This and that from re Thai r ment, by 3Th. 23 Joe 0009. (August 12, 2020)

“Imagination must seem like such a scary thing to those without one.”
          Montego, Greg. Ziegfeld Zaggar, Quantum Detective & the Dirty Rotten, Sarcastic Multiverse (The Quantum Detective Book 1)

 

 

 

TODAY FROM AMERICA:

 

 

A. POOKIE’S ADVENTURES DURING THE SIXTH MONTH OF SELF-QUARANTINE:

 

“Like all old men, I nurse the illusion that if I can remember enough of the past and imagine enough of the future, I will never reach the end of my life, or if I do, it will take forever to get there.”

            Hartman, Bruce. The Philosophical Detective (p. 30). Swallow Tail Press.

Alas, as my memories fade and become confused with the stories I may have told about them I become as frightened by the death of what I was as I am with the end of my life. On the other hand, and there always is another hand even if you have two already, today sprung bright and warm from a surprisingly pleasant night. After a delightful swim, my usual breakfast and seeing to the dog’s comfort. I set off into the Golden Hills to visit HRM.

It was a fun visit. HRM was excited about his yard work business. He says he enjoys it, being out in the sun, building walls, clearing weeds, planting gardens and above all the money he is making. We had lunch by the TownCenter Lake walked around a bit, shopped in Nugget and talked about things of little import.

On Thursday morning, I skipped my scheduled swim in order to watch the John Lewis memorial on television. I was struck that among the notables giving speeches, Bush, Clinton Obama and Pelosi, Nancy Pelosi, a woman, seemed to be the only one whose talk seemed remarkably free of rhetorical flourishes. Then, of course, there was that magnificent address by James Lawson (He was an associate of MLK taught non-violent revolution to Diane Nash, James Bevel, Bernard Lafayette, Marion Barry, and John Lewis) who demonstrated the true stirring of the human heart that can be generated by genuine classical oratory. And then there was the music. Throughout the Middle Ages and the Renaissance the Church used music as an essential compliment to ritual. Then, alas, there was the reaction that for almost 500 years replaced the magnificent music with simple chants. In the nineteenth century the black churches, in the South primarily, took these simple tunes and returned magnificent music to religious ceremony. At one point I turned to Naida and said, “ You know, I find it amazing that I am sitting here watching a funeral service in a church and find it as interesting and enjoyable as a great movie. It’s a spectacle with soul.”

In my previous T&T post, I included a photograph of me wearing sunglasses and dressed in a white bathrobe. There were several comments on the photograph. So far I have been accused of looking like Meyer Lansky, Santo Trafficante, Lucky Luciano and Vincent “The Chin” Gigante. I must be doing something right. Nevertheless, I always thought I looked a bit like Frank Costello — then again, maybe not.

 

A few days later, while we were watching MSNBC, Naida turned to be and said, “You know, you look just like an aged Rachel Maddow.”

Recently, I do not know whether I am ill, exhausted, or depressed. Even Naida who seems to approach the world with uncanny optimism seems down. After five months of social-distancing, who would not suffer bouts of seemingly terminal ennui?

I slept through the ringing of my alarm clock and missed my scheduled time for using the pool. I also napped away most of the afternoon. Should I be happy or worried?

Last night, we spent much of the evening with Sarah, Naida’s daughter and her husband, Mark, at their house a short distance off Watt Avenue. Mark is a supervisor of nurses at a Sacramento hospital, he has just returned from a two week fishing trip through Idaho and Montana. They loaded us up with a large shopping bag of produce that Mark and Sarah grew in their back yard some of which we ate this evening.

It has been almost a week since I last have written here. I wonder if it is because I have become so sedentary I no longer do much or so decrepit I no longer remember if I do. As I sit here typing this, Naida is playing the piano going through some old song books used by her mother and grandmother, both accomplished pianists and singers. Some of the song books are about 100 years old. After playing a mournful rendition of Old Man River, she told me it was her father’s favorite song. He was an excellent singer and when family and friends would gather at their home in the wilds of Idaho he would sing the song accompanied by Naida’s mother on the piano. She then showed me where her mother taped the edges of the song book pages so that while playing she could rapidly flip them without tearing them. Later we went back to the studio where I played with my computer and Naida continued to work on her memoir.

 

Pookie at rest

Naida at work

Another hiatus in posting here. I have put off swimming tor two days telling myself that it has been too cold and returned to reading vociferously the most trashy novels I can tolerate. Are these symptoms of stir-craziness?

One evening, Naida and I, with the dog in tow, drove to a local frozen-yogurt place where we downed a cups of flavored yogurt. I buried mine under a heathy amount of hot fudge. The trip made us very happy — even Boo-boo the Barking Dog seemed delighted. Such small pleasures loom large in the constant struggle to maintain out mental health during this year of social distancing.

You know, being called old is something to be proud of. It means nothing has managed to kill you yet. On the other hand, when you creak while you walk, your plumbing’s amiss, and your skin begins to looks like a cross between a dried out pickle and a year-old prune, it is not much of a compliment either.

A few days later… I went swimming this morning. For some reason, I felt like I did not want to swim, but I did anyway. Walking back I felt slightly dizzy and things appeared a bit dark. I got home and after a brief session in the massage chair, I went back to bed and slept until about four PM. After a late lunch, I returned to bed until about seven. I cannot point to any pains or specific physical upsets that might justify my fatigue. Perhaps, it is merely a symptom of age — unexplained bouts of exhaustion.

Hayden mentioned that he was taking the autistic boy at his school bowling on Sunday. The boy likes bowling and enjoys Hayden’s company. HRM often befriends other children like the autistic boy. Sometimes, I feel that almost all the members of the scooter gang are attracted to him in order to avoid being considered outcasts. I sometimes wonder about that, empathy can be a wonderful thing, but also a heavy burden. Well, his ego-centric years are coming up. They usually cure one of undo sensitivity.

This morning, Sunday I believe, we slipped out of the house and drove to Mel’s for a breakfast of overcooked bacon, blueberry pancakes and eggs. While we were waiting to be served Naida and I discussed poetry, namely Naida’s observation that Longfellow’s A Skeleton In Armor and Coleridge’s The Rime of the Ancient Mariner both use the device of an odd narrator telling the story to a somewhat unwilling listener. Naida can recite the Skeleton in Armor by heart and used to recite the Ancient Mariner by heart also but cannot remember it all now, so, I turned my iPhone to a uTube recitation of the poem. This all may sound odd and a bit fancy-dancy, but after six-months of social distancing there is no longer a limit to the depths to which we will plunge for entertainment. Besides, those poems are perfect for these desperate times. We have killed the albatross and forgotten those of our deeds worthy of the sagas.

“I was a Viking old!
My deeds, though manifold,
No Skald in song has told,
No Saga taught thee!
Take heed, that in thy verse
Thou dost the tale rehearse,
Else dread a dead man’s curse;
For this I sought thee.
A Skeleton in Armor

‘God save thee, ancient Mariner!
From the fiends, that plague thee thus!—
Why look’st thou so?’—With my cross-bow
I shot the ALBATROSS.
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner

On Monday, after my swim, I drove the Mitsubishi into the Golden Hills to visit Hayden. Although there are some similarities between El Dorado Hills and Campus Commons (e.g., socio-economic) there is one difference that stands out to me. When I lived in EDH I noticed that I rarely saw people on the streets. In the Enchanted Forest, however, whenever I walk around there I see people, some walking their dogs, some disappearing around a corner on the paths and others just strolling along. Every now and then, I see couples holding hands while they walk — In four years, I never saw anyone in EDH holding hands. Anyway, Hayden and I had a pleasant lunch.

The view from the front of our home in the enchanted forest.

Today after my swim, I took a long nap. When I woke up learned that Joe Biden selected Kamala Harris as his running mate and sat through several hours of various pundits on television and in print media tell me why I should like or not like his choice.

 

B. A FLOWER TO BRIGHTEN UP THE DAY:

PETRILLO’S COMMENTARY:

 

A new phase?

 

We, perhaps, are witnessing a new phase in the evolution of parties and elections in the nation. The traditional structure of both parties and the nomination systems that supported them appear to be in a state of collapse or at least major change. It is as though we are returning to the mirror image of the process that existed at the end of the Nineteenth Century. Now instead of nominating an unknown party hack, the parties through the nomination process seem to be moving toward selecting celebrity outsiders. The nomination process now exists for the benefit of ideologically based media operations. To them, it appears to matter less who wins the nominations than how it enhances their ratings.

We now have a plutocratic system, and many politicians see it simply as a matter of buying elections. Here’s why — As our economy is now structured, the big corporations — aerospace, oil, and so on — are able to pour out millions to support the candidates they favor. The restrictions on the books are easily evaded, and the politicians in power won’t do much about it because they want some, too. The Citizens United and McCutcheon decisions by the Supreme Court merely confirmed a process that already existed. What it did do is take away the power of government to alter the process.

In the American Federal political system Nominations are more important than the elections. Far fewer people vote or take part in the nomination process than the members of the parties that vote in the general election. It is essentially undemocratic at its core.

We as a nation are faced with a political party of the right well organized and capable no matter who is their standard-bearer or whether he wins or loses. On the left, any group professing an ideology more radical than that acceptable to the more centrist elected officials on the Federal, State, and local levels usually lacks an organization able to develop candidates on all levels and get them elected. However, the Obama campaign using modern telecommunications strategies appeared able to win. His success was not able to be carried over to subsequent Congressional, State, and Local elections. The Sanders and O’Rourke campaigns demonstrated again how electronic media fundraising and campaigning may assist and individual candidate to achieve electoral success. It has not yet demonstrated that that success can be translated to the party as a whole.

In 2016, on at least on the Federal level, the ideological based media organizations backed by the Financial, Natural Resource and Super Large Retailer plutocracy, elected one of their own to the Presidency (They had been successful one the more local level primarily through ideologically based radio in electing hoards of super conservative and generally unknown politicians under the rubric of the Tea Party.) 2018 has seen a significant reaction to the reality TV excesses (but surprisingly not the corruption) of the recently elected federal administration.

Nevertheless, the underlying fundamentals remain the same. The plutocracy and the ideologically biased media continue to fund and prop the Republicans. The South remains solidly conservative Republican although cracks in that have appeared primarily through the emergence of ideologically Democratic women and people of color at the polls. Retail fundraising and identity politics appear to have worked in 2018 and may work again in 2020, but until there is another fundamental change in how campaigns are financed, I do not expect a long term change in national politics.

 

 

 

 

MOPEY JOE’S MEMORIES:

 

Sometime ago in my much younger days, I wrote a post entitled, There’s Something About a Petrillo (Here). In it, along with the sordid tales associated with that surname, I mentioned that somewhere in the Andes region of South America there grows an evergreen shrub of the myrtle family commonly referred to as Petrillo (Myrceugenia correifolia). I recently discovered that there exists a type of Tomato also named Petrillo. Reputedly, it tastes delicious and ripens sooner than other similar types of tomato. There is a joke in there somewhere.

As I said in that post and at other times when I have scratched the itch to explore my surname, there is little to note or to be proud of for those of us who bear that patronymic. For example, today I discovered that among the sport stars to have born that surname the most noteworthy was one Ferdinando De Petrillo (August 11, 1904,—???), an Italian boxer who competed in the 1924 Summer Olympics and was eliminated in the first round of the lightweight class.

Oh, the Glory…

 

DAILY FACTOID:

They are all around us and closing in — a snag from Jason Colavito:

“Nephilim hunter and homophobic bigot Steve Quayle is facing new controversy after a fellow Christian writer exposed a fairly clear-cut case of industrial-grade copy-and-paste plagiarism in Quayle’s Genesis 6 Giants, a book written in 2005 and revised and updated in 2015. According to Ken Ammi, Quayle copied, usually verbatim, from Charles DeLoach’s infamous 1995 book Giants: A Reference Guide from History, the Bible, and Recorded Legend, a book I have previously consulted in debunking claims of giants in ancient history.”

“Ammi’s evidence is damning. Quayle, who tried selling sculptures of scenes from his book for as much as $50,000, can be seen copying and pasting whole sentences, paragraphs, and pages from DeLoach’s book, sometimes rearranging sentences, and other times pasting DeLoach’s footnotes into the body of the text. He seems to copy OCR errors, as well. Ammi also found that Quayle used large chunks of a public domain text, Edward J. Wood’s Giants and Dwarves.”

“I encourage you to visit Ammi’s website and read the evidence for yourself.”

‘Now, who would have thought that a guy like Steve Quayle, a friend of Alex Jones who has expressed his desire for a genocide to eliminate liberals and gays, would also be intellectually dishonest? I feel like that God fellow whose genocidal soul Quayle claims to know so well said something about not lying or stealing. But what would heathen me know about that?’” (http://www.jasoncolavito.com/blog/weekend-omnibus-younger-dryas-volcano-elon-musks-ancient-astronaut-tweet-steve-quayles-plagiarism-and-more)

 

 

 

PEPE’S POTPOURRI:

 

A. Terry on Top:

Terry, although dealing with problems of health and aging as well as other personal issues, continues to post his views about current affairs, specifically politics and the coming national election this November. Here he gives his opinion on what it would take to allow Biden, should he get elected, to carry out his proposed agenda. I agree with Terry, without at least 52 Democratic Senators most of his major programs are not viable and we will be left with a government that resembles the last four years of the Obama administration, sensible, honorable, and respected but ultimately ephemeral, much like Camelot.

“Straight forward data analysis: with 52 Dems in Senate: progressive program gets implemented . Anything less, it’s a compromising slog like Clinton or late 2011 – 2016 Obama. That’s primarily because you probably can’t get rid of the filibuster with 50 Dems plus the VP. You lose at least two Dems: AZ and WV. So which it will be is out of Biden’s hands. It’s all about MT, GA (2) SC ,TX, IA; that’s six on the bubble. We have, hopefully, CO, ME, NC, AZ locked up. We lose AL.”

“THAT MEANS WE NET THREE SEATS AND BRINGS US TO just 50 Senate seats. We need at least two more out of the six on the bubble. Then you have a working majority for climate change , ACA extension, and massive government intervention in the recovering economy , etc.”

“That’s what’s important on election night. Biden is effectively elected, absent a catastrophe. But the working senate majority is far from sure. In fact that’s where the ball game is won or lost.”

“Opinions | Biden could be a compromiser or a progressive. That choice is mostly out of his hands. The shape of the Senate, not Biden’s decisions, will shape his administration.”
By David Byler

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/07/28/biden-could-be-compromiser-or-progressive-that-choice-is-mostly-out-his-hands/.

 

 

B. Trenz Pruca’s Observations:

There is something to be said for religion. The less said the better.

C. Today’s Poem:

October
          by Helen Hunt Jackson

Bending above the spicy woods which blaze,
Arch skies so blue they flash, and hold the sun
Immeasurably far; the waters run
Too slow, so freighted are the river-ways
With gold of elms and birches from the maze
Of forests. Chestnuts, clicking one by one,
Escape from satin burs; her fringes done,
The gentian spreads them out in sunny days,
And, like late revelers at dawn, the chance
Of one sweet, mad, last hour, all things assail,
And conquering, flush and spin; while, to enhance
The spell, by sunset door, wrapped in a veil
Of red and purple mists, the summer, pale,
Steals back alone for one more song and dance.

Helen Hunt Jackson, in full Helen Maria Hunt Jackson, née Fiske, (born Oct. 15, 1830, Amherst, Mass., U.S.—died Aug. 12, 1885, San Francisco, Calif.), American poet and novelist best known for her novel Ramona.

She was the daughter of Nathan Fiske, a professor at Amherst (Mass.) College. She lived the life of a young army wife, traveling from post to post, and after the deaths of her first husband, Captain Edward Hunt, and her two sons, in 1863 she turned to writing. She married William Jackson in 1875 and moved to Colorado. A prolific writer, she is remembered primarily for her efforts on behalf of the American Indians. A Century of Dishonor (1881) arraigned government Indian policy; her subsequent appointment to a federal commission investigating the plight of Indians on missions provided material for Ramona (1884), which aroused public sentiment but has been admired chiefly for its romantic picture of old California. (Encyclopedia Britanica)

Naida tells me that her novel “River of Red Gold” was referred to as “the Ramona of Northern California.”

Another factoid, Helen Hunt Jackson was born on October 15. So was I 109 years later. Another example of the universe being nothing more than a giant bubble of coincidences. Think about it for a moment in quantum terms, no-one would have known we were both born on the same day until I observed it. Is science great or what?

 

D. Tuckahoe Joe’s Blog of the Week: Colavito — The Twilight of the Blogger.

Today I visited the blog of Jason Colavito, (Here) one of my favorite bloggers, and sadly learned that he will be withdrawing from writing his blog. Colavito, whose efforts I sometimes featured here in T&T under the heading, Jason Colavito Takes Them On, investigated the claims of those professing alien contact or other highly unlikely historical theories, especially on programs appearing in media like the History Channel, and demolished them. I am sad to see him withdrawing from the field especially since conspiracy theories and other fanciful beliefs have become such a sad and dangerous part of American culture. In the following essay Colavito relates his reasons for his pending withdrawal. It also is interesting in that it describes some of the vagaries and difficulties of the life of a blogger — especially where he writes, “…the transition away from an internet of articles toward a social media world of memes, videos, and pictures has further eroded interest in longer writing. Increasingly, there is no place for complex analysis.”

Frightening concept, a world where “there is no place for complex analysis.”

Upcoming Changes to This Blog:

For the past ten years, I have written this blog anywhere between five and seven days per week. For almost ten years before that, I produced regular content for the predecessor site to this one. When this blog was at its peak in 2013, I had 100,000 readers, regular appearances in media coverage, a number of TV opportunities, a literary agent, and a growing writing career in both fiction and nonfiction. None of that is the case today, and I don’t see a way to justify continuing to devote so much effort to this endeavor. Several recent posts had readership so low that I could have just emailed all of you a few bullet points and saved myself the trouble.

A number of reasons contributed to the decline, but a few are fairly obvious. First, I vastly underestimated the degree to which my readers cared about my work as opposed to simply hating Scott Wolter and America Unearthed. The (first) cancellation of that series in 2015 started the bleed of readership, and that downward trend never changed. Second, the transition away from an internet of articles toward a social media world of memes, videos, and pictures has further eroded interest in longer writing. Increasingly, there is no place for complex analysis. Over the last five years, I have tried many different strategies to expand my audience across many platforms and media, and nothing has made a dent. Even appearing on national TV did literally nothing for me.

I knew the end was coming when the hate mail started to dry up. In the mid-2010s, I’d get dozens of hate missives each week from apoplectic readers outraged at whatever it was I had said. The hate mail trailed off after 2015 and has largely stopped altogether. It’s a good proxy for disengagement as social media pushes people into bubbles where they may never encounter an unwelcome viewpoint.

On Sunday, one of my tweets had twenty times the number of readers as the weekly average for this blog. Overall, my tweets average around ten times the number of readers as my blog. However, that audience is almost all the same group of people, and it is not growing.

This past week, I borrowed a celebrity acquaintance’s 165,000 Twitter followers in an experiment to see if some higher-profile promotion could drive some more traffic my way and help to grow my social media presence in an effort to demonstrate to literary agents and media types that I have work worth representing. The results were beyond disappointing. The effort netted one like and somewhere south of 30 clicks. I had my largest audience since I was on cable back in 2013. And I got one like. Out of 165,000 people. I doubt I will get that kind of audience again, and it’s clear that I perform way below random chance outside the group that already follows me.

Whatever mysterious alchemy produces engagement, I don’t have it. Things haven’t changed very much since Nicole Kidman said in the movie To Die For that you aren’t anyone if you aren’t on TV.

The History Channel’s efforts to damage my career did not help matters. Leaving aside the time they threatened me with a lawsuit or the times I caught their employees posting inflammatory comments on my blog, their informal efforts caused real damage. My literary agent dropped me when he couldn’t get publishers to give me the time of day. The TV offers dried up next. I didn’t report every TV effort I undertook here on my blog. But I was under consideration for TV roles several times, and I shot a pilot presentation that impressed the producers enough to make plans for when the pilot was taken to series. The same answer came back every time: You can’t shop a show around in Hollywood with me in it because the bigwigs at A+E Networks and their corporate cousins (which include the Disney properties) decided otherwise. Sure, they could all be lying, but why would they all tell the same lie? I heard the same thing from the one literary agent since then who gave me any real consideration. If a book doesn’t stand a chance of finding favor with cable TV and Disney, then it might as well not exist.

I haven’t been featured in a news article in years, despite regularly doing interviews with reporters. I went from being quoted regularly in publications like The Washington Post and The Atlantic to being cut from the New York Times, CNN, National Geographic, and a list too long to name. The balance of effort to reward is far too skewed.

The trouble has always been that success isn’t an individual endeavor. It depends on having a network of people who are positioned to help you to succeed. That has never been me. It’s great that many people receive help and support from higher-ups that led to success. That wasn’t my experience. People tend to help only when they think there’s something in it for them.

So I got left with the aliens. Lucky me.

You don’t need to feel too sorry for me. I work all day at a dull gig writing backend copy for websites. I didn’t really want my legacy to be that I wrote the snippets of text that show up on a Google search for specific industries’ optimized keywords, but millions of people have read them. It would be nice to have a similarly large audience read something that actually had meaning.

The long and short of it is that I know what needs to be done for the next phase of my career, as much as I’m not enthusiastic about doing it.

First, unless and until more people read my blog or visit my website, posting nearly every day is not feasible or sustainable. There just aren’t enough of you to justify that. I won’t stop blogging entirely (and contractually I am obliged to continue efforts to promote my current and future books), but it can’t be as regular or as sustained as it has been for the past decade.

Second, since there are so few readers, having comments on the blog posts is increasingly pointless, especially when they are primarily the same handful of outspoken regulars making the same points over and over. The time it takes for me to read them and wade through all the spam (sometimes up to a 3:1 ratio) is a huge waste. Comments will remain open (with moderation) on this post, but I will be shutting them down soon.

Third, I will need to transition to more social media content, whatever that might look like. I’m not sure what it will look like yet.

Fourth, more of my efforts need to go into providing the best possible start to my new book—not the pyramid one, but the one after that. It will be connected to the upcoming seventy-fifth anniversary of UFOs in 2022, and it will need to be on a tight schedule to make the deadline. The first step is to devote the upcoming weeks to crafting a strong proposal. (http://www.jasoncolavito.com/blog/upcoming-changes-to-this-blog)

Sic Transit Gloria, the destiny of all life.

E. Giants of History: Peter’s Comments on T&T:

1. Peter’s comment:

“I just started reading this edition of TAT and came across the following line, which should be come an instant bumper sticker. As an alternative to hypochondria frolics, perhaps getting HRM to assist in producing and marketing the bumper stickers:

“PEOPLE OVER 70 SHOULD NOT BE FORCED TO UPGRADE ANYTHING”

2. I wrote:

“Once again it appears that it is women who will save us.” (https://trenzpruca.wordpress.com/2016/11/03/it-is-time-for-women-to-lead-us/)

Peter responded:

“When I was in India with UNICEF, I learned some of this. Found it interesting, not surprising, and irritating that many people in and out of govt. had problems with population control; UNICEF had to soft-pedal the family planning component of their aid program. Some local practicalities, like needing to make more children to have workers because of people dying from malnutrition and diseases, raised issues with birth control. BUT, definite sense that the women were/are more inclined (some not entirely, though, because of female social pressure) to do birth control as they end up with the most adverse impacts of dumb attitudes and behavior (a universal situation, it seems). And indeed, hope of the world lies with the women. I recall when we were in India in the 60’s in Orissa, found that the women on Thursdays did puja rituals for Vishnu (their local incarnation), who of course is the Preserver; Siva is he creator and destroyer – Hindus (Persian Aryans before them) had this deal pegged eons ago. Tolstoy got it, too, in War and Peace: when the men ride off on their trusty cavalry steeds to try to prevent Napoleon from getting to Moscow, meanwhile before dawn the women are up lighting the samovars and taking care of business.”

3. I inquired:

Could It Happen Here?

 

Peter Responded:

“No doubt: Definite possibilities. Several people have published scenarios and anxieties of this. Masha Gessen in New Yorker has a good, if ominous, statement. And don’t forget Betsy de Vos’s brother’s crew who, possibly may be in Portland now.”

4. I asked:

What do you plan to do now?

 

Peter replied:

“How much of an oasis in California? I’m reading a great biography of Einstein. I’m at the point where, in 1932-33 he finally moves to the US permanently. Ended up at Princeton at the Institute for Advanced Study. What would we put in the U-Haul to Vancouver? Do we set up a bank account there first?”

 

F. More Tales From the Old Sailor, etc.

The Old Sailor, Treasure Hunter, Deep Sea Diver, Dope Smuggler, Adventurer, and on and on was a friend I made during my stay in Thailand. He lived in a single room in and old hotel off Sukhumvit somewhere near Soi Eight in Bangkok. The walls of his room were covered with photography, letters, public documents various bric-a-brac and other things. I once asked him why it was like that. He answered, “I do it because when I wake up in the morning I want to know that my life has not just been all a dream.”

I do not think he lives in Thailand any more. He has moved back to the Caribbean area or Florida where he had spent much of his life. Now and then, I receive messages from him — some of the most recent of which I have reproduced below. As I wrote the last time I reported some of his postings, I cannot determine whether they are poetry or evidence of madness — probably both.

 

1. Life.

NO control over my life
…can’t take care of med.
Situations ………financial Situations fucked
…all my news on the street
….going to get 2 lotto tickets this week
….not complaining just stating
facts.
Unfortunately……e

 

2. LOTTO.

Yea
have been
double, up on the LOTTO
..thanks

 

3. PETE.

PETE WAS ENGLISH ….
@@GOT his start
in the bar on SXM
….BY PICKING UP A 50 FT .. DRUG BOAT
..AFTER DELIVERY…×÷=
IT IS DISPOSABLE
.AS A LICENSED CAPT..
he picked it up
And sold it ….=÷=
Got 40 $ his share
…bought a bar in sxm….
@@@had pictures ,,,,,,,,ALL OVER THE BAR
,,,,,,,, of the GREAT train Rober
living in Brizil

 

4. MY OWN MAKING.

MY OWN MAKING ….+++ — – –
** BAD JUDGMENT OF CHARACTER..
============/========
..UPDATE…….
….@gmail.com> wrote:
USING HIS POWER AND HIS EXPERIENCE
..AS A BANKER TO P.LAY DOWN ANY MONEY
NOT TO PAY THE DEPT ENFORSEMENT………>>
using Experience
FANCY,,LEGAL
WORDING
….@@documents and confirmation have any usable or lendable assets
and any debt
service can only
longer
have any usable or lendable assets ….
-@@ ->>ALL THIS PAPERWORK
is available to him at place of work
…None of his
$$ Assists are available-on his 200k+ FINKA in Majorca
…if they are I am shore
the PAPERWORK will b
the same…….
@@ OR – perhaps
the 4kelo of gold -of mine……..
SOMEHOW–fell out of his pocket
on his majorca
ESTATE …
@@ JB THRASHED
ALL MY ASSETS ((600k total))
left me broke and homeless .
…THE DEAL
WAS HE COULD HAVE
ALL MY ASSETS
AFTER I DIED– IN WRITING ..
@@@ MY GUESS HE COULD NOT WAIT FOR ME TO
DIE…..
—–HAVE LOTTO TICKET

 

5. The Cross Dresser of St Thomas.

Stthomas
…around the time of airport construction….
At ANTILLES Boatyard..
REMRMBER THE CROSS -DRESSER
…GERMAN – –
…BOAT WITH PINK DECK…””OOTS –
Bous””
>>++Wore tits around the boat yard
((AND PANTIES))..under an overcoat….=÷=
“”SAID ALL
the Psychiatrists…in GERMANY
…Could NOT help Me…. .
..DIED at the bar …with MtGay Rum

On Sun, Aug 9, 2020, 1:55 AM <sidt922@gmail.com

 

6.Ronny Biggs in Brazil.

Yea …some drug sumugular
…..the bar was full of them ………>>
went down to Brazil and got pictures
of him
…the ss went down there to
get him
but could not take him
because
he had a baby
….RONNY BIGGS

TODAY’S QUOTE:

 

 

“An angelic face swam into view above him. His voice came out as a parched croak. ‘Is this… heaven?’ Sister Dionne smiled down at him. ‘No, Mr McGarry, this is Brooklyn.’”
           McDonnell, Caimh. I Have Sinned (McGarry Stateside Book 2) (p. 310). McFori Ink.

 

 

 

TODAY’S CHART:

 

Today the United States Department of Commerce, Bureau of Economic Analysis issued its Gross Domestic Product, 2nd Quarter 2020 (Advance Estimate) and Annual Update that showed that:

“Real gross domestic product (GDP) decreased at an annual rate of 32.9 percent in the second quarter of 2020, according to the “advance” estimate released by the Bureau of Economic Analysis. In the first quarter of 2020, real GDP decreased 5.0 percent.” (https://www.bea.gov/news/2020/gross-domestic-product-2nd-quarter-2020-advance-estimate-and-annual-update.)

They go on to explain the reason for this dramatic drop:

“The decline in second quarter GDP reflected the response to COVID-19, as “stay-at-home” orders issued in March and April were partially lifted in some areas of the country in May and June, and government pandemic assistance payments were distributed to households and businesses. This led to rapid shifts in activity, as businesses and schools continued remote work and consumers and businesses canceled, restricted, or redirected their spending. The full economic effects of the COVID-19 pandemic cannot be quantified in the GDP estimate for the second quarter of 2020 because the impacts are generally embedded in source data and cannot be separately identified.”(https://www.bea.gov/news/2020/gross-domestic-product-2nd-quarter-2020-advance-estimate-and-annual-update.)

Later in the day, NPR reported on the BEA report and included the chart shown at the top of this post.

That chart, along with the NPR report purports to demonstrate that the recent 32.9% drop in the nation’s GDP was the worst drop in GDP since Eisenhower took office (although the article accompanying the chart maintains it was the worst drop since records have been kept.)

While others, I am sure, will comment on the BEA report and the staggering drop in the Nation’s GDP under this President, the chart, at least to me, may also show something else. Comparing Presidential administrations to recessions by political party, the nearest I can make out from the chart, of the 11 recessions identified therein since Eisenhower assumed office in 1953 at least 8 clearly occurred during Republican administrations, one during a Democratic Administration and two during the year a Democratic administration transferred power to a Republican (1953 and perhaps 2001).

To assist in making the comparison and the conclusions I came to, here is a list of the presidents and their term in office since 1953:

1953-61 Eisenhower
1961-63 Kennedy
1963-69 Johnson
1969-77 Nixon-Ford
1977-81 Carter
1981-89 Reagan
1989-93 Bush
1993-2001 Clinton
2001-09 Bush Jr.
2009-17 Obama
2017-20 Trump.

If this information is correct, it appears clear that the Republican Party, their chosen Presidents, and the conservative economic doctrines upon with they base their actions seem to me to have been woefully incapable of effectively managing the nation’s economy.

This observation may appear to be nothing new for most of us who post on Daily Kos, nevertheless, it is worth repeating every chance we get.

NOTE: Having published the above also in Daily Kos, I received the following perceptive comment:

Yes. And there are several reasons why many voters still believe Яepublicans are better for the economy: 1) the household budget fallacy, 2) the guns/butter investment fallacy, and 3) the number of new billionaires fallacy, to name a few examples.

1) The US budget isn’t like a household budget, but some voters believe that cutting spending on “luxuries” and goosing the economy will always help. Actually, the US budget is more like a corporate budget, where the income comes from taxes and we borrow to invest in growth. So the way to improve the budget is actually to borrow, invest in citizens as broadly as possible, and raise taxes. Democrats are right, and Яepublicans are wrong on this basic issue.

2) Яepublicans believe in spending on big military parade items, like missiles, jet fighters, aircraft carriers, and tanks. These expenditures help the economy, but only briefly, with great waste and to concentrated contractors. They make headlines, but typically sit unused until they’re obsolete or destroyed. Many voters see the results of this investment and believe they’re getting security and jobs. Democrats invest in things like education, healthcare, housing & food. These don’t make big headlines, and they often take decades to show results. Again, Democrats invest better for the country in the long term (e.g. fighting pollution), while Яepublicans make a big deal about investments in hurting people (e.g., supporting fossil fuel).

3) Too many people, especially in the media, judge the economy on big billionaire fortunes. But that’s typically driven by a very small number of people amassing wealth that used to be spread more widely. Imagine a private entrepreneur figured out how to produce & deliver all the goods & services needed with AI & low cost self-producing robots, then everyone else would be unable to compete. The economy would be finished. A healthy economy actually grows most by widespread participation and sharing productivity gains broadly. Яepublicans believe that wealth is like the lottery: the more billionaires the better. Democrats believe that wealth is like families: the more we help each other grow and spend time doing what makes us happy, the better off we are, despite our limitations.
(https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2020/7/30/1965287/-The-Collapse-of-the-Nation-s-GDP-Are-Republicans-Incapable-of-Managing-the-Nation-s-Economy#comment_78111301)

This and that from re Thai r ment, by 3Th. 4 Joseph 0009 (December 23, 2019)

 

“It’s a lot easier to stir crap up than to get it to settle.”
Hill, Reginald. Good Morning, Midnight (Dalziel and Pascoe) (p. 224). Harper Paperbacks.

 

Quote of the year:

“I’m never afraid and I’m rarely surprised.”
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi

May all your new years be better than the last.

 

 

TODAY FROM AMERICA:

 

 
A. POOKIE’S ADVENTURES IN MENDOCINO:

 

With a weather report for a week of rain and a steady drizzle slicking the streets and turning the landscape gray, Naida, Boo-boo the Barking Dog and I set off for Mendocino. I have done this trip so many times I no longer either notice or remember much of the drive other than where Naida and I switch driving duties and walk the dog.

I do recall stopping at Williams for lunch at a tourist restaurant that was not too bad, whose name I no longer remember but whose food was not so good that I would spend the time to look up the name on the internet in order to post here. After lunch, at the deli attached to the restaurant, I bought a panettone (Italian holiday bread) and a large jar of beautiful Sicilian olives for the party my sister was having on Sunday. Alas, when we arrived at my sister’s house and I was removing the jar of olives from the paper bag, I dropped the jar on the counter and it broke. I was so upset that I stalked off into a corner and sulked while Naida struggled to save what was left of the olives.

The first evening or perhaps the second, both Naida and George were suffering migraines and went to bed early, so my sister Maryann and I set off for dinner and caroling at the North Coast Brewery Pub and Jazz Club in Fort Bragg. The Club is usually a jazz venue but that evening the jazz had been set aside for a night of caroling. I ordered a delicious plate of sausage and peppers with polenta and washed it down with a glass of the brewery’s stout followed by a special seasonal berry-flavored light beer. Everything was delicious.

The meal was followed by the entertainment. A local guitarist played and sang a few Christmas tunes. He was Followed by the main event, the carolers, a local group dressed in faux 19th Century costumes that spent the rest of the evening singing many of the familiar carols of the season, enthusiastically and slightly off-tune

   

The next day the sun played hide and seek with the clouds. Naida, Boo-boo the Barking Dog and I went Christmas shopping in Mendocino and Fort Bragg, after which we had an excellent lunch at Maya Fusion in Fort Bragg. She had a mushroom soup to die for and I a sampler that included Arancini.

Arancini, one of my favorite things, originated in 10th Century Sicily when it was under control by the Arabs. It is a deep-fried rice ball usually filled with ragù (meat or mince, slow-cooked at low temperature with tomato sauce and spices), mozzarella and/or caciocavallo cheese, and often peas, and al burro or ô bburru, filled with ham and mozzarella or besciamella. It is a traditional Italian street food ranking right up there with pizza.

Later, at the wonderful Mendocino shop where our friend Maryjane works, Naida purchased a marvelous scarf. It was woven in India out of wool and silk by women who had been sex workers and were now attempting to break away from that life. Maryjane, who usually has a joke for us, when I asked for it said that she did not have one. It must be the season. Christmas season was no laughing matter in the Petrillo family I grew up in.

That evening, after Naida went to bed, Maryann, George and I watched episode two of the television version of Phillip Pullman’s novels in The Golden Compass series. In one of those strange coincidences that have you believing that you may be living in Pullman’s world, at the moment my sister suggested watching the show, I was in the midst of reading the second novel in Pullman’s second series on the same theme.

Another evening, we all piled into Maryann’s car and drove to the Festival of Lights at the Mendocino Botanical Gardens a Christmas event that I always enjoy. The gardens are lit up with thousands of lights arranged in strange and astonishing tableaus that surprise you at every turn along the dark paths.

     

The four Amigos warming themselves up after viewing the Festival.

 

Here, I managed to erase about a week’s entries. Given the current state of my memory, erasing what I have written means most of it is lost. This makes me sad — not because anything I had written was either important or memorable but because for me once gone it is gone forever. Worse, I have the vague recollection that what I had written I enjoyed. Anyway, here below is my best recollection of that week.

On Sunday Maryann and George held a Christmas party for a few friends and the staff of WEST Company, the non-profit she runs. The food was delightful, varied and copious. The special egg-nog prepared by Maryann was unusual and delicious. We enjoyed ourselves immensely.
   

B. OFF TO LAKEPORT AND BEYOND:
Monday we set off for Lakeport where Naida’s brother lives with his son Bob. From Fort Bragg to Willits, the shortest route from that area of the Coast over that portion of the Coastal Range is Route 20, a wickedly curvy road that passes over the Mendocino Ridge portion of the Coast Range on its way to Route 101. This road is a main route from that part of the coast to Ukiah the Mendocino County seat and relatively heavily traveled. As we turned from Highway 101 (Pacific Coast Highway), Naida told me that at the prior evening’s Christmas party one of the guests who drives that road daily told her that she and other similarly situated drivers actually counted the curves on that 35-mile road and numbered them so that as the drive them they could report to each other the nature and location of any problems along the route.

Another thing, perhaps several more things, that I learned while I drove that road was prompted by the fact that I usually drive as fast as I safely could (at least in my opinion). I believed it would get me to where I was going faster, and of course, confirm my manliness by proving that I was the most testosterone poisoned person on that road that day. Naida, however, protested. Actually, it was more than a protest. She screamed and insisted that she drive rather than me.

It seems, she had been in a number of automobile accidents in her life, including, she told me, once while riding in a car filled with her high school cheerleader teammates, it skidded on a curve, spun as it flew through the air and smashed into the ground tires up. These experiences so affected her that she would become ill when sitting in a car going too fast especially on a curvy road. So, I slowed down a lot and discovered not only was the drive time not appreciably longer, it actually appeared shorter to me. It also allowed me to enjoy the drive more — the dark redwood groves, the glimpses of the valleys between the trunks of the trees, the pretty little bottomlands, lakes, and marshes.

In Lakeport, we met with Roger Smith, Naida’s older brother and his son Bob who seems to suffer from Asperger’s syndrome a condition that appears common in the Smith side of her family. Roger is an accomplished artist, set designer, and singer. Now, because he suffers from macular degeneration, he can no longer paint. Nevertheless, he showed me a number of paintings that he had previously done. They ranged from photorealism to modern impressionism. Of the latter, he favored Cezanne like muted hues with a strong dash of red or another vibrant color.

At the bottom of the page, I have posted Roger’s homage to Governor Jerry Brown. He would like to bring it to Jerry’s attention. If anyone has any idea how he can do this, please let me know.

His set design pieces were quite dramatic and fascinating.

A backdrop for the opera Aida.
Naida, Roger and I then went for lunch at Park Place restaurant by the lake. I had gnocchi stuffed with mushrooms. It was as good a meal as I have had in months.

Naida and Roger
After lunch, we drove back home to the Enchanted Forest.

 

 

C. A NIGHT OF PROTEST:

 
The next day, we attended the Indivisible’s Impeach Trump Rally in Sacramento. It was held at the Capital. I had not been to a protest rally in over twenty years. There were between 3 and 5 thousand people there. There was the usual coterie of long-haired, bearded, shabbily dressed men and colorfully attired women carrying signs. We listened to impassioned, inspiring and at times incomprehensible speeches, sang a few songs, and generally had a good time.

   
A protesting dog attended and some children also.

 

D. ALAS:

 
Unfortunately, especially at this season, Mark’s mother died a few days ago. Mark is the husband of Naida’s daughter Sarah. She had been suffering from severe Alzheimer’s disease for several years now. We attended the memorial. It was a family affair. I suspect I may have been the only non-family member there. Josephine, Naida’s granddaughter sang a splendid version of Ave Maria. Anna’s children each gave a brief eulogy and remembrance of their mother. After a few more recollections and reminisces, a prayer and a joint singing of a Christmas carol, the memorial ended. Most of those who attend left for a reception at Sarah and Mark’s home. For some reason, I felt exhausted and depressed by the ceremony so I had Naida drop me off at home before she went on to the reception.

I dropped exhaustedly onto the bed and slept until the barking of the dog made such a horrible racket it woke me up. Between barks, I could make out the sound of the doorbell. I rushed downstairs and threw open the door and saw a slightly frazzled Naida standing there. She had returned from the reception but had misplaced her keys to the house.

 

 

 

 

MOPEY JOE’S MEMORIES:

 

 

 

Excerpt from my unpublished and never to be finished mystery novel, Here Comes Dragon.

Dragon’s Breath:

Sam Spade: “Then the trick from my angle is to make my play strong enough to tie you up, but not make you mad enough to bump me off against your better judgment.”

 

Chapter 2.

 

I watched her disappear around a corner, took a sip of my wine and realized she had not paid for it. “Bitch,” I opined to no one except me. Drank the rest of my Barbera. Began on hers since she had not touched it and I was paying for it and I am opposed to wasting good, or even mediocre wine on religious grounds, being raised Catholic.

Usually tracing a missing person for the price I was being paid warranted about a half hour or so on a computer, a few telephone calls to bulk up the brief final report. A report written in a way that allowed the client to resolve any residual guilt they may be feeling by assuring that he or she had done all that could be done under the circumstances or, if the client is still mired in guilt, suggesting they pay me the rest of my fee and retain me for another week of futility. What the fee did not include, however, was any effort requiring the use of foot protecting composite material or knocking on doors.

Nevertheless, given that the sun was out and it was about as warm as it was going to get in San Francisco; I had just drunk two glasses of wine; the knowledge that the missing Mark’s apartment was only about three blocks away from where I was sitting; and the urgings bubbling out of that dark and defective communication channel that ran between my brain and my groin suggesting that the extra effort could result in my observing Mavis’s tattoos closer up, I decided to knock on his door just in case Missing Mark had decided that Mavis was no longer his playmate and he was hiding from her wrath.

So, I finished the wine, packed the computer in its protective shoulder bag and signaled to Pino to put it all on my tab (which was met with a scowl and a sneer). I then got up, jaywalked across Columbus Avenue and moved on up Green Street toward Telegraph Hill.

I guess I ought to describe how I was dressed so you do not simply picture a dark blob bobbing along the sidewalk. I was dressed like a dark blob. I wore a shapeless grey-brown short overcoat with wool lining, that I picked up at Goodwill, over a yellow sweatshirt with nothing written on it. I do not do advertising. Black slacks below. I don’t do jeans. On my feet are ugly orthotic enhanced shoes to coddle my nonexistent arches. I don’t do sneakers or trainers or whatever those horribly expensive and garishly colored things are now called. Around my neck hung a ratty red and black wool scarf with a fringe on each end.

The sun was shining. The fabled San Francisco fogs of three decades ago a vague memory. It still, however, was about a million degrees colder in the City than in the East Bay but the temperature was still warmer than it had been in times past when one suffered through 12 months of semi-winter. Now, due in all likelihood to global warming, winter in San Francisco lasts only about seven months.

I regretted this change in the weather. Gone were the fogs that cloaked Hammit’s Sam Spade in his daily run from his offices near the Burritt St. ditch to John’s for lunch. You need a real City for mysteries, full of shadows and unhappiness. San Francisco is not a real City. It is too happy.

On the far side of Grant, Telegraph Hill rises. It is capped by that great phallus in the sky memorializing the transcendental virility of San Francisco’s Fire and Rescue personnel. The stunted cement penis also separates the residents of the sunny side of the hill from those fortunate few who really have views of the water. These few live primarily in shacks converted over the years into luxury aeries. These luxury shacks, reachable only by stairs, cling to the side of the cliff like barn swallow nests cling to the eaves of a barn. Among these fortunate few living snug in their aeries live some of the most unpleasant people living on the face of the earth. They are those who fervently believe that their struggles for preservation of their water views and indolent lifestyles benefit the rest of us.

Now do not get me wrong, I hate rapacious developers as much as anyone and believe that most developers should first be boiled in oil and then burnt at the stake in the middle of Union Square, but if these cliff dwellers were so concerned about the rest of us, as they would have us believe, why don’t they turn their happy huts over to the rest of us, say for two days a week, so that the rest of us can sit by the window, smoke a joint, sip some wine and stare slack-jawed at the Bay bridge marching across the water into Angel Island while the ceaseless maritime traffic in the bay passes back and forth under its soaring piers?

On the sunny side of the hill, the streets get steeper as they approach the crest of the peak. The sidewalks change into steps about halfway up the hill. The houses on this side sit cheek by jowl crammed one next to each other. Built about 100 years ago as immigrant tenements, over the years they have been stuccoed, shingled, painted or wood or aluminum siding as fashions dictated. All now painted either white or some pastel shade of pink, blue or green. All except missing Mark’s building located about where the sidewalk changes into steps. Sometime in the late 1950s someone tore down a number of older buildings and replaced them with a dark shake sided five-story apartment in the then fashionable but utterly boring international style. It gave that side of the street the appearance of an ancient bleached jaw bone with a few molars missing.

I knew this building well. In it lived Ann Kennedy who, as serendipity dictated, lived on the same floor as Missing Mark. Ann Kennedy was a masseuse that I visited now and then. She was the type of masseuse that one finds in the back pages of monthly alternative newspapers or on Craig’s List.

Because of the steepness of the hill the entrance to the building was on the second floor, Ann and Missing Mark’s floor. Various stacks of construction materials lay about as they always have as long as I had come here, but no one was ever working.

I marched up to Ann’s door first, because I thought she may have some information about her neighbor. Also, I contemplated the possibility of spending some of my fee on relaxation and release before embarking on my job. Knocked on the door and rang the bell which buzzed with that grinding sound that I hate almost more than anything I could think of.

The door opened about a foot wide. Now, if one were expecting that curvaceous, cleavage exposing, lingerie wearing, red-lipped, dark-eyed beauty in the photographs that often accompany the ads, it was not Ann. Ann more resembled a reject from a model call for a Dorothea Lange photo shoot on the ravages of the Great Depression, right down to her shapeless house dress.

“Yes,” she said?

“Hi, Ann,” I said with a big smile.

I was met with a grey-eyed, pupil-less stare of non-recognition.

“Do you have an appointment?” she asked?

Thought she was either stoned or my belief in the memorability of my presence was overrated. Decided I would save some money and later resolve by hand any uncontrollable urgings I still may have. Said, “Do you know Mark Holland?”

Long stare. “No.”

“He lives on this floor. He is your neighbor,” and I gestured toward the other end of the hall.

She slowly turned her head and looked in that direction, which made no sense since she was standing inside her apartment and could not see down the hall. Slowly turned back to me.

“No,” and she closed the door in my face.

Stood there wondering if I should kick the door in frustration. Decided I would only hurt my foot. Turned went to the other end of the floor to stand in front of Missing Mark’s apartment door. Looked down at the doorknob. Saw scratches and splintered wood. Thought, “Uh-oh, run!”

However, like touching just to see if a sign announcing “wet paint” means what it says, I reached down to turn the doorknob just to see if what I knew to be true really was.

 

 

 

PEPE’S POTPOURRI:

 
A. Naida and Joe’s marvelous adventures in the Pacific Northwest on Top:
This is a continuation of the story of my trip with Naida through the Pacific Northwest in what may be her final opportunity to experience the place of her birth and childhood and to visit her relatives who still lived there.
Into the Big Hole
We left Julie Miller and Alder Montana and drove along the path of Lewis and Clark on their voyage of discovery and the later migration of Chief Joseph and the Nez Perce nation as they fled their ancestral homes to seek freedom in Canada and avoid annihilation at the hands of the American Army.

On our way to the Big Hole Valley the Land of 10,000 haystacks, we passed through Wisdom Montana. The town takes its name from the Lewis and Clark’s expedition’s naming or the nearby river the Wisdom River (now the Big Hole River). It is considered one of the coldest places in the continental US and home to 98 people.

Beautiful downtown Wisdom Montana
A few miles later we passed the spot where the Lewis and Clark expedition almost gave up and turned back but was saved by Sacagawea who recognized the solitary mesa (Beaverhead Rock) near which her people would camp during that time of the year. She directed the expedition towards it and discovered nearby her brother leading a party of Shoshone rounding up horses.

Beaverhead Rock

We then passed onto the ridge overlooking the Big Hole Valley.

The Big Hole Valley
Further on we came to the Big Hole battlefield site. Here the 750 Nez Perce including about 200 warriors (basically the young men of the tribe) set up camp to rest for a few days before continuing on their trek to join Sitting Bull’s people in Canada and escape the genocide threatened by troops of the American government. They did not believe they were at risk because they thought the American army was far behind. Unknown by them, a second army had been dispatched to deal with them. In the night, that army arrived and hid in the trees and bushes by the Nez Perce encampment. As was the usual strategy of the American Army in the Indian Wars, they waited for morning and for the women and children to leave the teepees in order to begin preparing the morning meal. They poured gunfire into the camp in hope that the slaughter of their women and children would so dismay the warriors they would give up. Contrary to the army’s expectation, the Nez Perce warriors rallied, launched a counter-attack, destroyed the army’s cannon, drove the army off with significant casualties and allowed the remainder of the tribe time to withdraw in relatively good order.
IMG
The Big Hole Battlefield Site. The Nez Perce were camped in the field a little right of the center of the photograph. The soldiers were hidden in the trees and bushes that appear slightly reddish. The cannon was placed on the large hill just below the tree line on the left.
IMG_7323.jpg

 

 

B. Trenz Pruca’s Observations:

 
It is interesting to note how much easier it is today for a government to abandon its promises to its people but not to its creditors.

C. Today’s Poem:

“O sanctissima” (O most holy) is a Roman Catholic hymn in Latin, seeking the prayers of the Blessed Virgin Mary, and often sung in various languages on her feast days. The earliest known publication was from London in 1792, presenting it as a traditional song from Sicily; but no original source or date has been confirmed for the simple melody or the poetic text. The tune is often called “Sicilian Mariners Hymn” or similar titles, referring to the seafarers’ nightly invocation of Mary as their maternal protector. (Wikipedia)

“Travellers all agree in their account of the effects of the simple air called ‘The Virgin’s Hymn,’ sung in unison by the whole crew of the Sicilian seamen on board their ships when the sun sets, or when it is the twenty-fourth hour of Italy.”
William Seward 1792.

 
Imagine if you will, a calm evening on the black waters of the Mediterranean. A group of small fishing boats bobbing gently in the swells, a few lights twinkling like the stars above. Then from the boats the rough voices of the fishermen rising in uniform with the solemn strains of the hymn.

Also, note the interesting rhyming pattern in the Latin version.

O sanctissima, o piissima,
dulcis Virgo Maria!
Mater amata, intemerata,
ora, ora pro nobis.

Tu solatium et refugium,
Virgo Mater Maria.
Quidquid optamus, per te speramus;
ora, ora pro nobis.

Ecce debiles, perquam flebiles;
salva nos, o Maria!
Tolle languores, sana dolores;
ora, ora pro nobis.

Virgo, respice, Mater, aspice;
audi nos, o Maria!
Tu medicinam portas divinam;
ora, ora pro nobis.
O most holy, o most loving,
sweet Virgin Mary!
Beloved Mother, undefiled,
pray, pray for us.

You are solace and refuge,
Virgin, Mother Mary.
Whatever we wish, we hope it through you;
pray, pray for us.

Look, we are weak and deeply deplorable;
save us, o Mary!
Take away our lassitude, heal our pains;
pray, pray for us.

Virgin, look at us, Mother, care for us;
hear us, o Mary!
You bring divine medicine;
pray, pray for us.

Many, many years ago, I was a mere callow lad and altar boy in the Italian-American Parish Assumption Church in Tuckahoe New York. The parish and church existed mainly because at the time Italians were discouraged from attending the much larger so-called American Church nearby. At morning mass most of the worshippers were black-clothed vecchiadelli (Old Women). I would often listen to them singing this hymn in that strange reedy nasal voice that characterizes Sicilian singing. It has remained a fond memory of mine, even until now 70 years later.

 

 

TODAY’S QUOTE:

 
I cannot resist reposting this quote from the great and irrepressible Terry Pratchett. If one would re-read my many ruminations on memory here in T&T, one could consider me a disciple of Wen.

Wen the Eternally Surprised.

“Why was he eternally surprised?” And they are told: “Wen considered the nature of time and understood that the universe is, instant by instant, re-created anew. Therefore, he understood, there is, in truth, no Past, only a memory of the Past. Blink your eyes, and the world you see next did not exist when you closed them. Therefore, he said, the only appropriate state of the mind is surprise. The only appropriate state of the heart is joy. The sky you see now, you have never seen before. The perfect moment is now. Be glad of it.”
Pratchett, Terry. Thief of Time: A Novel of Discworld (p. 31). HarperCollins.

In addition to the Golden Rule, one could very well take as one’s guide to living good and moral life Wen’s almost biblical exhortation “the only appropriate state of the mind is surprise. The only appropriate state of the heart is joy. The sky you see now, you have never seen before. The perfect moment is now. Be glad of it.” So, be surprised always, be always joyful, and always be glad you are alive.

 

 

 

 

TODAY’S PHOTOGRAPH:

Roger Smith’s portrait of Jerry Brown, California’s recent governor.

 

Roger also is the artist who produced the painting behind the bar in Oakland’s Jack London Square’s “ Fat Lady Restaurant.” The Restaurant’s brochure explains the genesis of the name and the painting:

Why the Fat Lady? People always ask, “How did the Fat Lady get its name?” Well, there are two stories. Fact and legend. Fact has it that when Louis Shaterian owned the original Overland House, a superior court judge told him about a nude painting his son had painted of a pleasingly plump lady.
This aroused Lou’s curiosity. He was taken to view the painting and upon seeing it, he decided it was definitely unique but he wasn’t quite sure what to do with it. The judge suggested it should hang in the new restaurant Lou and his wife, Patricia, were about to open and thus became the namesake of the Fat Lady Bar and Restaurant. Now maybe this story is too mundane so we’ve created a legend. Factual history has it that the Fat Lady building (built in 1884) was once a house of ill repute and who could have been its madame? Our very own Fat Lady, of course! Rumors also say that Jack London slept here. Considering he lived within walking distance, maybe . . . just maybe he did know the infamous Fat Lady. We’ll let you decide.”

Roger also painted the portrait of the Yeti that hangs in The Yeti restaurant in Davis.

This and that from re Thai r ment, by 3Th. 13 Joey 0008. (April 3, 2019)

 

“Sometimes charity toward others is the only respite you get from thoughts about death.”
Burke, James Lee. Robicheaux: A Novel (p. 188). Simon & Schuster.

 
Happy Spring Festival Season to All: Easter, Songkran, Semana Santa, Holi, Nowruz, Passover, Cooper’s Hill Cheese-Rolling and Wake, Holla Mohalla, Cimburijada (Festival of Scrambled Eggs), Walpurgis Night, Las Fallas, and Spring Equinox in Teotihuacán.

 

 

 

 

TODAY FROM AMERICA:

 
A. POOKIE’S ADVENTURES IN THE BIG ENDIVE BY THE BAY:
On Tuesday morning, Naida, Boo-boo and I left the Enchanted Forest for the Big Endive by the Bay and my meeting with the surgeon. Upon crossing the Bay Bridge, we drove directly to Peter and Barrie’s house where we unloaded and dropped off Boo-boo. We then proceeded to Mission Bay and my appointment. The night before, we had received a call informing us that the appointment time had been changed from 2:15 PM to 2 PM and insisting we be on time. We waited in the waiting area for over an hour before we were admitted into the examining room where we waited another hour before the surgeon showed up. During that second hour, we were first visited by a young woman who introduced herself as a “swallowing technician.” Yes, she did.

Interspersed between the happy talk and questioning me about the state of my swallowing, I was asked to make funny faces such as blowing out my cheeks while sticking out my tongue. I was also asked to make growling noises for some reason. Finally, a balloon was placed in my mouth and I was directed to press it with my tongue against the roof of my mouth three times. The only reason I could come up with for why I was subject to this silly but not particularly unpleasant activity was that I surmised it allowed the hospital to submit additional charges to Medicare. On the other hand, it could have been intended as entertainment in an effort to cheer me up for what was to come later.

The swallowing technician was followed by another young woman who introduced herself as the doctor’s assistant. Strangely, her first question was to ask me why I was there today. I responded, “Because I wanted to know whether I was a dead man walking or not.” She then looked up my records on the computer and informed us that there was a growth on both sides of my throat that had been there since my first CT scan way back in September. “O,” I said, “that’s interesting, no-one ever mentioned that before. Why is that?” She did not know and became confused and said she would have to ask the doctor. She then busied herself with administering a sonogram to me and left.

Eventually, the surgeon arrived and his message sounded far less encouraging than I had hoped. Basically, he said that in his opinion it would be unsafe to operate at this time, and implied that at my age it would always be dangerous because my arteries were brittle from age and the effects of my radiation treatment. After musing about altering my chemotherapy regime, he advised me that I should enjoy myself as much as possible now. I did not take that advice as a positive comment on the state of my health. He then said, “I will see you in three months.” That seemed a bit more positive. At least he seemed to expect I would still be around three months from now.

That evening we had dinner back at Peter and Barrie’s. Barrie had cooked a very nice spaghetti carbonara for us. We were joined by a delightful friend of theirs from across the street who also happens to be my most responsive Facebook friend although I had never met her until that evening. She told us she was the daughter of a wealthy family in Orange County and that she had been kicked out of every college she attended until she ended up at some college in Mexico City before migrating to San Francisco at the height of its reign as the capital of hippiedom. There she was involved with people like Chet Helms and other leaders of the movement during those brief but wonderfully bizarre times.

The following morning we returned to the Enchanted Forest.

 

B. BACK IN THE ENCHANTED FOREST:
As I age, like many Vecchi, my short term memory seems to be…. well, a vague memory. If I do not write here every day, I often forget what has happened. It is Friday evening. We returned on Wednesday. I recall little of what occurred in between. We walked the dog several times. I visited EDH a few times and drove HRM and Jake to Dick’s house. Susan McCabe called to see how I was doing. That made me happy. So did the Good/Bad David today. He was calling from the doctor’s office. It seems he is having blood-clot problems. That did not make me happy.

Today, I picked up Hayden, Jake, Caleb, and Hamza and drove them all to Dick’s house. I asked them how they were doing in school. Jake said his marks were improving because he was studying more. Hayden said his were also. I asked H why that was. He said that Dick promised he would be allowed to move from his small bedroom to the large family room downstairs if he gets certain grades on his final report.

I left them off at the house. There would be no adult supervision there (H is a latch key kid now) because I was returning directly to the Enchanted Forest. I made them promise they would get into only a little bit of trouble. I worry about him. I know how distressing loneliness can be for an adolescent.

On Saturday, Naida and I exercised at the gym in the Nepenthe club-house. On Sunday, we sat in the studio, Naida editing her memoir in hopes of having it published before the State Fair opens in July while I passed the time writing this and trying to find something interesting enough on the internet to banish the pit of ennui into which I seem have fallen. I am not unhappy, in fact, I am as happy as I have ever been. It is just that I find this much sedentary living unsettling. Usually, whenever I have had this little to do, I take a nap. For some strange reason, I am both napping less and doing less. I will think more about this tomorrow, or the next day and perhaps understand it better.

It is now Tuesday afternoon. Tomorrow I leave for The Big Endive by the Bay and my infusion appointment. As usual, I will stay at Peter and Barrie’s house for two evenings before returning here on Friday.

 

 

C. OFF FOR TWO DAYS IN THE BIG ENDIVE WITH QUESTIONS OF MORTALITY.
So, three weeks have passed since my last Chemotherapy infusion and we are off again to San Francisco for what may be my final Chemo infusion and hopefully to find out more about my prognosis. As usual, we spent the night a Peter and Barrie’s home. My grandson Anthony arrived and joined us for dinner along with a friend of Peter and Barrie. She, suffering from incurable ovarian cancer, has lived for four years so far on immunotherapy alone. She has spent those four years happily traveling around the world. Hiromi and my granddaughter Amanda joined us a little later but Amanda was suffering from a bad cold and since I was told by my doctors to avoid such contacts they left after a brief meet and greet.

Barrie prepared a great meal that featured excellent polenta. During the meal we told stories and played “small world.” You know, recalling the famous and near famous we may have run into in our long lives. Sometimes, I feel a bit like Zelig that mysterious character played by Woody Allen in the film of the same name who appears in the background of photographs of significant historical events. If I can be excused for name dropping and I can (this is my Journal after all) let me list the US president’s I have met and known — Reagan, Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter — and presidential candidates, Fred Harris, Mike Dukakis, and Hillary Clinton. I assume most of us as we age have brushed shoulders with the so-called great and near great and experienced at least a passing contact with significant events. I guess we are all Zeligs to some extent.

The next morning I met with my oncologist, he told us that this was to be my last chemotherapy treatment and that surgery to remove the tumor was off the table because of my age and the fragility of my cartroid artery. This opinion was devastating to me since it was essentially a death sentence. However, he also told us that the chemo has stabilized the tumor and it appears to have been effective in preventing cancer from spreading to other parts of my body. He informed us he was putting me on a two-year immunotherapy regime and advised me to enjoy life to the fullest. He appears quite confident that an early onset of death would be delayed to sometime beyond the two years and perhaps held in check long after that. This cheered me up — but only a bit.

That evening back at Peter and Barrie’s during dinner we had to break up a contretemps between Ramsey and Boo-boo over possession of a well-chewed tennis ball.

Boo-boo Hiding Out at Peter and Barrie’s House after Misbehaving.

The next morning we returned to Sacramento.

 

 

D. BACK IN THE ENCHANTED FOREST AND A BRIEF TRIP INTO THE FOOTHILLS.
After dropping Naida and Boo-boo off at our house in the Enchanted Forest, I drove up to the Golden Hills and Picked up HRM and the gang and drove them to Dick’s house. H and I discussed the possibility of making a trip to Portland, Idaho, and Montana during his spring break. I then returned home and wrote this while watching Ray Milland and Grace Kelly in Dial M for Murder. We then walked the dog. I feel good.

It is now Sunday. Spring seems to have slipped into the Great Valley and taken hold, bringing with it sunny days, warm weather, flowers of every color and hay fever (It’s always something —Rosanna Rosannadanna.) It being such a beautiful day, I decided to walk the dog along the meandering pathways of the enchanted forest. The new leaves of the ground cover ivy were a bright almost iridescent green in the bright sun.

On Tuesday at about 2PM, I went to bed. Not for a nap, I knew I would not get up until the following morning. The side-effects of the Chemo infusion, depression, and general fatigue had exhausted me. I woke up periodically during that afternoon and evening. During those brief periods, I would read a chapter of Elena Ferrante’s Novel, “My Brilliant Friend,” or check up on Facebook and then return to sleep.

Ferrante’s book is marvelous and its translation extraordinary. The translation often preserves the Italian language’s ability to express itself in long (at times a page or more) complex sentences encompassing vast emotions and multiple events that in English must be broken up into many separate sentences.

At some point during the evening, I finally came to terms with the fact that I was going to die, sooner rather than later. It is clear that an operation is infeasable and any potential chemical cure has run its course unsuccessfully. I recalled when Bill Yeates’ wife in a similar situation had had enough of the suffering from attempts to prolong her life and chose to take advantage of the new law to end it humanely. I do not believe I will choose that approach. Primarily because I am, in fact, happier than I have ever been in my life. At night, every night, I lie entwined in Naida’s arms ( sometimes so entwined we giggle over our inability to easily identify whose arms and legs belong to whom). There is a peace and happiness I never experienced before. Yes, I always had hoped I would find that, but there was always something else to do, something more to explore. Perhaps happiness needed accomplishment and experience. And, it did — but only for the stories with which to pass the time and perhaps a bit of justification for one’s life. But enough of this. I woke up on Tuesday. It is another day. When I awoke she was in my arms and that is all that matters now.

Damn, I cannot connect to the internet today. I cannot figure out how to fix the problem. Naida’s computer is connected. My smart-phone after a brief problem connected, but my computer remains— stubbornly unresponsive. What to do.What to do. Is interruption of internet service a modern form of Death? I sit in my chair typing this and feeling a strange form of fear. What happens should I not be able to re-connect here, am I doomed to trundling off to Starbucks every day to access the internet and confirm my existence? Is my life so bereft of meaning that I am reduced to depending on the friendship of people on Facebook many of whom I have never met? Is social media simply an updated version of those two-way radios long-distance truck drivers used to use to avoid the boredom and loneliness of their working lives? Have we become the physical and emotional slaves of our machines? Are we needed for anything beyond self-indulgence? Am I so bored that I need to ask these questions even in jest? Is anyone laughing? If I were connected to the internet I could find out.

Ha, one of our medical student borders just came downstairs and said her internet connection was down also. She marched over to the modem that I had fiddled with for a very frustrating hour or so, pressed a button on top and the internet connection popped right up again. I feel like an idiot. Now if she can do the same with my failed medical treatments I would call today a very good day.

This morning, Hayden called to ask me to pick him up after school. It was unusual for him to call like that, so despite not being completely over with the side-effects of the infusion, I drove into the Golden Hills. I met HRM and Caleb at the skatepark. They were planning to go to the Wednesday church youth get together. He said that his mom appears to have relaxed her opposition to him attending. She had wanted him to become a Buddhist and not a Christian. He felt Buddhism was a way of life and not a religion. “Besides,” he said, “it’s boring for teenagers.” She seemed to concede by responding “Whatever makes you happy.” So I dropped them off at Caleb’s home where they would spend the afternoon until it was time to go to the teenage get-together. I left them with my advice that they should be kind to all as much as they can but to be fair to everyone and drove back to the Enchanted Forest where I was met by a happily yapping little dog and a hug from Naida.

 

 

 

 

DAILY FACTOID:

 

 

Etymological Origins Of Ethnic Slurs
David Tormsen November 27, 2015

Human beings like to divide themselves into different categories, a process that began with family units and tribes and eventually worked its way up to nationalities, races, ethnicities, and vaguely defined civilization groups. Another aspect of humanity is its natural tendency toward creativity. It was perhaps unavoidable that we’d spend so much time and effort coming up with nasty words to call each other.

Here Tomsen discusses the derivation of common several ethnic slurs including the following:

‘Wop’
This term, used chiefly in the United States to refer to people of Italian descent, has a number of false etymologies being bandied about on the Internet claiming that it derives from “Without Papers” or “Without Passport.” Supposedly, immigration officials at Ellis Island used stamps, chalk, or placards to designate those arrivals lacking sufficient documents as “WOP.” However, the association with immigration documents makes little sense, as the term has been recorded since 1908, while immigration papers weren’t required until 1918.

“Wop” actually derived from the Sicilian and Neapolitan slang term guappo, which means “thug” or “gangster.” Guappo may have come from the Spanish adjective guapo (“bold”) during the period of Spanish rule over Southern Italy. The Spanish term was itself derived from the Latin vappa, meaning “sour wine,” which the Romans used to describe a worthless person or loser. Southern Italian immigrants to the US used guappo among themselves, and it only acquired an offensive meaning when it was picked up by other Americans and mutated into “wop.”

By the 1890s, it was being applied to Italians in general as well as restaurants (“wop-house”), spaghetti (“wop-special”), and Italy (“Wopland”). It may have been popularized throughout the English-speaking world by early talkie films and was in wide use in English-language newspapers during World War II.

 

 

 

 

PEPE’S POTPOURRI:

 

 

A. Procopius on Top:
Periodically, I like to peruse a site called, “The Fold of the Bards,” (http://www.maryjones.us/ctexts/index.html) a blog dedicated primarily to translations of ancient Celtic poetry. It sometimes also contains bits of prose commentary on historical events often written by those who actually lived during the time the events occurred or shortly thereafter. The following, by Procopius, contains a brief history of the departure of the Romans from Britain in the Fifth Century written about one hundred years after the events described. It is interesting, and fascinating to me at least, in that it departs from the often laconic and unsatisfying descriptions found in most history books — namely one form or another of the statement, “The Romans left Britain in 410AD after 400 years of occupation.” It leaves so many questions, “Do you mean a few bureaucrats packed up their documents and left.” Why did the population decline so radically immediately after departure? Did they just get up and leave? Why? Was there a sudden and vast die off? From what? Did they just suddenly choose to migrate? Why,  they were not under serious military attack? And so on.

Here Procopius informs us that in the vast turmoil of the 5th century of the Roman Empire during the reign of the last Emperor of the West, Honorius, the armed bands, tribes and the like saw an opportunity for profit by taking over (plundering?) a resource-rich and valuable section of the Empire. After all, the Roman Empire had been organized and always was a profit-making enterprise for the benefit first of the Romans themselves and then of those they chose to make citizens. They acted like corporations do today. They did not know or suspect the Empire was ending. They were not prescient. Like today’s corporations, they saw short term profit and did not recognize, appreciate or care whether or not a great historical era was ending.

It seems reasonable that the “corporate” leaders of 5th Century Britain saw the apparently far more valuable lands of Brittany and Galicia free for the taking and assembled their bands and their people and set off from dismal fog-shrouded Britain to conquer them. Sort of like a modern company moving their head office, administration and production to someplace that would increase short-term returns to their management and investors.

On Britain
From Procopius’ De Bellis
c. 540ts CE

[Years 408-450] And the island of Britain revolted from the Romans, and the soldiers there chose as their king Constantinus, a man of no mean station. And he straightway gathered a fleet of ships and a formidable army and invaded both Spain and Gaul with a great force, thinking to enslave these countries. But Honorius was holding ships in readiness and waiting to see what would happen in Libya, in order that, if those sent by Attalus were repulsed, he might himself sail for Libya and keep some portion of his own kingdom, while if matters there should go against him, he might reach Theodosius and remain with him. For Arcadius had already died long before, and his son Theodosius, still a very young child, held the power of the East. But while Honorius was thus anxiously awaiting the outcome of these events and tossed amid the billows of uncertain fortune, it so chanced that some wonderful pieces of good fortune befell him. For God is accustomed to succour those who are neither clever nor able to devise anything of themselves, and to lend them assistance, if they be not wicked, when they are in the last extremity of despair ; such a thing, indeed, befell this emperor. For it was suddenly reported from Libya that the commanders of Attalus had been destroyed, and that a host of ships was at hand from Byzantium with a very great number of soldiers who had come to assist him, though he had not expected them, and that Alaric, having quarreled with Attalus, had stripped him of the emperor’s garb and was now keeping him under guard in the position of a private citizen. And afterwards Alaric died of disease, and the army of the Visigoths under the leadership of Adaulphus proceeded into Gaul, and Constantinus, defeated in [411 a.d. ] battle, died with his sons. However the Romans never succeeded in recovering Britain, but it remained from that time on under tyrants. And the Goths, after making the crossing of the Ister, at first occupied Pannonia, but afterwards, since the emperor gave them the right, they inhabited the country of Thrace. And after spending no great time there they conquered the West. But this will be told in the narrative concerning the Goths.

 

 

B. Trenz Pruca’s Observations:
The Media, whether left-leaning or right, generally dispenses its information about political proposals not by exposing the public to the specifics of the proposals themselves but by limiting its discussion to the feasibility of those proposals being accepted by the political decision makers. Media insiders call this “Tactical Framing.” The reason for this, I guess, is because the conflict over a political issue they believe is more “newsworthy” than the actual proposals themselves. This is wrong.

 

C. Today’s Poem:
As I mentioned, I periodically like to visit the Blog “The Fold of the Bards,” (http://www.maryjones.us/ctexts/index.html) containing mostly the poetry, original and in translation, of the Celtic bards of antiquity. Posting of much of the poetry, epic in form, is far too long to include in T&T so I often look for shorter pieces or excerpts like the one I include below.

The poems themselves were not originally written down. In order to become a bard one had to spend as much as eighteen years memorizing the poems of the past. Most of the poems concerned battles or the doings of the various gods or other supernatural creatures of Celtic mythology. Often when the heroes of one tribe met the heroes of another in battle, the bards of the respective warrior bands would retire to a nearby valley and conduct a bardic competition. The victor’s poem in that competition often would become the record of the battle in the bardic canon no matter the actual outcome of the battle.

One epic poem I read concerned a powerful tribe in northern England who had achieved dominance over a large area of what is now Northumbria. The battle was fought and the tribe was wiped out to a man. The only record we have of the tribes and that battle is a long poem listing every warrior on that losing side, what each was known for and how they died in battle (heroically of course). As for the winners, virtually nothing appears in the bardic canon. They disappeared from history as though they did not ever exist.

Gofara Braint
The Flooding of the Braint River

LlGC 9094 (i, ii) [Robert Vaughan’s Notebook]
Peniarth 120 (iii) [Edward Lhuyd’s copy of Vaughan’s Notebook]

Handid haus genyf gerdet yn ddigynvyl
o adaw kymbry wrth ynghussyl
Can dodyw pen Edwin lys Aberffraw
a dyfod Cymru yn un andaw
Neus duc Gwynedd gorvoled i Vrython
Translation:

The Flooding of the Braint River

Ease the flood without strife
From Wales to forsake my council (?)
The head of Edwin came to the court at Aberffraw
And the Welsh came in an assembly
The lord of Gwynedd brought joy to the Britons
NOTES: This five-line fragment of what we assume was a longer poem is found in only two manuscripts, the second a copy of the first. Robert Vaughan records it, but it’s believed to be much older, at least before the 14th century, based on its orthography, and perhaps not much longer after the life of Cadwallon ap Cadfan, about whom this poem is apparently about. Cadwallon defeated King Edwin of England, who was beheaded; Bede says the head was taken to York, but this poem claims it was taken to the royal court of Aberffraw on the Isle of Anglesey.

The title is difficult to understand on its own; it’s believed that gofara should be amended to gorlifa, “flooding”, and thus evokes the image of the Braint River on Anglesey, overflowing its banks after the death of Cadwallon.

The image of the river overflowing in grief–essentially the land weeping for its fallen lord–may have its origins in the old Celtic concept of the king marrying the goddess of sovereignty. The name of the river–Braint–is derived from Brigantia, the tutelary goddess of the Brigantes, the powerful tribe of North Britain. The name Brigantia, it is argued by scholars like D.A. Binchy, gave rise to the Welsh word for king, brenin, i.e. brenin < breenhin < *brigantīnos, “consort of the goddess Brigantia”. It certainly was the origin of the word braint, meaning “privilege”, for instance privileges concerning land grants (i.e., the Braint Teilo).

This possibly points to either a general wider worship of Brigantia, or to the settlement of Gwynedd by the legendary Cunedda from the part of North Britain where Brigantia was worshipped; however, this presupposes Cunedda to have still been pagan in the fifth century, which while possible is unlikely. It’s also possible that the river was named by the Irish who settled North Wales, including Anglesey, in the fifth century; indeed the Llŷn Peninsula that stretches southeast from the area bordering Anglesey is named for the Laigin, i.e., the Leinstermen, who were likely descended of the Brigantes in Ireland (their territories overlap), and whose patron saint was, not coincidently, St. Brigit.

SOURCES: Gruffydd, R. Geraint. “Canu Cadwallon ap Cadfan”. Astudiaethau ar yr Hengerdd: Studies in Old Welsh Poetry. Cardiff: University of Wales Press. 1978.

 

 

 

 

TODAY’S QUOTE:

 

 

“…Had I so interfered on behalf of the rich, the powerful, the intelligent, the so-called great, or on behalf of any of their friends… it would have been all right; and every man in this court would have deemed it an act worthy of reward rather than punishment.”
John Brown the abolitionist at his trial for the attack on Harpers Ferry in 1859.

(It seems like nothing ever changes for the one-percenters.)

 

 

 

TODAY’S CHART:

TA

This and that from re Thai r ment, by 3Th. 25 Papa Joe 0007 (November 11, 2018)

 

“Man is fed with fables through life, and leaves it in the belief he knows something of what has been passing when in truth he has known nothing but what has passed under his own eye. “
—Thomas Jefferson in a letter to Thomas Cooper.

 

 

 

 

TODAY FROM AMERICA:

 

 

POOKIE’S ADVENTURES IN THE ENCHANTED FOREST:
It is autumn in the Enchanted Forest — Time to change from Hawaiian shirts to flannel; for hearing the fallen leaves crackle beneath my feet as we walk by; for golden sunlight in the afternoons and early sunsets; for the yellow pollen from the Deodar Cypress trees coating the cars and the sidewalks; and a time for sleeping late in the morning and for reflection.

On Tuesday, I went for my appointment at the office of the surgeon selected to operate on my neck. A very young doctor followed by a female medical student entered the examination room where I had been placed. He appeared to be of South Asian heritage. He examined me briefly and answered my questions. He was thin with limpid sympathetic eyes. He then left with the student trailing in his wake.

After a while, the surgeon himself entered with the young doctor and medical student in tow. He was a small man in a grey-brown suit and sporting a bright blue bow tie. For some reason, his appearance made me recall that I had read somewhere that surgeons have the highest percentage of psychopaths of any profession. He felt around my neck, had the young doctor stick a camera down my nose and into my neck and watched whatever it was he saw on the monitor. He then announced that the proposed operation was dangerous and I would probably die. He followed that good news up with the observation that there had been almost two months since the PET scan and his examination showed that during that time the tumor had grown substantially and now pressed too close to my cartroid artery to be safely removed by surgery. He then railed about the unwillingness of my health-care group to allow his health-care group to use their follow up organizations thereby limiting his activities only to the surgery. He ordered his assistant to schedule another CT scan. If it confirms his diagnosis, I may be in deep trouble.

My oncologist told me a few days before that if surgery is unavailable then we may try immunotherapy. At best, immunotherapy, he said, slows the growth and spread of cancer cells. If it does not work, then it is goodbye time for Joey.

I had woken up that morning in reasonably good spirits. By 3PM I may have become a dead man walking. Life is funny sometimes.

For the next day or two, I was very depressed. That little voice in my head, the one that talks all the time and tells you how good you are or how bad you are as though your goodness or badness is the most significant goodness or badness of anyone in the world, was worried.

“What does it mean to me for you to die?” it said in that same youthful voice it always had? “I mean, it’s not like sleep,” it added. “When you sleep you anticipate you will wake up in the morning. Isn’t that consciousness? You anticipate something is going to happen next even if you cannot know what.”

I was getting annoyed, even depressed with its musings. “That’s it,” it continued. “You close your eyes like you’re are going to sleep and you never wake .”

“That’s very profound, you idiot,” I said annoyed.

“No, you Don’t understand,” it went on. “Without anticipation, there is no life, no consciousness.”

“And this insight is supposed to help me how?” I enquired. It was silent. Perhaps for the first time in my life, I could not hear It. I was afraid, very afraid.

By Thursday I felt a little better — a good dose of valium and a nights sleep allowed me to begin to get things in order. First, I thought, “Write a will” — a wasted gesture. I always wanted to die with nothing. I am pretty close to that — both dying and money. I probably need someone to take my collection of Hawaiian shirts, however. I would rather not send them to Goodwill. Pookies last will and testament: “I leave to______ my Hawaiian shirts. End.”

So here I am typing at my computer, watching MSNBC and CNN and reading Tana French’s latest novel. It is a mystery novel, but so far I am not sure about the mystery. I have read about 1/3 of the book and all that’s happened so far is that the narrator gets beat up and spends a long long time in the hospital worrying about everything except who beat him up and why.

The weekend trundled by. I arranged for the CT scan on Monday that will indicate whether an operation is feasible. On Tuesday, I will watch the election returns. If the Democrats do not retake at least one house of Congress with a substantial majority, then — then what? I am too close to the end for it to make much of a difference to my welfare, but I may be sad for everyone else.

Perhaps, this is where it all may begin to end — in some ways, life has always been, little more than a scramble for scarce resources (money and sex — ok, not so scarce) ending in death.

A computer simulation by Jeremy England and colleagues at MIT showed that a system of particles confined inside a viscous fluid in which the particles are driven by an oscillating force, over time, triggers the formation of more bonds among the particles. In other words, shine enough light and apply enough heat long enough you eventually get life. In general, the function of life is to more efficiently convert matter (resources) to energy (movement). Humans have gotten very good at converting resources to energy and leaving waste and destruction behind — perhaps too good. Maybe the answer to Marconi’s query, “Where are they?” regarding alien civilizations of 40 billion planets in the Milky Way capable of sustaining life, is simply that advanced life-forms a become so efficient in converting resources to waste they destroy the planet before ever making an effective foray into space searching for others.

On Saturday, we had a barbecue and fresh oysters at Naida’s daughter’s home nearby. Sarah’s husband is a nurse. One of his colleagues, another male nurse, was there also. I asked them why they became nurses. Besides liking to help people, they agreed that employment opportunities were a major draw. One said, “I could be fired at my current job and before arriving home I would have a new one.”

Between medical appointments and various episodes of depression, I have not seen HRM all week. That makes me sad. On the other hand, autumn is a pleasant time to walk the dog and stand on the levee watching the river flow by.

The second third of the Tana French book focused on Hugo, the narrator’s beloved uncle, who is dying from inoperable cancer. Hugo surprisingly confesses to the murder and promptly dies the next morning while in police custody. In fact, the murder had been committed by others.

On Sunday Terry, the Cannabis King of the Siskiyou’s dropped by. It was good to see him. He had been looking into some alternative therapies for me. It is good to have friends. I have had some very good friends along the way. When I was very young, in grammar school, I had no friends so I used to pretend that I was sick so I could stay home in bed and read the encyclopedia. That is where I get my fondness for melodrama —pretending I a sick almost to death. Once I recall, I successfully persuaded my parents I was as sick as I had ever been in my life, so they let me stay home. After they both left for work and I was alone, I began to persuade myself that I was, in fact, very sick. I was sure I was going to need help or I was a goner. I slipped out of bed and crawled because I was too weak walk through the apartment to the door where, if I were able to open it, I could call for help and one of my neighbors would undoubtedly save me. I reached for the doorknob but I was too weak to grasp it and I fell motionless to the floor.

After an appropriate amount of time. I got up off the floor and walked back to the bedroom, climbed back into bed and resumed my reading.
On Monday I had my CT scan. More needles stuck into my body and radioactive substances injected into my bloodstream. After that, I drove up to the Golden Hills, ate lunch and walked a bit around the CCD park.

I finished the Tana French book today. Despite everything I found out previously and the resolution, more or less, of the murder that occupied most of the book, it ends with a twist as surprising as any I have read in detective fiction.

Today I have my appointment with the surgeon to review the results of the CT scan and determine if I am dead or not.

Well, the surgeon informed me today that if they operate there is a 90% chance I would die on the operating table. I do not know if that was an evaluation of his abilities or the complexity of my tumor’s location. He followed up that news with the opinion that, absent successful alternative therapies, my remaining lifespan would be somewhere between three and six months. Unfortunately, the only alternative therapy available to me appears to be immunotherapy which the surgeon explained to me would have about a 20% chance of success.

If the situation is as dire as he indicates, I intend to fully indulge myself of whatever unorthodox alternative treatment approach that I may enjoy — mushrooms, cannabis, of course, acupuncture, mood-altering drugs and the like. One of the good things about knowing your days are limited but you are otherwise in good health is that you have few restrictions on pandering to yourself.

In the evening, my sister joined us for dinner. She is down from Mendocino to attend an economic development conference. After dinner we watched the returns come in. I had hoped for better.

That night, I was afraid I would not be able to sleep. I tried all of my little tricks to help me fall asleep including counting my breaths backward from 99 and contemplating the SF 49’s starting lineup but to no avail. So I turned to Naida and said, “I can’t sleep so I am going downstairs so that my twisting and turning will not keep you awake.” She responded, “What are you talking about? It is 5:30 in the morning. You’ve been sleeping peacefully all night.”

The next day, my radiology physician confirmed the surgeon’s diagnosis and opined that under these circumstances immunotherapy was the best alternative — “Sometimes it works,” he added. I said, “It is odd feeling as well as I do but knowing I’m as good as dead.” “Yes,” he responded. “It is like that for cancer patients.” That got me wondering how many people I pass each day with similar problems to mine, that go about their days without complaint. Almost every day I meet someone who asks me how I am doing. As is my want, I tell them. They often tell me that they had gone through similar treatments two or three times already. It always makes me feel worse when I am unable to wallow in the uniqueness of my imagined misery.

I left his office with him promising to think about the possibility of additional radiation therapy should the immunotherapy treatment falter and traveled into the Golden Hills to pick up the Scooter Gang. I dropped them off at Dick’s house. They promised not to get in trouble (follow my rules, don’t hurt yourselves, don’t spill anything on the floor and don’t break anything) while in the house but begged to be able to get into a little trouble when they traveled to Town Center later. While I was leaving, Hayden walked up to the window of the car and said, “Remember Pookie you have got to believe.”

I guess there are no more adventures for Pookie — unless dying itself is an adventure — Pookies last adventure. Dylan Thomas wrote, “Do not go quietly into that dark night.” Well, I am pretty sure I will not go quietly. But instead of “railing against the darkening of the light,” it will be more like bitching and complaining (see my screed on bitching: https://trenzpruca.wordpress.com/2018/02/12/petrillos-commentary-on-bitching/). My mother always said I screamed constantly from shortly after birth until I began to talk and then I complained of everything until I became a teenager and then thankfully I only sulked.

My sister came by again yesterday evening. We laughed a lot. Planned for Thanksgiving and reminisced.

The leaf-fall of autumn has increased since the air has cooled and the Fall breezes grown stronger. They are falling too fast for the ground-keepers with their leaf-blowers to keep up so the Enchanted Forest’s paths and lawns are covered with yellow and brown leaves that in the sunlight look like spilled paint. While walking the dog I like stomping through the leaves, kicking them into the air and watching them fall back again like a 79-year-old child.

Today, we visited my chemotherapist expecting to set the schedule for my immunotherapy. We were surprised. Apparently, he spoke last night with the various doctors involved in my case. He said the radiologist changed his mind and now thought radiation might be possible. Also, my regular oncologist told him he was setting up an appointment for a second opinion at UCSF. He then laid out my treatment schedule. First, I get the second opinion. If that supports the first surgeon’s judgment, then we will begin a new round of radiation therapy, followed by Chemo and if necessary immunotherapy. Although this might appear to be more positive than the other recent medical opinions I have received, it actually seems to me to be simply a change in a treatment plan and not in prognosis. I think they are just trying to make me feel better. Despite their attempts to humor me I intend to continue bitching and wailing, “The end is nigh. Woe is me.” I do so like melodrama.

Yesterday evening, I picked up HRM from his mountain bike team practice. On the way home, after asking me how I felt, he mentioned that at the church youth meeting he attends every Wednesday all the eighth-grade boys, many of whom I know, prayed for Pookie. I may not be someone particularly optimistic about the power of prayer, but I cried nevertheless at the thought of the Scooter Gang praying for me.

On Friday, before returning to Mendocino, my sister came by to take us to a Japanese grocery store to hunt for mushrooms for my new diet. Later we had lunch at the Freeport Inn in the Delta. Following my sister’s departure back to Mendocino, Naida sautéed some of the mushrooms for dinner. They were delicious.

Saturday, we attended the weekly coffee at the Nepenthe clubhouse. It is the season when everyone there was involved in the various charity drives and party planning undertaken by the community. On the way back home while I was busy kicking the leaves about, Naida noticed a sign for a meeting at the small clubhouse of something called “Conscious Community.” We decided to find out what it was all about. We discovered they considered themselves a consciousness-raising group like those of the late ’60s except without the dope.

During the walk, we noticed a mysterious cement ball had appeared in the street in front of our house. It remains there today. Nothing like it exists anywhere else in the neighborhood. What can it be? A portent of something? Alien scat? A hairball from a giant cat?

Pookie with the mysterious orb.

 

 

 

 

DAILY FACTOID:

 

 

–$710,000,000,000,000 to $1,500,000,000,000,000 – The estimates of the total notional value of all global derivatives contracts generally fall within this range. At the high end of the range, the ratio of derivatives exposure to global GDP is about 21 to 1.

 

 

 

 

PEPE’S POTPOURRI:

 
A. Adventures with Hayden on Top:

One day, I set off with Hayden to drive to Mendocino in order to spend a few days with my sister. During the drive from Sacramento to San Francisco to pick up my grand-daughter Amanda and her mom Hiromi, they were joining us for the weekend, I tuned into the local university classical music station to listen to a 1977 NY Metropolitan Opera performance of that old Verdi warhorse, La Forza del Destino, sung by the aging Leontyne Price and the young Placido Domingo.

A few days before, I was listening to the same station while driving Hayden to school in the morning. As we approached the school, he insisted I turn off the music, which I did assuming he found my choice of music distasteful. Because of this, during the station’s introduction before the opera presentation, I asked him if he wanted me to change the station or turn off the radio since he did not enjoy the same type of music as I.

“Oh, no,” he said. “It’s not that at all. I was afraid that some of the bullies at school would hear the music when I opened the car door and make fun of me for listening to old people’s music.” Then for the next hour, he entertained me by singing along with the performers every part of the opera, especially mimicking Ms. Price’s lirico spinto soprano – sometimes note for note including vibrato.
March 29, 2013

 

B. Tuckahoe Joe’s Blog of the Week:

In searching through the Blogosphere, I discovered a blog entitled “Logarithmic History: the history of the universe — from the Big Bang to the end of the year — day by day (https://logarithmichistory.wordpress.com/). The author attempts to compress the entire history of the universe using a logarithmic scale (you can read the “about” section of the blog to find out what he’s about)

The first entry I came upon, I assume corresponding to November 4, the day on which I discovered it, contained an excerpt from Essays of Montaigne on Cannibals that I found fascinating. Here it is in its entirety.

Three of these men [Tupi Indians from Brazil], ignorant of the price they will pay someday … ignorant of the fact that of this intercourse will come their ruin … poor wretches …were at Rouen, at the time the late King Charles IX was there [in 1562]. The king talked to them for a long time; they were shown our ways, our splendor, the aspect of a fine city. After that, someone asked their opinion and wanted to know what they had found most amazing. They mentioned three things, of which I have forgotten the third, and I am very sorry for it; but I still remember two of them. They said that in the first place they thought it very strange that so many grown men, bearded, strong, and armed, who were around the king (it is likely that they were talking about the Swiss of his guard) should submit to obey a child, and that one of them was not chosen to command instead. Second (they have a way in their language of speaking of men as halves of one another), they had noticed that there were among us men full and gorged with all sorts of good things, and that their other halves were beggars at their doors, emaciated with hunger and poverty; and they thought it strange that these needy halves could endure such an injustice, and did not take the others by the throat, or set fire to their houses.

I had a very long talk with one of them. … When I asked him what profit he gained from his superior position among his people (for he was a captain, and our sailors called him king), he told me that it was to march foremost in war. … Did all his authority expire with the war? He said that this much remained, that when he visited the villages dependent on him, they made paths for him through the underbrush by which he might pass quite comfortably.

All this is not too bad — but what’s the use? They don’t wear breeches.

C. Trenz Pruca’s Observations:

Your successes may be enjoyable but your failures are usually far more interesting.

D. Today’s Poem:
Luigi Pirandello (1867-1936)

Luigi Pirandello was born in 1867 in Girgenti (now Agrigento) on the southern shore of Sicily. He attended the University of Rome in 1887 and later transferred to Bonn University. His doctoral thesis was a study of the Sicilian language. He was influenced by Luigi Capuana (1839-1915). Antonietta, his wife by an arranged marriage suffered a mental breakdown that is said to have led to Pirandello’s sense of disillusionment. He was a prolific writer, producing widely acclaimed novels, short stories, and plays. His masterpiece, Six Characters in search of an Author was written in 1921. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1934. He published five books of poetry.

Sempre Bestia

Senza far nulla, un leone è leone:
e un pover’uom dev’affrontar la morte
per avere l’onor del paragone
con quella bestia, senza stento, forte.

D’alti pensieri l’anima infelice
nutrite, si che s’alzi a eccelse mète.
Un gran premio v’aspetta. Vi si dice
che veramente un’aquila voi siete.

Sciogliete in soavissima armonia
il vostro chiuso intenso ardente duolo,
fatene una sublime poesia,
e vi diran che siete un rosignuolo.

Ma dunque per non essere una bestia
che dovrebbe far l’uomo? non far niente?
non pigliarsi ne affanno ne molestia?
E ciuco allora gli dirà la gente.
Always An Animal

Without doing anything a lion is a lion:
but hapless man must brave death
to have the honor of being compared
with that animal, strong, without limit.

Nourished by the soaring thoughts of an
afflicted soul, if one reaches an apex.
A grand prize awaits. Then it is said
you truly fly like an eagle.

Write a sublime poem,
that sings in silken rhyme
of your innermost intense feelings,
and they’ll say you sing like a nightingale.

What must a man do to not be likened to
an animal? can he simply do nothing?
without feeling anxious or troubled?
People would then take him for a jackass.

– –translated by Arthur V. Dieli

 

 

 

 

 

TODAY’S QUOTE:

 

“That’s right! Zombie bankers!” A flaming skull floated along beside the ghastly businessmen, howling like a hellish carnival barker. “Which is more terrifying: their eternal hunger for the flesh of the living? Or their reckless fiscal irresponsibility? No, seriously. Your input is valuable!”
Pike, J. Zachary. Son of a Liche (The Dark Profit Saga Book 2) (p. 528). Gnomish Press LLC.

This and that from re Thai r ment, by 3Th. 13 JoJo 0006 (May 28, 2017)

 

“Childhood, after all, is the first precious coin that poverty steals from a child.”
Horowitz, Anthony. The House of Silk: A Sherlock Holmes Novel (p. 54). Little, Brown and Company.

 

 

HAPPY BIRTHDAY’S TO MY BELOVED DAUGHTER JESSICA, MY FABULOUS BROTHER IN LAW GEORGE DREAPER, NIKKI REFFO, AND NEAL FISHMAN.

 

CONGRATULATIONS TO TOM AND KATHLEEN ON THEIR UPCOMING WEDDING.

 

 

 

TODAY FROM AMERICA:

 

 

A. FUNERAL

On May 18, we held my mom’s funeral at St. Ann’s Home in San Francisco. Although a sad occasion, I felt uplifted and a sense of closure due primarily to my sister and George’s efforts. They made the event a celebration of her life with a display of memorabilia, photographs, my mom’s artworks and with their eulogies — especially Maryann’s (see below).

I drove to SF the day before the funeral and spent the night at Peter and Barrie’s house. Because El Dorado Hills is such a silent place, I had an excess of words bundled up inside of me which, in an unbroken monolog of stories, observations, comments, and opinions that I spread across the floors of the house until I emptied myself. Then, exhausted and slightly embarrassed I trundled off to bed.

At the funeral the next day, I was pleasantly surprised by who showed up. Of course, my sister, her family, and a few of their friends were there including one of whom traveled all the way down from Mendocino. My son Jason and his family, Annmarie and the grandchildren were there also. Peter and Barrie attended along with Kathleen Foote (outside of family members, Kathleen and Ruth Galanter are the women I have known the longest), and Bob Uram, my partner at Shepard Mullen and one of the nation’s best environmental lawyers. In a welcome surprise, Don Neuwirth who I had not seen for over 20 years also dropped by.

The funeral brochure included a beautiful poem written by Ruth:

Teresa Petrillo departed this earth
Leaving grief and relief among those she gave birth.

To watch someone aging is hard while you do it;
In some ways as hard as yourself going through it.

So much as you’ll miss her, remember she’s free
And keep all her stories in your memory.

Teresa was tough, as her tough life required
To raise her three children. She should be admired!

And so as she passes from this life to next
Let’s think of her life in its broader context:

An immigrant child when few folks had phones,
She lived to see spying conducted by drones!

She had strong opinions, as all of you know,
And it’s likely that she chose the time she would go.

And so as she passes, remember her strength,
Tell others her story, but not at great length,

Be glad that you knew her because there’s no other
Relationship quite like a child with its mother.

Be sure as she’s watching from heaven above
That she sees you with pride and, above all, with love.

My mother as a young woman.

 

B. POOKIE’S ADVENTURES IN EL DORADO HILLS:

After a brief reception at Annmarie’s, I returned to EDH. The next day, too exhausted to move much, I stayed in the house and rested.

The sun has begun its annual baking of the Golden Hills transforming them from spring green to summer gold. The skies, now and then dotted with cottony clouds, have turned deep blue.

Clouds over the health club pool.

My doctors seem to think I am doing well and continue to try to persuade me that my complaints of various pains and physical difficulties are simply signs that I am recovering. In fact, I do feel a bit better and have begun to eat and exercise more. In addition to swimming, my exercise consists primarily of seemingly endless walks around the lakes in City Center. To avoid collapsing and expiring from ennui in the middle of the path during those walks, I have taken to talking to and arguing with myself. This I suspect is a sign of terminal mental breakdown.

Along the walkways, wild grape vines have taken over the landscape like kudzu vines take over a forest. Depending on how I feel that day, I am either happy to be strolling between those lush green walls or terrified that the twisted tendrils reaching out will grab me and swallow me up. I think I am becoming delusional. Perhaps, I have been so for a while now.
IMG_2798.jpg

 

 
C. MENDOCINO:

Having had enough of the excitement of the golden hills, I set off to spend the Memorial Day weekend with my sister and George. I took a different route than usual. I traveled along Route 5 up the Central Valley and then along State Route 20 to Ft. Bragg. Although this route was slightly longer in miles and did not avail itself of as much freeway n my usual way, once past Sacramento I avoided the traffic slowdowns at the Yolo Causeway, Davis, Route 37, Petaluma and Santa Rosa cutting my actual driving time by two hours — even with stopping for a pleasant walk along the shores of Clear Lake.

Since arriving in Mendocino, I have gone for walks along the coast, eaten well, napped a lot, and talked at length with Mary and George. Some friends of their son Brendan arrived to scout out sites for a music video. I suggested a few likely places that I was aware of and thought might fit their needs and they trundled off to look at them. The next day they left leaving Mary, George, and I to face the weekend.

 

D. JERRY SMITH:

On May 7, 2017, Jerry Smith passed away. He had been my boss and a great friend. Jerry had been a California State Senator. He carried the California Coastal Act of 1976 to passage. I was his committee consultant responsible for shepherding the bill drafting and negotiating with the various interest involved. Together, we also passed a major revision of CEQA, Victims of Crime rights, and several other significant pieces of legislation.

Following eight years in the Senate, he was appointed by Governor Jerry Brown to the Appellate Court. Upon his retirement from the court, Jerry became a consultant to countries seeking to reform their judicial systems.

Later, he became a well-known local sculptor whose work appears in many public places in Santa Clara Valley. In the photograph below, Jerry stands near his bronze sculpture of St. Cardinal Bellarmine at Santa Clara University. I think of everything, he loved being an artist best.

 

 

 

PEPE’S POTPOURRI:

 

A. Mary Anne on Top:

 

1. The Entrepreneurial Mindset and Women’s Empowerment.

My sister wrote an interesting article in a local Mendocino publication about entrepreneurship and women’s empowerment the first two paragraphs of which I especially liked.

 

CELEBRATING THE ENTREPRENEURIAL MINDSET
By Mary Anne Petrillo, Executive Director West Company

The youngest daughter of the first born son of a patriarchal New York Italian family generally does not stray far from home. But somehow a crack occurred in the continuum of the universe and at the age of 16, my father gave me his blessing to travel to California to visit my oldest brother. The year was 1974. What I and my family did not know at that time, was that my brother was bushwhacking his way up and down the California coast using his legal chops to save the coast from development. Shortly after my arrival he put me on a Greyhound bus and said go to Mendocino it’s like nothing you have ever seen, it will change your life. Arriving at midnight, it was not until morning light broke when I walked outside to see the Pacific Ocean in all its glory for the first time. The experience did change my life because I knew, as only one does when they feel a physical transformation that I would one day live here. Two years later I was in California. Thirty years later Mendocino became my home.

But the journey from then to now was more than just a location swap. When I arrived in California it was the 80’s and anybody with a little bit of knowledge, some office space, and a telephone could open up shop and start a business. I jumped in and joined the fray. Business was booming. There were no PC’s no internet and no social media. Cold calling was king. Big shoulder pads, a briefcase, and a business card was all the armor you needed. I ran my own business, hired staff, and fired staff, balanced checkbooks, and embraced the technology vortex as it radically transformed the work environment and dramatically transformed how we communicated. While I was trying to build my reputation as a woman entrepreneur little did I know there was another woman with a mission laying the groundwork for women empowerment in my future home.

 

 
2. My Sister Mary Anne’s Eulogy for our Mom:

 

For Mom

She was the youngest daughter, born to the oldest son, of a patriarchal Sicilian family
By rights, her place in life should have been secured, as the youngest girl it should have been the life of a princess, but

By age 7, she was an orphan
By 10 she was an indentured servant living in a foreign country, gripped by hunger
By 15 she had found true love and began to believe there was a future
By 16, she lost this love to a tragic death (her next true love would not come for another 63 years)
At 19, she married a man who adored her but was plagued by his own demons and insecurities
Throughout her 20’s and 30’s, she struggled to raise her two sons while fighting off cancer, epilepsy, leukemia, anemia, colitis, ulcers and depression.
At 40, as her middle child lay in a hospital bed struggling to live after a severe car accident, she gave birth to her last child, a daughter
At 50 she learned to drive and received her first paycheck … as a waitress
At 70 she celebrated 50 years of an unhappy marriage
At 80 she found the community of St. Anne’s that brought her the peace of mind and heart she never knew
At 82 she met her second true love and at 84 she lost him
At 85 she picked up a paintbrush for the first time and astounded everyone with her capacity for creativity
At 90 as her mental state precariously rocked between a woman who was for so long was my best friend and cheerleader and a contrarian who sadly saw the glass … half empty

This was the life of Teresa Corsello known to everyone as Terry Petrillo and known to me as mom.

I was the recipient of all she learned of a life that brought endless challenges and also quiet joys. It falls upon me today to speak about my mother to many of you who knew her during only one phase of her life.

Throughout her long life, my mother was many things. She was an incredible cook who always seemed to produce endless amounts of comfort food no matter what time of day you dropped by unannounced. Once during college, I came to her house with a group of friends unexpected and within what seems like minutes there was 10 roasted chickens, 3 green vegetables and 2 yellow vegetables and spaghetti and meatballs followed by cheesecake!

She was what we today might call a fashionista. In her late 50’s she held a sales job at Niemen Marcus. They loved her and she was like a sponge absorbing the latest fashion trends. Her sense of style carried on well into her elder years as she always knew how to put together an outfit. Whether the clothes were bought at the thrift shop or Sak’s Fifth Avenue she intuitively understood color and style.

Long after her children were grown she became a creative force. Brief as this time was in her life she surprised us all with her capacity for creativity. Who knew! Learning first to be hula dancer and then picking up a paint brush at 85 to become an extraordinary painter. Had she lived I have no doubt she would have tried her hand at music and gone on tour with her grandson!

She was a grandmother of the first degree. Loving her grandchildren with abandon. There was no bowl of sugar cereal too big and no ice cream cone too large for her grandkids. As a child, I couldn’t always see the unconditional love my mother gave me but observing her with my children I witnessed a love so profound and so pure that now when I see how confidently my children walk through this world I know it is because of her unbridled love for them.

She, of course, was a mother and wore that role with pride. But she suffered from the Mother’s conundrum which is to raise your children to be fiercely independent so that they stand on their own but then keenly feel the loss of your children once they were gone. There are no recipes to be the perfect mom. And she had few role models to pull from so she relied on the belief that you can never love too much. And love her children she did.

And finally most of all she was a friend. If I close my eyes today and think back on what I witnessed most during my childhood it was the multitude of friends that walked through our tiny apartment. My mother was a confidant. She was the type of person you could tell your troubles to and she never criticized or diminished your need to tell your story. Today we live in an age where so many things vie for our attention. What made my mother unique and why she was such a good friend is because when she was with you she was with you 100% you always felt that you were the most important person there was and she was listening just to you.

She knew when, as a child, I had no friends so she became my best friend. She knew that I loved art but had no role models, so she took me to museums. She didn’t pretend to know art she just took me to the place where it existed. When I had no boyfriends like most teenage girls were supposed to have she never once stopped believing that I would one day find my true love and she knew he would be a good man. And when I made her wait an incredible 10 years before having grandchildren she never chided, guilted or pressured me. She believed in every single one of my choices and never held back in expressing that belief.

She fastened me with wings so that I never once believed there was a situation I could not rise above. The wings she gave me were made of steel, honed by the endless stories of her childhood, her fears, and her failures. Without the benefit of lofty analysis or intellectual pursuits, she took what life lessons she acquired as an immigrant with no family of her own and she spoke her stories to me in the hope that they would somehow protect and prepare me for life.

They have and they will forever more…..

 

 
B. Peter’s Comments on the Previous Issue of T&T:

I galumphed through two gigs yesterday: The first, with the old Beardos, was at the Lilienthal School’s annual Mayfair. Our respective children went there, and one year Barrie was in charge of entertainment for the Fair, which is held in the school yard (fun and fundraising). She said to me: “You’re playing at the Mayfair.” At that time I hadn’t been doing any of that for some time. I replied negatively. Then, of course, she and three other wives/mothers caballed and the four husbands/fathers became the Beardos; this after we actually played at the Fair where no one threw tomatoes and we discovered we had a good time. Followup: the Beardos stayed together and played for eight years; and, we have played at the Mayfair each year for 25 years; yesterday was the silver anniversary. We noticed that the children and most of the adults weren’t around when we first played what became our ‘greatest hits’. Time passes. My morning pain pill and the stool I now sit on to play got me through that one.

Later on, I went over to Emeryville to join the Blind Lemon Pledge folks to celebrate the release of James’s and BLP’s new album, Backwoods Glance. The event was at a place called Strings, a performance venue (an auditorium-like room, with living room feelings, created by an old hippy named Joey). Prior to a downed another pill. I’m now almost out and the doc needs to refill the prescription; he assumed one a day would do; it doesn’t. Limping toward Bethlehem…..

I chose to have the hip surgery in late June because for May and June I have 22 gigs between the two bands. Not a matter of getting it up: rather more, one of getting up in the morning. Fortunately, the recurring necessity of what my grandmother (in a triumph of her pseudo-victorian pretensions) used to call “voiding” drives me to the loo. Down the primrose path to senility…..

Peter’s response to my statement that I am a wuss and complain too much about my infirmities:

Actually not. I noticed the other day that I’m kvetching a bit too much about my current ‘infirmity’; people notice my limp and that sets off the grumble. However, I do not blog. As to others, probably many men are caught in the stiff upper sphincter approach to maintaining their external manliness presentation and remain silent about their various imperfections. Another take on it: On TV, 5-6 pm is prime time for pharmaceutical ads during the news programs. Weird as this may seem, I recently counted 29 different drugs advertised during this one hourly period, such as Eliquis, Premarin, Repatha, Claritin, Flonase, Humira, Xeljanz, etc. Why grumble when you can scarf down an endless chain of pills and be part of Making America Great Again.
I also thank everyone who, in response to the previous issue of T&T, expressed their condolences upon learning of my mother’s passing.

 

 

 

TODAY’S QUOTE:

 

“Whoever would make a name (i.e. glory) loses the name; he who increases not [his knowledge] decreases; whoever learns not [in Ab. R. N. xii.: “who does not serve the wise and learn”] is worthy of death; whoever exploits for his own use the crown (of Torah) perishes” (Avot. 1:13).
Rabbi Hillel

 

 

 

TODAY’S CHART:

 

 

 

 

TODAY’S PHOTOGRAPH:

From the mid-1950’s. Me and my bud’s from Tuckahoe NY, Charles (“Charlie”) DeVito and Peter (“Sir Rince”) Cirrincione. I am the dork on the far left — Shades of “The Lords of Flatbush,”