In American culture, we have a tradition of equating power with heartlessness. We have grown to expect our leaders to have a no-nonsense, logical approach to solving problems without allowing their emotions or personal histories to influence them. The accepted theory is that it takes strength to make the hard…
It’s Not Our Party
Many of us want to be good allies in the fight for racial equality, but we don’t always seem to have a good handle on how to do that. Black comedians have done a pretty good job of lampooning the white character, too eager to join in and be one…
All Uniquely The Same
Here in America, where individualism is the true national religion, we demand the freedom to be different and then work tirelessly to get everyone to follow suit. We fight for our right to be uniquely homogeneous, and fight legislation that allows anyone to be different than what we’ve collectively decided…
The Calculus of Cruelty
I never understood the calculus of being cruel. Could never grasp the return on the investment of time and energy. It always seemed like you really had to go above and beyond what was worth one’s time. Had to go out of your way to be unjustifiably cruel. Greed might…
An Eye For An Eye
There is a long history of anti-semitism in America. One particularly prevalent, and openly racist accusation, was that Jewish people were somehow questionably loyal to America (or wherever they lived) because of a presumed overriding loyalty to Israel. They weren’t “real” Americans, as their loyalty couldn’t be trusted. This has…
firefly
we were curious by naturestudents of the worldconstantly wondering what this wasor how that workedwhere did money come from?and how does one get to Paris?until one daysome time in our late twentieswe decided we had learnedall we needed to knowas if the world had ceased tomystify us any longerand we…
Wrestling With Vikings
A sordid tale of Cookery, villainy, deception, and opossums Part One I am not a Viking. I lack the taste for violence, the desire for blood and guts and sweat and tears, the drive necessary to subdue lesser men, to take what is theirs and make it your own, to…
Take A Walk On The Wild Side
Since I have been home during the pandemic, which is coming up on a year now, I listen to music for most of the day, on most days. I always listened to music, but on my long drive to the office, I more often listened to podcasts than music, meaning…
It’s Still Rock and Roll To Me
There was a comedian, it may have been Seinfeld, that had a bit about men hitting a style wall at some point in their lives. Some peak moment where they decide, this is as far as I’m going, this is the look I’m going with. Whatever it is. I find…
The Life Of Brian
This is a partial list of things I want to do, but probably won’t, so I will write about fictionally so that I’ll feel like I did.