Supreme Rant

 I'm thankful for a lot of things, but not for the hi-jacking of the Supreme Court by conservatives. I suppose they are smug now with their latest victory over reason and humanitarianism with the ruling that overrules New York Covid-19 restrictions for "some houses of worship." This bit about freedom is sort of like the motorcycle helmet thing, where I think if people make bad decisions to conduct self-limiting behavior, I don't really care. But it's never like that--not even with the motorcycle helmet question, and here I'll add that to say "it's debatable" only recognizes that anything at all is debatable given that there are enough people willing to take a ridiculous stand (although, yeah, no shortage there.) Allowing some groups to ignore common-sense rules regarding their health and safety amid the spread of a pandemic is just a wonky decision in that it so obviously affects other people outside that group. 

I have no problem with "freedom of religion." Here, the problem is that the broad sweep goes way outside the group in question, and hence is too broad. I don't understand how a reasonable interpretation of the law could fail to account for that, and for the special circumstances, in this case, requiring extreme, if temporary, measures due to the danger to all in a community, even, and especially, those outside the group seeking special consideration. 

End of rant. And though I tried hard to make this a Thanksgiving post, (see leading sentence) I recognize that it's a stretch. None the less, happy Turkey Day, all! 

1st Sentence of Each Paragraph

Every now and then I find it humbling to do this. After writing a long, windy post, I wonder if it could actually be improved by eliminating everything but the first sentence of each paragraph, as someone famous once said. (Maybe.) Here is the modified version of the previous post. Even though it has been rendered incomprehensible, it's a shorter read and therefore much improved. It's possible I learned something. I will now put down the ol' turkey quill and go play the guitar, or something. 

Happy Thanksgiving, in whatever format you can manage. 

Here it is:

While I was a repair technician for the phone company working out of a garage in south Independence, Missouri, I had the good fortune of working with this guy named Roger. 

Possibly you had to be there. 

But Roger was the guy that ran across this weird scenario. 

Trouble was, the Cable TV guy had to pull up on the rod in order to expose enough of it at ground level so he could get his clamp around it. 

Several weird things happened at once. 

The reason this happened so easily is that we were experiencing a drought, and the ground rod was sitting in dry dirt, and so wasn't doing much grounding and the current went all over the place instead of down the ground rod and out, as it was supposed to. 

Roger thought only of alleviating this mess.  

By this time, our supervisor was in on it, because the customer was already escalating the whole thing since their wiring was damaged, and this was, obviously, not their fault. 

So, what about the school bus, I hear you asking.

They stopped to see if anyone needed help.

Roger and the guys wrapped a big chain around the frame on the underside of the bus, attached it to their own line truck, and by driving away at a right angle, they righted the bus so it plopped back up on its four wheels.

I wanted to shrug and ask him if he got any mud on the old prayer bones while removing the chain from the bus. 

Roger and the School Bus

 While I was a repair technician for the phone company working out of a garage in south Independence, Missouri, I had the good fortune of working with this guy named Roger. He was one of the "older guys" who, I believe, hired on as a lineman in south Missouri about the time I was entering third grade. Roger had lots of stories, and he had a funny turn of phrase for many a situation. For example, one rainy day I returned to the garage after working on a buried pedestal, and so I had mud all over the front of my pantlegs. Roger saw that, grinned, and said "I see you've been out working on your old prayer-bones." 

Possibly you had to be there. But he was an accomplished phone man, the casual, politically incorrect gender specific title these guys gave themselves. Me too, really. It was 1988, and certain demographics hadn't quite caught on yet. We got there eventually, but that's another boring story. 

But Roger was the guy that ran across this weird scenario. As he tells it, he got a trouble report assigned to him that said the phone wires in the house were smoking. When he arrived and checked the line where it entered the house, at the side, he saw next to the phone company's lightning/surge protector that a Cable TV tech, apparently, was just there to install their equipment. Needing to attach a ground wire to a ground somewhere, he apparently decided to attach his wire clamp to the phone company's ground rod. This was understandable because a ground rod was about six feet long and had to pounded all the way into the ground with a sledge hammer, and no one wants to do that if there's already one there. 

Trouble was, the Cable TV guy had to pull up on the rod in order to expose enough of it at ground level so he could get his clamp around it. In doing so, he inadvertently rammed the top of the rod up into the electric power meter. 

Several weird things happened at once. First, the ground rod touched one side of the power inside the meter, effectively putting 110 volts onto the ground rod. The AC current then traveled along the phone company's ground wire all the way to the lightning surge protector. There, the sudden surge of current tripped the fuses in the protector. In our system, the "protector's" job was to ground the line in case of a surge of power, NOT to open it up. So, doing what it's supposed to do, the protector blew, and now the 110 volts is flowing through it and onto the phone line. Meaning it flowed onto the wires going inside the house. This is why the phone jacks were smoking. 

The reason this happened so easily is that we were experiencing a drought, and the ground rod was sitting in dry dirt, and so wasn't doing much grounding and the current went all over the place instead of down the ground rod and out, as it was supposed to. This 110v AC current also flowed along the metal sheath around the drop wire, which was buried, and to the green metal pedestal in the back of the lot. It probably also flowed up and down the cable run, down the street, on the ground wires and cable sheaths. Someone could have gotten hurt. Luckily no one did, and just as luckily, the house didn't burn down. 

Roger thought only of alleviating this mess.  The grass and the yard was bone dry, as I said, so he put on the heavy duty rubber gloves we were all issued, and without much risk, grabbed the ground rod and yanked it down so it was no longer touching the 100 volt lug in the power meter.  Problem solved. 

By this time, our supervisor was in on it, because the customer was already escalating the whole thing since their wiring was damaged, and this was, obviously, not their fault. So, we learned, Roger got reprimanded for a safety violation by yanking on the ground rod, even though by doing that he pretty much saved the day. The BSP ("Bell System Practice,") would have been to call the electric company, which then would have dispatched someone out to essentially do the same thing Roger did, only with a few more steps. 

So, what about the school bus, I hear you asking. The next day in the garage we were all ribbing Roger about his adventure in high-tech circuit field modifications of the previous day. This was partly because he got in trouble for it, but that reminded Roger of the time back in '57 or '58 he and some guys were driving a big line truck, towing a telephone pole somewhere in south Missouri and encountered a school bus lying on its side in a shallow ditch at the side of the road. 

They stopped to see if anyone needed help. It had just happened a minute before, and the bus was full of kids. No one was hurt, but they couldn't get out because the bus was lying on its right side, and the door wouldn't open. 

Roger and the guys wrapped a big chain around the frame on the underside of the bus, attached it to their own line truck, and by driving away at a right angle, they righted the bus so it plopped back up on its four wheels. "And the kids weren't hurt?" I asked, somewhat upset about this story. Roger said, "Oh no, just a few bumps and scratches." 

I wanted to shrug and ask him if he got any mud on the old prayer bones while removing the chain from the bus. 

Public Service Announcement

 

I'd like to say just a few words about wearing masks. 

Now, when you wear a pair of jeans, let's say, for sake of argument, you don't stick your head through one leg hole, and one arm through the other. No. If you put jeans on this way, you're not really wearing jeans, are you? Because your underpants are showing. You put your legs in the leg holes, one at a time, please, and then zip 'em up. Easy peezy. 

And so, I submit, is wearing a mask to protect yourselves and others from exposure to floating pathogens. But of course, you have to PUT IT ON PROPERLY. 

Thank you. 

Please Feed the Crocodiles

It's almost like a hobby for a lot of people nowadays, trying to figure out what Trump's motivations are for the things he does, why and how he got elected in the first place, or, maybe we wonder, what secret does he possess to command the allegiance of nearly half of America? Is it the history of reality TV? The cocksure blustering?  The surreal, clown like atmosphere surrounding the Whitehouse, with the flapping flags flanking the big, orange head above the podium?

And why is he continuing to push back at the election results when it has become obvious, many times over, that he lost?  He lost the popular vote by a hefty margin, and he will lose the Electoral College vote by the same margin that brought him victory in 2016. The barrage of frivolous lawsuits his team launched has fallen flat. Trump continues this strategy at the risk of squandering what tenuous legitimacy he might have had. 

I mean, he's starting to look like an idiot. (Starting . . . ?) What could he possibly be trying to do?  What is his motivation? What's the plan, the strategy? Then it hit me. 

He's addicted to the attention. During his tenure as president, he has managed to keep himself on the virtual "front page" of the news almost every single day. An incredible feat, actually. And now, quite suddenly, it's over. It's over--at least in a normal, reasonable world--because when you lose an election around here, you concede, you congratulate the winner, and you step back. 

There's the rub. 

It's all too sudden. It's like your doctor said your lung function is deteriorated and you have to quit smoking, no other option, but on the way home you realize you still have half a pack of Marlboros in the glove box of your car. Hell, yeah, you smoke them.  And you tell yourself you'll quit after that. This is where Trump is right now, I reckon. 

Oh.  And "Whitehouse aides" have related stories that Trump says he intends to make a come-back, and run in 2024.  OK, the very term come-back says he has, in his mind, at least, conceded defeat. But 2024 is too hard to resist. The tweets, the media coverage, the rallies! 

And the media will feed it--with a sigh of relief at the renewed prospect of all that job security.

Sums it Up

 Who is this person?  Because I'm sold.  And why is all of this just one notch below WWF mania? 

Post Election

 I realize the election was over just a few days ago (or at least, over for those of us who believe our election process is still functioning, and robust) but I am kind of waiting for things to simmer down. It is still evident how intensely divisive and tense this political season was. I see a lot of people on the Internet who seem unwilling to let go of the anger and frustration the Trump administration caused them. One FB post header: NOW can I vote for Bernie??  Then, a thread on FB where contributors seem to be fantasizing about watching Trump defeated and humiliated on their own TVs at home via a new reality TV show featuring a camera in Trump's cell . . . stuff like that. This morning I found myself scouring Google News for anything stupid or outrageous Trump might have said overnight, since I last checked. 

It dawned on me that a considerable percentage of over half (apparently) the people in the United States of America are suffering from a form of PTSD, and will probably continue to do so for quite awhile. 

One of my favorite passages from a book of Eckhart Tolle's is a story about two ducks peacefully floating in a pond, as ducks are often wont to do. So, one duck accidentally bumps into the other, and, startled, a squawking flurry of hostile, angry wing flapping ensues until the ducks finally drift apart. Then, Tolle says, if you watch one duck as it drifts away, the situation now past, it will drift for a moment and then suddenly shudder, loosening its wings and then tucking them back in before returning to peaceful floating mode. The moral of the story is that at some point, you have to let go, experience that involuntary shudder, and then return to your normal life. 

Headline

 Favorite headline today at 11:48 a.m.: 

"The End of an Error"

-New York Magazine

Says it all. 

Counting

 I know that it has been a weird year for a variety of reasons, not the least of which has been the political climate. It's not the first time, nor will it be the last, that there was so much divisiveness, but this time it struck me as particularly bad. Maybe it's just me, here, and now. I have a friend who is one of those people who thinks that neither presidential candidate is any good. This strikes me as wrong, since I think it would be difficult to make an equivalence of any kind between Trump and . . . just about anybody else. 

But, that aside, what happened was in an email exchange I simply stated my particular political perspective. I'm a Democrat, and I explained why.  I did so in a very reasonable manner, I might add, since I am aware that my friend is probably either a Republican or one of those people who thinks the political solution lies in America's version of Che Guevara, or whatever. His response: nothing. A full stop on email exchanges. I find it puzzling that in today's political climate, the response to a variant opinion is met with complete dismissal. It might be marginally more encouraging than if it was anger, which I've also encountered in similar circumstance. 

What I'm thinking, now, is that I can deal with a differing political opinion. My friend can remain a friend if he wants to be a Republican, of course, but what about if he cuts off all contact because my opinion differs from his? I  can only respond by respecting his actions. I mean, seriously, who cares? But it's a little disappointing. 

I could keep going on this post, but that would mean a devolution into the exploration into my failure as a NaNoWriMo "contestant." I lasted two days. Too much going on, too much to do, and I know that for the last third of November I'll have hardly any free time at all. 

What can I say?  

Keep counting. 

Day 1

 Have you ever read something so well-written that you had to stop and read it over and over, first to admire it, and then as if you think you’re going to figure out how they did it?  I once read a passage from “In Cold Blood” that was so good I stopped to re-read it many times like that, then thought, goddammit, I knew all those words! Why couldn't I write something like that?

Tom Wolfe affects me in the same way, quite often. The closest I’ve ever come to figuring it out is that these writers somehow manage to create their own context and then fill things in using pure wit—the kinds of things that just happen, things about which you can only later say, you had to be there. 

It's that NaNoWriMO time again, and here I am, half-way through Day 1 and still trying to decide if I'm willing to commit and face probable failure once again. I want to do something new and different, like, maybe Laslo wakes up in the bed of his pickup parked on the levee and instead of stumbling into the universe of the Busy Bee Cafe he runs across a freshly murdered dead body that has drifted into a tangle of driftwood at the river bank, and realizes it is his foreman at the foundry where he used to work--the job that he was just fired from two days prior. Hilarity ensues, etc., etc., etc. I dunno.