The Trumpian Nation’s Un-American Flag

 

Ever since the Coronavirus Pandemic began sickening America’s workforce and economy, the politically, excessively ambitious Dow Jones Donny has been worried sick (only regarding the latter). Hell, if he could have his druthers, he’d thoughtlessly order everyone back to work… even though that would absolutely fan the flames of said Pandemic.

To flesh that out, the fake prez would needlessly sicken multiple millions of workers / cause many of them to drop dead.

Donny’s rightwing extremist, propaganda ministers fully concur. They’ve been DEAD WRONG to ceaselessly seethe and screech about how the economy’s health is far more important than the well-being of human beings.

While I do wish it were otherwise, I suppose it’s high time that America’s flag be befitting of Trumpian Times. That means it’s high time to commission a seamstress (a latter-day Betsy Ross)… to sew up / hem in America. Here’s the pattern she’ll need…

 

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NOTE TO READERS: Since this blog’s above image is highly experimental, how it’ll actually appear, offsite, could be problematic… the green and red text will likely appear black. It might not even appear rectangular, either. Anyway…

If you’d like to view it as I had intended it to appear, visit my site’s homepage.

 

 

My parting message to you… stay well! If you are ailing, you have my hopes and prayers for a full, speedy recovery. Wherever, whenever we discover a leadership vacuum, it’ll be incumbent on us to do everything we can to save our lives. Please stay safe by continuing to heed the following common sense, disease fighting advice…

[1] Practice good hygiene (scrub hands often at least 20 seconds), [2] Cover coughs and sneezes, [3] Avoid touching eyes, nose and mouth, [4] Social distancing (remain 2 meters / 6 feet apart [5] avoid large crowds or (ideally) just stay at home and [6] if ill, self quarantine.

 

 

 

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And we sigh a collective sigh of relief…

 

By now, most of us have heard the good news…

As of my blog posting time, Donald J. Trump is now accepting the scientific fact that it would’ve been premature and reckless for him to declare victory over Coronavirus while the pandemic still rages on and on and on…

I would’ve loved to have been a fly on the Oval Office wall… just so I could’ve been eyewitness to whatever exorcism it had taken to [1] free Donny of his anti-science demons, [2] resurrect what little sanity and humanity he might still possess and [3] sweet-talk him into nixing his ill-conceived, harebrained, political and greed driven scheme to cram-pack America’s church pews by Easter Sunday (April 12th).

We should award the Public Safety Officer Medal of Valor to the unsung hero(s)… correction… the savior(s) who miraculously prevented Trump from causing a massive spike in the number of Coronavirus infections and deaths.

I would’ve blogged on this topic earlier, today, but, due to the fake prez’s capricious nature, I had to first make damned sure he really meant it when he announced the extensions of social distancing protocols to April 30th.

Of course… who the hell knows what Trumpian mood swings tomorrow will bring?

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 Dozen Daffodils

One of the scarier aspects of this damned pandemic has been the ease with which Coronavirus can exact its emotional toll… that is… if we allow it.

Albeit not as often as would be optimal, I have managed to battle that damned bug’s relentless attempts to drag me down. So far, I credit my minor victories to my still being deeply rooted to my boyhood home. This doth afford me a profusion of fond memories to draw upon… in particular… of how, throughout my (now dearly departed) folk’s 40 year marriage, they had teamed up to beautify their property (and the neighborhood, too), courtesy of their gardening projects.

By the by, their springtime perennials continue to be the very first to bloom in the immediate vicinity. And I do look forward to / count on the arrival of each vernal equinox to remind me of how much of themselves my folks did leave behind.

A moment ago, I stepped outside to discover how one dozen daffodils, awoken by Ma Nature’s alarm clock… i.e., her overnight thunderstorm… are now swaying, in full bloom, in the temperate, gentle breeze.

Ever since then, my parents’ handiwork has been reasserting their lingering presence… almost rendering it palpable.

After nearly three long weeks of social distancing… I no longer feel as isolated.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Fortune Cookie Blog (Leadership Vacuum)

 

A leadership vacuum sucks. Upon our discovering such a problem,
it becomes incumbent on the masses to [1] “rev up” the ballot box,
and [2] fill the void with the best candidate(s) to suck up the mess!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Magical Thinking’s Trick

Back in the early 1980’s, when humanity first added two, 3-letter acronyms to our lexicons, namely HIV and AIDS, the (then) fake prez, one Ronald Reagan, was the man-child, who hadn’t wanted a highly communicable disease to go down on his watch. So, how did his (spin) doctors play down a highly communicable, deadly pathogen?

Short Answer: Magical Thinking.

“In psychiatry, magical thinking is a disorder of thought content; here it denotes the false belief that one’s thoughts, actions, or words will cause or prevent a specific consequence in some way that defies commonly understood laws of causality.” (Source Wikipedia / Read More Here)

Somewhat Longer Answer: Reaganites had opted to brand AIDS, (exclusively) a gay man’s disease. Granted… they did trot out a bit of Parenthetical Fast Talking to hint at how HIV could also infect patients receiving tainted blood transfusions… BUT their paste on a smiley face, overall, misleading message was…

If you’re not a bed-hopping gay male and/or in need of donated blood / blood products, you are good-to-go? That it’s, somehow, A-OK for otherwise healthy heteros to bare back it while flinging themselves limp?

If those magical thinkers had possessed any healthy skepticism, at all, they had certainly checked it at the Oval Office door. Most assuredly, I was not buying into any of their White House whitewash. Within a nanosecond of ear-witnessing that Republican spewed claptrap, I asked myself…

• Would not bisexual males also make AIDS a female problem… everybody’s problem?

Truth told, on Reagan’s watch, people needlessly got sick and (until recently), the doctor uttered sentence “You’ve got AIDS” had been a death sentence. Had the general public been told the sobering truth… right from the get-go… namely… that only monogamous couples don’t need to routinely “rubber up”… people would’ve begun playing it safer far earlier. That bygone era’s fake prez had squandered a golden opportunity to prevent all too real human suffering and death. And, ironically, in the process, he had actually caused a highly communicable disease to go down on his watch!

What Reagan did prove to me is that even an ignoramus can teach us these valuable lessons…

• Any self-serving, magical thinking president, who winds up “singing” unhealthy “lullabies” to the general public, does an inexcusable disservice to humankind.

• Any leader with his head up his ass has an obstructed view of reality and, as such, is virtually never a trusted, credible source… especially when it comes down to life or death matters.

• The same assessment applies to magical thinker Donald J. Trump and his monumentally ass-backward mismanagement of the Coronavirus Pandemic.

 

To all who’ve stopped by on this day, I wish you well! To all who are ailing, my hopes and prayers for a full, speedy recovery. Wherever, whenever we discover a leadership void, it will be incumbent upon us to do everything we can to save our lives. Please stay safe by continuing to heed the following common sense, disease fighting advice…

[1] Practice good hygiene (scrub hands often at least 20 seconds), [2] Cover coughs and sneezes, [3] Avoid touching eyes, nose and mouth, [4] Social distancing (remain 2 meters / 6 feet apart [5] avoid large crowds or (ideally) just stay at home and [6] if ill, self quarantine.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Music For Every Mood?

 

If we look long enough, we can find music to match just about every mood imaginable. In this post, the mood swings affect three versions of the same song… namely… the Kurt Cobain / Krist Novoselic / Dave Grohl composition Smells Like Teen Spirit. Which of them (or combination of them) will match your own mood of the moment? That’s for you to decide…

Tori Amos:

Amos / Nirvana Mash-Up:

Nirvana:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Need to Nod Off Fast? “Pop” This Poetic Sleeping Pill!

 

Song writers mind meld with either sobriety or insanity,
Bass / Treble notes dot their clefs; well-known to humanity,
Lyrics span the vast spectrum; from pap to profanity,
Multiple genres can range; from bucolic to urbanity,
This “well duh” moment in verse; rooted deep in inanity!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Warm regards…

 

The only warm regards befitting any lowlife, who would propose
sacrificing humanity, simply to fatten up stock market portfolios:
May you burn up in the Hell, of your own making, HERE on Earth
and face down Satan’s blazing inferno, once you do dwell in Hell!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I’ll Bet We All Can Outdo This Tune’s Dude!

 

While the Coronavirus Pandemic’s highly recommended, social isolation protocols (to say the least) have been trying and tiring, we must never take our eyes off the Grand Prize. After all, our being temporarily bored to death is an equitable trade off… i.e., seeing how the alternative could be inclusive of death, itself.

Every moment we spend in seclusion helps slow the spread of contagion and WILL buy precious time for the medical community to diagnose / treat / cure the ever-increasing backlog of patients and, ultimately, facilitate the healthcare professionals’ selfless, heroic efforts to contain / conquer this potentially genocidal pathogen.

Key to a happy outcome for humanity, is our helping ourselves to some pleasurable diversions. When left to my own devices, that involves two keyboards (computer and piano), hanging out at WordPress and tracking thru my CD, LP, VHS and DVD libraries. And should I ever tire of such star quality (actors and musicians), there’s literal stargazing, too (both naked-eye and telescopic). When left to your own devices, I’m confident you can easily outdo my own boredom fighting MO.

Now, speaking of musicians… this would be a great time to return to this post’s headline, thusly…

 

That dude would be the very character, which the Statler Brothers’ crackerjack composer, Lew DeWitt, portrays within the track Flowers On The Wall. As he presents his musical vignette, he sums up, succinctly, what has got to be one of the worst cases of cabin fever on record.

To quote Wikipedia’s storyline synopsis:

“The singer assures a concerned neighbor that, even though he rarely, if ever, leaves his home, he leads a full life: counting flowers on the wallpaper, playing solitaire with a deck of 51 cards all night and well into the morning, smoking, watching Captain Kangaroo and pretending to go out.” (read more here).

BTW, smoking would be ill-advised. Not really preaching… just saying…

As for anyone who now may be asking, “Who the hell is Captain Kangaroo?”

Well, to the very first generation of TV tykes (inclusive of yours truly) our idolized Captain (a.k.a. Bob Keeshan) was a kiddie show pioneer (akin to Mr. Fred Rogers). The clip below… as well as this Wiki Link… will help fill in a few more details.

If you still find yourself ISO a great diversion, why not follow up this blog’s vids with additional YouTube content. That platform’s library is as limitless as the ever-expanding multiverse above.

 

To all who’ve stopped by on this day, I wish you well! To all who are ailing, my hopes and prayers for a full, speedy recovery. Please stay safe by continuing to heed the following common sense, disease fighting advice…

[1] Practice good hygiene (scrub hands often at least 20 seconds), [2] Cover coughs and sneezes, [3] Avoid touching eyes, nose and mouth, [4] Social distancing (remain 2 meters / 6 feet apart [5] avoid large crowds or (ideally) just stay at home and [6] if ill, self quarantine.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Week #16 Meets Week #81 (Sunday Song Series)

Way back @Week #16, our ongoing journey into the world of Sunday titled songs (travel date: 12-31-2018) we found ourselves exploring Velvet Underground’s Sunday Morning… a track bookended by a glockenspiel intro / outro.

VU’s likely influence upon the Nineties alternative – emo – pop – punk – indie band Jimmy Eat World, resulted in the latter group’s composition A Sunday, which appeared on their 1999 album Clarity AND, which also just happens to be our Week #81 Sunday Song.

Thanks and Kudos to YouTuber Stephen Carpineta for supplying the mood enhancing visuals… perfect imagery for imperfect times. A walk on the wild side… i.e., our meandering through the underpopulated wilderness… doth neatly conform with our society’s newfound, hopefully temporary, socially distancing lifestyle.

Thanks for stopping by on this day. STAY safe, STAY at home, STAY healthy and meet me back here for our next Sunday Song… seven days from now…