"...bucket"

 

It was July 4th two hours ago, and now September is in our faces. With it comes "Labor Day" the "official" end of Summer. Granted summer doesn't really end till September 21st, but ya see what I'm saying.

When you're young a year seems like ten years now it's about a half hour. You watch it'll be Christmas in two weeks.
Been a hell of a ride.

I've been considering my "Bucket List". Stuff I mean to do while I have any time left. Well first what scary stuff have I already done. I was in a police raid of a Gay Bar as a kid. I had lunch a number of times on the ledge of the 96th floor of the Empire State Building back when I was a transmitter engineer.

I dangled my feet over the edge while eating Arbie's pastrami.

Went to a Nude beach with pals for a few summers. Was in a race riot, and had a car explode near me. The fire ball went on forever! Been to any number of "Be-In" events. Ask ya hippy grandma what that was. I helped talk a co-worker out of suicide. A year later was talked out of same by others.

Had a bullet just miss my head on Albany Avenue in Brooklyn during the 1990's Crack Wars. It's true what George Washington said about that. Not the Crack wars...bullets.

"Fired musket rounds have the Deep Hum of Angry Wasps."

It did.

I slept outside with pals on the balcony of a skyscraper in mid-town as a youth. This while a full summer moon rose over the Chrysler Building behind us. There were the green streaks of meteors as well. A night to remember indeed.

Overdosed on narcotics on three different occasions in my late 30's. Died three times because of it. Foolishly came back each time.

I nearly drowned as a little boy.

I remember being knocked down by a gigantic wave. Then being dragged out to sea. I saw bubbles grains of sand seaweed, and that would have been the last thing I saw.

However I wasn't getting out of this "job" that easy. Because after the sand, and sea weed came this bleeping big arm with an equally big hand attached to it.

There was one of them Army wrist watches on that arm which grabbed me, and hauled my little butt back to the beach. I think I was too freaked out to cry.

All I remember is being picked up hauled back up, and I think passed on to my Mom. There was all this noise yelling I think crying...my Mom I guess. I don't remember anything about the man that saved me.

Other than his big hairy arm, and his watch.

Mind you I've nearly bought it any number of times since. However that one stays with me. I'm here today to whine, and complain because of some neat guy with big hairy arms.

Ain't life something.

As for that "Bucket List"...the British Museum Paris Disney World, and Santa's Work Shop are on it for sure. Other stuff too, but ya know.

Since you're here there's something else on my mind.

This country would be better off certainly more Just, and sane if it were smaller. Say seven or eight states. Yeah that makes sense. New England, and a few others...maybe up to Pennsylvania.

....that sounds right.

The rest of them "Murakans" can drink heavily praise jebus burn books beat'n starve their children abuse their wives, and shoot each other as they do so well, and often.

Meanwhile we'll just harvest maple syrup have community feasts sing songs do stupid plays, and write bad poetry.

I like it.

Oh,...the Vermont New York, and Maine Air National Guard keep all their Phantoms, and F-16's/18's, and AWACS along with that stash of nukes the feds hide in New Hampshire.

We may be Hippies, but we ain't stupid.

( Life goes on. Just ask our old pal Godzilla as he paints his new digs in Queens.) 

"...Fuck'em"

On the lighter side of the news,...

Russia Wants Bulgarians to Stop Vandalizing Soviet Monuments To Look Like American Superheroes. 

Fat fucking chance.

"...Coolness"

A view above of the "Peoples Palace of Heavenly Coolness" in our Royal Republic. Yeah it looks 1930's Mussolini-esque, but it was cheaper to just take it over instead of building from scratch. Btw as King Empress I just decided to make a new holiday. "Ignore your iPhone Day". Granted this may be hard for the youngsters. However I think a day wandering around actually looking at the world, and each other might be good for us.

Also as compensation to those not into it I'm raising everyone's salary for the holiday by 250%. Buy something nice for a friend or stranger. Btw we're still trying to make baseball more interesting...don't worry this will not affect the balance of the season. More stuff as it occurs to me. 

"...you're welcome"

As King Empress of the Earth, and outer Colonies. I give to each of my good, and loyal subjects one of these for your birthday. Below a prototype. Style, and colors on the way.

It beats a hover board.
It's a fusion powered ramjet pollution less safe via variable force field "Floatercycle". Btw you could run into a wall with this all day at 50 mph, and at most just get dizzy. You can't run anybody over either...even, and especially if you tried.
The Ministry of Imperial Research has made this actually "Human Proof". Something heretofore thought impossible. They are also currently working on 'safe' greasy foods, and Algebra for idiots.
You're welcome.

"...asparagus"

My old radio friend Claude Horvath mentioned that he was always amazed at my feelings about other races religions cultures. In that I didn't seem to have specific hostilities. Well I'm not remotely angelic. I'm a grumpy Drama Queen from way back. I can't stand certain individuals. However going after whole races religions or nations is just too damned much work!

Anyway my ma my extended family traditions had much to do with my attitudes. I'm from a multi-ethic family of many colors. A lot of that in this country...more all the time.
As a child I thought a mommy could have a baby of any color. This seemed to be happening before my eyes as my new cousins showed up. I thought all mommies were having babies of all the colors. No one in my family told me otherwise. With this as a given we all turned out as we are. 'Hate asparagus though. 

"Brooklyn Heatwave 2018 BC" ... before COVID

 

From 2021 '18 seems a simpler more innocent time.

Well summer has air-burst like a tactical nuclear warhead over Coney Island. Which I still haven't seen this season. Coney not the bomb. It was 238f degrees, and humid in the Emerald City this afternoon. So of course I went out for a long walk in the sun. See around the corner above.

No I didn't end up in the hospital though I did think of going. This as I hung half off a park bench gasping for air, and clutching my chest. The phrase , "...What da Fuck were you Thinking!!" did come to mind.

They were handing out bottles of water outside my local library. With special attention to kids, and elders. I didn't even have to ask. Some nice NYU grad student City Volunteer came up to me as I stumbled by, and shoved a bottle in my hand.

"Are you alright sir?"

Aw crap do I look that bad? Well okay I'm 138, and wandering about on the surface of the sun. So yeah I could see her concern. Actually I wish they was handing out ice cream I could 'a used a hit of that. Yeah that stuff will kill me now, but so what I likes it.

Wait it get's better.

Another NYU kid, they were wearing the t-shirt, this do-gooder comes over, and offers to help me into the library. For those of you reading this in the civilized world. Thanks to the new Hotter Climate in NYC public spaces in summer are now Thermal Shelters. This includes libraries,...just like science fiction.

I imagine these nice kids are trained to see folks in trouble, which besides gasping for breath I had no idea I was in. What the heck I let them walk me,...they held me by the arms. Which was sweet. I like that folks are nice to old folks, and kids. The "Baby Snatching" by armed enforcers at our border has awakened humanity is some.

Anyway they dump me in a nice chair, and I'm good. Wait again,...get's even better. One of the librarians asks me if I would like a book or magazine to read while I got better from the heat.

Did I just win the humane society lotto or something?

Hey I'm game. I asks if she could find the "Collected Prose of Walt Whitman" the Penguin edition if it was handy. She smiles, and goes. A few minutes later she, and Uncle Walt appear.

I'm figuring this is Candid Camera or whatever passes for that now. Anyway there I spent the balance of the afternoon. In the air conditioned womb of the same library I've been going to since I was six. I moved back to my old 'Hood after some decades of ambiguous adventures.

Today was a good though profoundly hot, and interesting day.

"...Advise, and Consent"

Fauci's Moment. Smart man. I wonder who will play him in the movie. Perhaps a Kevin Costner sort with two days growth of beard, and in his old Navy leather jacket. The House guards open the great doors carved with the symbols of our national honor. Slowly "Fauci" hero to millions enemy to millions of others enters the great hall.

All goes quiet. Dust motes drift in the slanted sunlight.

The only sound from his faded cowboy boots clicking on the marble floor. He approaches the bench with grim calm. Trump's daughter watching from the family jet over Riga quietly sez to no one "...we're fucked." Yeah that's how I'd shoot it. Cut to scene in an Idaho whorehouse. Trump saying, "...that bastard loser. I could 'a had cool a jacket like that."