Potpourri

"My" homeless vet is having heart troubles. I spent a lot of time today trying to find a VA service that will go out to the TR bridge on-ramp and do outreach to him -- and came up empty. Tomorrow, I'm going to take him aspirin, which I know can help to stave off a heart attack. Are there any other supplements that are good? (Damn. I hate feeling powerless. Hello, Shadow.)

Dill, oh dill! Why will you never grow where I want you to grow, but always grow where I've planted rosemary or thyme? Why? (Hello, again, Shadow!)

Butterbur, if you keep encroaching on the day lilies, you will find out that I can be as Kali, Bringer of Death. I am just saying.

Oregano, please see my comment above re: dill.

Spent today reading, thinking, editing, talking to smart people, and writing. Once, in my wicked youth or childhood. . . . Sometimes, your job IS your daily practice. And that, pace R. Frost, has made all the difference.

Anne Hill has up a great post about talking to children about dreams. A few months ago, G/Son was awakened by a bad dream. He headed across the hall into his 'rents' room. Sleep-addled and hoping for a few more of Lethe's blessings, they pulled up the covers, snuggled him in between them, rubbed his back, and attempted to get some more sleep. He shook my beautiful DiL awake: "Mommy! You did not ask me about what was IN my dream!" Children want to talk to us about their dreams; it's up to us to teach them that what they dream matters. Thank the Goddess, my G/Son has a wonderful mother who woke herself up and asked the important questions. A while later, G/Son spent the night with me and, when he woke up, in that magical, information-rich moment between sleeping and waking, he said, "Nonna! Can you hear my friends? I think I hear my friends from my old school." I told Son and DiL about G/Son's dream, and they've been making opportunities ever since for G/Son to spend more time with some of his old friends. And he loves it!

African Alchemy has an interview w/ Adrienne Rich, who GOT ME THROUGH LAW SCHOOL w/ A SNIPPET OF POETRY Rich says: "Nothing 'obliges' us to behave as honorable human beings except each others’ possible examples of honesty and generosity and courage and lucidity, suggesting a greater social compact."

Thorn Coyle. Leonard Cohen. A good cause. For precisely what are you waiting?

Dear Glitter Person I do not know you, but I think I love you. Why thrice-married Newt Gingrich ("I was against Ryan's plan to deny health care to old people before I was for it") gets to complain that allowing gay people to marry will "destroy traditional marriage" is way beyond me. Also, as someone who is financially responsible, I have to say that if your estimated worth is only about a million dollars, you've got no business owing between 1/4 and 1/2 of that to Tiffany's. And I love Tiffany's, purveyor of all things Elsa Peretti. (As I've posted before, one of my rules for dealing w/ a bonus is to get yourself some little thing you want before investing most of the bonus. I've spent more than a few of my bonuses on Elsa. Unlike Newt, I could afford them w/o going into debt.)

If you don't check in every day with In the Mists of Avalon, you should.

What the Arch Druid Said. This week as every week. If you only have time to read one blog, this is it.

Everything here smells good. As do the gardenias in my garden and the earth after all this rain. Not to mention the (see above) dill, oregano, chocolate mint, sage, and deep black iris.

If you care about social media, you should read my brilliant friend, E. No, really. Every day.

This morning, I passed a new (at least newly-advertised) farmers' market at the OPM (that's Office of Personnel Management for those of you outside the Beltway). Thanks, Michelle Obama! Mr. Bittman has a great article about how Detroit, yes Detroit, is embracing locally-grown food.

If you're interested in checking out some Pagan events, you should be checking regularly with Medusa.

After days and days of heavy rain, I got to go sit outside in my bit of Earth and reconnect. It felt wonderful. What's going on in your bit of Earth?

What's rocking your world these days?

Picture found here.
.

My New Name for a Blog

What Cenk Said

Mr. Mubarak, It's Time for You to Go

The god forsakes Antony

When suddenly, at midnight, you hear
an invisible procession going by
with exquisite music, voices,
don’t mourn your luck that’s failing now,
work gone wrong, your plans
all proving deceptive—don’t mourn them uselessly.
As one long prepared, and graced with courage,
say goodbye to her, the Alexandria that is leaving.
Above all, don’t fool yourself, don’t say
it was a dream, your ears deceived you:
don’t degrade yourself with empty hopes like these.
As one long prepared, and graced with courage,
as is right for you who were given this kind of city,
go firmly to the window
and listen with deep emotion, but not
with the whining, the pleas of a coward;
listen—your final delectation—to the voices,
to the exquisite music of that strange procession,
and say goodbye to her, to the Alexandria you are losing.

- Constantine P. Cavafy (1911)


Translated by Edmund Keeley and Philip Sherrard

Framing

I was re-shelving some of the books in what passes for the library here at chez Hecate and came across (because who re-shelves books without re-reading at least a few passages?) this quote from George Lakoff's book Don't Think of an Elephant: Know Your Values & Frame the Debate. I think it's worth sharing.

Taxation is paying your dues, paying your membership fee in America. If you join a country club or a community center, you pay fees. Why? You did not build the swimming pool. You have to maintain it. You did not build the basketball court. Someone has to clean it. You may not use the squash court, but you still have to pay your dues. Otherwise it won't be maintained and will fall apart. People who avoid taxes, like corporations that move to Bermuda,, are not paying their dues to the country. It is patriotic to be a taxpayer. It is traitorous to desert our country and not pay your dues.

Perhaps Bill Gates Sr. said it best. In arguing to keep the inheritance tax, he pointed out that he and Bill Jr. did not invent the Internet. They just used it -- to make billions. There is no such thing as a self-made [person]. Every businessman has used the vast American infrastructure, which the taxpayers paid for, to make his money. He did not make his money alone. He sued taxpayer infrastructure. He got rich on what other taxpayers had paid for: the Treasury and Commerce Departments, the judicial system, where nine-tenths of the cases involve corporate law. These taxpayer investments support companies and wealthy investors. There are no self-made men! The wealthy have gotten rich using what previous taxpayers paid for. The owe the taxpayers of this country a great deal and should be paying it back.

Picture found here.

My New Name for a Blog

What Crabby Old Lady Said.

hat tip/Diane in comments at Eschaton

Picture found here. Warning: Lots of ads.

My New Name For A Blog

What Athenae Said.

Yeah, everybody's losing their jobs, there is nothing the boss man can't do and walk away from scot-free, your years of service to a company barely get you a shrug when you're shoved out the door, so far, so good.

Yeah, the rule of law's been destroyed, we basically live in a police state, Miranda rights no longer mean all that much, there's nothing the authorities can't do and walk away from scot-free, so far, so good.

Yeah, it's getting harder and harder to breathe, the ocean is filling up with oil, nobody gives a fuck about the polar bears, everyone has asthma, there's something in the drinking water the town said was safe and now the kids have cancer, so far, so good.

Yeah, the guy we elected to end the wars and close the torture prisons isn't doing that so much, Congress is still full of assholes, our state legislators are too busy gobbling corporate knob to take our calls, our school boards want us to worry about if Jesus rode a dinosaur and if our kids can't read it's because they just don't want to enough, so far, so good.

Yeah, poverty and ignorance have been institutionalized, walled off, and called the acceptable price of living the way the top five percent live while the parts of the city the tourists don't visit might as well rot for all anybody gives a damn, so far, so good.

Go read the whole thing.

Picture found here.

Echidne Asks Some Questions

Why you should always ask these three things.

I'll add a 4th: What about the 7th Generation?

Picture found here.

Nice

Don't look now, John, but they could and they did.

Spot On

Gus di Zerega explains, rather well, I think, the confluence of religion and politics in a sane world.

Being Pagan helps give me the strength t[o] stand my ground, and influences the positions I take, but I believe that my political reasons should address issues in ways that atheists and Christians, insofar as they are decent people, can accept and still remain atheists or Christians.