SOMETHING?

Ray Bradbury once said, "If you can write one short story a week—it doesn’t matter what the quality is to start, but at least you’re practicing, and at the end of the year you have 52 short stories, and I defy you to write 52 bad ones. Can’t be done. At the end of 30 weeks or 40 weeks or at the end of the year, all of a sudden a story will come that’s just wonderful." (Or more succinctly, "If you want to be a writer, write a new short story every week. No one can write 52 bad short stories.")

I believe that. 

So it logically follows that tRump eventually will do something good for we the people. Whether deliberate or by accident, I am sure it can be argued he may even have done something good along the way.

I noticed, however, virtually no one is praising tRump for any good he has done. Instead, he and his supporters attack Obama, Hillary, Biden, and anyone who dares criticize him no matter how deserved it may be. He lashes out, name calls, insults, lies, denies etc. Since there is NOTHING he can say or do that would dissuade his Dunning-Kruger infected followers, it's up to those with open minds to speak their minds and point out his culpability and immorality, another useless exercise because to many there is NOTHING he can say or do that's good and decent.

The America I thought I knew growing up no longer exists (maybe it never really did, but at least we thought it did). 

Whether one can see it or not, things are a mess. 

Four more years will be the nails in the coffin.

I GOT GOT... AGAIN!

You know how on some sites there are lists of 'Sponsored Stories.'

I was scrolling through the FOX NEWS site when one caught my eye. In all honesty, I am not sure why, but the headline said "Meghan McCain Shows Off Her Partner & WOW," and I decided to see her partner and find out why 'WOW' was the descriptor.

As I went through each page, there were some real surprises! I think we see actors and other celebrities as interesting people and often forget they are really just people with lives like the rest of us - sort of. There were people like Snoop Dogg, Terry Bradshaw, and Michael J. Fox and their other halves. 

I finally found out about Meghan McCain's partner (Ben Domenech). They have been married for three years.

The thing is, it took me 114 clicks to get there when a trip to Wikipedia could have given me the same information in about five seconds. 

Maybe someday I will learn.

(In all honesty, however, sometimes what we discover along the way makes the trip worthwhile. Just saying.)

RANDOM THOUGHTS - PART III

 

RANDOM THOUGHTS LIST THREE

I think we are going to hear a lot more from Deutsche Bank.

I am quintuple (5x) compromised, so in public I will be masked and hope you will be as well.

Just saw a video on privilege. I learned I was privileged (but not with a capital ‘P’).

A piece of writing is never finished – it’s abandoned.

How many people voting for Biden will really be voting against tRump?

So, if microwaves can heat food, could macrowaves chill it?

More A-listers – we need a lot more A-listers. We’ve currently lost ONLY around 170,000 lives of fellow Americans, but they’re mostly the ordinary little people. When more rich and famous start to go, maybe people will take notice. #trumppandemic

Delay the election? Don’t you think he has done enough damage already?

The very people who demanded to see Obama’s birth certificate don’t seem at all interested in seeing tRump’s tax returns or care Russia hacked us. Why?

Thinking about undoing the damage tRump and his supporters have done is like putting toothpaste back in the tube.

So tRump announced that he donated his most recent quarterly paycheck to the National Park Service. That’s $100,000. Nice gesture. Of course, his golf outings have cost taxpayers approximately $139,000,000. Just sayin’.

Should be banning Dixie cups? What about our horse whose name is Dixie?

THIS IS A HARD ONE....

(That what sh... never mind.)

This is a most difficult post to write because it deals with higher-level ideas, and not everyone is equipped to deal with such, which is making it hard for me to approach. I don't know if I can even get the point across.

Ray Bradbury, in 1948, published a short story (14 pages) called "Tomorrow's Child." A partial plot summary follows:

"Tomorrow's Child is a futuristic story about a child that is born into an alternate dimension due to the malfunction of a new birth procedure machine.  The story is told in third person, but switches between the regular dimension, and the alternate dimension in which the baby is born.  Dr. Wolcott and his team of doctors at the local hospital have never seen anything like this before, and insist on testing the physical and mental attributes of this little blue six-arm-pyramid-baby named Py (short for "pyramid").

 "Peter Horn, Py's father, is reluctant at first to giving care to Py, calling him "a crime against god," but eventually accepts that this is his son, no matter the physical form of his being.  Unlike her husband, Polly Horn, Py's mother, immediately takes to Py and treats him just as she would if he were in any other form.  After clearance from the hospital to leave, Peter flies Polly and Py home in their helicopter, while Polly holds Py.  Polly seems to notice that Py makes "cooing" in response to her, almost like he can understand her.

"At this point, the story switches to Py's dimension.  Where in the regular dimension, everyone sees Py as a six-limbed pyramid, Py sees himself as what we believe a normal baby of the regular dimension looks like.  Py sees everyone around him as geometric shapes, Peter as a hexagon, and Polly as a rectangular prism.  He is able to recognize the shapes that he sees most often, and the ones he sees less often.  He becomes close with the hexagon and the prism, and recognizes the square that comes once every few days and looks at him.  Py is curious about the machine he gets plugged into, and all the moving lines, flashing lights, and beeps that fill the environment." (google.com)

There's more, but in the unlikely event that someone wants to read it, I don't want to give any spoilers.

Here comes the difficult part. People today are of two schools re: tRump. People either love him or hate him. There is no middle ground.

We see and hear the same things about the #trumppandemic (currently 168,445 fellow Americans dead), unemployment, evictions, loss of health care, crude nastiness, lack of leadership, lies, businesses closing, more lies, etc., etc., etc.

One 'side' is appalled (#themanwhodestroyedamerica). The other still fully supports him and cheers him on (he says what he means).

Now, the point of this whole thing: I am not a stupid person. Seeing what I see, I have to ask, "What color is the sky where you are?" 

LAUGH, LAUGH...

My mother used to have this thing where she would laugh uncontrollably often at the wrong time.

One time following a surgery I had, she came to visit me in the hospital. I was uncomfortable (to say the least), and when I shifted position, the pain, a tearing sensation in the stitched area, was excruciating. I grimaced, and she started laughing, which started me laughing. Fortunately, I don't remember the pain (life is sometimes good that way).

That said, The Ever-lovely Miss Kim and I recently went into a Five Guys for a quick lunch. Everything was fine until I saw a man come in wearing a black tRump face mask. In all honesty, I didn't read the whole thing. It could have said, "Trump - Keep America Great" (🙄) or it could have said, "Trump Virus 2020" or "Trump for Prison 2020."

I looked around the store - everyone was wearing masks (the new 'normal), there were plastic barriers set up, and tables socially distanced, but at least they were open.

Sudden thoughts washed over me like a tsunami - massive unemployment and related financial issues, small businesses disappearing, loss of health care, over 160,000 fellow Americans dead, loss of sports, food lines, the mess with schools, travel, tourism, etc., etc., etc.

I would love to tell you I started to laugh - harder and harder. Tears came to my eyes, and my laughter grew louder and louder and my voice raised in pitch. I stumbled back against the wall hitting it with my back, and slid to the floor still laughing.

I thought about the unnecessary ridiculousness of the whole thing. I know it is what it is (sorry), but it didn't have to be. Mike Leavitt observed that "There is a time in the life of every problem when it is big enough to see, yet small enough to solve." At least that's how it should be for most normal people. 

Believe and spin what you want, but this is the tRump Pandemic. I hold him and his pertinacious supporters responsible for everything that is going on. Other countries have figured it out, but not the good old U.S. of A. "My rights are more important than yours and the country's." (Think 'The Ugly American.')

Smart people can pretend to be stupid, but stupid people can't pretend to be smart.

(By the way, I really didn't start laughing - I just thought about it. I didn't cry either, which would have been easy to do. In reality, I finished my lunch, and we went on our way back into the tRump Pandemic).)

BERMBIT'S GAME

I learned this game many years ago as an icebreaker at a personal growth workshop I attended. It was a great way to learn about others and their interests and experiences.

After I tried it in school, it didn't go viral because there was no Internet then, but it certainly did make the rounds. Bottom line, the goal is to get people talking. Interestingly, when the game circulated locally in school and on some chat sites, it started being called Bermbit's Game, which I will gladly keep.

Just this week, I have seen a newer version on Facebook, which inspired me to resurrect the old game. The current Facebook version has someone naming five famous people they have met or been close to, but one is a lie. 

The original game was things one has done or achieved, like or dislike, etc. 

Here's an example - five things follow, but one is not true (which, of course means four are true!

(1) I ate Chinese food up and close with Led Zeppelin.

(2) I once won $10,000 in the Lottery.

(3) I have a short piece published in one of the Chicken Soup series.

(4)  I once road-managed The J. Geils Band.

(5) I played intercollegiate ice hockey for my college.

So, at this point you should be looking back at the answers and wondering which one is false. 

And go....

(As I usually do, I will wait to post the answer.)