The Inmates Are Running the Asylum

The title reflects one of my favorite sayings these days and it's so true.

Here we have the alleged President of the United State routinely speaking falsehoods under the guise of daily briefings, which we all know are just replacements for his rallies we taxpayers fund in myriad ways. The true experts in the Administration are either muzzled or fired outright.

And Trump's base, those God-fearing covidiots are getting louder and more kinetic in their protests, many of whom are now threatening store clerks who are just doing their jobs to enforce social distancing.

Imagine going to a Costco, standing in line for hours, only to be shot by some maniac with a semi-automatic rifle because he wasn't able to get into the store when he wanted to. It could likely happen. Hell, there have been mass shootings for less "justification" than that.

In our little community, the right-wing, Trump-loving lunatics are getting more and more boisterous in their demand that all the amenities we have here open up no matter what the Governor's orders are.

We're seeing here (and in other parts of the country) citizens going head to head with cops, spraying their COVID-19 breath everywhere, demanding to have their freedoms "restored." There are also some county law enforcement officials who declare they will not enforce the social distancing orders and there work for the damn state!

My wife and I have talked about moving out of here to be closer to our families. We actually had a loose timetable to do this since we visited them last year. But because of the novel coronavirus, our plans are on hold. We have no idea when we'll be able to travel to look at a new home, let alone get everything all ready to move.

So, my wife had enough today when we saw on Nextdoor.com veiled threats from some members toward the vocal liberals among us. It was disturbing enough. Check this one:

This kind of thing is more than discouraging. Considering how these people love their guns here, is it that out of the realm of possibility that someone will step up the assault and shoot one of us? So we're stuck here until we'll be able to travel freely again. Until then, we just have to remain vigilant.

Yours from the nuthouse,

Michae.

The problem with committing to writing a blog every day is you sometimes have nothing noteworthy to discuss, at least something that will fill a short article space. Sure, I can rant on about the latest stupid thing that Trump and his minions did, but that gets old. Every day is a new insult to our country and to analyze every single one of those instances is better left to the journalists.


So, here's a brief list of things on my mind this day.

SNL At Home

Have you had a chance to watch the two episodes of SNL produced all from within the cast's homes? Despite the lack of a studio audience, it's been pretty inspired comedy. It demonstrates the professionalism of those involved with the product, from the writers all the way to the video editors and everyone in between.


I've been a fan of SNL since it first aired back in the 70s. I was in high school then and I thought their comedy was edgy and a bit dangerous, as compared to the way TV was back then. Over the years, the quality came and went, but I hung in there as so many fans did.


Sure, their episodes are uneven. Some skits are funny as hell, others are just bombs. Sketch comedy is a brutal business and the way SNL's process seems to lend itself to disasters sometimes.


To be able to see new episodes in this stay-at-home format really has increased my appreciation for what they do. Bravo, Lorne Michaels and the entire team!

Nextdoor.com

I've already ranted about the people using this platform in our neighborhood but their complaints have grown both more strident and more ridiculous since I began posting there regularly.


The number of in-house epidemiologists we have here is simply astounding! These self-described experts (really covidiots) cite their sources as some idiot they saw on Fox News or some You-tube video they saw. They attack the true medical experts like Fauci, even questioning his motives, his background, and everything else.


Yet, these same morons think that everything that spills from Trump's lips is like words from the Lord himself. Talk about a bunch of delusional twits.


And the complaints? Don't get me started. Besides the constant whining about the amenities still being closed, they bitch they're "rights" are being taken away because they post stupid and misleading stuff on Nextdoor, and then the posts are removed.


The First Amendment's intention was to prevent the government from abridging the right to free speech. It was not written to allow anyone to write/say anything on any platform completely unfettered. NextDoor.com isn't run by the government; users must follow the guidelines prescribed by the moderators. The same goes for Twitter and all other social media.

Hot Peppers

Do you like spicy food? I mean really like spicy food? I do. And having grown up in a household of pepper-eaters (my mother's Italian), I grew up eating the stuff, the hotter the better.


When I met my wife, she wasn't a big fan of spicy food but over the years, she's learned to love it almost as much as I do. Every once in a while we buy chilis japones, those hot red peppers you get in kung pao style food at Chinese restaurants. We fry them up in vegetable oil until they just a little crisp and then put the result in a glass bowl with a spoon, where we apply it to any/all food we eat.


Without getting graphic, of course there's the natural digestive result that comes with eating hot food. But anyone who loves the burning going down to the point of an addiction tolerates the results with a modicum of acceptance. Even when it hurts, you still crave more.


I won't admit to the number of hot chili sauces I have in our refrigerator, either. Just know I regularly have to replace empty bottles of the stuff.


Yours in miscellanea,


Michael

May Day 2020

Is the year over with yet? The decade?

Today as I look out at this bifurcated country we live in, I wonder how the hell the United States can continue to survive intact. Of course, in large part, I'm referring to the political polarization that both sides of the divide engage in.

Sure, I could trot out the well-worn platitudes honed from years of cable news coverage, but we're not talking with each other--instead, we're talking at each other, which never bodes well for the future of a unified nation.

But I'm not going to do that.

Instead, I'll point to the more dangerous schism than right vs. left. It's the crazies vs. the sane people and I fear the former are taking over (that is, the inmates are running the asylum).

Case in point...the ongoing "freedom marches" being held across the country by covidiots who want their state governments to reopen the state immediately despite what the experts are saying about opening too early and inviting a resurgence of COVID-19.

It's not just those that are marching that bothers me. I've already written that they get themselves sick, they can infect the rest of us, overwhelm the healthcare system, invite an even further extended quarantine, etc. These people live in a world where Fox News tells them what they should think and do. Morons, one and all.

No, the ones I'm really fearful of are those who propose absolutely unscientific, ill-advised, and just plain batty theories about novel coronavirus. Some examples:

• The virus is a hoax perpetrated by [fill in the name of your least favorite liberal]
• Bill Gates wants to control us with all with his vaccine
• This is how the liberals will take away citizens' guns
• 5G technology is responsible for COVID-19
• The virus was manufactured in a Chinese lab as a bioweapon & it got away from them
• The world is conspiring to get rid of Trump
• People aren't dying, they're crisis actors we're seeing
• Hospitals aren't being overrun, it's all fake news

How the hell do these people dress themselves every day? Something tells me they have a screw or ten loose.

With the internet, these whack jobs now have the way to join forces and enlist other brain-dead souls to their way of thinking.

You may be asking what does this rant have to do with May Day?

May Day was once celebrated in Soviet Russia (and still is, to some degree) in honor of the working class on whom the Russians built their communist world and of whom were taken advantage of by the Communist Party elites. It equates to a much lesser degree to our Labor Day.

The fact that on this May Day workers are demanding to be allowed back to work is, of course, a noble thing. I don't fault people for wanting to get back to making money. Too many folks are in a financial bind and being furloughed without pay is making it impossible to meet their expenses.

But when you see covidiots bringing semi-automatic weapons to these demonstrations or seeing anger toward a made-up enemy (George Soros, for example) makes me wonder if they have any sense God gave pocket list.

(Actually, I don't wonder, I know they don't).

Meanwhile, and this is true, Georgia, which flung open their doors wide a few days ago, has already reported a surge in COVID-19 cases since their grand reopening.

Of course, they did. Any wonder?

Yours in confusion,

Michael

Fitness Update

In an earlier post, I mentioned I started a yoga program using an iPhone app called Sunsa. This app offers free programs, using real yoga instructors who take you on a routine that ranges from 10 to 26 minutes.

As of yesterday, I completed my first full program (for beginners of course). The entire journey was twenty-eight days long. I only missed one day, thanks to one of our long retail shopping days.

Here is the review of the app and my overall personal experience.

The app itself is truly wonderful. The instructors are very fluid in their movements. The narrator has a soothing voice that accompanies the gentle music that plays in the background. While some reviews indicated that they would've preferred getting to see each pose with its name individually so they would recognize them, anything I needed to learn, I found out about on Google. All in all, I give the app five stars out of five.

As far as my overall personal experience, I can truly say the last 28 days have been transformative--mentally, spiritually, and physically. While I did experience pain early on (leading me to purchase Joint Juice, a glucosamine-chondroitin drink), I am pain-free as of this writing.

My flexibility, which wasn't too bad to start with for a sixty-year-old man, has improved quite a bit. I find myself looking forward to my daily yoga sessions and feel very cleanses when I complete them. In fact, I employ some yoga poses during the day, too, just to center myself.

I now have to decide whether to go further in my studies or stay with what I've done to date. As of today, I decided to start from the beginning of my program and add a few additional poses on my own in conjunction with the push-ups, sit-ups, and planks I already do twice a day.

The only cardio workout we're getting is walking outside. Most days, we're getting three or more miles done. While it's not my preferred aerobic exercise, it works for now considering we won't be able to get into our gym until at least May 12th (Arizona's "reopening" date) and probably longer than that. As I told my wife yesterday, I would want to wait it out for another 3 weeks to see if we have a resurgence of the virus before going back.

Yours in health,

Michael

Tales from the Loop

As I've noted multiple times in this blog, we've been watching new series as we learn about them from our son or from the internet. After weeks of action movies, we've decided to change the mood a bit and began watching Tales from the Loop, an 8-episode series on Amazon Prime that falls in the realm of surrealistic sci-fi (perhaps a redundant term).


Based on the eerie paintings of 36-year-old Swedish artist Simon Stålenhag, the series explores the lives of residents of Mercer, Ohio, a company town where the "industry" is a device called The Loop that is built underground. From all appearances, The Loop is a particle accelerator and the question viewers will consider is whether the strange happenings a result of the device itself or merely an adjunct of a town filled with engineers and scientists.


But that's only the backdrop. The town itself is drab, but the lives of those living there can hardly be described as such. Though we've only watched three episodes thus far, it seems like each episode, though standalone, feature characters that are interconnected linearly from one episode to the next. Certainly, it's not a movie series in the traditional sense.


On the plus side, the cinematography is beautiful, the soundtrack is tight, and the writing is beyond skilled. Figures and structures in Stålenhag's paintings are faithfully reproduced and integrated with the entire story. Whether some of it is CGI or not (I respective it is, though), it's still quite stunning.


On the minus side, it's very slow. If you're used to your series jump-cutting here and there, lots of car crashes, bullets, and bombs, then you may not really enjoy this series so much. However, if you're looking for a more cerebral viewing experience, I say it's worth a try.


The good news is, according to the showrunner, there is enough material for future seasons of Tales from the Loop, though right now, there's no word whether Amazon's interested in renewing the contract. So much in the air right now with impacts from COVID-19, we'll just have to wait and see.


Yours from the Loop,


Michael

General Miscellanea

Sometimes I don't have a particular topic I want to discuss, so I'll fill this space with news bits and pieces, or as Stephen Colbert refers to a segment on his show, "Meanwhile."

Meanwhile...

We already finished season 6 of Bosch and it was every bit as good as the first five seasons. The downside of binge-watching, of course, is we have to wait another year, or maybe even longer now that filming is on hiatus, for season 7. I have to satisfy my Connelly cravings with the few remaining ebooks of his I haven't read (though none of them are about Harry Bosch).

Meanwhile...

We're going out shopping today after being home for a little over two weeks now. Running low on fresh produce and some other staples, as well as things we can live without, but we'll get while we're forced to be in the grocery stores. Of course, we'll be wearing masks and surgical gloves in our travels. Wish us luck--I hope we don't run into any covidiots while we're out.

Meanwhile...

The price of oil went negative for the first time ever yesterday. With that, investors are saying May is shot as far as manufacturing is concerned, though futures beyond that look hopeful. It's impossible to imagine that the price of oil -- not gas -- would get so low considering the oil shortages of the 1970s. Still, we don't plan to do any driving anytime soon.

Meanwhile...

We're about to hit our first triple-digit temperature days in the next week. What this will do for our daily exercise remains to be seen. We're not morning people and to shift our internal clocks to earlier than what they are now won't be easy. I don't want to be like stereotypical seniors generally are, up at dawn, in bed at dusk. Just because I'm sixty doesn't mean I have to act my age.

Meanwhile...

I'm getting a lot of reading and writing done during this long period of self-isolation. I have a 50-book target to read this year and I'm a little under halfway there already. My writing goals are a little looser. So far, I've finished five screenplays this year and I have two in progress as of this moment. I'm also in the middle of writing two novels and what I think will be a novella, though I'm not limiting that in case it wants to be longer.

Yours in miscellanea,

Michael