Department Of So Long To Asparagus Every Damn Day Month
Every damn day. Of March. Yep.
I’m gonna miss it; moiself loves fresh asparagus season. It was fun, every damn day, either trying out new recipes or returning to long time favorites. [1]
Asparagus Every Damn Day Month is not on the official National Day Calendar or those months long observances lists [2] …but it should be. It will be on mine, starting this year, and continuing…as long as moiself feels like it.
* * *
Department Of Attention, All You One-Issue Warriors:
This Is What Your Purity Got You
Moiself, remembers how frustrated, hopeless, and angered-bordering-on-enraged I felt when, before the election, I was talking to daughter Belle about why some Otherwise Fully Left-Leaning People ® her age openly spoke of their reluctance to vote for the Democrats in November. She said the OFLLP were thinking of either voting for The National Socialist German Workers Party the MAGA Nazis the Republican presidential ticket, or not voting at all, due to the Democrats’ [3] knee-jerk support of Israel.
“So, for this one issue about which they feel strongly, they are willing to risk the shitstorm which *Every* Other Issue will undergo, if the Mandarin Mussollini and his jackbooted thugs attain power?” I sputtered. “What do they think will happen if the Republicans get to The White House – do they think Palestinians and those who support their cause will get a better shake, or anything resembling fair treatment?”
Though I am also frustrated by the seemingly unnavigable and unwinnable (for any side) Israel-Palestine situation, I was quite twitterpated by this leftist electoral clusterfuck strategy – which I’d heard/read about from other sources as well – enough so that Belle had to assure me that *she* wasn’t going to do that. She saw that strategy as ultimately self-defeating (not voting at all would be a passive vote *for* the Evil Empire Republicans), if understandable, on certain levels.
And now, here we are.
“The video is a grim watch. Plainclothes officers, some masked, confront a student in a Boston suburb, handcuff her and force her toward an unmarked car. From what we know now, the student — Rumeysa Ozturk, a 30-year-old Turkish national on a student visa working on her PhD at Tufts University — was taken by homeland security officials to a facility in faraway Louisiana. The video of her arrest Tuesday proliferated on social media.
By Thursday, U.S. officials confirmed that Ozturk’s student visa had been revoked and that she was in deportation proceedings — one of a growing number of foreign nationals here legally who have had their visas revoked by the Trump administration for allegedly participating in pro-Palestinian protests on university campuses. Secretary of State Marco Rubio criticized foreign students he said were ‘creating a ruckus’ in universities and said his agency had already revoked about 300 student visas. ‘We do it every day,’ Rubio told reporters Thursday. ‘Every time I find one of these lunatics, I take away their visas.’ ”
(excerpts, The Washington Post, “Trump’s war on universities puts U.S. in an
autocratic club – Rumeysa Ozturk’s arrest reflects a wider global trend of
nationalist leaders targeting universities as hotbeds of radicalism….” )
“We’re going to punish the Dems; they take our support for granted….”
( rhetoric from Palestinian supporters & other disaffected leftists )
To y’all Of-course-I-didn’t-like-tR___-but-I-wanted-to-punish-the-Dem-establishment voters and abstainers:
Y’all happy now?
Did you get what you wanted?
Of course it wasn’t what you *wanted.* But it *was* what was FUCKING INEVITABLE, to anyone paying half a brain’s worth of political attention.
* * *
Department Of Speaking Of The Unspeakable
#47, who as regular readers of this space know will not be mentioned by his birth name in this space, is known for his nicknaming of his opponents, in spectacularly non-imaginative ways (e.g. such rhetorical zingers as, Crooked Hilary; Sleepy Joe). The they-go-low-we-go-high optimistim policy of the Obamas, while morally and ethically admirable, was ultimately ineffective. Thus, moiself highly encourages one and all to take what little comfort can be gained in these times that try our hearts, by riding that low train on the low road, as far down as it will go.
If you need help in doing so, see ActionNetwork’s Pick a Nickname for D_____ tR___ here.
I think this was from a while back, but it’s still fun. And petty/infantile? Sure. But, as the site curator wrote…
“I think it’s time we came up with, and stuck with, a truly wicked nickname for Trump. One that all of us can use, akin to what Dan Savage did to Rick Santorum [5] oh so many years ago.
Now why do it? For the same reason Trump does it: It will drive him nuts. And the nuttier Trump gets, the more quickly he will show the American people just how unfit he is to serve as president. (And frankly, the man spends so much time taunting people, he deserves a little taunting back.)”
You can suggest entries of your own (moiself likes The Mandarin Mussolini, which I first heard from Belle ), or vote for entries they list, which include such spot-on pithy descriptors as
* Traitor Trump
* Cheatin’ Donald
* Don the Con
* Cadet Bone Spur
* Agent Orange
* Benedict Donald
* Lil’ Donny Moscow
* Red Don
* FAUXTUS
* Mrs. Putin
* Impotus
* President Spanky McLiarface
* * *
Department Of A Sure-Fire Cure, However Temporary,
For Cynicism And Despair…
…doesn’t exist. Yet. But watching Love on the Spectrum comes close. [6]
LOTS is a reality television show, from a couple of years back (with a new/third season, available just as of a few days ago), with American and Australian versions. It follows young (mostly) adults on the autism spectrum as they begin, with the help of family and friends and autism-knowledgeable life coaches, to dive into the dating world.
When moiself recently started re-watching that series during my morning exercises, I remembered the spectrum (sorry) of emotions I experienced the first time I saw it, several years ago. I didn’t know anything about the series when I first started watching it, then had a sheepish, Well what were you expecting?! realization about halfway through the second episode, re what I was so surprised about? I couldn’t (shouldn’t) have been surprised to see that, regardless of one’s neuro (typical or atypical) status, most of us share the same panoply of emotions and experience the same wonders and blunders of humanity, particularly when it comes to trying to understand attraction, dating, and love.
* * *
Freethinkers’ Thought Of The Week [7]
( Excerpts From responses posted on ( an atheist-leaning) Reddit chat site, in response to the prompt:
“The Middle East is fighting over make believe again.
Do you ever think ‘fuck it, let them fight?’ ” )
* I will admit that this thought crossed my mind despite being a Jewish wife.
Then I saw the video of the grieving families….
I support both Israeli and Palestinian victims and stand against Hamas and the Israeli Defense Force and anyone else who kills civilians….
This brings me back to the murderous almighty.
“ Do you ever think ‘fuck it, let them fight? Do you feel guilty for thinking this?
I felt guilty AF.
* The religions might be fake but the exploded loved ones are really real.
This fight will go on forever, until one side or the other is dead. It’s disgusting.
And it did not have to be this way.
* This fight will go on forever, until one side or the other is dead.
* It will not end after this. History has shown that they will just pick a new enemy to kill
over something equally meaningless.
* * *
May you never vote as a one-issue purity warrior;
May you appreciate the love in your life no matter your place on the spectrum;
May you enjoy the petty pleasure that is only possible
when savoring nicknames such as Lil’ Donny Moscow;
…and may the hijinks ensue.
Thanks for stopping by. Au Vendredi!
* * *
[1] When in doubt, steam or bake, dress with lemon juice, minced garlic, salt & pepper, a spritz of EVOO and/or a tablespoon of plant-based parmesan.
[2] There are some good ones there – I was aware of January’s Dry January and Veganuary, but had no idea that February is National Bird-Feeding Month (United States), April is Financial Literacy Month, and May is International Masturbation Month….
[3] the party in general and the Biden administration in particular.
[4] Why isn’t there another footnote here?
[5] In the early 2000’s Rick Santorum made many anti-LGBTQ statements in his campaign for the senate, including comparing gay marriage to man on dog sex. In response, author, advice columnist and gay rights activist Dan Savage led a campaign to have the name “santorum” mean a crude sexual act, and enough people participated in the stunt that for many months, when you googled ITAL Santorum the first two hits you got were a description of some quite visually repulsive imagery…. Ah, the glory days.
[6] No footnote here; nope. Move it along, folks.
[7] “free-think-er n. A person who forms opinions about religion on the basis of reason, independently of tradition, authority, or established belief. Freethinkers include atheists, agnostics and rationalists. No one can be a freethinker who demands conformity to a bible, creed, or messiah. To the freethinker, revelation and faith are invalid, and orthodoxy is no guarantee of truth.” Definition courtesy of the Freedom From Religion Foundation, ffrf.org
