
October 4: Non-express lane at the Aldi store in Mount Pleasant, Wisconsin.
Another Week: Number 93
One of the things I cannot understand is how we have an addictive drug that kills 178,000 Americans every year — more than twice as many as fentanyl — and yet the companies selling it are allowed to peddle it via seductive TV ads.
On Sunday, I saw a commercial for Crown Royal Deluxe featuring the song “Midnight Rider” by Gregg Allman. How’s he doing? Oh, that’s right — he died of liver cancer after spending most of his life addicted to alcohol. Apparently, that’s “what royalty tastes like.”
Another thing that’s hard for me to comprehend is how we have a Batman villain on the verge of recapturing the presidency of the United States of America. Imagine the Riddler running for mayor of Gotham City with half of its citizens ready to accept a criminal in that office and being fine with his bizarro behavior.
Trump has the notorious name, the cartoony suit, tie, hairdo, and spray tan. There’s his obnoxious dancing to “YMCA,” his Jerry Lewis-like slurring and rambling, his felony convictions, and his affection for America’s adversaries. He’s got no answer at all to healthcare or global warming. He has an economic plan out of 1890, a pathological hatred for immigrants (despite that fact that his mother was a dirt-poor immigrant), and a sick fetish for grisly torture and violence beyond Dr. Evil‘s most twisted fantasies.
On Sunday, Trump proposed “one real rough, nasty” and “violent day” as his answer to crime in America — even as crime rates keep dropping.
Republican ads in our swing state pound away day and night at two main panic buttons: transgender phobias and barbaric immigrant “invaders.” So far, they’ve got Americans frightened enough that the race is neck and neck. It’s as if their diabolical firehose of fear has extinguished all sense and reason among our pigeon-hearted citizens.
Meanwhile, the daylight dwindles and horror season settles in.
On Tuesday, though, I was startled to find a hummingbird sipping from my Wendy’s Wish salvias. I have never seen a hummingbird in October. They’re usually gone shortly after Labor Day.
Saturday night was warm and beautiful. After dinner and a movie with my mom, I returned home to find a party underway in the backyard of my new next door neighbors — complete with barbeque smells, kids, and music. Then I walked over to the backyard of my other neighbors, who had invited several households to enjoy conversation around their fire. It was the kind of evening our block hasn’t enjoyed in far too long.
I walked 6.44 miles this week.
This song was on my mind a lot this week during walks and guitar playing.
Bend of the River (1952)
One of the TCM flicks I saved in my mom’s cloud DVR was the covered wagon drama Bend of the River. Introducing it, Ben Mankiewicz explained that after serving in World War II, Jimmy Stewart began playing somewhat darker characters. In this movie, he’s guiding a wagon train to Oregon and trying to leave behind his questionable past in Missouri.
It’s not a particularly bad movie, but nothing is gained by watching it. The story, adapted from a Bill Gulick novel, ratchets along mechanically. Human beings get stabbed, shot to death, or stereotyped with nonchalant regularity. People are double-crossed.
My mom enjoyed it more than I did.
0 Comments