Not black at all

As people all around the world know, today is Black Friday, one of the most insane shopping days of the year. The custom has spread to places that don’t have Thanksgiving, which I do not understand, but whatevs.

And here’s what I’m grateful for: I will at no time today be anywhere near any place where people are shopping.

Many thanks

It’s the Big Day for gratitude here in the United States. The very lucky among us will be gathering with family and friends over a meal, and then some other activities. Bowl games; worship services; going to a movie; board games; serving at a homeless shelter; catching up on news; arguing about fashion choices, politics, original Wonder Woman vs reboot.

Some will go shopping, which means that others will be at work, helping them. Still others will also be at work, on fire trucks and ambulances, in hospital wards and emergency rooms, in cockpits and airports, in patrol cars and precinct houses, on military bases all over the world.

The less fortunate will be eating at soup kitchens, or alone, or not at all.

Today I’ll be joining the friends who had me over last year, and I’m deeply grateful for this. And here’s what else I’m grateful for:

All the turkeys, pigs, cattle, lambs, fish, oysters and other creatures who gave their lives so we can feast—I hope you had a kind existence and a humane end. Thank you.

Farmers, ranchers, fisherfolk, workers in the fields—thank you for your labor that brought this amazing bounty to our tables. You too, supermarket workers—stocking the shelves, directing us to the arcane things we need, sweeping the floors, ringing up all the bags of groceries. I hope you’re unionized. Thank you.

Those who operate homeless shelters, free clinics, soup kitchens, food banks every day of the year—you are my heroes. You give me hope for humanity. Thank you.

Gas station attendants, emergency road rescue crews and convenience store operators who backstop people on the road today, you’re performing a mitzvah. Thank you.

Restaurant cooks, busboys and waitstaff serving families all over the country: I hope your customers don’t give you a hard time and they tip well. Thank you.

First responders of all stripes—thank you.

Serving military, wherever you are, you are on the frontlines of national policy, often making the best of a bad lot. Veterans, however long your service, you contributed to our security at a cost to you we cannot fully understand. Thank you.

Robert S. Mueller III and your team of lawyers, tax experts, terrorism investigators, litigators, RICO prosecutors, money laundering investigators and criminal fraud specialists: please take the day to be with your families and friends, and reflect upon the hundreds of thousands of lives being endangered by the crimes you're probing. The nation and the world are depending on you to uncover whatever acts of corruption, financial improprieties, high crimes and misdemeanors that this Congress is too spineless to look for. Be safe. And thank you.

Those eating alone, or at soup kitchens or not at all—my wish for you is that you soon will find your place among friends who welcome you into their hearts, and that there is room there for gratitude.

Happy Thanksgiving, all.

And I don't mean lettuce

I love bread—thick-sliced whole grain for sandwiches, home-baked white with crusts removed for cinnamon toast (which my great-grandmother made for us), challah (don't slice it!), corn tortillas straight from the tortillería (or your abuelita’s hands), tandoori-blistered naan, buttery-flaky croissants washed down with café au lait in the morning, paper-thin lavash for scooping the pilaf and kabob koobideh, cornbread, those pancakes for moo-shu pork, crusty French to soak up the garlicky broth from moules. If I’m missing any, just fill in the blanks yourself.

Not for nothing is bread called the staff of life—it is an integral part of meals around the world. “Our daily bread” is code for all food that sustains us. “Breaking bread” is how we invite friends and strangers alike into our homes and our lives. In many cultures, to haul off and commit violence while either a host or guest is a serious crime, because it violates the sanctity of hospitality, as symbolized by the sharing of bread.

And, speaking of sanctity, also not for nothing does bread symbolize the body of Christ during Communion. Because see above about the staff of life.

So today I’m dreaming of bread in all its manifestations, and I’m thankful for its manifold blessings, both real and symbolic.

November heat

There’s something about November—the world (at least in the Northern Hemisphere) getting ready for winter; leaves have finished running through their October particolored changes and are being blown all around by the winds; menus shift from salads and grilled fish to boeuf bourguignon and roasted potatoes.

The weather here in the District They Call Columbia has completely bought into the pre-winter schtick, with daytime temps creeping barely into the 50s, and that sharpish wind slicing through several layers of clothing. So I am deeply grateful for having functioning central heating in my house, with a thermostat, which enables me to come in from that cold outside, to a blissfully warm inside, no matter which room I walk into.

A long time ago I realized what a difference having heat makes on one’s outlook. We were moving from the house where I grew up to another one, which had been in probate and therefore the gas wasn’t connected. I went over on a December morning to wait for the PG&E guy, and in the hour or so it took, I felt like the entire world blew rocks. We’re talking Los Angeles, but in the foothills, so it was pretty chilly, and that house was…weighing heavy on my soul.

But within a few minutes after PG&E fired up the furnace and I felt the warm air through the vents—my spirits started to lift, and all kinds of things seemed possible. Nothing else had changed except the place wasn’t freezing.

So, every time I walk through the front door now I’m reminded again what a blessing this is, how fortunate I am to have shelter that offers this kind of comfort throughout this bleak season.

Gratitude Monday: The spirits are about to speak

Gratitude Monday for the Big Week of Gratitude here in the United States, Thursday being the giorno di tutti giorni of gratitude. So I’ll ease into it.

I’m very fortunate to have been invited back for Thanksgiving dinner with friends. My contribution to the festivities will be a couple of pies. So, I’ve been frantically trawling the Interwebz for recipes, and then perusing my gleanings in search of something both traditional and interesting.

A couple of my finds required bourbon, which I do not have. So, on Friday, on a huntin’ trip to McLean (a community blessed with both old and new money, the operative term being “lots of money”) for suet (a story for perhaps another post), I went to the McLean ABC store.

(ABC, in case you do not live in a benighted state, stands for Alcoholic Beverage Control, which is the agency in the Commonwealth of Virginia that runs the only liquor stores in the state. Up until just a few decades ago, you couldn’t buy booze legally here at all. Because God. Then, once the legislature decided that, well, okay, maybe God—and the Baptists—was okay with spirits, they determined that the only appropriate outlet should be controlled by the state. Because revenues. And here we are, entirely at the mercy of what some centralized, Baptist-Methodist bureaucracy decides Virginians should drink, if they’re hell-bent on drinking anything by sweetened iced tea.)

Well, the McLean store moved across the street from where it used to be. Seems like a larger space, and the manager—in a considerable upgrade from the usual good ol’ boy reeking of tobacco exudates whose idea of likker is Virginia Gentleman with a Bud chaser. (Or the newer group, who appear to be from South Asia. And also have no notion of their merchandise.)

Okay, but I went in armed with a list of recommendations from my spiritous adviser. And the manager was very helpful indeed. Buffalo Trace, as it turns out, disappears off the shelves within a day of arrival, but choices two and three—Eagle Rare and Larceny—were available. The manager had a couple of comments on both, which indicates that he at least knew his stock.

I also splurged on a bottle of Calvados, which I have not had since a trip to France in the last century. I thought the holidays a good time to revisit that. Again, the manager was au fait with this—calva, too, disappears quickly, so I was glad to snag this one.

It remains to be seen whether I’ll particularly like either of the bourbons, but they’re good quality, and my guiding principle is that you don’t cook with anything you wouldn’t drink. And I’m grateful for the opportunity to venture out a little into the spirit world. 

Let the baking commence!

Booted out

Let’s close out the week with a tale of suburbia, from the commuter parking lot where I leave my car most days. I got back one evening and saw this:

As I got closer, here’s what they were:

I just wonder what the story behind those boots is? Invent your own answers.

Learning disability

What with successive rounds of the Repugnant attempts to “repeal and replace” ACA, plus just unbelievable nominations to the Kleptocrat’s administration, I’ve made so many calls to my Senators and Representative that I’m now expecting their staff members to start inviting me to weddings and Bar Mitzvahs.

The latest was yesterday when I called yet again to urge the triad to vote the Repugnant tax scam bill back under the rocks where it was spawned. And this reminded me of an attempt by the ‘Pugs back in June to hawk up some support for their ambush of fired FBI director James B. Comey. It was on Twitter, and it did not go well. Viz:

They seriously never learn.

Locked down

It’ll be interesting to see how one of Amazon’s new (well, ish) business models plays out. I’m talking Amazon Locker, the ordering option that, instead of having your purchases delivered to your front door, allows you to designate a secure locker (well, I assume it’s secure) in some location that’s presumably convenient, and you can go there to pick it up.

I get it that there are issues around packages left on people’s doorsteps—big enough issues that Amazon has another delivery option for you: Amazon Key. With Amazon Key, if you’re a Prime customer (and I don’t know why you’d order more than twice without being a Prime customer), you can install an Amazon-provided digital lock on your front door. When you have a delivery, the Amazon-authorized delivery person goes through some sort of authentication process and then is able to open your door and leave the package inside your house. You, of course, can follow all this via an Amazon Key app on your mobile phone.

(I’m seriously not wild about this, primarily because of the third-party delivery services ranging from—at best—FedEx, to—at worse—USPS, who delivers the last-mile for UPS in many cases, and does all Saturday/Sunday deliveries. Well, I suppose there’s one possibility even worse than USPS; that would be DHL. But I’m leaving them out of the equation. My point is, these are contractors or sub-contractors, and I would not want them inside my house under any circumstance. I also don’t see how Amazon can guarantee against theft in these conditions. We’re basically talking a TSA-baggage handler finger pointing ring of non-accountability. So, no.)

Well, okay, back to Locker. I bring it up because for me the whole point of paying for home delivery is, you know, home delivery. As in: delivery to my actual home. Not some locker somewhere I have to drive, park, find, unlock, schlep to my car, drive home and then again schlep from my car to my house. For me, it ain’t “delivery” unless it’s delivered. (I became a big Amazon consumer when I lived in a third-floor walk-up in the Valley They Call Silicon. Other things being equal, I’d much rather the UPS guy carry the laser printer, office chair and 40 pounds of bird seed up two flights of stairs instead of me.)

This is especially an issue in urban environments, like the Metro DC area. Just in the Greater Reston-Herndon Metroplex in Fairfax County, going two miles can take 15 to 30 minutes, depending on time of day, high school sporting events, weather and other variables. I don’t see why I should do the work I’m paying Amazon to do. (I also avoid the self-serve supermarket checkout lanes for the same reason. You’re not giving me a discount for doing that, so I’m not doing it.)

Case in point: I saw this one at the Whole Foods store in Vienna, which is about 25 minutes away from me on a Saturday morning with no football games or Christmas fairs.

Let me just say that there is absolutely no value proposition around making me drive to Vienna at any time to pick up a package of cute socks, or an Italian fountain pen, or 40 pounds of bird seed.

WMATA cocktail

‘Kay, well, I’m thinking that someone on the Metro was having a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad Monday. How do I know this, you ask?

By getting on at Metro Center and finding this in one of the seats:

Man, whoever you are, I feel your pain.

Gratitude Monday: Every rung

How ‘bout them elections, huh? Just one year after America’s psychotic break, the fog appears to be lifting, and voters went to the polls in multiple states last week to begin restoring the notion of government of the people, by the people and for the people.

As opposed to government of the greedy, by the corrupt and for the plutocrats.

Since Tuesday I’ve been thinking a lot about that song we learned in elementary school: “Jacob’s Ladder”, about keeping hope alive while putting one foot in front of the other. It seems an apt reminder after the appalling events of the past year, and I’m feeling that hope revive.

Here in the Commonwealth of Virginia—once the capital of the Confederacy, and scene only last August of willie-waving demonstrations by obese neo-Nazis and pimply white supremacists in Thomas Jefferson’s home town—we made tremendous strides. In the gubernatorial race, Democratic candidate Ralph Northam handily defeated former RNC chief Ed Gillespie, who ran a campaign of vile, racist ads that took many pages out of his idol, the Kleptocrat’s play book—screaming about MS-13 taking over the Old Dominion, even though crime is down here.

(As late as Tuesday morning, the dotard was spewing tweets urging Virginians to support Gillespie. As the returns came in in the evening, and it became evident that Northam was leading, there was speculation on Twitter as to how long it would take him to throw Gillespie under the bus. I may have won the pool with my “in a New York minute”; the first NBC call for Northam had barely been made before Klepto tweeted that it was Gillespie’s failure “to embrace me” that caused the loss. I’m still trying to wash the mental polaroid of what that embrace might have looked like out of my mind.)

In addition to Northam, Virginians voted in Democrats for Lieutenant Governor and Attorney General, which guards against infighting at the top of the state government structure.

More heartening were the races for the House of Delegates, where Democrats made huge inroads into Republican control—which will have a salubrious effect on redrawing gerrymandered Congressional districts down the road. At time of writing, Republicans were down to 47 (from 66) seats, with votes still being counted in three districts. (There’s some kerfuffle in Stafford County over absent ballots from active duty military that hadn’t been opened, with the county registrar blocking recounts. I hope to God the ACLU is on this.) Pulling to a 50-50 split in the House would mean that newly-elected Lt. Governor Justin Fairfax (only the second African American elected to statewide office in Virginia history) can cast tie-breaking votes.

(There were also reports—too many to be dismissed as a rumor—of calls made to Democrats in different jurisdictions, announcing that their polling precincts had changed and directing them to bogus locations. Other reports surfaced of uniformed law enforcement officers standing outside polling places “directing” Latino-looking voters how to vote. Repugnants do not change their spots.)

But even more amazing was the fact that Democrat Danica Roem became the first openly transgender person to be elected, and she defeated incumbent Robert G. Marshall, arch-conservative and proudly self-proclaimed “chief homophobe”, perhaps best known for proposing a law banning transgender people from using public toilets in accordance with their gender identity.

I purely loved the classy way she closed out the race: when asked about Marshall, she replied, “I don’t attack my constituents. Bob is my constituent now.”

In other races, Elizabeth Guzman and Hala Ayala both defeated Republican incumbents to become the first-ever Latinas elected to the House of Delegates, and Cathy Tran—who came to this country as a refugee from Vietnam as an infant—defeated another ‘Pub incumbent to join Guzman and Ayala. However the still-contested races turn out, the House of Delegates is losing its pasty complexion and getting some healthy color.

And—one of my favorites—down Blacksburg way, former news anchor Chris Hurst, whose girlfriend Alison Parker was shot dead on live TV two years ago by a former colleague—defeated yet another Repugnant incumbent. The delicious kicker? Hurst’s opponent, Joseph R. Yost, holds a “Grade A” stamp of approval from the NRA.

There were other amazing stories around the country from last Tuesday’s election, including more transgender wins in Palm Springs, Ca.; Minneapolis, Minn.; and Erie, Penn. Charlotte, N.C., elected its first black mayor, and Hoboken, N.J., elected the first Sikh American mayor in the country—despite a vicious, fear-mongering racist campaign waged by his opponent. Women and underrepresented minorities made gains across the country, despite the perceived wisdom that non-presidential elections are lackluster.

I take real hope from these events—even though I well know that these wins were the result of hard, slogging work by thousands of individuals, and we will need to replicate this work in next year’s elections, where one third of the Senate and all the House are up for grabs. Even so, I’m savoring this moment, and I am grateful for all that work that got us this far.

Like that old song says, every rung goes higher, higher.