Oh, the drama!!

First, let’s not buy into the Bully Theater of the Matt Gaetz (Trump’s version of a thick-headed though pretty wimpy hockey goon) led “storming” of the impeachment inquiry to order pizza, some homophobic chicken sandwiches and stand around looking stupid for five hours. This was nothing more than poorly scripted and worse acted window dressing of their spin as they try to muddy the waters and sell that these proceedings are unfair and unconstitutional (which is just TOO funny considering the source), aren’t transparent enough and somehow aren’t allowing due process by being held behind closed doors. They might wanna refer back to Trey “I’m a profound joke and hubris always catches up” Gowdy and the Benghazi hearings to temper their playacted outrage.

Oh, the drama!!

Know this: The Dems are following the rules established by the Republicans in 2015 and this WILL be public eventually and according to those rules.

Know this: It was the juvenile stunt of the “Gang of Dumb” that was against the rules.

Know this: There are a dozen Republicans from three committees behind these closed doors allowed to question the witnesses just like any other. Oh, and all twelve were part of the “storming” even though they could have just walked right in.

Oh, the drama!!

Don’t mind Lindsey “Trump has some serious shit on me” Graham and his toothless resolution to condemn the impeachment inquiry. This again, is just more theater, a chance to get in front of the cameras, say dumb stuff and continue to desperately try and paint a picture that Dems are doing something wrong in the way they are going about this when they are not.

It’s just like in a mob family I guess, the Lieutenants’ll do anything to protect the Don…and their own asses in the process.

Oh, the drama!! (and simple minded smears)

Then there is Stephanie Grisham (the worse Sarah Sanders…I know…WTF!?…Really?!) approving, on Fox News of course, “We do Propaganda, You do blind”, of Donnie Dictator’s referring to those who oppose him as ‘human scum’. Seems to me that makes us the new deplorables, just on the other side right? Now, I knew that whoever replaced Hucksterbee would also be a liar, just like her, I mean you can’t speak to the lies without also lying right? But I didn’t imagine that whoever it would be could be worse. Alas, I was wrong.

I was certainly no fan of the often condescending and dismissive and obviously untruthful Hucksterbee, but there was a certain genuine earnestness in her disingenuousness that I almost miss now, and I knew that she supported her boss but Stephanie? Oh, she is just straight up kool aid crazed zealot, more in the mold of brown shirts Kellyanne and Laura Ingraham than Sarah.

Oh, the grave concern!!

The unabated abuse of power as Donnie continues to use what he feels is his personal law, William “The Low” Barr and the DOJ, to go after his opponents in only the finest of autocratic fashion as the review of the investigation into Trump, Russia and the 2016 campaign is now a criminal investigation with conclusions certainly already drawn. Barr, a devil’s perfect right hand, has even said so himself.

This turning of what is supposed to be an independent DOJ into just another political tool for Trump to exact revenge and bend the law to his will, like any good despot, should scare the hell out of all us. And it’s also another example of the dangers that Trump’s ego poses as he will stop at nothing, stoop to no low too low in order to revision history and the facts surrounding the 2016 election. And his ego doesn’t mind if the revising is bold faced lies…he’s well accustomed to them and they are the only place where he finds comfort, finds legitimacy. In lies. As he himself would say … ‘sad’.

Facebook post 10-21-19:

So I’m wondering just what it is in my history at Facebook, maybe it’s all the items I haven’t bought for the home I don’t own from my apartment recently, that somehow has me in some sort of algorithm where I get notifications from Marketplace for an Old Cast Iron Pipe Stove (that only MAY be functional) and a Leaf Blower?

Now admittedly, the cats would probably love curling up on a rug in front of the pipe stove and the leaf blower could come in handy for dusting (single dude – no dusting DNA) but other than that I think I’m good.

I’m just waiting now for notifications for a lawn mower, a chainsaw, maybe a freezer or possibly even a shed (which I’d probably have to think about – ya know…to make a fort).

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Followup Facebook Post 10-23-19:

A couple of days ago I posted wondering of just what it was in my history at Facebook that might have suggested to their Marketplace to send me notifications on an Old Cast Iron Pipe Stove and a Leaf Blower, especially since I’ve been a non-homeowner-apartment-dweller for the last 5 years and generally, the largest purchases I make are socks, a second container of food from Adams hot bar or maybe the 40lb bucket of kitty litter at Stop N Shop.

So, after noting that I was good on the need for an Old Cast Iron Pipe Stove or a Leaf Blower I jokingly mentioned that I was just waiting now for notifications for a lawn mower, a chainsaw, maybe a freezer or possibly even a shed.

Well, late last night I got my first notification from Marketplace and then this morning my second for an actual chainsaw. As you can imagine I was VERY excited as I have never owned a chainsaw and this is just the time of year to purchase one, especially if Facebook’s Marketplace presents you with such an opportunity. I’ll just have to check with the seller to see if the chainsaw also comes with a scary pig mask and a heavy rubber apron.

Another thing occurred to me though during this, and that was how quickly Albie the Algorithm stalked my post to notify me of chainsaws and I thought, well, why not try my luck and say….?

…so just waiting now for Marketplace notifications for a bag full of an obscene amount of cash in small unmarked bills, a mail order Russian bride who loves Democrats and is black hat crazy skilled with computers, maybe old shoe boxes of baseball cards and original stocks found in grandparent’s attics or, and I’ll repeat this one, possibly even a shed (I just really want to make a fort. Got a shitload of pillows and blankets at the ready)

 

 

(Note: My landlady owns an animal shelter and I have an apartment above the garage of her home which is just up the hill. She herself has quite a few fur and feather here but there can also be a good bit of traffic from the shelter, a sort of half-way house if you will).

They started out as a Fabulous Five, a litter of inseparables that began here at the house along with their very noisy, very scrawny momma-cat, made their way down to the shelter and then, after one had found a home, returned uptop to the sunroom, though a little ring wormy, as a Force of Four, then it was back down to the shelter again, to isolate that ring wormyness, then a sad loss of a little long hair, to a now Thing of Three and then another to a new home and a Tale of Two who made their way back here once again, one more new home and then to just a One of One, White Nose, or as I called him, Wynne. White Nose – “W” N” – Win – Wynne.

It was a name, really, just for me as he wasn’t around long enough for the introduction of it to Celie and her son Matt or to get comfortable with it as we had to say goodbye to him earlier this week. But, and as I’ve mentioned in the past, he needed a name. Everyone needs a name, even if it would have been simpler to just not give him one as having to just say goodbye to “kitten” would have been so much easier.

I also shouldn’t say “we” when it came to the saying goodbye. I wasn’t there for it, I was a coward. Matt was there. He was the “we”. He cried, and he’s been through this kind of thing before. I tried to distance myself remembering my Blink, that damned little dynamo of kitty humor and life, who bounced and bounded everywhere she went, with china shop abandon, and, though she was with me for less than six months, just broke my heart when she left. I mean, really crushed me and I’VE been through this kind of thing before. So when Celie told me Wynne’s time was probably short I opted just for the attention he cried for in the mornings when I would make my way downstairs, his belly now a pufferfish, picking him up to just cradle him and then I would walk away. Did I mention that I was a coward?

In my weak defense though, he wasn’t like Blink. Though he spent some time with me in my place he much preferred to be downstairs, much preferred Celie and Matt and the crazy of the dogs and pups (the youngest of which loved him to a pulp) and the other cats to the confines of my apartment with the old girls. Blink, on the other hand, loved our/my spot and owned this place in her short time. Plus, Wynne liked being able to go outside, no, he LOVED being able to go outside. A spot in the sun, a patch of grass, with a bit of a breeze, a Wynne found wind at the top of this Celie Manor of Fur and Feather on a Hill? That was Wynne’s glory.

Why do I even write of this, of a kitten who wasn’t going to escape a cat disease? One who wasn’t here all that long, barely 6 months and wasn’t mine? Especially after I’ve written a remembrance for all of my fur who were, but who spent way more time? I don’t know. Celie will tell you she’s inured to this kind of thing now, after all her years of running an animal shelter, of being on the recieving end of fur stories that don’t end well, of the wildlife that is dropped at her door because of heartlessness or stupidity or the cruel reality that we humans can pose or with a finality clearly evident or a future that will require constant care. But I know that even though she may claim otherwise she always holds out hope and that is why she does what she does to such great effect and that’s why some of the wanting end up here. She knows that some of them land in the middle and come out the otherside. In that gray area of the maybe not definite. Thus the maybe Wynne.

She’s often told me how Wynne’s litter of kits was special, how she’s never come across one just like it, one so full of personality and kitty wit and she’s got quite a history with such so you take that telling to heart, gospel. If you had walked into the sunroom during the Force of Four’s stay here you would have been overwhelmed with the noisy rush of fur to your feet like a gray wave ready to drown you in cat happy.

And Wynne was always the first one you noticed, the first one you picked out in that original Fabulous Five, the one you picked out in the Force of Four, the one you picked out period with his distinctive, handsome little white nose. He was the one who stood out. And if you didn’t pick him out? He’d let you know it.

I think I write of him, even though his here was for such a short time, because I and Celie and Matt hoped, beyond hope, that maybe he might have been in the middle, and maybe could have come out that otherside.

And maybe I write of him because … oh, well, just because. Because he deserves a few words after having not been given a chance.

Wynne.

Trump says Turkey and Kurds needed to fight ‘like two kids’

So, now it’s a “he allowed” Turkish forces and Kurds to battle instead of he hung the Kurds, who fought with us side by side against ISIS, out to dry by enabling a Turkish offensive (there’s no equal battle here) that has killed at least 500 so far and displaced thousands?

So, this is the new spin, somehow Trump portraying himself as the adult in the room “Like two kids in a lot, you have got to let them fight and then you pull them apart” when in reality it was a selfish fawning child who allowed all of this to happen in the first place? The man-boy who wanted to protect his own interests, his Istanbul properties (any “America first” take should always be interpreted as Trump first) while trading an assist to one of his strong-arm thug buddies and hopefully continue to be looked upon favorably (an easy patsy) by the members of the Despot-Man Freedom Haters Club.

He then takes the new spin for a spin in true conman fashion by propping up his clueless recklessness with now claims that his abandoning an ally was strategically brilliant and then taking it even further, as only he can, in his ludicrously exaggerated way, to say the feckless ceasefire, that Turkey promptly ignored, was a great day for civilization? Now that one’s pretty funny.

“It was unconventional what I did” as Trump further drives his spin around the block, an actual message to any ally that he cannot be trusted to have their back, promises or not, is one here that Trump, instead, tries to turn into an attempt to burnish his image as the maverick, the guy who breaks the mold, who does things “unconventionally”. Yeh, unconventionally screws an ally in what, for Trump, will always be one way relationships, loyalty just a word unless HE demands it.

He also said “Not one drop of American blood” was lost without having to go further for us to know exactly how much he cares for blood he’s caused to drop, as long as it isn’t his red, WHITE and blue prop, to know that he genuinely feels no responsibility for it, instead desperately searching for ways to make this appear “plan” when we all know that isn’t the case. He has no plan, ever, other than self enrichment and aggrandizement.  No, he’s just looking for ways to blame this blood while washing his hands of it as easily as he does a bit of sharpee on his fingers.

How truly skewed and surreal are the times that we live in? This age of the Trump Dumb Down? Trump uses his “fixing” of problems that he has soley caused as moments to claim brilliance and victory and great days for all the world.

No this spin, as Trump’s delusionally calculated spins go, is pretty impressive.

Next up, the continuing efforts to revision fact with falsehood and cast doubt on Russia’s proven influence on 2016 as ego will not abide him something as pesky as truth to allow his election to be viewed as illegitimate. Never fear, William “Low” Barr, personal law and partisan hack, is on the case.

 

https://www.axios.com/mitt-romney-trump-kurds-betrayal-f8b2b829-eefe-47c3-9c0a-1526269579fa.html?fbclid=IwAR3vkMbJHvBtFJOOHajz8roLTXFX_s15oIMeb_A-SuJdznlAFg65zS_aMMo

https://news.yahoo.com/trump-says-turkey-kurds-needed-fight-two-kids-041809988.html?.tsrc=notification-brknews

I like to take a Monday off every now and then always with the notion of “man, I’d like one work day to just sleep in”. A day to take, if afforded amid the scrape, is one you should take if you can, if for nothing more than just a reset. Well, so much for that notion apparently, as I was awake at 7. Damn internal clocks. I blame you, work. Bastard. But, now that I’m awake, a couple of notes. I know. Again with this guy with the notes.

– After a quick run to the convenience store this morning for a cream cheesed bagel I have now heard Toto’s “Africa” for the 5th time since Friday. Serengeti? Really? In that convenience store and while scanning through stations in my travels with BB this past weekend. That shouldn’t happen to anyone. I won’t even say it’s not fair. It’s just unkind. And I like Toto. Screw you Universe. That’s a demerit earned.

– Watched my first football of the season last night, my high school games not included. Watched my first Pro Football I should say then, my Steelers (a well needed victory) and I watched in silence. I volumed down the annoyance and just watched. Football fans? Give it a try.

– Celie excitedly texted me earlier. Sweets, the pretty little fox (no, not a 70’s reference feather in a flamboyant fedora long fur coat kind of thing) who was brought to Celie, motherless, some time ago along with her fox pal Toons and who has been missing from her daily morning play with the puppies, Georgia and Lewie, for over a week now while Celie and I imagined the worst, is back. She’s back! Damn, that feels good to know. Ok, I’ll grant ya that one Universe. Demerit bought back.

– Came up with the answer, over the weekend, cheap beer in tow, to the maybe question of why I don’t go out or care to do so.

– Now to take that Monday off.

 

Another Friday night in the books (week 6) and another trip upwards NY Albany again for some more High School Football. This week BB (my little Scion XB for your reminder) and I returned to Shenendehowa. It was a big night for “Shen” as they guaranteed themselves a spot in the playoffs with a monster 3rd quarter as CBA kept shooting themselves in whatever feet and limbs they had left, while Shen did what they did in front of their always huge legion of fans ringing the field and crowding the stands. Huger still for Homecoming and Senior’s Night. This community truly revels in team and these Friday’s…an embraceful, vocal force. Even I get the feel and I’m pretty far removed from it. Not just the not being from here or the driving 2 hours north after leaving work early but for what I don’t recall of my High School days and Mahopac Football (probably because I had no interest). No, this is destination stuff for everyone in Clifton Park on home games and they were well rewarded in this one. Cheers to the seniors.

 

I was “Redcap” tonight (actually a gold Pirates hat…I know…whodathunk?), the guy who becomes the center of attention a few times during the game while he holds the action up for the live broadcast pausing refs and teams while feeling the impatient, maybe even angry stares of the crowd on the back of his neck. Mom always knew I’d be the guy that would make people wait. I also was reminded that Greg, the boss and director, would try and grab a quick shot of me doing whatever it was I was doing on the sidelines for this broadcast’s night, usually carrying a parabolic mic, but not moreso than anyone else I thought. Figured it was no different than the sports broadcasts you watch where they take time to recognize the crew, a camera shot of the camera shots kind of thing, the sideliners too, but I didn’t really realize until a few weeks ago that the truck calling for a shot of “Frankenberry” was a thing (apologies to northern NY for the intrusion of my ugly mug). Joe in the truck even lamented that he tried to catch a picture of me with his cell on the monitors but just missed. Shit just makes me laugh and smile. Said “Hi” to you last night Ma by the way…with a small knowing wave.

On my and BB’s way south out of town at the end, at the McDonald’s at exit 8 on 87, I was greeted with a “Hey, how are you … what are we having tonight?” from the assistant manager who has taken my end home order three times in six weeks now. Poor guy apparently doesn’t get Fridays off. Another laugh. Another smile. Here’s to making the world small.

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For the last week or so Celie (my landlady) has taken up a project here at this Celie Manor of Fur and Feather on a Hill. She’s constant projects. Constant projects on an old house. But, unlike those you may know who have “projects”, jobs that often get started but are never finished, Celie finishes hers (even as I type I hear the sounds of power tools and buffers of another rising from below). The latest? The front porch and then also the mud room. The ripping up of the mud room to be exact, and an eventual new floor. Other than the kitchen downstairs the mud room is heart #2 of this spot. It is the first place you enter after the parking of your car and then heading through the garage and past the garage cats, Dutch and Lumpy, Curly, Ghost and the Black and White gang. It’s the room at the bottom of my apartment steps and it is a place of dogs (occasional cats). Ok, not a place “OF dogs” but a place “WITH” dogs I should say. It is warm and barky (hello Pea) and welcoming (as long as you’re a familiar), especially if the light is off when you come in but the kitchen light, just beyond this room’s half door, is on, filled with its humaness. It is the quintisential “mud room”, piled shit, shoes on the floor, cat beds on top of and dog beds inside of open cages, too many jackets on hooks and even too many hats if need be, it’s just a bit more furry, and with a heartbeat. Did I say warm?

This mud room is also home to the washer and dryer. When I first moved in here, just a few months shy of two years now, I was a bit reticent to use them. Thought I might be overstepping. I was just the new guy upstairs. Who was I to assume that I could use the house’s laudromat? But after the first time, and folding a few things of Celie’s and her son Matt’s sitting in the dryer while I washed, I seemed to be given a thumbs up to clean undies (I’m all set for paramedics cutting them off Ma) with my one usual hamper a week.

The mud room project, though, has left the washer/dryer out of commission.

Celie: We may have to do our laundry at the shelter this weekend. I think the washer and dryer in the back, behind the kennels, are hooked up.

Me: Gotcha.

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I knocked on the back door of the shelter. I waited. Cats approached. “who the hell is this guy?” said those who at least gave me a sniff but at length. Then there was the other Bruce.

There is a Bruce at the house. The Alpha Cat. The coolest of dudes who puts the fear of swipe and scratch with a deep throated “meooooowllllll” in the heart of the dogs, Polly on occasion but moreso Pea to the point where he cries and growly bounces or circles, afraid to pass, but also a Bruce who can’t wait for a pick up and a shoulder.

Then there is the other Bruce. At the shelter. Alpha Cat the same, but he of the long nose and easier countinence. We hung out for a pet after another knock.

“Hi, I’m the guy that lives up the hill…at the house…of your boss…of Celie?”

Silence and a stare.

I have that effect. Probably one explanation of my singleness.

“I’m just gonna come in and do some laundry” followed by a long winded fading off explanation as to why.

More stare.

“I’m Steve”

In my sweats, ratty t-shirt and beat up sneaks I guess I looked a bit sketchy. I wouldn’t wanna let me in either.

Kayleigh did eventually let me in, though I don’t think she was happy about it. Understood.

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I know a lot of this is covered ground, especially in my recent posts, apologies for the re-hash, but I just like the talking about it, about the wonder of me somehow landing in this perfect of spots. Talk about my luck, something I don’t often find myself doing, and a found friend in Celie. Though I barely make enough for a 55 year old guy with a 55 year old guy’s debt and bills to get by, thus the reason for these Friday night treks to the northern NY hinterland for a dollar or two, I have the comfort of a really good spot to come home to. The happy madness downstairs and my girls upstairs, Little (forever little) Bella, Mimi The Quirky and Cricket The Blind. My carott. AND I get to venture through the kennels and cat rooms and back spots of hopefuls at an animal shelter, this place here at HVARS and maybe, though they don’t know it, give them them a bit of hope if anyone pays attention. Some pictures here as a reward for bearing with me.

 

So pay attention ya baaassstaaadds and baaassstettes! How could you not if you’ve read this far? If you’ve been considering adding to the family, well, you need go no further. HVARS. Just take a look at these faces for pet’s sake.

Cheers all,

 

 

(Linked in a Robert Reich Facebook post – a column from the USA Today)

Record debt and inequality gap? It’s almost like 40 years of Republican tax cuts failed.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2019/10/03/republican-tax-cuts-fail-record-debt-and-inequality-gap-column/3833546002/?fbclid=IwAR0NoeloRZ6OJCFbvQrRRnuIsAP37GgRFbvkb1AvHY0Q29I0UYGCqxevgPE

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And a shout to the majority of Americans who have never benefited from the trickle and to the minority who still vote for those who claim it will somehow still, while they laugh at you behind your back, or in some cases, right in front of your face. They call it TRICKLE DOWN for fuck’s sake! They’re telling you straight up that it’s the scraps, the leavings, the crumbs of what is left from their really lavish tax-cut meal (then they’ll try and steal your Medicaid & Medicare to help pay for dinner). Just the fact that they’ve been able to foist this dismissive, arrogant, condescending premise on us and pass it off as a genuine economic platform for all these years while the gap widens, and not in our favor, should tell you all you need to know about how much they care for you and also about how truly blind and gullible you really are. #tricklethis

It’s just another of the many varieties of “tonic” available to us in the snake oil aisle that too many willingly purchase believing labels like “Projection Potion”: will allow you to believe that it is others that are guilty of the accusations, not the accuser who is actually guilty of them in spades.

Or “Conspiracy Colonic”: a deep cleansing of rational thought that makes room for belief in debunked and ludicrous, sometimes just plain invented, ego protecting conspiracy theories.

There’s the “Fascism Cordial”: allows you to relax, almost a bit drunkenly, while obvious fascist overtures take place in plain sight.

Then it’s the “Backroom Bracer”: wakes you up from the Fascism Cordial but only after the backroom deals that were being made in your stupor are done so, when you wake, things are what they are and you’re none the wiser as to how they came to be.

A very popular choice these days is “Emoluments Extract”: take in a gaudy gold plated cup of tea and suddenly find no issue with a President profiting from the office, you may even find yourself assisting this profit and feeling quite trendy.

And of course there is the biggest seller in the Snake Oil aisle, the gold standard of all the panacea’s available to you from the Orange Chemist, “Elixir of Lie”: allows you to absorb the myriad lies bombarding you on a daily basis without necessarily feeling the toxic effect they have on you and Democracy. Truly the only “must have” in the aisle.

Happy shopping.