Gambling with WWIII

 I say, bring it. A nuke dropped on the Kremlin and a bounty placed on all Russian military personnel above the rank of corporal, paid in vodka so their own buddies will turn 'em in, would do the world a ton of good. Russia and Russians have been a festering boil in the face of the Earth for 100s of years, and as for practical matters, none of the orcs' nukes will work anyway because they don't maintain shit. 

Since Dirty Diaper Don, AKA Krasnov, is Pewtin's employee, I'm thinking the American public may well really increase their support of Ukraine, as has been happening since the war started. 

I say all this because the world has just been treated to Orange Stinko behaving like the ass he is to the great hero Zelenskyy. The result will certainly be Europe detaching itself more from the US and continuing to arm up and prepare to, hopefully, wipe Russia off the map. 

I got 15 things photo'd and got myself cleaned up and got out of here just before 4, dropped off things at the post office and deposited my check in the bank (my math and theirs matched to the penny) and went over to Whole Foods for a slice of pizza and a pint bottle of Guinness, and some shopping. It's really damp or something outside, and warm. Maybe I'll live to see an Earth like in the movie Blade Runner, where it's just raining all the time - that's the best of the possible scenarios. 

I got bubble mailers at the Amazon place, stopped at Nijiya for more things, and got back here. Nice and uneventful, just how I like it. 

 

Thursday

 I got things to the post office (all small things) and went to the Baguette for a study session. I simply have to face that without coffee shops, I'm not going to get any studying done. 

The place was jammed when I went in so I decided to try this chicken bowl thing for $10 at this Korean place. It was good, if you like sweet. The chicken and little rice stick things were swimming in what I can only describe as syrup. Someday someone's going to start serving hamburgers, chicken, etc., between two "Belgian" waffles smothered in maple syrup and topped with whipped cream and sprinkled with chocolate chips and they'll make a fortune. Anyway ... it was ... food. 

I found a *lot* of OTC medications and things at the EMT training place dumpster so I took a little while loading those up, and found a box of "Loramed" for Ken because his wife takes it. 

I'd just gotten back here and was doing Ebay stuff for a few minutes before I was going to brush my teeth, clean the place up while chewing xylitol gum, and do a bit of practice, when I heard Ken's truck pull up. He was early. I showed him the box of Loramed and he said, "Oh, and Suzy just bought some" and I asked what happened to the big of it he'd just gotten from me - had he lost it? He said, "Maybe". Maybe I should just put the stuff in a padded mailer and mail it to Suzy directly. At least it will get to her. 

So, no practice. And I only got any studying done because of the coffee shop. 

After Ken had gone, I got to work rounding up things to list. I took a big thing apart which got me a lot of neat parts to list, plus before starting on that I rounded up a lot of crap to put out for the scavengers, like tons of cheapo power strips that we'll never use. So far Ken's not said a peep about this or that being gone, and there's a chance he actually likes to see space cleared out. 

I didn't wake up until 12:30 but now I have things photo-ready for today/tomorrow. 

In other news, the nightmare continues. Social Security and Medicaid (probably Medicare also) are on the chopping block. I can pay for my own vaccinations but I'll have to make sure not to end up in the ER again. Also it makes me nervous about keeping my money in the bank, just when I'm getting close to my goal of having $10k in there. 

If the FDIC is ended, then there will be a tremendous bank run. People will also flock to things like precious metals so I'd expect gold and silver etc., to skyrocket. As well as guns, ammo, etc. Germany in the late 1920s to early 1930s was surely like this also. People who can, are working on ways to get out. They didn't know how bad it would get, but the smart ones felt it was high time to get out. 

This time around we know how bad it can get. 

I packed all the things, and got the big ones dropped off at FedEx OK but the two small ones, that I thought I'd put in one of the drive-through boxes at the post office, were no-go because the boxes were stuffed with mail, and the one with the large slot had what appeared to be a flattened box crammed in there, with letters people had stuffed in on top of that. I took the letters and put them into the narrow-slot box. But I had to take the two small ones with me and will mail them tomorrow. 

I did a study session at the Baguette, and since I'd left at 7 instead of 6, when I got there it was nice and calm and uncrowded. They're open until 10 it turns out, which is amazing. Sure a basic coffee is $4 but to me it's worth it. 

I got back here and checked the temple's calendar and it turns out the service is "at home" tomorrow so I can relax a bit. I still have to deposit my check at the bank but I can do a quick out and back and get back here and relax. 

Wednesday and warm

 It's about 75F out there, warm! And it's still February. 

I woke up a bit after noon, got my 10 things listed, etc. 

Yesterday was fun. I actually don't have any more class sessions at Shir Hadash so I don't have to worry, but if I need to study for an hour or so in that neighborhood, I'll just go to Starbucks. Lunardi's Market is like a boomer theme park or one of those lion country safari things where half the fun is wondering if a lion will try to climb into your lap. 

The ride home on the light rail, predictably, was full of crazies, hobos, and crazy hobos. There were like two "normals" who got on, one an Asian guy in a suit who looked pretty disoriented at seeing the train car full of crazies, hobos, and crazy hobos. And a "Mr. Normal" looking guy who got on at the Airport/Metro stop, obviously just off a plane. Me, I found the ride pretty humorous as I noticed, sitting there. that there was a cigarette butt sitting perfectly on top of my rear bike tire. It was just too fitting. 

Off to class cold and all

 Yesterday I got the 25 or so things I'd packed to the post office and FedEx, got some diet 7-Up at H Mart, then rode straight over to Nijiya for a bunch of things, from eggs to beef to portion out and freeze, to veggies like gobo (burdock) since celery is $4. 

I cooked and ate some fish soup when I got back and got 10 things ready to list or almost ready anyway. 

Amazingly, Chris The Polyglot emailed me yesterday to as if I was OK, since I hadn't been to Friday's potluck and service or the Sunday class, and I said I was, just got a cold, and would be at class. I thanked her for checking on me. 

It was really nice. I'm not used to being checked on. 

A few days ago I emailed my youngest sister and asked if the next-youngest is OK and a day or two later she replied that "she is doing fine" with nothing more. Of course she probably *is* doing fine because she's a psychopath. The last job/career she had that I know of, was for a credit card company, nagging people to pay up. The job was probably a perfect fit and I'm sure she took to it like a duck to water. She's probably risen in the ranks and is in charge of nagging workers to nag people to pay up. 

I heard nothing more than this short, flat, reply from the youngest because she *is* a psychopath. I could say she became one in the hard times we went through but it goes back much further to when we were still living in a nice house. The long and short of it is that C- had gotten into our father's wallet which he'd left by his bedside and went around handing us a few dollar bills.

Sad to say, we all were OK with this and more than OK. Of course when our dad woke up, he found the money missing and got to the bottom of things quickly. And now that I think about it, this means that C- wouldn't have simply found the wallet there when everyone was out and about, or maybe Father gone across the street to the beach to skip rocks, no, this was early in the morning and she'd sneaked in there, right next to my sleeping dad, and gotten the money out quietly. 

Naturally she fell in with the "Born-Again Christians" when she was in her teens, since that's the most psychopathic subculture you can get into in the US, legally. She'd be my pal if I'd just join that cult. To her, Jews are "Christ-killers" and so on. 

My older brother, A-, is supposed to be calm and mellow, but the one time I thought I'd get together with him was through a common hobby or sport, and it was going to happen until he found out I'd become really good at it, better than him. That shut the door forever. I wonder if Trump/Krasnov actually hates all pro golfers because they can play golf better than him? That's the mentality. 

That leaves the oldest, whom I think I might refer to as Hyacinth, after the hilarious British TV show, "Keeping Up Appearances". I was describing her to a friend here in California and after a bit he exclaimed, "She's Hyacinth!" since he knew the show too. 

I really thought she cared about be but really it was all about whatever reflection I could make on her. Thus, when I was poor, I was persona non grata, and when I was doing well or at least looked like I was, she was much more friendly. 

Why is this normal American behavior so strange, one might ask. Isn't is normal to not want to associate with "losers" and to suck up to "winners"? Because it's normal American behavior, not normal human behavior. 

Normal humans, not Americans, live in circumstances where they have to work together on things. They have to go through things like hunger and physical danger and bad weather and getting through winter etc. So they bond in a way Americans don't, and someone who works for the good of the group is valued, unlike among Americans where that person is a "sucker". 

This is what you see among immigrant families, the parents working to help the children and then the children helping (and being able to help) the parents when the parents get old. This is the secret to why immigrants do better here in the US than people who have been here for generations. And in grand American style, immigrants are hated for this. The present administration won on this, hate and envy, and its promise to deport millions of immigrants - they never said illegal immigrants, just ... immigrants by which is meant those with brown skin and accents. Those are the people who will still have some human values. 

The present administration is going on the assumption that once those pesky non-psychopathic immigrants are out of here, we'll have this great country and society. Actually it will be horrible and I hope to be out here here far before that happens. Some white Real Americans(tm) know what's going on and call for all-white communities to be set up, but those always crash and burn. 

I listened to a screed by a guy on Twitter yesterday that was linked on r/antisemitism and I could agree with a lot of the guy's points, but it's like he's farting into the wind. He either has no knowledge of the history of attempts to make all-white settlements or he's ignoring it, hoping this trying one more time would work. It's telling that he said he's getting very little interest. 

What's really needed is some way to temper the, I'll say it, evil effects of capitalism. Only very old traditions seem to have done this to at least some degree. Buddhism in Japan, Confucianism in China, Hinduism in India, Judaism in the West and Middle-East. 

I got a couple more things packed, worked on my bath of 10 things to list, and got to class OK. Wow are there a lot of mentally ill people on the light rail. My plan to study ahead of time at Lunardi's market went OK except the nice little cafe area fills up with people - apparently even Los Gatos has homeless people. Next time I'll go to Starbucks. 

Back to what I was writing about: Adam Curtis, in some of his documentaries, has noted that post-WWII, the assumption in the US is that people would act as perfect calculating machines, calculating their own benefit and not actually having any logical impurities like empathy, group-feeling, etc. And it turned out only psychopaths actually work and think this way. Psychopaths are the ideal in the US but most of the population are not psychopaths, and even American culture and American upbringing can't turn everyone into a psychopath. So messy things happen like Obama getting elected. 

Then there's the whole "doomsday prepper" thing, quintessentially but not uniquely American, more of an Anglosphere thing but it's a very strong religion here in the US. 

"Reddit is mostly americans. In a big apolitical sub, you're going to get a healthy serving of <current party> folks who think it's their duty to do free propaganda for the admin. All the "this is just whining, things have never been better" is just spouting the same kind of shibboleth will stancil was 3 months ago.

There's still plenty of "I would just kill myself" and "I would just move" which is a denialist form of engagement, but at least engages with the topic.

Very few comfortable americans can engage seriously with this topic, and I'm talking about even folks who consider themselves preppers. The concept of capitalism coming to an end is like gravity coming to an end to most, they can't even conceive of a world oriented in a way without endlessly increasing consumption. The american mind defaults to mad max as if that's ever been the way a civilization has collapsed in thousands of years"  - u/Less_Subtle_Approach on Reddit. 

I quote this because the guy's nailed it. The prepper guy whose land I lived on in Gilroy, was constantly saying "the doom times" would be like this or what because this or that movie depicted it such and so. He had (and probably still has) no awareness of how delusional that sounds. 

 

Cold is ... worse?

 Now my voice is all trashed. I was awakened by a knock on the door, it was the FedEx guy delivering a package that was not for me, this address but some person/company name. I took it in then thought for a bit and the FedEx guy hadn't driven off yet, so I went back out yelling "HEY! HEY! This isn't me, can I return it?" and he took it back. My voice sounded like shit so I'm sure the guy could tell I was having a hard time. The business seems to be down in Morgan Hill, and how they decided to use this address I have no idea. I'll just have to keep bouncing packages back. 

My throat's still sore and now it's affected my voice. And apparently the next class session which my syllabus said is at a place fairly nearby, has been changed to the place that's the farthest away. At least it won't be raining. And all I have to do is take it easy on the ride there/back. At least the class is with the rabbi who's (self admitted) has ADHD and whose accent drives me up the wall so I won't be talking much through my mask. 

I felt so good yesterday evening that I almost did a practice session, thinking I'll play lower register stuff and take it easy, but in the end I didn't and I'm glad. It's a long time since I've had a good and proper cold, and I remember now that it starts in the head and then settles into the chest, so I *am* in the process of getting over it. 

Krasnov

 For some reason it's being suppressed, but there's some out a story, with a legit paper trail, that shows that Dirty Diaper Don was recruited as a KGB asset decades ago. 

I believe this because Dumpo's so bad with money and so greedy and crooked, that no legit bank or investor would deal with him even back in the 80s. Enter the KGB (essentially, these days, the Russian mob). We learned about this in the Army. You could not get a security clearance if you were a gambler, had debts, played around on your spouse, etc. The KGB's name for the orange retard was/is Krasnov. 

Here's the scoop on a non-US site which, presumably, will be harder for the powers-that-be to erase: https://www.kyivpost.com/post/47630

So now instead of typing in something long like "Dirty Diaper Don" I can just type "Krasnov" and be done with it. 

I've been feeling a fair amount of I guess is good old fashioned despair. It being winter, my nervousness about having to "ace" the class, the horrible politics these days, with the possibility of things getting worse, much worse. 

I was really all set to move back to Hawaii, and I was going to do is quick and slick. Get a round-trip ticket with the flight there on my birthday. Probably do a big parking lot garage sale to get rid of tons of things, have the return ticket for a month or two after my arrival (Hawaii is weird this way in that even as someone who grew up there, a lot of places won't deal with you if you don't have a return ticket). 

I'd just land in a hotel to start off, expensive but easy, and look around for a room to rent. Join the local musicians' union and get out there busking and also put lots of work into being able to reel off "Taps" or "To The Colors" etc., on a moment's notice, as Hawaii doesn't seem to have anyone who's essentially "on call" to do that. There *are* trumpeters who will sound "Taps" etc. but their fees are super high because they've got to fly over from the mainland. 

There's even a Jewish community there, although I don't know if they're a bunch of those stupid anti-Israel noodnicks or not. There have got to be some sensible ones and of course they have a Chabad. 

But all in all it's still too American a place. I have two sisters there but I don't have family there because in mainstream American culture, "family" is a word with no meaning. 

If I'd become rich somehow, they'd be crawling all over me. In fact, thinking back to what relationship I had with my older sister, the one family member I thought I was close with, said relationship was directly proportional to how much money I was making. 

For instance, when I was first out on my own, taking home about $350 a month and really scraping by, she didn't communicate with me at all. Once I was in college and presumably on track to become an electrical engineer, a well-paying profession, she then and only then wanted to be friends. 

When I moved to the mainland, everyone in Hawaii thinks that if you go the mainland you'll be hugely successful (I thought this too) and so we kept up a years-long correspondence, first with written letters and then with email. My traveling to places like Germany and Japan certainly didn't hurt, as that's what rich people do, right? It was all paid for by the sports team and I remember ordering a bowl of soup for $10 or so in Barcelona because I had only about $12 on me and hadn't gotten my per diem yet. 

Then when I got my ebay thing going, I guess I appeared very much worth being friends with, because entrepreneur yadda yadda. This ended with the crash of 2008 and when I told my older sister that I may well return to Hawaii and be homeless for a while, that ended it. She accused me of wanting to be homeless, and I tried to explain that no one wants to be. 

This is the older sister who, when I visited back in 2003 and we were driving along the main drag in Waikiki and she spotted an Asian gal trying to sell T-shirts on the sidewalk, said that gal, who looked high school age and probably was, should be put right into jail. 

On Reddit I learned about the trope of people who "peaked in high school" or "what they did in high school is their whole personality" and that's my older sister to a T. You don't have to ask her if she went to Punahou, she'll tell you and within not very many minutes. 

She says things that make her feel smart, like "The US is a republic, not a democracy" - a standard right-wing talking point. God help you if you don't pronounce some word the way she does, because she'll turn a rather pleasant conversation into a very tiring and insulting lesson on how to say this or that word or brand name the way she says it.  

She'd be considered a real intellectual, in perhaps Iowa. Once I tried talking about artists; I believe I'd just finished reading Irving Stone's book on Van Gogh and something about Renoir, and she came back with, "Well if there's anything I know, they were all sex fiends". A very Iowan thing to say. Very Middle-America, very stodgy. 

This cold is really depressing though. I'd had one good practice session then one where my tone was not as good as it ought to be and that's when I was coming down with this thing.

Saturday night.

 This is an excellent article: https://newrepublic.com/article/191421/trump-emigration-wave-brain-drain in part of it, it's mentioned that by ceasing funding for things, we could end up in a condition the preppers call WROL or Without Rule Of Law. 

Yesterday I photo'd a dozen expensive to somewhat expensive things for Ebay, sent an email to the rabbi saying I've got a cold and don't want to spread it so I won't be at the service or the Sunday class, then packed things to go out because I still wanted to do errands. 

I dropped the things off at the post office, deposited my latest pay check at the bank, got my new books of checks, and stopped in at Whole Foods for a couple of things and I was hoping, one of those little bottles of Siggi's kefir or if not that, a Brown Cow yogurt. They only had big bottles of the kefir and they don't seem to have Brown Cow yogurt at all, so I didn't have anything. 

I rode over to the music store to buy the Bach 3C mouthpiece and asked about used ones. The guy and I looked through the used mouthpieces they had, and then he suggested looking in the "returns" and they had one that's like new and I got it for half price. So, something around $35 instead of the $60+ it would be, new. 

I rode back over to Whole Foods and had some chicken, broccoli, and a pint bottle of Guinness. After that was to get things that need to be kept somewhat cold like cream for coffee, a cucumber, etc. 

Then I stopped at Nijiya and got some smoked salmon, seaweed-flavored peanuts, and fried peas. I was considering getting a 4-pack of beer but then settled on something cheaper, a big bottle of sake. For some reason I guess I thought this would make me feel better or go to sleep earlier or something. 

The end result was just my feeling lousier when I woke up. The sake didn't even taste very good, the stuff's made in Hollister for goodness' sake. There was still some in the bottle when I got up, so I poured it down the sink before  I got any funny ideas about drinking any more of the stuff. 

And somehow I've gotten an appointment to get a passport, in mid-April at one of the libraries. That should give me time to get all my papers in order, and I'll even bring my old passport, which according to someone on Reddit, works as proof of citizenship if for some reason the birth certificate doesn't. 

I should probably see about getting a replacement social security card, since mine got lost years ago and I don't think I even have the little stub that it came with that had my number on it also. Maybe even dig up my Army papers. In any case I have until mid-late April to get it all together. 

Another daily serving of disaster and a cold

 I've got a cold or something. No wonder my tone was mostly not good when I practiced yesterday. 

There's not much to say about the news, just Nazism coming in fast. There's an excellent thread on r/collapse with tons of good comments, too many to post here, but possibly the best one is one where one of the posters says something like, "the public thinks they're flying but we're actually falling". 

WWIII shaping up

 I got back here after mailing things and doing a study session at the Baguette, found some shipping stuff on the way home, and got back here and got in a productive practice session. I'm finally coming down to the realization that playing up high is going to require my midsection being in better shape, so I'd started the day with some crunches as well as other exercises. 

Ken came by at the usual time, and brought me a burger and fries. I got my pay check, and we talked about things. One of the things we talked about was getting out of here if things get worse (is there any doubt they won't?)

He said that I could "easily" sneak out into Mexico or Canada through one of the places on the borders that are not watched. I said the only reason for me to go to Canada or Mexico would be if it's easier to get to Israel from there than from here. 

My own forecasts are much gloomier. I said that if things get bad here in the US, while Jews don't do the "1/2 Jewish" or "1/4 Jewish" thing, you're a Jew or you're not and no one is "more Jewish", Israel may have to prioritize which Jewish people it extricates from here and those with family in Israel, those who are not converts, and so on, may be able to leave first. 

I said my plan is to slide out of here with as little a ripple as possible, because fighting in war is work and I'll be retiring and don't want to work. But if I have to work I will, I'll arm up again and put in the work. 

Ken said his own plans are probably to move to Italy. Suzy, his wife, being a Spanish speaker, can get by in Italian pretty well, they've made a trip there a few years ago which may have been an investigatory trip, and between her money and theirs from selling their house, they could do it fine. He's done work with companies over there like the European Space Agency, and could still probably do remote work for his employer here. I said, "You'd better take your kids too since they're brown". 

I said what worries me is if the FDIC is ended. Ken said he thought it was already, and that sent me on a tirade about how ignorant he is, and looking it up online. I think I managed to convince Ken that the FDIC still exists, barely. My point being that if the FDIC is ended, then anyone's bank account can be emptied out  - kind of like PayPal's original business model of cleaning out the bank accounts of random people - so anyone from journalists, scientists, basically people on the orange turd's shit list, can be cleaned out, all the way down to anyone who's a registered Democrat. 

On Reddit today people were talking about re-registering to vote as "independent" or "no party" but I think it's too late - they can just look up what a person was registered as in the last election. 

As for one's bank account being wiped out, Ken said that's the time to buy gold, and I said Yes, gold or any assets and talked about cigarettes being currency in wartime. And booze. Guns, ammo, this last being jokingly called "ballistic wampum" in prepper circles. 

But after Ken left I thought about it and one of the best ways to isolate oneself from the seizure of assets is to have skills. It's the reason why Jewish culture is huge on education (it's no accident that in Israel, you can go to college regardless of class or skin color, very reasonably or free). 

I know how to buy and sell things, I know how to make little handicrafts and hustle them on the street, I can do art to some degree, and I'm a fair trumpet or cornet player, even above "fair" as a busker, busking standards being so low. What would be really good would be to be outstandingly good at a single thing. Like, started-trumpet-at-age-5 good. 

That ship has sailed, but I'm fair ahead of the people whose posts I read on r/homeless 99.99% of whom seem to have NO skills. Nor any interest in acquiring them. 

Yet they seem to expect to be fed and housed and supported. These are people who are not mentally retarded, they have working arms and legs, they don't have any reason to be housed and fed with nothing expected in return. They just don't want to do anything. 

I'm not sure even Jewish culture, as kind as it is, supports this way of thinking. There's the belief that if parents don't set their kids up with some trade or occupation, it's as if they raised criminals. Unlike the hyper-individualism of English-speaking culture, there is the feeling that we're all in this together but one has to do something to contribute. 

It doesn't even have to be something flashy like art or music, it could just be a person who's good at cooking or cleaning or anything like that. But if there are homeless on r/homeless getting along by going to all the little shops in down and becoming their odd-job person, or being the car-detailing guy, or anything like this, they're not writing about it. 

I guess my point is that I won't have the director of the Israel Philharmonic saying they've got to get me out of Nazi America, but if I can get to Israel, I think I can survive there and it sure will beat ending up being homeless and killed by feral dogs or zombies, or worked to death in a concentration camp because that's the way the US is headed. 

In a sick way it's interesting living, day to day, in a country that's going into hard Fascism. Things look pretty normal, people going to jobs and doing normal things. Back in Hawaii the University of Hawaii is going right along with all of the orange turd's orders and even recommendations. I haven't looked up today where the latest ICE raids are but I'm sure there are some going on around here. The guy whose land I lived on in Gilroy, who I'm certain voted for Mango Mussolini, may now be reaping the rewards as his livelihood depends on the EPA, and the EPA is going away. But by and large is looks terribly normal around here. 

In my testing of my two cornets and the trumpet, I've realized something. With the cornets I'm using the same Bach 3C mouthpiece because I just have the one (I have a Bach 7C too but I don't really play a 7C). With the trumpet I've been playing the Blessing 3C I have, but I wonder if I got a Bach 3C trumpet mouthpiece for the trumpet if it might make a difference? 

After all, if I had to go out busking tomorrow, I'd take the trumpet because I've got a gig bag that fits it and it's not an expensive horn if something happens to it. The Connstellation needs new valve corks and felts and stuff, and I'd not take that out busking besides not having a gig bag for it. 

So I might visit the music store tomorrow, among all the other things  I have planned for the day, and buy a Bach 3C mouthpiece because they're sure to have one. 

Fuck you and fuck your camps

 "Today's WWII Internment camp remembrance day or some shit. I had a hard time finding out whether Americans/Westerners were imprisoned in Japan and the answer is: 

Yes. Everywhere that Japan had control, not only for the Americans but for all the Allied white women and children. In Japan proper, they were rounded up and interned immediately. Some few were traded on the Gripsholm exchange ship. Those in Indonesia (NEI at the time) were likewise interned, where quite a few were raped, even as young teenagers. There are some Dutch first-hand accounts. There is a movie written by a survivor called “Three Came Home.” Likewise, there was an infamous camp in Shanghai and one in Manila at Santo Tomas. There are some memoirs from survivors of both the Shanghai and Manila camps which are worth acquiring and studying carefully. There was a civilian camp in the Hong Kong area, too. I don’t recall, offhand, where the Singapore civilians, women and children were sent, but they were imprisoned, too. Lots of these women died in captivity, of course, due to the undernourishment and intentional starvation diet. My friend Colonel Allen (R.I.P.), who helped with the publishing of “Magic: The Untold Story of U.S. Intelligence ,” was a child with his mother in the Manila camp. He had horrible memories and nightmares of the Japanese treatment for life. His mother died within only a few years after the war, due to the “half-cup of rice per day” treatment that they had lived through. She would give her half-cup to her son, so that he might live. Heart-breaking.

Unlike in the American WRA temporary relocation centers from the declared combat zone of the U.S. West Coast Defense Zone — which began sending Japanese (even aliens!) out during the summer of 1942 to complete freedom in the other 44 states — Japan never released any of these women and children internees throughout the duration of the war until they could be liberated." 

- Dave Brown on Quora. 

So fuck 'em. For such nice, neutral people, they sure like hiding this fact and showing anti-Israel/anti-Jewish movies in their temples. 

Hitler and Staling divvying up Poland

 Oh, wait, it's Dirty Diaper Don and Pewtin getting together to carve up Ukraine, with, as with the case with Poland, their having no say in it. History is rhyming HARD these days. 

In other news, children (and adults, presumably) who need medications like SSRI's for anxiety / depression are to be put into concentration camps to labor growing organic crops, to help with their concentration, geddit? And children with diabetes, turns out it's all in their minds, and bad parenting. 

I'm really glad I'm old enough to have missed out on that, but I'd likely have been prescribed them. A lot of people - adults - on Reddit say they're really screwed without these medications and well, if you've got diabetes, a labor camp isn't going to cure you. You'll just be very sick or in the case of type 1, just die. Which is no doubt the actual aim. Kill off the "weak". 

I got my practice in last night which is good, and got 20 things ready to list on Ebay today. I also packed 15 things to ship. I got those things sent off, found packing stuff on my way back, and got cleaned up to leave for the class tonight. 

I ended up having about 45 minutes to study so at least I did the reading assignment, and I was not behind on the Hebrew so that's good. The class was interesting as always. 

On my ride home, I was on 4th street and at one intersection, I had an interesting thing happen. A young maybe 20s gal, actually pretty attractive, got on her bike and started to cross right in front of where I was going. If  I were not prepared to slow way the hell down, I'm sure I'd have hit her. I had my lights on so I'd have been visible from quite a distance off. Time to plan. 

So I slowed way the hell down, and the gal crossed in front of me closely enough for me to smell the stale cigarettes and cheap booze on her breath. I looked over to the sidewalk where 3-4 of her scumbag friends were hanging out. I'm pretty sure of what their plan was. 

In the universe of scumbags, anyone running lights on their bike is a "square" or a "tool", the kind of person who has a job. The enemy; someone to be taken advantage of. The idea was for me to hit the gal, then they'd all mob me. If I were lucky I'd get away with my life and maybe I'd not be lucky. 

But instead, I glanced over at the scumbags, and unlike a "tool", I kept rolling however slowly to get past, then sped up again and rode on. I checked at the next corner, where I had to turn anyway, and made sure none of 'em were following me. 

If I'd been a real "tool" I might have stopped, said out of concern that they need to be careful, etc. I doubt there would even be an obituary. And people think Israel is dangerous? 

I got a good practice session in, comparing all three of my horns. Conclusion: The Yamaha student trumpet is the worst of the three. It just doesn't have as good a sound. The Connstellation has a good sound and a "big" sound. The Getzen is the best of all three which is to be expected. Also the trumpet feels strange after playing the cornet for a while, and I might just be a cornet player. The Connstellation needs new corks or felts or something, and so I need to start looking again to find out which overhaul kit fits it and get one. It will cost $30 or so. 

Two big delusions

 Yesterday  I set off to do my "weekly Wal" but I also, in my effort to simplify things and thus make my mind a bit more at rest, decided to take all the books I'd been saving up to trade in at the used book store, and just donate them at the little free library in Japantown. Trading books in is just too much work for too little money (or trade credit). 

I got as far as Japantown, dropped off the books, and got a bento in Nijiya. It was crammed with people in there so I ate over at the old hospital, and realized I had to take a crap, bad. So I headed back here. 

I did find a copy of "World War Z" by Max Brooks, a book I'd heard a lot about, and that was mostly what I accomplished, was reading that book. I got a so-so practice session in too. 

For some reason I like to learn about people doing incredibly silly things, so at various times I've gotten into watching videos about people doing solo ocean crossings in sailboats, climbing stupid high places like Everest, and bodybuilding. 

One of these things is not like that other. At least with sailing and climbing Everest, a person has to have a fair amount of money to pony up, plus you don't just go and do it; you have to do a bunch of sailing or climbing first and work your way up to it. Plus there are concrete, not-subject-to-opinion measures of success. You made the summit or you didn't, you made it across the ocean (or the finish line) or you didn't. 

But bodybuilding is something with almost no barrier to entry because if you're young and vigorous you can train and also work a job, the diet isn't any more expensive than the average working-class diet as you're switching out beer and cigarettes for more eggs etc. So just about anyone can get into it and if you have a talent for it (good genetics) you can go very far, very fast. This is a commonality with some of the obscure Olympic sports such as the one I got into (no it was not weight lifting). 

And herein is the problem: It's a really common delusion that, the "real" world being corrupt and crooked as hell at least here in the US, that if you get into a sport you'll be entering some kind of pure world where there's actual sportsmanship. So in my watching video after video about bodybuilders, a lot of them names I remember from the 1980s and 90s, I'd see again and again, the same story: A guy works his guts out, has good genetics, is really of tip top quality, and due to politics and fixing, they don't win. I saw many big guys in tears. 

The more obscure Olympic sports are like this too. Big ones like running or swimming have too many judgemental eyes on them and there's less, not no, but less, corruption. But there are all kind of ways people in the smaller sports can be dicked with. 

So I've come to the conclusion that if you're in a society where crookedness and corruption are the norm, the sport you get into will probably be rife with it too. So the delusion is a mistake, that if you can get good at a sport you'll enter some idealized world where everything will be OK. 

So that takes care of the first delusion I wanted to describe here. The second is even more widespread. I'll call it the delusion of American hyper-individualism. 

Americans are best described as "Iks who drive cars". Everyone. Is. On. Their. Own. Family means nothing. The delusion is this: It's believed to be the best way to live. Working together in any way is considered to make one "weak". 

We're now entering our end game, where we become Russia or Hungary or maybe post-WWII Sicily, but much more atomized than even those places. But this cancer has been at the center of our "culture" for a long time. 

Not only did my father make it clear that once I was 18 I was to be out the door, but even in my quest to find what little work could be found for a "haole" where we were, he did things like fix me up with a job weeding a yard for a lady, who pressured me to come up with an estimate and I'd be paid that estimate. I had no idea how long it would actually take, thinking it would be an afternoon, so I estimated $10. It turned out to take 2 days and I had to take the bus back over there the next day to finish it, and I'm not even sure I saw the $10. I think it may have been given to my father, who kept it. 

My older sister, being the oldest and thus everything showered on her, got to go to the same elite preparatory high school that Obama went to. Thus, to her, if you didn't go to Punahou, you were some kind of lower form of life. I remember her, seeing some Asian gal trying to sell some T-shirts on the sidewalk in Waikiki, spit out that the young girl should be put in jail. My older sister, who some years before, had been trying to sell puka-shell and macrame jewelry on the sidewalk in Haleiwa. 

Iks who drive cars... I remember my older sis going on and on in self-pity, about how when she was first out on her own she was so poor, she could only afford a small car. I didn't own a car and learn to drive it until I was almost 30. 

My older sister doesn't even want to communicate with me now, and why should she? I didn't go to Punahou. I didn't marry into money. Fuck You I've Got Mine. 

So here's the delusion: The delusion is that being hyper-hyper-individualistic like this makes one "stronger". My argument is that it does not. Reading as much Reddit and r/homeless as I do, I see again and again, people who talk about life no longer being worth it, and wanting to put it to an end. I can't blame them because their lives, like the lives of most Americans, are incredibly bleak. They've had to do everything all on their own, and a lot of the ones who say they're determined not to end it all, don't, because they have a dog or a cat. A dog or a cat, not another human, not in the entire world. 

I will say here my blasphemy: That a single, isolated human is as meaningless as a single ant. The American ideal of being utterly alone is a recipe for weakness. It's the reason the American life expectancy is low and falling. 

The recipe for strength is to have other people who care about you, and who you care about. That's what has kept humans going for all of the history of humans. It's the reason why the Jews as a people (and other groups like Chinese, Hindus etc.) have survived for 1000s of years while other peoples are gone and forgotten. 

Sunday

 Amazingly, after the Friday night service I stopped by TAK Market and got a 4-pack of Guinness in tall cans, got back here and drank 'em, and went to bed early (for me) around midnight. The end result being that I had my alarm set for 8AM and woke up at 7AM. 

I was out the door at 7:30. I rode over to the Japantown light rail station and took the light rail down to the Winchester station. I don't know why, but for some reason the Winchester station seems to be a haven for bums, crazies, druggies, etc. Some undead character was yelling about something and I just hustled out of there. 

The ride down to "King's Court" which of course is an example of that great American contribution to world culture, the strip mall, was easy. It was weird seeing everything in daylight. 

I stopped at the Peet's there and got a coffee and a cheese danish and sat outside by my bike. The place was crammed with Boomers all talking loudly and preparing to camp out there for hours, and besides, being dressed for cold it was too warm inside. 

I hung out a bit with the nice Muslim lady and her daughter selling Girl Scout cookies and we ended up talking about migraines, which the lady gets and which I think are the basic type of headache I get if I eat chocolate. When my coffee was finished I wished them to sell lots of cookies, and took off. 

The reason for all of this was this was one of the "Shabbat Experiences" we're kind of "volentold" to go to as part of the class. It was supposed to start at 10, and since it was a bar mitzah also, there were tons of people. 

So I was there a bit before ten, great, and I ended up in this Torah study class that was being held, the actual Shabbat service starting at 10:30. The service was OK, except as seems to be a constant, I prefer the way we do things at Temple Emanu-El. Rabbi Nico at this place says/sings Hebrew so fast he sounds like an auctioneer, and what's the utility in that? 

Afterwards was a nice big oneg and I loaded up on veggies and a dab of shakshuka and lox on pieces of bread etc. It was good. I ended up with a table of people, talking about stuff and then "I had to go". 

I got as far as outside, where by where my bike was parked was some guy and the security guard was there and also a bit of wind came through so I told the security guard about how I was one long ago and one time I was to catch the culprit who was throwing leaves into the pool of this hotel, and I found that the culprit was the wind. 

The guy by my bike chimed in and we talked about how overstated Hawaii is, and how tons of places are better and far, far cheaper. Then he told me all these stories of hustling for money by holding places in line at different tourist sites like The Louvre, and we talked about money in general. The biggest spenders I've seen are poor people, who spend money like water on beer and cigarettes and fast food etc. 

Then I got around to saying I'd only gone to this event because it was part of the class I was taking and I normally stay home on Shabbat, read my weekly Torah portion, etc. This was too much work! And I took off. 

There was more zombie drama at the light rail station, with some homeless guy on the nod and refusing to wake up. Eventually after much cajoling and a few packets of cookies given by a nice old Indian lady many seats over that I passed along, the bum was convinced to sit up and at least put on a good simulation of being alive, and we took off. 

I got off at the Japantown station and rode along Ayer street to see what the hell that's all about because for years I'd wondered at this weird house that looks sort of like a castle and what might be down that street. Older houses, that's what. 

I rode over to Nijiya and got a bento and a 4-pack of Asahi beer and got back here and just relaxed the rest of the day. I drank the beer and it was OK I guess but I feel like it made my blood pressure go up and it was really not all that refreshing. Like I should have just gotten a big bottle of Perrier instead. 

The illegal casino/brothel/whatever it is had a bangin' night last night and thus I sent in a report but there had, according to Reddit, some big bar fight downtown and apparently all the cops were down there. There seems to be some kind of private security guy going around in a little white car and maybe he's actually hired by the brothel because they must be making money hand over fist between the whoring and the suckers losing all their money. What needs to happen is a good old dispute, with some loser shooting some other loser than and only then will it get shut down. 

I woke up just before noon today. If I'd gone to bed nice and early, I might have considering having a try at going out busking, but of course this is not the proper season for it, it being the half of the year when there's no work. 

This is different than Israel and Hawaii, where there's no real off season, and while the summers are hot, you can just go out and play at night, and the winters are often the better season because it doesn't get so hot. In Hawaii they talk about summer visitors and winter visitors, with the winter ones having more to spend. 

Thinking back to 1982

 Believe it or not, back in 1982 I always had at least $500 in the bank, often a bit more but never less. On $500 I could always find another room to rent for less than $200, and I figured if I was out of work I'd have tons of free time to scrounge, so $500 was save-my-ass money. 

Well, now I'm at just about 9 grand, and it feels about the same. I actually want to keep a "float" of 10 grand in the bank, which will take some time still because I've got about 4 grand going out pretty soon, 3 to the IRS and 1 for temple membership. 

Yes, I went to the bank but first I went to my meeting with the rabbi and it was all hunky dory. Then I went over to the music store which wasn't open yet so I went to this weird "Hash House" place on the corner and got sourdough toast, explaining to the guy (who was nice and talkative) that I can't check on the opening time of the music store next door. He said he'd check and when I got my toast, he said they opened at 11. It wasn't even 10. "But that's OK!" I said cheerfully, "I've got toast!" 

I did the bank (there's a new gal working there who's from Israel and I got to try out saying "Boker Tov!" which means "good morning" to her which went over well) then dropped a couple of things at the post office, got a bunch of things at Nijiya and got back here. 

Now to list 10 things I've got photo'd, and get back over to the temple for tonight's service then back here ... then I have to get up super early tomorrow morning to go to Shir Hadash for their Saturday morning service as part of my class. 

I've been thinking about Harvey Pekar since I have that book by him to read, and I remembered he'd tried moving to Israel and the way it's described, it's like he was officially told they'd not have him. This is not the truth. The truth is, he went to the embassy or something, asked the guy there about it, and the guy shot back that he'd have a hard time and not be able to find a job. 

This was undoubtedly your typical Israeli directness, brutal directness even. Sure, Pekar apparently came across to everyone as twitchy and neurotic, but what that guy told him was not official policy and all he'd have had to do is go through the process and I'm sure they'd have taken him in just fine. And his skills working for the Veterans Administration here in the US would have been translatable to something there. The trouble is, he was "thinking" with his emotions. 

The trouble with this is, it's Harvey Pekar we're talking about here. His almost off-the-cuff stab at looking into moving to Israel resulted in a book "Not The Israel I Expected" or some shit, and was fuel for the fire of antisemitism the Left has as a core value. And Pekar, always worried about making a living, had to make the right noises to ingratiate himself with the Left or he'd become a non-entity, no more Comics Journal interviews, no more Letterman guest spots, no more illustrators willing to work with him. 

Israel: Not for the weak! In fact the rabbi and I talked a bit about this today, he said the one lady who made aliyah just before the election, "has the right attitude" and said so do I. Maybe it's a sort of "survivor" attitude. 

This is great that he thinks this, because he'll be my #1 reference. And that lady doing well will affect me because no doubt she was recommended by him. 

One of the other things mentioned is that I think I'll have something like $1500 a month in Social Security coming in by the time I make aliyah, and that's a lifeline that will make sure I'm always housed at least. And I can play music, buy and sell stuff, all sorts of things. 

This is why I'm back to practicing, too, because that skill is a real lifeline. 

Juicy Thursday

 Ken came by but an hour later than usual, and didn't bring any food so after getting my check and settling in for our BS session I got up and cut up vegetables, thawed some beef, etc and made myself a bowl of beef noodles and ate that. 

I got a bunch of mail too, a thing from Temple Emanu-El detailing my contributions for 2004 (a fair amount, too, since those two plaques had been $750 each), a bank statement, and appeals for money from NPR and "The Democrats" which went into the trash. 

I raved to Ken how glad I was to see it dry outside when I got up yesterday, and was able to send things off, most particularly that big oscilloscope. 

Ken took off around 1, and I'd eaten so that's good, and I just relaxed and eventually went to bed, telling myself I could sleep all I want. 

The end result is I woke up at noon, then went back to bed until about 2:30. It's still raining out there. 

Thinking about things in the news (the University Of Hawaii will no longer use "affirmative action" which in the past was used to keep "haoles" out of things, now the lack of it will be used to keep "haoles" out of things even more restrictively no doubt) I reflected a bit and realized I'm kind of like these folks: https://www.seattletimes.com/entertainment/books/the-forsaken-betrayed-by-two-countries-during-stalins-great-terror/

An excerpt: 

“The Forsaken” tells the unknown story of the thousands of Americans who left the United States to start over in the Soviet Union. It is a wrenching and at times appalling tale of shattered dreams, betrayal, the cruel logic of realpolitik and breathtaking naiveté.

In 1931, the USSR was in the midst of the First Five-Year Plan, Stalin’s audacious attempt to industrialize the country practically overnight. Many Americans migrated to the Soviet Union out of an ideological commitment to socialism; others for more prosaic reasons. Regardless, most were swept away by an euphoric rush — they were to be the builders of a future, more perfect society. Some were so overcome with excitement, they threw their American passports overboard on the sea crossing.

At first it seemed to most that they had been right to leave. The new arrivals were given jobs and housing and accepted by their new homeland. They set up schools, started newspapers and even organized a baseball league with teams like the Gorky City Autoworkers." 

Of course I didn't move anywhere in my early 20s but it's pretty obvious I should have been preparing myself to leave the US. Learning another language and French would have been a good bet, since Israel was really not on the horizon for me in my early 20s. 

It's hard to do the right things though when everyone's telling you the wrong things are the right things. Like the college scam. College isn't a scam in most countries but it really is in the US. Even buying a house is a scam given our wildly gyrating economy, designed to boom and crash so the rich can rake off their take.

Homeless Paraphernalia

"As a former cop I don’t see handing out food or clothing as violating this new city law. But I do see handing out sleeping bags, cookware, or other paraphernalia that is defined in the section might be a violation.

The cleanest way to do it is to have the homeless come to you, such as a soup kitchen or pantry. It may get murky if you go the encampment and pass out food and clothing but I think it’s still fine.

For decades it’s been illegal to possess drug paraphernalia but non-profits have been passing out clean needles"

- u/Forward_Sir_6240 on Reddit

There's a law now in Fremont, California, the city I'm legally a resident of,  against "aiding and abetting" the homeless or some shit. This is being agreed upon that eat-right-there food, and drinks, are OK but not giving them a tent, a sleeping bag, a small cooking stove, canned food that can be stored and eaten later I guess, etc. 

Imagine ending up in jail for possessing and distributing "homeless paraphernalia"! 

When I woke up it was dry, so I packed all the things except one small thing I can't find yet, got them to FedEx and the post office, did a study session at the Baguette, got back here (it was starting to sprinkle by then) got back here and cleaned the place up and got a good practice session in. Yay me. 

 

Another day, more horrors

 If we were only French! When the gov't does crazy things, the French simply call out "To the barricades" and shut the country down. For however long it takes. 

But no, apparently we're Germans, and most of us will happily assist or at least stand by, while a good portion of us are killed off or put into concentration camps, and that's before our leaders get around to declaring war on most of the world, and killing off even more of us. 

And make no mistake, Hitler was far from any kind of patriot. Instead he was a believer in some kind of weird neo-Darwinism and in the end (near the end he wanted Paris burned to the ground, fortunately the general put in charge of this refused to carry out his orders) wanted Germany utterly destroyed because the Germans, whom he professed to care so much about, were "weak". 

We're headed the same way; following Hitler's playbook eerily closely. 

Well, at least I have some regular checks coming soon with my address on them and thus proper to pay one of the libraries with if I do my passport through them, which might be easier than trying the post office. 

And in selling the flutes, I've turned some things I'm not taking to Israel with, into money and money is useful especially in wartime. Officially when one moves to Israel through Nefesh B'Nefesh, one is allowed something like a shipping container of stuff that's shipped for free. Realistically, I assume I'll be able to carry something between a bag in each hand and just the clothes on my back. 

What cracks me up is, having had the poor judgement to actually talk to some street scum, they're overwhelmingly pro-Dump. What makes that hilarious is that, to the Neo-Darwinists, they are "weak" and may be some of the first into the camps. 

Watching everyone - the media most notably - falling into line and taking the crazy rantings of a senile, drugged-up, probably syphilis-riddled, old man is really jarring. If your next door neighbor started ranting about annexing Canada and Greenland, buying "Gaza" (not sure how that would happen) and al the other crazy shit the Dump says, you'd look around nervously and probably call Adult Protective Services. But instead his crazy babbling is being taken completely seriously and being acted on faithfully. 

The most striking example is the draining off of huge water reserves here in California. It would not be hard at all to let out a little water and lie about it but no, utterly faithfully the water was drained off. 

There's a 50% chance of rain today/tonight plus the next two days will be rain days so I was sure to pack all the things that had sold so hopefully anything else that sells won't have to be sent until Friday when the rain's supposed to let up. 

And a cold Monday

 I woke up at 11, and had put a lot of things away when the illegal casino/brothel got firing up for the night and I didn't want any more lights on then necessary. I'd practiced on the cornet also so it was a fairly good night. 

I had my brekkie and packed a few things and got out of here around 2 maybe, maybe closer to 1:30. I went to the bank and deposited the check for the flutes, and ordered some checks because if I get my passport through one of the libraries, they want a normal check not any other payment system and not a "starter" check. So those are about $30, and they told me how I can get them cheaper from Costco or Walmart, but I see that as much more expense and trouble to go through Costco which I'm not a member of. 

That done, and having mailed packages at the post office, I then went to Whole Foods, put $20 on my clipper card, and rode the train to Menlo Park for some business, and after that I checked out the Trader Joe's. And I'm really glad I did, not because the Trader Joe's is anything great, it's not. But because right near it is a used book store and I found the greatest book, "Yiddishkeit" by Harvey Pekar. What a find! I was hoping I'd find something good but wow. 

I was going to get some kind of bao or something from the bakery stall that's usually set up near the train station but they were closing down, but the lady said their home bakery, Little Sky, is open until something like 6 or was it 8? In any case now I know, and I can just go there - I thought the Little Sky place was a restaurant. 

I got back to Whole Foods and had wings and broccoli and a Guinness, and rode back here, stopping at Nijiya for things. It's cold out there! 

Cold Sunday

 I was actually up in time for class, which started at 10. This was not the Intro To Judaism Tuesday night class but a Sunday class run by my rabbi, and this one was about Tu B'Shvat, often called "the birthday of the trees". There are a couple of activities but they're far away etc., so I'm not going to do 'em. 

We talked a lot about trees and plants and fruits and as always it was fun. It turns out there's a big carob tree next to the temple and after class was out I gathered a handful of fresh pods. There were carob trees around town and I knew of some by the old Poor House Bistro, and the Canada geese liked to hang around and eat the pods. But they've been taking them out since they're not native. 

I went to Recycle Books but didn't find anything I wanted, then went to Whole Foods for chicken wings and a Guinness. The usual "Save The Children" or similar scam, scammers weren't set up and it might have been a good day for busking, other than the really cold wind. 

I went over to Target for things, and got things in Cost Plus Imports too, including some Ty-Phoo tea which Ken likes. I now have some expensive, but less expensive from there, "Nuri" sardines to try. 

I went by the Amazon place for bubble mailers, and Nijiya for things. Then I got back here and put things away and packed all the things I could ship, including two flat things to go into one of the drive-through boxes at the post office. That was ... interesting because the one with the larger slot was stuffed full, including with regular letters which should not have even gone in there. I contemplated pulling them out and putting them in one of the boxes with a thinner opening, which my packages fit into just fine and had tons of room. But I decided not to, maybe someone will check it later tonight. 

I found a good bit of packing stuff on the way back, so all in all it was  productive day. It's only in the last week that I've realized I can ship out the big load of shipping that normally goes out on Monday, on Sunday and that even includes small things which if they're small enough can go into a drive-through box at the post office or if a bit bigger, can go FedEx Economy, which is a tiny bit more than the post office and is just FedEx handing the packages off to the post office anyway. 

Saturday night

 Saturday night. I woke up around noon, and the lady who was going to buy my flutes, sure enough, showed up on time which is great. She played them (the two Yamahas sounded much better than the Armstrong but she said the Armstrong had problems which can be fixed) and I got a check for $400. I included the flute books and key oil and various odds and ends like that too. 

I need to order some checks that have my name and address on them because one like that is required for payment if I get my passport through one of the libraries. And I forgot to ask about that at the bank on Friday. So now I have an excuse to visit the bank on Monday and see about that. 

Other than that it was a nice quiet day and I got a decent cornet practice in. 

Friday

 I photo'd a bunch of things before bed last night and did other things like a practice session, and put a lot of things away (but not all of them!) and started a load of laundry. 

The lady buying my flutes is coming over tomorrow, yeah, during Shabbat. Somehow she plays her flute at some of the shabbat services and knows to say "Shabbat shalom" in her email, but wants to come over Saturday afternoon. So I'm going along with it, because I don't need those flutes and ... money's always useful. 

If I were a busker in New Orleans, this being the tourist season, I'd have my blog offering stickers, T-shirts, guitar picks, etc. But I'm not, I'm just in boring ol' San Jose California. 

While sorting through some stuff though, I did find some stickers, some Zionist ones to stick on the folder I keep my Hebrew study stuff in. 

 

A nice rainy "in" day

 Last night I was just about a third of the way in to a good practice session when I heard a car right outside. It was Ken and he was an hour early. 

I'd shipped out everything I could ship, and did a study session at Paris Baguette, and got back here and was going to practice, it being a "loud" activity, then later in the evening do quieter things. But, well, here was Ken. It's a good thing that even when I don't clean the place it's pretty clean. 

I got my check and Ken had a burger for me, and he brought a couple of big plastic tubs of stuff to be sorted through. After we'd eaten, I took all the stuff out of the tubs and said one will be the stuff I'm to handle, sell or throw away or use or whatever, and the other's for him to put the stuff he's keeping. So that's what we did. 

We hung out and talked about stuff as usual, and instead of leaving at about 10 minutes after midnight, he left at about 10 minutes after 11. He doesn't want the check deposited until Friday and I said that's fine with me as tomorrow (today) will be a rain day so I'm not going to the bank until Friday anyway. 

I sorted through the stuff and put the tub, with the things I didn't want, out for the scavengers. And eventually called it a night. 

I slept until 2 in the afternoon today because I told myself I can sleep all I want to. Then I spent hours on end not only eating but also looking around on Reddit and otherwise wasting time online. But I'm so busy all the time, making it to/from the class on Tuesday nights (the class itself is easy, the travel which takes a minimum of 2X the class time, often in awful weather, is the thing) and in general trying to keep the numbers good so Ken gets some income and I don't have to become street homeless. 

This last is why I'm getting back into practicing, even though I can't count on having time to busk until the class is done with, at the end of April. Then it will be the beginning of the warm 6 months of the year and thus, "busking season" anyway. 

In actuality, busking season here is whenever you find it, and being rained on for profit might actually be a really good tactic. But as long as I'm working for Ken, time to explore these things is just about nonexistent. The best I can do (Pawn Stars voice) is to try to get in an hour's practice a day. 

The nonsensicality

 Here it is Wednesday, clear and cold. Today will be an "out" day where I go out to mail things. Tomorrow's supposed to be rained out again, so it will be an "in" day. 

I've been thinking for a while about the nonsensicality of a Jew moving to Hawaii. Hawaii, along with the mainland US, is one of the great colonialist experiments of the world. Jews in Israel predate the Arab colonialists of the Middle East by the odd thousand years or two. But Hawaii, and the US mainland, were unapologetically colonized, with the native populations if not completely wipes out, at least trimmed back by 90% or more. 

Somehow this is OK. With the caveat that in Hawaii, it's OK if the colonists are Asian, not-OK if they're white or perceived to be white. I even saw, on Reddit a day or two ago, the sentiment that "No white person should live in Hawaii". But no one's saying "No white person should live on the US mainland" and there's a really good chance the person who said that is Asian. 

I put in the required(?) hour searching ways to get a passport (I'm becoming a lot less mystified as to why so few Americans have them) and it looks like I can do it through one of the somewhat county libraries. The post offices are all booked up (I haven't gotten as far as trying to book an appointment with one of the libraries, enough despair and horror for one day) and maybe less people are thinking of going to a library. 

Rainy Tuesday

 Another day, more craziness. I was able to mail things off yesterday because the rain was skating by to the North of me, and today it's raining here but thanks to NWS radar maps, I can time things to travel between bands of rain. 

I got a good cornet practice in yesterday and played a bunch of stuff and now my "El Condor Pasa" is solid as well as my "Shalom Aleichem". My new Getzen cornet can really sing. I need to practice some with the Connstellation which is what I'd take with me out busking if I had to right away, and also play the Yamaha trumpet a bit just to verify that it doesn't have the sound either of the cornets do, and prepare to sell it. I want to get over to "Hornucopia" and hopefully find another cornet that's the shepherd's crook style and thus short enough to hide in a bike bag or messenger bag, to be my main horn for busking. And then probably sell the Connstellation because it's old and heavy. It's got a nice big sound though.

I did other little things too like consolidate my concert flute stuff together for the flute lady, who's coming over next weekend to buy the flutes. The concert flutes anyway. 

My country right now has a foreign born illegal immigrant with a hard Nazi ideology in control of the purse strings. fElon Musk is some kind of "Special Government Employee" this is the US's Rasputin moment. 

My next step in the passport process is to try to get an appointment at one of the local post offices. Nearly impossible it seems. I could try for a walk-in appointment, which might involve a number of times going to one of the post offices before 9AM and probably waiting in a line like people used to do for concert tickets. As of right now it's OK if it takes me a year to get a passport, but that time may shorten depending on how crazy things get here and I'll be SOL if the borders are shut down. 

I went out into the rain at about 4:30 and got good and wet, rode the green line light rail to the Winchester station then went into the Safeway near there to get some jerky and stuff, and was quickly reminded why I loathe Safeway. The bathroom was 'way in the back and both bathrooms had, apparently, someone camping in there for the night. Fine, I'll hold it. In fact, like all Safeways seem to be these days, it was a magnet for bums and there were bums all over the place, some screaming and cussing, some just staggering around, etc. I gladly overpaid for my snacks at the little liquor store in the same parking lot. 

At least I had a nice new set of bike bags to put my snacks in because I'd put the new set on the bike before leaving the shop. They're nice. 

I rode down to the JCC and was there about a half-hour early so, not enough time to study, more like time to spread things out to dry and to eat one of my noisier snacks, a small bag of Funyuns. 

Class went well as always, and now I'm glad the audio files helped me at my sticking point on page 34 in the Hebrew work book, because the homework is ... pages 38 and the first few things in page 39?? I thought I was actually far ahead and apparently not. We're working on Hebrew numbers now. 

The non-Hebrew part of the class was interesting, the nature of God, the problem of evil existing in the world, etc. 

After class it had stopped raining but had gotten really cold. That, I can deal with. I rode back to the train station, got on the train, and I rode to Metro/Airport and over to the casino, where I got these "steak bite" things that are really good, and a Guinness. Surprisingly I didn't get a buzz from the Guinness, which isn't really what I wanted one for, I just craved the taste. It was just something nice to drink with dinner. 

Now I'm back in the shop and it's not even midnight yet. 

Monday - I have a theory

 Theory: Cultures, not race, not genetics, etc., are what makes humans, human. And cultures, like coral reef ecosystems, take a ton of time to build, and can be destroyed within unsettlingly short periods of time. 

Somehow Judaism is a difficult-to-kill culture, and I'm also going to say Chinese culture is like this also. The rest of the world won't forgive Jews for having a resilient culture, and likewise the Chinese, whom some wags have called "The Jews of Asia" are also not forgiven. We had the Chinese Exclusion Act in the US, there's all the tons of anti-Asian sentiment and violence in the US where with few exceptions Asians are "Chinese". 

It's why I was puzzled when I saw, on r/collapse, an article about the "Biggest and oldest economy in flames" I thought, Wait, what? What's going on with China? But the author, being American, was talking about the US, of course. 

And for cultures being able to, in many cases, be destroyed surprisingly quickly, I've been thinking about Colin Turnbull's book "The Mountain People" which was about the Iks, a people who had a developed, working, culture then were uprooted and became hyper-individualists. Even a bit more so than Americans which is really amazing. 

So now we're undergoing a coup. We're to live under a sort of techno-Hitlerism apparently. There are protests planned for Wednesday and I'm not sure if I'll go. It will be predominantly people on the Left protesting and there will be at least a few "Palestinian" flags in other words, people saying they want me dead. So I might make a productive day of it and stay home. 

Black Lives Matter went like this. I think we can all agree that no one should die for selling loose cigarettes. Or "passing" a funny $20 they may not have known was funny (I ended up with a funny $5 from busking once, and the lady in Dai Thanh market just said she'd not take that one, and I crumpled it up and left it in the gutter). Or for walking past an empty half-constructed house that may have been a hangout for a few people to smoke and BS. Or any of a number of things.

But it left me cold when BLM turned into, essentially, a cash cow so its leader could buy herself *another* big house, and Blacks kept attacking Asians, who, as a group, had supported BLM and been there at protests, donated, etc. 

This is all reminding me of Hawaii where each racial tribe looks out for its own except for the haoles, who, hyper-individualistic and armed with a culture that essentially suicidal, are puzzled and defeated by it all. 

Is this how empires die? Where you have, instead of The Romans or The Americans or The French, we end up with a zillion little interest groups each looking out for itself? Then it comes down to numbers and power, and in this whites have the real advantage in the US. They've got the guns, but also they've got the culture that glorifies using them. They pretty much have the monopoly on violence. 

Having almost no culture of their own, whites are tending to fall back on things like "Viking" culture, weird beliefs harking back, or trying to, old pre-Christian European beliefs, and like the Nazism 1.0 of the recent past, glorifying violence. So we're in for a bumpy time. 

The problem is that under capitalism, whites are not going to be allowed a real culture, one that say you MUST take a couple of weeks off to do this or that, one that say you MUST care for others at least fellow whites, one that says children must not go hungry etc. So even under some sort of State religion like "Identity Christianity" or "Norseism" or something, it will be just like now, where the average person is born to just work until they can't any more and ideally die at their work bench. 

This is what places like China and Israel have resisted to an amazing extent compared to the US. There are holidays you take and that's that. You care for family - and this means extended, not just nuclear family - and that's that. There are cultural mechanisms for taking care of the poor and the number of homeless in China and Israel is very low compared to the US. It's what got me into watching Cory Gil-Shuster's videos and those of "Relaxing Walker" - the lack of poverty and trash can diggers and blanket-clad shuffling zombies on the streets of Israel. 

So these white supremacists are going to try to make some kind of White Homeland out of the US and it's not going to be better than now, it's going to be a lot worse. 

I was going to list things yesterday but I realized I could get a ton of shipping out and it was actually dry so I did that. I finished off the night by taking apart a big ugly thing that it's good to get out of the shop, yielding surprisingly few parts to sell but at least it's outta here. 

Sunday

 A dark and rainy-looking Sunday too, but I looked at the National Weather Service (I really hope we don't lose that!) and it's just gonna be dark and that's it. 

I looked up what I need to get my passport and it's fairly normal stuff.  I need to make an appointment at a post office and I need to Xerox some things, and have a packet of papers for the appointment. Too bad my old passport is so old, I'll be applying for a brand new one as far as the system is concerned, but I'm gonna Xerox it too, just to include it. 

The whole process might take months, but as my plans are now,  I have plenty of time. Naturally I want my papers in order as soon as possible, but without plane tickets and a travel itinerary I have no reason to get an expedited passport. 

I caught up on my Torah reading last night, and on Friday I'd gone into the audio files and gotten straightened out on the pronunciation of some words that was stumping me, on page 34 in the Hebrew work book. Whew!  And, I found I could pick out the name of Pharoah in my chumash; it's actually "Pear'oh" in Hebrew. 

Oh, and I did a good cornet practice! I can play "El Condor Pasa" now, from the Simon & Garfunkel version. I heard tons of Simon & Garfunkel growing up, as they were one of the many groups that my father bought records by, ostensibly for my older sister but in reality for himself - and played them a ton. Dad being a WASP was a real deadbeat and not suited to raising children, but through the accident of his loving music and we kids being in the house and thus exposed to it, and my eyes being messed up so I paid extra attention to the music, I'm the musical one now. 

I really had plans of retiring in New Orleans, having one streetcar route to take me most everywhere I'd need to go from the VA to the Social Security office to place I'd shop or busk. But after looking into it more deeply, the crime rate alone is enough to avoid the place. Add in the racial divide (although as a pale-ish person I'd probably come off as "French" at worse and thus come out OK there) and the far-right politics and it's a big No, thanks. Now add in hurricanes. It's only a matter of time before there's another Katrina. 

I packed All The Things(tm) putting everything in boxes to go by FedEx or FedEx Ground Saver which where for a little more money than the post office would charge, they send it through the post office. I did this because this way the things could go out today. And 3-4 things went into bubble mailers that I was able to mail at the post office by putting them into the one box with the larger slot, in the drive-through. 

I did a study session at Paris Baguette, found some shipping stuff on the way home, got here and offloaded the stuff and the trailer, and headed right back out. I was almost out of Simple Green and Windex, and got a gallon of each at Lowe's. Then I went to Ross and really lucked out. I found a pair of sweat pants that aren't the ne plus ultra but are pretty decent and good for this cold weather. And a T-shirt, and an amazing find, a pair of Crocs "Bistro" shoes in my size. Those were $30 and they're usually $60+ and that's if you can find them. These are a find because they're great shoes for everyday schlogging around and if they get wet, no problem. 

I got back here and put things away and made an interesting and delicious gluten, egg, and mushroom soup. Yum!