Category Archives: Blogs' Archive

The police don’t seem to understand how much to blame for the current  situation they are, how  badly they have fucked up, and they may never understand it, unless there are some indictments.

Instead, they grow bolder and bolder with their “Fuck you, we’re the police, we can kill whoever we want” attitude.  Witness the blatant act of disrespect showed to New York Mayor Bill de Blasio when he was speaking at the funeral of a cop.  They  turned their backs on him.  Hundreds of them.

They are angry because Mayor de Blasio said something like “I can understand why  people are protesting.  Maybe the police shouldn’t be all the time killing black people,” which  is actually a fairly reasonable thing for a mayor to say.

De Blasio didn’t shoot those  two officers.  That was a  deranged man who hated cops (of whom there are now millions, due to cops killing black people all the time and never standing trial for it, even when there is video) and who had shot his girlfriend that morning and stolen her cell phone, a couple of crimes that the police were just  ignoring.

I can understand how  it must hurt to lose a friend and colleague, and how bad it must feel on top of that to know that the deaths were really caused by laziness and a lack of professionalism on the part of police.  So, they start pointing the finger at De Blasio.

It’s a shame it has to come to this, because cops are struggling, working class people as well, but he should fire every last one of them if he can.  Their job is to protect and serve.  Their job is not to act like an asshole and try to score cheap political points.

If he can’t legally do that, he should fire the chief.  Because this is bullshit.

Well, I don’t really know what the connection is, if any,  but there is this article here, about how Russia’s economy is in the shitter partially due to embargoes and whatnot, and the dropping price of oil which I can’t quite figure out.  Did everybody stop using oil?  Then, there is this article here, about how Ukraine has cut off Crimea’s train service, and it could be hard times for the  people of that region which has the  natural misfortune of being geographically desirable.

Putin up a good front

First, condolences to the  people of Crimea, caught in the crossfire.  Secondly, condolences to the  people of Russia, for having to put up with the sanctions.  But,  I’m guessing that no civilians were hurt too much and the weight of the sanctions mostly fell on the right people.

How can I assume that?  Because it’s actually working.  And sanctions often as not don’t.  They sometimes just serve as a stimulus to local production.

At any rate, I find it kind of funny, both in a funny ‘weird’ way, and in a funny ‘haha’ way.

In other news, people are saying more and more that North Korea didn’t hack Sony, that it was more of an inside job, done for the massive publicity that it did, in fact, generate.  I don’t know the first damned thing about hacking, or about how anybody can figure these things out.

But it wouldn’t surprise me.  Also, I’d be happy to hear that that was the case so we could just go back to ignoring North Korea.

I’ve skyped more in the last two days than I’ve ever skyped before in my life, I think.  I’ve never taken to the technology, I’m not really sure why.  It’s kind of amazing that you can call someone halfway around  the world, and look at them as you  talk to them.

It’s existed for years now, but it still seems kind of science fictiony to me.  Actually, though, we didn’t have visual on all of the calls.  We called my Aunt, who is 101, yesterday.  We couldn’t see her lying there in her hospital bed, and she wasn’t completely coherent due to some painkillers, but we could all talk to her at once, which was very nice.  That’s a big difference from an old fashioned phone call, right there.

Then, we talked to my niece Michelle, in Vancouver, and there we had the visual, which was great, because holding up her two year old made the picture very clear, in a way that putting a phone up to a two year old’s ear and saying “Say hellooooo!”  just doesn’t.

The call with my brother Russ, whose son Ben is visiting, was interesting.  He’s used to the technology, so it was a smooth call.  I’d never seen their dog before, and he’s a really cute dog.

Then we talked to my nephew Don (brother to Michelle and Betsy, who was the one arranging all the skyping on our end) and I haven’t seen him in real life since he was 12 or 13 or thereabouts.  He gave his girlfriend an engagement ring for Christmas and, through the miracle of skype, we saw her, too.

Right now, Betsy’s talking with her Dad, no visual but we are listening to the conversation and occasionally I’ll interject something but I’m writing the blog at the same time.

Even though it was great to talk to everybody, and I can clearly see the advantages, I don’t think I’ll make a regular habit of it.  I’ve never really  enjoyed talking on the phone much, and it’s still not the same as talking to somebody in person.  Actually, with spending so much time on facebook, I’m kind of moving in the other direction.  A  print conversation is much less personal, much less real, but somehow I feel like I’m better at it.

Still, all forms of communication are good and I’m glad we’ve got so many of them in the world.

We’ve got quite a crowded cabin right now so I’m going to crank this out and get to bed and out of the way.  We’ve got my niece and her husband on the fold out couch, my nephew on a mat on the floor, and his friend on a mat on the floor in the kid’s room.

We open gifts on the 24th here, and we had a full holiday dinner, with turkey, mashed potatoes, and several different kinds of cookies and fruit.  After that, it was torn paper all over the place.

Basically, it’s difficult to move through the house so here, behind the screen, is the safest place to be.

Sam got some new Kinect games so right now Isabel is standing on the couch (bed) jumping up and down and everybody’s having a good laugh.

Betsy and Enderson have been here a couple of days so we all went down together to meet Ben at the train station and he arrived with a friend so there was one new person at the table, which keeps things interesting and in perspective.

I’m glad we celebrate on the 24th.  It’s over.  The pressure is off.  Tomorrow I can take everybody on a walking tour of Prague and it will be almost a normal  tourist  experience.

Also, because so much of the family is here, we skyped our aunt in New York City, who couldn’t hear us very well (she’s 101), and then Betsy’s sister Michelle, whose 2 year old did not feel like hamming it up for the camera, but it was good to see her anyway.

It has been a good day.  It has been a good year.  Much love to you all.

Tonight is the last night of Chanukah, and we just finished putting up our Christmas tree, so it is apparently a good time for my favorite annual winter’s tale.  This is the legend of how the Angel came to be at the top of the Christmas Tree:

It was a mighty cold winter that winter up at the North Pole.  The wind was howling like a spoiled child and it was colder outside than Ebenezer Scrooge’s heart.  The heat was on in Santa’s workshop, however.  The elves were sweating, and  a roomful of sweaty elves does not create the sweetest odor in the world.  Four out of eight reindeer had serious colds,  and Santa was deeply worried that it might turn into reindeer flu.

“Reindeer flew” is an expression you want to hear after Christmas, not before it.

Mrs. Claus was upset because Santa was working such long hours, and she was starting to be a bit of a nag about it, quite frankly.

The worst part was, however, that he had mountains of mail from seriously rotten little kids.  He knew they’d been  horrible, selfish, inconsiderate, lazy little toads throughout the previous twelve months and he knew that they knew that he knew that.  Nonetheless, the wretched little miscreants were making demands (Demands, mind you, not requests) for toys and games which were becoming, with each passing year, more complex and harder to build and, because of their bulk, harder to fit on the sleigh.

One evening, at about 3 o’clock in the morning, at the  tail end of a 48 hour shift, a little angel came into the workshop with a tree slung over her shoulder and said “Santa Claus, Santa Claus, where do you want me to put this Christmas Tree?”