Category Archives: Blogs' Archive

Of course it is an insidious and self-destructive habit to look at the number of likes, and shares on your posts, because it’s only going to make you feel bad. It’s like looking, long and pointedly, into the mirror, looking for your flaws. It’s like getting out the scales to see who got the bigger piece of pie. No possible good can come from it.
Nonetheless, I do it. I suspect most people do it. After all, that’s why that feature is there.
I have noticed that most of my posts get no more than a handful of likes, and the poetry posts are generally liked by the same group of 5 or 6 people. The political posts will vary a bit depending on where I post them, but if one gets more than a handful of comments, it’s probably because the comment thread veered off-topic at some point and is careening, out of control, down a rocky slope.
On the other hand, I made a two word comment on a post about the proper ingredients for a potato salad, which led to more actual debate than most of my political posts do, and then I looked at the overall number of comments on the post. It was 169 thousand and change.
This might be what’s wrong with our society, this might be what’s right with our society, I’m not sure, but it’s a phenomenon that precedes the internet. You can get 40 or 50,000 people to a concert or a sporting event, where you have to spend a lot of money to get in, but it’s hard to draw more than a hundred to a political rally, or a demonstration on a topic of importance to our society, which is absolutely free.
With wildfires consuming all of our forests, from Australia to the Amazon, with fires breaking out in the middle of the ocean, with rivers flooding their banks and destroying communities which have lived peacefully along their banks for millenia, with mountains of ice breaking off and falling into the oceans, most people would rather talk about potato salad.

We are at the cottage this weekend, which is something I generally avoid but Helena was not having it this time because it’s her Mom’s birthday. Well, it’s the weekend everybody decided to celebrate her Mom’s birthday, anyhow. That’s a very Czech thing. If you’re birthday is, for instance, July 10th, than any time between the middle of June and the middle of August will do. Also, that way they combine birthday celebrations. Our nephew Adam and Helena’s cousin Waldek are also here, and have birthdays within the range.
It sprinkled a bit on the way up, and there are some clouds, so while it is hot, it is not insufferable. After lunch, we went mushroom hunting. The two of us, Isabel, and our two nephews. Didn’t find enough mushrooms even for a full meal, but it was a nice walk in the woods.
I spent a bit of time picking cherries, which was frustrating, because the top of the tree was full to bursting, but there was no way to get up there without some serious climbing. I did not trust the ladder, so I filled about half a basket with what I could get from ground level, and then went and picked some red currants, which was much easier. Had a great dinner, pork on the spit, cole slaw, corn, some meat pastries which were quite delicious and, of course, cake. Then went for about a 5 k walk, didn’t feel that far but H had it calculated, and it included some spectacular panoramic views, and after that jumped into the pool to cool down (it’s an above ground pool and flotation devices and ball pit balls covered more than half the surface of it) even though it was after 9 o’clock, and I’m really glad we did because now I feel great instead of grungy and will sleep quite well tonight.
Love to all. Will write again tomorrow.

I would like to apologize to the busker who was playing in the tunnel that goes between Žižkov and Karlin at about 6:30 this afternoon. Honestly, I had no change in my pocket, the smallest I had was 200 crowns, and that’s outside my busker budget.
If you had been an average, uninspired busker I wouldn’t be giving this a second thought. Sometimes I give, sometimes I don’t. Whatever. But, you were better than that.
As I entered the tunnel I could hear you, clear as a bell. I think the difference is, you totally owned the space. It’s an arched ceiling, so the acoustics are good in that you can hear lots of sounds far away. Usually that means a bicycle is coming. Come to think of it, it’s maybe not the best spot to set up. Most people passing through that tunnel are eager to get to the other side. Plus, it’s not so wide that a huge crowd could gather without creating an obstacle.
Nobody was gathering. The song was Roy Orbison’s Unchained Melody and you were really belting it out. Today, you owned that tunnel. So, I apologize that I didn’t leave any money. I hope you did well. I hope you do well in future.

Although I watched a movie yesterday which I highly recommend, The Good Liar with Sir Ian McKellan and Helen Mirren, I have pretty much run out of anything on Netflix I truly want to see, so I am rewatching Voyager, starting as of a couple days ago, and I’m already into season 2. I am seeing things I didn’t notice the first time around. When Tom Paris comes on board Voyager for the first time, of course, a lot of people treat him like shit because of his dishonorable service record. Notably the first officer, the pilot and the doctor.
All of them died in the first episode, giving Tom the chance to be the pilot, and opening up the slot for Chakotay to be the first officer, and of course paving the way for Robert Picardo to be the doctor and, IMO, the most interesting member of the crew. It’s not a continuity error, and it’s probably not that significant, but I thought it a bit weird that everybody who dissed Tom got killed right off the bat.
Two other things I noticed were continuity errors. In episode one, when B’ellana Torres introduces herself for the first time, she pronounces her name B’yelllana. By episode two, the y sound is dropped and nobody, not even B’ellana, ever uses it again. (I’ve often wondered, on Deep Space Nine, why some people say Bajor with a j as in jelly, and others say Bayzhor. It’s not even consistent among Bajorans. Maybe it’s a regional accent thing, with Dahkur province being different from the capitol, I don’t know. I don’t believe the issue is ever addressed) The other thing also involves B’ellana Torres. She says, somewhere in the first couple of episodes, that her father left when she was five, which sent me straight to ‘other episodes and more’ and I checked out season 7, where she is flashing back to her childhood, on a camping trip shortly before her father leaves. I’d have guessed twelve or thirteen. My wife said she looked about ten. Definitely not five.
But, I am enjoying the binge, by and large. I skip past all episodes with the Vidiians, because that’s an aspect of the franchise I don’t care for. Aliens can be near-human and exotic, like Vulcans or Bajorans, or they can be intimidating like Klingons or Cardassians or Borg, or they can be pure energy beings, but I don’t care for it when they are just plain gross. It’s actually an interesting plot line, an ethical dilemma, but yuck.

I’m actually pretty selective about what I share on Facebook. Partly because I prefer to add my own original content (and I consider comments original content -admittedly, a lot of my internet activity consists of commenting on stuff), and partly because so many things, even if I agree with them in general, have something wrong with them. Even a tip-top left wing meme, if it has a misspelling in it, I’m not going to share it. Another reason is that if it’s a good meme, there’s a good chance that lots of other people have already shared it, and nobody needs to see anything more than once, and if it’s not a good meme, there’s no point.
So, I don’t respond when people put up posts about cancer, or Alzheimer’s, or anything like that, and says “I’ll bet nobody cares enough to share this,” I don’t share. Could be they’re right. When somebody says “Post the last picture you took on your phone” I don’t bother. There are other people who will play that game and they can all have a good time together. But, there is one particular phraseology which truly bothers me, and that’s my subject for tonight’s blog.
“I’ll bet nobody has the guts to share this.” It usually is attached to some right wing message, because they’re all about guts, it is of far greater value to them than, say, intelligence. But it’s really a nonsensical thing to say, since it takes no guts at all to share something on the internet. Anybody in possession of all ten fingers, or even a few less, has what it takes to share something on social media. Making a statement in real life, well, there it depends on your location. If it’s something saying support your local police, you could still say that in real life in most places, but there are some bars where it might get you punched. If it’s saying we should dye the grass in all major league stadiums to look like giant American flags, sure you could say that in public. The people who disagree with that (like me) are not generally violent people. If it’s something about how much you love guns, it still doesn’t take courage to post. Some people will agree with you, some might disagree with you, and most will ignore you, but nobody’s going to go to your house and start shooting at you. We don’t have guns, remember?
So, post what you like, but as far as trying to guilt people into reposting, maybe choose a different phrase. Guts has got nothing to do with it.