Today at Longwood Gardens

 

 

 

 

A fountain in the middle of the city

 

How much does it cost a British politician to change a light bulb?

Apparently it is 135 pounds.

Our president is better than smart...

he's lucky.

If three people were walking beneath a tall skyscraper: man A, Obama, man B, and someone dropped a brick from the roof, it would hit either A or B, and Obama wouldn't even know something had happened.

Look at his record: Won the Dem primary by disqualifying his opponent; won the election by threatening a juicy scandal about the Republican candidate, intimidating him into withdrawing from the race; then beat Alan Keyes, who is clearly insane and doesn't even come from Illinois. He's never actually won an election before the Big One.

He might not have won that one if the economy hadn't crashed and burned just before the election, causing the electorate to blame Republicans for the mess.

He promised to withdraw from Iraq, but before he could keep his disastrous promise, Gen Petraeus won the damn thing, getting him off the hook. Lucky!

I hope some of his luck rubs off on the country. If we come out of his administration relatively unscathed, it won't be his fault. He believes that in order to fix the economy, we have to mess up health care. That's like a doctor telling you that he can't cure your bleeding ulcer until he cures your acne.

Some photos of Gibraltar

 

 

 

Something called Free to the First State took place today. Delaware residents could visit any number of historic sites free. These were taken at Gibraltar, a garden on Pennsylvania Ave in Wilmington. I was glad to make its acquaintance. I've often driven by and wondered what it was.

It was a beautiful day, despite the sun that fitfully emerged from the clouds.

Squalid family story

Mother, in an attempt to get my brother and me to clean up after ourselves, used to ask: "What would happen if nobody cleaned up?" We never found out, because mother had what my aunt called a "girl," to avoid the pejorative "maid," which for some reason was a low class way of speaking (Considering that my aunt called her friends--grandmothers all--"the girls," I guess girl was a better term. Well, you had to live through it, all women under the age of 90 were called girls, not women.) Anyway, we had a cleaning woman--a former client who had done time for shooting her husband--and the house was clean, if cluttered.

However, mother's theoretical was tested by a close relative, who I'll call Alvin. Alvin and his wife didn't like to clean, and didn't. Nor did they employ a cleaning person, girl, woman, or man. So we got to know what would happen if nobody cleaned up. It was pretty grotty.

Alvin and his wife, Alice, left piles of books, newspapers and junk mail on every available surface, and when that surface was covered they just piled it higher. Theirs was the only household I've ever visited where the toilets were covered with dust. And I have visited some very humble households, namely those of most of mother's clientele. Some lived in the country and had outhouses that were not as filthy as that of these two college graduates.

Add three children to the mix, and let them do whatever they want in the house, such as play ball indoors and scatter their possessions everywhere. A baby grand piano, shoved up against the wall where no-one could access the keyboard, made a cultural statement. A mattress and bedding in the middle of the living room floor attested to the fact that Alvin snored and Alice didn't like it.

To make matters worse, Alice was an awful cook, who served up whatever she could find in the refrigerator. So Shabbat dinner could include, but not be limited to, one baked potato, a few string beans, and a challah that had seen better days.

They were awfully nice people and very glad to see you, so once in a while you could not avoid Shabbat dinner. They were trying to be hospitable, the poor things. I guess they had long ago stopped seeing the dirt and disorder and thought it was normal.

But what about public health? What about germs? Had our ancestors left the poverty and oppression of Eastern Europe so their progeny could end up like this?

Another former friend

A friend of mine was having a play put on in New York, and a bunch of local citizens was chartering a bus so they could attend en masse.

I invited Linda to join me on a theater trip to the big city. This one would be great for both of us, because the question of who would drive would not arise. Because Linda wouldn't drive in New York. Her car was too new. It would be acceptable if my old Taurus were completely demolished by rabid New York drivers, but her Lincoln was too valuable.

Anyway she agreed to go, and I agreed to order and pay for the tickets. The price was something like $40, $50, or $60 per ticket, I don't remember.

So we went, and a good time was had by all. As I drove her home from the bus stop, I asked her to reimburse me. She said she didn't have the cash on her. I said I would take a check. She didn't have her checkbook either.

What could I do? The amount was more than I wanted to lose, but small enough so I would feel like I was hassling her if I kept reminding her that she owed me. Pestering people for small sums put the onus on me. Don't you feel defensive when you remind people of trivial amounts of money they owe you? You feel like the guilty party, somehow.

All this went through my mind as I approached her house, a big old Victorian which had been restored and refurbished within an inch of its life and was now worth millions. I knew that if I didn't do something, that money was going to slip out of my life for good.

So I told her I would go into the house with her and wait while she wrote a check.
In her dining room, which sported a priceless Oriental rug and a lovingly restored dining room table, she retrieved her checkbook and managed to write out a check in a most annoyed, "why are you so petty?" manner.

The next I heard of her, she sent me an invitation to her daughter's wedding shower. Since I knew neither the daughter nor her fiance--and was not invited to the wedding anyway--I decided I couldn't afford a friendship with Linda. She was too expensive a date.

Does Obama really believe that fixing the economy depends on health care reform?

Byron York:

Meanwhile, the president is taking every opportunity to argue that real recovery won’t be possible unless we spend hundreds of billions of dollars to enact his so-far-unspecified health care reform plan. “I’ve said repeatedly that getting health care costs under control is essential to reducing budget deficits, restoring fiscal discipline, and putting our economy on a path towards sustainable growth and shared prosperity,” Obama said at the White House on Monday.

Jeff at Protein Wisdom:

Unlike York, I don’t have sources inside the beltway, but nevertheless I’m going to disagree with him and say that it is unlikely Obama is betting an economic recovery on the passage of universal health care. Instead, I’m guessing that Obama — always one to take advantage of historic symbolism — simply wants to be the one who brings about the total overhaul of the US economic system, to be the man responsible for pushing (or forcing, depending on your point of view) anti-capitalist progressive policy into the political mainstream, where it will become difficult to roll back.

The president's logic--if logic is involved--confounds me. it's like building a house with the roof constructed first, then the actual structure under that, and last, the foundation. Very innovative--but it doesn't make sense.

Big wind in Delaware

 

The wind apparently blew part of this tree down.

Two toned tree

 

My neighbor's tree looks like it grows flowers in two different colors.

From Delaware, for Mother's Day

They are Brandywine Bluebells.

Happy Mother's Day!

Construction dust

When I went to Arizona back in early April, I was naive enough to believe the construction on my new bathroom might--just might-- be complete or nearly complete when I got home. This is equivalent to believing that the stars are God's daisy chain or that the Easter bunny lays colored eggs.

Brian the Boy Contractor seemed so eager to complete the job! He had nothing else to do--nothing! It would be his A-1 priority!

Well, Brian and his silent helper have managed to spend about eight hours a week on this job. The bathroom is the usual jumble of tools, wallpaper fragments, pieces of lath, sawdust and crumbly stuff. The entrance hall is completely covered with contractor footprints against a backdrop of mud. Bits of board adorn the front walk. The garage, which is usually full of junk, now contains a toilet, sink, and medicine cabinet in addition to the usual dreck. The dining room holds a large carton containing the stuff that was in the old bathroom. A fine layer of dust lies over every available surface.

And so it goes.

Any hope of actually keeping this mess presentable would be futile. I did sweep up the fragments that were in the kitchen so I could have an occasional meal there. I also mopped the kitchen floor and the entrance hall. Then it rained for nine consecutive days.

At this point all I do is cringe when I walk into the house and leave urgent messages on Brian's voice mail. Is this some sort of contractor's tradition to make the biggest mess possible for the longest possible time?

My brother's birthday

 

is today. This is what he looked like as a boy. Now he has a long white beard and looks like God.

Wilmington Institute sells prints by N C Wyeth

Bad news.

The Wilmington Library plans to pay for a new roof, heating and air conditioning system and other repairs for its Rodney Square building by selling 14 illustrations N.C. Wyeth painted for the 1920 publication of "Robinson Crusoe."

The remarkably large collection of Wyeth originals is expected to bring about $5 million when it's auctioned piece by piece at Christie's in New York on Dec. 2.

"The paintings are among Wyeth's most famous book illustrations and their sale is significant in the world of collectors," said Eric Widing, an American painting specialist at Christie's.

It's rare that so many illustrations from one book -- there were 16 in all for "Robinson Crusoe" -- go to auction together, Widing said. That's likely to be seen by buyers as a momentous event, he said.

Also heading to the auction block in October is a rare, complete 20-volume set of Edward S. Curtis' books and photographs of the native peoples of North America and Alaska. It's expected to raise $700,000 to $900,000.

These items, particularly the Wyeth prints, belong here, not in some millionaire's collection in Saudi Arabia. No doubt it was the intent of the donor to assure them a safe home in the library--not to repair the roof!

I'm a librarian. I know what leaky roofs do in libraries. Air conditioning and heating problems are also quite familiar to me. But I wouldn't sell irreplaceable paintings to fix the roof. What will happen when the new roof needs a new roof, as it inevitably will? Will they sell the circulation desk?

A very similar incident took place in Paterson, NJ, a few years ago. The library had in its possession several priceless works by painters of the Hudson River School. These painters were very much in vogue at the time. They were sold, and some citizens brought a lawsuit, claiming that these paintings were a gift to the city of Paterson and were not really the property of the library. The suit was successful, the buyers returned the paintings, and the library had to re-pay the auction house for their lost commissions.

I'm not a lawyer, but I wonder whether the donor of the Wyeth illustrations intended the library to sell them for lunch money.

Cranky, and other, observations

I haven't figured out Verizon yet, and I don't think I ever will. But I think Verizon is going to get their comeuppance, just the same. Every few days, at least once a week, I get an offer from Verizon for phone+internet+tv for $99. These wonderful offers are for new customers.

Why are new customers gold and old customers garbage? If you can earn a profit selling service to some people for $99.00 a month, why not me?

I predict that someone somewhere is inventing a technology which will put Verizon out of business, and I can't say I'm sorry. Magicjack is already here, for $19.95 a year. Unfortunately, this does not work for me, but someday something will.

I can't feel sorry for the CIA either. They had a shiv stuck deep in Bush's back, the bloody traitors. I bet they all voted for Obama. Now let them take their lumps.

Nor can I work up much sympathy for the car manufacturers. The last time I had my car --a Mercury Sable--repaired at a dealer's it cost $400 and I had to sit around all day. What goes around comes around.

Senator Specter, the newest member of the Democratic Party, has had his seniority taken away. I'm crying bitter tears. I hope Norm Coleman takes his disputed election result all the way to the World Court. We don't recognize the World Court? Wait a while, we will.

I was out shopping last night in the dusk--you know, the brief period when all the light has gone away but darkness has not yet completely descended? It was raining and there was an air of mystery. Has anyone captured that light, or absence of light, in a painting?

Speaking of light, the stars shine more brightly in Sedona than they do here. The night sky is astounding.

Homecoming float

 

A picture of a homecoming float from a long time ago. These girls are all grandmothers now.

Would you believe I know the names of two of them? That's why you label your photos.

Depression

When I am worried about something I lose my appetite and therefore lose weight. It's easy. I just don't feel like eating. When I feel better, though, I gain it all back. Now that's depressing!

Small tree

 

This tree--actually a twig--was a table decoration at a Hadassah dinner a year ago, and I won it. It is a redbud tree, or will be when it grows up. I watered it daily last summer, and it made it through the winter. They say it blossoms in seven years. Well, that's one down and six to go.

It's about 10 inches tall right now.

Flowering trees, April 2009, Delaware

 

 

 

Misc

A collection of uninteresting observations:

I'm not having much fun now. Mr Charm is still in rehab and not feeling well today. I'm not afraid of being alone, scared of burglars, or noises in the night. I miss him, though. What does it all mean? Life seems absolutely senseless: "a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing."

Someone has suggested that I actually got the better of Verizon by posting my screed against them. Not so. I've actually spent over $600 in the first third of this year on totally unoutstanding--it would be a stretch to call it mediocre--service. So who's ahead? Who's laughing now?

Every time I have a question about a bill or technical support from anyone, I set aside about an hour to get out of voice mail jail and actually talk to someone. Sometimes that's not enough time.

The people of Wilmington DE are very polite and friendly. Even the panhandlers say please and thank you. Good show, Wilmington!

More than one black person has wished me "a blessed day." It doesn't improve my situation, but it makes me feel better. Good show, black people of Wilmington and environs! That's a nice thing to do.

A letter to Macy's

Dear Macy's:

I am writing to inquire why I must have two Macy’s accounts, one of which does not send me a monthly statement. I pay my Macy’s bill in full every month, yet these other charges do not appear on the bill. But even though they don’t send me a bill, I am supposed to pay the bill they don’t send me.

How am I supposed to know what the charges are, if you don’t send me a statement?

If you people are not smart enough to send me one simple statement for this account, how do you expect to run a business? No wonder the economy is in trouble.

Now I am paying off this Visa account in full, and I want this account closed permanently. I would still like to have a Macy’s account, but if I have to close both of these accounts to have peace of mind, I will be regretfully forced to do so.

I’ve enjoyed getting discounts at Macy’s, but they’re not worth being driven nuts.

Sincerely,

Miriam

The life the environmentals want us to have

"Whatsoever therefore is consequent to a time of Warre, where every man is Enemy to every man; the same is consequent to the time, wherein men live without other security, than what their own strength, and their own invention shall furnish them withall. In such condition, there is no place for Industry; because the fruit thereof is uncertain; and consequently no Culture of the Earth; no Navigation, nor use of the commodities that may be imported by Sea; no commodious Building; no Instruments of moving, and removing such things as require much force; no Knowledge of the face of the Earth; no account of Time; no Arts; no Letters; no Society; and which is worst of all, continuall feare, and danger of violent death; And the life of man, solitary, poore, nasty, brutish, and short."

Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan

Mandatory cringe-worthy environmental post

This one by Neil Kramer --a blogger I actually like--will do.

As for me, I hate the environment. Environmentalists posture because they think they have a self-evidently superior cause. Few of us want to be sen as defenders of pollution, deforestation, global warming, and a host of other bogus concocted evils.

The only environment I care about is my own. So I turn out my electric lights when I am finished using them, because I don't want my environment cluttered with electric bills. I want cheap energy from nuclear power, if that's what works. I want to live a lavish American lifestyle, using plenty of cheap energy to meet my most whimsical desires, not some thirdworldy existence communing with nature, playing with sticks, and using the outdoors as a toilet.

Give me my cell phone, my incandescent light bulbs, my washer and dryer and dishwasher and all the rest of the gadgets which make my life pleasant and convenient. Big gas-guzzlers which burn lots of cheap gasoline! Building projects which use lots of lumber and spread suburban sprawl all over the countryside! Miles and miles of highways covering the countryside! I love them all.

A poem by Robert Burns

O my Luve's like a red, red rose
That’s newly sprung in June:
O my Luve's like the melodie
That’s sweetly play'd in tune.

As fair art thou, my bonnie lass,
So deep in luve am I:
And I will luve thee still, my dear,
Till a’ the seas gang dry:

Till a’ the seas gang dry, my dear,
And the rocks melt wi’ the sun;
I will love thee still, my dear,
While the sands o’ life shall run.

And fare thee weel, my only Luve
And fare thee weel, awhile!
And I will come again, my Luve,
Tho’ it were ten thousand mile.

I have to admit that I avoided Burns's poetry for a long time, because I loathe dialect and loathe even more poets that are celebrated by cults--like Bobbie Burns. But this one is so pretty.

I believe that all of Burns's loves (or luves, if you prefer) were like a red, red rose--every last one of them. And there were many.

Another favorite poem

DOWN BY THE SALLEY GARDENS

by: W.B. Yeats

DOWN by the salley gardens my love and I did meet;
She passed the salley gardens with little snow-white feet.
She bid me take love easy, as the leaves grow on the tree;
But I, being young and foolish, with her would not agree.

In a field by the river my love and I did stand,
And on my leaning shoulder she laid her snow-white hand.
She bid me take life easy, as the grass grows on the weirs;
But I was young and foolish, and now am full of tears.

One of my favorite poems

"Daffodils" (1804)

I WANDER'D lonely as a cloud

That floats on high o'er vales and hills,

When all at once I saw a crowd,

A host, of golden daffodils;

Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

Continuous as the stars that shine

And twinkle on the Milky Way,

They stretch'd in never-ending line

Along the margin of a bay:

Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced; but they

Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:

A poet could not but be gay,

In such a jocund company:

I gazed -- and gazed -- but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought:

For oft, when on my couch I lie

In vacant or in pensive mood,

They flash upon that inward eye

Which is the bliss of solitude;

And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.

By William Wordsworth (1770-1850)

When I saw a huge spread of daffodils on a hillside in the Brooklyn Botanic Gardens, I thought of, and appreciated, this poem. My heart actually did leap up with joy, at least for the moment, as prescribed by the poet.

I must admit that they do not flash upon my inward eye in solitude. I am always deflected by thoughts of what's for dinner, or the need to pay some bills.

Still, it's a very suitable poem for National Poetry Day, this April.

Don't blame me!

President Obama is quite clear that he is not responsible for the current mess. It's all Bush's fault.

When do we get to blame Obama for everything? How about, erm, some Tuesday in November?

Tree, shadow, boy

 

National poetry month

Truly I am not myself, if I let National Poetry Month slip by. So here's a poem, and it's an April sort of poem, too, by Robert Frost:

Nature's first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf's a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.

Vexed in Delaware, California, and Arizona

It's been that kind of week.

It had been cold in Delaware, so I was looking forward to a little California sunshine. Wouldn't you know it, it was colder still in California, with an ominous wind that I'm convinced was just laid on to inconvenience me. It's always warmer in California! Isn't it?

Everything in my suitcase was suddenly unsuitable. I spent four days in my son-in-law's hoodie, and slept in an old robe. The only time I got warm was in the shower. I also lost my cellphone---the one with everybody's number programmed into it. That's like losing your entire social history.

So California was a bit of a washout, weatherwise. (Besides my losing one of my favorite earrings in the hellhole my daughter calls a guestroom.) But we were going to Arizona. Surely it's warm, even uncomfortably hot, in Arizona? Well, it wasn't. Sedona was freezing, and furthermore it has no bookstores, which always makes me suspicious of a place. They didn't even have those books they always have in convenience stores--you know, books with black covers about aliens and vampires, or romance novels. No magazines either, unless you consider publications about trucks magazines.

Sedona was spectacular, but so what? What can you do with scenery, once you've taken its picture? There are also many, many psychics, tarot readers and other various nutcases who must have moved there from California, no doubt seeking a warmer climate.

So we moved on to Scottsdale, obviously a real place--realer than Sedona, at any rate. Scottsdale is either part of Phoenix or not, I couldn't decide. Anyway, one runs into the other, as towns do in New Jersey. It happened to be very cold in Phoenix, or Scottsdale if you prefer. The natives found it refreshing to have a cold spell in a season which is usually hot. Not me. Places should have the proper weather suitable to the season.

All of those places had unsuitable weather, due no doubt to global warmening.

Just got back from Arizona

 

Complaint re: Verizon

Sent to the Delaware Public Service commission:

Every month, Verizon sends me another bill for over $200. there are always extra charges on the bill for movies and services I have not ordered, such as service in Filipino. I am constantly on the phone with them, correcting their billing. The next month there is another extra charge for television programs and movies I have not ordered.

Every month I attempt to pay their bill, by phone or by credit card. They never credit my account with payment and are constantly sending me disconnection notices. About a week ago I paid their bill over the phone, plus a $3.50 charge for this service. Now I get another disconnection notice!

I would pay this bill over the phone yet again, using another credit card, even though I already paid it, but they seem totally unable to post my payments to my account. So why bother?

I recently called them and enrolled in a bundled program, where I am to receive phone, television, and internet service for $109 a month. This has not been put into operation, even though they agreed to set up the account this way.

These Verizon charges are making my life a living hell.

Can you please, please PLEASE ask them to straighten this out?

Bad bunny

 

What on earth did this bunny do, to cause his owners to string him up?

I swear I will not write about male undergarments again

after this.

Stink free underwear

The Japanese are testing “stink-free” underwear on the space station. Reuters reports that Koichi Wakata is trying them out the “J-ware”:

“He can wear his trunks (underwear) more than a week,” said Koji Yanagawa, an official with the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency.

Wakata’s clothes, developed by researcher Yoshiko Taya, are designed to kill bacteria, absorb water, insulate the body and dry quickly. They also are flame-resistant and anti-static, not to mention comfortable and stylish.

H t to Basil.

A women's seder

I went to a women's seder last night. The atmosphere was pleasant and friendly. The food was pretty good, too--always a good sign.

But what really moved me was the prayers, Torah passages and psalms. They are so beautiful--noble and profound. These words were written down so long ago, and despite every adverse circumstance, they have been preserved and repeated for centuries.

I'm a great skeptic. I find it difficult, as my life plays itself out, to believe there is anything but a great Indifference in the universe. It would be nice to believe in something, but most religious beliefs seem so far-fetched.

And yet, there are still Jews in the world, and every year they still celebrate their deliverance, despite all the hatred and genocide they have endured through the centuries--and continue to endure. The continued existence of this people seems to sugggest that the unlikeliest things can be true, perhaps.

Another figure from the painting, "Trio"

 

Violist

 

A portion of my painting, "Trio."

Tuesday was not my lucky day

Mr Charm was not doing too well....
No-one was returning my phone calls....
I parked in the street, at a meter. When I came to get the car, my cell phone fell under the car. I had to pull the car out and stop in traffic in the middle of the street, to pick it up. Then I noticed a parking ticket under the windshield.

I got home to receive another disconnect notice from Verizon. As I had paid them over a week ago, I was steamed.

Oh, well, we're all still alive.

Happy birthday to me--not

Another monumental sucky birthday. Not only is it the anniversary of my mother's death, but Mr Charm is in the hospital--serious stuff.

I don't have much loyalty to a particular place---nowhere is home, except where he and I are together.

How quickly things change: you're just starting to enjoy something, and it's gone.

Prayers, please, all you rock-ribbed Christian right wing nuts who actually read this stuff.

Portrait of three vegetables

 

New Castle honors Vietnam vets

 

Memorial in Brandywine Park, Wilmington DE, photographed 3/17/2009

The emergency ward

I had occasion to spend some time in the emergency ward of a downtown Wilmington Hopital. The daytime group was evidently made up of persons who consider this service a substitute for making an appointment with a regular doctor, and don't mind wasting three hours waiting to be seen, mostly mothers, children, and old people. The medical personnel were patient, sorting out those who had true emergencies and dealing with them first, but eventually getting to everyone. It was a very patient and orderly crowd.

At night it was a different story. For one thing, there were trauma injuries, some from car accidents or bar fights. I saw one young man with a bleeding head injury that was scary looking but possibly not as bad as it looked. There was more injury in the night crowd. They were younger and tougher looking: definitely the huddled masses yearning to breathe free. They also had worse injuries and the pace had picked up. More repressed anxiety. Still a three-hour wait, though. The scene was worthy of Goya.

Coming from a New Jersey hospital in a wealthy suburban setting, I had never seen anything like this: platoons of patients. It was an eye-opener.

The taxpayer's club holds their annual meeting

Washington, DC, April 15, 2012. Since President Obama and the Democratic Congress passed the Budget Omnibus Bill of 2011, the number of people who actually pay taxes has dwindled to .000012 of the population, making it possible for all of the actual taxpayers to convene in one room, albeit a banquet hall.

Featured speakers were Bill Gates, Warren Buffett, and the guy who owns all those parking lots at airports.

Unfortunately, there were a large number of demonstrators outside the hotel where the event was held. They held handmade signs reading, "More medical care for less money," "How would you rich guys try to live 15 years on my lousy welfare check?" and "Free plastic surgery for all." The fellow carrying the sign protesting paying 80 percent of his wages for Social Security arrived on his $20 bicycle, having scrapped his car when gasoline reached $100 a gallon.

Chuckie Cheese is a behavioral sink

And I thought it was good clean entertainment!

In Brookfield, Wis., no restaurant has triggered more calls to the police department since last year than Chuck E. Cheese's.

Officers have been called to break up 12 fights, some of them physical, at the child-oriented pizza parlor since January 2007. The biggest melee broke out in April, when an uninvited adult disrupted a child's birthday party. Seven officers arrived and found as many as 40 people knocking over chairs and yelling in front of the restaurant's music stage, where a robotic singing chicken and the chain's namesake mouse perform.


Chuck E. Cheese's bills itself as a place "where a kid can be a kid." But to law-enforcement officials across the country, it has a more particular distinction: the scene of a surprising amount of disorderly conduct and battery among grown-ups.

"The biggest problem is you have a bunch of adults acting like juveniles," says Town of Brookfield Police Capt. Timothy Imler. "There's a biker bar down the street, and we rarely get calls there."

I've only been to Mr Cheese's establishment twice and nothing could induce me to visit it again. Simply, I don't like places where children run wild, such as the aforementioned C Cheese, the Liberty Science Center, or any children's museum in the country you want to name. I'm all for repressing the natural instincts of children to run wild. They need to be civilized, sooner rather than later.

The best part of the whole thing? Construction of two new Chuckie establishments in Lima, OH is subsidized by tax dollars from the State of Ohio.

Bernie Madoff is going to jail

He's going straight from the courtroom.

Cheer up, Bernie! Eric Holder is still on the scene. Maybe he can get you the same deal he got Marc Rich.

Rich was trading with the enemy. All Bernie was doing was what Barack Obama wants to do--fleecing the rich. After all, anybody who has a million dollars or more got it from stealing from the middle class, didn't they?

A musical note

I attended a concert Sunday--Mahler's Das Klagende Lied. To the Philadelphia Orchestra's credit, they have been playing a lot of Mahler recently.

From the program:

The work is scored for three flutes (II and III doubling piccolo), one offstage piccolo, two offstage flutes, two oboes, English horn, two clarinets, bass clarinet, two offstage clarinets, two offstage E-flat clarinets, three bassoons, three offstage bassoons, four horns, four trumpets, two offstage E-flat trumpets, four offstage flugel, three trombones, two tubas, timpani, percussion (bass drum, cymbals, tam-tam, triangle), six harps, strings, soprano, mezzo-soprano, tenor and bass soloists, boy soprano, boy alto, and mixed chorus.

Musicians must have worked cheap in Old Vienna.

What good are the humanities?

In this article, the case is made that PC has made the humanities dreadful and irrelevant to students. I won't argue with that.

Ms Cohen says that the "critical thinking, civic and historical knowledge and ethical reasoning that the humanities develop... are prerequisites for personal growth and participation in a free democracy," and of course I'd be happy to join her in that view of the humanities. But in saying so she seems completely out of touch with what is really happening in college humanities courses, for it is not this. Doesn't she know that civic and historical knowledge of American history and institutions is at a low ebb precisely because that knowledge does not mesh with the dominant politically correct ethos of the professoriate?

Also true, at least at some times and in some places.

But I reject the notion that the humanities are some particularly nasty-tasting medicine that the student takes because it makes him a better person, for his mental health, so to speak--for "personal growth," a tiresome phrase that reminds me of granola and whole wheat bread without additives.

I don't agree with that view. I regret many things I've done in my life, but I don't regret spending four years reading great literature. I enjoyed it, but I don't believe it taught me wisdom or goodness. Life teaches you those things, to the extent you can learn them. When I was 20 I had read all of Shakespeare's plays but I couldn't say boo to a goose.

Shakespeare and the rest don't need me to argue their case. Great art gives great pleasure.

Curses

When I was a child, I longed to be able to curse, it seemed so grown up. Mother told me I could not include curses in my vocabulary. I was too young to use bad language. She was evasive when I asked her how old I had to be, and I never got a satisfactory answer.

Bubbe did not use profanity but wished horrible fates on those who won her disfavor. One of her favorites suggested that the person she was angry with should go with his/her feet in the church and head in hell. Gay in dererd simply meant go to hell. Or she would wish cholera on people--a chalerya auf im! or she would wish a klog on someone. My Yiddish-English dictionary defines klog as a "lamentation," but as she used it, I would guess it meant curse.

She had lots of disparaging names in her arsenal: bahama (from the Biblical Behemoth," was literally a cow, but figuratively, a clumsy oaf. A naar was a dumbbell; mamzer was a really bad word, meaning a bastard, a gonif was a thief. A child who wouldn't sit still had shpilkes in toches (ants in her pants). A person who wouldn't listen was a goyishe kop, which translates into--well, it's hard to translate, but it's not good.

These are just a few I remember offhand, but bubbe know plenty more and was never at a loss for words.

The Itiderod race started today

I have never been particularly interested, until I read a book called "Murder on the Itiderod trail by Sue Henry.

The Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race got off to its ceremonial start Saturday in Anchorage, Alaska, with mushers and their dogs going on short runs through the city.

The grueling 1,150-mile trek to Nome begins in earnest tomorrow with 67 mushers and more than 1,000 dogs competing, but intrigue and controversy are already mounting.

-- The recession has hit the famous race, with entrance fees rising as the purse declines to $610,000 from $935,000 last year. Fewer mushers are competing this year, with some saying the expense of training in tough economic times caused them to sit out.

Cranky

I have been cranky lately. I've been living in Toe World, with a bandage and a weird shoe. Sitting in the foot doctor's office, waiting to be seen, I was left to reflect on the decor's total lack of charm or interest.

Why do doctors do this--I mean, decorate their offices with graphic pictures of the respiratory system, the spine, or the foot? If I'd wanted to go to medical school that option was open to me. I chose to be an English major instead. It was a reasoned decision. I hate the sight of blood, guts, bones, muscles and circulatory systems. I don't want to be reminded that I have all that stuff inside of me. Ugh!

What started me thinking along those lines was a poster in the foot doctor's office showing a disgusting toe, whose nail was infected by a particularly ghastly fungus. The nail was about the size of my foot and in glorious living color.

Hint to doctors: decorate your offices with soothing landscape paintings. Seascapes are good, too, as are depictions of tots gamboling in the sunshine of country estates. Portraits. Pictures of flowers, wine bottles or fruit, or a combination of the above. I'll even settle for paintings on velvet; but let's soft pedal the anatomy lesson, okay?

Twitter--or not?

Hitherto I have avoided twitter like poison.

What is it? Do I need it? Why do I need it? Will I become an even larger Internet weirdo than I am now? Jack explains:

I have been using Twitter for around a month and am slowly learning my way around it. For a long time I was reluctant to get involved with anything else that could serve as a time suck. As it is I feel like I am constantly searching for ways to turn a 24 hour day into 36 hours. So the idea of adding another responsibility bothered me.

But at the same time I find social media to be incredibly interesting so I wanted to dip my toes into the water and see what happened.

Thus far I have been pleased with it. It is fast and easy so I haven't found it to be particularly taxing...yet. Yet is the operational word because I can see a time and place when it becomes too time consuming so I have been relatively cautious about who I follow.

Thus I have fulfilled my obligation to link with Jack, ass today is Link with Jack Day.

The latest style

Notice the sweater. This is the latest look. See how snug it is? It's almost straining the buttonholes.

Lucky me! I don't have to buy it, because all my cardigans fit like that. Actually, all my clothes.

You too can be stylish if overweight. Just gain 10-20 lbs. It's easy.

What will we do if health care is rationed?

Realistically, we have much to fear from Obama's health care plan.

Obama’s budget would boost taxes on the wealthy and curtail Medicare payments to insurance companies and hospitals to make way for a $634 billion down payment on universal health care. That is a little more than half the money it would take to extend insurance to 48 million uninsured Americans.

One doesn’t curtail payments without curtailing benefits. I see rationed health care for the elderly and disabled. When I go on Medicare, I expect my benefits to be drastically reduced.

Canadians coped with nationalized health care by coming here for treatments that were denied or postponed--for instance, a patient who would have to wait for a coronary by-pass or a hip replacement could come here and have it done. When our health care is rationed, what will we do? Where will we go?

Get yourself a family doctor in Thailand. I understand procedures are much less costly there. Of course, it's a long commute, and if you have a health emergency you might croak before you got to the hospital, but we must consider the greatest good for the greatest number. Mustn't we?

March snow

 

Toes

I know this blog is somewhat dreary visually, and I was going to enliven it with a picture of a toe, but all the pictures of toes and even of feet were so Godawful ghastly I couldn't bring myself to do it. Toes in general aren't too good-looking, are they?

I bring up toes because I had surgery on one of mine. The toe in question is doing fine, thank you for asking.

I am squeamish and not particularly fond of looking at body parts in their less glamorous moments. SO I am not going to take a picture of my toe and post it here.

However, high tech has come to the world of the toe. The sore toe is sent home from the hospital with about 50 lb of high tech gear, including a machine which periodically circulates ice water around the poor wounded piggy. It's a marvel of ingenuity.

Then there's the rubber boot, which is designed to allow the patient to take a bath or shower or go deep sea diving, judging by the four-color illustration on the package insert, which shows pictures of happy, cheery swimmers gamboling in the surf.

The principle of the boot is this: there are two sizes of rubber boots for waterproof feet: small, for children, and large, for everyone else, from petite size 5 1/2 ladies to size 14 football players. Since it must fit all these feet, it is on the large size.

Attached to this gizmo is a small pump, with which you are supposed to pump all the air out of the boot after you put it on and before you get in the pool. This takes the air out, and then the boot is snug and keeps your foot dry. In theory.

In practice, it would take you a week to expel all the air from this object. I managed to get the thing over my foot, even though the opening is about 4 inches in diameter (that's so no water gets into it). I ended with the object flapping off my leg and putting me off balance since it weighs a good 20 lb. It kept the water off my foot, but unfortunately its outside held enough water to thoroughly flood the bathroom floor.

I believe this was invented by those who brought us the stimulus bill.

Brilliant comment

In a post referring to Gavin Newsom's incredible offense of drinking bottled water, This commenter hits the nail on the head:

Religions have plenty of arbitrary rules.

The modern environmental movement has it all: sins (including original), heretics, commandments, ostracism, confessions, indulgences, tithing, prophets, high priests (of unquestioned authority), blind faith, and guilt by the sackful.

By God, I wish I'd said that!

Courtesy of James Lileks.

Two may keep a secret...

if one of them is dead.

Good luck with hiding the details of the defense budget--or anything in Washington.

New California dream

People are leaving.

The buffoonish current governor and a legislature divided between hysterical greens, public-employee lackeys and Neanderthal Republicans have turned the state into a fiscal laughingstock. Meanwhile, more of its middle class migrates out while a large and undereducated underclass (much of it Latino) faces dim prospects. It sometimes seems the people running the state have little feel for the very things that constitute its essence — and could allow California to reinvent itself, and the American future, once again.

I understand a popular destination is Seattle. If they reproduce the government which led them to leave in the first place, Seattle will be California without the sunshine.

Mother and the courthouse

Mother never separated her private life from her professional life. One of the most annoying things about life with her was the incessant stream of phone calls from her clients. There was no such thing as Caller ID or voice mail, so we always picked it up. One of the conversations, related to me later:

Saturday night caller: Miz Goldie, my husband's in jail! Can you get him out?
Mother: When did this happen?
SNC: Last Thursday.

If it was possible to get him out, mother would often do it. To make herself presentable, mother would put on a coat over her nightgown, cram her feet into shoes, and put a hat atop her head. She was then perfectly groomed for a Saturday night jail visit.

We often tried to discourage her clients from calling at all hours. We didn't understand that her profession was like crack to her, that she needed it to feel alive. Her clients, black and white, were poor people such as you never see nowadays, uneducated and working at menial jobs. They loved her and trusted her completely, and she never let them down.

I went with her to the courthouse on more than one occasion, and saw how she relished the milieu: the stew of clients, judges, clerks, policemen and lawyers, the peeling walls and worn out stair treads, the statue of justice with a blindfold on. Phones rang, people shuffled to and fro, doors opened and closed. She was at home there; that was her place and she flourished there, like a fish in an aquarium.

Once, during a blizzard, mother drove through the town, stopping at about 90 traffic lights, from the extreme east side to the center of Columbus, a large, spread out city. When she got there, the court was closed: the judge was not there, neither was the prosecutor, nor the clerks and secretaries. Only mother had come to court. She was about 70 at the time.

Wifeswap doesn't work out

The striking thing about this couple is that they actually make money at their respective professions: he as a "biofuel entrepreneur" and she as a--wait for it-- "weight loss lifecoach." Only in California would you find anyone who would trust either one of them with a potted plant. And yet, they earn a living! a comfortable one!

According to the male half of this caring, concerned couple: "I probably make more in a week than you make in a year."

Take that, you proletarian redneck.

Too much fuss?

The assimilated Negro thinks so.

These images [of monkeys and other simians] strike me as racial Rorschach tests; they reveal more about your own personal racialized perspective, than actual objective truth on malicious racist intent.

Also, in the post I didn't get to include my two scientific nits on this matter:

1. monkeys and chimps aren't the same. check the wiki.

2. monkey scientists are telling us there's only 2% difference between the DNA of chimps and humans, so technically, the insult wouldn't be that far off from the truth. And is universally applicable to blacks, whites, asians etc.

But the Reverend Al needs something to fuss about, or he will be out of a job. Since Al can't pass as a Muslim, being a Christian Rev and all, (where's his church?) he has to settle for the next best thing, resenting unintended slurs as an offended African American.

Income tax

All week I have been grappling with my income tax, and I believe I've got it beaten into submission now. I e-filed it all. Every year, at tax time, there is a problem with the printer. It's not always the same printer, either. A gremlin must visit the corner where my printer resides at about this time every year. One year it declined to download the proper version of Adobe; this year the roller doesn't pick up the paper properly, so I have pleated sheets of paper, suitable for making Japanese fans but not much else.

Doing your income tax online is not an intellectually challenging task. It is more like something tedious and detailed, boring but demanding full attention, like cleaning the bathroom grout with a toothpick while standing on one foot. I'm not sure that sentence is grammatical, but I'm going to let it stand anyway.

However, I am happy to be getting a refund. I was praying some money would descend on me somehow, and the Almighty came through handily. Unfortunately I cannot use it to stimulate the economy because I already owe it to the guy who installed a new bathroom floor, and the plumber. Sorry, Barack. Better luck next time.

Speaking of Obama, does the man ever let a day pass without making a speech somewhere to a group of adoring fans? He zigzags across the country, going back and forth in it, like the devil in the Book of Job. I can't figure out whether he is running for student council president or King of the World.

Advice to BHO: put in some time at your desk. You might like to read some of the legislation you have signed, are signing, or are going to sign. How about simplifying the tax code, so Tim Geithner and I can understand it?

Moderating comments

On the whole, I think moderating comments works well. For one thing, no house cleaners in Iowa comment on my ideas, which is on the whole a good thing. Another good thing--someone linked to a blog which is obsessed with what my grandson would have called doody and I erased it without a qualm.

The best kind of comments are favorable. If you disagree with me, try to be polite, at least. Telling me what a contemptible person I am is unlikely to change my views, nor is calling me a dirty Jew. Why would I publish nasty unpleasant comments? I myself only read blogs the authors of which are witty and funny or agree with my ideas, which makes them witty and funny. I don't pay much attention to those who have different opinions, as my mind is made up already about a great many things.

But someone made a point of disagreeing with me about the New York Times and its celebration of those who wish to save the planet. Their pretentiousness made me want to go out and burn some tires, just out of spite.

Actually, I don't get much pleasure out of squandering electricity or gas. Would I hang my newly washed clothes on a clothesline? No. Would I turn off the refrigerator, putting my eggs and milk outside in winter? Again, no. I believe all these conveniences exist because they are--erm, convenient. And there is no way I would plunder someone else's garbage--that's nasty.

I'm not going to put myself out because I have lived long enough to learn something I didn't know when I was young. Here it is: You can buy anything, gas, electricity, refrigerators, cars, houses. All you need is money, which you can get if you want it badly enough. The one thing you can't purchase at any price is time. And time goes by swiftly. Where, for instance, are the snows of yesteryear?

Instead of wasting my time over something which makes no difference at all in the great scheme of things--contra Al Gore, I don't feel responsible for global warming--I would rather spend my allotted hours reading, blogging, listening to music, playing with my grandson, or just hanging out.

Do I care about the big three automakers?

Some little mean part of me doesn't. None of their dealers ever gave me a break when I brought the car in for servicing. Or when they gave me an "estimate" that cost $150. Or when the diesel Oldsmobile--yes, they made one-- wouldn't start and they could never find anything wrong. Or when I ordered a part that took three weeks to come in. Or when they told me replacing the side mirror was "body work" and I'd have to leave the car for three days. Or during the good old days before Japanese cars took hold when they would sell any damn poorly functioning thing because we didn't have a choice....

US Steel went under didn't they?

Curses on you, Brogan Cadillac!

Hopeless situation

Stuck.

Watch out who you mess with

There's life in the old girl yet.

Our new president preaches

Obama is starting to sound like one of those preachers who warn you that you will go to hell if you don't accept Jesus. Or the stimulus bill. Dire.

The tides have risen

Thanks, Barack Obama.

Scores of people had to be evacuated from their homes in Essex as the Environment Agency issued a sever flood warning for the Rivers Chelmer and Can at Chelmsford.

Head of flood defences, Craig Woolhouse, said a combination of heavy rain, snow melt and "tide-locking" of rivers caused by high tides off the southern coast of England had come together to create the risk of floods.

Now if you could just get them to recede the tiniest, little bit?

The New York Times does it again

More bullshit from the planet saving crowd.

I managed to control myself after the Times published an admiring story about people who dived in dumpsters for sustenance, despite living in one of the richest cities in the world, with marketable skills they could have easily used to earn a decent living. My mother told me that garbage was full of dirt and germs, but if they don't mind being exposed to disease, my hat's off to them.

Then there was the family who tried to live sustainably in a New York apartment eating local produce and avoiding the use of toilet paper. If concerned citizens want to eat locally grown food, they can dig up potatoes in Central Park during February--that's the only locally produced food available in Winter. I would rather have fresh fruit flown in from Chile, but that's just me. As for the toilet paper, I'm just going to draw a curtain on that one.

But I have blown a gasket over the refrigerator deniers, who are saving about $40 a year on the average by inconveniencing themselves and being sanctimonious about it.

All these folks are like the aristocrats in Louis the Fourteenth's court, dressing up as shepherdesses and playing at being poor, humble peasants. They make a mockery of human beings who live in poverty, filth and hunger because they have no choice.

The game doesn't cost them anything; they can plug in the fridge, buy food--even toilet paper--at the supermarket, even go on welfare and food stamps if they need to. Poor people in other countries don't have those choices.

Who in the world...

 

Can these people be? I think thy're from the 1930's, judging by their clothes.

Label your photographs!

This deal is only available for a limited time!

Obama's urgency about the stimulus package reminds me of nothing so much as a used car salesman warning you that the deal is going to slip through your fingers if you don't act immediately. With the added threat that if he doesn't get his way right now, the World as We Know It will come to an end.

Or perhaps he more closely resembles one of those television pitchmen selling a gadget that will cut your hair, trim your toenails, and put out the cat. And if you call this toll-free number right away, you get a free ginsu knife and a month's supply of Nutrisystem. Just pay shipping and handling!

But act now!

A new tax cheating record

Seventeen states! His parents must be so proud of him; Daschle and Geithner only cheated the federal government. Pikers!

What happened to AIG

The two cows explanation.

Unfair to Caroline Kennedy

I think the press is being hard on this poor woman. She hasn't got anything wrong with her that many of our most prominent statesmen don't have.

In many ways, she has had an unfortunate life. Yes, she has money. But she lost her father when she was six, and her only brother died an untimely death in the flower of his youth.

The quality she lacks is shamelessness, or effrontery. My bubbe would have called it chutzpah. Call it high, or unwarranted, self-esteem. Without this attribute, Barack Obama would never had run for the presidency. Nixon lacked this attribute, and that is why he slunk away from the presidency like a whipped dog after Watergate.

Bill Clinton has it in spades. When the Monica Lewinsky scandal came along, I, for one, thought he would resign. He determined to brazen it out, and rightly so. When Ted Kennedy got caught in a scandal that would have ruined most political careers, he had the brass balls to fight, and win!

In fact, most of the Kennedy family have high self-esteem. Look at Patrick, a man who should have sought obscurity long ago--still a Congressman. Look at all that bunch of Kennedys in Massachusetts, one or more of whom-I can't remember who at the moment, there are so many of them--put themselves forward as worthy candidates for higher office, despite lack of intelligence or accomplishments.

For God's sake, look at Rod Blagojevich!

On the other side of the aisle, there is plenty of arrogance to go around. Larry Craig and Duke Cunningham spring to mind, and there are plenty of others. All of Abramoff's buddies.

But I digress. Poor Caroline! Modesty, or shyness, held her back. When interviewed, she could not boast of any accomplishments, because she didn't have any. She had had a couple of books ghostwritten for her, and had never been arrested. She had raised children, none of whom are presently in jail. She wasn't kissing up to Hugo Chavez. For a Kennedy, that's a sterling record. But she lacked the gigantic ego and total lack of shame which would have carried her to victory. The one man whose vote she needed, David Paterson, was not impressed.

We're going to lose 500 million jobs!

Every month! According to Nancy Pelosi, a woman with not too firm a grasp on arithmetic--or reality.

Pelosi says that if legislators don't move quickly to pass President Barack Obama's stimulus package, "500 million Americans lose their jobs". According to her, this sobering scenario will occur every month without proper government action.

However, according to the US census bureau, the current population of residents in the country stands at about 305,000,000....

[T]there could be many a wayward American (almost 200 million of them) in other parts of the globe, who soon will lose their jobs just because of the simple fact that they're American. And everything that goes on within US borders will always affect them, no matter where they dwell.

But basically, all Americans (and then some) will be unemployed if the Senate doesn't get moving on this legislation.

We'd better encourage both legal and illegal immigration ASAP if we want to meet Speaker Pelosi's quotas.

Another old photo

 

There goes the image of the United States!

Oy vey! I've set foreign relations back at least a decade.

I just noticed that a bunch of people on a Polish social networking site called Grono are visiting this particular post. I hope they are not taking this as gospel. How do you say "It's a joke" in Polish?

I wonder what people in Warsaw and Bialystok think of it.

In related news, I am still getting visits to my post, Miriam's porn site. I'm wondering if I should take it down? It must be very disappointing.

Welcome, Polish readers!

Defiling the environment

I happened to mention today in art class that I don't like fluorescent light bulbs, and they all looked at me like I was Mussolini come back to life. I mentioned that incandescent bulbs give a nicer light, and they all protested. I do have one fl bulb, and it makes everybody look like one of the pictures in the post office.

Case closed.

I've been losing sleep over this

Whew! Foreigner who teaches at a mediocre local university reassures Americans:

America's tarnished star got some needed polishing overseas last month, thanks to recent actions by President Barack Obama, according to foreigners living in Delaware.

From his visit to the U.S. State Department and his first formal White House interview with Arab news agency Al-Arabiya to reversing several policies of George W. Bush's administration, he helped the United States regain the credibility it lost over the past eight years, said Muqtedar Khan, an international relations professor at the University of Delaware.

"You can argue that Obama's election has caught most of the world on the wrong foot, and so right now they are much more positively predisposed to the United States," Khan said, noting an international perspective that thought Americans' prejudices would prevent them from sending a black person to the White House.

You can also argue that he is full of s--t. The article certainly gives us no reason to believe that he knows what he is talking about.

Who is this guy? What is his area of expertise, that he can bloviate over how the world sees America? What are his associations? For that matter, since he is a foreigner, what is his country of origin? Is he a member of a terrorist group, for instance, like Sami Al-arian? And why are his vaporous musings printed above the fold in a Delaware newspaper?

Just asking.

Octuplets--should there be a law?

This woman is crazy, not to put too fine a point on it. She has certainly taken advantage of "the right to choose," although Gloria Steinem probably would not agree with her choice.

This is one of those instances when hard cases make bad law. The situation is deplorable. Her children's future looks bleak. The government's options are all bad. But meddling with the rights of women to conceive and bear children by legislating or regulating or harassing doctors would make matters worse.

Fortunately, very few women will be inspired by this woman's example. I don't think there are going to be too many imitators of a woman who can certainly be classified as a breeder, if anyone is.

Blogroll Amnesty Day or weekend, whatever

Jon Swift and a bunch of others have declared this weekend Blogroll Amnesty Day.

We little tiny blogs are supposed to link to five really really wee blogs that we really like and want to list on our blogroll.

Truthfully, I don't know of any little blogs because I don't know what the traffic of other blogs is, being obsessed with only my own traffic. But I do like and regularly read lots of blogs. I don't read blogs that don't agree with me politically; since I've already made up my mind, I find that skipping the insights of left-wingers saves time and keeps my blood pressure on an even keel.
I'm going to recommend two bloggers, since it's late at night and I'm tired. Maybe later I'll think of more.

My first pick is a fellow librarian who calls himself Akaky Bashmachkin, but I have always suspected this an alias stolen from Gogol. Anyway, he attended the same library school I did but managed to get out without totally muddling his brain, which is more than I can say for myself.

You've got to like a fellow who writes a line like this:

After all, Barack Obama probably doesn't hate white people no matter what 20-years in the pews of a racial separatist church suggests. It's just far harder to see a bunch of white people against ice and snow.

At least I do. But I'm breaking the rules, I don't believe he's small. I suspect he has more readers than I do. So what? A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of small minds.

And so to bed.