Rugby yes. Fencing no. I will not be taking any questions.
Paris Olympics
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Author Archives: Ron Byrnes
Choose To Be Nice
Picking up a Saturday night pizza and salad. A scrawny, pale Boomer with straight hair half way down his back and an earring materializes next to me. I have no doubt I could take him, but I’m getting ahead of myself.
He’s looking at individual slices. A 20 year-old Evergreen State College student making $15/hour asks him if he’s been helped.
I don’t know if I write well enough to capture the depth of his cruelty.
“Have I been helped? Would I like anything?! No, I’m just standing here looking at the pizza because I don’t know, maybe I want pizza.”
I’m dumbstruck, but she keeps it completely together and explains what the slices are. He says something about being vegan.
I wish my peabrain engaged more quickly. It wasn’t until I was in the car that I realized what I should have said/done.
Asked him, “Were you born a dickhead or is it a more recent development?”
There are two types of jobs. Those where you have to deal with the public and those where you don’t. A young woman at the Westside Vic’s deserves a “public dickhead” bonus.
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Don’t Drink The Water
The Wall Street Journal headline asserts, “The Dirty Secret of Olympic Swimming: Everyone Pees in the Pool”. Two main reasons. The swimmers are super-hydrated and their speed suits take 20 minutes to take off and put on. Chlorine for the win.
There’s an unspoken rule that you don’t let loose near others. That is, most swimmers most of the time. Apparently, there are some exceptions.
For the record, I would never whizz in any body of water that’s not encased in porcelain.
Everything Is Going To Be Alright
Now that it’s looking like the Demos have a Presidential candidate who is two decades younger than the other teams. The Other Team is livid at the eighth inning substitution which is as clear an indication as there is that everything is going to be alright.
Or is it?
Hardly anyone is paying attention to the most recent sign that the U.S. is in decline. The (d)USA Olympic basketball team was down 14 to South Sudan at halftime of their recent Olympics tune-up. And won by 1 point thanks to LeBron’s last second heroics.
South Sudan. Do the South Sudanese players not understand the concept of American exceptionalism? In case not, here’s a primer.
Because I like to keep it real, I’m going to tell you what no one else will. It doesn’t do a nation any good to be “unique and even morally superior. . . for historical, ideological, or religious reasons” if that country doesn’t box out and clean the glass.
The Difficulty Of Exiting The Stage
Stupendous achievements. Legacy intact. Physical impairments mounting. Less sharp. Aging. A shell of his former self. Yet, extremely prideful and throughly convinced he can still win.
I Feel You Joe
“Biden plans to resume campaigning,” the lead article on the New York Times website right now reports, “as more Democrats urge him to quit.”
We know how this ends. With him quitting. But man, I for one salute his stubbornness because whenever everyone tells me to do something, like find a therapist, I instinctively don’t want to do it. And the more they push, the more I resist.
Maybe that’s human nature more generally?
There is one notable difference between Joe and me though. My knee-jerk contrariness does not threaten the future of our democracy.
The Kevin O’Learys Of The World Are Full Of Shit
Some ultrawealthy peeps are moving to states with no income taxes.
O’Leary says he moved from ‘Taxachusetts’ to Florida because he couldn’t afford to live In Boston anymore.
His net worth is reported to be $400m. That should generate $20m/year in passive income. Maybe $12m after taxes? With the price of Celtics’ tickets, it’s hard to get by in Boston on $1m/month.
One question for Mr. Hyperbole. What exactly, after paying taxes, can’t you afford?
More proof, the hardest part of being honest is being honest with one’s self. If O’Leary was honest with himself he’d say he doesn’t want to pay Massachusetts’ taxes. And maybe he wants to be surrounded about other right wing fabulists.
To which I say, have at it. Watch out for wayward amphibians, don’t forget to ask for the Senior Discount, and enjoy the humidity.
Tonight At The Trump National Convention
The theme is “Make America Safe Again”. Which can only mean one thing. The Trumpblicans ignore data that doesn’t align with their feelings.
Turns out, it’s not the Demos who are all in their feelings.
Paragraph To Ponder
“So here is what the Democrats should do. Tomorrow morning Chuck Schumer should put on the floor of the Senate a law mandating strict background checks for all gun purchases. Perhaps tie it to a reinstitution of the 1994 assault weapons ban that Republicans allowed to expire in 2004. Give it a name like the ‘Anti Political and School Violence Act’. Make Republicans shoot it down. Make them say, as Trump himself did after a school shooting massacre in Iowa this year, that we ‘have to get over it, we have to move forward.’ It’s not just an outrage when your right-wing authoritarian hero gets his ear nicked by an assassin’s bullet. It’s an outrage when anyone is shot by a nut with a gun.”
Pause and reflect on the last mindless phrase in an otherwise thoughtful paragraph. . . “a nut with a gun”. Consider an alternative description. A desperate, socially isolated person with nothing to hope for in the future, and therefore, nothing to lose.
An experienced former FBI investigator speculated on the shooter’s motives in ways that made imminent sense and will likely prove correct. The gunman was bullied in school, eccentric, and most importantly, socially awkward and isolated. The investigator called him “The Invisible Man” and compared him to Hinckley who wasn’t political at all. Hinckley shot Reagan to get the attention of an actress.
The Invisible Man can only take so much invisibility and commits a horrific act of violence to be seen. By any means necessary. Now, everyone knows his name and he will be remembered. Extremely negatively of course, but remembered nonetheless.
Ever notice the similarities among mass shooters? White, male, working class, bullied in school, socially isolated, parent(s) with guns.
The descriptor “nuts” suggests a randomness that defies reality. Reality is not every white, male, working class, bullied in school, socially isolated young adult with access to guns decides there’s nothing to lose. But what if 1 or 2 percent do?
That’s the country we’re living in.
The President Did A Presser
And I watched until I had to get ready for my hot dinner date. 37th anniversary and all.
Just now cued up the DVR and watched the second half.
And here’s most of what I was thinking. If I communicated like the President, my students would stop coming to class.
Pressing Pause 