Whelp, I cdan now say I passed a course on-line at M.T.T. and am thrilled....

Took the final today, and really had to sweat it out on a couple of the problems to solve.  Gawwd, I hate the charts to fill out per drag and drop.....   Renembering dates is not my storng point.  But concepts and completing floor plans..   a breeze.

So to sum up my experience with the EdX program.  The concept is fantastic, the interactivity is first rate.  

i dumped my two courses at the university of Texas.  The first one was only doing it by rote and was so terrified of the camera, he was distracting...   looked like a deer in the headlights and the content was so superfluous, wasn't learning much I didn't know.  

The second had me stymied for weeks.  I thought it was my fault, till he got to the eras I know about.  First he pissed me off by trashing Freud, then Wittgenstein, and represented theories in such a vague way, I thought...   this stuff is just masturbating your brain, going in circles and never coming to a conclusion about things soague, they are insignificant.  

But when he got to the Soixties, I knew he was a charlatan, and a racist to boot.  He dissed Kennedy, praised McCarthy, and sorta praised Johnson, and then came to the only thing he thought was interesting about the era, and that was the race riots in 1968...  and said of Johnson, 'He'd given them (the african Americans)  everything they wanted, and they rioted.  And went sanctimonious theatrical, and with hands up, said, 'Why?  Why?   Nobody knows.'

And which point I finally exploded and yelled at the screen and shouted, you sanctimonious ASSHOLE!'

Point one..   he's near my age and grew up in Philly, so should know better.  Point two, I had a course in Salzburg just on the year 1969 alone with a socioligist who is world renowned, it was so important, because it nearly came to a world-wide revolution, and there was mcuh more happening, so I was incensed that he would be teaching young people such revisionist and racist drivel.  

So I got hold of myself, and said...  'Ren, think.   You don't want a flame war.'  So I dropped them both.  The people of Texas are not being served well, if those two are typical of what is being taught.

The course at M.I.T. was balsam.  It was fresh, it came from an unexpected viewpoint and gave a historical view of the world around us and how moments and buildings in history have left legacies in society that have echoed down through the centuries to the present time.  

It was demanding, but fascinating, and that professor was so passionate, and was able to pass on his love of the subject and knowledge in such a way that the way you see the world slants in perspective and seems new.  And THAT is the difference between education and 'edumacation', as Atrios an economist calls it.

.

So...  with EdX, it's a case of picking and choosing   The M.I.T. courses are demanding, but if you have a solid background, very valuable.  Forget Texas at Austin.  

At any rate, I passed the final and fucked up one problem because the icons were too small.    You had to drag and drop the tiny pictures on a world map, but even with my reading glasses, three of them were so vague, I couldn't recognise them even using a magnifying glass.    That was the pits...   so I sort of guessed and got it wrong.

There was a final video from the professor this week.  Thanking for everyone's participation.  Twenty four thousand people enrolled in the course and followed it.  Four thousand will get a certificate, as he set the bar high at 80 percent correctness.  I ended up with a 93 percent overall, and 95 per cent on the exams.  

This made me very happy and satisfied.  But more importatntly, I learned a lot and feel enriched by the experience.  He's going part 2 next year on-line, and can't wait to sign up.  

So to reiterate....  one has to choose.  But hey, it's all free.  But one should try to stay away from the ones who waste your time.  Really terrific professors are rare as hen's teeth.  Professor Mark is a gem.

A requium for a good man..

I had just finished the post below, and got bad news.  Or news...  whatever.  The only one of my former bosses whom I truly liked and respected had just died.  And he was younger than I am.   

Seeimingly he'd had something with his gall, maybe stones, then it was acute, then they operated, then he got sepsis, and died,  

He was from Iran.  

I know, I know, there is a mess of stuff in the right wing media nowadays and for a long time now about Iran, none of it good.   But there is a difference when you know someone from that country, and they consider themselves Persians with a long history of which they are very proud.

Mr. N. was very kind to me, which I found odd...  because we came from diametrially opposite cultures.  He had the Tunesian board of tourism people stay with us, and was explicit about wht he wanted in their hotel rooms.  First time West went contra East hey.  He wanted me to put alcoholic beverages in them.  I said, 'sorry, I can't do that.'  #'And we had this Ausrian guy in the lobby pering up his ears.  

Mr. N. said, listen, there are 55 mph signs on the highway, but people still go faster.  

(His references always made me nearl laugh outright)

When Peter messed up and I left our home, he drove all the way from 'Vienna just to let me know in person that he was supportive, and that if I needed anything, anything, I should just call him, which perplexed me to the max.  

And surely flattered, but, I thought, hey, people of islamic faith aren't like that...   But he definitely was...   He said, I really admire your loylty.'  I thought he meant to the company, but he repeated it with emphasis, and I knew he meant mine to Peter's and it blew my mind.

I know that he was very kind.  And that he lvoed his family above everything on earth.  And I know that he had it bad with his partners, because they treated him with less than the respect he deserved.  So it doesn't surprise me that they galled him to death..,s  so to speak.   

He was very small in stature.  Such tiny feet.  Delicate in frame, and somewhere along the line, had had is eyebrows singed off.  they were just darker red lines above his eyes, which was a bit distracting.

I assume he was Sunni in his religious faith, although he never talked about beliefs.  I recently learned the difference in my M.I.T. course about that.  If so, their beliefs come parallel to what real christians believe.   I found him to be more 'christian' than a lot of people who run around touting their supposed superiority and proselytise their ignorance and try to force it on others.  He lived his faith, and was very kind.

And tolerant.

He leaves a very beautiful and cultured wife behind, and his beloved children.  His eyes danced when you were in favor, and if something rankeled, they turnd to deadlights.  no light, no sparkle, and you knew you'd overstepped a boundary.  He was an artist in a kitchen.  

Paradise is as persian word, I recently learned.  It means a wonderful most beautiful garden you get to live in in the afterlife.  So I hope that Mr. N finds his paradise.  and may he rest in peace.l  and for the war mongers....  well, they really don't know what they are talking about with all their hate.  

He meant much to me.   



                                   

Things you remember.... regretfully...

Props to Jo for the New orleans mardi gras swag...   It really isn't how I thought I would look at sixty four, but I got this present, you see, and  I COULDN'T resist....  

But have waited since I was eighteen for the day, so why not....    Was never a fan of the beatles, and this song drove me absolutely nuts.       Now it makes a bit of sense.  Have fun.   I  was certain I would never reach this age, so happy birfday to me....   or something.....                                                                  

Odd...  when you're eighteen or nineteen, you think you will live forever.  Then you turn around twice, and hey!  you're sixty-four.

Time can be like that.


I was watching the film Logtime Companion last night on YouTube and thought...  'acturally Ren, you shouldn't BE here.   So for what it's worth:    enjoy.

Adventures in Edumacation... Thanks to Steven Colbert...

Sometime back in August, I was watching Steven Colbert's show on the internets...  and his guest was a professor from Harvard, who said he'd gotten together with a bunch of colleges and universities to offer free courses on-line free of cost to anyone who wanted to siggn up for one.    Well it sounded interesting....

Colbert asked him whiy he would do such a thing when it costs sexty thousand dollars a year to physically study there, and he said, it was a way of giving back to the world.

It sort of got my attention, all right.  So I went to the site he mentioned, and took a look at it, and what was being offered, being retired and all, and mostly bored, thinking it would be a change of pace and challenging to see if I still had a noggin which would absorb 'rarified information'.

The course titles looked a bit daunting.  But I found four that were mostly related to my minor subject at UNH forty !!! years agp. amd sogmed up. Three were topic related, one was in science.  Now, in October, have dropped two of them.  One because it was so advanced, I didn't have the necessary basic knowledge to follow, let alone pass, and one because it was badly organised.

Leaves two.  Of the tow, one is at the university of texas at Austin, and am getting by in, but am not so keen on how it is constructed.  The other is STELLAR.  A History of Global Architecture taught at MIT.  I've already learned more about the world in two weeks than I could have at UNH in tow semesters!  It is time consuming and demanding, but really a complete trip.  And is more about the history of the world and how we hot to where we are now than mechanics, and about the buildings themselves.  I really look forward to each lecture, and this past week, had to get through twelve hours of them, but each was a minor revelation.

I've since picked two others, one of which begins today, and one which begins in November.  So it is keeping me busy.  But that isn't the reason I wanted to bring this subject up.

I know from the news about the insane costs of higher education in the US these days.  So for anyone who has children who are strapped for funds, this site may provide a real answer to those who want to study but can't afford it....  BECAUSE...  if you pass, you can earn a certificate which will be acknowledged as course credits by most colleges and universities.

And some of these aren't what we used to call gut courses  (easy).  They set a high  bar and demand some intensive time on-line.

The set up is very easy to folow, and there is a tutorial course on how to navigate the interfaces.

There are no hidden costs.  

So pass the word along to anyone you know who are so strapped, financially, they can't begin or continue their education.   So far, I've leared that some of the courses are just 'edumacation, but others are of very high quality indeed, and challenging.

Just tell them to go to www.edx.com and sign up, which is very easy, and to check what is being offered.

And a tip:  the people at MIT are just incredibly good.

This was a public service announcement.

And Georgie Got His Gun.... back

George Zimmerman killed a sixteen year old kid who was just going home and agressively confronted him, and possibly, the kid tried to defend himself from the creepy ass cracker who was following him..   

George Zimmerman was acquitted.  And the court gave him his gun back.

His racist lawyer said he needs it because now he is more threatened than ever.   open seson on black kids....  or something...  scary.

Seriously, if that were here?  Well...  I've never wanted a gun, but am fairly sure the laws in ma countra would prohibit me from owning one...  And I'm fine with that.  We don't have crazy ass crackers going after minorities out on the square...  it would be a blood bath.  We did have one liquored up asshole backwater mountain guy stab and egyptian ....   once.   Some time ago.  We don't have a culture of violence...  

But we also don't get easy access to high grade weapons...  like at all....  

But Georgie got his gun back.  Here he'd have undergone strict psychiactric evaluation.  There?  n'yeh...  they just returned it to him.  Some people didn't find it a good decision.  I  wonder why....

LET him go out on a RAM-page,    And then they'll say... 'WHO WOULD HAVE SUSPECTED HE'D DO THAT???#

Yup...  Georgie got his gun back.  God help the people where he lives in the future, and oh!  fun fact.  He had a rap sheet.  His victim didn't.

How incredibly devastating...,.

I just learned of the verdict in the George Zimmerman trial, and had been certain, given all I'd seen of it, and the intense discussions concerining it, that there would be at least a manslaughter decision, seeing that the murder 2 bar was set very high given the lack of evidence...   

That he was acquitted left me speechless for two hours.  Literally.  I hadn't written about the case before now, because I thought it would be a slam dunk for the prosecution.  

The verdict only proves that there is no justice for african-americans in 'Murka, and that the stand your ground laws only invite disaster.  

It's disgraceful.  But there's a lot of that going around these days, and not only in 'Murka.   

One of the interesting things about msnbc is that they have really increased their hosts with racially diverse backgrounds, and from them I get to hear points of views that I normally wouldn't not having contact personally, and that enriches the discussions people have.

Like the incredibly handsome and intelligent Touré on The Cycle, who can sound off about what it is like to be a young  black man who just by nature of the color of his skin is perceived as threatening , and he gets very vocal about how frustrating it is, or how he and his peers have to behave in ways that do not get them into life-threatening situations.

B ut it was the women who really drove home the results of what that verdict meant to the african-amercan community...  what to say to their children.  Melissa Harris Perry put it best...  she said they have two choices...  live in a predominantly black community where young people can die on the street, usually killed by other young blacks..  or live in a gated community, and even there...  like Trayvon Martin, they can go out to the local store for a snack, and end up  being profiled and killed without having been up to any sort of mischief.  And her frustration was so palpable...   ending with...  there's no place you can go where your children will be safe.   

That is a really damaging conclusion to have to come to.  But didn't surprise me.  The right will make George Zimmerman a He-ro...  but Trayvon Martin is still dead and the justice system in the US failed their minorities.

Disgrazia!  Disgraceful.

So Where Did YOU vacation????

I lurvs me the US morning shows.  Really.  They are anything but down to earth.  I watch college educated assholes who probably had C or D averages jawing on about affairs of the day, and spouting the worst nonsense I ever heard....   but hey...  they went to college, they're in the club.....

I don't mean to offend anyone who went to college because they theought they would LEARN something...  And possibly did.  There is a college trap...   

Let's think about this.  In my day, registration fees were two thousand dollars aq year.  That hardly covered living on campus so I knew some 'poor' people who commuted, and we arraanged to get to our lectures and seminars, and drive back to work 80 hour weeks to psay off our loans so we could finance the next semester, because......

We earned too much and thuis weren't eligible for a grant or scholarship.  The novel Catch 22 was popular back then.  You should read it.

The most wonderful thing that ever happened was when I got to 
German summer school....  oh msn...  2 semesters in eight weeks.  Wow, I was up for it, paid the fees....  only to find they hadn't included the dorm and cafeteria fees.  I was devasated.  Said...'Sorry, I can't come up with that money...'  And they told me to wait and held a conference, and whaddaya know...  I suddenly had a grant from the German government.  Just like that.

Kids in America are fasced with debts on .loans that are so high, it is unimaginable to me.  I spent nearly eight thousand dollars on mx so-called edumacation....  except the government nixed what I was studying, because, hey...  what Ami wants to learn a foreign language, so they didn't have it as a requisite to get into college.  

We never got taught economics.  That got dumped from the lower school curriculum in the Fifties, man....  they didn't want us to understand how we were possibly getting fucked over.

The year I was paying my tuition...  and workind eighty hours a week and trying to learn something...  I paid nearly rwice what a waieter in Austria made...  before tips...  and they lived ok...

No one ever held out a hand to help except the germans...  which was interesting...

So I get back into the rhythm of the news after the fucking loooongg break for the fourth of July, and everyone on these morning shows, who are so attuned to people...  but are in a sort of club...  went ON about where they vacationed......

OOOO...  the Hamptons...

I was in Nantucket.

I was in Cape Cod, but went to Martha's Vinyard for the first time...

That was stupiid Joe.  

But the most vapid of the morning shows, who thinks she has themes that connect with 'üeople'... No, we weren't in the South of France'-  Sje was om 10 Downing Street sittting in Winston Churchhills's chair.  And vistiting her ambassodor brother in 'Sweden...  who is doing a tremendous job!  Everybody'ss should have a life like hers....  except she is always unhappy and suffers from an inferioritys complex....  and because she grew up with every amenity you could ever wish for...  she thinks she cqan empathise with the plight of the average americaqn and chirp and twet and peep and be 'cool'

Why does a liberal chanel liek msnbc let thexse people on screen where you get so frustrated you want to scratch your eyes out?

And then I think of Peter...  except he spread the joy and the money and took people with us because they liked me or loved me.  So, Mika...  I haven't been anywhere in five years, nor can I afford to....

But I've seen Venice over two decades, and Genua, and Rome, and Athens twice, and the most beautiful island in the world Hydras, and the blue of the Mediterranean, and the excitement of Berlin especially after the Wall fell and that ensuing chaos..I sat in Harry's 'Bar in Venice in the 70's, and watched Truman Capote come in for the nien p.m dining sitting upstairs, with his coterie from New York.  

So they should just go fuck themselves, becauser it downt get you anywhere in life, it was a personal experience and they should get over it.  Just because they could afford it doesn't mean that it was more meaningful...  Some of my cheaöpest trips taught me more about life than anything the fenced off upper class would ever imaginge.  

They  really irritate me.

Ok.. I now admit I'm a news addict... yay..... and the world is nuts. and then comes the crash in San Francisco...

There was no news...  understandable... Murkins stare at their navel and celbrate their grandiosness....  (hold hand up....)  'But Egypt is erupting, and what does it all meeeeaaaan?'  Crickets till Sunday buster, and then the white journamalist who is so ENTITLED is gon  na get a whole lot of white old grouchy men in to tell you they know what's going on and explain it to you...  

Riiiiiight....

You get this entitled guy who is so out of it and has mostly only republicans on huis show..., because, xyou know they are in charge or something...  he's really gross...  And then you get the liberal channel breaking in in the afternoon, with sympathetic hosts who champion the right causes, and cheer on the left.   

Who's there for the middle?  Seemingly no one, but they are the ones who carry the country and the top tier is basically: 'fuck em'.

What I hate about being addicted to news is that I confuse it with a soap opera.  I'm ooooollllld...  And Fridays are sort of cliff hanger Fridays, like the old series they used to show before a movie...  Flash Gordon=  Oh yeah, I saw them in a retrospective...  awesome.  That dude was awesome......  really...  for the Thirties?  daring undrgarmentys...  but he'd never make final cut for the Chippendales nowadays....  

So on Cliffhanger Friday, we always get a crisis somewhere...  A congressman in trouble, another Rethug who said he went hiking and ends up with his mistress in South America, and she's SO FUCKING GOOOD...  he extends vacation and gets caught... but he's baaaaaack....  bless him.

Friday, Egypt was on fire..  dangersous stuff.....   interesting, how would the government react, hoq would the WUUURLD survive, because, hey, that's how they fucking sold it...

So over four days...   nada...   the Essence Festival in New Orleans, and there were some very serious topics covered...  so we got thrown a bone...  (salivate, salivate, get engergiued....)

It was interesting that those clips only got posted sunday niht late when no one was pulling it upß on the internets, but me being six hours ahead, yeah, I cautht it and said, 'oh, thanks for the crimbs you guys...  You put fucking braying jackass Joe up about ten minutes after a segment is shown.....

Sheesh..

So today is MONDAY....   oooooo....  I've been news deprived for over four days, and what happened Friday in Egypt and how is the US going to handle that?    

There ARE no cliff-hanger Fridays...   Egypt fucking DISAPPERED!   Can you imagine?  It's not what I saw elsewhere, but wow...  for the Murkins...  it doesn't exist any more....  That's better than a Houdini trick.

And what was the topic?  WOW...  the plane crash in San Francisco and the media whores pointing out that no major crash had happened in YEARS... (if you except that one ant that ont and that one, but hey, ehy were small planes, not zzz's....  (sigh... I luvs me some media whores...  smile)

And they want instant gratification.  'What CAUSED this?  I wanna KNOW!!  lIKE YESTERDAY!!!'

OK; let us get our panties otu of a twist, and some of you may need more time than others because theye is mor cloth involved.---

Personally?  Amaing that there was so little loss of life...  but I hate to think what the 186 injured are gonna have to indure... the news dosn't focus on that.... they need the STORY...  except they miss the story...  how will those people's lives be impacted.  How will they survive financially..  What will be the physical and emotional cost of recovery= Will anyone cover those costs?

Well, we never get that narrative...  in any sense of the word....

And THAT...  is show business....   always deflecting, never attention focussed on what is the subject or real, 'Oh, look shiny new object.  

I ahven't told anyone I grew up there in a long while.   It would be too embarrassing.  Rapacious, racist, supressive, repressive, b igoted, divisive, hateful spiteful, angry...   and #God help me....  if ther is one...  there are a couple of people I love there,   So what do you do?

It'w a dilemma...

I want the contunance of Friday's episode, because you can bet your bottom...  (who though up that term...  why would yo wanna bet your ass on anything...  and what would the winner want to do to it`?  Beat it?

They'll mess it up..  And on Halloween, I will go as Mr. Cahos.  

It might be a worthy goal.

Chilren and Art...

I had an interesting afternoon...   a friend dropped by and returned some videos.  And since the US had been devoid  of news these past days, I diverted myself by watching 'AouTube.  I wanted something cheerful to laugh about, so I typed in G'eorge Carlin, only to find out he died in 2008..   six months before Obama was elected.  There were many clips, but one in paricular which sort of summed up his entire view of the world qnd politics and religion and was outrgeous....   because what he said was true...  and that was nice...

I think it sort of shocked my friend...  not so much the profanity but the content.  

But one of his non-political themes sort of resonated with me.  Children in the US are no longer allowed to be children in certain circles.  The parents fight to get them into the best kindergartens at great cost.  Make playdates fot them for crissakes..   Children can not be children any more over there..  seemingly...  And parents here are also so overprotective...  I just thought...  I'm glad I'm not a child nowadays.

My parents weren't over-prtective...  they both worked, but they istilled some sense into us and there were rules....  be home at five p.m. for supper, and if it was summer,  before dark.  They never questioned where we'd been or what we'd done and we rarely got out of hand on our early years...  

I had a ro-mance with a young girl when I was nine...  as was she.  We traded notes at the VA club next door...  in a grate in the wall... very romantic....

That club was the center of much attention for us kids.  It had a huuuge hall where we could be onlookers at elegant weddings, and square dancing competitions, and on Saturday nights, we could watch the 'hops'  sponsored by the local radio, and my brother would hang upside down on a fence and was obsessed with counting who had the most petticoats going it.  It was the Fifties, after all.  Many took umbrage, and I had to get him out of trouble, even tho he was three  years ysounger.  

And yesah, we could get out of hand and go down to the LOWER corporation beyond the canal and run riot with the really poor kids and hunt rats in the millyards, where the kids were really Dangerously cool...  or something...  and did dare sou stuff like jumping onto moving trains.  

Or going onto the other side of Elm St and joining a gang for a day or so to help demolish the remnants of a house that was to Be demolished...   jumpin oon beams and just revelling in being destructive, because it was coming down anyway...  

Well, after two days of that without injuries, I decided it wasn't reallys my thing...   Instead...  four or five of us with meet under some bushes outside the Cancer Society...  and it was dank and cool in there on a summer's eveining...  and tell ghost stories or  tell all about the latest hooror film we'd seen and try to creep one another out...  till it got dark and we had to go home...

Later, when we were older, we'd join some lame-assd group and it was an excuse to get out once a week, but we didn't go to the meetings, oh no..  we cruised the main drag, and ate pepper steak sanwiches and smoked...  shocking.

And when we started working in the cinema, we met people from all sociqal classes, and made friendships which would last a long time.  And we's sit up till 2 a.m. and discuss the newest films, and it was so exciting, there were so many new ideas...  and we'd share our expieriences and find out that kids from the rich part of town had the same problems we did.  Which was sort of liberating...

Our parents ere worried we were taking DRUGS?  We were hveing marathon discussion about religion and how it had affected our families..   ooooo   we were such rebels....

A'lthough I was up to reading seven books a week at that point,,,,,  once an addict always and addict, and it was about new ideas...  i came into contact with other peers from diverse social strata, and that was a good thing.

So all the molly-coddling and wussification istn't EVAH gonna do any good, because if they do that...  the trouble they'll get into later is going to be major.

I'm glad I was let to 'rund wild'  because, hey taught me right from wrong but they gave me real freedom.  

Just sayin'

First the dogs....

Am watching Morning Joe...

Clips of the Arizona fires and that 19 firefighters died, and tragic...

And then there was a clip of this OLD guy who'd just lost his house...  and he said, 'First I got the dogs, then the wife... and then we lost the house.'

I went into complete hysterics...  for laughing.

And I thought...   'oh MAN, you'r priorities are really screewed up.'  And laughed so hard I could hardly contain myself.

It really says a lot about 'Murka.  And certainly says much about women's rights and how they are being trampled on.

I really think that guy had a prblem with is wife......

just sayin...

Filibuster

So...  juis before the weekend, the almost best filibuster EVAH was carried out by a texan lady with brass ovaries...  Wendy #Davis.  The coverage was awesome.

Not so awesome was the response of that half-witted entitlement Bush wannabe Perry.  Texas is so weird...  And he was so out of line with his personal counter attack, I'm sure he'll not get much traction out of his egregious reaction.

A friend gave me a present two days later...  a restored version of Mr.Smith Goes to Washington on dvd.  The timing was so ironic.  I hadn't seen it in over forty years, and it was from the golden year 1939.  

Needless to say, it became so timely when watching, I got goose bumps.  James Stewart has to defend himself at the end by staging a filibuster, which in those days was a rare and nearly unused procedure in the Senate.  

Although nowadays, all anyone has to do is say filibuster, and the process gets shut dwon, back then, it was dramatic.  It jmade me cry...   not because it was a moving story and is a masterpiece of filmmaking, but because of how relevant it is to today.  I would reccomend it to all who have an interest in history, and see how nothing changed, but indeed, became worse.  

Wendy Davis of Texas became the real-life James Stewart of today by standing up and giving the state senate bore than it ever bargained for.  Good on her.  I'm sure she'll go far.

Joe Scarborough is not a racist or a bigot....

I've been cogitating over the past few days about the horrendous supreme court ruling on the voting rights act.  And I was right...  they saved the DOMA and Prop 8 decisions for last to deflect from how bad that decision was...  

So let's begin with a short story.  In the 90's we had groups of US tourists mostly from the US, who stayed on one of those whirlwind tours they so like.....  visit ten countries, fly low over five others and     you have seen the world sort of things.  And one evening one of the UK tour leaders who liked me said, come join us, they'll love that your from America.  So I said ok., and she introduced me to a rather regal looking lady who was from 'Tennessee, and said, 'He's American too.'   (I still was, at the time)  And she asked, 'Where y'all FROM?'  And I named a northern state, whereupon her visage underwent a remarkable changed and her eyes practically spit sparks and she hissed:  'Damned Yankee!'  She was a senior citizen.  I was taken aback, and said, 'Well, I can't help were I was born', and excused myself and went back to my desk thinking, ''Wow, over 100 years, and it still is there...that hate.'

That anecdote is the crux of my point in this post.

Now, I listen to Joe Scarborough's 'Morning Joe' often, usually doing something else on the computer, because he irritates me totally, and his cohort Mika is so clueless and entitled and snobbish, I would throw something at the screen if I were only to watch it.  

Over time, I know he is self-deprecating and usually has a sort of inferiority complex because he 'only' went to the university of Alabama, but the way he does it is telling when he has his white privileged class guests who were at Yale and Havid...  and he's brash, and yet...  he has a good heart, and he engages in good causes that really go opposite to what you think he would support.  

I think he is somewhat mysoginistic, but don't know how much of that is for show....  I know he was in congress and had the time of his life and was very conservative, but he is one of the few who can present an idea which even I would agree with, which would make it interesting if I would ever meet or have a conversation with him...

So on Friday, that man's head EXPLODED when he had people on his show who were critical of the shutting down of the voting rights ammendment.  He was close to an aneurism, and felt he was being accused of being racist, or bigoted.   

And the discussion went so badly, he really nearly lost it.   

On the first listening, I thought   'What is his PROBLEM?'

No one had intimated anything of the sort.

I was so surprised, I listened a second time while I had a game on since I don't have to actually SEE him...   and there it was...

More than once he referenced living in the Northeast and how it GALLED him, this condescending attitude and I believe the phrase 'the north having their boots on our necks' and treating his part of the country as racists and bigots.  Or maybe I dreamt it...  But it wasn't the sort of thing I might imagine.  

And there it was, my 'AHA!' moment.  We're back to the goddamned 'War of Northern Agression' and the feelings of anger and hate and humiliation that got passed on over generations.  

And the truth of the matter is:  it all had nothing to DO with what has been egregions in voter supression in the US of late.  At least not directly, not as I see it.  It's a fucking game they play.  As in 'How to Win DIRTY.  So you change the rules of the game to get your candidates in, and you don't fucking care how you do it, you go in to win....  

That is the real crux of the matter.   So you make up rules to make the opposing side not want to vote, or make it difficult for them to vote, the main goal is getting your candidate in.

I don't think that the fact that the people who get the short end of the stick are poor, or minorities, or even racially motivated.  At least not most of the time.  But the fact ist... people who vote for democrats  usually are minorities, or very poor.  And that is a sad staste of affairs...   but I do not think they are thinking race first....

They'd target any other sort of demographic if they think it would serve their purposes.

Actually, he came up with a good idea.  Make the preclusion laws valid for all fifty states, because let's face it...   as is, the supression problem is rampant all over the place.

So no...  Joe Scarborough is not a bigot, he is not a racist.  He's a human being, and even has some very likeable qualities despite me finding him abrasive, and fights some good fights.  But I think he is a good man who passionately defends his positions, and so deserves my utmost respect.  I wish others of his party were half as human as he is.  It would even lead to sensible discussion.  Maybe....

Cowardly Supremes

The bastards appointed to the SU'preme Court really outdid themselves yesterday. But wanted to keep their hands clean, because that is what they do...  they deferred a decision back to congress to change and decide.  Doesn't that sound 'judicial''.  Trusting the current Congress to decide anything as vital to the sysem as the voting rights act.    Thjese people need to get their act together.

The voting rights act was a huge acheivement in American history to ensure there would be no more supression, and that every....EVERY...  citizen had a right to vote.  That's what democracy is supposedly about...  as some #Greek explained it to me, because, you know, they invented democracy in Athens, thanks to philosphers or somethin':

So the idea that Americans invented it is pretta funny becaquse, errm, there are documents that pretty much tell us it was a Greek invention, although the West seems not to like them at the moment.  along with a lot of other people..

Having followed eh last election closely in teh news, the attempts at keeping  certain minorities from voting was very prominent and angrifying.  But the Supremes seemingly live in a rarified atsmosphere...  when some of them aren't beeing seen with the Koch Brothers or others of that ilk, but they have the chamring knowledge that they are above what they decide and SEEMINGLY  stay at home but a few get found having attended weekends with the Koch 'Bros, those hideous but obscenely wealthy twins... almost...

I'm old enough to remember fifty years ago.  I remember very well.  Thoday the Bush appointees to the Supreme #Court killed democracy and equal voting rights.  Tomorrow, they might grant gay marriage rights...  fucking DOMA., which was a Clonton fist up the ass to all gaa 'Americqans might be rescinded, and all teh hurt will go away.  They would think.

I'll say right now:   if they repeal #DOMA and overturn Prop 8 tomorrow, it will be a huge victory for the lgbt communitsy, but a hollow one....  because we just witnessed....   they took equal voting rights away afer fifty years.  'And that should override every other thing.

The citizen's united case was the most scandalous diecision in decades.  Yesterday, they topped themselves....Bravo! BRAVO!     BRAVOOOOO!

Fuckwads.

Some people are heros or heroines and don't even know it

The first thing I do in the morning is go get cigarettes.  One package.  And the shop is run by a lovely woman  who loves to eat, has many interests in common with me, can be very very funny, and very very angry, and over the years, these little ten minutes of interaction have sort of piled up, and i MIGHT EVEN say...  we're nearly friends.

I've heard about her struggles with schools and having her hearing impaired son not be shunted off but demqands and GETTING equal treatment for hio,. amd je now a sucessful businessman.  She  has always been a fighter.  And she is liberal, although in some things conservqative, but the latter views tend to refer to aqncient history, where we hope they will rest.

As usuaal, I sounded off abvout the post below, it being Mondaqy, and haveing CHEWED on it all weekend, and she told me a remarkable story.  Her younger son had a schoolmate whose family really put him through the wringer.  And she sensed something was wrong and drew the boy out.  Upshot was, he wanted to be a girl, and his parents werent the nice liberal ones or even half-way understanding ones you would wish for in that situation,

At any rate, she was shocked at the reaction of his parents, and she did the one thing that probably saved thaat child's life.  She listened'  She read up and seeked qdvice.  And was a rock in the ocean tide for him helping him o decidee wjhat it is he wandted.

A few months ago she came in after having all the surgeries to complete her sex chaqnge and practically smothered her with love.

Without her..   she might have died...  her parents kicked her out...  just like relatives of mine did to their sixteen year old.  Being religious is hard work, seemingly, diswoning children.

But this lady...   I'm ce.rtain she saved a life, and she said she still can't figure out what the fuss was all about in the first place.     Amd tp look at her....  you'd never guess she was-----  the most empathetic person in the world


But she's taken...  for over thirty years.  So forget it.

Cry me a River;jey... Your#RE SORRY; AND THAT's it... Well you can shut your doors but reparations are 'WAY in order...

r

I PURPSELY chose a clip that was 'Christian' and 'forgiving', because...  in the religion you were brought up in, that is what you are supposed to do.  Except:  I REALLY don't feel forgiving at all.

Look at that face..  'Who'd think it is the embodiement of pure evil and selfö-hate???`

Ok, let's back-pedal here, and explain...   TGhirty seven years ago, a group called EODUS was formed.  It was tho 'help peoplö. wo were gay become straiht.  /'Clears throat)...  People today in englightened lands woun't anderstand this at all.  But I was young at that time and very unhappy, because there weasn't media, or internet or anxyone to tell me there was nothing WORNG with me.  All I got form my sixthh year was a reamrk from a gredat Auint who was the queen of Rethug BITCHES to remar, 'Dick..  he runs like a GIRL.'  And from that moment, I thought something was WRONG with me.  

My father, God blsss him., never said a word to me...  EVAH.  If I was a bit odd, and not like other boys, he never said a word.  He's ninety-eight years old now, and we're cool...  but we don't talk about 'it'.  Even tho he met Peter, and tyhe most I got out of him was that he didn't think he was good enat eough for me.  That was a nice and loving thing to say, but he is of the last century, and was probably afraid for me because violence against my sort of person was common.  I'll never know if he ever worried about that.

So I grew up with a very negative self-image and thought for a long time I was the only person on the plantet who was 'bad' and would burn in Hell.  I sure had issure.

That was about the time that EXODUS came into being.  My Bio Mom told me when I was sixteen, first time I'd seen her after she had split and left us when I was five that if I'd discovered I were gay, I could come to her, and she'd fully understand, and THEN told me about the joys of anal sex.  

Now, if that wou't fuck your mind, what will, i ASK  you.....  

So imagine a world where you have now one to want to emulate, and you feel like a freak.

Exodus came in...  and told everyone iwhat you felt was learend behaviour, but they had the key, reparative therapy, and 'whoosh!' EVEN >YOU COULD BECOME A HETERO.

SO they had prgrames... presumably for a price...  and you could presto-changeo be a raging homophobic Republicunt.  Or somehing of the sort.

I was very lucky, because I never selfö-identified as being gay as the be-äall and end-all of my personality.  I thought, ''Ok, it's part of who you are, but yhu're lots of othing things too.'  And struggled with it alone till I was thirty, had an epihany, and said basically, 'well just FUCK you all...  I am who I am and I'm not vgong to be afraid any more.

Others in my generation weren't so lucky.  'They tapped into the trap that EXODUS set.  And  blamed themselves when they couldn't 'change' to the point of such dispair, many commited suicide, or submitted to experiments and shock therapy....   and many killed themselves.  

Thanks to the an absikzte sea.change in society, and the immense efforts of edumacation in the LGBT communitys, their sources of income have dried up, so yesterday, the head of this nefarious and evil group announced the end of their endeavours......

And the cureent head BASTARD apologised.....  for all the huurt inflicted and for those who took their lives, in a wasy that really roiled me, where I thought, 'Reallah?  YOU SICK FUCKS'.  

Younger people nowadays don#t understand the import of this news.  Especially here.  They grew up thinking everything is sorta normal, as long as it doesn't get in their way.  Case in point...  my friend K wasover in the winter scoping out my dvd's and piped up wiht Queer as Folk...  what's that about`? '  

said, 'oh, you won't like it, it's aboput gays, and and is fairly graphic.  The stations in the US had bomb threats when it was aired.  He wanted to borrow it, of I gave him the first season to look at, and he thought it was funny and interexsting.  I'd forgaooten Iive in Euerope.  

Tonight I was on the horn and told him about EXODUS and how they closed down, and he said, 'OH...  'See the LIGHT''...  there were two episodes about that in the first season.  So I said, 'Yes...  people killed themselves over it because they couldn't convert.'  Silence.

It had been portrayed humourously, but I hadn't had the heart to tell him what damae it had caused.

For those assholes to say, 'I'm sorry'     just doesn't cut it.  As a person of a certain age, I WANT RETRIBUTION.  Saing I'm sorry won't bring back the people they drove to suicide, and I am one who nearly went that route..  I want to see reparations... BIG ones.  Then...  I might accept their apology...  but unlike the lady reverend...   I can't find it in my heart to forgive the unforgiveable.

fun with health care...

I ordered my glasses today.  I get them under a leasing term because the fucking graduated ones cost so much you might as well just go blind and die.  

Leasing is...   you pay for your glasses via the bank in a nominal rate every month, and after two years, they replace them for free!  Hey!  WOW!  

Shit...

Our laws covering glasses on the national insurance rates are scandalous.  

So I ordered me some reading glasses per prescription, and am at 6 dioptrin which is a measurement and well on the way to going blind.

So this company has a leasing programme for glasses.  Sounds real good.  EXCEPT: you can only lease one pair not two, nope.  t'other is to  be paid for in full, and get this. THE THICKER THEY ARE; THE MORE HEY COST:

#I have anger issues with this... clearly.  They can suck you dry monetqarily just so you can see.  That and the dental cre system in our health care are the two things that I think need great reform.

In the other branches of med...  no complaints...  OBAMACARE is coming...  and just like here, there will be drawbacks...  but it will be awesome.  Actually, So many people in 'Murka won't have to line upü in cattle call health clinic 'SHOWS any more and reveal to the world that 'MURKA  is a heartless place.  Except:   It IS!

Who wouldaa thought...  

And the NSA thing.

As to Miss Lindsay Graham...  you go girl on your path of self.destruction, and Mr Turtle should just crawl under a rock and go to sleep for q hundred years only to wake up and have some kids think he is  frog qnd splat him with 59 Chevies.  I had one once but no drivers license yet.  My 

Life is so unfair

I've heared from three doctors, and gotten the same advice. All of them suspect I might have diabees. And given my hisory with Peter... it's really freaking me out. And even tho i knew better, I called Peter. Even after all this time, and you'd think I'd have learned. We used to discuss everything. But he's in a place... there's nuttin' for a come-back or interaction. All he understood is that I may be ill and have diabetes... and he sort of laughed, not meanly but the sense of 'how ironic'. Being the eternal iöptimist, I'd hoped for something in him to awaken and guide me, but it really isn't there any more. Nobody's home and he's in med heaven. Yet still half-way alert. Because when I told him if it really is true that I have diabetes, theere is no WAY, I'm gonna do that. And will leave. And he said, 'take me with you.'. And I said, 'Sorry Bear, can't do that.' If i comes to that and I really do, although I can't imagine why... I've always hated sweets and even ice cream as a kid, haven't had sugar in the house for ten years. But I suppose anything is possible.... But if it is... oh no, I'm not doing it. Have two shout outs from him where just the names make Peter give a shout ou and his heart-felt greetings. First to my Father, and then my cousins D and L. He loves them. which makes me verys happy. Actually... We hadn't been together long, and we were learning about each other, and exchanging stories about our families, and he was so closeted in certain ways for the time, and I wAS SORT OF EXPLODING OUT OF THE CLOSET: Ad writing a lot of stuff. And he took me aside one day and knew that I missed my father. So he took me aside, said he's saved a little money and booked a flight for him to visit us. That was very overwhelming. Of course things went sour... someone in the famblxy thought we were just jerking an old man of 70 around, and so interfered that the discount ticket Peter had gotten got bumpded and he had to pay three hundred dollars more, but other than the original anger at the interference, I never heard one further word of reproach. I later learned it had cost him the money he saved and he took a very large advance on his pay to enable us to go all over the place and for me to show my father the best side of Austria. So I guess he loved me as much as i loved him. And we all know what happened. It was the same with my cousins, and then he just arranged a sailboat tour of the adratic, hoped to be there,but was alreaDY too ill to participate in. Sometimes I think he fell in love with my family, and because he loved me and just spoiled anyone in my family or friends with a generosity that was extraordinary. So it's still there... he knows the names, perks up, says, 'oh, send them my most heartfelt greetings'. So to my Dad and cousins... something is still there in his heart if not in his mind. I can't condemn anything he ever did... later in the relationship. He always loved me, and I was always astgounded. Because he was so beutiful and I WAS A GEEK: bUT WHATEVER. If I ge a posiive on a diabetes test... there is no way I'm gonna end up a vegertable in a Pflegeheim. so... enough upset for one day. And oh yeah...

NSA just ate my post

There was a lot more below. It disappeared when I hit 'publish'. So much for freedom of expression.

This Is laughable... if it weren't so sad

For three days, I've been listening to the 'shaock and awe' of the US media and the reacions to the revelations regarding the NSA 'scatbe bad guys would know.... Psych 101. Whatever... they do it worls-wide. All you need is someone really evil... like Dick Cheneys to come in and take over, and boy howdy. Hitler will have looked like amateur hour, because wiith the hate coming out all over the place over there? 'Murka is skeeey. And a lotta people got castrated. It's a fact of life that the world is a terrible place and terrible things happen but it is no reason to go all submissive and thing it will make you safe. All in all, fairly disgusting. Can anyone tell me what people there were fighting all this time for? I don't think it was for that.

Adventures in Health care...Euro style

After avoiding doctors for two and a half years, it's become time to have some maintainance done .  So I got an optometrist appointment, and had the good luck to get an appointment in two weeks after calling.  Except that went down the tubes because the doctor got sick, so it was today.  I presented my plastic insurance card, today, and went through the exams involving some of the most modern machines imagineable.  Including fotos of the inside of my eyes immediately available to study on the computer.  (They sort of looked like NASA fotos of Saturn.)

After an hour, I had a consult with Dr. Hedwig, who is strict, but I like her especially because of that.

She told me she is stymied, because she can't find out any cause for how badly I currently see.  There is only a beginning of glaucoma, hardly enough to be an impairment. and otherwise, structurally they are sound, but the veins are extremely constricted.  Could be due to high blood pressure.   So she is 'at the end of her latin', as she said.  Although she let out a low whistle when the eye fotos appeared on the screen...

So she set up an appointment at the eye clinic where I will have more tests.    And will only have to wait six days.  Which is really fast.

She aksi advused ne to get to my GP and check out my blood pressure and test for diabetes.

So,,,,   there will be no bill.  There will be no financial havoc wreaked on my finances.  And will get the best tests possible till they find out what the problem is.  That is very comforting.  Beginning next year, people in the US are going to find that Obamacare is going to be something very positive after all.

 

back after hiatus....

My laptop hasn't functioned since november.  Today I got a replacement.  So I will be back bloviating.  Am catching up on news I hadn't seen in  a long while, and getting the new one to have the programmes in it that I want.

I reallx missed msnbc programmes.   Am currently having the gladz because 'crazy eyes' Michelle Bachman, congresswoman, Schadernfreude is soooo  delicious.

Unsolicited advice to qa young man contemplating marriage...

Dear k...  when you dropped the M word last night,one of the words that you let slip  was Torschusspanik.  And that probably is more revealing than you know.    

Despite my stupid reaction there were things that came to mind that I wished to tell you, but hey... Rose Monday and two beers....  it wasn't gonna happen.  

So...myunsolicitedadvice based on a lot of experience.  Getting married just because everyone else is is not a good idea.  

You should ask yourself the following:  is my partner to be a real friend=  That seems silly, but is far more important than most people realise.  By friend, I mean is she someone who shares most of your interests, who has the same sense of humour, who would be there for you no matter what, and who can just enjoy being silent without feeling uncomfortable, or wondering what you are thinking.  And would you feel the same way?  T If the answer to all that is yes,I see a good chance of you becoming a very happy man.

Seual compatibility is actually a secondary factor in a relationship.  It can grow and wane, and should never be the main reason to commit yourself for a lifetime if thatis all that is behind one's decision.  It only sets you up for a world of hurt somewhere down the line.I have known many people who have arrangents that are unorthodox, but their friendship and mutual respect is what holds them together.  

I sincerely wish you have found all that, because then you will have a rich life,and the obstacles that fate throws your way will be easier to overcome.  I wish it from the bottom of my black little heart.

And by the way...  thanks for prying this crustaceous old clam out if its' moorings yesterday and making him laugh as he hasn't in a long time.  I hope to return the favor.

Fractured #Fairy Tale ii

  

Once upon a time, there was a boy....He grew up in a time when movies were magic, and the places they were shown in were palaces of grandeur and light and beauty.  And one of his first memories was being taken to the empress of all the teheaters in his town, with the big granite head on it side, the main room was vast and beautivul, and there were what he decided were Crhistmas trees depiced on the sides of the stage and had partridges in them, so he thought.  At eight, he'd no idea of what art was, or art deo...  it was just beautiful, hr thought.. And there was a monstoursly big chandelier way up above hanging miraculously from the ceiling. 

The boy became enamoured of seeing stories unfold and became enraptured of all the tleles they told, thinking that they might be ones that would come ture for him one day.  But he didn't go to that palace often, and changes abounded in the years he was growing up.

Ownership had passed from the father do the daughter, who married a man who had the same last name and she entrusted the running of the company to him, although his real interest lay in antiques, and the authenticating of the same.  In that, he was so expert, he became an advisor to the highest official in the land, and renovated their ...  and the nation*'s house.   He was a proud man, and an arrogant man.  Because, unlike the man who built a small cinema empire on his own, and was thankful for the employees who made him successful and rewarded them, he had grown up in a family of wealth and privilege.  

Yet he was smart enough to know that if he wasn't savv about running a cinema chain, he trained and hired the best managers possible to run it for them, and mostly sayed out of their way, and prospered very nicely.  

And for all his love of antiques...  he had no sense of what a jewel he possessed in the Emprss of the one city where most of his assets were.

The Boy would later meet two of the people who had been there from the beginning  An usher who had worked up through the rnnks to become a successful manager, and a cashier ticket seller who was rather odd and became outright dotty.

The manager presided over two palaces in Phlidelphia, which was a pretty exciting place to be in the Fifties...  He learned how to throw benefit showings for good causes, and 'society' thanked him for it generously.  Hollywood people mingled with mob types, and he handled it with aplomb.  He was a heavy-weighted man, with jowls, and eyes that twinkled with an innate good humour hard to be found anywhere, and a sense of generosity that was unbounded.

He retured to his home town and to manage the 'Emrpess and it's subsiuaries sometime in the late  Fifties.  The Empress played host to live concerts, and one charity event that had the people of the city on their ears for the SCANDAL....  a midnight showing... for charity...   of Fellini's 'La Dolce V'ita'....   one night only, and it was never shown in the state again.  Shock levels were very low compared to what the world knows today.  

Around the time that Ben Hur was shown, which the BOY attened, outraged that the price for a child had been jacked up from 59 to z5 cents, there had been a general remodeling.  Gone was the high glorious atrium, the ceiling had been lowered to an everyday entry, gone were the glorious art deco paintings to the sides of the screen, and every thing was the color of dried blood, drab and dull.  

And despite that, it still maintained the majesty it had always had, and to either side of the lobby the ceilings soared, and there were still remarkable chandeliers, and staircasee majestically rising to the upstairs level where the balcony and offices were.

In some of gthe auxillary palaces there were special events, and in the Fifties, there were late night monster flims where...  so read the placards...  the monsters came out of the screen and attacked the audiens... of tried to scare them at least.  Unfortunately, that never worked so well  The monsters were just poor ushers in costumes, and the local high school hoodlums were ginned up on beer or what not and beat on them.    Not the best call one could make...

And through all this, there was Gertil..  She'd been a ticket chashier since day one, and had become old....  very old.  Tiny, hawklike face, by the Fifties, hse had become every childs' nightmare   

Her arthritic hands made her fingers claw like, and she had unnaturally odd blonde hair.  Later the Boy would learn it was because she used coffee grounds in her shampoo, and thus the color, and believed that that was why they had never turned grey.  But she terrified him as a child.  

'PUT your money down!  PUT your money down!'  And the minute anyone did it was 'GEt yozur HANDS outta da box office!'  She was terrifying.

Although the Boy would work alongsinde her for some years later, he only learned a few things from her.  In quiet moments between shows, she woulod continue to pine over her deceased fiancé.  'We were engaged for 20 years, but he died before we could get married.'  The 'Boy never figured THAT one out.  

Her proudest day was woking a venue in Boston, and the origina lowner paid ehr a compliment.  That one had no air conditioning, so on a hot day, you would seat people with spaces between them, so the air circulated better, and he told her 'Gerti, you really know how to seat a house'.  And that, coming from the origtinal owner was something she carried to her grave with pride...  that she really knew how to seat a house.

And it was something the subsequent owner would never have dreamed of saying.  His employees made him even richer, but his opinion was..htey were lucky to have HIM, not the other way around.  

Beginning in the Sixties, society began to chane, and would bring many to the Empress of theaters, and later ultimitely the decline and fall of the proud Empress.  To which the Boy was witness  

To be continued....

Fractured Fairy Tales... history...

Once upon a time, in a far-off kingdom, there was a golden age, where everyone had a chicken in their pot, and dreamed of getting rich quick, and thought that if they only invested their savings, they would be able to accrue great wealth. And dreamed that everyone could become a king.

They built pleasure palaces the likes of which had nver been seen.  Alas, the building in that kingdom was the last of the great ones.  It was in a style they called 'Art Deco', and when one entered, there was a vaulted shaft reflecting the multivaricolored lights in the glass on the front, and sported a magnificent chandelier.  

Inside, there was a spacious reception area, and the theater room was huge, with another chandelier high up near the ceiling which was so enormous, the electric lights in it could only be changed if it were lowered on a winch and the breadth took up over a third of the auditorium...  and took a full day to change all the bulbs at necessary intervals, and raise it again.

It was so modern, it had a series of vents beneath the seating in which, during the dog days of August, ice blocks could be placed.  In the back below ground were two, one and a half story high fans, which, when activated, cirdulated through the vents and blowing over the ice, cooled it in summer.  It was a marvel of modernity

There was organ playing for silent films, and a full stage that could accomodate live shows, dressing rooms upstairs in the back of the stage, everything one could wish for in elegance and efficiency for its' time.  

Just a few days before it was to open in all its' splendor and magnificence, disaster struck.  Stock speculations had become rampant, several bubbles burst and people who had believed in becoming richer and richer were suddenly left with nothing...  all their money had magically disappeared into thin air...  poof.  

The results were, it plunged the kingdom into a depth of poverty no one had ever seen or imagined before.  Certainly, some profited from the disaster, but no one ever spoke of that.  The main concern was finding where one's next meal was to come from.  Factories failed, people died.   

The owner of the pleasure palace had invested a vast amount of money in his building, the crowning jewel in a chain of splendiferous edifices.  And these developments left him in a terrible situation, as it would have to go under befoe it even opened...  unless....  unless...

The owner gahtered all his people, and asked them to believe in his undertaking.  He asked them to work for the first two weeks without salary, promising to include them in profit sharing, and benefits if they would help him.  

And as there wasn't much of a choice, the staff agreed.  The opening was magnificent, and after the two weeks, the business was solvent and more or less saved.  The owner was very grateful, and treated his employess very well, gave them benefits that were generous, arranged yearly outings for them at his expense, and so it thrived.  

Things a ren't that way today, but whaddaya want, it was long ago and in a far-away kingdom. So it survived.  

To be continued.... 

A History Lesson for Michiganders, Wisconsinites, and all the rest

We once had a very brilliant chancellor who did not suffer fools gladly.  Famously, when asked a stupid question in a press conference which exposed the ignorance of the 'jornamalist', he went on a rant with the famous line, while shaking his finger at him, 'Learn history, young man!'  It was a classic moment.

I think it would be a good moment for the people in the above-mentioned states and the ones where the so-called 'freedom to work' laws are in the works to learn a bit of history.  

And as distasteful as it is to put that image on my blog...  well, it's to the point, isn't it?  And isn't it peculiar that the GOP is following Adi's playbook, in the oh-so-wholesome, 'values loving' center of the country...  

Learning history might be of value, but I assume they sanitized everything meanwhile, as they so often do.  

Found the graphic on an unlikely blog, but used in the same context, so hat tip to Kyle.