Everyday Life and Politics armistice day, france, marshal foch, paris, ww1 7:59 am
Yesterday was Armistice Day and I posted a famous poem to commemorate the day. I also have this pic I want to post. This is the tomb of Marshal Foch in the same building as Napoleon’s Tomb in Paris at the Military Museum there. I actually found this tomb very moving. More so than Napoleon’s really and I really like this pic.
Entertainment and Everyday Life alan seeger, armistice day, rendezvous with death, world war one 6:55 am
On the 11th day of the 11th month at the 11th hour, WWI ended. It was called the Great War at the time. A war when in a battle 100,000 men would die in the first minute of going over the top of the trenches. It was brutal and the blood lust was unreal. In many respects, WWII was an extention of it. So, to honor the day, I thought I would post one of the most famous poems to come out of that war and there was some good poetry in the war. This one though, is probably the most recognizable and worth another read.
‘Rendezvous with Death’ by Alan Seeger killed in 1916.
I have a rendezvous with Death
At some disputed barricade,
When Spring comes back with rustling shade
And apple-blossoms fill the air—
I have a rendezvous with Death
When Spring brings back blue days and fair.
It may be he shall take my hand
And lead me into his dark land
And close my eyes and quench my breath—
It may be I shall pass him still.
I have a rendezvous with Death
On some scarred slope of battered hill
When Spring comes round again this year
And the first meadow-flowers appear.
God knows ’twere better to be deep
Pillowed in silk and scented down,
Where Love throbs out in blissful sleep,
Pulse nigh to pulse, and breath to breath,
Where hushed awakenings are dear…
But I’ve a rendezvous with Death
At midnight in some flaming town,
When Spring trips north again this year,
And I to my pledged word am true,
I shall not fail that rendezvous.
Everyday Life shoes 5:57 pm
I bought new shoes yesterday. Yes, I am wearing them today. 
Entertainment fire, friends, halloween, poker 7:26 am
Halloween weekend was quite unpredictable. It actually started off on a bit of a bummer but quickly improved in status. First, I learned my friends on the West Coast – I am totally attached to their kids and them to me – had their house catch on fire. Fortunately, someone spotted it and so no one was hurt. The house didn’t burn down but was damaged to the point where it probably will be a month before they get back into it. Needless to say, I felt bad for my friends. I have an open invitiation with them and stay there sometimes so it is like a second American home for me.
I worked all day in the office and got a lot done but I didn’t have any Halloween plans or even a costume. I know, can you believe it??? But I went down to the watering hole thinking I’d have one quick beer. But I ended up tagging up with a bunch of people I know and we had a blast. The large amounts of mead + endless shots helped. Afterwards, we dragged our crazy selves over to someones house and continued the party there. The top of my head got kissed a lot by the wife of one friend for some odd ball reason. A girl I know dressed as a pirate had figured out how to do something kinky with her hook I think. And of course the mandatory poker game – always interesting when you’re drunk or stoned or both – took place. I managed to drag myself home around dawn.
My friend’s gave me a bottle of homemade wine at the party which I put in my backpack to haul with me. I forgot about it. So I have been lugging it around all day in my backpack and only this evening rediscovered it. *lol* That means I took it to a bunch of meetings today and to places like a church, daycare, courthouse etc. That totally cracked me up.
Sunday I managed to do a lot of work but it was a good sports weekend too. I won the football pool at the watering hole. I’ll get anywhere from 50-100 bucks out of the pool so not a bad days take.
Anyway, even without the costume, this was probably one of the best Halloween’s I’ve had. It just was fun to be able to toss the work aside and party for a night with a bunch friends. OH, and as way of update, my friend Sunshine who is pregnant, baby will be make his stage debut sometime in the next week.
Entertainment and Politics charles manson, corrupt judges, roman polanski, roman polanski wanted and desired, rosemary's baby, sharon tate 5:38 pm
Monday night, I took time away from research films which I’ve been working my way through and popped into the dvd the documentary Roman Polanski: Wanted & Desired . This documentary directed by Marina Zenovich is a VERY non-biased look at Roman Polanski spending a good deal of time on the legal battle which Polanski has faced since the late 70’s and now has him sitting in a Swiss jail awaiting extradition to the U.S.
If you don’t know anything about Polanski, this movie is a good primer. He survived the Holocaust as a boy then got himself to Hollywood where he directed several big hits. He married one of his actresses, Sharon Tate, and from this movie is clear to see they were very much in love, and she was pregnant with his child when she was murdered by Charles Manson and his bunch of sickos. Needless to say, Polanski had to struggle with that and he talks about it briefly in the film.
The film is very good about using Polanski’s own comments to give his side of events and equally good in that it has all the major players giving in-depth interviews. You really do get to know Polanski as a person to some degree in this film.
The bombshells – and there are numerous ones -mainly center on his legal troubles. He was accused of rape when he had sex with a 13 y.o. girl and plead down to unlawful sex which with he did some jail time and which every department recommended probation for him having determined he wasn’t a sex offender.
Things you learn in this film are:
1. The girl had a very active sex life before she met Polanski and her mother didn’t seem to mind. It was one reason the girl’s attorney – both of who were interviewed in the film – agreed to a plea. In fact, their side initiated the plea process first.
2. The Judge was corrupt. More interested in fame then justice and did several illegal things. When you have both the guy prosecuting the case, and the defense lawyer agreeing the judge was corrupt, then you pretty well know things aren’t right.
3. The Judge was going to violate the plea and sentence Polanski to decades behind bars just to make his own reputation.
4. The victim doesn’t want Polanski prosecuted further.
5. The prosecutor said he totally ‘understood’ why Polansk fled. In other words, he didn’t blame him for doing so because justice wasn’t going to be dealt.
One thing I learned that surprised me is how people and the press in America have always treated Polanski. They have ALWAYS villified him. When his wife was murdered, even though he was on a different continent making a movie, they said he was behind the murder because he had made the movie Rosemary’s Baby. And anyone who makes such a good movie about the occult must actually be involved and thus he had to be behind the murder. They actually printed this stuff in the papers. Neighbors didn’t want him living in their neighborhood because of it. It was like a modern day witch hunt without any real witches.
I have never figured out how Polanski has kept his sanity. Surviving the holocaust is bad enough. Surving the brutal murder of your wife and daughter on top of it almost too much to bear. Add all the legal troubles etc. Most of us would’ve gone off the deep end.
The Swiss making a deal with the Americans and locking Polanski up is going to keep Polanski in the news probably for a long time. If you want to know something about Polanski, the case, his life, this movie is definitely the one to watch.
Everyday Life 5:42 am
Want to know what happens when you don’t want to maintain factories capable of making vaccines? You get the debacle we have now with the swine flu vaccine.
The vaccine is finally being distributed. Well, sorta. My COUNTY got 200 doses of vaccine. 200 doses. That’s it. The whole state of Indiana received just over 3000 doses. There are a few million people in Indiana so that isn’t going to far. Half the people seem to have already been infected with disease and though it has been declared a national health emergency by Pres. Obama there seems to be no rush to get the vaccine anywhere.
Over 90% of all flu cases are swine flu cases according the CDC. If it wasn’t for advances in modern medicine to treat symptoms once infected, there probably would be thousands more dead. And speaking of the ill, hospitals here have restricted visitors for patients due to the swine flu and some hospitals are setting up tents and treating patients outside the main facility.
This strain of flu will probably be around for awhile. I’ve had it already so I am hoping there are now anti-bodies in my system to keep me from catching it a second time.
Entertainment and Everyday Life blindness, french girl, optic nerve, tigger, winnie the pooh 3:53 am
I had a scare the last 24 hours in that my father was working at his office desk and suddenly went blind in one eye for a couple minutes. After spending the entire today taking medical tests, the eye doctor told him he is in great shape. The only thing they can figure out is that he suffered a rare occurence.
It seems that cells sometimes don’t carry enough oxygen to the optic nerve and this will cause temporary blindness. Doctors don’t know why this happen just that it does. Since there is nothing else wrong with my dad they figure this is what occurred. Needless to say, we’re both very relieved.
But my day was made so much easier by a friend who sent me this video. Now, you have never seen a Winnie The Pooh tale told the way this girl does it. What an imagination she has! She is so into it as well. It is French but it has large English subtitles so you can follow along and this will absolutely crack you up and is worth a couple plays: Child Tells A Magical Winnie The Pooh Story!
Everyday Life and Politics child abuse, education, poverty 5:04 am
Sometimes, pesky numbers say a lot about who we are. For instance, it came out this week that 1 in 6 Americans is living beneath the poverty line. That is a revision upwards of over 7 million people. For me this is totally unreal and avoidable. The three trillion dollars we’ve spent in Iraq and Afghanistan could’ve been spent here creating jobs and giving everyone universal healthcare which we actually could afford if we weren’t busy spending the money on weapons to blow people up.
Then I saw another stat today where Kentucky is the worse state for child deaths from abuse. 41 kids died here in the last recorded year. Per captia, that made them number one. The U.S. puts no priority on it’s kids. Schools can’t fund their academic programs (sports teams no problem, but studies forget it). In Chicago, a school kid gets killed every week. Around half the students in this country drop out before graduation.
I blame a lot of this on the home front. We treat our kids like dirt so they have no expectations. I saw that abuse stat today and it reminded me of a conversation I had with a friend last month where we were talking about how badly kids are spoken to by parents in public. For instance, my friend said she was in department store and some parent started giving their kid a good cursing over something the kid had done. My friend, who isn’t shy, butted in and told the lady that she didn’t want to hear that – the tirade went on a bit – let alone have her child who was with her hear it.
At the daycare in our building I’d say 1/3 of the kids are being raised by grandparents because the parents are screwed up. And another stat I saw this week is that in school districts around here around 65-70% of all students are applying for free lunch programs. I’m sure a lot of that is due to the economy.
It seems to me, people ought to take a step back once in a while and determine what is a priority. For instance, building a bridge in say Afghanistan or repairing a school falling apart down the street from your house? If you can’t take care of your own, how do you expect to take care of anyone else?
Entertainment and Everyday Life and Magick and writing ben and jerry, music, writing 4:00 am
Ever have one of those weeks where you just can’t stop singing to yourself? That is me this week. I am in such a fantastic mood that I am literally singing everywhere I go. I think people are probably giving me those ‘ok, he’s lost it’ looks but it can’t be avoided.
Things pretty much started on Monday. I went to lunch with my dad then stopped on the way back to the office to speak to a friend briefly. I never made it back to the office. There was the serious chat about their personal problem. Then we got to chatting about some magic. We had a couple beers at the watering hole and basically spent the afternoon there. That evening the party moved to another friend’s house. By the way, if you’ve never played ping pong while a bit on the tipsy side, coordination does become an issue.
Tuesday, I worked all day and got so much writing stuff done! I actually was busy right up until about midnight. I am so happy with how the rewrite is going and now characters for the comic are starting to take shape in my head. I am stoked about the comic!!! I know that sounds silly but I think it is going to be fun to do.
I made this music mix for a friend’s daughter. Their two teenagers and me talk music all the time so we’re swaping music every now and then. It actually makes me feel pretty good to know I can still relate on that stuff. What did Neil Young say, “Better to Rust then to fade away”. Rock on! But this mix was really, really good if I say so myself and I’ve got the songs in my head now and everywhere I go I’m singing something from that mix.
I know this is a rambling post but I’m in too good a mood to really care. It has been an EXTREMELY productive week and I like being in this space. I’m even splurging on myself tonight in that I bought a pint of Ben and Jerry’s ‘Cherry Garcia’ which I literally have not had in years. Living the high life. Yeah, baby.
Everyday Life and Magick dumb supper, halloween 4:01 am
Halloween will be upon us in a couple weeks. This is my favorite holiday of the year. That’s a surprise, right? I mean with the candy, drinks, parties, dressing up, plus the whole serious magic factor, what’s there not to like? Last year, I created a really kewl demon costume, with a severed hand etc. well, I was going to put the picture below but it’s on a different hard drive. I won second place in the costume contest down at the watering hole and basically had a blast.
This year, I have a dilemma. I want to party and go all out for the holiday like usual. Like I said, it is my fav holiday. But there are factors mostly financial. I’m saving up for the big move in January which is no small feat. Moving to a new country means all new stuff. I also have this cascading series of events that keep costing me extra bucks. I had to buy two tires a couple weeks ago. Now a brake is going bad which will be more money. I had a couple major birthdays to buy for and my bed, well the welding on the frame went kaput …it’s a little hard to explain but basically there’s a hole in it. It keeps getting worse and I’m probably past the point where I need a new one but I don’t want to buy one because, hey, again, I’m moving in 90 days and well, won’t need it then. I may compromise and buy the cheapest futon I can. Still, that’s extra bucks.
So my dilemma is do I splurge on the money for a costume? I could do one for under a hundred bucks but as you can tell from the list I just gave, a hundered bucks could be used elsewhere. Do I do a major night of partying? I actually thought I might do a Dumb Supper this year. I’ve never done one. I know this will sound sacriledge to some but I’ve never done one because I’m very much into the here and now and like I said Halloween is my fav holiday and somehow I am pretty certain being out enjoying the night is something my ancestors would agree on.
It just dawned on me that some won’t know what a Dumb Supper is. It is a traditional supper where nothing is said and your ancestors are honored and there’s this whole spirit connection thing that goes on. What is odd is that I checked to see if I could find one in this area and I can’t. So that pretty much decided itself.
At the moment I am inclined to go really light for Halloween and be responsible. I just don’t know if that inclination will last. It is hard to stay disciplined in this kind of dilemma.
