Micro Posts

# Long overdue, I've begun updating my blog roll to include podcasts, blogs and websites by indigenous people who continue the struggle against the ongoing white settler colonialism rooted in the US.

# Have we finished our mourning? Because we need to move onto community defense organizing. Don't be a "Good German". We can't be "Good Americans". Now is not the time to keep our heads down.

A lot of liberal folks spent the past few months warning that "democracy was on the line", that this was different, that Trump was an authoritarian. Well, I hope that they really understood what that meant. Authoritarians and fascists do not share power via elections. If you're holding onto "get through the next 4 years" drop that delusion now.

2024-11-10

# Reposting this: Community organizing and active citizenship. An introduction to what we can do today to get started in our community. Some nuts and bolts descriptions. We've got 2 months before the transition. Keep that in mind. After that conditions will begin to change.

Folks, our previous lives and norms are coming to an end. Some of us are safer than others. We can be "Good ~~Germans~~ Americans" which is to say, put our individual safety first and ignore the violence and breakdown going on around us or we can resist.

Commit and prepare.

# Thinking this morning about community mutual aid projects. What can we do, on the ground, in small groups, to quickly build short-term beneficial and protective action while also building meaningful, longer-term relationships? Act>Connect>Build>Help

Blogging and social media is great for sharing ideas but it should be leading to additional, on-the-ground action. If it doesn't we're stopping short.

#If You Force Me to be Your Property I Will Become a Wood Chipper
Leslie J. Anderson

I've been many things in my life—
a scholar, a mother, a laborer, a love,

a singer of songs that are mostly puns,
a dancer with my dogs in the living room,

but if you force me to be an object
I will become very sharp—
A blender. A garbage disposal.

Arsenic served our ancestors well
but have you considered
that we are being threatened
with the room where the knives live?

Someone once told me
the best poems are threats.
Well,
so am I.

2024-11-08

# Perhaps I'm going too far off the deep end but I keep seeing people referring to the notion of getting through the next four years. My question is how realistic is it to expect an election in four years? It's become popular (and correct) to say "When they tell you who they are believe them" or "When they tell you what they intend to do believe them."

What they've been telling us is that there will be no election because fascists and Nazis in power don't take turns by allowing elections. People are still talking about this from the bubble of history and previous norms. That seems delusional, magic thinking. It's the same sort of pretend reality that ignores the climate emergency.

So, explain it in realistic terms, why should we expect an election in four years.

2024-11-06

# Went to bed early. Woke up early. Time for coffee and a double shot of Irish Cream.

# Just some obvious examples and points of likely failure as citizens that actually take democracy as a responsibility rather than as an afterthought. A brief survey:

When was the last city council meeting you attended?
When was the last county commission meeting you attended?
When was the last school board meeting you attended?
Have you ever served on a local advisory board or a non-profit board?
How often do you volunteer in your community?

# There's a lot of anxiety and panic leading up to the election. Whatever happens, I hope it is understood that this election is just the most obvious, open fissure of very deep systemic problems and increasing pressure building up. We keep failing to learn the lesson that as citizens we have a full-time responsibility to be active participants in and watchdogs of "our" government. We abandoned our responsibilities long ago.

# Spending this rainy morning watching The Cure. Their YouTube channel is a treasure of interviews, old videos and concerts. I'm on my second watch of their three hour long live stream from a couple days ago. What a show.

2024-11-03

# Out on a walk in the woods today I discovered a small patch of pawpaws on the trail and it occurred to me that now might be the best time to find them because their very large oblong leaves are currently pale yellow and stand out as most of the trees have already lost all of their leaves. I think there is a longer post to write exploring the different ways to learn to read nature. Trees, stars, birds, lichen all have their own language, their own patterns.

2024-10-30

# I was sitting on my porch cracking walnuts and noticed a nasty smell. I couldn't see any smoke. Turns out the less-than-one year old battery recycling facility 3 miles south of me was on fire. I moved inside immediately but I'm guessing my 15 minutes of breathing in those particulates was a couple years worth of average exposure. Yay?

2024-10-27

# Joe Biden has apologized to the indigenous people 'for what happened during the "Indian Boarding School era".

Now let's apologize and reckon with the rest. America has turned away from its foundational truth: It is a country built on white supremacy which is, even now, based in genocide, land theft, slavery and violence. In the years since its founding we've repeatedly and arrogantly pretended to be the champions of freedom and democracy.

The truth is we have become a violent empire with a thin veneer of democracy. The core is white supremacy, systemic violence and capitalism.

2024-10-25

# I'm happy to have been included in Manuel Moreale's ongoing People and Blogs series. You can read the interview here. There are 60 other interviews in his ongoing series. There are lots of interesting folks out there publishing blogs.

2024-10-22

# Watching season 2 of Pachinko and it's excellent. Also, I cannot resist watching the opening credits for this show. The smiles, the dancing, it's delightful.

2024-10-17

# Today's afternoon food experiments. Dinner was my usual sweet rice which is simple, just a bit of sugar, cinnamon, salt and soy milk. I'm out of soy milk so I subbed in peanut butter and also added 1/4 cup of canned pumpkin pie mix. Oh my that was good! Then some hot chocolate and because I'm out of soy I subbed in peanut butter again. Might sound odd but I just blend up a bit of water and peanut butter to make a frothy, nutty milk that works great for hot chocolate.

# Morning breakfast that was so good it deserves a mention: Baked pumpkin oatmeal with walnuts. And coffee of course.

2024-10-13

# Morning coffee and oatmeal while listening to Tech Won't Save Us podcast. An excellent podcast and this particular episode is especially worth a listen. They just dig right in. Accessible but really dense in history, the facts and narrative of the current moment. No doubt I'll give it a second listen.

2024-10-08

# I've made a good bit of progress the past couple weeks getting my Images page setup. It's far from complete but I've got a good start. Each image linked to the matching blog post.

# Sitting on the porch listening to a flock of birds in a nearby tree. I've not identified them visually but Merlin suggests Common Grackel or European Starling. They're having quite the conversation and it is somehow very soothing.

# Should we act? The latest reporting from the Guardian suggesting that "humanity’s future is in balance".

Look. There will be no averting profound human suffering. Let's have some fucking straight talk. We have waited too long. Should we act? YES. But look around you. Look at yourself. What are you willing to give? If you're a typical middle class American the answer thus far is not a fucking thing. The middle class of the US is a significant driving force behind the climate emergency. And from my observation these folks could not care less than they do...