Washington Park Arboretum

As promised, I went for a 3 hour lunchtime walk from work today.  I don’t know how many miles that was, but it feels like quite a lot because my back is aching since coming back (just in time for the work ping pong tournament coming up – I play my Round 1 match on Friday).  I went to the Washington Park Arboretum – in the hope of catching some nice fall colors, but I think I probably missed the best of it.  This is kind of place you could go to a 100 times and never walk the same route - a big park with lots of trails crisscrossing it.  I stuck to a fairly basic route –  along the waterfront and then up and down the main paths through the park – but with so many different areas to explore I probably missed out on the best views and the best photo opportunities.  And just looking at their website, I should have printed out a map of the monthly highlights – oh well, next time I’ll know better (and I think I would like to come back at different times of the year, as it’s a nice place to go – and perhaps I can drive there so that I don’t spend quite so long away from work!).  Just a couple of photos:

Lack of Momentum

I feel like I'm running out of steam on these blog posts.  Perhaps reflective of my mood as the nights get longer and the weather gets gloomier - though having said that, we have had some really nice weather the last few days.  And it's nice to get out on a fresh autumnal day with all the fall colors.  If nothing comes up at work, I'm going to sneak out tomorrow afternoon and go for a long walk.  And that gives me a chance to get back to work and stay late, hopefully avoiding any potential trick and treaters - though my landlord said we don't get many where we are.  I have bought some candy just in case - sadly, I've ended up consuming most of it myself already.  Hence the need for the exercise!

NFL

I've been a fan of American Football a long time before I moved to America.  And although I am still a fan of the game - though probably not as much as I used to be - I am no fan of the NFL organization.  I hate the cover-up of brain injuries.  I hate the predominantly old, white, rich, pro-Trump team owners.  I hate the fact that they blackball a player who takes a knee during the anthem, but a free pass is given to all the players guilty of assault, domestic battery, etc.  I hate the ridiculous schedule that includes long trips to London, meaningless exhibition games, a Thursday night game that doesn't make sense when everyone else plays on Sunday or Monday, and only one bye week per team per season.  I hate that advertising and business interests have slowed the game down even more than it already is.  I hate that they can just take a team away from a city.  I hate the inequality of wealth in the game.  I hate the over emphasis and over-exaggeration of fantasy stats.  I hate that the game just doesn't seem as enjoyable and entertaining to watch as it used to be.   

Ballz

I am playing a lot of Ballz on my iPhone currently.  But I shall resist engaging in lots of double entendres with that fact.  Sorry.

Road Rage

As the traffic only gets worse in Seattle, so does the quality of driving, and so does the instances of road rage.  And, sadly, I am guilty of this as well.  There are so many bad drivers, but worse there are so many clueless drivers that don’t think they are doing anything wrong – signaling is apparently not something they teach at American driving schools.  It’s no wonder there seems to be a fender bender or some other crash that snarls up the commute most days.  I haven’t been involved in an accident yet, though I’ve had my share of close calls.  But I have been involved in multiple instances of road rage – and I probably don’t help myself in that regard because I follow a philosophy of “no signal, no space” and also if I see someone behind me lane weaving, I will close the gap to make sure they can’t get in front of me.  But also, there have been several instances where someone has just started tailgating me for no discernible reason – and that happened again this morning.  Perhaps they see the GB sticker on my car and don’t like me as a foreigner, perhaps I inadvertently did something to annoy them, perhaps I’m going too slow for their tastes.  Whatever the reason, whenever it happens I am prone to slowing down to annoy them even more.  And I am prone to gesticulating – which normally results in an exchange of middle fingers.  Perhaps I shouldn’t do this – I wouldn’t be surprised if someone I exchange pleasantries with in this manner has a firearm in their car or truck (and truck drivers are the worst).  And it’s probably not worth the hassle or the stress – I hate going into work flustered, blood pressure raised and pissed off at something that has happened on my commute.  I need to chill out.

PS If I develop cold or flu symptoms in the next week, I know exactly who to blame.  I was in a company-wide meeting this morning, and a person sitting directly behind me had the sniffles and was constantly clearing their throat and loudly sniffing throughout the meeting.  RIGHT BEHIND ME.  As you can imagine it was beyond annoying, yet I’m too gutless to actually say something.  I could almost feel their germ-infested breath on my neck – shockingly selfish and inconsiderate.  If you’ve got something contagious, don’t go to a meeting with 100+ people in attendance.  Some people… and this was someone who has an office and so has some degree of seniority and importance (more than me), so you’d think they’d know better.  People suck.

JFK

So they've released some documents that will probably reveal absolutely nothing new about the JFK assassination - a not subtle distraction from whatever calamity the "mentally deranged US dotard" has said or done now.  I despair. 

Baseball

It's currently the "World" Series between the Houston Astros and the Los Angeles Dodgers.  I don't care, baseball sucks.

Live Web Class

I’ve been doing some training via a live web class this week – and it’s nowhere near as bad as I feared.  I’m taking the class from my cube (which doesn’t tend to get too noisy because all the people around me appear to work from home most days), and basically you’re connected so that you see a video of the instructor from her home office, a Q & A panel where you can communicate with the instructor, a copy of the slides as she is presenting, and a “virtual work area” where you log in and perform exercises as part of the training.  It is a surprisingly effective way of doing things – and certainly cheaper and less hassle than everyone having to travel and stay somewhere in order to attend the training in person.  My only criticism would be that it is very time consuming – 6 days of 3.5 hours training, when 3 full days would maybe be better.  But I like the course and what I’m learning – part of my desire to improve my technical skills, and something that should look good on my CV.

Fortune

A fortune I received today: “Today is the first day of the rest of your reading time”.  I don’t even know what that means.

Ikea

I braved the crowds to go to Ikea this morning.  Even just after opening time, it was packed.  It's the kind of place I could easily spend a lot of time wandering around and spending a lot of money at.  Despite the blandness, I quite like Ikea's fixtures and furnishings - they're cheap, functional and last a long time.  And there's a lot of stuff I could really do with upgrading.  But I just couldn't tolerate all the people there (I dread to think what its like on weekend afternoons), so I dived in and out of the store with just the things I wanted (a hallway bench and a rug) - I didn't even get any Swedish meatballs....!

Blade Runner 2049

Blade Runner is one of my favorite films - definitely in my top 10, maybe even in my top 5.  So naturally I wanted to watch the long overdue sequel - and this finally happened today.  And I have to say, I really liked it.  It's obviously not going to be as groundbreaking and as much of a classic as the original (there are only 2 sequels that have ever matched the original - Godfather Part 2 and Aliens).  But it was a great tribute to the original, and a good film in itself.  Great sound design, looks great (as any film does which has Roger Deakins as the cinematographer), a worthy continuation to the original and I would highly recommend watching it on the big screen.  I watched it at the Cinerama in downtown Seattle - and one of the few films that I've been to where there was a spontaneous round of applause when it finished.  And make sure you use the restroom before you watch it - it flew by, but it's a good 2.5 hours long!

PS We still don't get an unambiguous answer as to whether Deckard is a Replicant or not.  It seemed pretty obvious from the original that he was, and there is nothing to suggest otherwise in the sequel.  But still, one of the great sci-fi questions of our time. 

Flu Shot

I got a flu shot this week.  I get one every year, but this appears to be the first time that I've had a reaction to the shot - it's red, sore and swollen around the injection site.  This seems to be quite a common side effect, so hopefully nothing to worry about - but I've started to get a bit paranoid about my health at the moment, so this is just one more thing to add to the list.  I generally haven't been very good at going to a doctor regularly, but now I'm in in my 40's I think I might need to change my attitude - especially making use of my work healthcare plan whilst Trump decimates Obamacare...

Pop

Gregg Popovich - coach of the San Antonio Spurs - is one of the greatest ever basketball coaches.  He is well respected, has won loads of championship rings with the Spurs and is hilariously terse during in-game interviews.  And, unusually for someone as white privileged as he is, has some strong opinions on our current presidency that not many other coaches share or voice (contrary to the players):

"I’ve been amazed and disappointed by so much of what this president had said, and his approach to running this country, which seems to be one of just a never ending divisiveness...This man in the Oval Office is a soulless coward who thinks that he can only become large by belittling others.... We have a pathological liar in the White House, unfit intellectually, emotionally, and psychologically to hold this office, and the whole world knows it, especially those around him every day. The people who work with this president should be ashamed, because they know better than anyone just how unfit he is, and yet they choose to do nothing about it. This is their shame most of all."

Hear, hear.

Storm

Today, a rainstorm hit the Pacific NW for the first time in what feels like ages.  Lots of rain.  Lots of wind.  Lots of downed power lines.  Lots of power outages (including me).  This is where living somewhere now with lots of big trees surrounding me makes me a bit a nervous - some branch, or god forbid a whole tree, could come down and cause some major damage.  I heard and saw something big go down just in the gully next to where I live.  Yikes.   

CRT

The Cognitive Reflection Test is known as the world’s shortest IQ test, and consists of just 3 questions to tell if you’re a genius

1. A bat and a ball cost $1.10 in total. The bat costs $1 more than the ball. How much does the ball cost?

2. If it takes 5 machines 5 minutes to make 5 widgets, how long would it take 100 machines to make 100 widgets?

3. In a lake, there is a patch of lily pads. Every day, the patch doubles in size. If it takes 48 days for the patch to cover the entire lake, how long would it take for the patch to cover half of the lake?

I confess that I got the last question wrong when I came across this quiz this morning, and I shouldn’t have done – a classic case of jumping to a quick conclusion without giving any proper thought to the question and answer.  Shame on me.

Yorkshire Pudding Burrito

I love Yorkshire pudding.  I love Burritos.  I love the idea of combining them.  I strongly approve of Yorkshire pudding burritos that I’ve been reading about, such as the beef brisket Yorkshire pudding burrito which Aldi will sell over winter – I must insist on having one of these when I’m next back in the UK.

Discovery Park

I went to Saint Edward State Park yesterday, but not worthy of mentioning again since I went there almost a year ago and blogged about it then.  But I will mention Discovery Park, which I went to today - and somewhere I don't think I've been to since moving back to the Seattle area.  It's the biggest park in Seattle - so unsurprisingly also one of the most popular, especially on a sunny day like today.  I got there around 9 am, and the parking lot was already quite full up.  There are plenty of trails there - but I had one picked out from one of my books that totaled about 6 miles.  However, thanks to my utterly useless sense of direction and inability to read a map - I ended up getting lost twice and probably ended up walking closer to 8 miles for over 3 hours.  That's quite a lot, but fortunately it was bearable thanks to the nice views - there is a little bit of elevation change on the trails, but nothing too strenuous (I think I actually suffered more during my much shorter walk yesterday).

Underrated TV

I consider myself a TV aficionado.  This means that I know a good TV show when I see one.  And there are plenty of them out there - but some of them fly very under the radar.  One of them ended today - it was the last episode of Halt and Catch Fire.  This is a classic underrated show - critically acclaimed but severely under-watched, and it aired it's final season on a Saturday night - which for American TV is a death knell.  Which is a shame, because this last series has been terrific - strong enough to at times move me to tears.  Another program in the same vein is The Americans, whose last season is due to air next year.  And there are many more shows that have aired over the years that have been great but have been cancelled far too prematurely - shows like Terriers and Kings spring to mind, that you've probably never heard of.  But I pride myself in recognizing a good show - I watched The Office when it first aired on BBC 2 before it really blew up, and same with The Wire before everyone else started calling it the best TV show of all time.  With so much choice, the TV landscape has become diluted and it's a lot more difficult to find a classic show now.  A good judge is whether I would like to own a Blu-ray set of it - and by that standard, only Game of Thrones merits the moniker of a great show.  But if you look hard enough, there are plenty of other shows out there worthy of your time.  My suggestion - take a look at metacritic.com and the TV shows with a 90% rating or more - you can't go wrong with these.

Liam Gallagher

Classic....(warning - bad language alert!).  I don't think anybody in America understands a word he says!

Heating

Summer is long over, and I know this because I've had to work out how to operate the thermostat.  I could probably have found out by trial and error, but much easier to find the instruction manual online!  I'm so clueless that until this week I didn't even know that the cover of the thermostat opened to reveal the control panel.  But now I'm living in a house rather than an apartment, it will be interesting to see just how much my heating bills will increase by.  But at least the heating is effective, which is more than can be said for my last place.  I don't think I'm adventurous enough to try using the real fireplace here, but we shall see!  

USMNT

England may not have qualified for the World Cup in style, but at least they qualified.  That can't be said for the US - who somehow contrived to mess things up and not qualify, much to the embarrassment, shame and chagrin of a lot of people here.  Coming in to the last round of games they were third in their standings, only needing a draw against Trinidad & Tobago to secure a spot.  That is Trinidad & Tobago ranked about 100 in the world and bottom of a qualifying group that included Mexico, Costa Rica, Panama, Honduras and the US.  The top 3 qualified automatically, and 4th place went into a playoff.  The US lost 2-1.  A disastrous result.  But even more unlikely, Honduras managed to beat Mexico (top of the table) and Panama managed to beat Costa Rica (second in the table) with a goal 2 minutes from time, which meant that they both overtook the US who consequently finished 5th and didn't qualify.  Shocking!  But then not really that shocking when you consider the US managed to also lose to Mexico and Costa Rica twice in qualifying.  A big wake up call for the lack of advancement in US soccer and all that totally unrealistic talk of them being World Cup winners one day. I only hope this doesn't affect the American coverage of the World Cup on tv!        

Reg Dwight

Last month it was Condoleezza Rice being interviewed as part of a lecture series at my company, this month things have taken a bit of surreal twist with someone even more famous.  Sir Elton John gave a little talk and performed a few songs this afternoon!  I knew he did private functions, but I always presumed they were parties hosted by rich folks – so apparently our company can afford to shell out a few bucks (7 figures?) on Sir Elton!  But there is some justification – our company is heavily involved with developing and selling HIV drugs, so there is a lot of synergy (yikes – shoot me now for legitimately using this word in a sentence) with his AIDS charity.  Would love to have been in California to have seen him in person (looked like a big crowd crammed into the company auditorium!), but had to resort to watching via a video feed.  He talked about AIDS and his charity for a bit and then performed a few tunes (Tiny Dancer, I Guess That’s Why They Call It the Blues, Don’t Let the Sun Go Down on Me) before leaving.  Was hoping for a few more songs, but I’ll take what I can get and he can still sing and play the piano as well as anyone else.  And thank god – no Candle in the Wind.  

Trumpism

… a good recent article I came across that I definitely empathized with.


The Enormous Emotional Toll of Trumpism

Every day it’s something. Or 10 somethings. Can we really live with three more years of this, let alone seven?

At a certain point, the distaste becomes exhaustion. Donald Trump’s presence in our national life has been alternately infuriating, embarrassing, revolting, gross and bizarre. His non-stop assaults on our political norms are testing our capacity to sustain constant outrage without giving in to despair.

I meet victims of Trump fatigue everywhere. They stop me in airports and restaurants and on the street and ask how long we’ll have to put up with this madness – when will Bob Mueller finally bring him down, and how much more can our systems bend before they break. When I tell them Trump is likely to clamor on until either the 2018 election slows him down or the 2020 election stops him (or if Russian interference, non-white voter suppression and liberal perfectionism succeed again, ‘til he terms out in 2024), the look on their faces is something akin to terror.

For many Americans – many humans – Trump’s presidency can often feel unbearable.

Try as you might to put him out of your mind, he blunders back into your consciousness. He lumbers across your television and cellphone screens in his giant Trump suits, squinting and pouting with his silent, sullen wife or exhausted looking cabinet members in tow. One minute he’s tearing up international agreements. The next, he’s tweeting out his inner demons,mocking people of color, taunting unstable dictators with stupid nicknames and generally wreaking havoc. The Trump Show is the reality TV train wreck you can’t turn off, no matter how badly you want to. No sooner does he ruin one thing (so much for empathetic hurricane response being Presidenting 101) than he’s on to the next one (stay tuned to find out what our “tease to commercial break” president means by “the calm before the storm!”)

Even his cabinet seems to be succumbing to Trump exhaustion. Rex Tillerson, his miserable secretary of state, is said to slouch and grimace in Trump’s presence. He fails to return White House phone calls. And he apparently told associates at the Pentagon that Trump is a “fucking moron.” It’s tough to sympathize with Tillerson, the oil mogul and Putin pal currently decimating the half-empty State Department. But it’s not hard to relate to his sense of ennui. Trump’s presidency is enervating. Every day is a new game of Russian-aided roulette. We careen from hour to hour, wondering if he’ll blow up our healthcare system, our access to birth control, our tentative peace with Iran, our European alliances or literally us, via nuclear war with North Korea.

Recently I asked a cross-section of politically active observers to describe the constant barrage of Trump news and its impact on their psyches. They offered adjectives that descended from bad to worse.

“Exhausting,” said one lifelong Republican, adding that they are “sick of it.”

“Nervous daily,” is how a GOP strategist who is mostly supportive of Trump’s policies, but troubled by his rhetoric, tweets and divisiveness, described himself.

A third Republican – younger, white and reliably conservative - who remains active in the party despite a strong distaste for Trump described himself as “saddened … because this is the decline of the U.S.”

“It’s exhauuuusting,” said one young Republican – a Millennial woman struggling to reconcile her place in a Trumpian party. “It’s a very strong feeling of, ‘Oh no, not again. … Why can’t he calm down and be a decent person, JUST ONCE?”

A Navy veteran recounted a conversation with fellow tourists from Chicago while traveling in Europe. “Oh, we hate hearing his name when [we’re] here,” they’d said. “It makes us sick.”

It’s “embarrassing and depressing that his idiocy is literally risking my family’s life,” the veteran said.

“Trump’s divisive rhetoric is in direct competition with his incompetence,” said Naveed Jamali, a former double agent against Russia who occasionally advises Democrats on national security matters. “It’s both embarrassing and depressing.”

An anti-poverty activist from a Midwestern enclave described herself as alternately “angry, on high alert – adrenaline always running – and helpless” in the face of Trump’s constant attacks on vulnerable communities.

Asked to describe in a single word how Trump makes him feel, one longtime Republican active in the party, including as a donor, offered: “petrified.”

“Disgust,” said a Democratic operative who worked on the 2008 Obama campaign.

An African-American police detective in a Southern state Trump won in November called the nation’s 45th president “sick and demented.”

“That’s the only way I can describe him,” the robbery-homicide officer said of Trump, offering a view not likely to be popular among his colleagues. “He has single-handedly placed this country on a downward slide.”

On the day news emerged that Trump’s administration would end the Obama administration’s contraceptive mandate, a black Millennial woman active in Democratic politics said she feels “rage.”

“Every day it’s a new and fresh hell.”

Her colleague, a white woman active in feminist politics, added that her feelings include anger as well but “sometimes shame,” too, given that a majority of white women voted for Trump last November.

Apparently, most Americans agree with these grim assessments. Trump’s approval rating fell to a record low of 32 percent in a new AP poll, though opinions about Trump remain deeply polarized by political party, and especially by race.

One black progressive activist said she careens from feeling “enraged” to “worried – for young people of color in this country, like my kid,” to “fearless” and ready to fight.

There’s “this awful feeling of ‘flashback’ to a time when black people could not vote or sit in the front of the bus … that second, third class citizen feeling that he proudly verbalizes whenever he can,” the activist said. “Black people have always had to be vigilant living in America. Trump took it one step further. Now I feel like I’m constantly living in a state of trauma.”

Bishop William Barber, who has become one of the nation’s most prominent voices of opposition to Trump and his party’s ultra-conservative policies, said the people he encounters in the country as he travels across the country are angry but also “inspired to fight back.”

“People are getting tired, but it's a Fannie Lou Hamer kind of ‘sick and tired of being sick and tired,’” Barber said. “They are tired of people saying a person who lost an election by 3 million votes is called the winner.  They are tired of the attacks on voting rights, tired of the attacks in healthcare and the poor and living wages; tired of the policies and practices of white supremacy and tired of the hypocrisy of politicians who claim they are offended by Trump’s style, but [when it comes to] substance and policy, [despite the] extremism and racism they vote with him and have the same agenda.”

“The feeling is unprecedented,” added Mark Thompson, who hosts a progressive talk show on Sirius XM and who doubles as a civil rights activist and political analyst. “I’ve never felt so baffled. No one else personally or historically has been rewarded for such bad behavior, and bizarre behavior. And as a political analyst, how does one analyze paper towel jump shots?” referring to Trump tossing rolls of paper towels at Puerto Ricans during a visit there last week.

Thompson said his radio listeners “are not only equally baffled, they feel generally betrayed … betrayed by a ‘democracy’ that would enable the second-place vote getter to occupy the White House, that would critique a woman’s benign behavior more than a man’s malignant behavior and that would be susceptible to manipulation of the public discourse by Russian state actors.”

Dr. Jeffrey R. Gardere, Ph.D., a clinical psychologist, said some of his patients over the past nine months “have expressed much frustration, unhappiness and stress with the present political climate,” and that he is seeing increased instances of “dysphoria, and sometimes the related eating and sleeping interruptions.”

“In some ways they feel that the unorthodox practices and behaviors of this president appear to be crisis or conflict driven,” Gardere said. “The way these patients perceive the messages from this White House place them in a state of emotional arousal, resulting in a ‘flight or fight’ physiological state, resulting in a release into their systems of a number of hormones including norepinephrine and epinephrine (excitatory hormones) and cortisol (steroid hormone), to name a few.”

He added: “What we do know is that though this physiological state gives us the strength or energy to get through an occasional crisis, emergency or danger, chronic exposure to these hormones through being in the ‘fight or flight’ state over a long period of time can eventually result in fatigue to the body, mind and spirit.  This may explain why some people are feeling worn out, tired, exhausted or even numb as a result of this political environment.”

And yet, Trump’s hardcore supporters remain blissfully serene. The level of alarm expressed by their fellow Americans is met with shrugs.

“The word that best expresses my innermost feelings about Trump is ‘confident,’” said one such Trump supporter, a financial manager and conservative Christian. “He makes me feel confident that America is somehow going to recover itself and again be the force for good in the Earth that I believe was intended by the Almighty when, against all odds, America became an independent nation.”

The Trump supporter praised Trump for “showing the American people that they do not have to be ruled by … the ‘effete snobs’ and the ‘ideological eunuchs and nattering nabobs of negativism’ who seem to have been in charge of America’s identity and direction for many years,” adding that “Trump’s calling is to encourage ‘we the people’ to rise up and show the ruling class who really rules.”

He’s not alone. Republican members of Congress, eager to roll their eyes and complain about Trump to reporters on background, publicly can’t back him eagerly enough.

And therein lies the impasse. Trump is not the president of the United States. He is the unquestioned leader of a minority faction within the United States, and the bane of the majority’s existence. The toll he’s taking on that majority is a toll his supporters are taking as well, leaving millions of Americans feeling as if they’re being held hostage.

It’s not a healthy place to be. And experts on authoritarianism warn that over time it settles on the spirit, fed by exhaustion in hope that fatigue morphs into apathy and finally, acceptance.

Barber says despite the gloom, he doesn’t see that happening now. Not among the people he encounters.

“They are tired,” says Barber, who founded the social justice organization Repairers of the Breach after years of leading the North Carolina NAACP. “But they are also ready to forge a multiracial, moral, anti-racism, anti-poverty, pro-justice pushback, not to save a party, but to save the soul of the nation.”

Staying Positive in a Negative World

Dare I say it, I feel like I might be running out of steam on these blog posts.  I so don't want to get too negative, but it is tough when there are so many things that make my blood boil - Trump, the NRA, England performances, and so on.  Yes, I realize that some of these things are not quite as important as others - but ultimately they all come together to form a world that I don't really understand and don't really like.  This is the first time I've really questioned living in America, but despite current events I still believe this is a great country that will eventually correct itself.  It's not like I want to move back to the UK - I think Brexit, in whatever form it takes, is going to be an absolute disaster.  But I think and hope that the Trump administration is just an aberration that we can quickly move on from in 4 years time (or less!).  But still, to get Trump elected in the first place has made me question humanity like never before.  And I've never liked humanity - but this is on a whole different level then the many, many small things that people do that drive me crazy.  I wish I was strong enough of personality and courage to actually do something to make the world a better place.  But sadly, I am just too apathetic like most people.  Perhaps we deserve the world we live in.  

'Nam

Finally finished watching The Vietnam War documentary today.  Boy, what a slog - about 18 hours total, I must have fallen asleep at least 5 times at various points of trying to watch it.  Having said that, it was very good, very informative and surprisingly quite objective - giving voice to the Vietnamese as much as the Americans.  It has been criticized as not being very pro-American - but given how poorly conceived and executed the war was, I thought it was a fair reflection of what a senseless tragedy and waste of life it was (especially to the Vietnamese people).  What is clear is that my knowledge of the Vietnam War was not as extensive as I thought - e.g. I had no idea who Le Duan was until watching this.  I covered the Cold War in GCSE History, but I remember more about the Korean War than the Vietnam War and so I learnt a lot more about a war that is the backdrop to many of my favorite films.  And to think I have also visited Hanoi and seen the embalmed body of Ho Chi Minh - with so little context to who he was and where I was.  What was also interesting to me were the parallels between then and now - in Trump we have a Nixon-esque president, the polarization of people and protests against the war are almost identical to the protests we have now against Trump, and in the last episode seeing all these Vietnamese refugees on the water is so very similar to the refugees we see in the Mediterranean Sea.  "Those who do not learn history are doomed to repeat it" indeed.

I got gas in the tank ...

... I got money in the bank ...

... I got news for you baby ...

... You're looking at the man.

Can't get this song out of my head.

Tired

2 early morning starts (6 am) in a row, I've got nothing.  I am not, never have been, and never will be, a morning person.  I hate work and I hate the Seattle traffic (which has got a lot worse now that schools and colleges have started again) for forcing these early starts on me.

Sports Woes

Palace - 0 points, 0 goals, worst start in English top-flight history

Padres - finished season 71-91, 7th season in a row with losing record, 11th season in a row not making post-season, never won World Series

Chargers - relocated to Los Angeles, 0-4 start to season, no home fans (good?), never won Superbowl

I hate sports.  And I hate fantasy sports even more - American Football coverage has started to be dominated by fantasy football stats and makes it even more borderline unwatchable.  Depressing.

T-Shirt

I came across this t-shirt today.  I think I might have to order it (and I suspect some of you will not get the reference to an infamous scene in Moonraker).

Viva Las Vegas

Another day in the US, another mass shooting.  But will this carnage finally change gun control in the US?  Will it f*ck.  This looks like being the worst mass shooting in the history of the US – I haven’t, and won’t, look at any of the horrific videos of the chaotic scenes (I’ve been watching a lot of The Vietnam War documentary recently, and I don’t need to see any more of this kind of slaughter) – but even that won’t be enough to challenge the NRA’s influence and Americans flawed belief in the right to bear arms.  It appears that, once again, automatic gunfire was used to incur mass injuries and fatalities – there isn’t any reasonable justification for private use of automatic weapons, but if anything this kind of mass shooting will only increase sales.  And if the recent shootings in Orlando and Sandy Hook haven’t made any difference to gun control and gun regulations, then Las Vegas won’t either (especially under this administration).  And that is tragic.  And that is why there will continue to be more mass shootings – each as senseless as the previous one.  If anything, things could and probably will get worse – case in point, a current Republican bill that would deregulate the use of gun silencers.  Disgusting.    

Once a Couch Potato ...

... always a couch potato.

I want to cut down on my TV intake, and yet here I am looking at my scheduled DVR recordings today and see that I have 12 recordings scheduled.  Yes, 12!  That is way too many - even for the best viewing night of the week.  Let's see what we have - 2 animated comedies (Bob's Burgers, Family Guy), 2 network comedies (Ghosted, The Last Man on Earth), 3 premium cable comedies (Curb Your Enthusiasm, Episodes, Vice Principals), 1 reality show (Shark Tank), 1 British costume drama (Poldark), 2 premium cable dramas (The Deuce, Ray Donovan) and 1 comedy news show (Last Week Tonight).  Having managed to empty my DVR to new lows over the summer, clearly it is going to quickly fill up again....!