"Remembrance Day"

I wrote this last night when it was already November 11th in Australia. I was posting to FB friends there, and other parts of the Commonwealth. Remembering WW1 is a serious matter to that population to those cultures. Here it's mostly forgotten. It's a niche knowledge.

Professionals political science students , and online history fans are aware of it in the States,...few others. The Vietnam experience dimed our interest in anything celebrating or memorializing past wars. 

Some young people are not clearly aware there was a WW1. Others have only the vaguest notion of the Second War or which side of the Korean or Vietnam wars we fought on. We are a nation with few memories now. This bodes badly for our future.

However some here do remember the 11th month of the 11th day at the 11th hour in the 18th year of the then new 20th century. The First World War came to an end. This the first round in the Second Hundred years War. 1914~2001.

The First Hundred years war was in the 15th century the Third began in 2001. The Fourth perhaps around 2110. After that there may be no organized human culture left to fight. 

Not because of the wars. Rather due to the Earth itself rebelling against our presence upon it, and washing us away starving us via it's rising oceans, and expanding deserts.

However we have it in us to adapt. Adapt out of our habit of conflicts, and adapt to living in a new planetary reality. We can do this are more than capable of it.

The Earth Abides

 "...timeslip"

I’ve been wanting to write a new dark matter time shifting story. Then came across this in the Encyclopedia Galactica. A booster section from an early Elon Musk space attempt fell to earth. It passed through a random timeslip, and landed on a Swedish farm in 1887. It found it's way to the Saint Petersburg Academy of Science, and rested there unremarked. Well in WW2 General Zhukov had a look at it when the place was Leningrad. Otherwise it still sleeps.

  "...a room"

A Room of One's Own" 
"...A woman must have money, and a room of her own if she is to write fiction." 
Ms. Woolf was on to something.
I would add a room that locks from the inside. A room with your quiet treasures. A room where you make dreams come true. 

  "I Still Believe in Angels" ...mostly

"Today's Sermon" ...It ain't Sunday, but so what.

I still believe in Angels,...mostly. Granted these guys are never around when you really need them. Well okay sometimes. Like when one yanked me out of the way of that cross town bus.

It was many years back. Just after the non-appearance of the Y-2K Apocalypse. Just before the 9/11 20 year long failed war on terror. Anyway I was stumbling along oblivious when a thousand tons of flying steel came bearing down on me. You'd think a person would notice that. Anyway someone yanked me back from the curb which I was wandering off of.
This into the cross hairs of red eyed General Motors hot raging steel.

ZOOM!

All over in a second. I hardly knew what happened. Yeah folks a for real Uncle Sidney adventure,...no really this happened which is why I'm alive to post it.
Here's the thing. There was nobody there. I was on a side street across from Madison Square Garden. The ugly stupid thing they tore down the wonderful Penn Station for.

Btw there's talk of their rebuilding it,...please gawd.

But I digress. Thing is I was alone when that bus turned the corner, and missed me by half an inch. Yeah that. The suction near pulled me over as it went.
I was alone. Not a soul.

Somebody or something grabbed me.

We all have many mysteries in our lives, and this is one of my big ones. Seeing a Demon Spirit was another. Though yeah I was insanely stoned at the time, but still.
I choose to call this bus event the work of Angels. Well that or some dark matter entities invisible clowns dead relatives or space aliens. Take ya pick. For me it was Angel folks. I guess they wanted me to hang around for something,...what I can't imagine. ...we'll see.

So endeth the lesson.

*(The above is probably not the Angelic, and or space alien in question,...cute though he is. Still he'll do as a reasonable stunt double for the entity involved.)

  "Exit Visa" ...here's something to cheer you up.

 

I sent in my application today. This for the Federal "Freedom with Dignity Act of 2026" entitlement. If accepted I can present myself at any of the regional facilities for processing. I'm pretty sure I qualify. I meet the basic standards of acceptance.

I think the only exceptions are minors under 14 military veterans with a retirement rank of major or over. Most medal of honor winners former elected officials, and former board members of major corporations. For them there's still a federal program of subsistence.

It's minimal, but it's there. Sort of a radically cut down Social Security before that was abolished. This by the Economic Freedom, and Choice Act of 2022. 

As for my processing which should come as they say "on or around the third of the month after acceptance". Thing is you have to walk or take public transit to get there. It's still early in the program so the facilities are not conveniently sited yet.

I saw on the news they're renovating old malls factories, and abandoned supermarkets to make access easier on clients, and to encourage applications.

This is a good idea.

I'd have applied a few years ago if they'd done that in the first place.

Bad planning if you ask me,...politics.

Btw they send you a nice booklet with hologram images of their places. Nice videos online with client interviews that seem more or less authentic. It doesn't seem to be the scary shit demonstrators are claiming.

Yeah these are the prototype ideal layouts, but still. I imagine the "supermarket" processing stations will be a bit more humble. Ya know the usual bored civil servants, and minimum wage armed guards.

...who cares as long as it works.

If accepted I'm to go to Fort DeKalb the former Army base at the foot of the Brooklyn Bridge.

It used to be a processing center for WW2 to Vietnam era draftees.  It was still working for volunteers to the Army through the Terror War era. Anyway it's up, and running for "Dignity Act" work. One of the first in Brooklyn as I recall.

I looked over their website. Part of the deal is they slowly work you through the plan. There's medical assistance, and emotional back up if needed. The whole thing used to take two hours for each client. They streamed lined to down to 10 minutes.

This is fine with me. Just get it done,...ya know.

First an orientation. Then a very nice buffet,...you can order special. Anything,...within reason, as much as you want.

I noted on my application a Thanksgiving Dinner,...all the bleeping trimmings. I hear this is one of the favorite requests so I imagine them guys have got at it. I requested some lines of cocaine for after. I hear that's allowed.

I bet they just give ya a TV dinner.

After the meal you get a stage show from Broadway. With real stars from current hits,...at least in that prototype place. I imagine most will just get some local stand-up crew to keep us cheered up.

Either is fine with me.

After all this, and another interview to make sure this is of my own choice, and that I have not in any way been coerced physically or mentally. You have to sign a bunch of shit about this. This so your family or one them religious nut groups don't sue the government.

I just want the damned process being poor, and hungry is no gag.

It's nobodies business but mine!

Overseas it's a seriously different story. In Europe the army just rounds up their poor the immigrants trouble makers, and they get the shake, and bake. No foreplay. 
Here they give you a dinner, and a show. 

This is fine with me.

According to the big packet they sent. After all the fun, and games they gets down to business. You're taken to the processing level below ground. It looks like a cheerful hospital ward. You lay down in a private room,...again in the prototype. 
In the real deal I hear you get dumped on a gurney in a large hall with everybody else. 
They inject you right then no pretty please.

Unless you request 'in writing' a fruit juice drink with the "stuff" in it.

It takes about 4minutes no pain you just drift off. 
They guarantee this. 
Then you're removed to another facility for final processing. Your ashes are either mailed to your family or designated friends. If not it's used for fertilizer. Btw this makes everybody in the country a kind of cannibal since we're growing their food with our bone meal, and ashes. I find this hilarious. Fuck'em all.

Bon Appetit!

I keep the idea of "Magic" quietly with me as a kind of teddy bear. Something I know can't be proven, but comforts me anyway.

 

Simon Loekle

November 7, 2014  · 

Many years ago, I declared that WBAI might learn something from Count Basie. I don't think it was noticed at the time, so herewith an somewhat expanded version.

Habte Selassie is our Harry Carney, baritone sax for the Ellington band, Carney's sound was magnificent (as is Habte's) rich & full.

Chris Whent is our Earl Warren, "master" of the Basie reeds. We'd be nowhere without him and his steady presence.

Sidney Smith = Johnny Hodges. Lyrical, but swinging, our beloved Jeep!

James Irsay well now who else but Art Tatum? Is there nothing Irsay cannot do?

Max Schmid the rhythm of the station, and so Jo Jones. The finest drummer ever!

Delphine Blue (though technically no longer a part of BAI will always be part of BAI.) Who other than Billie???

(Program Directors could learn a little from Freddie Green.)

M G Haskins: choose your bassist ! But Walter Page is not a bad place to start.

These links are not final. But a suggestion.

And where do I fit in? Probably not. Just a member of the band.