Stormy is 12

the last cat?

Stormy is 12. Her birthday was back in June. Apparently, I am not a good cat parent.

She received her physical in mid-July and is well for a 12-year-old feline. My wife and daughter report that, while she hates being in the cage, she didn’t fuss as much in the car. She resisted leaving the cage at the vet’s, but tilting the enclosure did the trick.

Stormy has lost about a pound since last year’s exam. The vet was slightly concerned because our other cat, Midnight, had stopped eating and started losing weight right before he died last summer. But we theorize that as Midnight ate less, Stormy ate more. So we think it’s all fine.

As I’ve noted before, she’s become much more likely to sit next to me as she is in these pictures, and she didn’t do that before when Midnight was around because he was quite possessive of me, even though he was pretty hostile to me.

Before I feed her, she can become very loud. She likes to rub her head against my leg and let me scratch her, but she also rubs her head up against the sofa, the chair leg, and a table leg. When it’s cold, she will sleep in my wife’s and my bed; when it’s warmer, she’ll sleep in the hallway.

Don’t Go Near The Water

She has the annoying habit of going into the human bathroom and drinking from the shower drippings. But she doesn’t like water on her. I wash my hands, and whatever residual water is on my fingertips, I can flick at her, and she’ll run down the stairs in about three seconds.

The vet said we shouldn’t have another cat with her because 12-year-olds tend to be quite territorial. I don’t think we’re ever gonna have another pet. We’ll probably move to a smaller place, and having an animal doesn’t seem to be a likely scenario anyway.

80 years since Hiroshima

The Devil Reached Towards The Sky

 

It’s been 80 years since Hiroshima. I remember two things about the discussion around the Oscar-winning film Oppenheimer, one of commission, and the other, omission.

You may recall the scene of the protagonist uncomfortably accepting accolades from workers after World War II, an honest reflection of his ambivalence. The other was the feeling by some critics that the results of the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki should have been reflected.

To the latter point, I don’t think so; it wasn’t where the American consciousness was at the war’s end. From staff writer Jane Meyer in the New Yorker: “Thirty years after this magazine published John Hersey’s ‘Hiroshima,’ [paywall] I sat in his classroom at Yale, hoping to learn how to write with even a fraction of his power. When ‘Hiroshima’ appeared, in the August 31, 1946, issue, it was the scoop of the century—the first unvarnished account by an American reporter of Hiroshima and Nagasaki of the nuclear blast that obliterated the city.

“Hersey’s prose was spare, allowing the horror to emerge word by word. A man tried to lift a woman out of a sandpit, ‘but her skin slipped off in huge, glove-like pieces.’ The detonation buried a woman and her infant alive: ‘When she had dug herself free, she had discovered that the baby was choking, its mouth full of dirt. With her little finger, she had carefully cleaned out the infant’s mouth, and for a time the child had breathed normally and seemed all right; then suddenly it had died.'”

Starting the dialogue

“Hersey’s candor had a seismic impact: the magazine sold out, and a book version of the article sold millions of copies. Stephanie Hinnershitz, a military historian, told me that Hersey’s reporting ‘didn’t just change the public debate about nuclear weapons—it created the debate.’ Until then, she explained, President Harry Truman had celebrated the attack as a strategic masterstroke, ‘without addressing the human cost.’ Officials shamelessly downplayed the effects of radiation; one called it a ‘very pleasant way to die.’ Hinnershitz said, ‘Hersey broke that censorship.’ He alerted the world to what the U.S. government had hidden.”

(There will be a public reading of John Hersey’s “Hiroshima” today at 11 a.m. at Townsend Park in Albany, NY. The event is free and open to the public, and the public is encouraged to join in the reading. Those interested in reading can sign up to participate when they arrive. Please bring folding chairs. Rain site: Social Justice Center, 33 Central Ave.)
Saving a million American lives?

When I was in sixth grade, we had a rigorous debate about whether the atomic attacks were justified. Most of us were opposed, but our teacher, Paul Peca, suggested they were appropriate.

Mr. Peca likely would have supported the position of , who wrote in Harper’s in February 1947: “The decision to use the atomic bomb was a decision that brought death to over a hundred thousand Japanese. No explanation can change that fact, and I do not wish to gloss it over. But this deliberate, premeditated destruction was our least abhorrent choice. The destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki put an end to the Japanese war. It stopped the fire raids and the strangling blockade; it ended the ghastly specter of a clash of great land armies.”

Only recently, I learned that McGeorge Bundy, a future national-security adviser, was the ghost writer for Stimson, when they “claimed that dropping nuclear bombs on Japan had averted further war, saving more than a million American lives. Kai Bird, a co-author of ‘American Prometheus,’ the definitive biography of J. Robert Oppenheimer, [said] that this pushback was specious: ‘Bundy later admitted to me that there was no documentary evidence for this ‘million’ casualty figure. He just pulled it out of thin air.”

As I noted here, Dwight Eisenhower wrote in 1963: “Japan was already defeated, and dropping the bomb was completely unnecessary… Secondly, our country should avoid shocking world opinion by the use of a weapon whose employment was, I thought, no longer mandatory as a measure to save American lives.”

To this day, the debate continues. 

Movie

I saw the 1982 documentary The Atomic Cafe in the cinema; here’s the trailer. “A disturbing collection of 1940s and 1950s United States government-issued propaganda films designed to reassure Americans that the atomic bomb was not a threat to their safety.” It was really good, and also had a killer soundtrack (but not the last track on this YouTube chain). 

Here’s a list of seven books on Hiroshima, starting with Hersey’s book and including Barefoot Gen by Keiji Nakazawa (1982); the “comic book has little of the artfulness and refinement of the modern graphic novel. But the storytelling’s power, simplicity, and anger, based on the author’s experience, are indelible.” I bought it at the time and still own it.

This week, ABC News touted a new book that uses oral history to tell the story of the atomic bomb. Martha Raddatz spoke with author Garrett M. Graff about his new book, The Devil Reached Towards The Sky, on the nuclear bombing during WWII.

The events of eight decades ago still resonate with me since I have written about Hiroshima every five years since 2010.

Part 2 of the pop hits from 1975

John Denver

Number 1 in 1975Part 2 of the pop hits from 1975 contains more songs that reached the Billboard charts. If a song reaches the pinnacle of another Billboard chart, it will be designated as such. I own all of these songs in some form, except Falling In Love. 

Lady Marmalade – LaBelle (Epic), gold record. The song also went to #1 in 2001 as performed by Christina Aguilera, Lil’ Kim, Mya, and Pink. In my opinion, the original is way better than the Moulin Rouge take.

Pick Up The Pieces – AWB (Atlantic),  gold record. The group is also known as Average White Band. Instrumental

The Hustle – Van McCoy (Avco), gold record. Instrumental. “The original LP track of this international disco hit ran just over 4 minutes, and a 6:25 remix version was issued in 1979 following McCoy’s death at age 39.”

Black Water –  The Doobie Brothers (Warner), gold record. I have a particular recollection of this song at my college, New Paltz.

Let’s Do It Again – The Staple Singers (Curtom), gold record #1 RB

Have You Never Been Mellow – Olivia Newton-John (MCA), gold record, #1 AC

Beatles-adjacent

Listen To What The Man Said – Wings (Capitol), gold record

Best Of My Love – The Eagles (Asylum), #1 AC

Falling In Love – Hamilton, Joe Frank, and Reynolds (Playboy), gold record, #1AC

Thank God I’m A Country Boy – John Denver (RCA Victor),  gold record

Shining Star – Earth, Wind, and Fire (Columbia), gold record, #1 RB. This was their first big hit, and I loved it.

Please Mr. Postman  – Carpenters (A&M), gold record. #1 AC

Mandy – Barry Manilow (Bell), gold record

You’re No Good – Linda Ronstadt (Capitol). From one of the greatest “contractual obligation” albums of all time, Heart Like a Wheel.

I’m Sorry – John Denver (RCA Victor), gold record, #1 AC

Fire – Ohio Players (Mercury),  gold record, #1 RB

Sister Golden Hair – America (Warner)

Get Down Tonight – KC and the Sunshine Band (TK), #1 RB

Movie review: F1

racecars

To my mild surprise, my wife wanted to see the movie F1. I said OK, though it wasn’t high on my list of must-see films. In my time, I’ve avoided many summer blockbusters. We went to the Spectrim 8 Theatre in Albany on a Tuesday afternoon in early July.

F1 did what it set out to do: make you feel like you are riding with these drivers. Sonny Hayes (Brad Pitt) will drive almost anything, and his old friend Ruben (Javier Bardem) recruits him for his Formula 1 team.

You get sucked into feeling like part of the management and pit crew, trying to ensure that the two team drivers, Sonny and Joshua Pearce (Damson Idris), succeed or at least don’t crash and burn. Kate (Kerry Conlon) is central to the team and wants to be taken seriously as the technical director; I liked Conlon in The Banshees of Inisherin. 

Critic Michael Cook wrote: “This is a classic ‘summer and popcorn’ movie. Some beats may feel familiar, but it’s done so well that you overlook some of its problems. It’s a movie worth seeing at the theater to get the full experience.” I agree with that, and the fact that the actors practiced actual driving for several months gave those scenes a feeling of verisimilitude. True Formula 1 fans will grimace at some inconsistencies, but most of the general public may not notice or care.

Pop

Frankly, I enjoyed it on the level that my grandfather McKinley Green and I used to watch Indy car racing on TV when I was growing up. But F1 doesn’t seem like a movie you want to see on television.

When Formula One came to Las Vegas in the story, I was fascinated because I was in that city in 2024 shortly before it was altered to create the track. Businesses near the course, such as restaurants and bars, which could benefit from more people coming in, were thrilled. Ordinary Las Vegans with no monetary benefit tended to be irritable about the inconvenience.

Rotten Tomatoes critics gave the film 83% positive reviews, but it was 97% positive with audiences.

Sunday Stealing – Let’s Blog about Blogging

alternative facts

Welcome to Sunday Stealing. Here we will steal all types of questions from every corner of the blogosphere. Our promise to you is that we will work hard to find the most interesting and intelligent questions. Cheers to all of us thieves!

This week’s meme is swiped from If By Yes, a Canadian blogger who describes herself as a “left-wing left-hander with two left feet.” It’s a shame she doesn’t update her blog anymore. Anyway, she participated in a meme that she tells us was popular way back when.

About Blogging

1. When are you at your blogging best – a.m. or p.m.?

Absolutely in the morning. At some level, if I have an idea about a post, I sleep on it, and often I have at least an approach mapped out in the morning. The only time I work on the blog after about noon is doing something mechanical, such as adding links to articles and music posts.

2. How many blogs do you have? Please include the links in your answer.

This is it, at least publicly. The rogerogreen.com blog content morphed from the rogerowengreen.blogspot.com on May 2, 2010. The old content from those first five years is here, but not all comments have been moved, so there’s that. My old work is defunct, as are a bunch of others I’ve participated in. I had a blog on the Albany Times Union from 2008 to 2021, but that ended; the content is uploaded here.  

The rest is silence

3. Do you prefer silence when you compose your posts and write your comments?

Absolutely not. I write to music, and it doesn’t matter if it has words or not. I am listening to Rossiniana by Ottorino Respighi, which Kelly posted. But usually, I listen to compact discs of artists whose birthdays are in the current month, such as John Hiatt, Joe Strummer (The Clash), and Robert Plant (Led Zeppelin). Indeed, I can’t do very much without music. I use it when I’m cleaning or filing.

Conversely, I can’t listen to talk, such as the NPR news shows my wife likes to listen to. Sidebar: I’m very sad/angry about the death of the CPB— the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

4. What’s the grossest thing you’ve ever spilled on your keyboard?

Probably Diet Coke.

What’s the use of getting sober…

5. Ever posted while intoxicated?

I don’t generally write on Facebook immediately. I might write a blog post and then post that, but that requires time, thought, and a cooling-down period. The only immediate things I have posted on FB and BlueSky lately are public service announcements about accidents and severe weather.  

I don’t even post immediately when ticked off, but let the thoughts simmer. These recent examples bother me as a librarian because they are not fact-based decisions. The FBI redacted djt’s name from several references in the newly released Jeffrey Epstein files. The Smithsonian said it restored a display to an earlier version, which notes that “only three presidents have seriously faced removal.” djt accused the head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), Erika McEntarfer, of faking jobs numbers, directing his team to fire the former President Biden appointee. These are, to quote a former White House staffer, “alternative facts,” which are bad for democracy.

But see how c-c-c-alm-m-m-m I am? And sober. 

 Thank you for playing! Please come back next week.

Ramblin' with Roger
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