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