Summer Solstice - June 21, 2024

Yesterday 4:52 PM marked the beginning of the summer solstice, the little best day of the year on the Northern hemisphere. People have celebrated this day since time immemorial across the globe. The word Solstice means “sun standing still” or “grianstad' in Celtic. This morning I awoke at first light. 5:14 AM.

Back in the last century my friend AJ and I went out to Stonehenge for a neolithic day trip. I hugged the monumental stones and cried as one with Celtic blood, even though the monolithic stones were erected by an unknown race many millennium before the Irish wandered northern Europe. Since that visit the Crown, which claims ownership of the ruins, has restricted entry to the ring of stones. Today thousands of pagans greeted the dawn at Stonehenge. New Yorkers for the most part ignored the yearly phenomena, even though Manhattan's East to West streets from 14th to 155th are aligned with sunrise and sunset during the three-day solstice period.

According to Wikipedia the Commissioners' Plan of 1811 arranged the street grid for most of Manhattan according to the azimuth at sunset to 299° (i.e., 29° north of due West), so he island's sunset aligns with the streets on that gird.

Tomorrow morning I will greet the sun naked in Montauk.

Enjoy the cosmos.

It's in our blood.

Why Read At All - Florida Ban On Books - 2024

On September 11, 2024 Florida fired the New College of Florida's librarian after the release of photos of the dumpster of books. The state liberal art college had been taken over the previous year by allies of Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis dedicated to the Nazi-styled cleansing of books offensive to Bible Thumpers. In early August library Dean Shannon Hausinger had asked a New College lawyer about the policy for weeding out books. The lawyer had answered that the process that had been started by her predecessor of removing books that no longer aligned with the college's mission or hadn't been checked out in years according to NPR. New College Board of Trustees member Christopher Rufo a neo-religionist described as "taking out the trash." Given the green light Dean Shannon Hausinger issued the purge order without any supervision; damaged books, out of date books et al.

ABC reported that The Social Equity Through Education Alliance had been alerted by a New College student who reported seeing what they believed was up to "thousands" of books being "shoved into a dumpster" behind the college's library.

"We basically tried to communicate to officials that there were educational nonprofits and shelters that were immediately willing to bring trucks and save all of the books … and officials refused," said Zander Moricz, executive director at SEE.

Moricz continued, "There were Bibles, there were stories of Black authors, of Latin authors, female stories, there were LGBTQ+ and queer stories, or trans stories, all thrown into a dumpster. It sends the message that New College of Florida wants to send stories of gender and diversity to the dump, and it was so heartbreaking and also very frustrating."

Dean Shannon Hausinger was fired on 9/11 for carrying out her superiors' orders.

I suspect the none of the offending Bibles were the King James Version. Known as Many Independent Fundamentalist Baptist churches as King James Onlyism.

My mention of this even is a year late, but a new survey by the Pew Research Center reported that 42% of college students stop reading after graduation . Amongst my friends only 10% read books dedicated their time to cat memes online, thus becoming nonliterate. I'm presently rereading CLADIUS THE GOD by Robert Graves. King Herod of Judah is his best friend, but has nothing to do with the Nailed God.

ps Ignorance is easier to achieve than enlightenment. - James Steele - Fugitive

Dean Shannon Hausinger was terminated on 9/11/2024. Funny how that date keeps showing up.

I hope MANCHILD IN A PROMISED LAND by Claude Brown or PIMP by Ice Slim weren't in the trash.

Their fragments remain in my mind.

"I said a fool was somebody stupid. Dad said I was right, but there was more to it than that. He said it takes a stupid person to keep looking for something that is never there." Claude Brown.

December 19, 2024

Almost two years since my liver transplant. I'm on the Q train crossing the East River. Over the years I've probably crossed he Manhattan Bridge thousands of times. Today it's to Weill-Cornell hospital on the Upper East Side. Yesterday while taking care of Professor Berthell Ollman I noticed my abdomen swelling and the sensation of pressure. Back at 387 I stepped on the scale. Up two pounds in a day. If I've learned anything over the last years it's if something doesnt feeling good, check on it. Last night and this morning I called the transplant doctor on call. This morning she suggested my heading up to the ER to get blood work. The express train is passing 23rd Street. I'll be there by 8. Coffee and a bagel. Unfortunately I will be missing a day's work. Tant pis. Such is life. Happy Holidays.

Later

Almost noon. A MRI. A long one, as the nurse checks all my vents for bleeding. The screen shows the blue blood in the veins and the red oxygenated. Almost an hour on the bed, as she presses the scanner to my belly. There is no pain.

Good thing I came in early. Even better that I didnt go out to Montauk. Blood work. No eating. No drinking. Waiting for a Cat Scan. Cold back here.

A young couple come into the ER. The woman is in pain. The nurse examines her. She has numbness in her side. Lots of nurses in the ER. Not that many patients.

It's early in the day.

Four minutes short of noon.

No telling when I'll get the Cat Scan.

Later

ER's Cat Scan is an old one, a GE scanner from this century. The tech said he had performed fifteen scans since morning. Fifteen minutes each

US Elections 2024

Donald Trump has resumed his role as Leader of the American people in a devastating loss for the Kamala Harris. Her Kumbaya Joy campaign after Biden's protracted abdication coupled with the wars in Ukraine, inflation, and emigration left the Democratic Vice President little time to combat the GOP leader's headstart. The defections of Latinos and Black males to the Orange Messiah nailed shut the coffin and we wake on a sunny morning in New York with clouds on the horizon, as the Republicans control the White House, Supreme Court, the Senate, and perhaps the House of Representatives.

Yesterday I sat outside 387 and thought about Mrs. Harris winning the election, suspecting the worst. The worst has come to roost. Life will go on, knowing the GOP will come after Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, Food Stamps, the EPA, censorship of media ad nauseum.

Trump's victory is easily by a quote attributed to HL Mencken, an American author and social critic.

"Nobody ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public.", which according to Wikipedia was not found verbatim in his published works, so the source and original form of this expression are not known with certainty. Likely a nearly verbatim paraphrase of: "No one in this world, so far as I know ... has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the plain people.

And so we go into the future.