That’s Enough of That

August 31, 2020

Day 1: *looks at last year’s*

And then once again itโ€™ll be May 24, to do this again in 2020, for round 20, whatever form the world will be in then. Whatever indeed.

Oh… oh man… Yikes.

Day 7: Brownies! Mmmm…

Day 8: No big deal, just cops attacking the journalists witnessing them attacking peaceful civilians, that’s totally fine and not at all abhorrent!

Day 10: Primary voting in the time of COVID.

Day 11: Just sayin…

Day 13: I’m not budging…

Day 14: Hey, JK Rowling, would you please shut the fuck up and sit your ass down?

Day 28: Eating fries for first time since before pandemic and this is heaven.

Day 29: Raspberry muffins! So sweet!

Day 33: Raspberry brownies! Look at those dents!

Day 36: Time for a goodbye.

Day 38: Nectarine muffins! Not bad, feels like it needs another flavor.

Day 41: A review?

Day 42: Berry cake!

Day 44: Still not budging…

Day 48: Time for another goodbye.

Day 49: Blackberry muffins! A little dry but tasty.

Day 51: The regeneration sequence begins…

Day 53: Strawberry blueberry muffins! Not bad but could be better.

Day 56: John Lewis

Day 61: Nailed it!

Day 63: Strawberry chocolate chip blondies! So rich! Like eating a syrup soaked pancake!

Day 68: Strawberry brownies! Very tasty, if my powdered sugar skills could use some work.

Day 72: Cinnamon nectarine blondies! WOW! This is the most amazing thing I’ve tasted in a long time. And I made it myself!

Day 78: Tarp trouble!

Day 80: And… it’s Kamala Harris.

Day 81: Blueberry cereal muffins! Hmm. Overestimated how absorbent the cereal would be so reduced the flour but batter was too wet. Still came out tasty, though.

Day 85: Blackberry cereal muffins! Slightly overbaked maybe but very tasty.

Day 87: Cool state roll call!

Day 89: Blueberry lemon blondies! They’re… awful. Underbaked. Flavors combined in a weird and off-putting way. Blueberries themselves are very good. The rest of it, not so much. Damn.

Day 95: Chocolate strawberry muffins! Very good. Strawberries practically melted into the batter. Not too overpowering but satisfying.

Day 96: Fight the power, NBA and WNBA and MLB and others. Proud of you.

Day 97: Chadwick Boseman

Day 98: You all remember we’re supposed to be social distancing, right? Because you’re not acting like you remember.

Day 99: I should bake but I’m playing a game instead. Tomorrow…

And finally…

DAY 100

Strawberry almond cinnamon blondies! Forget what I said three weeks ago. This is the most amazing thing I’ve ever tasted. And I made it myself!

As these 100 Day of Summer draw to a close, it’s a world quickly doing away with the old or just plain changing a whole lot. Such is the business of life. Time for another goodbye, closing out Round 20 and 2000 days of whatever this is.

We’ll see what’s next…

This has been Day 100 of the 100 Days of Summer, Round 20.

Keyblades and Dugout Dances

August 31, 2019

It’s once again my annual countdown to nothing, and nothing has again arrived.

DAY
100

And I haven’t posted since Easter, despite having a lot of things in the works. What have I been busy with? Mostly running around Disney universes beating up monsters with a giant key. And watching the Nats dance. And tweeting regarding some of it. Let’s just get right to it.

Day 1,

Day 2,

Day 3,

Day 4,

Day 6, “I need… more rage. I need… more hearts.”

Day 10, I don’t always spill food on myself, but when I do, it’s onto clothes that came out of the dryer two hours ago.

Day 13, oh, did you not like my word choice nine years ago?

Day 19, went to the store for: 1) Kingdom Hearts: The Story So Far, for PlayStation 4, 2) Kingdom Hearts 3, for PlayStation 4, 3) a PlayStation 4.

Day 20, WTF is up with this card system?

Day 23, Obi-Sean Kenobi bobblehead

Day 25, where the fuck is my box?!

Day 29, what do you mean stuck in Memphis?!

Day 30, guess I got to go get it, on a Saturday!

Day 35,

Day 37, done with this card business, now for the prequel with, uh, wait, isn’t that Roxas?

Day 39, don’t do it, Woody!

Day 42, made chili, because I’m American, Americans make chili.

Day 46, TV is broken, long live the new TV!

Day 47,

Day 50,

Day 60, this game just keeps going and going, doesn’t she get out of the darkness?

Day 61, break from Sora and friends for Crash Bandicoot remake.

Day 62, The graphics are beautiful and the music is sharper. But that log spinning bullshit in Great Gate and Native Fortress is still bullshit.

Day 65, watched the Nats get their asses handed to them by the Dodgers and all I got was this tote bag.

Day 67, not even the garlic festivals are safe.

Day 68, Sora and Riku have their own Pokem- er, I mean, “spirits”.

Day 82,

Day 84,

Day 86,

Day 87, drop, drop, drop, drop, drop… looking for Special Portals.

Day 89, the other game still hasn’t ended, she’s still in the darkness.

Day 90, and, at long last… Kingdom Hearts 3

Day 93, John Oliver is Zazu

Day 100, it’s a festival of dead tree sandwiches.

As these 100 Days of Summer draw to a close, I once again ask why am I even still doing this relic of college days half my life ago? Maybe it’s for some connection to my earlier life, that even as things change, certain rituals remain. But there’s no shortage of that. Up next the baseball season will give way to the postseason. Then Halloween and Thanksgiving and Christmas and New Year’s and the Superbowl and Valentine’s Day and Lent and Easter and then I’ll be all “holy shit, how am I 37?!” And then once again it’ll be May 24, to do this again in 2020, for round 20, whatever form the world will be in then. Whatever indeed.

This has been Day 100 of the 100 Days of Summer, Round 19.

Round 18

August 31, 2018

This again! Yup, it’s August 31, so that means…



Day
100


It’s this thing I started doing in 2001 counting down the days I’d return to college, and for some reason am still doing 15 years after I graduated.

Anyway, let’s get to it…

Day 1, ah, the day after the Caps won the Eastern Conference.

Day 3, *Infinity War credits roll* … What?!

Day 4, I got it!!!

Day 7, WHAT?!

Day 14, what did you do?!

Day 15, CAPITALS!!!!!

Day 16, Anthony Bourdain

Day 17, JUSTIFY!!!!

Day 18, shade is thrown.

Day 20, Caps parade crowd size >>>> Orange Thing’s inauguration crowd size

Day 22, Flag Day.

Day 25, go walk by a lake.

Day 32, what do you mean you don’t have the orzo tabouleh anymore?!

Day 35, so busy.

Day 36, so very busy.

Day 37, so busy it’s unbelievable.

Day 38, protest against immigrant family separations! Which I couldn’t go to because I was so tired from all the busy.

Day 41, snack time!

Day 42, chili con… corn.

Day 43, Pruitt’s out.

Day 46, ah, someone is back in area!

Day 49, go walk by a lake again.

Day 50, pizza pile!

Day 52, these sunflowers do what they want.

Day 53, awww, I was hoping Croatia would win it.

Day 54, okay, is the Orange Thing just committing treason in plain sight?

Day 66, why do I get sucked into these pointless arguments?

Day 67, only to realize no one is on my side?

Day 68, *opens fortune cookie* *it’s empty* That can’t be good.

Day 70, hmm, cable’s out.

Day 71, I knew it!

Day 73, cable’s back.

Day 77, goodbye, Sense8!

Day 80, YASSSS!!!!

Day 81, fuck off out of my city, white supremacists!

Day 85, at the fair with Kathleen who met the sheep.

Day 87, fair again? no, other stuff happens.

Day 88, Disenchantment!!!

Day 90, crab cake and crepe!

Day 94, so McCain goes.

Day 95, PUPPY!!!!

Day 97, another crab cake.

And…

Day 100, a Friday, before the three day Labor Day weekend, and I’ve got some poke. Mmmm.

As these 100 Days of Summer draw to a close, completing my annual countdown to nothing, our political climate continues to be batshit and leading to… something or other. What can you do? Well, there’s voting in the midterm election in November, of course. What else? The usual. Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas, of course. And whatever else is ahead. Got to look ahead. It’s the direction we’re going, even if it’s always so hard to see.

*rereads last paragraph* Ugh. Who writes this stuff?

Anyway, back to this for some reason next year for Round 19, on May 24, 2019, whatever the world will look like then.

This has been Day 100 of the 100 Days of Summer, Round 18.

McCain the Honorable

August 26, 2018

So, anyway, John McCain died.

As with any such political or otherwise high profile death, there’s the predictable and rather tiresome back and forth where some want to venerate him while others want to yell at those venerating him that he was responsible for lots of bad stuff.

I’m not interested in doing any of that. Instead, let’s have a look at this.

If you don’t feel like clicking and watching, it’s the clip from 2008 during the McCain-Obama presidential campaign (was there ever such a time?) where a woman says she doesn’t trust Obama because he’s “an Arab”. McCain shakes his head no, that he’s a “decent family man” and that his only differences with him are policy, that there is nothing to be afraid of about him.

Now what’s remarkable about this? Well, nothing really. Except the fact that, looking back on it from a decade later and in our current political climate, it seems remarkable at all.

Really, there is so much wrong in this exchange it’s hard to know where to begin. For one, this woman rather confusingly claims Obama is an Arab, because she likely thinks “Arab” and “Muslim” are just interchangeable terms referring to the exact same people. Which, of course, isn’t even close to true, with a great many people being one and not the other (including my own Christian Arab mother). But I guess I forget there are parts of this country where such distinctions never cross anyone’s mind, where people who aren’t white or black are pretty much unheard of. And that such people might be such a sizable portion from these regions that they get to ask such a question on the national stage of a presidential candidate.

Of course, there’s nothing wrong with being either Arab or Muslim. Just an ethnicity. Just a religion.

That’s what’s tricky with responding to such a claim. “I don’t trust Obama because he’s Arab!” He’s not Arab (or Muslim for that matter), not that there’s anything wrong with that if he were. But McCain didn’t mention that latter part (though perhaps due to time). He simply refuted any assertion that he’s dangerous or untrustworthy, with the “decent family man” comment. Not that men who are Arab and/or Muslim can’t be decent family men. Not that being a family man necessarily makes one decent, of course.

His response left something to be desired, or at least it would if not for us now being starkly aware of how much worse it could have been. I mean, we really shouldn’t be holding him up as honorable for simply doing the bare minimum of decency in refuting such assumptions about his opponent, in trying to keep it about policy rather than racist paranoia. That’s what he should be doing. It’s not extraordinary. What’s extraordinary is that he even needed to. What’s extraordinary is that, in that video, when McCain uttered his defenses of Obama from these weird assertions, the crowd grumbled and booed.

Instead, all we can think now is how the Orange Thing would and does handle such questions.

Of course, McCain has been a vocal critic of the Orange Thing, so lately he’s had that going for him as well, if he perhaps could have done more to stop him. Though, again, that should not be extraordinary, since everyone should be against the Orange Thing. What’s extraordinary is that most Republicans have fallen in line behind the Orange Thing, with McCain and a few others being the exceptions to varying degrees.

Perhaps you could still say McCain is honorable in the sense that he’s mostly if imperfectly resisted the temptations to paint Obama as dangerous and the Orange Thing as not dangerous. But really it’s all a sign of just how low the bar is set now.

This has been Day 95 of the 100 Days of Summer, Round 18.

Pruitt the Faithful

July 8, 2018

A few days ago, Scott Pruitt resigned as head of the EPA, the latest departure in this revolving-door-like administration. In doing so, he penned a letter to the Orange Thing. Let’s have a look…

Mr. President, it has been an honor to serve you in the Cabinet as Administrator of the EPA.

And you use the term “honor” very loosely.

Truly, your confidence in me has blessed me personally

I wasn’t aware Orange Thing was capable of blessing people. Or of having confidence in them for that matter.

and enabled me to advance your agenda beyond what anyone anticipated at the beginning of your Administration.

Be it through catastrophic environmental damage or nuclear war, his agenda of turning our planet into a smoking husk will be realized much sooner than anyone would have thought, yes.

Your courage, steadfastness and resolute commitment to get results for the American people, both with regard to improved environmental outcomes as well as historical regulatory reform, is in fact occurring at an unprecedented pace and I thank you for the opportunity to serve you and the American people in helping achieve those ends.

In other words, we’re way ahead of schedule on that 2ยฐC rise.

That is why it is hard for me to advise you I am stepping down as Administrator of the EPA effective as of July 6.

Now that wasn’t that hard, was it? Take note, Sessions! And Sanders. And Nielsen. And the rest.

It is extremely difficult for me to cease serving you in this role first because I count it a blessing to be serving you in any capacity,

Someone has a cruuuuush…

but also, because of the transformative work that is occurring.

Look at those ice caps melt!

However, the unrelenting attacks on me personally, my family, are unprecedented and have taken a sizable toll on all of us.

Yeah, really, all the horrific accusations about you having a private e-mail server and running a child trafficking operation at a pizza restaurant- Oh, wait, that wasn’t you…

I believe these are yours.

My desire in service to you has always been to bless you as you make important decisions for the American people.

You talk to and about the Orange Thing as if his occupation of the White House is ordained by God or something-

I believe you are serving as President today because of God’s providence.

I believe that same providence brought me into your service.

Actually, Orange Thing appointed you- Oh, that’s what you mean. Weird.

I pray as I have served you that I have blessed you and enabled you to effectively lead the American people.

No entity real or imagined anywhere ever has enough power to make the Orange Thing an effective leader. All you’re doing is feeding his already dangerously high narcissism by speaking to and about him like some god-king, for reasons I’m not really sure I want to know.

Thank you again Mr. President for the honor of serving you

You keep using that word. I don’t think it means what you think it means.

and I wish you Godspeed in all that you put your hand to.

Because when you’re famous they let you do it.

Your Faithful Friend, Scott Pruitt

This has been Day 46 of the 100 Days of Summer, Round 18.

This Is Not Who We Are

July 4, 2018

On July 22, 2016, around the time of the Republican National Convention, I posted this to Facebook:

I spent my 4th of July evening on a plane flying home from across the country. When the sun was out, I saw craggy desert that gave way to the Rocky Mountains that became flat farmlands. When it got dark, far below me, blinking on and off all over like lots of multicolored fireflies, were the fireworks shows. From above, on its special night, I watched my country sparkle. And under the sparkling were the people, in all the various terrains within our borders, from all walks of life, enjoying a cozy summer evening and watching bright flashy colors across the sky, saying “ooh” and “ahh” and “oh, look, a plane”. Diverse yet with a common bond. That’s who we are. That’s what it means to be American.

Yet, we have a presidential candidate and the major political party behind him peddling paranoia, xenophobia, bigotry, greed, and violence. Worse still, these things are being touted as “American”, that these things are not only desirable but are part of our national identity, that they are what makes us “great”. And the thing is, as the primaries have shown us, this is resonating. Maybe it’s because so many, of any political persuasion, whether in support or against, really are buying the idea that this is what it means to be American.

So let’s maybe drop that idea already. It is a dangerous lie. Don’t lend it any credence. We’re a diverse land and people who value freedom and human rights and other nice stuff like that. And when some ultra-narcissistic loudmouth seeks the highest office in the land by supposedly speaking for us all when he promotes fear and hate and the ugly manifestations thereof, we have to say NO! SHUT THE FUCK UP AND SIT DOWN! THIS IS NOT WHO WE ARE!

The Orange Thing’s campaign seemed like a bad parody of white conservative American intolerance, from the longing for some imagined “great” past to the hostility toward Hispanic and Muslim immigrants, with the explicit notion that those white conservatives who have these beliefs are the only “real” Americans, that the rest of us either don’t exist or aren’t important or don’t belong in our own country. The rest of us make up the vast majority of the country, and surely, I and so many others thought, what he’s saying is so blatantly toxic and against everything we’re about.

But then, on the night of November 8, 2016, I reshared that post with the added comment:

THIS IS NOT WHO WE ARE!

*looks at electoral map*

…right?

The following January, a few hours after Orange Thing made it official in front of probably anyone, at a resistance event at WES, I read the above post in the open mic portion. In person, through a microphone, with my actual voice, to a room full of people, I recited: “…And when some ultra-narcissistic loudmouth seeks the highest office in the land by supposedly speaking for us all when he promotes fear and hate and the ugly manifestations thereof, we have to say NO! SHUT THE FUCK UP AND SIT DOWN! THIS IS NOT WHO WE ARE!” Followed by a round of applause.

It’s a year and a half later, and so so so much has happened, much of which I don’t even remember because it’s been one thing after another with this administration. There isn’t exactly anything great going on, that’s for sure.
Continue reading “This Is Not Who We Are”

Immigrants Aren’t the Problem

June 30, 2018

Now for a migratory, border wall busting edition of…

SHUT THE HELL UP!!!!

This one is for just about anyone blaming immigrants for, well, anything.

We’ve all heard it. “They’re taking our jobs! They’re committing crimes! They’re costing tax money! They won’t even learn English or assimilate!” And so on.

Just stop. It’s been the same complaints over and over, ever since those horrible immigrants were Irish and even in other places. And it’s not clear why some of these complaints are specific to immigrants, as native born citizens are guilty of whatever the complaints are as well.

Oh, “they took our jerbs?” So are you saying that if you lost your job to a non-immigrant citizen it’d be fine? Wouldn’t you be just as without a job?

“They’re bringing drugs and gangs!” Right, because there aren’t any homegrown gangs? Trust me, even if all traffic in and out the country stopped, these things would continue.

“But it’s illegal immigrants that are the problem! They’re illegal!” So let’s make the path to legal citizenship easier then- Oh, you’re grumbling at that now? Okay, so somehow I don’t think the legality is what you’re so worried about. But I already knew that given all the jaywalking and neglecting to use turn signals that you do.

“But they don’t understand or care about American values!” Do you?

There’s no real backing to any of these usual anti-immigrant complaints, yet people are screaming bloody murder about them coming here as if this is life or death. No, you imbecile, it’s life or death for those who are coming here. They’re not leaving their home countries for shits and giggles. They are leaving because the situation at home has gotten extremely dangerous, such that their lives are on the line if they stick around.

So they come here to the US. And we should be PROUD of this! That when other countries unfortunately have problems and their people need someplace to go for safety, they see us and think “hey, that place looks great!” And they come here and become part of us and flourish. Isn’t that what we’re all about?

At least they would, except right now we’ve got dickheads in charge who recently decided it’d be a good idea to break up the families of those trying to seek asylum here. As in snatching small children from their parents and locking them away in their own camp, without any real means of being able to reunite them, all because these people had the gall to -gasp!- try to come into this country and HOLY SHIT this is a real thing that is happening in my country and how the fuck is anybody okay with this?!

Except for Jeff Sessions, who gleefully declares it a means of deterring these desperate people from trying to come here, because, well, it’s already obvious he has no soul, but I think his presence also saps the life force of anyone in his general vicinity. This is just plain raw evil right before our eyes, as this country’s Attorney General, and he does this believing there is a base to appeal to with this behavior. That the people who share in this evil, who are all for it and genuinely believe it’s good for the country, are the only people in this big diverse country worth appealing to.

And, you know, even if all the above paranoia about immigrants were true, and even exclusively so for immigrants, how is this sadistic backlash justified? How is ripping a terrified toddler from his mother’s arms and locking him up hundreds of miles away without any means in place of returning him no matter what happens with the rest of the family even remotely an appropriate response? Or, since that practice was finally ordered to halt a few days ago, locking them all up indefinitely? Why is there such a deep-seated fear of immigrants, be they Latin Americans or Syrians or whoever else, that anyone could believe them so deserving of the most horrific treatment for simply trying to come here? That this attempt to migrate here is deserving of swift and terrible retribution? What the fuck kind of country are we to behave this way, and what the fuck kind of people do we have here who look unflinchingly at this and think “this is fine”?

I don’t have an answer for that. Other than that it may be apathy or simply not knowing what to do or what can be done. Or in the case that they do truly believe all this is fine and good, and there is a fair share of them, they’ve been lied to for a long time. Because it’s not like such people feel this way due to specific incidents with immigrants. Even if they lost their jobs or were victims of some crimes due to illegal immigrants, somehow they had to be convinced it was the illegal immigration aspect to blame rather than anything else. Somehow they’ve been convinced not to look at the hiring practices and motivations behind those who might take an illegal immigrant employee over a citizen, that they might perhaps see an excuse to pay this person less and threaten them with deportation if they complain about treatment. It’s like, why blame those in power who create the problem when you can blame the powerless desperate migrant who has so much more to lose?

And that’s the core of it all here. Those screaming against immigrants are doing it because someone wants them to and is happily stoking the paranoia. Someone pointed to the immigrants, said they were the reason for the economic hardships of much of our population, and that population swallowed this right up and watches the indefinite migrant detentions with glee. Without a care for the long-term effects, be they personal for those migrants or for all of us for being citizens of the country responsible for it.

Immigrants aren’t the problem. Whoever is trying so hard to make you believe they are is the actual problem.

This has been Day 38 of the 100 Days of Summer, Round 18.

Internal Threats

June 14, 2018

I hereby decree…

Colin Kaepernick is an American hero.

So a few weeks ago, NFL owners banned players from kneeling or otherwise not overtly respecting the flag during the national anthem. Or they could just stay in the locker room during it. That way they are out of sight and their lack of participation in athletic patriotic theater doesn’t have to offend anyone. Any non-compliant players and their teams would be fined.

Now there’s a ton to unpack here. For one, how many of these players do we keep finding out have been beating women and children? Yet they just get to keep on playing as long as they stand for the flag.

Why do sporting events have these patriotic and military displays to begin with? What do they even have to do with each other? Well, it seems the Pentagon has been paying teams for these displays for a long time, although apparently they’ve finally stopped. It explains why the games have them, but there’s the other troubling question of why the Pentagon has been doing this in the first place. Perhaps the pageantry is supposed to inspire a feeling of blind loyalty?

That may be the case. After all, Kaepernick and all the others who have taken a knee are doing it because things within the country we love aren’t that great, namely, as these guys are about, police brutality and the racism that perpetuates it. They don’t hate the country itself. They hate something seriously wrong that is happening in it and are using their public platform to call attention to it.

But calling this attention to something wrong in the country ruffles a lot of feathers. For one, so many miss the important distinction between calling attention to a serious wrong in an otherwise loved country and hating the country. The message is supposed to be “please stop killing black people!” but some keep reading it as (or claiming to read it as) “I don’t support the troops!”

It’s a weird stretch to see a perceived lack of reverence for the flag and the national anthem as a slight against the military. Perhaps it’s mostly a guilt trip, that these soldiers went out and died for this country and that flag while not showing proper reverence for that flag somehow diminishes their sacrifice. It’s a bullshit guilt trip, of course. I mean, the Star Spangled Banner is literally about the flag surviving a war, but apparently it can’t survive a football player kneeling?

It’s also bullshit because the point is to silence the kneelers’ message. I mean, I get being indignant when it seems like someone is raining on your celebration, where you want to enjoy the bit of tacky showy patriotism, only for someone to be like “okay, but a lot of bad shit is happening”. We’re all permitted our escapism, and watching football is most definitely that. But the military promotion is kind of in and of itself flying in the face of that, because it’s like we all just want to chill and watch a game, and there they are being like “but don’t forget, war is a thing!”

You know, they go on about the sacrifices these soldiers have made and celebrate them and the country, but gloss over any justification for why those soldiers were wherever they were in the first place, why they had to die, or, which would drive their point home more but they nonetheless avoid it, how mind-blowingly horrifying war is. But of course that’s how they sell it. They want more people to sign up and keep promoting doing so as something heroic and glorious, and a lot of us eat it up. I mean, if it were always just causes, sure, but the reality has a lot more shades of grey.

Maybe this is why it ruffles so many feathers to see a black man kneeling instead of saluting, calling attention to the senseless murders of other black people in a society that sees only white people as important or worthwhile. They don’t want their attention called to serious problems within the country these soldiers are making the ultimate sacrifice for (and they certainly don’t like a black person calling attention to a failing of white society). They don’t like this perceived slight against heroes.

But then again, Colin Kaepernick is himself heroic. I mean, he’s not at a literal war, true, but he’s speaking out about an important issue at great personal risk.

I’ve mentioned before about the difference in perception of members of the military and social activists, where the former are considered heroic and deserving of unquestionable praise while the latter are troublemakers who should sit down and shut up, something that is clearly playing out here. But the social activists need to be recognized as the heroes they are, because what they work on are internal threats, which are often even more dangerous than anything from the outside.

For example, September 11th was touted by some as an attack on our freedom. But what ended up happening was we curtailed our own freedom in response. The horrific attacks happened but alone did nothing to change how free we were or weren’t. Everything from reduced civil liberties to Islamophobia we did on our own. None of that could be fixed by sending troops to Afghanistan. These were at home internal threats that domestic activists had to rectify, knowing it would destroy us to let them go unabated, all the while being called unAmerican.

Let me say this again. These internal threats would destroy us. Racism is destroying this country, as are sexism, ageism, ableism, homophobia, transphobia, and the rest. These are not mere inconveniences for certain affected populations, but a serious problem that can and will destroy us. After all, those affected populations are just as American, and more importantly just as human. This country belongs to them at least as much as to any privileged white people who get to debate this as a distant rhetorical game rather than live it on a daily basis. When you truly understand that, then you’ll understand how urgent the problem is, and how much deep shit we’re in as a nation when we not only don’t effectively address it but mock and vilify those who do. And you’ll understand it’s nothing you can point the military at. It’s all within.

I’d like to point out also that I do like our flag and our national anthem. I can feel that way while recognizing how dangerous it is to make them mandatory.

This has been Day 22 of the 100 Days of Summer, Round 18.

All for This

June 8, 2018

Sometimes you find that time after time, year after year, you hit your head against the same wall. Or you put your hopes in something that continually disappoints and does so hard. Sometimes you find yourself hoping and yet knowing the result will be the same. Sometimes you go or end up into something where it’s pretty much guaranteed you’re staring down hurt and frustration and disappointment and the subsequent depression.

This can be said for a lot in life.

Here in DC, the hope gets shattered in October and in May and sometimes in January, if any of those gets that far. When they do, they are shut down and hard. Every time there seems to be hope, a possibility. Maybe this time, it is said time and again, followed by maybe next year. Maybe next year. Maybe next year.

And why? What is even the point? Why be set up just to be knocked down? Why endure the nervousness only to feel it replaced with the icy rush of defeat flowing through your blood vessels? Why keep coming back? Why?

Because…

That tiny little possibility that it really just might be different this time.

Because…

Somehow…

Sometimes it is.

6/7/18 – NEVER FORGET

This has been Day 16 of the 100 Days of Summer, Round 18.

That’s 17 of These Now

August 31, 2017

Oh, look what day it is…


DAY
100

What is the 100 Days of Summer? I think I last explained like a decade ago so maybe I should again. Every year starting in 2001, I have counted the days from May 24 through August 31. It was back then counting the days to when I’d return to college, being the summer between my sophomore and junior years, as I very much did not want to go home. Eventually that original Day 100 arrived and I was back at school and happy. Same the following year, so I repeated the event with the exact same days even though they didn’t quite correspond. I graduated the following May, so ever since it has been counting down to nothing, but I still do it for some reason. Anyway, here’s what happened.

Day 1, *looks at Round 16 recap which ended with referring to May 24, 2017, and “whatever shape the world is in then”*, *simultaneously bursts out laughing and in tears*

Day 2, finally, reading Game of Thrones!

Day 3, oh, Montana…

Day 4, where has Cards Against Humanity been all my life?!

Day 6, something about a fish store and a Canadian.

Day 7, covfefe.

Day 9, new season of House of Cards, you’ve got nothing on reality!

Day 16, lots going on!

Day 17, ow!

Day 20, why are we being bug bombed?

Day 23, oh, look who came back east.

Day 25, AwesomeCon! Something about a keyblade, a life-size dragon, and a Canadian.

Day 27, ow.

Day 28, ow!

Day 29, owww, what the hell?!

Day 30, ah, I’ve got a pinched nerve, making my arm hurt like hell. :irked:

Day 42, chili and ‘splosions!

Day 49, ice cream!

Day 50, sushi!

Day 53, something about an art museum and a Canadian.

Day 54, I would find a way to get lost on Theodore Roosevelt Island.

Day 66, well, it finally happened.

Day 80, DOGS!

Day 85, the fair! And bacon s’mores on a stick.

Day 88, the fair again! And a Krispy Kreme burger. And another bacon s’mores on a stick.

Day 90, eclipse!

Day 91, oh…

Day 92, ๐Ÿ™

Day 93, am I getting a cold?

Day 94, yes, this is a cold.

Day 95, I think it’s time to replay Kingdom Hearts! ๐Ÿ˜€

Day 96, it’s a

Day 97, much needed

Day 98, escape

Day 99, from reality.

And now…

Day 100, still playing the game, about done and onto replaying the second one soon, and I picked up some pizza on the way home from work! I didn’t have any space in my room for the pizza box, so I just stacked the pizza slices onto a plate, so really it’s a pile of pizza. Yummy!

So there’s another vague and cryptic (because none of your damn business) recap of these now rather arbitrary days onto which I still assign a very outdated importance because I’m a little too attached to my annual traditions. But, hey, we all have our coping mechanisms. Sometimes everything is going to hell, but you can still think, hey, it’s not so bad, I’m still observing some annual tradition like normal. Speaking of which, we have Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, and the new year on the horizon, as we stare down these final four months of 2017.

As these 100 Days of Summer draw to a close, in a year that is just one glitch in the fabric of space-time (shut up, that makes sense) after another, as the personal and the political alike fly off the rails over and over, where next does this ride take us? What a frightening thought.

So ends this round, to return of course for Round 18 on May 24, 2018, whatever form the world and universe is in then. If still remotely recognizable. Probably not. :scared:

This has been Day 100 of the 100 Days of Summer, Round 17.