No Kings Day

Living with dementia and craving to be king:

"I don't feel like a king.
I have to go through hell to get stuff approved.
A king would say I'm not going to get this.
I -- a king would have never had the California
mandate to even be talking to him.
He wouldn't have to call up Mike Johnson and Thune
and say, fellas, you got to pull this off
and after years we get it done.
No, no, we're not a king. We're not a king at all."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

WE???
Has someone been talking to Queen Victoria?

Here's a THIRD batch of embarrassing drivel,
just in time for No Kings Day
[Also posted on The Fortnightly Kitti Carriker]

FIRST batch:
"I Didn't Even Know Anything"
QK & FN

SECOND batch:
"A Very Much Different Country"
QK & FN

1.

Drone technology,
as described by someone living with dementia:

"I think you're gonna find that it's a very different, uh, warfare out there today. Now, they've introduced a thing called drone. A drone is a little bit different. It makes -- You have to go back and learn a whole new form of warfare, and you're gonna do it better than anybody else." [Photo: Beginner Drone Set]

2.

God's Plan,
as described by someone living with dementia:

"We're gonna have a big, big celebration, as you know, 250 years. In some ways I'm glad I missed that second term where it was because -- I wouldn't be your president for that. Most important of all, in addition, we have the World Cup and we have the Olympics. Can you imagine? I missed that four years and now look what I have, I have everything. Amazing the way things work out. God did that, I believe that too. God did it."

3.

Unbelievable!
-- to someone living with dementia:

"But we've found things that are unbelievably stupid and unbelievably bad with the Department of Government Efficiency. . . . DOGE has installed geniuses with an engineering mindset and unbelievably talented people and computers. I actually asked Elon one time, what's their primary thing, and they have a lot of primary things, all having to do with being smart."

4.

Member of the U.S. Senate Joni Ernst in 2016
standing alongside presidential nominee living with dementia:

Ernest speaks sarcastically of Jesus, right along with the tooth fairy: “I made an incorrect assumption that everyone in the auditorium understood that, yes, we are all going to perish from this earth,” she said. “So I apologize, and I’m really, really glad that I did not have to bring up the subject of the tooth fairy as well. For those that would like to see eternal and everlasting life, I encourage you to embrace my Lord and savior Jesus Christ.”

5.

Living with dementia
and a fourth grade vocabulary,
so that everything is "big and beautiful"
or "mean and nasty" or "REALLY BAD":

“What Vladimir Putin doesn’t realize is that if it weren’t for me, lots of really bad things would have already happened to Russia, and I mean REALLY BAD. He’s playing with fire!”

6.

Is America ready for a president living with dementia?
7.

Meeting agenda
for a person living with dementia:

"We're going up to Camp David. We have meetings with various people about very major subjects."

8.

Living with dementia and delusions of grandeur:

"The U.S could survive without almost anybody
. . . . Except me."

Heather Cox Richardson:
“There is also no doubt Trump continues to demonstrate
that he is more committed to fantasy than reality.”
[emphasis added]

9.

"Political correctness" as misunderstood
by someone living with dementia:

"I watched it very closely and it was amazing the job that the National Guard did. And by the way, the police were working very hard also. But the police are given instructions to be politically correct. I said, no, no, you don't have to be politically correct, you have to do the job."

10.

2024 was a Landslide...for 'Did Not Vote'

Just a reminder: one half of the country
did not vote for the current Republican administration
-- only about one third. Not the same thing.

"Mandate," as misconstrued
by a person, living with dementia:

"I won the election by a landslide. I mean, we have a crack -- and we have a big mandate because of that."

11.

Living with dementia and tilting at windmills:

"The windmills are killing our country, by the way. . . . Even if they're white ones, a beigey white, ones a darker white, ones a lighter white. And then they start to rust after four or five years. And then they start to wear out and nobody takes them . . . Windmills, all over the place, tall ones, short ones, dead ones, they're all dead."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Click here for FIRST batch:
"I Didn't Even Know Anything"
QK & FN

And SECOND batch:
"A Very Much Different Country"
QK & FN

My Favorite No Kings Day Sign!

The Truth Shall Set You Free

Photo Source

Ken Jennings really stands up for America
and speaks out in his recent NYT guest essay.
If you haven't read it yet, read it now:

Trivia and ‘Jeopardy!’ Could Save Our Republic

Alternative Facts "But trust in authority is not exactly at an all-time high, as you’ve probably heard. It’s been more than eight years since Kellyanne Conway’s coinage of the phrase “alternative facts” on “Meet the Press,” an Orwellian way to soft-pedal the outright falsehoods being told by powerful institutions. You don’t hear much about alternative facts anymore, but only because so many of them are no longer the alternative to anything. They have moved to the mainstream."
[Thanks Ken Jennings]

Which hearkens back to Stephen Colbert's term --
Truthiness: "Truthiness is the belief or assertion that a particular statement is true based on the intuition or perceptions of some individual or individuals, without regard to evidence, logic, intellectual examination, or facts.[1][2] Truthiness can range from ignorant assertions of falsehoods to deliberate duplicity or propaganda intended to sway opinions.

"The concept of truthiness has emerged as a major subject of discussion surrounding U.S. politics during the late 20th and early 21st centuries because of the perception among some observers of a rise in propaganda and a growing hostility toward factual reporting and fact-based discussion."
[Thanks Wikipedia]

More on Jeopardy!
Running list of boo-boos
Purdue
Shakespeare
Olden days
Insomnia

"I’ve always hated the fact that 'trivia,'
really our only word in English for general-knowledge
facts and games, is the same word we use to mean
'things of no importance.' So unfair!"
~ Ken Jennings

I Had Been Missed

The House at Rueil (1882)
by Édouard Manet (1832 - 1883)

Someday, I would like to go home. The exact location of this place, I don't know, but someday I would like to go. There would be a pleasing feeling of familiarity and a sense of welcome in everything I saw. People would greet me warmly. They would remind me of the length of my absence and the thousands of miles I had travelled in those restless years, but mostly, they would tell me that I had been missed, and that things were better now I had returned. Autumn would come to this place of welcome, this place I would know to be home. Autumn would come and the air would grow cool, dry and magic, as it does that time of the year. At night, I would walk the streets but not feel lonely, for these are the streets of my home town. These are the streets that I had thought about while far away, and now I was back, and all was as it should be. The trees and the falling leaves would welcome me. I would look up at the moon, and remember seeing it in countries all over the world as I had restlessly journeyed for decades, never remembering it looking the same as when viewed from my hometown."
[emphasis added]

Henry Rollins (b 1961)
American singer and writer

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Some music for the restless journey:

1. Bach ~ Cello Suite No. 1 in G Major, Prelude
Two versions: Yo-Yo Ma & Mstislav Rostropovich

2. Handel ~ Suite No 4 in D Minor, HWV 437, Sarabande
& Vivaldi, as heard in the movie Barry Lyndon

3. Thanks to Sam for sharing
No Hard Feelings

RFK

Rest in Peace RFK
November 20, 1925 – June 6, 1968

American politician and lawyer
United States Attorney General and Senator
Assassinated after giving a speech in Los Angeles,
when running for the Democratic presidential nomination.

“Each time someone stands up for an ideal, or acts to improve the lot of others, or strikes out against injustice, they send forth a tiny ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring those ripples build a current which can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance.”

Robert Francis Kennedy
from a speech given in
Cape Town, South Africa
exactly 2 years before his death
June 6, 1966

As far back as I can remember, my grandparents had a picture of JFK and RFK, just like the one above, hanging on their living room wall. According to family lore, my youngest brother thought that the Kennedy brothers were our uncles, because their picture was right next to the framed photograph of Uncle Rudy, my dad's handsome brother who died in WWII.

Rest in Peace Uncle Rudy

TSgt Raymond R. Carriker
b. June 3, 1921 - d. April 1, 1944
93rd Bombardment Group
Stationed at RAF Hardwick, Norfolk, UK
Killed in action, over Reims, France

Sadly, a number of my elders (evangelical Protestants) were prejudeced against Catholics -- and against the Kennedys for that reason. But not Grandma and Grandpa Carriker (RLDS). I'm glad I had them as role models for knowing that the Democrats (no matter what their religion) had better hearts than the Republicans. I think it may be the memory of their example that inspires me, election after election, to vote a straight Democratic ticket (eliminating any traitors to party policy, but NOT taking on any Republicans unless they have actually changed parties).


Ted Kennedy’s Eulogy
For his brother Robert Kennedy
"We loved him as a brother, and as a father, and as a son. From his parents and from his older brothers and sisters, Joe and Kathleen and Jack, he received an inspiration which he passed on to all of us. He gave us strength in time of trouble, wisdom in time of uncertainty, and sharing in time of happiness. He will always be by our side.

"Love is not an easy feeling to put into words, nor is loyalty, or trust, or joy. But he was all of these. He loved life completely and he lived it intensely. . . .

My brother need not be idealized or enlarged in death beyond what he was in life, to be remembered simply as a good and decent man who saw wrong and tried to right it, saw suffering and tried to heal it, saw war and tried to stop it.

Those of us who loved him and who take him to his rest today, pray that what he was to us and what he wished for others will some day come to pass for all the world. As he said many times, in many parts of this nation, to those he touched and who sought to touch him:

'Some see things as they are and say why.
I dream things that never were and say why not.' "

P.S.
"Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?"
& Hope of a Nation

Body Image, Again and Still

"Mirror, mirror on the wall . . . "
Photo Credit

Now at last I have come to see what life is,
Nothing is ever ended, everything only begun,
And the brave victories that seem so splendid
Are never really won.*
~ Sarah Teasdale ~

Shall we never be done fighting the body image fight? Or is it going to be forever popping up like a whack-a-mole for the rest of our lives? That's how it seems, if current events are any indication. Just take a look into the fun mirror of popular culture and medical media for a barrage of images and messages to make you feel bad about your appearance.

Thank goodness for counter messages such as these, that keep offering a healthier alternative:

1. This video: "48 Things Women Hear"
posted by my niece Chantel

Sad but true -- every single one. But one weird thing about "no guy wants to have sex with a virgin" -- I was taught the exact opposite: "Guys only want to have sex with virgins." Catch 22: so you better never have sex or you won't be a virgin and no one will want to have sex with you. I guess for every hateful message, there's an equally hateful counter-message. So you can never win."

2.This photo essay: Mermaid or Whale
posted by my friend Jean

Speaking of weight, I was irritated at the endocrinologist’s office recently to hear the nurse advise me that if I had carried more weight over the years my bones would probably be stronger and denser now — while simultaneously giving me a personal fitness handout stating that I need to lose weight!

So the message is, okay, you may have a scrawny little compromised worthless skeleton, but you’re still too fat! What??? Which one is it? How small does a woman have to be around here for people to stop telling her that she is too big? Sometimes I think the right answer is "When she disappears. That's when she'll be small enough."

I hope she never loses
this optimistic energy & self-image

Once again, here's my long ago
Letter to Editor

and

Tribute to Bette Midler

The Wide Missouri

Sunrise, looking east
from St. Charles toward St. Louis

"Oh, Shenandoah! I hear you calling!
Away, you rolling river!
Yes, far away I hear you calling,
Ha, Ha! I'm bound away across the wide Missouri."

Additional renditions by
Chanticleer & Springsteen

Some listeners like to pretend that this is a song about the Shenandoah Valley and the Shenandoah River, but no! It is a song about the Wide Missouri!

Mid-day from our hotel room . . .

when the hailstorm came . . .

For further thoughts on
The Wide Missouri & The Gulf of Mexico
see my recent post

The Gulf of Mexico and Beyond

@The Fortnightly Kitti Carriker
A literary blog of connection & coincidence;
custom & ceremony

~ More river pics ~
The Misouri
The Mississippi & The Wabash

Outdoor Rocks

A thoughtful activity for Memorial Day:
go on a nature walk or to the cemetery, find some rocks,
and assemble a cairn, like this impressive stack of stones,
gathered and balanced in our neighbor's backyard.

More cairns on my blog.
Also called ebenezers.

The Cairn

When I think of the little children learning
In all the schools of the world,
Learning in Danish, learning in Japanese
That two and two are four, and where the rivers of the world
Rise, and the names of the mountains and the principal cities,
My heart breaks.
Come up, children! Toss your little stones gaily
On the great cairn of Knowledge!
(Where lies what Euclid knew, a little grey stone,
What Plato, what Pascal, what Galileo:
Little grey stones, little grey stones on a cairn.)
Tell me, what is the name of the highest mountain?
Name me a crater of fire! a peak of snow!
Name me the mountains on the moon!
But the name of the mountain that you climb all day,
Ask not your teacher that.

by Edna St. Vincent Millay (1892 - 1950)
More poems: QK & FN & KL

Another fun & mystical idea:
Design a Stone Cat!

In contrast to Outdoor Rocks,
check out my recent Fortnightly Blog:

Indoor Rocks

Ellie & Aidan's treasure stash
(one of many)
containing numerous indoor rocks.

A Very Much Different Country

Did somebody say Gulf of Mexico?

Arbitrary name change,
as described by someone living with dementia:

"We named the Gulf of Mexico into the Gulf of America."

Wait, there's more, there's always more
embarrassing, demoralizing, and revolting drivel,
not fit for children -- or adults -- to hear.

Here's a SECOND batch of nonsense,
[Also posted on The Fortnightly Kitti Carriker]
just as inappropriate and cringeworthy as before!

" . . . making us a very much different country
and a very different Republican Party."

I'll say!
1.

Can you say Stepford Wives?
In thrall to someone living with dementia.

2.

Headgear fashion faux pas
by someone living with dementia.

3.

A Cartoon for Fun

Recent urban construction,
as described by someone living with dementia:

"Majestic skyscrapers, the towers that I see . . . and all of the different [unintelligible] I’ve seen a lot of different towers. I didn’t think there’s any version of a tower that I haven’t seen in one form or another."

4.

Insomnia,
as described by someone living with dementia,
completely misunderstanding that
tossing and turning = guilty conscience:

"Mohammad, do you sleep at night? How do you sleep? Huh? Just thinking. What a job. He tosses and turns like some of us, tosses and turns all night, how do I make it even better, all night. It’s the ones that don’t toss and turn, they’re the ones that will never take you to the promised land. Won’t they? But you have done some job. True."

5.

Who's hot & who's not,
as described by someone living with dementia:

"The United States is the hottest country — with the exception of your country, I have to say, right? I’m not going to take that on. No, Mohammed, I’m not going to take that on. Wouldn’t that be a terrible thing if I made that full statement? But I will not do it. You’re hotter. At least as long as I’m up here, you’re hotter" [in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, May 13, 2025] . . . "Has anyone noticed that, since I said 'I HATE TAYLOR SWIFT,' she's no longer 'HOT?' ” [online Friday, May 16].

6.

“…a top of the line, uhh, timberman like...
Like... You know who? Sean... Duffy,”
as described by someone lving with dementia:

“He's a great Sean though, I have to tell you but Sean Duffy was the world champion for five years climbing trees and down, up and down, world champion! So that's what you call a serious a lumberjack."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Click here for FIRST batch:
"I Didn't Even Know Anything"
QK & FN

CREDITS
I think we can count
on a steady stream of material for this project.
Above comments taken from:

Occupy Democrats

Speech in Riyadh

Memorial Day Message to the UN

Americana Candy
from The Vermont Country Store

Message to the United Nations

I want the flags torn loose from the thunder
in the full sun of day, at the zenith,
in a hush, as steam rises in the greenhouses
and birds are struck mute by the heat;

I want the thunder torn from the tongue of the sun
and buried in the sea,
as children's marching - bands play out of tune
waving all their tinsel, their spangles and flags;

I want the thunder and the flags together burned
by a towering lens reflecting the sun,
a bowl of emerald, sapphire, and gold,
a paradigm of brightness,

and I want them swallowed forever
in the immense vertigo of hurled fire,
moribund salamander no longer able to rise:

and then, from the blazing center of the flames,
from the dizzying height of the incandescence,
a parade of lightning-strokes
silently to emerge in awesome serried rows,

proclaiming the Power of the universe
to humble the maddest of men,
dissolving the obscene dialectics of the generals,
obliterating all the configurations of politics

and welcoming the beatific lion whose mercy
sustains the people, the lion of Samson
in the stead of the lion of Nemea
vanquished by once-mad Heracles finally and forever,

and then, at last, the dissolution of ranks
in the regiments of slavery
as the people re-emerge from their sleep
and come forward in a vast alive frontier

in a hurricane of souls born again
in the silent thunderclap of the leaves,
on the sapient amplitude of the conflagration!

10 / 2 / 72

by Dan Propper (1937 - 2003)
[See also Samurai & Gulf]

Friends Have Made the Story

On my birthday ~ thanks to all my friends!

Two Women on the Hillside, 1906
by Franz Marc (1880 – 1916)

“Thus it is that my friends have made the story of my life. In a thousand ways they have turned my limitations into beautiful privileges, and enabled me to walk serene and happy in the shadow cast by my deprivation.”

from The Story of My Life
by Helen Keller (1880–1968)

Two Girls Reading the Novel "Paul et Virginie"
by Marie Françoise Caroline Vallée (b 1803)

Gemini Season

Apollo & Artemis
And other twins in mythology
Previous Gemini Posts: QK ~ FN ~ KL
Although I do not put much stock in astrology, I have always thought it significant that my twin brother and I were born under the sign of Gemini. Whether or not I myself am a true believer, it remains true that my most - searched blog posts are

The Age of Aquarius: It's a Sign!
&
Gemini, A Mutable Sign

Apparently, astrology rules!
Years ago, traveling in England as graduate students, my friend Kathryn and I took the train from Oxford to Leeds. At Birmingham, a woman took the seat across from us and immediately asked if I was a Gemini. I answered yes and realized that she had noticed the small, pewter Gemini charm hanging on a chain around my neck. She then pulled a huge Gemini pendant from under her sweater and was doubly surprised when Kathryn revealed her Gemini identity also. When Kathryn and I first met and tallied up our many common interests and characteristics, one of our favorites was the coincidence that we were both Gemini.

The most fabulous part of meeting the traveler with the Gemini pendant was when we shared our names. Our newfound Gemini friend introduced herself as "Kathryn," nick - named "Kitty." (Unless she just said that!) As if this wasn't quite enough of a coincidence for one day, when Kitty got off at Derby, the man who took her place was named "Bruce" -- the name of my twin brother!

Always Be Twinning!

Previous Twin Posts: QK ~ FN ~ KL

I Didn't Even Know Anything

No! You may not have the rainbow,
not 3 dozen, not 1 dozen -- only 5!

Scarcity vs Plenty,
as described by someone living with dementia:

"I’m just saying they don’t need to have 30 dolls.
They can have three.
They don’t need to have 250 pencils. They can have five."

“In our age there is no such thing as ‘keeping out of politics.’
All issues are political issues,
and politics itself is a mass of lies,
evasions, folly, hatred, and schizophrenia.”

George Orwell (1903 -1950)
Politics and the English Language (1946)
I have started a new series of facebook posts, referred to by my friend Tom as my "Wish this was satire, but it's actually the President of The United States quoted verbatim" column! I started brooding about this idea on Easter Sunday, when a facebook friend posted Trump's latest skreed and asked in dismay, "How is the author of this the President of the United States?" Responses from her readers:

1. "I don’t understand why he being allowed to remain president after an outburst like this. He is obviously psychologically compromised.

2. "Beyond being POTUS, the greatest danger we confront as a nation is the tens of millions who support him. History has now vindicated Hilary Clinton who gave us a sober, mild and respectful definition of who they are."

After reading the entire thread of very thoughtful responses, I started wondering, what is a "sober, mild and respectful" way to call out these repeated disrespectful and totally demented outbursts that so clearly signal "psychological compromise."

I settled on "living with dementia." That's respectful, right? Nicer than "totally demented." And I wouldn't even have to say his name. Everyone knows. Also, in case anyone wants to make a comparison, even on Biden's worst day, he never sounded this disconnected from reality!

Of course, my loyal reader Tom totally gets this approach of publishing verbatim statements that are so absurd in the original that without even so much as an Op-Ed comment, they come off as effective political satire. However, I do worry that no matter how asinine those comments may sound to many, they might sound completely normal to those who support the current administration -- or worse yet, those who might read them and say, "Oh cool. Good idea!" I certainly don't want to do them any favors by posting their nonsense or accidentally colluding in heightening their visibility!
Nevertheless, here is the first batch.
[Also posted on The Fortnightly Kitti Carriker]
May they inform and entertain and outrage:

What it means to be popular,
as described by someone living with dementia:

"If you look at some of these internet people, I know so many of them. Elon is so terrific, but I know now all of them, you know they all hated me in my first term and now they're kissing my ass. You know [mumbling] it's true. All of them. It's true. It's amazing. It's nicer this way."

Inappropriate gossip about "trophy wives,"
from someone living with dementia:

"He retired and he led a beautiful life. He had a wife, I must tell you, it was his second wife. It was a trophy wife. What can I say? I don't like telling you everything, but we're all friends, right? Can we talk? We're all friends. He had a trophy wife."

Change and resistance,
as described by someone living with dementia:

"Change is never easy. And the closer you get to success, the more ferociously those with a interested interest in the past will resist you."

Majoring in journalism,
as described by someone living with dementia:

"You're available. It's a good time to be available. There are some times when it's not so good to be available, but this is a great time. . . . To the journalism majors, of which I've had a lot of problems with, I must be honest. I'm not sure I like them. No, I do. I do. But you're really leading of everything because we need a great and free press."

Bird Flu and Easter Eggs,
as described by someone living with dementia:

"And when I took over, you remember the big thing with eggs? They hit me the first week, 'Eggs, eggs, eggs,' like it was my fault. I said, 'I didn't cause this problem. This problem was caused by Biden. What's the problem with eggs?' And they said, 'They've doubled it,' Well, eggs are down 87% since I got involved. . . . And by the way -- and there were plenty of eggs for Easter, which we just went through. There were plenty of eggs for Easter. They were saying, 'You won't have enough eggs for Easter.' We ended -- our sec -- my secretary did a fantastic job on eggs."

~ A helpful book for children ~

The Declaration of Independence
as described by someone living with dementia:

"Well, it means exactly what it says, it's a declaration. A declaration of unity and love and respect, and it means a lot. And it's something very special to our country."

~ Alcatraz as seen in "Eh, the movies." ~

Alcatraz Prison,
as described by someone living with dementia:

"Well, I guess I was supposed to be a movie maker. We're talking—we started with the movie making and will end. I mean, it—it represents something very strong, very powerful in terms of law and order. Our country needs law and order. Alcatraz is, uh, I would say, the ultimate, right? Alcatraz. Sing Sing and Alcatraz. Eh, the movies. But, uh, it's right now a museum, believe it or not, a lot of people go there. It housed the, uh, most violent criminals in the world, and nobody ever escaped. One person almost got there. But they, as you know the story, they found his clothing rather badly ripped up. And, uh, it was a lot of shark bites, lot of, a lot of problems. Nobody's ever escaped from Alcatraz. And just represented something, uh, strong having to do with law and order. We need law and order in this country. And so we're going to, uh, look at it. Some of the people up here are going to be working very hard on that. And, uh, we had a little conversation. I think it's going to be very interesting. We'll see if we can, uh, bring it back in large form, add a lot. But I think it represents something. Right now it's, uh, a big hunk that's sitting there rusting and rotting, uh, very, uh, you look at it, it's sort of a [?]. You saw that picture that was put out. It's sort of amazing. But it sort of represents something that's both horrible and beautiful and strong and miserable. Weak. It's got a lot of, it's got a lot of qualities that are interesting. And I think they, they make a point. Okay."

CREDITS
I think we can count
on a steady stream of material for this project.
Above comments taken from:

Interview with Kristen Welker~ NBC

Interview with Terry Moran ~ ABC

Commencement Address
at the University of Alabama

My favorite line in one of the above interviews:

"I didn’t even know anything about
what you — we were talking about."

You can say that again!