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The Cheaper the Crook, the Gaudier the Patter Week 29

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“It’s better to ask for the earth than to take it.”

ITEM:

ITEM: I had forgotten, until the Wee Bairn showed up, how great libraries are, especially the well-funded ones in my part of the world.   Books, CDs, DVDs, an opportunity to learn, a safe place to hang out for a few hours and charge your phone if you’ve got nowhere else to stay.  A couple of hours of fun for a Wee Bairn.  Communities need good libraries.

Of course, there’s always some asshole who wants to blow up a common good to save himself $1.50 in taxes a week and make googly-eyes at a sociopath who makes $250 Million a day.

ITEM:  Co-workers donating vacation time to expectant mothers and CEO “gifts” car to employee who walked all night to get to job.  Feel-good stories!  No, not at all an indictment of our collective neglect of social support and infrastructure, while wages stagnate, taxes get cut, and the pocket book of the C-suite bulges!

ITEM: Sarah Huckabee Sanders, like her father, is a bezoar in the good functioning of democracy.

ITEM: I’m ready to do my bit:

Let’s back up here briefly and establish something important, though: No one, and I mean no one, is saying that straight guys, white or otherwise, shouldn’t have a place in comedy anymore. Only that — like the brilliant Mulaney, who has described himself on many occasions as the whitest man alive — in the future, they’ll have to take more risks and work harder to earn a spot that might’ve been more easily obtainable 20 or 30 years ago, when the sight of a woman or a person of color onstage was more of an anomaly. They’ll also have to listen, or at least pretend to listen, when somebody calls them out on their subject matter, their joke writing, or their political opinions. They’ll have to refrain from trying to short circuit debate by claiming that the other person is too sensitive or “can’t take a joke” or is somehow endangering their free speech. And they’ll have to make peace with the fact that, if they’re able to claim a spot of prime cultural real estate, they’ll be expected to constantly defend it as they age, by becoming better at the art and craft than anyone who dares to accuse them of sucking up cultural oxygen that should be nourishing them instead.

ITEM: When all candidates are clients, how does the algorithm choose the winner? 

Facebook took the methods it learned from the Trump campaign to further refine a marketing model called “Test, Learn, Adapt” (TLA), which it currently uses to assess its own advertising. These internal documents are a candid recognition by Facebook of the GOP candidate’s advertising success and reveal the degree to which the company views Trump not just as a potential regulator or a source of misinformation, but also, above all, a valued customer.

Also, the Zuck is totally running and his Facebook is going to tell us whatever we want to read to make it so.

ITEM: Prime Day has come and gone.  Another chance for Bezos to hoover up $$$ and crush his warehouse employees under the strain of unreasonable deadlines, and of course I’ve played my part like stooge. Picked up Hitchcock’s Shadow of a Doubt, with Joseph Cotton, A collection of all five Star Trek TOS movies on BluRay, and Remo Williams on DVD.

Found a pretty good copy of the Blade Runner Blu Ray 5 disc set with all cuts of the film, from Working to the Final, from a guy on eBay.  Case broken, but otherwise fine.

This is me personally trying to keep physical media alive and well, so I can watch the films I like when I want to, not when Netflix decides I want to.  Why go back to the 70s?

ITEM: I’ve upgraded my DSLR three times in the last 15 years, each time expanding on speed and functionality… and price.  I know have a D750 with several FX lenses of good quality.  Finally, the Bairn is in focus, but I have not improved my photography.  I took a class in Lightroom this weekend with the hope that I’d be able to enhance their quality.  I left with enough knowledge to understand that It’s a poor artist who blames his tools and I should probably stick with what I’m best with: my Instax and cellphone.

The Cheaper the Crook, the Gaudier the Patter Week 28

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What’s up, bootlickers? 

I’ve been sleepwalking, cotton wool wrapped around my head. I find it unfathomable that anyone could ignore or even approve of the “work” that 45 and his stooges have been inflicting upon the world, but they’re out there, assuming the best with a smile on their face and a XXXL “Choose Happiness” tshirt on their chests, or gleefully cheering for the detention of 2 year olds. Still, a read through my (admittedly small) list of acquaintances, family, and friends on Facebook and other social media show that I’m not alone, although most manage to continue with their lives, work, and hobbies without wallowing in existential dread. I guess it’s time to pick up my dusty ukulele (not a euphemism) again.

45 is a sideshow barker and we’re marks, staring stupefied at the stage, in glee or utter terror, while yokel grifters, who’d sell their mothers for a seat with titans of industry, rummage through our pocketbooks.  McConnell stole a Democratic Supreme Court justice; Kennedy’s retirement puts another rubber stamp in a seat for a conservative, anti-human agenda, that lines the pockets of the wealthy and, to keep them voting against their interests, gives frothing whites the axe they desperately want to butcher the social safety net and hard won freedoms.

Still,  although I loath it, I can understand this fear and hate from people that look like me.  I know why they hate change and growth.  What I can’t understand is the vitriol coming from people slightly to the left of center.  Hippie punching, the kids say.  “Elections Have Consequences,” is quite a statement from people who don’t vote in midterms and never seem as interested in state or local politics as they are in the presidential horse race. Who can’t see that voter suppression and gerrymandering have silenced voices.  Who wag their fingers and shame third party voters, but court those who voted for a so-called “man” who openly mocked the vulnerable, who called for violence at rallies, who has assaulted women… People who think America was great when minorities and women “knew their place.”

Democrats, who can’t get behind the DSA candidates who actually won their primary.  Septuagenarians who don’t know or don’t care that people are terrified that they have to work harder for less, year after year, and that this didn’t improve one percentage point during a Democratic presidency or congress.  Democrats who have been powerless to stop the dismantling of union protections, scoffed at a rise wages for all, proportionate to those gains made by the ruling class, dismissed medicare-for-all as pie in the sky dreaming while voting for $100 billion additional military spending.

Or, insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result. 

ITEM: Steny Hoyer, from my fair state, admits on tape that he doesn’t believe in free elections.

ITEM: This administration is full of monsters who despise children

American officials sought to water down the resolution by removing language that called on governments to “protect, promote and support breast-feeding” and another passage that called on policymakers to restrict the promotion of food products that many experts say can have deleterious effects on young children.

ITEM: Nope, we’re all monsters

ITEM: Amazon is likely to come to Montgomery County, and have us pay for the privilege.  They want a piece of all government procurement and this is as good a place as any to staff up.  A normal, functioning government would not let one company own one of the largest non-military sectors of that nation’s federal infrastructure.

ITEM: All is not doom and gloom: I had forgotten how much I loved to read.  Since I don’t drink, a good book really can slow things down in the ol’ brain pan.  And there are these places called libraries where you can check books out for free?  I can’t wait for some techbro to try and disrupt the library model.  Until then, I’ve been checking out Miss Marples as fast as I can read them. And I really enjoy the Vera and Shetland books by Ann Cleves (which is her real name) although our local doesn’t have a great selection of those in print; I can check them out on Overdrive.

ITEM: I write about lines and presence.

ITEM: Donald Sutherland is best as the beatnik tank commander in the Kelly’s Heroes, which I love.

ITEM: Great American Action Movie, or Greatest American Action Movie?

Edited 16JUL2018  12:38pm EDT

Present, In Line, Continued

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[Read the first part Present, In Line]

Patiently, the wee Bairn and I stood with the other families waiting to make our own pinewood windmill for Mother’s Day.  I held her little hand and we talked: what  would do when we got to the front of the line; what plants and flowers should we look for; should I get a new Weber gas grill.1  Even so young, it is one of the great pleasures of Fatherhood for me to watch the Bairn observe the world, people, and parents, create unique thoughts and ideas and state them.  Our conversations make me smile and laugh and appreciate this tiny person next to me. 

We’re not alone, obviously, so I’m on edge because, while the line is moving, and quickly, it’s chaotic and loud and there’s only one person holding back the tide of eager and aggressive parents and she’s either gonna get knocked over or run out of supplies before we get into the classroom.  We should go elsewhere, I think, to Michael’s to get our own project, or pillage my home scrap pile.

We don’t.  We stay.  The Bairn likes people.  A peek at my phone and I know that we had only been there a few minutes since we started at the back and the line  halved.  So what if they run out?  I was enjoying my time with my daughter.

When we stepped in line, I saw that many kids had their own tiny Home Depot smocks on.  When I registered the Wee Bairn (which I gather that no one else had done) the confirmation suggested she’d get one for attending.  I asked the woman two places in front of me (because the guy just in front of us had shut off the world for his phone; more later) if A) we were in the correct line for the project, and B) if kids got the smock at the front.  She looked at me, zero expression, said ‘Yes’ and then pulled out her iPhone.  Conversation done.

The other families were the usual mix I’ve come to really appreciate in our East Coast Elite Bubble.  Watching them was a little like my own version of Hitchcock’s Rear Window.

At the very back of the line was a Dad and son, white, dressed like they had just come from the back nine.  He was loud (so loud), shouting, to no one in particular, about how long the line was and wondering why nobody was paying attention.  Anytime a gap grew in the line, he’d point it out.  “HEADS UP!”  No one listened.  “WHY IS NO ONE LISTENING!”  Obvious to everyone else: he held no authority.  His paycheck, dick, and skin-tone didn’t rate in that line.  People were paying attention to their own kids.  Trying to tune him out, like me.  Eventually he announced his attention to pick up some wood from the cutoff pile and build their own project.

Disappointing his kid to own the libs, as they say on the Twitter machine.

There were many mothers in line, with friends and all of their children.  When loser to the front, Dad and their older kids joined, swelling the line.2    The parents asked questions in Spanish; the kids answered in English.  I wondered if they were the wives of construction workers and home builders, minding the kids while their husbands shopped for tools and supplies and checked out at the contractor line.  Their kids were quiet and exceptionally polite.  I’m not a big family guy, but I wish the Bairn lived closer to her cousins.

Everyone checks their phones.3, trying to tune out the noise of the store, the line, the creeping doubt about whether it was even worth it.  Their children. 

The father directly in front of us was scratching around gems in a Bejewelled-clone on his phone and holding for too long any place he could comfortably rest his ass, even as the line moved forward without him (HEADS UP THE LINE IS MOVING!, shouted the guy at the back before he split in huff).  The kid spun in place, silently, in tight circles, while Dad zoned out.

Kid weaved between shopper’s legs.  Shoppers with lengths of carpet, tiles, handsaws.

He tripped over a woman’s feet. 

He knocked over 10′ lengths of wood trim. 

Dad: nothing.

Only when the kid started pounding on the metal door to the classroom did Dad look up.  A Mom shouting “Who’s son is this?”  He grabbed the kid by the arm, pulled him to his side, and went back to his game

All of this happened within less than 5 minutes.  No time at all.  And meanwhile, my kid, my Bairn, stood next to me with her hand in mine, also watching the people, asking about and waving to other kids, talking about what we were going to build and what we were going to do after.

If I had spoke to that father, if he had asked (it’s not my place to put pressure on another Dad; as I don’t believe any woman has the right to question how my wife mothers) and only if he had asked, I would let him know how much improved my life has been from just talking with my wee bairn, spending some time in my day to see the world from three feet small.

There are times when she lays out flat on the floor of the Giant Supermarket.  When I’d like to pick her up, put her in the car, take her home, and lock her in her room until dinner time.  But they are nothing compared to the sheer joy of watching her be excited by nearly everything that’s happening around her.  The Bairn was excited, frantically so, to go with her dad to the Home Depot on a beautiful Saturday morning and make a present for her mama (which, incidentally, she kept for her self, so it was a good thing that Dad had many backups).  And I was excited to hear the hilariously bananas ideas that come out of her little mouth.

We built the little windmill planter.  No paint, but all of the stickers.  I did most of the building; she held the hammer, too, while I tapped nails into place.  The Bairn got a smock and a pin to take home.  We planted some beans in the small planter cup and watered them.  They sprouted, but didn’t make it to July.

***

A new mother mentioned, on line, how grateful she was when her husband came home from work with an iced coffee and took their child off of her hands for a few minutes.  I wondered if the bar for successful fatherhood was really that low; that doing the bare minimum is worthy of ebullient public praise?

I guess the answer, at least sometimes, is yes.

Men can do better.

  1. The answer was ‘Yes,’ so I did and SWMNBB was very, very excited that grilling would no longer include time to get the damned charcoal lit. ↩
  2. The cranky, privileged version of me can get burned up at this sort of thing.  But, really, would it be better to have all 10 family members in line at the same time?  No. ↩
  3. I’m not immune from this disorder and even with 1001 really good and observant questions coming @ me from the Bairn, I slip. ↩

Cheaper the Crook, Gaudier the Patter Week 18

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It’s becoming difficult to follow the news and continue to suppress my lifelong desire to pack my tiny family into the CRV and hightail it to our private compound in a location I will not share on a public forum.

ITEM: Maybe we’re all burned out, but I haven’t seen much on this. Over the weekend, two stories were published that suggested Trump admin staff had hired an Israeli spy firm to do oppo research on the Obama staff who worked on the Iran nuclear deal, with the goal of derailing the agreement. In the Guardian and some additional confirmation in the New Yorker.

Two twitter threads from one of the targets provides some context.

ITEM: I watch Westworld, but I’m surely not a fan. The cast is excellent and would love to see any of them in another role (If Anthony Hopkins and Brian Cox are interchangeable septuagenarian British actors, I’d rather see Cox in the part) I feel like I’ve seen this all before, like we’re all stuck in someone’s narrative loop and this is the latest iteration of the LOST storyline: story unstuck in time; shadowy corporation being shady; who’s more truly “alive” and “free;” who or what is running the world; is it freedom to every scenario ends in your destruction?

Sunday night show pulled the old switcheroo, introducing Park 6, Raj World (my name) and a new character who is chased into Westworld by a Bengal tiger. Will we see her again? Who knows. I’m not sure I care.

I’m not sure if Delos is harvesting DNA as part of a titanic Big Data project to optimize razor sales or they’re creating clones of business leaders as part of a global hostile takeover. Will Thandie Newton’s character give birth to a hybrid? All of this has happened before. All of this will happen again.

ITEM: Or, turn off the infernal beast.

I don’t know if Bezos knows this, but before he ruins the quality of life in DC Metro Area he may want to read up on these things we have here called libraries. I had forgotten about them until the wee Bairn decided she was interested in learning about words and pictures.

In addition to books, the Montgomery County Library system holds a good collection films, TV shows, and audio recordings. I’ve caught up on my Agatha Christie habit and have taken to Ann Cleve’s Shetland books, a series about a Detective Inspector Jimmy Perez in one of the northern most points in Great Britain. He doesn’t drink to excess, but he sure is miserable and his life filled with misery. The stories are good, not great (Cleve’s also wrote the Vera Stanhope books; both series have made good TV). When I’m done with those, there’s a 1000 more to choose from, even if 99% of the mystery books on their shelves include a cat protagonist. I can always re-read Raymond Chandler or Graham Greene.

And unlike Amazon Prime and Netflix, the cost is baked into your tax bill, like all those other things that make your day a little bit better, like parks and trash collection and schools that actually educate. True, you may need to have some patience, but, since neither of us are very good at it, I think that’s a good thing for me and the Bairn to practice.

ITEM: Speaking of, I bought myself a D750 to take better pictures; specifically, pictures of the Bairn smiling and in focus. Could have saved a packet if I had followed this guidance.

ITEM: WTF is wrong with us men?

ITEM: These kids seem like giant assholes. They learned from the best.

ITEM: Or why I don’t write & publish here more often

ITEM: “The poorest way to face life is to face it with a sneer. There are many men who feel a kind of twister pride in cynicism; there are many who confine themselves to criticism of the way others do what they themselves dare not even attempt.”