Good morning. Hello. How are you? #1121
Super Tuesday results, follow-up about yesterday's post, etc. A short one.
Hello! Howdy, boy howdy. I feel so much better today. God, I was so run down yesterday. Massive headache, exhausted, felt like a terrible hangover (it was not a hangover). I had gotten eight hours of sleep and I have to accept that for whatever reason, at this moment in time, eight hours is not enough. Got nine last night. Feel much better.
Speaking of which, I checked the hours of the middle school and high school Jane will be going to (assuming she never gets into the awesome K-12 public charter school), and they all start at the same time. We are not one of those counties that lets high schools start later. Every school has its own busses. So I am, in fact, looking at this “get up at 6:10 bullshit” for another decade or so. I now realize why my mom was completely fine with me getting my learner’s permit at 14 and tooling around with my older friend Mike, who qualified to be my “adult” in the car since he was 17. She was sick of carting my ass everywhere. I don’t mind the carting but I sure do mind the waking up. This sent me into a two day depression, not gonna lie. A decade of this shit. Man. If i think about it now, Ima gonna get depressed again. We shall move on.
Smooth drop-off of Jane at school today. Followed the G Wagon on the way home, she speeds too much. You could sense the anger oozing off of that wagon whenever she came up behind a car who had the temerity to only exceed the residential speed limit by five mph. Gotta go forty through suburbia or you are being oppressed.
Thank you for all your kind words on yesterday’s post. You know, the night before when I was sitting in bed thinking about how I might be getting dumber, I kinda thought about writing about it and it seemed preposterous. It seemed self indulgent, paranoid, and not particularly interesting. But you guys! You delivered once again. It is heartening how many people are going through similar stuff as we get older.
Theories range from information overload to context switching to long Covid to just run of the mill cognitive decline. But here is a quote from one friend that I think is the interpretation I am going with, courtesy of Annie, who always did have much wisdom:
My theory is that as smart people get older, we embrace contradiction, uncertainty, dichotomy, and the like as being more the true state of many issues, feelings, etc. Expressing one, confident, ego-derived proclamation, as in youth, is easy compared to explaining that something can simultaneously be this AND that or that there is well-thought-out validity to multiple angles on a thing. And uncertainty — or saying — this is too complex for me to have one declaration about — or even I don’t know — or I am unsettled by my myriad feelings about this… those are the hardest things to say and express. So, not getting dumber, but just waiting for words (and ego?) to catch up to a new level of mature complexity in thinking.
I do find myself doing this constantly. Rabbinical, I think of it as. No issue is black and white. Except Trump, fuck that guy.
I’m sure there would have been even more insightful comments had Facebook, Instagram and Threads not all been down for an hour yesterday. That was funny. Really was hoping it was some sort of world-changing ransomware attack. We all secretly yearn for revolution. Maturity is not letting it effect your vote I guess. Just your internet implosion fantasies. Or something.
Speaking of which it is hilarious (read: terrible and borderline treasonous) how the press is treating Trump’s election results yesterday as a coronation. Did the dude break 90% in a single election anywhere? No, no he did not. In five races, he couldn’t even beak 70%. In his own party. I voted uncommitted for Biden, as did 12% of North Carolinians, but my god, he outperformed Trump in every single state. People be all like “well Trump is not an incumbent” and lol, that is not true in any meaningful sense, and there’s certainly no recent historical precedent for all conventional wisdom to coalesce around this far more forgiving narrative. Fact is, as a former president running for president, he is doing worse than anyone in modern history.
But whatever.
Congratulations to Vermont Republicans for being the only sane republicans in America. Barely.
And hats off to Taylor Swift for her brave stance of a single, ephemeral Instagram story post with the brave message of: go vote. You’re almost as brave as yours truly for declaring his controversial political opinions in buried, passing GMHHAY asides.
Here in North Carolina, hrm, let’s see. Josh Stein, the current state AG, a Democrat, won his primary for governor to face off against the Hitler-quoting, abortion abolitionist. Supposed to be a “close race” so, you know, that’s how things are going down here. My bud Jeff Jackson won his primary to replace Stein as AG, facing off against January 6 apologist and architect of the bathroom bill. No big deal.
Gonna be super fun.
OK well that’s all I got today. Got some long meetings today, but also a long call that should allow me to finally finish the greenhouse shelves, since I can hang shelves while chatting on the phone. This is a far more monumental event than it has any right to be. But they are gonna look good. From a distance. Don’t get too close. I shoulda planed and squared the wood, I shoulda sanded more, I have so little patience for sanding. But all in all, I think they’re gonna look great. I am excited.
Todays’ Media of the Day is this mix of new stuff. Lots of good new stuff. I rather like the new MGMT I am surprised by that should I be surprised by that? New Dandy Warhols is promising I hope they tour again. Annie Hamilton is the best and I am very excited there is new music from her.
I wish you best of luck in all of your Wednesday endeavors.