Chapter 118: COVID Chronicles

By Karen

Day 155

Tony’s Fundraising Update & Biden Picks a Mate

As of this minute, Tony is ON the 2021 RAL Calendar but in 12th place, and $20 short of 11th place. This contest has become as nerve-wracking as the Kentucky Derby in the stretch. A lot can happen in the final nine days.

Yesterday, one Cats Working reader’s donation qualified for the match, and that helped loads, so THANK YOU to her and everyone who has supported our Tony. Donations are accepted until August 22.

I hate to be a noodge, but Tony’s got a real shot at this. I know I’m biased, but of the top 12, I think Tony’s a standout in name and looks, and his calendar page (should he get one) will be stunning…

I tried to get a nice headshot of Roc this morning, and this is how he cooperated…

Now, on to politics. I hope every treacherous fat cat who got a job from Trump enjoys his last five months at the taxpayers’ trough, because once Biden and Harris take over in January, the heads start rolling in Washington.

I initially wanted Kamala Harris for attorney general so she’d have the satisfaction of prosecuting the entire Trump administration. But then Washington Post columnist Jennifer Rubin reminded me of Sally Yates, and she’d be just as ruthless as AG because of all the shit Trump and his GOP clown squad in Congress have put her through, so there’s that.

Now I’m thrilled Kamala has the opportunity to redirect her aggression toward Biden’s foes as viciously as she attacked Biden himself in the primary debates.

Comedian Lauren Mayer’s singing may not be Broadway (or even off-off-Broadway) caliber, but you’ve got to give her credit for lightning speed in composing lyrics to extol our future vice president…

Trump did himself no favors yesterday by holding a press conference where he delivered the same litany of lies and boasts and called COVID deaths “fatilities” — TWICE. Someone has figured out that his team isn’t even bothering to write him new material every day, because he always reads it as if he’s never seen it before…

President Trump seems to be repeating the same talking points at his coronavirus briefings over multiple days. pic.twitter.com/xxjh3SNIpi

— New Day (@NewDay) August 13, 2020

I wonder if Kamala will goad Trump into dumping Pence for former South Carolina governor Nikki Haley. There’s nothing Tump would like better than to watch two women mud-wrestle over him in the VP debate on October 7.

If Trump does shed Pence, I hope he saves the news as his nomination acceptance speech’s big reveal on August 27 so cameras can catch Pence’s adoring gaze melt into excruciating pain as Nikki Haley plants a stiletto on his instep clamoring for Pence’s place beside Trump.

It’s a relief to know who our weapons are, so now Democrats across the country can fully focus on crushing what’s left of Trump.

BONUS: Since Trump is toying with delivering his acceptance speech at Gettysburg because he’s developed this delusion of being greater than Abraham Lincoln, comedian JL Cauvin delivers the Gettysburg Address, Trump-style…

Chapter 117: COVID Chronicles

By Karen

Day 152

Tony Has a Couch Breakthrough & “Resign or Hang” Has a Nice Ring

Max lies forlornly on the end table whenever he doesn’t feel the couch is safe, so I made him a special “spot” there. Now it’s his favorite spot…

I probably should move that figurine which looks like Adele. The kitty fountain is right below it, and Max looks like he could be plotting a drowning.

CATS WORKING SCOOP: While I was doing my daily 7,500 steps, for the first time EVER, Tony took my spot on the couch…

He jumped down soon after this pic when he realized he’d been seen…

NOW, TO INTERNATIONAL NEWS: Lebanon’s government and Hezbollah apparently ignored a massive 6-year-old stockpile of explosives sitting at Beirut’s port until it detonated last week, blowing a huge hole in the capital city that killed 160 (so far), wounded 6,000+ and left hundreds of thousands homeless.

The understandably furious people are protesting to force out the entire government, rallying around the theme, “Resign of Hang.”

This is suffering on an epic scale, made even more tragic because it wasn’t caused by war, but probably self-inflicted through government corruption or ineptitude.

The Washington Post talked to people there. See if anything they say rings familiar…

“These thugs in power don’t represent us.”

“They stole from us, they looted us, they made us go hungry, they made us poor.”

“They are stealing everyone’s money, stealing people’s rights.”

“We lost everything, so hope is all we have left.”

A member of Lebanon’s Parliament who just resigned, Paula Yacoubian, said, “I cannot stay within the mafia. They stole everything, they destroyed the country and they want to continue doing business as usual.”

Here in the U.S., Trump’s stupidity and pathological sadism has sickened more than 5.1 million Americans and killed 165,000 (so far). Also, nearly 18 million people have lost their jobs and mass evictions are about to start because Congress can’t get its shit together to deliver more aid.

As of that weren’t enough, after decimating most government agencies using hand-picked toadies, Trump’s now trying to dismantle the U.S. Postal Service in a last-ditch effort to sabotage mail-in voting and stay in power, ending mail delivery as we know it.

And he wants to abolish the payroll tax, which does NOTHING to help the unemployed. No paycheck, no payroll tax deducted. But it will soon leave seniors with no income and no health care, because Social Security and Medicare are funded through payroll taxes.

Instead of squabbling over the irrelevant Confederacy, I’d like to see American protesters put their muscle behind “Resign or Hang” rallies around the White House, Capitol, and anywhere else congressional vermin burrow. There shouldn’t be a fence or wall high enough — anywhere in the country — for Trump and his enablers to hide behind. They need to see that consequences as direct and personally devastating as the physical harm they’re inflicting in some way on every American will be their fate if they don’t stop sabotaging the county or, even better, resign NOW.

Lebanon’s got it right. When your government is crawling with murderous thugs who are literally blowing up the country and its people, the punishment should fit the crime.

Chapter 116: COVID Chronicles

By Karen

Day 148

Tony Becomes Couch-Curious & Dreaming of a Trump–Lisbeth Salander Matchup

Tony’s over the moon that his post has raised $250 (Thank you!) in the Richmond Animal League’s 2021 Calendar Contest to help once-homeless dogs and kitties like Max, Roc and Tony get medical care and a second chance at life.

Tony hopes to be a top-12 fundraiser and get his name and face on a calendar page as a tribute to Anthony Bourdain. If you can help him by August 22 with a donation of any size, please do.

In the meantime, I think I need a bigger couch. Lately, Tony’s been angling for a spot, but Roc and Max aren’t giving an inch. This morning, Max wasn’t even in “the” coveted purple spot when Tony tested the water…

Now, to literature: When my friend Shelley told me about the Swedish crime novel, The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson, it didn’t sound like my kind of thing. But I read it and Lisbeth Salander, the “Girl,” has earned her place beside Jane Eyre, Jo March, Scarlett O’Hara and any other steely heroine you can name.

Larsson intended a 10-book “Millennium series,” but had only finished three, not yet published, when he died unexpectedly in 2004.

Films were made in Sweden of all three books, starring Noomi Rapace as Lisbeth…

What happened with the series after Larsson’s death between his long-time partner Eva Gabrielsson and his executors is an unfinished story in itself, which you can read about in the link above.

I thought no actress could compete with Noomi Rapace until an American Dragon Tattoo came out starring Rooney Mara…

Several years later, Americans filmed the third book, The Girl in the Spider’s Web, with Claire Foy, the softest incarnation of Lisbeth…

But back to the books. After Larsson’s nearly complete fourth novel and notes for others got tied up in squabbling, his publisher hired Swedish author and crime journalist David Lagercrantz to continue the series. He wrote three more and now says he’s finished. I’m reading his last book, The Girl Who Lived Twice, and it’s a shame because he has stayed true to the characters and added some great twists.

In the past week, I’ve also rewatched movies starring all three actresses. I’ve chosen Noomi Rapace’s Lisbeth as best to deal with Trump.

A bit of backstory: Larsson’s original title, which was oddly translated to The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, was Män som Hatar Kvinnor (Men Who Hate Women). Being abused and tortured by misogynists all her life is what turns Lisbeth Salander into literature’s ultimate avenging badass.

My Salander-Trump match-up fantasy is a situation from the first book. Picture this:

Trump has been put in charge of Salander’s personal finances (that’s all you need to know). Before she can get an advance on her “allowance,” he forces her to give him a blowjob in his office. The next time she needs money, he invites her to his apartment. She expects more oral stuff, but he ties her up and violently rapes her.

Can you picture Trump doing that to a woman? Sure you can.

When she comes back AGAIN, he thinks she’s into him. Instead, she tasers him, strips him, trusses him up like a steer, and forces him to watch a secret video she filmed from her purse while he was attacking her. She threatens to use it to ruin him if he ever crosses her path again.

As a final touch, she tattoos, “I’M A SADIST PIG AND A RAPIST” in big, bloody, sloppy letters all over his chest.

Now that I think of it, this is probably something like Trump fears Putin will do to him if he ever makes a peep against Russia.

Lisbeth Salander, I wish you were real.

BONUS: When Trump called Yosemite National Park “Yo-Semite” and “Yo-Semin-ite”…

My sister Keri and her actor friend Dan Ruth made this parody, which Keri hopes will go viral…

DOUBLE BONUS: I just loved this scene of Hitler bemoaning Trump’s miserable crowd failure in Tulsa…

Chapter 114: COVID Chronicles

By Karen

Day 141

Baking Bread & Trump’s Headed For a Fall

Before I get started, Tony sends his regards, relaxing by his favorite mess…

BTW, it’s day 13 and still no sign of the rubber band.

Now, to the kitchen: I don’t care much for the bread my borrowed bread machine puts out, which my parents LOVE, so I made Jacques Pépin’s quick and easy-peasy Soda Bread the other day. I know I made it once before and liked it.

The book it’s from, Essential Pépin, also has a PBS TV series I’m slowly working through. Writing this, I just discovered he makes this bread in episode 17, so I must jump ahead to see that. These are the only ingredients it requires…

You spend no time letting the dough rise because it’s never dough, but a pile of goo…

I think my first mistake was not mixing the milk into the dry ingredients fast enough, and probably stirring it too much.

I lowered the oven rack to accommodate the stainless steel bowl you put over the bread for the first 30 minutes of baking. The bread steams rather than rises because there’s no yeast in it. Warning: Removing the bowl releases steam that can easily scald you. Trust me. Here’s how the bread looked after the bowl came off…

The lowered oven rack was too hot to move, so I think the bread was too close to the heat and the bottom almost burned. I was also worried the parchment paper it was on would catch fire because it got crispy, too. The finished loaf looks decent enough…

It didn’t rise much, and I could have used a chainsaw to cut it, but once I did manage to break some off, it tasted good with butter.

My third mistake was putting the loaf in the fridge because I couldn’t really slice it thin for freezing. Now it’s like a paving stone. Tonight I may try to whack some off, soak it in egg, and make French toast. I think that’s my only hope to salvage it.

Meanwhile, COVID creeps ever closer to Trump. Dipshit Texas Congressman Louis Gohmert has it now, blames it on wearing a mask, and will treat himself with hydroxychloroquine. I wish he’d asked his witch-doctor for a Clorox enema.

Every time Trump wears a face mask, which must be disorienting, Trump flirts with face-planting on camera. He was in North Carolina the other day and fell backward (splayed hands to steady), then lurched into a jerky little bow before he could settle into his knuckle-dragging ape stance to balance…

Trump had trouble w/balance & walking in North Carolina yesterday. It’s part of his frontotemporal dementia decline. He lurches forward & backward before getting into his comfortable dementia leaning stance. It looks involuntary as he probably felt himself falling & jerked back pic.twitter.com/ro8DZGnnya

— Tom Joseph (@TomJChicago) July 28, 2020

When Trump inevitably does fall, he’ll blame the mask. Ninety-six more days before we vote and send that monster to hell, where he belongs.

THIS JUST IN: No sooner had I pressed “Publish” on this post than I came across the news that Trump’s BFF Herman Cain has died of COVID, after a month in the hospital, after have the last time of his life at Trump Tulsa rally. Wonder if Trump will skip Cain’s funeral the way he dissed Rep. John Lewis this week?

Chapter 113: COVID Chronicles

By Karen

Day 138

Cats are BAACCKK! & More TV Time

The humidity is still terrible in Richmond. I’ve lost count of how many weeks straight it’s been feeling over 100^o with only occasional violent thunderstorms. No end in sight.

Confederate statues continue to disappear. One night last week they spirited away a bunch of busts and figures from the state Capitol (including a Robert E. Lee), while a court battle still rages over the the huge Lee statue on horseback standing on Monument Avenue.

Virginia has yet another Lee statue at the Washington, D.C., Capitol and wants to remove it but hasn’t decided what to replace it with.

In the meantime, our only daily newspaper, the Richmond Times-Dispatch, must delight in having Civil War “news” for the front page every day.

Tony Rubberband Update: It’s been 10 days since I think Tony swallowed the rubberband and so far we have had no “outcome.” I wonder if having that much indigestible elastic in his tummy will work like stomach stapling to lower his capacity and he’ll lose some weight. So far he seems fine. He got right up in my face to say “Hi”…

Max and Roc have finally reached an amicable sharing arrangement on the couch, and mostly take orderly turns. Max even returned to the rocker for a spell…

And Roc, lying in the path of a fan as always, says “Howdy!”…

Movie Recommendation: I don’t know what made me DVR it, but I caught this absolute confection of a movie last week from 2008 called Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day, a light, lavish 1930s-style Art Deco screwball comedy, complete with Cole Porter music.

To top it off, the cast included a few actors I love, like Stephanie Cole (Waiting for God, Doc Martin) and Tom Payne of Prodigal Son on Fox.

Prodigal Son is in the second half of its first season, and I’d liken it to a less gory Dexter. Payne plays Malcolm Bright, the son of a serial killer known as “The Surgeon,” a real-life surgeon with a family who committed at least 23 murders on the side. Payne grew up unwittingly learning the ropes from his father and now works as a profiler with the NYPD.

The show would be your typical murder of the week police procedural except that Malcolm has mysteries from his past to unravel. While trying to do that and solve crimes, Malcolm often has to consult with his father, who’s now in prison, crazy-brilliant and still homicidal.

Michael Sheen (Masters of Sex) plays The Surgeon. In the few scenes he gets, he always steals the show and keeps drawing the other characters to him like an evil magnetic force. Anyway, I love it.

BONUS: Randy Rainbow raided West Side Story to compose “Gee, Anthony Fauci!”…

DOUBLE BONUS: Trump’s in his last 99 days of playing a tyrant, and comedian Sarah Cooper shows how he mastered “person, woman, man, camera TV”…

PS: As Mary Trump’s been making the talk show rounds to promote her book, Too Much and Never Enough, I’d like just one journalist to ask her why she thinks Trump became a Republican to run for president. I feel sure the answer would be a real sock in the jaw to his supporters.

PPS: I’m now on a twice-weekly schedule, planning posts for Mondays and Thursdays.

Chapter 111: COVID Chronicles

By Karen

Day 128

Cats Having a Heat Wave & Trump’s Probably Having a Hissy

Richmond’s seven-day forecast is 90^os every day and, thanks to humidity, feeling like 102-108^o. Afternoon thunderstorms will keep that steam rising.

Despite being indoors with air conditioning and fans, we’re all feeling lethargic. Last night Max neatly pushed aside the fleece blanket on his bed in the Man Cave to sleep on acrylic, which must feel cooler…

BACKSTORY: I knitted that little blanket at least 50 years ago for my first guinea pig, Guinevere. I had just learned how to purl and did a basket weave pattern. The fringe was also a new skill. The yarn is indestructible and you can see it’s still in pristine condition.

Here’s Roc just now, lying on the floor behind me, directly in the path of the fan…

I caught Tony last night in his usual routine, sacked out for a few hours after dinner to get his second wind. He’ll hate me posting this because he says it makes him look like he’s fat and has big feet…

Well, he’s not fat.

Rachel Maddow has been on vacation all week. When I saw that Mary Trump was on her show last night, I feared the second-stringer would get the interview, but Rachel hopped back in the saddle.

They’re probably repainting walls in the White House today from Trump banging his tiny burger-greased fists all over them.

Watch how Rachel so carefully leads Mary to state she heard Trump say the N-word and anti-Semitic slurs, like the rest of his family…

This should be a big deal because no journalist has found such a credible witness to confirm this before. The White House responded to Rachel’s request for comment by calling “the book” a bunch of lies. But Rachel says that claim isn’t in the book. (I’m still reading it.)

But let’s face it. In the epic saga of Trump’s corruption and crime, we know he’s a racist, and that he calls people foul names is the least of it. In every book I’ve read about Trump’s reign, his normal conversation has F-bombs in every sentence. It’s a wonder he cleans it up as much as he does in public, given the growing holes in his brain.

What we should be terrified about is that Mary confirms that Trump not only doesn’t care how many Americans and immigrants his policies (or lack of) kill. He enjoys it. The more people he destroys, the more he gets off on it. He’s a sadist.

Yet, we’re supposed to wait until November to destroy him unless his own health takes him down first. There’s not one soul in our government with the guts to initiate Trump’s immediate removal, indictment and imprisonment, despite having an avalanche of charges to be brought against him.

Oops, a thunderstorm is rolling in. Got to wrap this up quick.

Chapter 109: COVID Chronicles

By Karen

Day 126

Trump Threatens Suburb Extinction & Tries to Unplug the CDC

On lunch breaks, I check what’s going on with Twitter. Today, “Abolish Suburbs” was trending (for non-Twits, that means “very popular, lots of tweets”). Since I live in a ‘burb, I had to know why. Here it is…

Joe Biden and the Radical Left want to Abolish Police, Abolish ICE, Abolish Bail, Abolish Suburbs, Abolish the 2nd Amendment – and Abolish the American Way of Life. No one will be SAFE in Joe Biden’s America!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 15, 2020

It’s past time someone confiscated Trump’s phone. His tweets win over no one who isn’t already brainwashed. Instead, he shows us how an already-deranged person behaves when dementia sets in.

Meanwhile, Oklahoma’s governor tested positive. He was at Trump’s Tulsa rally, but doesn’t think that was it. Oklahoma has been breaking its daily records for new cases since then, so he could have caught it anywhere.

It’s also increasing in Virginia. Roughly half of new cases are on the coast, where people have been merrily romping at Virginia Beach.

But back to Trump. Yesterday afternoon, reporters roasted in the Rose Garden for a “press conference” I didn’t watch. It was supposedly about China (why?), but was actually a scripted anti-Biden rant.

Every time Trump opens his mouth, he blurts panic. His poll numbers are tanking everywhere — even Texas — and prison looms.

In addition to abolishing suburbs, Trump also says Biden will eliminate windows.

I’m not going to decipher this nonsense; here’s a good article debunking the bullshit.

The most important thing, which Trump apparently omitted, and which should scare the living shit out of everybody, is that Trump is trying to unplug the CDC from COVID. He’s ordered hospitals to report their case stats not to the CDC, but to some database he’s cooking up. Probably an Excel spreadsheet Jared created.

Trump has already muzzled Dr. Fauci. They don’t speak anymore and Fauci is forbidden to appear on national TV. Instead, Fauci does interviews with entities like Stanford University, which then allow the media to rebroadcast them.

As if anyone sane still needs it, Trump proves every day that he doesn’t care how many Americans this pandemic kills.

Mary Trump’s book describes Trump’s parents as self-absorbed in different ways. They wouldn’t bother to acknowledge their kids’ feelings. This led twisted little Donald to create a persona of not having feelings. It’s become a core inability to empathize or care about others’ suffering.

Now that Trump’s losing what little ability he ever had to reason, he doesn’t care that his current behavior kills the voters he needs to stay out of prison until 2024. Every action is motivated by greed, revenge or self-preservation, no matter how many deaths he causes.

I’m reading about John Adams’ fight to free America from British rule, which ironically seemed sane and benign compared to Trump’s dystopian hellscape of a government.

It’s depressing to know that what was once considered the greatest democracy on Earth granted this ignorant, corrupt inhuman creature the power to literally destroy the entire country, economically and physically.

The other two-thirds of our government, supposedly in place to counteract a murderous despot, do nothing and leave it up to us to overcome all Trump’s schemes to cheat again and take him out in November.

I’ll admit, my heart rejoices every time I see a GOP voter or politician test positive. I wish the worst for all of them. They have to go, or be deprogrammed to rejoin decent society, before we’ll be able to scrub away the orange stain of Trump from the U.S.

Chapter 107: COVID Chronicles

By Karen

Day 124

Max, My Guinea Pig & Trump v. John Adams

He keeps topping himself, but in Trump’s most ridiculous assertion to date, he predicts that all media (social, print and TV) will wither and die under Joe Biden because Biden would get “low ratings.”

After three+ years of whining and screaming about wanting “the enemy of the people,” The New York Times, The Washington Post and CNN, out of business, Trump in his dementia has the nerve to claim credit for their markets. Like we all want All-Trump-24/7. The narcissism and madness have reached another galaxy.

Trump played golf this past weekend and had a big white van parked near the course to block photographers’ view. But someone managed to capture this priceless little clip of Lard-Ass’s steadily advancing meltdown. Watch his left leg as he walks away (hope this works, I just figured out how to embed tweets)…

OMG!!! WATCH!!
What is wrong with Trump?? pic.twitter.com/SL8JBcv28g

— Mystery Solvent (@MysterySolvent) July 12, 2020

There’s NO WAY to rationalize that leg splay as anything but involuntary lack of muscle control (or a twisted diaper). Now, if only COVID would catch up with him. Even #MoscowMitch McConnell is getting cold feet about breathing COVID fumes in Jacksonville during the GOP convention, with Florida smashing through all records for new daily COVID cases, surpassing 15,000 on July 12.

NOW, TO THE CAT BEAT: Yesterday I washed the purple blankie that has been Max and Roc’s battleground at the end of the couch. To figure out what Max is really fixated on — the couch or the blankie — I switched it with the pink blankie from the rocker. Max has never had a problem with it. In fact, it was his favorite spot last Christmas…

My hypothesis: Max would either prove that what covers the couch is irrelevant and it’s a turf war, or he’d go to the rocker because his real love is the purple blankie.

So, I invited Max to sit beside me on the couch. When he noticed that his end looked different, he not only refused to touch the pink blanket, but seemed a bit agitated. After I swapped things back, Max went right over to his spot and plopped down.

Bottom line: It’s the couch AND the purple blankie.

ANOTHER SCIENTIFIC BREAKTHROUGH: I’ve discovered how not to have Trump be my last thought at night (leading to nightmares), or my first shriek of despair in the morning.

While I was watching the musical 1776 last week, I had an urge to learn everything about John Adams. We were born roughly 42 miles apart in Massachusetts, so he’s my people. I ordered a used but pristine copy of David McCullough’s mammoth Pulitzer Prize-winning biography, John Adams, for $7, including shipping.

Last night I started reading it before bed, and I’m already hooked. Adams was only about 5’7” or 8” and many found him mouthy and obnoxious. He was considered a conservative, but had many liberal positions like anti-slavery. As a person, he was virtually Trump’s opposite. For example, only one wife, Abigail, and their voluminous correspondence is hard evidence that they had a strong, loving 54-year marriage.

Anyway, I went to sleep trying to picture the Adams farm in Braintree, and woke up still thinking about Adams.

Just as in 2001, after I heard George W. Bush refer to the 9/11 terrorists “the folks who did this” and immediately drove to Charlottesville to visit Monticello and be near  Thomas Jefferson, I think Adams will take the edge off Trump through the election.

Well, after I hit “Pause” tomorrow to read Mary Trump’s damning book about Uncle Donald, Too Much and Never Enough.

 

Chapter 106: COVID Chronicles

By Karen

Day 123

Trump Finally Masks Up & Natalie Wood Still Haunts Us

Today marks exactly four months I’ve been cooped up. Last night I got another haul of Chinese takeout to put off going to the grocery store a few more days. I feel safer spending a few minutes at China Taste’s plexiglass window than wandering through a whole Aldi or Food Lion, possibly among mask-free Trumpers.

Virginia just hit 70,000 cases, with daily figures increasing from roughly 600 to 900. The foolhardy reopening, against Governor Northam’s medical training and common sense, seems to be catching up with us.

Meanwhile, Trump returned to Walter Reed to visit wounded troops — the ones who cheated Trump’s buddy Putin of the opportunity to pay a bounty on their corpses — and Trump wore a mask…

During his chopper talk before leaving the White House, Trump said he thinks it’s customary to wear masks in hospitals (DUH, ya THINK?) and that he’s “never” been against wearing masks.

His lies just keep spewing like a firehose.

Meanwhile, his little buddy Roger Stone minces off with a nice commutation from 40 months in the slammer for seven felonies, just in time for Stone to commit more helping Trump cheat to a second term.

On the home front, this morning I washed a big load of cat blankies, including the purple one at the center of Roc and Max’s struggle over the couch. I’m wondering if it’s the location or the blankie that’s drawing Max, and plan an experiment tonight if he comes downstairs.

Right after I used a pet glove to clean fur off the couch cover, Roc had to claim the sunny spot. Tony prefers to bask upright. He looks so big!…

But as soon as Tony noticed me taking his picture, he came at me like a celebrity flushing paparazzi out of the bushes…

I have almost enough to build a kitten from what came off the blankies in the dryer, but at least it’s not fur stuck all over the house…

Speaking of celebrities, last night I watched the new HBO documentary, Natalie Wood: What Remains Behind. Her daughter, Natasha Gregson Wagner, who was 11 when Natalie died, provides much of the commentary. In one creepy scene, she sits opposite Robert Wagner, now 90, as he retells what happened that night on the boat.

Natasha believes he’s blameless, but he didn’t look at all like he was telling the whole truth.

According to him, it was just another night at anchor near Catalina. Natalie was down in their cabin getting ready for bed, and when he went down later, she’d left the boat for no reason whatsoever.

Actor Christopher Walken was also on board. He’d done Brainstorm with Natalie, and its director declared they couldn’t have been having an affair because they had zero chemistry during filming. I have no opinion on that.

I’m also not saying that I think either man pushed Natalie overboard. But I do believe things turned nasty, most likely a fight between Natalie and Wagner over something. Both men know exactly why Natalie left the boat. They were probably relieved to have her go sit in the dinghy to cool down and never dreamed she’d do anything life-threatening.

If Wagner dies first, I hope Walken finally comes clean. For now, they’re sticking to their pact of mutual silence to protect somebody.

Chapter 103: COVID Chronicles

By Karen

Day 120

Waxing Poetic & Pissed at SCOTUS

Once upon a time, I was an English major. But one of my least favorite things about it was analyzing poetry. I remember slamming into the wall on this little gem by e e cummings in both high school and college. Perhaps you’ve seen it…

The Red Wheelbarrow

so much depends
upon

a red wheel
barrow

glazed with rain
water

beside the white
chickens

PoetryFoundation.com describes the high school experience perfectly. I’d want to strangle every teacher who taught this one and asked, “But WHAT depends so much on the red wheelbarrow?”

NOTHING! Can’t you recognize gibberish, you fool? The guy doesn’t even know how to capitalize or punctuate!

Now another pesky poem from my past that used to make my eyes roll back in my head, by William Butler Yeats, keeps popping up in the media.  You’ll understand why if you read it with Trump in mind. It makes terrifying sense…

The Second Coming

Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.

Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out
When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi
Troubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desert
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds.
The darkness drops again; but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

Our “Second Coming” would be a Trump second term, should he last that long. But the “rough beast” actually arrived in 2017 and has been tearing the center to ribbons, aided by “the worst, full of passionate intensity.”

Today the Supreme Court finally ruled that Trump isn’t above the law in New York, and a grand jury can have his financial records. But then SCOTUS had to kick Congress in the balls by sending their similar request back to the lower courts, in a prime example of what happens when “the (supposed) best lack all conviction.”

In bringing about a quicker end to the vile scourge of Trump, Congress has failed us and now the Supreme Court has failed us. Meanwhile, Trump exploits a lethal virus — and the gullible nitwits willing to spread it for him — to kill off as many of us as he can.

Our only hope left until November, when we can slay this beast ourselves at the polls, is for COVID-19 — aided by Trump’s own myriad health issues — to find him and slay him first.