Ramblin' with Roger

COVID isn’t breaking me, presently

Standing in line

throat_and_nasal_passages_2x — **From https://xkcd.com/2563/**

I noticed an odd thing amidst the Omicron surge. COVID isn’t breaking me. At least not presently, even though some say it’s the 681st day of March 2020.

I attribute it to being so damn vigilant over the past two years that the normal things felt, well, special. Our church was meeting in person from Father’s Day until Epiphany. And I attended, in person, all of those times when I was in town. The fact that we’re now experiencing a “pause” in in-person worship, while mildly disappointing, is totally understandable.

I hadn’t sung in the church between March 8, 2020, and December 12, 2021. Then I got to sing on Christmas Eve! So I know I won’t go another 21 months again. Right? I’ve been to films in movie theaters, and I saw a musical. Not going again right now. But eventually, yes?

My daughter’s district has gone remote for a week and a half. Yes, being in school is better; we know that. But when 25% of local school infections targeting are teachers and staff, it becomes logistically difficult to sustain. In any case, my daughter can con her loving father into making her lunch.

Testing, dammit

But I remain mystified by how inadequate the testing continues to be. With at-home kits largely unavailable, I decided to go to the NY State rapid test site at Crossgates. I entered my ZIP Code and the first result was for White Plains, NY, only two hours away. The next suggestion was for somewhere in Texas. Finally, I secured Wednesday, January 5.

The website said that walk-ins would also be accepted, so I got in line when my bus got me to the mall at 9:17 for a 10:10 appointment. The instructions that I should get there 15 minutes early. I’m 30th in line. EVERYONE is wearing a mask outdoors which is both unusual and comforting. For about 10 minutes, the line wasn’t moving. And it’s literally freezing out there – 32F according to my phone.

A few folks actually went to the front of the line, who I assumed had earlier appointments. But I wasn’t really in a hurry until 9:45 when I was still 10th in line. A guy wearing shirt-sleeved scrubs – did I mention it was 0 degrees C? – came out and said there should be TWO lines. That’s one for those who are registered, and another for those who aren’t, but that they need to register too. Note about giving instructions: YOUR left when you are facing us is OUR right. I’m certain that many of the folks in line had TRIED to get into the system earlier, but they wouldn’t have had the location code.

Who’s in charge of logistics?

By now, I’m third in the registered line. The guy in the scrubs, who had a face shield, asked if everyone could hear him. I’m 10 feet away and I can barely make out what he was saying. So I turned and barked the info to the two dozen people behind me.

Finally, I get inside at 10 a.m. The venue was a defunct Ruby Tuesday’s. We’re directed to some restaurant booths, where they take our registration info and give us each a slip of paper with a code. Then we move to the bar and subsequently another set of booths. Lots of jokes by us about the setting; someone asked when the buffet would be ready, e.g. I get my swab and leave at 10:25, instructed not to go into the mall proper until I received a negative test.

And within 30 minutes, I received the negative results, which is positive. My experience was much better than a friend of mine who spent 2.5 hours the day before and never did get tested.

I suppose I didn’t really NEED to get the swab. But the day before the test, I discovered that someone with whom I had contact tested positive, though asymptomatic, only a few days earlier. Then I learned two more people likewise were infected.

What is the definition of close contact? “Close contact through proximity and duration of exposure: Someone who was less than 6 feet away from an infected person [check] for a cumulative total of 15 minutes or more over a 24-hour period.” [Well, no, fortunately].

Random posts, or the illusion of same

MLK, blogging, music, movies, race, anger…

random Here is my annual compilation of random posts from the previous year by month. Or maybe it’s an illusion. “Humans tend to see patterns when, in fact, the results are completely random.”

Speaking of which, Kelly “randomly” selected the Concerto No. 1 in F minor for piano and orchestra, by Alexander Glazunov. You should listen.

January. MLK: When Peace Becomes Obnoxious. “I come to declare war over injustice.” This is from a 1956 sermon. This was a catch-his-breath bit because the sentences before and after are much longer and detailed. Still relevant, and possibly more so.

February: Death of the Times Union community blogs “’Nothing urgent, but please give me a ring if you have a few minutes — cell is…'” Casey Seiler, the editor of the Times Union newspaper, was the caller. I was surprised to discover that, although I was not dependent on the TU blog – I have this one, after all – I was still sad to see it go.

Looking into the future

March: Paul Whiteman and the hits of 1921
“’After all is said and done, there is really only one.'” The lyrics are to a tune called Margie by Eddie Cantor. I have a version of the song by Ray Charles. The nice thing about the series is that, if I’m still blogging, I know that in October 2029, I will be writing about the #1 songs from 1999. Hint: one of them is Smooth by Santana featuring Rob Thomas. I have the album from which that song was pulled.

April. Review: Judas and the Black Messiah. “FBI director J. Edgar Hoover (Martin Sheen) considered Hampton a threat to decency in America and wanted him surveilled from the inside.” It was one of my favorite films of the year.

May. Critical Race Theory. “Much of the recent discussion seems to center around the response by Senator Tim Scott to President Biden’s ‘Can’t Be Called the State of the Union’ address.” I don’t know why I wrote about CRT. Almost no one was talking about it in 2021.

June. Musician Nils Lofgren is turning 70. “He was a two-time member of Ringo Starr’s All-Starr Band.” A friend of mine told me this fall they never read my music pieces because they don’t care about music. OK.

Side Two

July: Anger, a national disease “But living near a hotheaded neighbor who thinks we’re always calling the cops on her -I did once, because of the dog – unexplained noises at night are unsettling.” I BELIEVE that my neighbor moved in December, thank Allah.

August: Sunday Stealing, March 2020. “But only the ones I feel like answering.” When I get stuck or busy or tired, the quiz is the way to go.

September: The SCOTUS abortion ballet. “In a state that leads the country and much of the developed world in the rate of maternal mortality, women in Texas will now have to travel to another state to secure an abortion or resort to life-threatening back-alley coat-hanger abortions.” And SCOTUS has taken up the Mississippi law. I fear this will not end well.

October: Rhymin’ Paul Simon turns 80. “I got Stranger to Stranger in 2016, when it came out.” Paul Simon and Stevie Wonder were my favorite musical artists in the 1970s.

November: The way-too-detailed diaries. “I wrote or received letters from people A, B, and C.” My disappointment was that the diaries so far hadn’t gleaned much useful bloggable information.

December: Six Legends of Baseball. “Minoso lead the American League in being hit by a pitch for 10 seasons.” That would be Minnie Minoso, who played primarily for the Chicago White Sox.

1902 #1s: 1st college football bowl game

J.W. Myers

The first college football bowl game, the Rose Bowl between Michigan and Stanford, is held in Pasadena, California on January 3, 1902. The Wolverines, a team that hadn’t yielded a point all season, shellacked the California team 49-0.

Meanwhile, in music that year, at least two very familiar songs.

Arkansaw Traveler – Len Spencer, 11 weeks at #1. This is a comedy record, with a background fiddle. At least one joke, the one about the roof, I’ve heard in some comedy routine a couple of decades ago.

Bill Bailey, Won’t You Please Come Home? – Arthur Collins, 8 weeks at #1. This is also considered a comedy. He was “one of the most prolific and beloved of pioneer recording artists, regarded in his day as ‘King of the Ragtime Singers’. Collins was in duos and quartets as well as a solo artist. He specialized in what were then called coon songs, popular African-American dialect numbers associated with vaudeville, and minstrel shows. Collins also utilized an array of vocal effects and caricature voices which gave the impression that there were multiple persons at the horn on his recordings, though it was just Collins.”

In The Good Old Summer Time In The Good Old Summer Time – J. W. Myers, 7 weeks at #1

On A Sunday Afternoon – J.W. Myers, 6 weeks at #1

Way Down In Old Indiana – J. W. Myers, 5 weeks at #1

Williams and Walker

Good Morning Carrie – Bert Williams and George Walker, 5 weeks at #1.
Williams “was a Bahamian-born American entertainer, one of the pre-eminent entertainers of the Vaudeville era and one of the most popular comedians for all audiences of his time. He is credited as being the first Black man to have the leading role in a film: Darktown Jubilee in 1914. He was by far the best-selling Black recording artist before 1920.

“Williams was a key figure in the development of African-American entertainment. In an age when racial inequality and stereotyping were commonplace, he became the first Black American to take a lead role on the Broadway stage, and did much to push back racial barriers during his three-decade-long career. Fellow vaudevillian W. C. Fields, who appeared in productions with Williams, described him as “the funniest man I ever saw—and the saddest man I ever knew.”

Walker was an American vaudevillian, actor, and producer. In 1893, in San Francisco, Walker at the age of 20 met Bert Williams, who was a year younger. The two young men became performing partners. Walker and Williams appeared in The Gold Bug (1895), Clorindy (1898), The Policy Player (1899), Sons of Ham (1900), In Dahomey (1903), Abyssinia (1906), and Bandanna Land (1907). Walker married dancer Ada Overton, who later also was a choreographer.

“The two men set up an agency, The Williams and Walker Company, to support African-American actors and other performers, create networking, and produce new works.”

More hits

The Mansion Of Aching Hearts – Harry Macdonough, 4 weeks at #1

The Mansion Of Aching Hearts – Byron Harlan, 3 weeks

Under the Bamboo Tree – Arthur Collins., 3 weeks at #1. Listed as a comedy, presumably because of the dialect. Some of the Lyrics by black composer Bob Cole, who you should read about.

Down in the jungles lived a maid
Of royal blood though dusky shade…

If you lak a me, lak I lak a you,
And we lak a both the same,
I lak a say, this very day,
I lak a change your name;
‘Cause I love a you and love a you true

Health report, from head to toe

Golden Oreos

headtotoe I haven’t done a full-scale health report in a while. Actually, I’ve been impressed how Arthur, for instance, here and here and here, has been quite open about his health challenges. So from head to toe, me.

Head (inside): I briefly saw a shrink online in 2021. Part of it was technological, specifically that I was supposed to use my old phone, and it didn’t work to their office’s technological needs. In any case, I was put off by the process. Then the personal connection with the therapist just didn’t happen. Maybe I’ll try with someone else this year.

Skin: As noted, I have vitiligo. I had been getting an annual full-body skin exam for three years running. The next appointment was scheduled for June 2020, but of course, did not happen. I had one scheduled for January 2022, but then got an appointment at the very end of 2021. Except for my feet (see below), A-OK.

Eyes: my vision is such that I need a good amount of light to see some objects. For instance, if the remote control, which is black, were sitting on the dark brown cabinet in the underlit living room, I’d have a difficult time seeing it. If I were driving, I’d probably not do so at night. I’ll likely have cataract surgery in 2023.

Nose: occasionally runny, but the allergies are mostly under control.

Teeth: Cavity in the lower left part of my mouth. It probably would have been caught earlier if not for COVID.

The heart of the matter

Heart: As I’ve noted, I may have a congenital bicuspid aortic valve. At some point in the next year or two or five, I’ll need surgery. Meanwhile, I’ve taken my blood pressure almost every day for nearly two years. It’s amazingly consistent, for the most part.

Body: Too much of it. I’ve been flirting with diabetes and hit the magic threshold. Now I’m seeing a nutritionist. My levels have clicked back down to pre-diabetes levels, but naturally, I still have to be vigilant.

One very bizarre thing I’ve discovered recently is that, when I’m grocery shopping, my desire for certain snack foods is driven by price. I can walk by those Golden Oreos, which I love, when the package is $5 or more. But when they were on sale for $3 in December, I was sorely tempted, especially since my wife and daughter like them as well. But no. And I actually had my hand on a packet of bakery-quality apple turnovers. A four-pack, two for only $5. No, no, no, no, no, no, no.

Knee: Specifically, the left knee I tore the meniscus in 1994, and it’s hurt pretty much since. I wore the knee brace back when I played racquetball, and I put it on now when I know I’m going to be walking a distance. If I’m walking on an uneven surface – lawns are particularly treacherous – I use the walking stick someone made for me.

Foundational

Feet: I was going to say that my feet are my Achilles’ heel but decided against it. Back in Binghamton, when I was 12, a bunch of us walked to see our 6th-grade teacher, Mr. Peca, who lived near the airport, about 10 miles each way. By the return trip, I had ruined the shoes with my pigeon-toedness. I got frostbite in both feet when I was 16.

Wearing hard-soled shoes has been an agony for decades. That’s why I almost always wore sneakers. I made the tactical error of wearing a pair of shoes, new ones at that, when I was on JEOPARDY in 1998! By the end of the second game, I was pretty miserable. This is why I believe in function over form.

For the last year or more, I have had neuropathy in my feet, especially the left one. For a time, I was so miserable – they felt as though they were burning from the inside – I was literally in tears. Since I’ve been taking Gabapentin, the misery has stopped, but they still as though someone has bound them. I COULD take more medicine, but I am loath to do so.

Only this fall, I got orthotic inserts for my shoes. This required getting better shoes, which I got at an SAS shoe store in the area. GOOD service, BTW. (And not a paid endorsement.)

I tend not to write this stuff often, less out of a sense of privacy and more about not wanting to bore myself, let alone y’all.

What January 6 insurrection?

Big Lie redux

Trump supporters clash with police and security forces as they try to storm the US Capitol in Washington, DC on January 6, 2021. – Demonstrators breached security and entered the Capitol as Congress debated the 2020 presidential election Electoral Vote Certification. (Photo by Joseph Prezioso / AFP) (Photo by JOSEPH PREZIOSO/AFP via Getty Images)

I was trying to write a post about the anniversary of the events of January 6. Now, I had gathered tons of articles and video clips laying out why the events of a year ago were so awful. But isn’t that self-evident? Of COURSE NOT, because America.

I’m going to use the I word here. Right after the January 6 insurrection, all manner of persons, even Republicans in Congress, specifically denounced the then-sitting President for fomenting the violence. Then, not so much. Did It Even Happen?! Spoiler: Yes (feat. Chris Hayes and Jordan Klepper | The Daily Show).

Yeah, I know: “When asked to describe what happened at the Capitol, 85 percent of Democrats surveyed said it was an insurrection and an attempt to overthrow the government. By comparison, 21 percent of Republicans said the Capitol attack was an insurrection and 18 percent said it was an attempt to overthrow the government.”

Don’t use that word!

This Newsweek opinion piece by Markweaver bugged me. “Since January 6, a clanging chorus of commentators has standardized the language surrounding the event with the use of a few choice phrases including ‘insurrection,'[oops!] ‘assault on democracy,’ and—according to President Biden— ‘the worst attack on the Capitol since the Civil War.'”

Then he points to United flight 93, which WOULD have attacked DC on 9/11 but for the intervention of “citizen heroes.” He also mentions “a 1954 assault on Congress when terrorists fired indiscriminately from the gallery into the House chamber, wounding five congressmen.”

I would submit that January 6 is worse because it was, apparently, an inside job. The committee investigating the event is subpoenaing Republicans in Congress, including Jim Jordan. Yes, that Gym Jordan, who House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy wanted to put on that very committee. He and others will be asked about their role in planning the insurrection.

Not as smart as Chauncey Gardiner

Worse because the “leader of the free world” apparently watched the DC riots on TV, ignoring pleas to intervene. This despite pleas from Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity, and Laura Ingraham from FOX News, not to mention Trump’s own family. They all tried to pressure him and his Chief of Staff, Mark Meadows, to “intervene to stop the insurrection (despite publicly downplaying and lying about it).”

Yes, this is worse because, even before the 2020 election, the incumbent made it clear that if he didn’t win, the system must have been rigged. And he repeated the Big Lie again and again, to the point where state Secretaries of State, county clerks, and even those folks who only work the polls were physically threatened.

This is worse because the intent was to stop the prosaic but required task of certifying the Presidential election. Will we ever be able to have an election that isn’t challenged for no good reason?

And this is worse because it could be the collapse of democracy in the US. Thomas Homer-Dixon, “the former head of a center on peace and conflict studies at the University of Toronto, warned that the ‘political and social landscape’ of the U.S.—a profoundly unequal and ideologically polarized nation that also happens to be ‘armed to the teeth’ —is ‘flashing with warning signals.'”

Vaguely related: Conspiracy Chart, from Detached from Reality to Grounded in Reality