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VERY MINIMAL chance of isolated showers over high terrain early today. Cool and moist weather will stick around for a couple days before gradually heating up into mid next week. (NWS)
STEPHEN DUNLAP (Fort Bragg): A foggy 55F this Sunday morning on the coast. No rain yesterday but it sure was warm & muggy. Our familiar patchy fog routine continues until further notice.
AUGUST 16TH FORT BRAGG PROTEST
Great turnout today, I counted around 200 people. (Susan Nutter)
More photos by Bob Dominy: https://flic.kr/s/aHBqjCqZjA
BODY AT REGGAE FEST ID’D AS VENDOR - MAN WAS FROM SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA AND REGULARLY ATTENDED MUSIC EVENT
The Mendocino County Sheriff’s Office has identified a man who apparently drowned along the south fork of the Eel River early this month. The sheriff’s office confirmed that they recovered the body of Robert Samuel James, a 66-year-old man from Los Angeles who had traveled to the area to attend the Reggae on the River festival hosted by the Mateel Community Center in Redway.
Mendocino Sheriff’s Captain Captain Quincy Cromer told the Times-Standard that there was no evidence of criminal involvement or ‘foul play’ and that the preliminary coroner’s report determined that drowning had been the cause of death. That determination is pending the results of a toxicology report, and Cromer said that those reports typically take six to eight weeks as the relatively small county’s pathologist sends samples to a lab in Central California.
James was apparently a regular attendee of Reggae on the River.
‘He had travelled from L.A., together with … a friend or acquaintance as vendors,’ Cromer said, but he said that from property recovered by the sheriff’s office and interviews with that friend, it was unclear what James’ involvement — formal or informal — with the event was. Cromer said that from interviews with James’ friend, the sheriff’s office had gathered that James routinely visited Redway for Reggae on the River.
James’ body was recovered from the Eel River on Aug. 2. At that time, a missing persons report had been issued for a woman who had disappeared from Reggae on the River early that morning. That woman was later found safe in a neighboring community.
Cromer confirmed that no missing persons report had ever been received about James, though he noted that the Reggae on the River festival is “very much a Humboldt County event” on the cusp of Mendocino County and that the organizers of the event are “extremely involved” and very proactive in terms of addressing concerns that don’t rise to the level of a serious criminal infraction.
Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office Lieutenant Jesse Taylor confirmed that HCSO had also not received an reports of James’ disappearance.
Nick Riley, a spokesperson for the Mateel Community Center, provided the following statement: “We are saddened by the discovery of a deceased individual in the South Fork of the Eel River, upstream from the Reggae on the River festival site. Our condolences go out to the family and friends affected, and we are cooperating with the appropriate authorities as they continue their work. We are awaiting information from the proper authorities before commenting further.”
(Eureka Times Standard)
NEW RULES LIMIT VINEYARD RUNOFF IN MENDOCINO COUNTY TO PROTECT WATERWAYS
by Sydney Fishman
The North Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board has approved an order that recently went into effect to limit the amount of waste discharged by commercial vineyards in both Mendocino and Sonoma counties.
The order, called the General Waste Discharge Requirements for Commercial Vineyards, is a policy designed to protect local rivers and streams, groundwater supplies and aquatic species by regulating runoff from an estimated 65,000 acres of commercial vineyards.
The North Coast Water Board is an autonomous agency representing the North Coast with its main office located in Santa Rosa. Its goal is to protect surface and groundwater sources to ensure water quality meets environmental and public health standards.
The board currently consists of five members appointed by the governor and confirmed by the state Senate, as well as a large group of staff members consisting of geologists, environmental scientists, and other experts who work on monitoring water sources, enforcing compliance and preventing water pollution.
Brenna Sullivan, an engineering geologist with the water board and a member of the group that drafted the waste discharge order, said in an interview that the creation of a vineyard regulatory order has been a long time in the making.
For more than a decade, the water board has been brainstorming ways to fairly regulate different sectors of agriculture, such as cannabis farms, cattle ranches and commercial vineyards.
Finally, in 2021, North Coast Water Board staff created a technical advisory group to develop the preliminary language needed to draft a regulatory order. The group included vineyard operators, environmental advocates and community organizations. The first draft of the order was released in June 2023, along with a draft environmental impact report.
This June, the water board voted to approve the waste discharge order. According to Sullivan, there is a 30-day petition period for affected parties to challenge the order, so the policy did not formally go into effect until last month.
The waste discharge order will largely protect the Navarro, Russian River, and Gualala watersheds. According to the water board, most of the North Coast’s commercial vineyards are near these water sources.
Sullivan explained that commercial vineyards are a huge source of pollution in the North Coast. One of the main pollutants released from vineyards into local waterways is sediment. Sediment can harm aquatic habitats, block sunlight that aquatic plants need to grow, and carry pesticides and heavy metals that degrade water quality.
“In the Russian River Watershed and the Navarro Watershed they are impaired for sediment, and so the main concern around vineyards is the erosion and sediment loss from storms,” Sullivan said. “This is related to the soil of vineyards. This is sort of what the order targets in relation to sediment in watersheds, which is harmful to sensitive species like coho salmon.”
However, commercial vineyards sometimes push back against new regulations in an already difficult economic climate. Over the past several years, the California wine industry has faced rising costs due to the COVID-19 pandemic, uncertainty over supply chain issues and the impact of tariffs imposed by President Donald Trump.
“I think the vineyard industry has been facing tough economic times, so any regulatory action is going to add costs for vineyard owners and businesses throughout the region,” Sullivan said. “I also want to note that the vineyard industry, particularly over the last couple of decades since our region started scoping these agricultural orders, has made a lot of voluntary improvements.”
According to Sullivan, vineyard operators will need to register with the North Coast Water Board to comply with the order. Information on how to enroll and other materials will be available on the board’s website once the enrollment period begins. Vineyard operators will not have to begin enrolling until July 1, 2028. Operators that have vineyards of 5 acres or less are not required to register.
Commercial vineyard operators will need to manage erosion and maintain road systems to prevent sediment discharge.
Overall, while the new order won’t require major changes from growers, it will require some additional labor to stay in compliance.
“For a number of vineyard owners in our region, implementing this order won’t require major changes, particularly for those who have already taken voluntary steps. For some, it could mean additional work and expenses to shore up their sites,” Sullivan said.
(BayCityNews.com)
UKIAH SHELTER PET OF THE WEEK
Marshmallow is a friendly, mellow, fluffy adult Husky, who found his way to the shelter as a stray. He’s a gentle giant, affectionate with people and amiable indoors. Marshmallow lived with another dog in the past and walks well on a leash. He’s very well-behaved and already knows the command for ‘sit’. Marshmallow is a big boy who will need lots of grooming to keep his fluffy coat clean and lustrous. If you’re looking for a sweet and playful canine companion who likes to cuddle, Marshmallow is the guy for you! Marshmallow is 5 years old and 65 pounds.
For information about all of our adoptable dogs and cats and our services, programs, and events, visit: mendoanimalshelter.com.
Join us the first Saturday of every month for our Meet The Dogs Adoption Event.
For information about adoptions please call 707-467-6453. Making a difference for homeless pets in Mendocino County, one day at a time!
NORM THURSTON (former Auditor staffer, former Sheriff’s financial officer):
The Major’s reporting on the upcoming resolution sponsored by the Auditor-Controller-Treasurer-Tax Collector (ACTTC) is excellent. He clearly got the concept that pooling of cash can cover shortfalls by funds that could not otherwise pay their bills. This is not smoke-and-mirrors, it is a legitimate tool authorized in the State Constitution. There is valid concern about how this situation came about, but the fact that this resolution is going to the Board is an encouraging sign. It means the ACTTC has identified a problem with sufficient detail to allow her to take steps to correct it. Ultimately, making each negative balance whole again may be a tough chore. For simple timing differences between the outflow and inflow of funds that occur in the road funds is not difficult, you just have to bridge that gap. More challenging will be overdrawn funds for which there is no anticipated reimbursement or revenues. Those will have to be made whole, possibly at County expense. But as someone who has some experience in this arena, I think the ACTTC is headed in the right direction.
AV EVENTS (today/tomorrow)
AV Village & AV Historical Society Presents: Dean Titus & the Coyote Cowboys
Sun 08 / 17 / 2025 at 1:00 PM
Where: Anderson Valley Historical Museum , 12340 Highway 128, Boonville
More Information (https://andersonvalley.helpfulvillage.com/events/4817)
Preparation For the Rest of Our Lives Book Club
Mon 08 / 18 / 2025 at 1:00 PM
Where: Private Address, please log in to see more
More Information (https://andersonvalley.helpfulvillage.com/events/4602)
JV & VARSITY VOLLEYBALL Lady Panthers
(Coach Brianna Ferreyra)
MENDOCINO COUNTY FAIR Exhibitor’s Guide Book 2025
https://mendocountyfair.com/exhibitors-guide-book-2025/
MAGDALENA HOMES OPEN HOUSE, WITH PALETAS!
Magdalena’s Open House on Friday, August 22 will include paletas/popsicles from a wonderful shop in Ukiah! The event starts at 5:00 PM at 17700 Boonville Rd, Boonville, CA 95415 (the Anderson Valley Brewing Co.).
Jean, Hernando and Felipe, and the rest of the Magdalena team, are looking forward to seeing you!
DANCE THE REDWOODS
Sink into the rhythm and flow of the redwood forest and watch dancers soar amongst the forest. Mendocino Dance Project’s 2025 Dance The Redwoods performance is a walking show through the spectacular event space at The Brambles in Philo, CA. Visit several performance sites where the redwoods become the stage and offer one of nature’s most beautiful venues. This year’s show will include musical guests Barb Murphy and Steven Bates.
- Saturday, September 20 / 2pm-3pm
- Sunday, September 21 / 2pm-3pm
- Saturday, September 27 / 4pm-8pm (Show PLUS special Gala Dinner and Silent Auction)
- Sunday, September 28 / 2pm-3pm
Tickets range from $20-$130
Get your tickets today!
https://mendocinodanceproject.ticketspice.com/dance-the-redwoods-2025
Visit mendocinodanceproject.org for more information about our non-profit organization.
TRIMMING SEASON
An elegy for the heyday of California's Emerald Triangle
by Valen Lambert
An estimated 15,000 illicit farms once operated behind the Redwood Curtain, with a pound of weed selling for upwards of $8,000.
My friend was bound together with the other trimmers on the floor of the barn, and left there half-naked without food, water, or toilet…
Out here, this green earth will swallow anything whole. Consider a felled coastal redwood, one of the largest and heartiest living organisms on earth, breaking down into the dank forest duff and disappearing into the understory. The desert tells time in dust, water through shape. The forest expresses itself in rot.
On my way to Willow Creek, a marijuana nirvana in the mountains above Arcata, I drive past forgotten properties tucked into the darkness of trees. They’re littered with broken-down cars and RVs, abandoned doublewides and graffitied trailers — the collective detritus of old pot farms slowly sinking into the earth. Discarded fuel cans, box fans, grow lights, the skeletal remains of retired PVC greenhouses and five-gallon buckets. Dappled sunlight interrogates the roadside debris.
And these old farms are just the ones I can see from the road. But don’t worry, the rest are being viewed from above, by the ever-present law-enforcement helicopters and drones. They used to pepper these hillsides by the hundreds, these quaint, herbal hamlets. But that was before legalization and its slew of regulations.
This part of Humboldt County is a two-hour drive down the coast from the Oregon border; too north for “California,” too south for the Pacific Northwest, estranged enough to have spiritually seceded, alongside parts of southern Oregon, into its own territory dubbed the State of Jefferson. It’s a region scarred by a long economic history of boom and bust. For a quick stint in the mid-1800s, the California Gold Rush brought thousands of prospectors who spread news of the abundant, durable, insect-resistant lumber of Sequoia sempervirens, or the coastal redwood. When commercial logging started in the 1860s, it took loggers up to a week to fell just one tree with a handsaw. Some of these trees boasted diameters of up to 30 feet.
By the end of the 1960s, with the later help of chainsaws and bulldozers and junk bond investors and corporate raiders, 95 percent of the 1.9 million acres of old-growth redwood forests in the region had been logged. So enterprising West Coasters found another tree to harvest, this one being an annual crop that’s cultivatable at scale: Mary Jane.
During the Summer of Love, Humboldt properties were selling for a few hundred dollars an acre and back-to-the-landers arrived en masse to escape the drudge of polite society and the soon-to-be burnt-out Haight-Ashbury scene. Turns out that hippies love weed, so they cultivated marijuana in their vegetable gardens, which were protected by the space and privacy granted by the remaining coastal redwoods. Fortunately for the hippies, a lot of other people love weed too, and these Humboldt homesteaders made enough money with their cannabis crops to fund local schools, clinics, radio stations, fire departments, and community centers. Money did grow on trees, for a time, in abundance.
After spending most of the 1960s formulating utopian ideals over joint rotations, these hippies finally had the land and the capital to realize their visions, transforming Humboldt from the final frontier of the Wild West to a bastion of DIY freedom. These communities grew and prospered via mutual aid in an otherwise lawless place; the dejected old logging towns became cultural hubs of isolated yet communal living.
And weed was the heart of the Emerald Triangle — the Humboldt, Trinity, and Mendocino counties of remote Northern California — spurring the Green Rush. As word spread throughout the years, people from all over the world took to the hills to bank in, including Chinese, Bulgarian, Russian, and Mexican cartels. At its peak, the “redwood curtain” made it possible for an estimated 15,000 illicit farms to operate in the region’s mountainous, forested expanse. A single farm could grow hundreds, if not thousands, of pounds of weed, each pound selling upwards of $8,000 during its peak in the mid-90s and $3,000 in the aughts. Hundreds of millions of dollars breezed through Humboldt each year, in cash, to then be locked in safes or buried deep in the forest. Such was life in the Klamath Mountains, and everyone wanted a slice.
In the early 2010s, not yet old enough to drink, I’d catch a Greyhound up Highway 101 to work on these farms during the twilight of the Green Rush. It was a part of alternative life on the West Coast: Young seasonal workers “trimmed” the flowers into presentable buds for smoking, after the great dopamine trees had first been chopped down and bucked into workable form during harvest. I’d stare out the bus window and watch the golden hills of the Central Coast roll into the oaks and madrones of the Bay Area, until they gave way to the thick Humboldt redwoods. Growing up in San Diego, it was as far and as different as I could get from home while remaining in the same state — a whole 14-hour drive north.
The growing season for marijuana begins around March, when farmers plant their first starts. They then nurture the plants until harvest in October and November, when trimming picks up in earnest. Back in the day, trimming work was so abundant in these Northern California mountain towns you could pick it up off the street most anytime during the fall, and so I’d make my Greyhound pilgrimage each autumn, with a dozen other dirtbags looking to earn some under-the-table cheddar. They’d pile out in Ukiah, Willits, Laytonville, Garberville, Rio Dell, Eureka, or Arcata to sit around with their backpacks at the gas station, waiting to get picked up, sleeping in the forest until work landed. It was the perfect way to fund a life without commitments. Growing up in the suburbs, it felt to me like the freedom of some forgotten past.
I’d hop off the bus in any one of these towns, depending on where my farm was that season, and a friend of a friend of a friend would pick me up and drive me some hours up a dirt road into the hills, through a series of locked gates, beyond which I would camp out, work long hours, and party with a bunch of other nomadic twenty-somethings and fellow trimmigrants from all over the world.
Those days, before legalization, you’d make $300 for each pound of pot you could trim, paid in cash at the end of your tour of duty. If you were fast and the buds were dense, you could trim a few pounds each day while sitting in a redwood forest beside a sparkling blue river, listening to a combination of audio books, folk music, and the lovingly elaborated conspiracy theories of the other trimmers. After a couple weeks, you’d ride off the mountain with thousands of dollars in a wad of small bills, a big bag of weed, a few new friends, maybe a lover or two, and carry on with your life.
For those who grew up in Humboldt, weed was the lifeblood keeping their families and their neighbors afloat. My close friends from Arcata, a two-stoplight town on the Humboldt coastline, recall the children of local weed barons driving Cadillacs to high school, counting out their hundreds in class, and throwing parties at their grow mansions in the hills. This wealth didn’t express itself in the way that I was used to — SoCal’s privileged youth flaunting cocaine, convertibles, and backyard swimming pools with waterslides. While Humboldt’s pot growers were profiting to the tune of millions of dollars each year, it was often by wearing steel toes and Carhartt suspenders, driving F-250s, playing the mandolin, raising goats, and living in the boonies.
Humboldt was single-handedly getting most of the nation stoned; people got rich, communities were built. But the country folk didn’t care much for frills. Things were just fine as long as you were sheltered from the violence and exploitation that was an invariable byproduct of the trade. In the local mountain bar down the road from any one of these farms, we’d hear of busts on human trafficking, sexual abuse, and the occasional murder. Per capita, Humboldt has the highest missing person rate in the state, earning itself the nickname “the black hole,” and a well-known area near the Mendocino border which earned the title of “murder mountain.”
The darkness always felt far enough away from where I sat at the trimming table. Still, depending on your corner of the mountain range, you’d wake up to the “morning warnings” — a conversation in automatic gunfire echoing through the valleys. A daily don’t fuck with us, something I came to respect as warranted.
It wasn’t uncommon for the cartels to raid profitable farms toward the end of trimming season, once the labor was complete and the product was ready for market. Such was the fate of my hippy friend’s farm in 2014:
A Mexican cartel rammed through their locked gates in a surge of SUVs before dawn; stripped and hog-tied everyone at gunpoint; shot the guard dogs; stole all the trimmed buds, guns, and money they could find; and left all the farm laborers zip-tied together, alive — deliberate in their decision not to kill anyone so as not to draw unnecessary attention to the heist. My friend was left there, bound together with the other trimmers on the floor of the barn, half-naked, without food or water or toilet, for two whole days before another friend rolled up and discovered them all cuddled together for warmth. Hence, the morning warnings.
Some seasons later I was trimming on a farm in Petrolia — a place so isolated that the Church of Scientology elected it as the home of an underground vault, secured by guards and fortified to endure any direct hit short of a nuclear bomb, to safeguard the writings and recordings of its founder, L. Ron Hubbard. But that’s a story for another day. The grower opened his safe one afternoon to find $50,000 in cash was missing; in its place was a single blue latex glove, the same kind trimmers often wear to avoid covering their hands in the bud’s sticky residue. For days, everyone on the farm was intensely questioned, if not accused. None of us were permitted to leave until he completed his interrogations. The grower never found out who did it; I cashed out and left that week, deciding finally that my time would be better spent on a strawberry farm.
Proposition 64 was a voter initiative to legalize weed in California, and it passed in November of 2016 with 57 percent support. Legalizing recreational sensimilla appealed to stoners and squares alike: removing the risk of the fuzz impinging on their buzz, while taxing revenues to fund public services. People loved the idea of shorter prison sentences for marijuana-related charges, new environmental protections, and the right to get stoned out of their gourds without fear of arrest. Prop 64’s biggest backer was billionaire Sean Parker, founder of Napster and Facebook’s first president, who ultimately contributed $8.9 million dollars to the campaign. Serving as its spokesperson was Jason Kinney, a man famously known for eating that scandalous dinner with Gavin Newsom — for whom he is a longtime friend, confidante, and adviser — at the beginning of COVID in Napa’s opulent French Laundry, and for being the head of Sacramento’s largest lobbying firm.
Farmers were skeptical of these bigwig intentions brewing in the state capitol, but were promised an honorarium if they came out into the open with their growing operations and became compliant with the new legislation; the carrot being a five-year head start to continue growing their weed at scale, legally, before corporate cultivation invariably came in to gobble them up. We’ll go out with a bang, they thought, and public support was handily rallied. In December of 2017, a month before the law was meant to take effect, the smaller farmers were betrayed when the state lifted the one-acre cap that was supposed to limit corporate growers for the first five years.
What followed was practically unlimited cultivation by big companies who took advantage of the industry these legacy farmers had built and profited from for decades. The selling price of a pound of pot plummeted from $3,000 to just $200 in a single growing season, collapsing the regional economy in the snap of a bong rip. The small farmers who came into compliance and invested their life savings in legal pot were met with a complete market collapse — and stuck paying up to $30,000 a year in trimming licenses, distribution licenses, transportation licenses, lawyers, consultants, compliance land modivications… and often penalized 50 percent of the licensing cost if they were late to pay by a single day. That was in addition to the tens of thousands of dollars that now needed to be spent each year on permitting, environmental impact statements, and state taxes.
By 2021, there were just 975 independently owned legal grow operations surviving in Humboldt. Today, that number has dropped to about 600. While traditional outdoor farmers with a few acres to their name had shelled out their savings to comply with the California Environmental Quality Act, big corporate indoor grows were popping up all over Southern California, spanning hundreds of acres, and relying on massive amounts of energy to power the fans, lights, and watering systems that kept their plants blooming, agnostic of the seasons.
Whatever people had voted for, they had been served up yet another example of corporate America snuffing small businesses and sucking the soul out of a product rooted in counterculture. It had only been a matter of time, but nobody could have anticipated the fallout of it all. Along that old Greyhound route, the main strips of those mountain towns are gutted, their storefronts boarded up and abandoned once more.
Dave and Lorelei’s farm in Willow Creek is one of the remaining legal farms cultivating cannabis in Humboldt County. They’re distinct, in that they’ve been growing legally since the late 90s under Proposition 215 (allowing the cultivation and use of medical marijuana in California, a whole other can of worms). The Prop 64 transition wasn’t as brutal for them as it was for others, though I know it hurt them too.
If we’ve learned anything, it’s that the redwood forest is a great place to hide. As such, it is also the chosen territory of the elusive Bigfoot. Willow Creek (“Bigfoot Capital of the World”) sits along the Trinity River and is the proud home of a Bigfoot museum, where one can find an impressive collection of large cast footprints.
(County Highway)
MENDOCINO COUNTY WAY BACK WHEN (via Ron Parker)
CATCH OF THE DAY, Saturday, August 16, 2025
SETH COSTA, 22, Ukiah. Disobeying court order, failure to appear.
EMILY DOURIDAS, 25, Willits. Domestic battery.
GRACE GHANEM, 28, Pine Grove/Ukiah. DUI-any drug, paraphernalia.
NATALIE HAYDEN, 19, Ukiah. Battery.
URSULA HEGGER, 60, Ukiah. Controlled substance with two or more priors, paraphernalia.
EDARDO SANCHEZ, 28, Ukiah. Loaded handgun not registered owner, ammo possession, felon-addict with firearm.
BRANDON WHITMAN, 25, Ukiah. Robbery, cruelty to child with infliction of injury, domestic violence court order violation, resisting.
JON KENNEDY (Potter Valley)
Some California Republicans are melting down over new district maps, clutching pearls about Modoc County being paired with Marin County, as if the job of a state legislator is to only represent people who look and think exactly like them.
Newsflash: California isn’t a collection of isolated fiefdoms. Wealthier, more populated areas help fund the less wealthy, and rural areas often provide the water, resources, and food the rest of the state needs. Having two wildly different regions in one district isn’t a flaw, it’s a chance to broaden your understanding and make decisions for the whole state. That’s what the job is.
I remember then, Assemblyman Brian Dahle, a Republican, talking about how proud he was to work across the aisle, even visiting SoCal officials to build relationships. That’s what leadership used to look like. Somewhere after 2016, he, and a lot of others, seemed to lose that spirit. Wonder what happened then…?
And let’s be honest, this “how dare they?” outrage isn’t about geography. California is responding to an attack from other states, pushed by MAGA politicians who are openly trying to rig political maps nationwide to lock in power and dismantle decades of progress since the 1960s, civil rights, environmental protections, voting access, you name it.
If your argument is “we have nothing in common,” maybe the problem isn’t the map. Maybe it’s you.
MEMO OF THE AIR: Marching down Broadway again.
/’We’ll all give a hand, as they march by the stand, for those wonderful hee-roes that finished Japan.’/
Marco here. Here’s the recording of last night’s (9pm PDT, 2025-08-15) 8-hour-long Memo of the Air: Good Night Radio show on 107.7fm KNYO-LP Fort Bragg (CA) and also, for the first three hours, on 89.3fm KAKX Mendocino, ready for you to re-enjoy in whole or in part: https://tinyurl.com/KNYO-MOTA-0657
Coming shows can feature your own story or dream or poem or essay or kvetch or announcement. Just email it to me. Or send me a link to your writing project and I’ll take it from there and read it on the air.
Besides all that, at https://MemoOfTheAir.wordpress.com you’ll find a fresh batch of dozens of links to not-necessarily radio-useful but worthwhile items I set aside for you while gathering the show together, such as:
Frank Zappa’s extemporized anti-drug PSAs. If anyone ever showed up high for rehearsal, they’d be out of the band in a blink and no return. One time at a concert, somebody threw a beer bottle at the stage. Frank Zappa stopped everything. The whole hall went quiet. He said, ‘We are not playing another note until the MFer who threw that is outta here.’ https://dangerousminds.net/music/enjoy-frank-zappas-emphatic-anti-drugs-psas
Alcohol, a global catastrophe. https://laughingsquid.com/how-alcohol-affects-human-body/
Profile of a lady wrestler. (25 min.) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sdr5jxaSPzA
And for VJ Day, which was yesterday, Harry Nilsson - Marching Down Broadway Again. (‘Guam!’) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PjwXoWdhtVg
Marco McClean, [email protected], https://MemoOfTheAir.wordpress.com
GIANTS BLOW JUSTIN VERLANDER’S GEM as Rays hand them 7th straight loss
by Shayna Rubin
Amid a grueling stretch at Oracle Park, the San Francisco Giants have been desperate for a bit of good luck. Given starter Justin Verlander’s unlucky season thus far, odds were stacked against them for Saturday against the Tampa Bay Rays.
Every so often the 42-year-old Verlander flashes a vintage performance, as he did through a season-high seven shutout innings spinning a snappy slider he’d tweaked to its next iteration of perfection during a bullpen session between starts. He left with a one-run lead and a second win of the year in hand, but the bad-luck bug came back to bite.
The Giants’ bullpen, operating depleted since the trade deadline, surrendered the slim lead in the eighth inning to hand San Francisco a 2-1 loss. The loss extends the Giants’ losing streak to seven straight games, a season high. It ensured the Giants lost their sixth consecutive home series, something this franchise hasn’t done since 2008.
The loss is also the sixth time this season Verlander has been in line for a win when he departed a start, only for the team to blow the lead and his chances to take one step closer toward the 300 win club. With the Giants, he’s gotten just one win in 21 starts. That quest alone isn’t bogging Verlander’s mind, but also the highs and lows he’s navigated in his 20th season as the Giants plummet.
“I have fun with the guys on this team. We have a great group of people,” Verlander said. “I’ve enjoyed every moment we’ve experienced on the field and in the locker room. On the field it’s been a struggle.”
San Francisco’s historic meltdown is an odd contrast to Verlander’s quest to wade through the misery for his own individual achievement. Not just the 300 win club, but his ascent in the all-time strikeout leaderboard. An odd moment happened in the fifth inning when Verlander struck out Ha-Seong Kim looking at a sweeper and the Oracle Park video board operators put up a graphic congratulating him. It was his 3,510th career strikeout, passing Hall of Famer Walter Johnson for ninth most in major league history. Verlander looked back at the board as the Oracle Park crowd cheered his accomplishment — they’d had little to cheer for up until that point.
Johnson’s 3,509 strikeout count, though, is by Baseball Reference’s account. The Elias Sports Bureau’s official count has Johnson at 3,515, which means six strikeouts over Johnson’s 21-year career between 1907 and 1927 were lost in translation. Verlander added one more strikeout to get to 3,511 — so he’ll be in statistical discrepancy limbo until he passes the 3,515 mark.
“I guess the guy keeping track back then was by hand,” Verlander said.
Unhelpful to Verlander on the win front is the minuscule run support he’s gotten this year — his 38 runs of support are second fewest to Colorado’s Antonio Senzatela among all starters with at least 20 starts this year — and Saturday was much of the same. Christian Koss’ RBI single through the gap in short, scoring Willy Adames in the sixth inning, was the only one he’d have to work with.
Verlander’s four-seam fastball sung and his slider had just the right bite to generate eight strikeouts and 14 swing-and-misses. He needed 88 pitches to get through seven, allowing two hits.
“That was his best stuff of the year,” manager Bob Melvin said. “He pitched really well here the last month, but that was as good as he’s pitched. He didn’t walk anybody. Punched out eight. Got lots of swing and misses. When you’re pitching that well at the end of the year there’s a lot of hard work involved to get to this point. A lot of tinkering.”
Because it was the first time he’d gone beyond the sixth, there was no conversation between coaching staff and veteran to have Verlander pitch an eighth inning for the first time since Sept. 25, 2023 despite a relatively light workload. He threw 101 and 100 pitches in his previous two starts.
Reliever Jose Butto surrendered the lead with a Rays two-out rally. It began when Butto hit nine-hitter Nick Fortes with a pitch and gained fuel when home plate umpire Dan Iassogna ejected manager Kevin Cash for arguing balls and strikes. Then, Chandler Simpson singled and Yandy Diaz knocked in the tying run. Against Matt Gage, Brandon Lowe hit the go-ahead single.
Briefly: Infielder Casey Schmitt, hit by a pitch in Friday’s loss, underwent an X-Ray on his injured wrist and results came back clean. He’s expected to be back in the lineup on Monday or Tuesday.
(sfchronicle.com)
49ERS BEAT RAIDERS BEHIND JAKE MOODY’S FIVE FGS, BUT DOMINICK PUNI, COREY KINER HURT
by Eric Branch
LAS VEGAS — Quarterback Brock Purdy and wide receiver Ricky Pearsall flashed excellent chemistry on the game-opening drive Saturday.
And that’s unquestionably the best news to come from the San Francisco 49ers‘ possibly costly 22-19 preseason win against the Raiders at Allegiant Stadium.
The 49ers arrived with an inordinate number of injuries, with 18 players on their 90-man roster sidelined after Thursday’s joint practice with the Raiders, and they quickly added to their attrition. Starting right guard Dominick Puni was quickly ruled out when offensive lineman Matt Hennessy was blocked into his right knee on a field-goal attempt. Undrafted rookie running back Corey Kiner was carted off with an ankle injury, potentially ending his strong push to make the 53-man roster. In addition, running back Patrick Taylor was ruled out at halftime after he suffered a shoulder injury on the opening possession.
Puni, a 2024 third-round pick, was ruled out after he was injured while blocking on Jake Moody’s 30-yard field goal that capped the 49ers’ opening drive. He was able to walk off without assistance after he was hurt.
If Puni’s injury is significant, it would be a significant issue for the 49ers, whose top backups at the position are rookie seventh-round pick Connor Colby and Nick Zakelj, a 2022 sixth-round pick with two career starts.
Last year, Puni played 1,078 of 1,079 snaps, allowed three sacks, earned Pro Football Focus’ fifth-highest grade (80.5) among qualifying guards and was named to the Pro Football Writers of America’s all-rookie team.
Meanwhile, Kiner was carted off after his left leg twisted awkwardly near the end of a 19-yard run in the second quarter. Without Kiner, and with All-Pro Christian McCaffrey in street clothes, the 49ers were left with two available running backs: Ke’Shawn Vaughn and Jeff Wilson. Both Vaughn and Wilson have been signed in the past week to assume spots in a banged-up backfield. The 49ers entered Saturday’s game with Issac Guerendo (shoulder) and rookie fifth-round pick Jordan James (finger) unavailable.
Meanwhile, Moody made 5 of 6 field-goal attempts, drilling a game-winning 59-yard kick as time expired after making a game-tying 44-yarder with 37 seconds left. Moody, who also made kicks of 50 and 26 yards, missed badly on a 53-yard field-goal attempt that he hooked several yards left, and he barely snuck his 26-yarder inside the left upright.
The 49ers signed Greg Joseph in May to compete with Moody after Moody ranked 32nd among 36 qualifying kickers in field goal percentage last year. They released Joseph on Aug. 4 as their injuries began to mount, with head coach Kyle Shanahan terming it a ‘luxury’ to carry two kickers.
About that good news: Purdy made his preseason debut and completed 5 of 7 passes for 66 yards on his only drive. Pearsall caught three of Purdy’s completions for 42 yards. The duo had a 21-yard connection on 3rd-and-18 from the 49ers’ 40-yard line.
Mac Jones relieved Purdy and began by throwing an interception — his second in two preseason games — on his third attempt. However, Jones rebounded after he failed to see safety Jeremy Chinn lurking eight yards downfield on a pass to wide receiver Robbie Chosen. Jones completed 13 of 16 passes for 135 yards.
The 49ers played seven offensive starters: Purdy, Pearsall, tight end George Kittle, fullback Kyle Juszczyk, center Jake Brendel, right tackle Colton McKivitz and Puni. On defense, they played just three potential Week 1 starters, cornerback Deommodore Lenoir, linebacker Dee Winters and safety Ji’Ayir Brown.
Lenoir and Brown had unfortunate introductions to rookie running back Ashton Jeanty, the No. 6 pick, on a first-half touchdown drive. First, Jeanty stiff-armed Lenoir to the ground on a 13-yard scamper before he shoved Brown backward at the goal line on his 1-yard scoring run early in the second quarter.
(SF Chronicle)
TOOT TOOT TOOTSIE, GOODBYE
by Gus Kahn, Ernie Erdman, Danny Russo (1922)
Yesterday I heard a lover sigh
Goodbye, oh me, oh my
Seven times he got aboard his train
And seven times he hurried back
To kiss his love again and tell her
Toot, toot, tootsie, goodbye
Toot, toot, tootsie, don't cry
That choo choo train that takes me
Away from you, no words can
Tell how sad it makes me
Kiss me tootsie and then do it over again
Watch for the mail, I'll never fail
If you don't get a letter
Then you'll know I'm in jail
Toot, toot, tootsie, don't cry
Toot, toot, tootsie, goodbye
Kiss me, tootsie, and then do it over again
Watch for the mail, I'll never fail
If you don't get a letter
Then you'll know I'm in jail
Toot, toot, tootsie, don't cry
Goodbye, tootsie, goodbye
LEAD STORIES, SUNDAY'S NYT
European Leaders to Join Zelensky for White House Meeting
Putin Sees Ukraine Through a Lens of Grievance Over Lost Glory
Ukraine Weighs Trump’s Offer of Security Guarantees With Caution
Ukrainians Fleeing Russia’s Attacks Say the Alaska Summit Was an Insult
At the Alaska Summit, an Unlikely Local Halibut Dish Gets a Cameo
Trump’s Selective Stance on Justice: Redemption for Some, Scorn for Others
Fox News Warrior Takes on Prosecutor Role in Trump’s D.C. Crackdown
“ONE OUGHT TO RECOGNIZE that the present political chaos is connected with the decay of language, and that one can probably bring about some improvement by starting at the verbal end. If you simplify your English, you’re freed from the worst follies of orthodoxy. You cannot speak any of the necessary dialects, and when you make a stupid remark it’s stupidity will be obvious, even to yourself. Political language — and with variations this is true of all political parties from Conservatives to Anarchist — is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind.”
— George Orwell
CRIMINAL FIGHTS CRIME
by Maureen Dowd
My sister is having a bad summer.
In fact, even as I’m typing this, Peggy is at D.C. police headquarters.
We had dinner in Georgetown recently and when we came back to my house, where her car was parked, she was short a Buick.
Two polite officers who responded to our call said they could do little, amid a rash of brazen car thefts by teenagers.
One officer said that, even if they saw the perp driving in her car, they could not chase him, because of laws passed by the D.C. Council.
Kids — some too young to drive legally — can just hot-wire cars to go home. Two 15-year-olds are charged in a carjacking attack on a former DOGE employee that helped set off President Trump’s crusade on crime in D.C. The council has been notoriously lax toward juvenile offenders.
Peggy had always loved that Buick, which she bought because Peyton Manning was the pitchman. We figured we’d never see it again.
The next morning, though, an officer from Prince George’s County, a working-class Maryland suburb, banged on her door. Her car was found in a park, running, nearly out of gas. When she collected it, after paying a $215 towing charge, she found an odoriferous collection: half-eaten pizza, grape soda cans, fast-food wrappers, a used condom and a couple of debit cards.
She called the D.C. police to tell them about the debit cards, thinking they could help trace the thieves. (Our dad, after all, was a D.C. cop.) But the police said to throw them away, noting that the cardholders had probably already gotten new ones.
Peggy got the car detailed and celebrated its return by going shopping at Bloomingdale’s. When she got back to her parking space, someone had T-boned the poor Buick.
Then, icing on the cake, she got over $1,800 worth of speed-camera tickets that the car thieves had racked up going 70 in 25-mile-per-hour zones, and some for running red lights. One ticket revealed that the car was stolen just after she got out of it, at 7 p.m., still light outside. For all we know, the thieves watched her get out. She had to go down to headquarters on Friday to get the police report so she could appeal the tickets.
It’s hardly the most heinous crime, but you hear a lot about Washingtonians and their personal experiences being preyed on.
City officials and many liberal residents are outraged about Trump’s painting D.C. as a hellscape and flooding the zone with law enforcement and troops. Protesters around town held up signs reading ‘Fascists,’ and a Department of Justice employee (now fired) threw a Subway sandwich at an officer and was charged with assault.
It’s ridiculous to drag F.B.I. agents from their desks to be cops on the beat. And the tableau of National Guard troops — even unarmed — raises the specter of martial law being normalized and weaponized. (Armed and masked Border Patrol officers showing up at a Gavin Newsom gerrymandering speech in L.A. was disturbing.)
It is also true that many D.C. residents are secretly glad to see more uniforms. No matter what statistics say, they don’t feel safe.
I’ve always been hypervigilant. My mom, the wife of a policeman, passed down a healthy paranoia. She drove me to move into my dorm at Catholic University with a butcher knife on the seat between us. She gave me a Chinese letter opener with written instructions on how to find the jugular. At Christmas, there was always a can of pepper spray or a whistle among the presents.
I find myself packing pepper spray again. I feel more wary walking around the city. It’s disturbing to ask someone to unlock the Claritin at CVS because the police don’t lock up the smash-and-grabbers. Drugstores, as Bill Maher pointed out, have become a ‘zoo for teeth-whitening strips.’
Trump is playing the savior on crime when he’s the biggest scofflaw in town — first inciting the mob on Jan. 6 and then pardoning felons who broke into the Capitol and beat up police officers.
Elie Honig, a CNN legal analyst and the author of the forthcoming book ‘When You Come at the King: Inside DOJ’s Pursuit of the President, From Nixon to Trump,’ summed up the dilemma.
‘Yes, Trump is hypocritical and scattershot on public safety,’ he told me. ‘And yes, he’s likely doing this as a flex. But he happens to be within the law here and he happens to be right.’
While the district’s homicide rate has fallen, it’s almost as high as New York’s at its most dangerous, in 1990.
In The Atlantic, Michael Powell noted that the reality of crime is most grim in Wards 7 and 8, the disadvantaged, majority-Black neighborhoods where more than half of the district’s homicides occurred last year.
‘I have no doubt that Trump enjoys targeting Democratic-controlled cities for embarrassment,’ Powell writes. ‘I also have little doubt that a mother in Ward 8 might draw comfort from a National Guard soldier standing watch near her child’s school.’
The diva of distraction is putting on a show. (They’re eating the cats and the dogs!) But progressives should not fall into Trump’s trap and play down crime, once more getting on the wrong side of an inflammatory issue. As with inflation, they should remember that personal experiences can count more than sanguine statistics.
Even if Trump is being diabolical, Democrats should not pretend everything is fine here. Because it’s not.
(NY Times)
THE MOST VOMIT-INDUCING EPISODE IN ALL THE TAWDRY HISTORY OF INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMACY BUT IT WILL HAVE TAUGHT TRUMP THIS VITAL LESSON…
by Boris Johnson
Well that was just about the most vomit-inducing episode in all the tawdry history of international diplomacy. It made the gorge rise to see Putin welcomed on to American soil.
It was emetic to see him applauded on the red carpet.
It was nauseating to watch his Gollum-like smirk as he became one of the only world leaders I can think of to be invited to ride in the back of the presidential limo.
It was positively chunderous to hear him given an American platform for his lies about the causes of the war in Ukraine – a country that in 2014, when he first attacked it, posed no threat whatever to Russia.
As I listened to the unctuous and wearisome predictability with which he tried both to flatter and discreetly humiliate Donald Trump, I wanted to gag. I bet you did, too – and most of us are not even Ukrainian.
Imagine how it felt to be one of those embattled heroes in a dug-out near Pokrovsk, fighting for your country’s freedom, and to hear the President of the United States – the ex officio team captain of the Free World – refer to Vladimir Putin as “the boss.”
Retch.
Think of the tens of thousands of Ukrainian widows and orphans. Think of the maimed and mutilated; think of the Ukrainian civilians living in daily and nightly terror of Putin’s bombs and missiles – still raining down, even though the so-called negotiations were taking place in Alaska.
Ask yourself how those people felt to hear the US President – in some ways the world’s ultimate guarantor of freedom and democracy – refer to the ‘fantastic relationship’ he has with Putin, a dictator who has been torturing their country for three-and-a-half years.
It was a disgusting moment because Putin is a war criminal, whose continual lies, dissimulation and aggression are directly analogous to Hitler.
You sometimes hear that the White House’s objective is to “stop the death,” or “stop the killing” in Ukraine, as though there were faults on both sides. What rubbish.
The blood of every Russian who has died in this conflict is on Putin’s hands. The blood of every Ukrainian who has died is on Putin’s hands.
All the carnage and all the tragedy in Ukraine is the fault of one man – because right now there would be no war, there would be no bloodshed, there would be no disaster, if it were not for the continuing arrogance, folly and fundamental miscalculation of Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin.
That was why it was so hard to stomach the sight of Putin preening at the Alaska summit. That was why the event felt so objectionable.
And yet like so many of the most objectionable pieces of historic diplomacy, that meeting was also, of course, justifiable and even essential.
Puke-making though it was, Trump was right to try. He was right to meet Putin, because if millions of Ukrainians were watching with horror at the red-carpet rehabilitation of the Russian tyrant, they were also watching with hope.
They were hoping that maybe, just maybe, this fabled New York deal-maker could produce a solution that would end the war – but still salvage what they want and need, namely the freedom, sovereignty and independence of their country.
Donald Trump was and is right to take the risk, because he knows that one day Putin will indeed make a deal. His position in Moscow is far weaker than it appears.
The Russian economy is starting to creak under the burden of war. Unemployment is climbing, and so are inflation and interest rates.
Putin has seen one of his biggest oil customers – India – suddenly and unexpectedly hit by Trump’s secondary sanctions, with Bloomberg reporting signs that Indian buyers of hydrocarbons are already switching away from Russia.
Most important of all, Putin still cannot and will not crush the spirit of Ukrainian resistance. Yes, times are very tough for Ukrainian fighters and, yes, with titanic effort and expense Putin has managed to make some small gains in the east – theatrically designed to coincide with the Alaska summit.
But those advances have again been contained by the Ukrainians and, as of now – mid-August – the much-vaunted vast Russian summer offensive of 2025 has yet to materialise, let alone succeed.
Trump has been 100 per cent right to sense a chance for peace, and right to want to make peace. He is one of those who thinks – with Benjamin Franklin – that there never was a good war or a bad peace, and he is right there, too.
But it was clear to observers of this “summit” – and I believe it was pretty clear to the American negotiators in the room – that Putin does not want peace, certainly not on terms that either the US or Ukraine could accept.
Anyone who has worked with Trump, and knows his moods, could tell that this meeting was not a success. The advertised lunch did not take place.
There was none of the predicted discussion of any mouth-watering new commercial partnership between the US and Russia, or Arctic collaboration. Instead, the summit ended abruptly and several hours prematurely with an entirely vacuous press conference at which Trump – extraordinarily – did not take questions from the Press.
The meeting was only valuable in this sense: that in Alaska Trump came face to face with the reality.
Putin fundamentally wants to control Ukraine, and to make it once again a vassal state of Moscow.
The Ukrainians fundamentally want to be free – and in that desire they have the long-term support of other Western democracies, and, crucially, of Trump himself, and indeed of Melania Trump, the First Lady, who is playing an increasing role in shaping her husband’s thinking.
Trump the realtor has discovered that this isn’t about real estate. This isn’t about geography or territory. This is about destiny.
It’s about the right of Ukrainians to choose their own destiny as a free and independent European nation. That means the war won’t end until Putin accepts the truth: that he has lost the battle for the destiny of Ukraine.
It’s only when that happens – when Putin accepts a spiritual truth that is obvious to anyone who visits Ukraine – that we will have peace.
Frankly, I doubt if Donald Trump will much enjoy the global headlines today. I don’t think he will enjoy the idea that Putin has bested him, that Trump rolled out the red carpet for a pariah – and expended a lot of political capital – and got absolutely nothing in return.
The failure in Alaska will harden what I believe is his growing conviction – that the only way to fix this now is to intensify the pressure on Putin.
Nobody really expected the US president to go ahead and put secondary sanctions on countries that have continued to buy Russian oil and gas – and yet he did it.
What about Britain? What about Europe? When are we going to have the courage to do the same? This is our continent. We continually demand leadership from America – and yet when we get that leadership we don’t even have the guts to follow suit.
One day this war will end with a peace that protects Ukrainian freedom; but as Trump said in Alaska, the Europeans – led by Britain – will have to step up.
TAIBBI & KIRN
Matt Taibbi:
The new book that we’re going to be reading is ‘That Hideous Strength’ (Earth) by C.S. Lewis, the third novel in his science fiction trilogy, after ‘Out of the Silent Planet’ (Mars), and ‘Perelandra’ (Venus). And not to delve too much into the book at the start of the show, which we don’t do. But the reason we originally decided to do this book portion, it was mainly just because Walter and I are book nerds and we like talking about books, and it was fun for us. And I think, I don’t know about you, Walter, I had this vague sense that there’s something missing from conventional news analysis that you can’t get from reading the news.
There was a dimension that we get by going into the past and looking at these deeper, more philosophical books that you can’t get into just by looking at the things that are online and hot on Twitter and trending. Well, now I’m beginning to think that we’ve entered a stage of the news where it’s now necessary to go back and read some of these things. Because absent some of the broader themes that fiction, great fiction writers and theologians and philosophers took on in the 1700s, 1800s and the 20th century, it’s impossible to understand some of the dilemmas that we’re dealing with in the news. One of them being this concept of AI and the related transhumanism craze. This idea that we… It’s the age-old fever dream of the scientific mind that Mary Shelley’s ‘Frankenstein’ got to this idea that purely by thinking we can overcome or replace nature, replace the natural processes.
And we always think of that, I think growing up we thought of that in terms of as a kind of classic, tragic human theme, this idea of trying to escape your fate, trying to escape nature, that it’s a fool’s errand. And that was the lesson of stories of antiquity. But now it’s becoming reality again. Now, once again, people, I think are believing that what goes up doesn’t necessarily have to come down. That we have the tools to write our own reality and create our own understanding of what gravity is, what justice is, what the laws of nature are. And we don’t have to go by any conventional grounding.
So, C.S. Lewis is not just a fiction writer, but he’s also obviously a Christian writer, non-denominational Christian morality is central to his writing, and it’s impossible to understand his books without having some passing familiarity with Christian theology. The idea that we find salvation and eternal life not through a technical process, but through communion with God, by submission, by being in touch with your soul and all of these things.
But we’ve got a generation that isn’t even familiar with a lot of these texts, has never thought about these questions. We’re actually a couple of generations removed, I think, from that even being a common topic of discussion. And so, we’re entering a new phase of human existence where we’re going to hit a conflict soon. Does that make sense, Walter? Does any of that make sense?
Walter Kirn:
I used to go into small towns, let’s say in the south or in the Midwest, and I’d asked somebody, because I had pledged not to use technology to keep it to a minimum on the trip. And I would ask somebody in a gas station, “How do you get to the next town 30 miles away?” And they would look at me blankly and say, “Don’t you have a phone?” And I’d say, “Well, yeah, it’s not working. How do you get there?” “Well get your phone to work.” “Do I turn north going out of the driveway here, or south to get there?” “What are you talking about?” And I realized that there was no bird’s eye view in the heads of the people who lived in this particular town. It might be, and often was a town of 2,000. And I was talking about going to a town of 10,000, the place you’d think they’d go to shop or wherever, to the movies. And still there was no sense of how things fit together.
And I see that with turn by turn navigation, even when you do have your phone, people are often lost the moment they go awry with the turn by turn navigation. They’re looking for guidance as to the next turn, but have no picture of where they are in relation to the landscape. And I think we’ve gotten that way socially and historically. We want to know the next turn, what’s the next update? What’s the next instruction from on high? But as to where it’s leading us and how far we are from where we set out, and whether or not we’re getting any closer to the places we thought we wanted to go is still a mystery to so many, and more and more of one. So, you’re absolutely right. And this notion that we can escape the bounds of space, time, and the body, personal history, genetics and so on, is often described as Gnosticism.
Meaning what’s important about life is the intellect and the mind and the body and the world are themselves a kind of dark forest to be overcome, to be escaped, to be transcended. As though the physical world is only the first stage of a rocket launch, which you then separate from and go on to this next level of transcendental life. The problem is that we relate as bodies, we relate in the real world and in the physical world. We talk, we meet, we fight, we love, we do whatever. And none of that so far occurs in digital space, which is the new version, I guess, of the Empyrean. We talk sometimes about going through physical space, to Mars or the moon. They say we’re going to build a nuclear plant there. But in my youth, that physical space, the cosmos kind of represented the next stage. I didn’t suspect that it would be this internal virtual space that would take over…
WHARF RAT
lyrics by Robert Hunter (1971)
Old man down
Way down, down by the docks of the city
Blind and dirty
Asked me for a dime, a dime for a cup of coffee
I got no dime, but I got some time to hear his story
My name is August West
And I love my Pearly Baker best, more than my wine
More than my wine
More than my maker, though he's no friend of mine
Everyone said
I'd come to no good
I knew I would
Pearly, believed them
Half of my life
Spent doing time for some other fucker's crime
The other half found me
Stumbling around, drunk on burgundy wine
But I'll get back on my feet someday
The good lord willing, if he says I may
I know that the life I'm living's no good
I'll get a new start, live the life I should
I'll get up and fly away
I'll get up and fly away
Pearly's been true
True to me, true to my dying day, he said
I said to him
I said to him, I'm sure she's been
I said to him, I'm sure she's been true to you
I got up and wandered
Wandered downtown, nowhere to go but just to hang around
I've got a girl
Named Bonny Lee, I know that girl's been true to me
I know she's been, I'm sure she's been true to me
GRT/Housing (Yesterday’s AVA)
Trump law could boost affordable housing production in CA – CalMatters https://share.google/1bOctyXHeAHImyTYS
‘California lawmakers are preparing for a historic surge in federal funding for affordable housing construction, a tsunami of subsidy that advocates say could as much as double the number of low-rent units produced by the state over the next decade.’
I’ve been re-minded, last coupla days, homelessness is about A LOT (no pun intended) more than having a building to live in.
Loving communities form around ‘homeless’ . Some may prefer to live outside, some prefer being unhampered by rental rules®ulations.
National: Putin on US soil, handheld by president, awful. Photos indicate trump putin’s b***h.
Local: Toothless, delayed, stream protection measure, open to criticism, in 2028??
Getting it, we are, from both levels; luckily the wife is a jewel
The wife and I went to watch the Coyote Cowboys down at the Boonville Museum this afternoon. Hard to believe they have been entertaining us for 50 years. Seems like I saw them at nearly every event throughout my 20s 30s and 40s. They still sound great even though I no longer hear so well.
The Supreme Deal Maker was on full display at the beginning of the Alaska Summit with his fake smile and touchy feely handshake to Putin followed by a ride in his limousine where there was no account of their interchange. He apparently was rebuffed and decided to skip the luncheon and other planned publicity stunts. I have a feeling this whole display was for the Nobel Prize Committee to consider him for a Peace prize which he has to have to keep up with Hussein Obama. I say this not because I hate America, but I do hate having an elected president backed by a party that tramples the Constitution and Bill of Rights, and actively and publicly asks governors to gerrymander and suppress the vote. There will be an accounting for tRump and the MAGA minions down the road. He might have pardoned the Jan 6 insurrectionists, but their lawless behavior will not be tolerated, nor will the ICE gestapo he sends to intimidate free people.