Not making any friends

I don’t know what it is about Trader Joe’s parking lots that makes people just lose their minds. It may be that they tend to be relatively small (unless the store is in a larger shopping center)—the lot in the original TJ, on Arroyo Parkway in Pasadena, had maybe 20 slots, and very limited on-street availability. Come the holidays it was not unusual to see people in BMWs and Benzes come to near-blows over a space.

The lot in The People’s Republic is larger than that, but still—I’ve learned not to go there between about 1115 and 1330, and again 1630-1830 on weekdays; I stay away altogether on weekends. People in SUVs just camp out in the limited driving lanes, waiting until someone comes out to load their car and leave. The SUVs block everyone behind them for however long it takes.

Well, the other day I saw this (wouldn't you know it's New Jersey):

You can believe I submitted it to the “Park like an asshole” Reddit sub.

 

©2026 Bas Bleu

 

Ephemera

Some time ago I posted about a grafitto in the gap under the bridge over the W&OD Trail near me. Since Dominion Power razed all the shrubbery along the trail there, a new tag showed up on the abutment:

On that stretch of trail, I almost exclusively walk from East to West, so after I noticed that art, I checked the abutment on the western side, which I never see. No tag, but signs that something had been erased.

Yesterday morning I noticed that the original work has now been sanded away:

Artists get so little respect.

 

©2026 Bas Bleu

 

Sharing the trail

Since Dominion Power razed the shrubbery along the W&OD Trail in The People’s Republic, all the critters that used to live there have relocated.

But apparently a cobra chicken family finds the accommodation suitable. I’ve seen them getting their morning exercise in the past week.

 

Yesterday the mother and one gosling were walking toward me, but by the time I got my mobile out, they'd melted into the brush.

©2026 Bas Bleu

 

Gratitude Monday: She never lets me down

Between SCOTUS and the Virginia Supreme Court, both the law and enfranchisement had a bad week last week.

I mean—ugh.

So I’m turning to Nature today for my gratitude, and boy, does she deliver.

Just—have some irises:

And these fuzzy things that the bees love:

©2026 Bas Bleu

 

Long, cold, lonely winter

Yesterday was one of those overcast days that May has been interspersing with absolutely gorgeous, humidity-free sunshine. Just after noon, I was sitting at my computer, doing some things, when I looked up and the sun was out.

So—here’s Nina Simone singing about it.

You're welcome.

 

©2026 Bas Bleu

Framing the message

This is a bit of a change from my usual posting on vehicular license plates, because it’s not really about the plate, which is not a vanity offering. This time it’s the plate frame, not the plate itself, that sends the message.

But also, there’s that little pink, plastic thing hanging from the bumper.

©2026 Bas Bleu

 

Not a senator from Alabama (although smarter)

Okay, a while back I found the mother of all tubers at Wegman’s. I mean—it dwarfed all the other potatoes in the bin.

(I have no bananas, so here’s a paring knife for comparison.)

It made a whole bowl of mashed potatoes, with having to peel only one.

Win-win.

 

©2026 Bas Bleu

 

Celebrating the overthrow of bad government

Today’s Cinco de Mayo, a holiday celebrated more widely in the US than in México. In my native California, the celebrations will have been going on for days, involving fiestas, mariachis and copious amounts of tequila y cerveza.

Also, any number of retail sales.

You may not know that Cinco de Mayo is basically a regional holiday in México, marking the defeat by forces under Ignacio Zaragoza Seguín of the invading French army at the Battle of Puebla in 1862. The victory didn’t stop the French, intent on an imperial adventure come what may. Not until 1867, when the US woke up from our own civil war and started reminding the French of the Monroe Doctrine, and adding that, gee, we have this whole army hanging around, trained, equipped and everything…did the French withdraw.

They left behind their ersatz "emperor of México", Maximilian, who had the misfortune to be an unemployed Hapsburg archduke (and possible relative of that popinjay Napoleon III), at a time when France needed a figurehead to legitimize their invasion of México. He was executed by firing squad on the orders of Benito Juárez on 19 June 1867.

Sic semper imperis.

Cinco de Mayo isn’t actually México’s independence day—that’s 16 September, when a criollo priest rallied the Mexicans to drive the Spaniards out in 1810. It’s kind of like the Fourth of July in the US—there wasn’t a major military victory, but the very act of declaring that enough is enough is the point at which a nation grows out of a colony.

Father Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla inspired his countrymen with “el grito de Dolores” (“Cry of Dolores). This was something along the lines of, “Long live Our Lady of Guadalupe, death to bad government and death to the Spaniards!” The Battle of Guanjuato followed a few days later, the war was on and the Spanish didn’t actually acknowledge México’s independence until 1821.

But back to the celebration at hand. It’s really a occasion to revel in the heritage of the Mexican immigrants to this country. I don’t remember it as a kid in LA, but by the 80s it was big time. At this particular time, it seems to me more important than ever to consider the multiple cultural threads that are woven into the American tapestry.

For me, I might go for just one shot of reposado, to drink to the death to bad government. That’s always something worthy of toasting.

¡Viva la Revolución!

 

©2026 Bas Bleu

Gratitude Monday: Nature laying it on

Today I am grateful for the poetry of Spring—all the colors that envelop us as Nature throws off Winter’s coat.

I’m grateful for brisk temperatures for my morning walk, as well as the lack of humidity.

I’m grateful for overnight rain that clears up before I go out.

I’m grateful for the birds who sing and the foxes running across the golf course.

Is there any better way to start the day?

 

©2026 Bas Bleu

Every frivolous whim

I’ve been thinking that we—meaning I—need something to start the new month off on a different note from most of my posts for National Poetry Month. May 1^st is May Day, which in European tradition celebrates the full blossoming of Spring. It’s also Beltane, in the Celtic calendar, marking the halfway point between the Spring Equinox and the Summer Solstice. It’s also International Workers Day, celebrating the strength and value of the laboring classes around the world. And it's a day beloved by dictators to show off their military prowess.

For all these reasons, today’s earworm should be exuberant, lively and danceable. So “The Lusty Month of May” has buzzing around my head for about a week and a half. It’s from the musical Camelot, with Queen Guenevere urging the Knights of the Round Table and the courtiers to cast off the gloom of winter, bust some moves and be fruitful.

Now, I’d been thinking about the song just because it’s such an animated piece. But this week I started considering the setting—the whole play; that made me sad. Because Camelot is about a king who wants to turn the notion of might makes right around and create a court where those with power don’t use it to oppress those without it, but instead deploy might for right.

In the end, it collapses not so much because Lancelot and Guenevere’s love betrays Arthur, but because that evil toad Mordred poisons the entire court, bringing it all down; all of it. The final scene is Arthur telling a young Tom of Warwick:

“Don’t let it be forgot
“That once there was a spot
“For one, brief shining moment
“That was known as Camelot.”

And this caused me to wonder if we in the United States are in that moment where everything is crashing down because an evil toad poisoned our society and we’re about to be consigned to the mists of history.

Well, anyway—“The Lusty Month of May”, from the original Broadway cast.

©2026 Bas Bleu