MCT: Saturday, October 24, 2020

• Autumn Day
• 1124 Cases
• Outage Watch
• Coco Drive-in
• Beauty Allowances
• Masks Help
• Restore Testing
• Mendo Visions
• Mental Illness
• Water Shots
• Voting Tips
• Methinks
• Felons Sentenced
• B Example
• PA Lighthouse
• Ed Notes
• Grammer School
• Planning Agenda
• Caspar Mill
• Art Instruction
• Yesterday's Catch
• Low Info
• Almost There
• Nothing Left
• Halloween
• National Nightmare
• Streetscape Update
• Family Size
• Bleeding Out
• Peaceful Transfer
• American Id
• Bag Wrestling
• Marco Radio
• Blisters
• Found Object

DRIZZLE LINGERS on the north coast this morning, however, conditions are expected to dry out once again during Sunday with east-northeast winds becoming strong across exposed ridges.

UPCOMING FIRE WEATHER: A very dry airmass will spread across northern California Sunday into early next week. Strong northeast winds will develop Sunday afternoon and remain strong Sunday night, mainly across the exposed mountain slopes and ridges. Winds will gradually diminish Monday and Monday night, but humidity will remain very low, with very poor recoveries persisting into Tuesday morning.

(National Weather Service)

THREE MORE COVID CASES reported in Mendocino County on Friday, bringing total to 1124, more than three-fourths of them in the Ukiah area. 

PG&E: MENDOCINO COUNTY PSPS OUTAGE WATCH: On Sunday, October 25 Power Shutoffs May Be Required For Safety

Looks like it is going to be in the Northern and Eastern part of Mendocino County, primarily in the Willits and Potter Valley areas.

From PG&E: Public Safety Power Shutoff: PSPS Outage Watch: pgealerts.alerts.pge.com/outages/map/?type=forecasted

Due to current weather forecasts, the following counties are currently under a Watch for a Public Safety Power Shutoff:

Mendocino: 10,038 customers, 552 medical baseline

Current weather forecasts, including high winds and dry conditions, may require us to turn off power to help prevent a wildfire.

Estimated Shutoff: Sunday, October 25 at 1400 (2pm)

Counties: Butte, Lake, Mendocino, Nevada, Plumas, Sierra, Yuba

Shutoff times may be delayed if winds arrive later than forecast.

We expect weather to improve by 0900 on Monday, October 26 in some areas but may last until 1000 on Tuesday, October 27 in other areas. After weather has improved, we will inspect equipment before restoring power.

Estimated Restoration: Tuesday, October 27 at 2200 (10pm). Restoration time may change depending on weather and equipment damage.

We recommend all customers plan for an extended outage. We will provide daily updates until the weather risk has passed or power has been restored. This will include a Warning alert if we have determined it is necessary to turn off power. Weather forecasts change frequently. Shutoff forecasts will be most accurate the day of the potential outage.

Resources To Help You Prepare

For customers who rely on power to operate life-sustaining medical devices or have access and functional needs, additional support may be available. For more information, visit www.pge.com/disabilityandaging

To view city/county level information, visit www.pge.com/pspsupdates

To view a general area map of the potential outage area, visit www.pge.com/pspsmaps

To look up addresses that may be affected, visit www.pge.com/addresslookup

Get outage tips and a sample emergency plan at www.pge.com/outageprep

For generator safety tips, visit www.pge.com/generatorsafety

To learn more about Public Safety Power Shutoffs, including the criteria used to turn off power, visit www.pge.com/psps

For a 7-day Public Safety Power Shutoff forecast, visit www.pge.com/pspsweather

If you see a downed power line, assume it is energized and extremely dangerous, and report it immediately by calling 911

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SUPERVISOR WILLIAMS ADDS: "PG&E has notified us that assorted areas throughout the county are in scope for a potential PSPS event Sunday, October 25, 2020. Currently, 9,157 customers are anticipated to be impacted. Restoration is slated for October 28, 2020."

THE CALIFORNIA DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC HEALTH UPDATES ALLOWANCES FOR PERSONAL CARE SERVICES

As of October 20, 2020, The California Department of Public Health has updated their Industry Guidance to permit additional personal care services to reopen indoor operations (in all Tiers), with modifications to ensure public safety (https://files.covid19.ca.gov/pdf/guidance-expandedpersonal-care-services--en.pdf). Businesses that are newly identified by these allowances include:

•  Skincare and esthetician services
•  Nail services
•  Body art services, including piercing shops and tattoo parlors
•  Massage services, including in a non-healthcare setting
•  Electrology services

As required by the Health Officer’s current Shelter-in-Place Order, before reopening, all industries/businesses must complete the self-certification process. For more information on this process, please visit https://www.mendocinocountybusiness.org. 

As we partner to keep our community safe, businesses must comply with Social Distancing Requirements. Businesses must enforce facial covering use by all employees at all times, and by all clients (excluding for the duration of a service relating directly to the face). No employee should ever come to work sick, and the public is urged still to stay home if sick. Together we want to continue moving towards mitigating this pandemic while supporting our local economy. 

LISTEN UP SUPES: GET TESTING RESTORED

We at the Anderson Valley Health Center are dismayed to learn that UCSF has cancelled its contract with the county for surveillance testing with incredibly short notice of October 31st. This means we are not able to provide free Covid testing beyond our last day of Thursday October 29th. Our Alliance for Rural Community Health partners (MCC, RCMS & LVHC) are working hard with the county to come up with another option for testing in Gualala, Fort Bragg, Anderson Valley and Laytonville. If it is important for you that free Covid testing remain available in our areas of the county, we encourage you to contact your supervisors and/or the county public health officer.

Anderson Valley Health Center Presser

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FROM SUPERVISOR WILLIAMS:

In my short experience as county supervisor, the most anguishing moments have been off camera, far removed from bow tie Tuesday. At times, tears have been the natural response to constituent stories of hardship born out of government dysfunction. Systemic social services dysfunction cannot be solved by a Tuesday board vote. Notional platitudes are both accurately explanatory and a collective cop-out. In contrast to the varied perspectives associated with most issues, I see my colleagues as purely collaborative partners in attempting to concretely address the hardships of mental health treatment. Local government is not internally conflicted, but rather a warped puzzle piece in a picture of structural deficiency. Solutions are most apt to emerge through collaboration, increased public awareness and our willingness to halt the visceral tendency to dwell on culpability.

On May 9 of last year, at a "Stepping Up" event hosted by our county in partnership with Mendocino County National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI), a father shared his daughter’s experience with modern day criminalization of the mentally ill. While waiting for a psychiatric hospital bed, she stayed in solitary confinement in our county jail for over four months, allowed out every other day for an hour between midnight and 2am. The elements of this story have been deemed accurate by our county mental health staff, professionals who do not oversee mental health treatment or confinement conditions in our antiquated jail. As I understand, this fact pattern was not an anomaly, but rather representational of the way our society treats (and further injures) the mentally ill. I want to assure you that these egregious shortcomings have been rectified, but regrettably, I cannot. Protecting public money is an important component of my role, but the opportunity for change through silence has lapsed. It’s now time to speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves.

More questions than answers at present.

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VOTERS who plan to vote at the polls this year, should bring their vote-by-mail ballot with them. If you arrive at the polls without your vote-by-mail ballot, you will have to vote provisionally, which requires filling out additional forms and placing the ballot in an envelop that is processed separately from regular ballots. If you are not registered to vote, you can register at the polls on election day and vote provisionally.

— County Poll Worker, Kathleen McKenna, Boonville

FOUR FELONY CONVICTIONS

Four felony-level defendants were sentenced this week in the Mendocino County Superior Court to state prison. 

The men are now in the queue at the Mendocino County Jail awaiting a decision by California Department of Corrections authorities to resume processing new inmates at state prisons. 

The felons sentenced this week were:

Joseph Phillip Hart, 46. He was living in the Spy Rock area of northern Mendocino County when arrested. Hart was sentenced Friday to five year in state prison after he was convicted by a jury of assault with a knife, a felony. The defendant's base sentence of 36 months was doubled because he admitted to having a prior Strike conviction.

Tylor Lauvale Ulugalu, 23, of Ukiah was sentenced Friday to five years in state prison after entering a guilty plea of unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor under the age of 16 years, a felony. The defendant's base sentence of 36 months was doubled because he admitted having a prior Strike conviction.

Randolph Paul Bisson, 65, of Covelo was sentenced Thursday to 13 years in state prison following his conviction by plea for assault with a firearm, a felony, and an admission that he personally used the firearm in the commission of the crime. The conviction is defined as a violent felony so any credits he may earn towards early release is limited to no more than 15% of the overall sentence.

Joel Jesus Ramos, 39, of Hopland was sentenced Wednesday to 24 months in state prison following his unsuccessful performance on supervised probation. The defendant was convicted by plea in May 2018 of vehicle theft and receiving stolen property (a motor vehicle), both felonies.

AT THE NAPA STATE HOSPITAL, a former medical director coined the term “Lake County Syndrome,” for the number of cases sent to the asylum with “co-occurring mental health and substance abuse” manifestations (not ever including natural enhancements of biologically-concurrent “cognitive impairment” from a variety of aging illness — compounding the medically diagnosable “mental” illnesses which, in any case must be proven to be “severe” in order to receive treatment — usually during an “involuntary hold” in a licensed psychiatric facility, which determines the fate of the individual based, we think, mostly on whether they are adequately categorizable in a DSM-defined mental health illness that is “billable”)....

WE HAVE WATCHED from our dusty remove the flailing and fighting and dithering of Mendocino County’s “Measure B” committee, and feel grateful to have its example to “lead” us. We are appreciative of the “patient” reporting by Messrs. Macdonald and Scaramella, leaving us perpetually aghast that functional and accountable public servants have not done even the most basic work to counter the inadequacy of our tax-payer funded, so-called “services.” It is understandable that many outsiders view our slough of despond as fertile ground for illegal and immoral exploitation of our fragile natural resources and easily plunderable governance systems. The “Peoples Temple” indeed. 

— Betsy Cawn

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ED NOTES

JOHN SCHARFFENBERGER is a man of many distinctions, among them major entrepreneurial successes in businesses as unlike as wine and chocolate. If contracting covid and defeating it had anything to do with initiative, the modest Philo man could rightfully claim that he got it, beat it on his own, and add the triumph to his impressive resume. And beat it he did to become the first resident of the Anderson Valley to go public with his dire experience. Our covid survivor forthrightly states that at his age, 69, and being HIV-positive, his pre-existing conditions put him high up on the covid hit list. On the plus side of the candidate ledger, this candidate does everything right. He was and is very fit and physically active. 

Take it away, John Scharffenberger: 

“I went with a friend to Colorado to get away from the constant isolation. We stayed a few days, hiking and biking and rafting and playing tennis. On my way back when I got off the plane I started feeling kinda crummy. I stayed in a hotel by myself in San Francisco and woke up with the worst fever I’ve ever had —102, 103. My friend got tested and came back positive. I think I got it from him because everyone on the plane was masked up and they were constantly wiping everything down.

“I got myself back up to Boonville where I jumped into bed with all my clothes on and stayed there for four days. I kept in touch with Kaiser’s covid line so I could be monitored by them. They like to do it this way to keep people out of the hospital. They were great. I didn’t have a sore throat or any of the other symptoms you hear about. My lungs were clear. The high, fever-like temperature was it, but it was bad enough. From the get-go I knew I wasn’t going to die from fever. 

“Basically I just sweated it out. People left me food, and a friend did my shopping. It was boring just lying there, drinking lots of water, eating peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. Kaiser told me no Ibuproffin or anything like that. I felt better after four days but I was weak and tired. I tested positive, which didn’t surprise me. The [County] Health Department called after I got tested, and kept on calling every other day for two weeks to do track and trace of who I might have been in contact with. I feel fine and I can travel now, but my immunity ends after four months. I feel incredibly lucky.

“My friend who tested positive has no symptoms, no nothing.”

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INTERESTING POINTS by one of our commenters: “The folks who first tried to paint Joe Biden as a doddering, addled, dementia-riddled incompetent are now trying to sell the idea that Biden is the head of a nefarious family of political gangsters deeply involved in Ukrainian corruption. The mind reels.

One another matter: The county’s purchase of the Best Western in Ukiah for unhoused citizens is a continuation of a trend since the 1980s of motels being converted to housing of some sort.

Almost all of the older motor court hotels that line State Street in Ukiah have been converted into permanent housing (I wouldn’t call them apartments).

The first ones I remember being converted was the Thunderbird and Marty’s Motel in the 1980s.

Now, a drive down State Street shows almost every old motor court type motel full of permanent residents.

The Woodlands Court, the Rose, the La Salle, the Travelers Inn, the Regency Inn, the Rancho Siesta, the National 8, the Royal Motel, part of the Discovery Inn, the Sunrise Inn, one right across from the BLM office on North State whose name I’ve forgotten, and a few others near the Forks such as the TopLak.

Everyone seems to have looked the other way as the lack of housing strained the community for years. Out of sight out of mind. Now that most of the old motels are full, there are few places for people without the means for a first/last/deposit to go.”

YES, there’s a county-wide housing shortage and, as the commenter points out, that shortage has been with us for years. Exacerbating it is the conversion of so many homes to tourist rentals. Much of the complaint about the Best Western buy arises from the term “homeless.” It’s become, to many, synonymous with a stereotypical free-range bum, psychotic, drug addicted when he isn’t drunk or everything in one reeling package. But there are more and more people out there who have been put out there by unhappy circumstance, not sloth or career deadbeatism. At least some of the currently homeless have HUD vouchers and income (low) but still can’t find shelter. If they get Best Western priority over the nightmare people the purchase, inflated price and all, won’t be the neighborhood wrecker lots of people assume it will be. 

AS HERB CAEN used to write, “Bumpersnicker” spotted in San Anselmo: “Senior voter not dead yet.”

PLANNING COMMISSION AGENDA for November 5, 2020, is posted on the department website at: mendocinocounty.org/government/planning-building-services/meeting-agendas/planning-commission

Please contact staff with any questions.

James F.Feenan
Commission Services Supervisor
Mendocino County Planning & Building Services
860 North Bush Street, Ukiah CA 95482
My Direct Line: (707) 234-6664
Main Line: (707) 234-6650

LEARNING OP

Have you always wanted to draw or paint?

I offer classes for all ages online through zoom, or inperson with Covid protocols in practice. With my flexible program, I will have you drawing and painting right away. I teach traditional methods that are tried and true. I welcome students from ages 8 years old to 80. If you ever wanted to try now is a great time. I charge $20 for an hour-long class and offer group discounts. I have a few time slots available. I would love to help you learn how to develop your skill set, along with pertinent life skills necessary to be creative. For references and more information contact me anytime. 

Thanks,

Gail Weissman, MFA

phone: 516-514-4708

website: http://www.gailweissmanart.com/

CATCH OF THE DAY, October 23, 2020

CARMEN ARENS, Ukiah. Disorderly conduct-alcohol, probation revocation.

EMMA BECHTOL, Fort Bragg. Domestic battery, probation revocation.

BRENDA CONDIOTTI-MCCLAIN, Santa Rosa/Ukiah. DUI-alcohol&drugs, suspended license, contempt of court.

JESSE DUBOIS, Redwood Valley. Disorderly conduct-alcohol, protective order violation, failure to appear.

PAULINE DUNGAN, Covelo. Protective order violation, probation revocation.

ALDEN LARVIE, Ukiah. Disorderly conduct-alcohol, vandalism, more than an ounce of pot, failure to appear, probation revocation.

ANTHONY ORR, Cloverdale/Laytonville. Probation revocation.

JEDIDIAH TODD, Potter Valley. Unspecified offense with $7,000 bond.

ZOLTAN VARGA, Eureka/Ukiah. DUI-alcohol&drugs, controlled substance.

MICHAEL WHETSTONE, Hopland. DUI.

JASON WOLFE, Comptche. More than six pot plants, felon-addict with firearm.

ON LINE COMMENT OF THE DAY

When you are standing atop the gallows with a noose around your neck the best you can hope for is that it is a new rope. 

Did you go along to get along your whole life?

“You’re the low information voter everyone is worried about.”

Are you OK with holding the world’s population hostage with the threat of being “bombed back to the middle ages” and pissed off about the Iranian hostage incident?

“You’re the low information voter everyone is worried about.”

Did you ever speak the phrase “creative destruction” in glowing terms?

“You’re the low information voter everyone is worried about.”

Do you believe your DNA is radically different to that of a Bonobo?

“You’re the low information voter everyone is worried about.”

Do you still use Facebook for any purpose”

Do you believe Oliver North is a noble and honorable purveyor of the truth?

Do you believe that Sarah Palin brought a valuable truth or insight into the United States political discussion?

Fifty six years after the Gulf of Tonkin fabrication do you still believe you have been told the truth about U.S. foreign policy?

Do you feel that Quantum Mechanics is B.S.?

no need to repeat the obvious

Luckily my name is not everyone, I am not worried.

Look!….. it’s mourning in America

KEVIN DRUM on Thursday Night’s Debate:

On policy, Trump doesn’t want to do anything about COVID-19. He doesn’t want to do anything about health care except repeal Obamacare. He doesn’t want to do anything about immigration. He doesn’t want to do anything about civil rights. And he doesn’t want to do anything about climate change. 

All he did was attack the stuff Biden wants to do. I suppose he thinks that after four years of Trump there’s nothing left to do.

This is not a debate that’s going to move the needle. Trump’s attacks were scattershot and ineffective—and even more full of lies than usual. Biden was mostly fine, but fairly mechanical. Overall, the whole thing was surprisingly low key.

A READER WRITES: At the end of Thursday night’s debate the moderate lady asked each candidate what they’d say at their inaugeration if elected. When it was Biden’s turn, my husband, remembering Gerald Ford’s statement upon pardoning Richard Nixon, shouted at the TV: “OUR LONG NATIONAL NIGHTMARE IS OVER!”

UKIAH DOWNTOWN STREETSCAPE PROJECT CONSTRUCTION UPDATE 

North State Street has its first new sidewalks! Please note that, on the day the new concrete is poured, access to front doors of businesses will be restricted. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause. The next day, however, businesses and pedestrians will have full use of the new, improved sidewalks! 

Unfortunately, several people have vandalized the new concrete already. We’ve been able to repair it each time, but that’s time spent that we’re not moving forward. We’re dedicating extra staff to monitor the areas where fresh concrete has been poured and will continue to do so. If you observe suspicious behavior around the construction site, please report it to the police department. 

New utility infrastructure continues to move forward on the south end, with sewer construction complete and water main work beginning. 

Construction Update - Week of October 26

North Side: Perkins to Henry Street 

Ghilotti Construction and their subcontractors will have completed the installation of irrigation and electric conduit along State Street, and will continue pouring the new sidewalks on the east side according to the following schedule: 

Monday: Pouring the sidewalk at the corner of Smith Street in front of Pure Blendz. 

Tuesday: Forming the corner and the sidewalk for the south side of the block between Standley and Perkins. 

Wednesday: Pouring concrete in the forms from Tuesday. 

Thursday: Forming the remainder of the block between Standley and Perkins. 

Friday: Pouring the rest of the block to Perkins Street. 

Starting Monday, November 2^nd, the work to install new sidewalks on the west side will begin, starting at Standley and working north to Henry. Details to follow. 

Work hours are from 7am to 5pm in this area this week; no night work is planned. 

South Side: Church to Mill Street 

Wahlund Construction continues the installation of the main water line between Mill and Seminary. The large pits in the street have been filled in, and now a trench is being dug for the water main. 

Monday-Friday: Main water line installation between Mill and Seminary. There will be an open trench along the west side of State Street, and some dust and noise associated with the trenching. 

Through traffic will be maintained on State Street during business hours, but there may be intermittent closures and detours between 6-7:30am; additionally, East and West Clay Street at State will be closed in the beginning of the week. 

Construction work will begin at 6 am in this area this week, and no night work is planned. 

As always, feel free to contact me directly with any questions or concerns you may have. Otherwise, have a great weekend!

Shannon Riley
Deputy City Manager, City of Ukiah
300 Seminary Avenue
Ukiah, California 95482
w: (707) 467-5793

BLEEDING OUT

by James Kunstler

“The difference between you and me,” Mr. Trump said to the ever more ghostly Joe Biden, fading mentally late in the action on the debate stage, “is that I’m not a politician and you are, and you’re a crooked politician.” Millions watching this spectacle might not have noticed, due to the media’s near-complete blackout of news detailing the Biden family’s adventures in systematic global moneygrubbing, but the Democratic candidate for president has political Ebola, a hemorrhagic fever of credibility, now gushing out of every pore and orifice.

Twitter and Facebook may try to squelch the story, but the evidence is all over the Internet now, like blood on a crime scene, in verifiable emails, texts, Snapchats, memoranda, and bank records that Ol’ White Joe Biden is at the center of a decades-long influence-peddling spree, selling his personal services to China, Russia, Ukraine, and any other country seeking favors in US government policy, and that this slime-trail of grift disqualifies him from holding high office as much as the irreversible rot of his cognitive abilities.

The “Laptop from Hell” affair has twelve more days to play out before the November 3 vote and the Democratic Party is in a terrible jam. Do they ask Mr. Biden to step aside, or do they keep running with him while the barrage of allegations and hard evidence pours down on them like so many mortar rounds on a besieged bunker? It’s obvious now that one way or another, voters are actually being asked to elect Kamala Harris president — but who asked for her? Only the disgraced and disabled head of the ticket, Joe Biden, desperate for a non-white running mate. Elsewise, she was so disliked by voters that she skulked out of the Iowa caucuses, ending her own run. Is Hillary ironing her purple pantsuit up in Chappaqua, awaiting the emergency call from her DNC?

The early 2020 impeachment gambit has finally blown up in the Democrats’ faces, too, as it’s now obvious the phony furor over Mr. Trump’s phone call to Ukraine President Zelensky was ginned up to smother any inquiry into Hunter Biden’s $83,000-a-month services to the Burisma gas company and its crooked chief, Mykola Zlochevsky, with help from then US Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch and several of her staff, as well as then Secretary of State John Kerry.

Interestingly, figures associated with Mr. Kerry (the 2004 Democratic party nominee), Devon Archer and Christopher Heinz (Mr. Kerry’s stepson) also happened to be business associates of Hunter Biden’s, and therefore the Biden family syndicate. Mr. Archer is currently under conviction, awaiting sentencing, on a federal securities fraud rap. If US attorneys out of the DOJ have any interest in talking to him, they have a lever to incentivize his testimony about many of the transactions involving Burisma in Ukraine and the Chinese companies that were funneling payments to the Bidens for “introductions” to US persons of influence.

The Democrats have a whole lot of bad behavior to defend, ranging far beyond the Bidens to the decades-long activities of the Clintons in their charity frauds, the related Uranium One matter — in which $150-million in Russian money found its way into the Clinton Foundation — and the deal that set up transfers of US secret computer tech to Russia’s Skolkovo project, which eventuated in Russia’s development of hypersonic weapons. Not to mention the RussiaGate coup operation to overthrow the president using false allegations supplied by Mrs. Clinton, the Democratic National Committee, and scores of high officials in a range of executive agencies.

Ironically many of those same schemers are at it again in the recent letter by a long list of former Intel spooks trying to discredit The New York Post’s reporting on Hunter Biden’s laptop as “having all the earmarks” of a Russian disinformation op. At the top of the list of that letter’s signers, you’ll find John Brennan, CIA chief under Obama, and James Clapper, former Director of National Intelligence – both of them progenitors of the RussiaGate coup and liable to prosecution for seditious conspiracy. Can you smell their desperation?

Something else may be turning now, though, on this titanic hairball of corruption and deceit: mainstream media reporters starting to jump into lifeboats to save their reputations by actually reporting honestly on developments in this web of stories. The few early adapters to truth-telling may be the only survivors. The ones who stick with the ship of deception are going down into cold and darkness. And if President Trump wins reelection — a possibility despite polling that, in many cases, is just propaganda — the public will learn exactly how the Democratic Party became the enemy of the people.

(Support Kunstler’s writing by visiting his Patreon Page.)

KEEP YOUR WITS

by Mark Lilla

It’s been four years now and you have not been yourself. You were no more prepared for Donald Trump’s election than anyone else was. It left you stupefied and outraged. It also left you with an unwelcome sense that you no longer knew your country.

You had grown accustomed to the right-wing road-rage media, though you never watched or listened to it. You knew the cast of characters from the Reagan and Bush years, and still fumed against those responsible for the Iraq wars. You knew that a significant chunk of the white working class had moved from left to right over the years, joining evangelicals, right-to-lifers, and gun fanatics as part of the Republican base. You had even read articles that tried to explain why that happened.

But the surge for Trump that carried him over the top didn’t come from the right. It came from below, from some dark American id you had no access to. The moment Trump took office your life changed. You followed the press conferences, which were unlike any you had ever seen. They felt like daily beatings, but still you submitted to them. You read the torrent of tweets coming out of the White House and watched the Saturday Night Live parodies, and shared the funniest ones with friends. Until they no longer seemed so funny. You obsessively checked MSNBC and Democracy Now! and Twitter, passing untold hours with people who were just as appalled and obsessed as you were. The Mueller investigation began and you were transfixed. Later, the impeachment trial. Both fizzled out without anything changing. The hyenas howled in celebration and the outrages continued. You slept badly.

Then, at a certain point, you gave up. You were tired of every conversation turning to Trump and everyone agreeing. Yes, even unanimity came to seem an embarrassing badge of impotence. The Republican Party, including members who had denounced Trump during the 2016 primaries, followed him zombie-like on his pillage-and-burn mission. Why? You had no idea. A pandemic hit the country, threatening their constituents, and they played it down. They promoted crackpot theories and medicines, and proudly went maskless in public. That was when you learned the useful term “vice signaling.” 

A group of armed jackasses in camouflage fatigues descended menacingly on the Michigan State Capitol to protest a mask mandate and roamed the marble halls with their assault rifles, unperturbed by the state police. Again, why? Fuck you, the mob explained.

On your laptop you saw a Black man, George Floyd, murdered by a police officer. You were aware that these things happened, but now you knew it in the marrow of your bones. And I was ashamed that it took me this long to get it. (Sorry, I meant “you.”) You were surprised and heartened to see Americans from every walk of life down in the streets to voice their disgust. Young people, old people, couples with kids in strollers. You were stunned that the protests actually forced a response by mayors and police chiefs across the country. Something was moving, and in the right direction. America, it seemed, was finally ready to address this. So you wondered whether you had been wrong about your country, whether the past four years in your little media bubble had skewed your vision.

MEMO OF THE AIR: Good Night Radio all night Friday night from Franklin Street again!

Hi. Marco here. Deadline to email your writing for tonight's (Friday night's) MOTA show is a little early, around 6pm. After that, send it whenever it's ready, up to 7pm Friday next week, and I'll read it next week, then. You can put this off forever if you want to. There's zero pressure, so no-one can hear you scream. Go ahead, try. See? Memo of the Air: Good Night Radio is every Friday, 9pm to 5am on 107.7fm KNYO-LP Fort Bragg as well as there and anywhere else via http://airtime.knyo.org:8040/128 (If that shows up for you as plain text and not a link, just paste it into your browser. That's the regular link to listen to KNYO in real time.) 

And any time of any day or night you can go to https://MemoOfTheAir.wordpress.com and hear last week's show and shows before that. By Saturday night the recording of tonight's MOTA will also be there, in the latest post, right on top.

I did say Franklin Street again. But I won't be entertaining in-person visitors. I'd love to, and we could sit far apart, but my day job has me around health-risk danger-age people and I'd rather not kill them. If you want to call in and safely read your work on the radio in your own voice, the number of the Franklin Street studio is 707-962-3022. And/or you can drive through spooky COVID-and-depression-boarded-up downtown Fort Bragg and honk your horn. That gets into the mic, just like all the years the bar next door was running and people would bark drunken laughter and swear bitterly at each other out front, occasionally bounce their antagonist's head off the doorjamb, and gun their motorcycle motor BROOMM! BROOMMM! to signal to potential mates how big and fat and powerful they are, and insinuate what wonderful organ donors they will become. 

Also, at https://MemoOfTheAir.wordpress.com there's a cluttered squat of items of arguably educational value to rummage through until showtime, such as:

Casual improv Trump impersonator's latest selfie stroll. https://boingboing.net/2020/10/21/trump-impressionist-decries-scooby-doos-unwarranted-star-billing.html

The traumatic life of Ernest Hemingway shouted by a puppet in 3.5 minutes. https://laughingsquid.com/puppet-tells-life-story-of-ernest-hemingway/

And fifteen ways to cook a hotdog besides boiling it. I recommend using chicken hotdogs or rather more expensive Polish-dogs. The regular cheap beef-pork-mystery hotdogs just taste off anymore, and it's not just me. Everyone says so. Turkey hotdogs, like turkey meatballs and turkey bacon, have always been concentrated vomit, in my opinion. https://www.bitsandpieces.us/2020/10/20/13-recipes-for-hot-dog-lovers/

— Marco McClean, memo@mcn.org, https://MemoOfTheAir.wordpress.com

IT WAS ACTUALLY BLISTERS that turned my career around. Going to spring training in 1951 I’d never hit .300 in the big leagues. But I got bad blisters on my hands. Rather than lose my turn in the batting cage, I choked up on the bat like you would do in pepper, 3-4 inches, and just tried making contact with the ball. All of a sudden, I started hitting line drives wherever I wanted to. I thought, “What the heck? What happened?” All of a sudden I had become a credible hitter. It was sheer luck, how it came about, but now I had complete control of the bat; the bat didn’t control me. I could put the bat just where I wanted to, not like the big hitters who hold it on the end and can’t get any consistency. Consistency is the name of the game; it turned my career around. I thought, “Well, as long as this is working, I’ll stay with it.” I hit .344 that year and led the league.

— Ferris Fain

FOUND OBJECT