Laboring Americans must relearn how to roll cars. Continue reading Laboring
Tidying Ancestry
Who knew reactionary Anglo-America was so afraid?
From where did that segment of our population derive its fright? What scares them so? Continue reading Tidying Ancestry
Survey Says
Technology is intrusive when it comes to mining consumers.
In the old days, sales pretty much determined products’ favorability along with foot traffic recorded in the establishment itself. Who would bother denying the success of a crowded store whose merchandise flew out the doors accompanied by a cacophony of cash registers?
Today, what is as simple as it was before? Continue reading Survey Says
America Is No Longer a Light unto the World
The vile pig now soiling the Oval Office, the treacherous Donald Trump, has transformed July Fourth into a dirge. Continue reading America Is No Longer a Light unto the World
Keeping True
On Father’s Day 2019, I performed an act my own late father might’ve considered sacrilegious. I attended a Dodgers game in Chavez Ravine.
To mitigate my baseball transgression I cheered for the visitors not the home nine.
Father was a Brooklyn Dodgers man through and through. The Los Angeles Dodgers could never have engaged his rooting interest. Continue reading Keeping True
Antipodes: Aftermath and End
Party people milled throughout Axman’s house. Then, he and an assemblage of housemates rented a structure only a cheery paint job saved from being judged Gothic.
This event occurred on a December 2009 night, in Quarropas. Our host had convened what we’d come to call “a gathering.” He scheduled “gatherings” once or twice a month.
From about the late 90s into the farthest aughts, how many party Friday and Saturday nights slid into late next morning inside his house? Looking back from June 2019? Too few and not damned near enough! Continue reading Antipodes: Aftermath and End
Antipodes: Before War
What follows occurred during the earliest years of last decade’s American-led incursion into Iraq. If any need judging, it’s not those who fought but the chickenhawks who sent them into unnecessary combat. Continue reading Antipodes: Before War
Antipodes: The Amethyst Twins
Annegreth and Lieslotte weren’t twins. An instant or two dedicated to closer inspection revealed this.
Yet thanks to same shaggy blonde manes, blue eyes, clear, sun-blessed complexions, and manners of smiling that made each tall though not lanky woman appear uncannily similar, clearer observations rescinded the quick judgment. Neither Uruguayan was truly indistinguishable from another. Yet that’s how most undiscerning strangers like MacDiarmid saw them. Continue reading Antipodes: The Amethyst Twins
Antipodes: The Shamrock
Looking back on the months of March in 2004, 2005, and 2009, didn’t I spend an almost inordinate amount of time in Buenos Aires inside the Shamrock? Why, yes I did.
Spent properly, those hours could’ve been devoted to visiting vineyards west towards the Andes or even venturing south into Patagonia. There, I might’ve investigated cities along the South Atlantic coast and waited to witness whales breaching the ocean’s surface.
But urban creature as I most surely am, and one who traveled alone then, louche comforts lured and guided me.
Perhaps “louche” a harsh judgment for the Shamrock. Let’s direct that upon its clientele. Continue reading Antipodes: The Shamrock
Antipodes: Dark Places
Dissolute excursions inside the Shamrock or the Shannon did not fill my every waking evening hour in Argentina and Uruguay. The principal cities offered plenty of cosmopolitan attractions, particularly Buenos Aires.
Maybe having grown up in Metropolitan New York made it easy or easier. But setting out to investigate rumored addresses never unnerved me. Most of those places were merry and bright; a precious few turned out being among the darkest recesses imaginable. Continue reading Antipodes: Dark Places