fresh tomatoes are deemed unnecessary except as a side dish. The room-temperature pitcher of fresh spring water, is filled and ready to be poured into the green pint Mason jars, which are replaced in their rack on the dining room table, after they have been washed.

The farm-hands mosey in from various directions, scrub down, and then swarm. I stay out of the way, preferring at all times to take a back seat. I eat, if and when I determine that all working Janes and Joes will get fed first. I can always scrounge-I am a master at it, especially since it always begins with a quick blitz through the garden for tomatoes, apples, a lingering lemon cucumber, and whatever else strikes my fancy.

Conversation is inevitably lively and yesterday was no exception. After bashing The Donald mercilessly for his vulgar words and intentions, we moved on to an infinitely more palatable discussion, though one which also touched on unruly behavior.

This headstrong performance was brought to us by none other than Small Boy, a moniker attached to Nathaniel, aka Lito, since he was a young boy who was anything but small. Maybe that is why it seemed natural that we would make the decision to go ahead and start him in kindergarten only ten days after his fifth birthday.

I mean, the little guy was as sharp as marbles and we figured, why not give him the boot out of the house, so as to free up Annie for volunteer work in the different classrooms? We had been talking up this scenario to Lito all summer long, and he was all gung-ho to give it a go.

[Editor's note: "Give him the boot?" Could we try, "Why not provide for the little tyke, the educational opportunity of a young lifetime?" Just saying.]

That is, until he found out that Mama was not a part of the package. I mean, he had been told all of this, but there was a disconnect somewhere, one which played out in the elementary/middle school staff room one September morning, way back in school year 1990. Coincidentally, this was also my first year as a full-time teacher in the middle school.

Official "mug" shot

Annie might have been in Susan Bradley’s class with Ben, or she may have been in Jane Puritan's class with Casey, but wherever she was, she got a phone call from Principal Matlock, he of the descriptive eyebrows and ever-present smile. 

Mr. Matlock would exude hospitality and benevolence while conducting your own execution.

Whatever was said to Annie on the phone, she flew in the side door of the staff room, to find Lito doing his best imitation of Hurricane Matthew, 26 years before the fact. Specifically, he was scrambling around the cramped room, knocking chairs over and pulling mail out of the district employees’ cubbies. 

He had already cleared the expansive staff room table of everything that had been deposited there, binders and books strewn around on the tiled floor, as if finally free on a long-awaited field trip.

Assessing the situation at a glance, and regretting that she had not been able to foresee this tantrum, all she could do was make a beeline for Small Boy, who put up a gallant fight. This included a last-ditch dive under the table to the other side, where the same debris that he had scattered, finally trapped him long enough for Annie to grab an ankle.

Triumphantly she glanced up at Mr. M, who paused no longer than an eyebrow flutter or two, before drawling laconically, “Well, I donnnnnnnn’t think he’s ready for kindergarten, yet.”

Hey, Lito could have put one of those chairs through the sliding glass door, so consider yourselves lucky, was all I could think when Annie gave me the sordid details. When asked what the issue was, Lito provided the obvious answer, or rather, question, “Where was Mom?”

Got it.

The story is that much funnier because the dude is not an excitable fellow, unless Conor Gillespie has just hit a three-run home run to knock the New York Mets out of the Wild-Card game. 

Then you might just see him revert back to kindergarten age.

Who'd a thunk?

My Fractured Country, Thee

Sung to the tune of "My Country, Tis of Thee," or "America."

My Fractured Country, Thee

My country, ’tis of thee,

Cold land of poverty, your pain I see.

Land where my fathers died,

Land of foul genocide,

From every ghetto street,

Freedom retreats.

My fractured country, thee,

Land of the wealthy, thy name I flee.

I loved thy rocks and hills,

Until the industry filled,

My heart and my soul, with revulsion.

Let music fade away,

And drag from all the trees, the last wood deck.

Let billionaires rule all,

Let Donald Trump take all,

Let rocks their silence break, And down we fall.

Our fathers now are gone,

Authors of liberty-

I’m glad they’re gone.

Imagine how horrified they’d be

Should they awake and see

Fifty million in poverty

Someone save their souls…

A Crock of Liars and Thieves

Veterans deserve to be supported.

A Crock of Liars and Thieves

The ultimate champion of the downtrodden, Charles Dickens, described Ebenezer Scrooge in “A Christmas Carol,” as a “tight-fisted hand at the grindstone…a squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous old sinner…”

Scrooge, aka The US Government

So might I describe the Republican Party of today, with one additional note that not only is it all of the adjectives Dickens uses, but underhanded and immoral as well. I say this because to promote war and weapons as a means to make money, without providing support for the “tools” of the trade, as military personnel might be referred to, is an abomination.

There is no other way to describe it. Rich lawmakers, intent only on their own self-serving agenda, savagely go about the business of producing weapons of mass destruction, in order to continue waging a global assault on what remains of earth’s natural resources.

They have one purpose in mind-to enrich themselves. These purveyors of death and destruction use the poor and the uneducated to acquire wealth, and then have the gall to deny the returning war force, the most basic of amenities.

Here is a list of bills that have been “shot down” by Republican lawmakers, the party which calls itself The Patriot Party:

The Clay-Hunt Suicide Prevention Act

Health Benefits & Retirement Pay Restoration

Wounded Veterans Job Security Act

Veterans Retraining Act

Homeless Veteran Reintegration

Disabled Veterans Home Accessibility Grant

Job Corps Act

Torture Veterans & Victims Relief

Veterans Business Center Act

Examine the list, if you will, please:

Greed, a game only the rich can play...

Suicide prevention? Why bother? Let the weak die and “diminish the surplus population,” was the way Dickens phrased it.

Health benefits? Act tung, Chucko! Costs money! Scratch that…

Wounded vets? Tough! Should have dodged that bullet…

Retraining? For what? We’re done with you. Get lost…

Homeless? Get a job!

Disabled? See above…

Job Corps? Hit Micky D’s up-they always need “chefs…”

Torture? You’re killing us!

Veterans: No begging on this corner...

Veterans Business Center? Why bother? 

There is so much wrong with this picture, it sickens me. I am not the veteran who needs help. I live on a farm on a ridgetop-I have everything I need, including good physical health, so I speak for my fellow vets-and against the filth and corruption of an uncaring government.

We can disagree on politics, we can disagree on cannabis and we can disagree on religion, but we cannot disagree on the concept of responsibility.

The government of this country owes the veterans who served it, a modicum of human respect and dignity, and it’s not providing it. Talk about standing for the flag all you want, and paying respect to a great nation.

Well, I got news for you folks, a nation that doesn’t take care of its “human tools of the trade,” is nothing but a despot, like Moammar Khadafy or Saddam Hussein. 

The creeps who run the government of our country are just a crock of thieves and liars.

https://www.facebook.com/Teanderthal/photos/a.241007069270330.50975.240984512605919/1151665911537770/?type=3&theater

Uncle Sam