Animal Crackers

Thirty days hath November and this day, today, is that 30th day.  It's the 334th day of 2021 and all we have left are the 31 days of December before 2022.

Today is the day for right livelihood, for with it we get rid of all evil ways.

On this day in 2004, Korean Zen Master Seung Sahn died at the age of 77 in Seoul, South Korea. Impermanence is swift.  Arriving in the United States in 1972, he settled in Providence, Rhode Island and worked at a laundromat as a repairman, spending much of his time improving his English. Shortly after his arrival, however, he started the Providence Zen Center. In 1974, Seung Sahn began founding more Zen centers in the United States, beginning with Dharma Zen Center in Los Angeles. The following year, he went on to found the Chogye International Zen Center of New York City, and then, in 1977, Empty Gate Zen Center. In 1986, along with a former student and Dharma heir Dae Gak, Seung Sahn founded a retreat center and temple in Clay City, Kentucky called Furnace Mountain (for whatever it's worth, I participated in a weekend meditation retreat with Dae  Gak here in Atlanta). At present, there are some 34 centers in his lineage in North America alone.  Starting in 1990, under an invitation from Mikhail Gorbachev, Seung Sahn began making trips to the Soviet Union to teach, and a student there later opened a practice center (Novgorod Center of Zen Meditation) in Russia.  

An imperfect person (aren't we all?), he admitted in 1988 to having sexual relationships with several students.  Because Seung Sahn was understood to be a celibate monk, the revelation of the affairs caused some members to leave the school. As described by writer James Ishmael Ford (Zen Master Who?), "It is not possible to adequately acknowledge the hurt and dismay that followed in the wake of these and similar scandals at other Zen centers." But in the wake of these disclosures, new systems were instituted that relied more on boards of directors than a single charismatic teacher. Seung Sahn participated in two repentance ceremonies, and now his organization is the single largest Zen institution in the West.  Ford notes that Seung Sahn is second only to Thich Nhat Hanh in guaranteeing that Western Zen will not simply be derived from Japanese Zen.

The book Dropping Ashes on the Buddha: The Zen Teachings of Seung Sahn (Stephen Mitchell, 1976) opens with the following passage:

One day a student from Chicago came to the Providence Zen Center and asked Seung Sahn Soen-sa, "What is Zen?"

Soen-sa held his Zen stick over his head and said, "Do you understand?"

The student said, "I don't know."

Soen-sa said, "This don't-know mind is you.  Zen is understanding yourself."

"What do you understand about me? Teach me."

Soen-sa said, "In a cookie factory, different cookies are baked in the shape of animals, cars, people, and airplanes.  They all have different names and forms, but they are all made from the same dough, and they all taste the same.

"In the same way, all things in the universe - the sun, the moon, the stars, mountains, rivers, people, and so forth - have different names and forms, but they are all made from the same substance.  The universe is organized into pairs of opposites: light and darkness, man and woman, sound and silence, good and bad. But all these opposites are mutual, because they are all made from the same substance.  Their names and their forms are different, but their substance is the same.  Names and forms are made by your thinking.  If you are not thinking, and have no attachment to name and form, then all substance is one.  Your don't-know mind cuts off all thinking.  This is your substance.  The substance of this Zen stick and your own substance are the same.  You are this stick; this stick is you."

Ben Bova

Impermanence is swift.  One year ago today, science fiction writer and editor Ben Bova died in Naples, Florida from the covids.  On this day in 2013, Dick Dodd, drummer and vocalist for The Standells on their 1966 hit Dirty Water, died of cancer at age 68.  On this day is 2001, George Harrison died of lung cancer in Los Angeles at age 58.  On this day is 1996, singer and ukulele player Tiny Tim died on stage from a heart attack while playing his hit Tiptoe Through the Tulips. 

Today is the day for right action, for with it there is no karma and no retribution.

Two cases of the Omicron variant have been detected in Ontario, Canada, the first cases on the North American continent.  A Portuguese soccer team came down with 13 cases.  Japan, Israel, and Morocco have closed their borders to all foreign travelers.

Evidence suggests that the Omicron variant is at least as transmissible as Delta, and more than the original virus.  But is it more deadly?  At the NY Times, journalist David Leonhardt reports that Barry Schoub, a South African virologist, said that Omicron cases have tended to be “mild to moderate.” Schoub added, “That’s a good sign. But let me stress it is early days.”  Dr. Rudo Mathivha, the head of the intensive care unit at a hospital in Soweto, South Africa, said that severe cases have been concentrated among people who were not fully vaccinated.  Dr. Sharon Alroy-Preis, a top health official in Israel, emphasized yesterday that when vaccinated people were infected, they became only slightly ill.  And as the Times’s Carl Zimmer reported, “For now, there’s no evidence that Omicron causes more severe disease than previous variants.”

So the burning question on at least my mind is: will the Omicron variant interfere with next year's planned Big Ears music festival?  My crystal ball suggests, somewhat optimistically, that the answer is "no."  Big Ears is planned for March 24-27, some four months from now.  Historically, waves of covid infections have tended to increase for two-month periods, and then decrease over another two months. If the Omicron wave hits us now, and if it shares the same temporal pattern as the previous variants, cases will climb in number during December and January, and then start to recede in February and March.  In a perfect world, or at least the best imperfect world we can expect, when the next Big Ears rolls around, we could very well be at the low point of the trough between the Omicron peak and whatever it is that follows next.

But to be clear, absent new evidence, the rational assumption is that the covids are likely to remain overwhelmingly mild among the vaccinated (unless their health is already precarious). For most vaccinated people, the covids probably present less risk than some everyday activities.  Be careful  and be sure to look both ways before crossing any busy streets out there.

Hanukkah

Today is the day for right speech, for with it concepts, voice, and words are all known as sound.  

Hanukkah begins at sundown, which will be at 5:29 p.m. tonight here in Atlanta. 

One year ago today, English actor David Prowse died from the covids in a London hospital.  Although most famous for playing Darth Vader in the original Star Wars trilogy, Prowse also appeared as a manservant in Stanley Kubrick's 1971 A Clockwork Orange (above).

The omicron variant has now been found in South Africa, England, the Netherlands, Germany, Italy, Belgium, Hong Kong, Israel, and Australia.  It has not yet been found in the U.S., but its arrival here is imminent and inevitable. Anthony Fauci said omicron appears more transmissible than other variants, but we don't know yet if it's more severe.  We should know later this week how the existing vaccines handle this variant.

I've taken advantage of this year's Steam Thanksgiving sale and bought copies of the Mass Effect trilogy, Far Cry 6, Horizon Zero Dawn, A Plague Tale, and Days Gone.  That should keep me busy for a while, especially since I still have Fallout 76 left to complete, as well as No Man's Sky, Grand Theft Auto V, Red Dead Redemption II, and The Outer Wilds, all of which I've started but never finished.

Other than that, or in addition to all that, days and nights pass with a pleasant regularity - no drama but no jubilations, either.

Omicron II

This is the day for right discrimination, for with it we eliminate all discrimination and lack of discrimination.

Yesterday, Kurt Bardella, an adviser to the Democratic National Committee, said “Any time that your mascot is someone who thought that it was an acceptable form of protest to show up at a political event with an AR-15, that is glorifying violence. And that’s a very dangerous thing to prop up and promote.”

Despite effort to restrict travel from southern Africa, two new cases of the omicron variant of the covids have been identified in England.  The two cases are not unrelated and are linked to one another, and both involve travel to southern Africa.

The actual risk posed by omicron is still unclear, although it was enough to spook the stock market.  But Peter Hotez of Baylor University said, "This variant does not appear to be causing worst disease than anything we've seen before - this is not The Andromeda Strain."  

The W.HO. says omicron carries an increased risk of re-infection compared with other highly transmissible variants.  People who contracted the covids and recovered could be subject to catching the omicron variant.  The biggest crisis facing the United States right now is that only have 59% of the population has been vaccinated.  "The game plan doesn't change," Hotez said, "We need to vaccinated the American people fully."

Omicron

Today is the 330th day of the year 2021, and there are only 35 days left to the year. It is the day for right view, for with it we attain the noble path on which the superfluous is exhausted.

Back on November 1, the average number of new covid cases in Georgia was 1,072 cases per day.  Today, there are 1,064 cases per day.  There have been a few upticks and downturns in the number over the past month, probably related more to reporting than changes in the infection rate.  It's been remarkably stable.

But now, they've discovered a new variant of the virus.  Great, just what the doctor ordered.

The variant, which they're calling omicron, may or may not be more contagious than the original virus or the delta variant.  They don't know.  The omicron variant may or may not be more deadly than alpha or delta covid.  They don't know.  Children may or may not be more susceptible to the omicron variant.  They don't know. “Substantively NOTHING is known about the new variant,” Roberto Burioni, a leading Italian virologist, wrote on Twitter, adding that people should not panic.

But the W.H.O. has called omicron a variant "of concern."  Cases have been found in South Africa and Botswana, and Singapore and several European countries have already restricted entry from the south of Africa.  Biden announced that sir travel from southern Africa will be restricted starting Monday, nut U.S. citizens and permanent residents are exempt.  The stock market basically tanked today over concerns about the effect of another wave of variant infections on the global economy. House Republicans are furiously trying to think of ways they can blame the outbreak on the Democrats.

Just when we thought we were out, omicron drags us back in.

Thanksgiving

Today is the day for abandonment as a part of the state of truth, for with it we can turn away from all kinds of lives.

It's also, in the United States of America, the Thanksgiving holiday.  We're supposed to remember a feast provided by indigenous peoples to pilgrims on these shores seeking religious freedom or something.  The pilgrims later repaid that hospitality with genocide.  So much for the spiritual values of their religion.

I used to post William S. Burroughs' cynical Thanksgiving Prayer every year, but I no longer feel comfortable doing that because of his use of the notorious n-word.  To be sure, he's echoing the sentiments of racists cops when he drops the word, but it still doesn't feel right to my ears. A lot of beat poets and writers of that period (Kerouac, Ginsberg, and more) used the word, thinking I suppose that it made them sound street-wise and tough, but today it makes them sound like bigots and racists.  Most of their work was overrated, anyway.

I'm thankful to be alive and sentient and occupying a human body.  I'm thankful that I have a home and a bed to sleep in and enough money set aside that I can afford to retire and live these next several years without subjecting myself to the office or other workplace.  

I'm thankful for electricity and thankful for a whole year without a tree falling on my house.

I'm thankful for the books and the television shows and the video games that amuse my days, and that the Andersons, both Wes and Paul Thomas, continue to make movies I enjoy.  I'm thankful for the Coen brothers, too, and I don't know, the Wachowskis? I'm thankful that there are still artists out there making satisfying and interesting music.  I'm thankful for the existence of coffee and banana bread muffins.

I'm thankful for the innumerable labors of workers unknown to me who provide food and clothing and tools from the farms and factories to the marketplace, and to those who provide me with essential - and sometimes nonessential - services.

I'm thankful that meditation exists and for all the centuries of Zen teachers who've handed the tradition down to this day and age. 

And finally I'm thankful for the attention of whoever it is that reads these little missives I post each day.

Darwin Day

Today is the day for the balanced state as a part of the state of truth, for with it we recognize that the myriad things are in equilibrium.

On this date in 1963, Lee Harvey Oswald was shot and killed in Dallas by Jack Ruby.  Impermanence is swift.  Two days earlier, Oswald had shot and killed President John F. Kennedy.  I was in the fourth grade at the time and the news was very confusing and upsetting to me.

On this date in 1859, Charles Darwin published On the Origin of Species. In addition to our birthdays and the solstices and equinoxes, I propose that we should also celebrate the great events in intellectual history, such as Darwin's publication.  Happy Darwin Day, y'all.

The average number of new covid cases in Georgia is still hovering just above 1,000 cases per day, as it has since the end of last month.  It's not going up, but it's not going down either.  It looks for all the world like it's here to stay. Welcome to the new normal.

But the big news today is that the jury in the murder trial of three white men who shot and killed an unarmed black jogger in Brunswick, Georgia last year found all three defendants guilty.  The case was so egregious that it's actually kind of shocking that the verdict was even in question.  But a case when white men are tried for the murder of a black man in the Deep South by an almost exclusively white jury is never a sure thing.  I think all of America collectively let out a breath of relief when the guilty verdicts were read and justice was served.

Georgia can still be counted on to do the right thing on occasion, be in electoral votes for Joe Biden, or producing Senators Warnock and Ossoff, or justice for Ahmaud Arbery.  

This might be the happiest Darwin Day ever.

The Jury

Today is the day for entrustment as a part of the state of truth, for with it conduct is already managed.

Today jurors in Virginia found the main organizers of the deadly 2017 right-wing rally in Charlottesville, a mix of white nationalists, white supremacists, and neo-Nazis (or as Trump once called them, "many fine people"), liable for the injuries to counter-protesters, awarding more than $25 million in damages, but were deadlocked on federal conspiracy charges.

Meanwhile, in Cleveland, a jury found that CVS, Walgreens and Walmart substantially contributed to the epidemic of opioid overdoses in two Ohio counties, the first jury verdict in an opioids case. The decision embraced a key legal argument that judges in other opioids cases had recently rejected, and is the first time the retail segment of the drug industry has been held accountable in the decades-long epidemic.

Finally, the jury is now deliberating in the Brunswick, Georgia trial of three white men accused of killing an innocent and unarmed black man who was out jogging in their neighborhood.  It is widely hoped that the Georgia jury exercises the same common sense and good will as that displayed today in Charlottesville and Cleveland.

Waukesha

Today is the day for enjoyment as a part of the state of truth, for with it we attain many kinds of balanced states.

On this day in 1963, as I was boarding a bus coming home from a day of elementary school, the driver told me that President John F. Kennedy had been shot and killed in Dallas.  Impermanence is swift. Kennedy had been shot by assassin Lee Harvey Oswald during a motorcade through the city, and Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson was sworn in as the new President afterwards. On that same day in 1963 that Kennedy died, British writers Aldous Huxley and C.S. Lewis also died, and exactly 30 years later, British writer Anthony Burgess died on this same date.  Synchronicity is just as swift.

It's Scarlett Johansson's birthday!  Marvel's Black Widow turns 37 today.

Closing arguments are being heard today in the trial of three white men for the 2020 lynching of an innocent, unarmed black man in Brunswick, Georgia.  Russia is amassing troops on the Ukraine border with the apparent intention of an imminent invasion.  Although the average number of new covid cases in Georgia is remaining steady at about 1,000 cases per day, the number is increasing in other parts of the U.S., especially New England and the upper Midwest just as we're approaching Thanksgiving weekend, a likely superspreader event.  The average number on new cases increased by some 42% in the past two weeks in Wisconsin alone.

But in the worst of all possible news stories, a man - a career criminal with a long rap sheet and out on bail for domestic violence charges - ran a large SUV through a Christmas parade in Waukesha, Wisconsin. Five people died (so far), and many more are in the hospital with injuries.  For some 12 hours, the nation collectively held its breath wondering who had committed this heinous act and why.  Was it a radical Islamic terrorist?  Was he somehow protesting or retaliating for the recent Kyle Rittenhouse acquittal in Wisconsin?  Was he a white supremacist feeling somehow empowered by the Wisconsin acquittal?  As it turns out, he was just a very stupid and very callous criminal fleeing the scene of his latest crime, reportedly another domestic violence incident, and chose to just drive through the crowd at high speed rather than stop running or find a separate route.  I don't think the man is going to be treated very kindly in prison.

Poor Wisconsin.  A cold, stony land with a history of violence, you deserve better (yes, I'm aware that the footage in this video is not all from Wisconsin).

Sunset in Georgia will be at 5:30 p.m. We're all Waukeshans today.

Negativland

Today is Sunday, the 21st of November, the day for effort as a part of the state of truth, for with it we become proficient at realization.

Despite what it says over there to the right, Negativland will not be performing at The Earl tonight. Do you believe everything you read on the internet?  Apparently, they cancelled this leg of their tour for reasons unknown to me and I never got the word.

In a perfect world, one would go to Eddie's Attic in Decatur tonight to catch the early (6:00 p.m.) set by ambient accordionist Walt McClements and harpist Mary Lattimore, and then swing over to The Earl with plenty of time for the Negativland show. 

But, alas, the world is not perfect and the Negativland show was cancelled and I still don't have the skill set back yet for going out to a live music show, concerns about the covids and all aside, even (especially?) an early-evening show at the comfy Eddie's Attic. But if you're at all interested in the innovative edge of contemporary (and contemplative) music, you'll be at Eddie's tonight for this extraordinary show.  

Me? Despite my enthusiasm and appreciation of these artists, I'll be spending the night as I have for pretty much the past two years now - home alone, playing video games and watching television.  Good times.  Depression and crippling social anxiety can be fun.

Wisconsin

Today is the day for examination of the myriad things as a part of the state of truth, for it illuminates all the myriad things.

Yesterday, a jury in Wisconsin found defendant Kyle Rittenhouse innocent of all charges against him (including murder), saying that he was acting in self-defense.  

What wasn't disputed is that the defendant crossed state lines with a semi-automatic gun he wasn't legally allowed to purchase (because of his young age) with the intention of acting as a one-person, unregulated militia to defend businesses in Wisconsin from crowds of looters and arsonists.  Those looters and arsonists were in the same crowd as others lawfully protesting the police shooting of an unarmed suspect, Jacob Blake.  There is no evidence that the defendant had any training in distinguishing between lawful protesters and unlawful rioters (not that the law allows "open season" on unlawful rioters).

As I understand the testimony I heard (I watched much of the trial on television - one of the benefits of being a Retired Old Man), the defendant inserted himself into several situations, including pointing his gun, an AR-15, at some people.  When people expressed their understandable distaste for having a lethal weapon pointed at them, things got confrontational and in the heat of the moment, the defendant felt he had to shoot one person.  Some in the crowd, concerned for their safety with an active shooter in their midst, then pursued the defendant, who then felt he had to shoot two more people to protect his own personal safety.

The cowardly little boy, driven to the protest by his mommy, was basically cosplaying as a vigilante defender of property - he testified that he chose an AR-15 because he thought it "looked cool," he wore military fatigues, and had his baseball cap on backwards.  But when faced with real crowds of real people expressing real anger, he panicked, and now two people are dead and one wounded.

And there's nothing that can be done about it under Wisconsin's laws, which allow lethal force if one considers themselves to be in danger, even if they were the one to cause the danger.  The jury got it completely right - the defendant was not guilty of the charges brought against him under the letter of the state's law, even if his actions were morally and ethically reprehensible.  The fact that the judge was obviously a right-wing loon who was clearly biased in favor of the defendant is besides the fact.  The jury got it "right" because the laws are "wrong."

I wonder if the families of the defendant's victims have a case for a civil suit against him - as I recall from the days of the O.J. trial, the standard of proof for a civil trial is different from that of a criminal trial.

I find it ironic that the same people celebrating the Wisconsin verdict are in many cases the same people so upset about the Capital Police, a legitimate well-regulated militia, shooting Ashli Babbitt during the January 6 insurrection attempt.  

I worry for our nation.  The lesson many will learn from the trial is that it is perfectly alright to insert oneself into a hostile situation, to make that situation even more hostile by pointing a gun at those you disagree with, and if those persons react to your hostile actions in a way that makes you uncomfortable, to shoot them dead on the spot.  Not only will some vigilantes and militias take this as a license to kill, future crowds of protesters, knowing there's a target on their back, will become even more aggressive and hostile, and less tolerant of counter-protesters.

The powder keg has been there for a while, primed and ready to blow, and now the fuse has been lit.

Behold The Moon

Today is the 19th of November, 2021.  It is the day for mindfulness as a part of the state of truth, for it is wisdom that accords with reality.

Although the whole world appears to be on the brink of collapsing into chaos, the moon has chosen this date to display the longest-duration lunar eclipse in 580 years.  The last eclipse of this duration was in the pre-Columbian year 1441.  How long ago was that?  In  the 1440s, 50 years before Columbus sailed to North America, Portuguese Prince Henry the Navigator was still commissioning exploration of the West African coast.  1441 was the year Henry's fleet brought the first enslaved black Africans to Europe.  Forget The 1619 Project - the original sin occurred in Lagos in the Kingdom of Portugal in 1441.  

But let's not discuss all that today and instead just behold the moon.  It's time for another photo essay.  Here are some photos, not of mine but harvested from my social media feeds, of the moon over Atlanta. Props to the talented original photographers.

Hard Rain

It's Chloë Sevigny's birthday!  The actor and national treasure turns 47 today.  In a better world, that's all we would need to report to make this a complete and perfect post, but sadly there's more that needs to be said today.

The waxing gibbous moon is very nearly full; it probably looks full to the casual observer.  The moon rose at 5:16 p.m. yesterday afternoon and set at 7:24 a.m. this morning.  

Today is the day for the power of wisdom, for with it we depart from the two extremes.

Sharon Jones, the last of the old school soul singers, died at the age of 60 on this day in 2016. Impermanence is swift.

Two men imprisoned for killing civil-rights activist Malcolm X back in 1966 were exonerated of the charges yesterday.  One man, Muhammad Aziz, is now 83.  The other man, Khalil Islam, died in prison. In an unrelated case, the Oklahoma governor cancelled the planned execution of a death-row inmate who has maintained his innocence for over 20 years.  The exoneration occurred a mere four hours before the death sentence was to be carried out.

In Wisconsin, the jury is still deliberating on the trial of accused mass murderer Kyle Rittenhouse, and in Brunswick, Georgia, the trial of three white men who lynched and killed an unarmed black jogger is almost wrapped up.  The defense in the later case has complained about the number of "black pastors" present in the courtroom.

Yesterday, Congress voted mostly along party lines to condemn Rep. Paul Gosar (R-Arizona) for posting a video that showed him as an anime character killing another Representative, a woman of color, and then turning toward the president.  House Republicans refused to condemn the action, causing one to wonder just how extreme the partisan divide has become.

But all of this is in the news - you know all this already.  I have nothing new to add to these stories, other than noting that together they seem to document the unraveling of the fabric of our society.  I despair for the years ahead.

In 2020, everyone was waiting for 2021 to be "a better year," but it turned out to be more of the same.  Between climate change, the covids, racial and economic inequality, and a global drift toward authoritarianism, I fear that 2022 and beyond will have us looking back wistfully at 2020 and 2021.

We're in for some dark days.

Scorsese

Hump day - half way through the week and halfway through the month. Today is the day for the power of balance, for with it we discontinue all thoughts.

The sun rose this morning at 7:12 a.m., a minute later than yesterday, and will set at 5:33 p.m. again, same time as the past two days. The waxing gibbous moon is 97% illuminated and rose at 4:18 p.m. yesterday afternoon.  It set at 5:29 a.m. this morning.

It's Martin Scorsese's birthday! The director (Mean Streets, Taxi Driver, Goodfellas, Casino, The Departed, and many more) turns 79 today.  Scorsese graduated from NYU in 1968, and his movies of the 1970s, particularly 1976's Taxi Driver, inspired me to want to be a film director myself. I perceived the American cinematic universe as consisting of twin poles, one in New York and centered around Scorsese and Woody Allen, and the other in L.A. and centered around Steven Spielberg and George Lucas.  NYU vs. UCLA.  I entered Boston University in 1976 as a Film & Broadcast major hoping to become a part of the East Coast axis, but for reasons far too complex to elaborate on now, somehow wound up switching my major to geology. Such is life.

On this day in 2019, the first known case of the covids was traced to a 55-year-old man who had visited a market in Wuhan, Hubei Province, China. Today, after several waves of pandemic, the State of Georgia has been experiencing about 1,000 new cases of the covids each day since the beginning of the month.

Okay, I have nothing else to talk about so I'll describe how I went from a Film & Broadcast major aspiring to be the next Scorsese to a nerdy geology major.  Even though I was insprired by Scorsese and Allen and Spielberg and Lucas (not to mention Hitchcock and Welles and Truffaut and Godard and Bertolucci), in the post-Watergate year of 1976, a large number of young people wanted to become the next Woodward or Bernstein, and the Journalism program in B.U.'s School of Public Communications was overrun with journalistic wannabes.  I entered the school's alternative Film & Broadcast program, but even that was dominated by young men and women who wanted to be broadcast journalists or news anchors.  I was more interested in learning dramatic direction, cinematography, and editing, and soon realized I was in the wrong school for that.  I should have been in the Theater program at the School of Fine Arts, and with each passing semester I was falling further behind in the entry-level prerequisite courses for Theater. 

However, the Film & Broadcast curriculum required me to take one science course, and I chose Geology 101, the notorious "rocks for jocks" course.  Oddly enough, I became fascinated with what I learned there, and as dissatisfied as I was by Journalism 101 and Visual Communication 102, I voluntarily took another Geology course the next semester, and then several the semester after that. There was something so much more concrete and real about the science of geology than the nebulous and subjective lessons of film and broadcast, and I felt there was more of a post-collegiate afterlife for a geology major than for yet another aspiring print or television journalist.

There was one thing, though, that kept me interested in the Film & Broadcast program.  We had access to video equipment and studio space, and meanwhile, just down the road from B.U., a burgeoning punk rock and new wave scene centered around clubs like Spit and The Rat in Kenmore Square was in need of exposure and promotion.  Someone came up with the idea of taping some of the bands' performances, primarily to show to club owners to get bookings. Those tapings were made both in the school's studio space as well as remotely at the clubs themselves.  Someone else took the idea a step further, and started making field recording of the bands performing on the mean streets around Kenmore and in vacant industrial space.  This was several years before the debut of MTV and I won't say that we invented the music video, but we were in the room when it happened.

If I hadn't migrated over to the Geology Department, I probably would have wound up in that music video scene, uninterested as I was in broadcast journalism, advertising, or the other career paths offered by the Film & Broadcast program.  It's well known that for every successful "star" in the world of media, there's at least 100 people who never succeeded, but I can't help but wonder sometimes what my life would have been like had I stayed on my original path.  Would I have become some sort of music video auteur, or even wound up joining one of those bands? (Lack of musical ability didn't hold many performers back in the early days of punk.) Would I have moved to L.A., or to N.Y.C., or to D.C.? Would I have acquired a $100,000-a-year cocaine habit?

It's fun to speculate, but I don't regret my decision.  Rocks have been very good to me, and while my life as a geologist may not have been as glamorous as a music video director, or a broadcast journalist or an advertising exec for that matter, I still managed to eke out a satisfying and productive career in environmental hydrogeology.  Je ne regrette rien.

Watts

Somehow, we have managed to complete 320 of the days of 2021, and now there are only 45 left to go. Today is the day for the power of mindfulness, for with it we do not blindly go along with others.

The sun rose at 7:11 this morning and set at 5:33 p.m.  Same times as yesterday.  The waxing gibbous moon is 95% full and rose at 4:18 p.m. yesterday afternoon.  It set at 5:29 this morning.

On this date in 1973, author, speaker, and autodidact Alan Watts (The Way of Zen) died in his California home.  Impermanence is swift.  By his own words, Watts was not himself a Zen Buddhist, although he spoke frequently on the topic and did much to popularize it in the West.

Quick to cash in on those sweet, sweet Biden infrastructure bucks, MARTA today announced a $300 million station upgrade program.  The first phase of improvements will cover the Indian Creek, College Park, Five Points, Lenox, Arts Center, H.E. Holmes, and Airport stations, but the program will eventually improve all 38 stations.

What this city needs is more transit and fewer cars for a sustainable future.  The station upgrades are a nice first step, as it may attract additional riders, but ultimately we need more lines, new stations, and more frequent service.

ODB

Today, the 15th day of November and the 319th day of the accursed year 2021, is the day for the power of effort, for with it we do not regress or stray. 

The sun rose over the greater Atlanta metropolis at 7:11 a.m. this morning and set at 5:33 p.m. for 10 hours and 22 minutes of daylight.

The average number of new covid cases in Georgia is still hovering right around 1,000 per day, and there still are no worrisome storms out in the Atlantic. 

On this day in 1864, having successfully burned Atlanta down to the ground, Union General William Tecumseh Sherman began his March to the Sea, culminating in the capture of Savannah.

Today would have been Wu-Tang rapper Ol' Dirty Bastard's birthday, but the ol' dirty bastard died on November 13 (the Ides of November), 2004, two days before his 36th birthday.  Impermanence is swift. Obviously, drugs were involved in his demise.

Despite some ambitious plans I had set for myself today, it was a full news day and I spent most of my time on the sofa watching cable news.  Big stories included: 

• The traitorous Steve Bannon turning himself in for contempt of Congress and getting arraigned by the FBI.
• The closing arguments for the prosecution of admitted Wisconsin murderer Kyle Rittenhouse.  Guilty, guilty, guilty.
• Smokin' Joe Biden finally signing the Infrastructure Bill for shiny new trains, bridges, and airports, and high-speed internet access for everybody.

Those "ambitious plans," mostly chores really, can wait until tomorrow.

I Always Wanted to Write a Post Ending With the Word "Thereof"

Today is the day for the power of belief, for it transcends the power of angels and demons.

In San Antonio, Texas, for his ReAwaken America tour yesterday, former Trump national security adviser Michael Flynn called for Christianity to become the singular religion of the United States 

"If we are going to have one nation under God, which we must, we have to have one religion. One nation under God, and one religion under God," said Flynn, who talked about his Christian faith in an effort to refute QAnon claims that he worships Satan.

Flynn is obviously using the Pledge of Allegiance as the basis for his remarks.  Many people forget that the pledge was written in August 1892 by socialist minister Francis Bellamy in the hope that it would be used by citizens of any country.  Originally published in The Youth's Companion on September 8, 1892, it read, "I pledge allegiance to my Flag and the Republic for which it stands, one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all."

In 1923, the words, "the Flag of the United States of America" were added. At that time it read, "I pledge allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all."

In 1954, in response to a perceived threat of atheistic Communism, President Eisenhower encouraged Congress to add the words "under God," creating the 31-word pledge we say today. Bellamy's daughter reportedly objected to this alteration. 

The pledge has nothing to do with the Constitution and wasn't written until some 55 years after the last Founding Father had died.  The words "under God" weren't added until 120 years after the last Founding Father died.

What the Constitution does say is that Congress shall "make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof."  Thomas Jefferson once noted, "The legitimate powers of government extend to such acts only as are injurious to others. But it does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods or no god. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg."

So Flynnstone is not only showing ignorance of the Constitution and of the Pledge of Allegiance, but of the intent and goals of the Founders of this nation.  Besides, there's no evidence of the existence of any god, angels, or demons, and nothing we need to legislate worship thereof.

Friday the 13th Falls on a Saturday

Today is the day for the faculty of wisdom, for with it we see the myriad things.

One year ago today, Peter Sutcliffe, also known as the Yorkshire Ripper, died from the covids. Impermanence is swift.  Sutcliffe  was found guilty of murdering 13 women and attempting to murder seven others between 1975 and 1980.  He initially attacked women and girls in residential areas, but appears to have shifted his focus to red-light districts because he was attracted by the vulnerability of prostitutes. After his arrest, he confessed to being the killer, saying that God had sent him on a mission to kill prostitutes. 

Balance

Today is Friday, November 12 (TGIF),  the day for the faculty of balance.  With balance, the mind is pure.

One year ago today, actress Lynn Kellogg, best known for her role as Sheila in the original 1968 Broadway production of Hair, died from the covids at a hospital in St. Louis.  Impermanence is swift.  Her husband said she became infected after attending a gathering in Branson, Missouri in which most of the attendees did not wear masks.

The average daily number of new covid cases in Georgia dropped below 1,000 again today, but that may be just due to underreporting during yesterday's Veterans Day holiday.

But according to an interesting article in the Times today, this is it.  It's not going to get better than this.  One thousand statewide cases per day is going to be the new normal.  We now have vaccines and boosters for prevention and medications for treatment.  Georgia, if not America, if not the world, has apparently decided this is a level of risk we can live with, not unlike heart disease and cancer and automobile fatalities.  Things are not going to get noticeably better soon, and if we don't go back to living life "normally" now, we won't for several more years, which is to say we're never going back.  Hey, no one lives forever.  Do I need to remind you of impermanence again?

But the shame is this all could have been avoided.  If the disgraced, twice-impeached former "president" only took it more seriously, if people only complied with stay-at-home orders and mask mandates when the virus first appeared, we could have nipped it in the bud before it became so wide spread and out of control.  But, alas.  We're now handing the next generation a world with yet another disease to worry about, although climate change will likely keep most of their attention.  

We could have made the world  better place, but instead we opted for shittier.

Antonioni

Happy Veterans' Day, y'all! There are 50 days left until we can scratch 2021 off the books.

Today is the day for the faculty of mindfulness, for with it we thoroughly perform many kinds of work.

Princess Irene Luise Marie Anne of Hesse and by Rhine was the third child of Princess Alice of the United Kingdom and Louis IV, Grand Duke of Hesse and by Rhine. Her maternal grandparents were Queen Victoria and Prince Albert. She was the wife of Prince Henry of Prussia, her first cousin and a younger brother of German Emperor Wilhelm II. Princess Irene was hemophiliac, although she lived to be 87 before passing away on this day in 1953.  Impermanence is swift.

On the day that Princess Irene died, both Andy Partridge and Marshall Crenshaw were born.  Partridge is a founding member and principal songwriter and singer for the seminal British band XTC.  Crenshaw is an American singer-songwriter best known for his 1982 hit Someday, Someway - I saw him perform that year at the Atlanta punk club 688. 

Now my days are spent puttering around the house, reading, talking to cats, watching Netflix, and playing video games.  C'est la vie.

Obsidian

Today is the day for the faculty of effort, for with it we thoroughly attain many kinds of wisdom.

This morning, all my hopes and optimism for 2021 were dashed.  The average number of new covid cases in Georgia, which yesterday dropped to 752, bounced right back up to over 1,021 cases per day.  Just when it looked like we were turning a corner, the caseloads rebounded to the same plateau level they've been at since late October.

Then, out in the Atlantic, a storm-force area of low pressure has appeared several hundred miles east-northeast of Bermuda. There's a 50-50 chance that this system might become a subtropical storm before it reaches much cooler waters Friday morning. Regardless of its status, it's not likely to make landfall on North America, but the Atlantic is not yet as calm and, well, pacific as it seemed yesterday.

Speaking of pacific, I listened to the new album, Obsidian, by Icelandic musician Jonsi (Sigur Ros) today.  Very, peaceful and beautiful - ambient waves of orchestral bliss to transport you to an Edenic other-world. There are seemingly no hooks to the compositions and as soon as the album was over, I couldn't recall a single melody.

I've reached Level 62 in Fallout 76 after some 191 hours of gameplay.  I seem to be approaching the "end game" in most of the storylines and quests, and am probably closer to wrapping this thing up than I realize, although the possibilities for continued, open-world exploration and game play seem endless.

Blah, Blah, Blah

 

Today is the day for the faculty of belief, for with it do not blindly follow the words of others.

Yesterday, the average number of new covid cases reported in Georgia fell to 752, a 32% decrease from the previous day's reported 1,104 cases.  It is the first time covid cases were that low since July 13th.  In fact, since April 7, 2020, the average number of new covid cases has been below 750 only between April 23 and June 13, 2020, and between May 19 and July 13, 2021.

The overnight drop in caseloads may simply represent a data anomaly, and there's no reason not to suspect that they might jump right back up to the 1,000 level tomorrow.  However, the 752 mark represents the level the daily caseloads would be expected to be if the previous downward trend observed in September and October had not stalled out two weeks ago.  In other words, if one were to extrapolate the September-October trend line out to today, it would be at right about 750 cases.  

So is the sudden decrease the aberration, or was the two-week "plateau" in the graph some extenuating factor on top of the otherwise downward trend?  To be sure, no one really knows, but time will tell.

Meanwhile, all is quiet out in the Atlantic.  Tropical Storm Wanda fizzled out before reaching the green shores of Ireland, and that funky disturbance off the coast of Cape Hatteras somehow resolved itself.  The National Hurricane Center is not expecting any hurricane activity anywhere in the Atlantic for the next 48 hours as we sneak through the last several weeks of the 2021 hurricane season.  

As for climate change in general, the outlook is still bleak if not outright apocalyptic.  We're doomed and we're all gonna die (impermanence is swift), but that doesn't mean that in the meantime we can't have a little fun with the COP26 proceedings.

Profound Consideration

Today is the day for the four bases of mystical power, for with them the body-and-mind is light.  The four bases of mystical power are volition, effort, intelligence and profound consideration.

On this day, the 8th of November, in 2012, German electronic musician and producer Pete Namlook died of a heart attack at age 51. Impermanence is swift.  Namlook released some 135 albums, both solo and as collaborations, not including even more numerous re-releases, vinyl singles, and compilations of existing material.  I have many, but by no means all, of those albums on CD. Here's Dreamfish, his 1993 collaboration with Mixmaster Morris.

Tropical Storm Wanda petered out in the Atlantic before making landfall in Ireland.  A separate, non-tropical, low-pressure system, but with storm-force winds, is currently located about 400 hundred miles east of Cape Hatteras, North Carolina and is forecast to move east-northeastward during the next several days.  However, the chance of hurricane formation appears to be low, and there's an even lower chance of it making landfall on North America.  

The average number of new covid cases per day in Georgia remains at about 1,000.  The rapid and encouraging decline in caseloads observed in September and October has stopped, and the average number has remained just over 1,000 cases per day since October 28.

According to my Steam statistics, I have played 176 hours of Fallout 76 since October 15.

How's your week going?

Picture Dump

Today, Sunday, November 7, 2021, is the day for the four exertions, which can eliminate all evil and realize many kinds of good.  More specifically, the four exertions are: 1) prevention of bad that has not yet occurred, 2) causation of bad that has already occurred to be extinguished, 3) causation of good to occur that has not already occurred, and 4) promotion of good that has already occurred.

On this day in 2016, poet, singer-songwriter, and occasional Buddhist monk Leonard Cohen died, age 82, from leukemia.  Impermanence is swift.

On this day in 2000, one of the country's largest LSD manufacturing labs was discovered by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration inside a converted missile silo in Wamego, Kansas. 

Is it time again to clean out the picture cache on my computer?  Why, yes, I do believe that is is indeed  time again to clean out the picture cache on my computer.  So here, without further comment, are various Facebook, Instagram, and Reddit memes, photographs, drawings, and other visual detritus I've come across since my last picture purge.  Enjoy!

This is the day for dharma as an abode of mindfulness, for with it wisdom is free of blurs.

On this day in 1991, actress and Hollywood legend Gene Tierney died in Houston, Texas.  Impermanence is swift.

The Fifth of November

Today is the Fifth of November.  It is the day for mind as an abode of mindfulness, for with it we reflect that mind is like a phantom.

On this day in 1605, Guy Fawkes was arrested for doing, I don't know, something Catholic?  Whatever it was, he failed at it and was tortured and then executed on January 31, 1606. Impermanence is swift.

The decrease in the average number of new covid cases per day observed in Georgia last September and October has stalled out at around 1,000 cases per day.  That's well below the August 31 peak of 9,244 cases per day, but still above anything observed before June 21, 2020.  We were also below 1,000 cases per day between May 10 and July 19, 2021.

Some constant level of new infections seems like it will become the new normal.  We've come to accept the risk and learned to live with it, just like we've come to accept morbid obesity, heart disease, and diabetes.  This thing ain't going away, at least here in Georgia - hell, right now Georgia has the country's highest rate of AIDS/HIV transmission. If we can't be bothered to get rid of that, there's no way we're getting rid of the covids. We'll go on with some people wearing masks and some people not, and some people getting vaxxed and some others not.

Same thing with climate change - even while the COP26 meeting is continuing in Glasgow, people seems to be resigned that there's really nothing practical that can be done. (Fewer gasoline-powered cars? Don't be ridiculous!) More effort is being made right now to devise means to live with the new, extreme weather than to try to mitigate the problem.  

As evidence, about $110 billion of Congress' Infrastructure Bill is directed toward roads and bridges, shoring up the nation’s highways and other infrastructure to withstand the toll of climate change.  But the investment in actually combatting climate change falls fall short of the Biden administration’s goals. Dollars for cure, pennies for prevention.