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You Are the Dirt Under My Fingernails

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Contrary to what some haters are saying, I am not only still the President of the United States, but also the best President this country has ever had. In fact, I am a better President than most of you deserve. You think you can convict me of a bunch of crimes the haters made up just to get even with me. It won’t work. I have been a perfect President, and everything I have done has been perfect.

Just look at my so-called mug shot. If you think you can have me convicted and put away, you are sadly mistaken. I will come for you: You are just the dirt under my fingernails!

So many weaklings who have worked with me have turned against me. Even my children, my wives, my lawyers, my political appointees, and women I supposedly raped. (Why would I have to rape any of them? They were attracted to me and gave their consent.) I am guilty of having been too perfect for the job.

Mess with me, and I will come for you. See who wins in the end, you pathetic losers! I have a 100% win record, and it will continue to be perfect.

There are millions of Americans who want to Make America Great Again (MAGA all the way!), and they will rise up rather than see me treated like dirt. See if it doesn’t happen!

I will bide my time and end up winning again. That’s what I’m all about. WINNING 100%

“Accidental to the Truth”

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The Flag of Venezuela

I have just finished reading V. S. Naipaul’s A Way in the World. No one can describe the sometimes barely visible gradations that make up racism and colonialism. At one point, his character Francisco Miranda—a fictional precursor to Simón Bolívar, José de San Martín, and the other liberators of South America from Spanish rule—discusses the difficulties inherent in unifying the newly freed peoples of Venezuela:

“In all your years of writing about Venezuela and South America, you simplified it, General. You talked about Incas and white people. You talked about people worthy of Plato’s republic. You always left out two of the colours. You left out the black and you left out the mulatto. Was that because you were far away?”

“No. I did it because it was easier for me intellectually. Most of my ideas about liberty came to me from conversation and reading when I was abroad. So the country I created in my mind became more and more like the countries I read about. There were no Negroes in Tom Paine or Rousseau. And when I tried to be like them I found it hard to fit in the Negroes. Of course, I knew they existed. But I thought of the m as accidental to the truth I was getting at. I felt when I came to write that I had to leave them out. Because of the way I have lived, always in other people’s countries, I have always been able to hold two or more different ideas in my head about the same thing. Two ideas about my country, two or three or four ideas about myself. I have paid a heavy price for this.”

As I read these lines, I suddenly thought about why Spain lost South America. The Spanish monarchy sent out mostly men, accompanied by very few Spanish women. Many of these men married native women, or black women, or mulattoes. Consequently, the thought arouse back on the Iberian peninsula that these Spaniards who “went native” probably did not have the best interests of the Spanish monarchy at heart. Consequently, they were almost never promoted to positions of authority. The rebels who defeated the Spanish armies were mostly these men, referred to as Creoles, who were not quite Spanish.

What I Look Like with Long Hair

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Carol Burnett and Tim Conway as the Oldest Man

As usual, I have delayed in getting a haircut. So now I look like the Tim Conway character in the Carol Burnett Show when he’s acting the part of the Oldest Man. It’s appropriate, after all, since we’re both from the Cleveland area.

The only difference is that Tim Conway, whatever part he plays, is usually more fashionably dressed than I am.

History of the Night

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Argentinian poet Jorge Luis Borges was well acquainted with the night, especially when he lost his sight in the 1950s. It is best to remember that fact as one reads his poem “History of the Night.”

History of the Night

Throughout the course of the generations
men constructed the night.
At first she was blindness;
thorns raking bare feet,
fear of wolves.
We shall never know who forged the word
for the interval of shadow
dividing the two twilights;
we shall never know in what age it came to mean
the starry hours.
Others created the myth.
They made her the mother of the unruffled Fates
that spin our destiny,
they sacrificed black ewes to her, and the cock
who crows his own death.
The Chaldeans assigned to her twelve houses;
to Zeno, infinite words.
She took shape from Latin hexameters
and the terror of Pascal.
Luis de Leon saw in her the homeland
of his stricken soul.
Now we feel her to be inexhaustible
like an ancient wine
and no one can gaze on her without vertigo
and time has charged her with eternity.


And to think that she wouldn't exist
except for those fragile instruments, the eyes.

A Wild Day

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A Tropical Storm in August—Followed by an Earthquake?

My friend Bill Korn had it right: “So. Floods. Tempests of wind. Even an earthquake. It seems like Someone is having an Old Testament-y kind of day.” Today, for the first time in eighty-four years, Los Angeles was hit by a summer hurricane that snaked its way north from Baja California. Just as a kind of bonus, we also had a Richter 5.1 earthquake around 2:40 this afternoon. (Fortunately, it was centered in Ojai, which is more than fifty miles northwest of here.)

Typically, L.A. has a short rainy season that lasts roughly from December to March. In the sixty-odd years I have lived in Southern California, we have not had any intense tropical summer storm events like this one. The rain started twelve hours ago and bids fair to continue for another whole day.

Thankfully, we are on the western edge of the storm, so we have not had any gale-force winds, just a whole lot of rain.

Martine and I went out for a Thai lunch early this afternoon, but otherwise we just stayed put, hoping with our fingers crossed that we would not have another power outage.

Spanish Barley

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Sort of What My Recipe for Spanish Barley Looked Like

Although I am tending more and more toward a non-Vegan vegetarianism, I have always thought that most American vegetarian cooking is totally blah. I take my cue from Indian cuisine, which is not afraid of strong flavors. The basic recipe I used can be found at GoBarley.Com.

I followed the recipe, but with two additions and two substitutions. At this time of year, one can buy Hatch chiles from New Mexico at a good price. I fire-roasted two chiles and peeled off the blistered skin. Then I chopped up the chiles and added it to the recipe.

Instead of diced low-sodium canned tomatoes, I used eight fresh Roma tomatoes which I chopped. Then, in place of plain paprika, I used smoked paprika to give it additional flavor.

Finally, when I served the barley, I added some Fly by Jing Sichuan Chili Crisp, which I described in an earlier post.

Americans are not used to cooking barley as if it were rice, but there are a number of advantages. First of all, it is far better for someone with Type 2 Diabetes to eat grains with a higher percentage of fiber to carbohydrates. One cup of long-grain white rice has 9% of the daily value of fiber, but 54% of the daily value of carbs. Compare that to raw pearled barley: a cup of barley contains 111% of the daily value of fiber compared to 56% of the daily value of carbohydrates.

Foods that are rich in fiber compared to carbohydrates tend not to overload the pancreas. It’s sort of like a mechanism to time-release carbs to the body rather than bomb the pancreas.

Oh, and it also tastes really great. More chewy than rice, but every bit as good if not better.

“The Echo Elf Answers”

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Thomas Hardy (1840-1928)

English poet Thomas Hardy uses an echo based on the last few words of a number of questions he puts regarding his future. It’s a somewhat dark poem, but a good one.

The Echo Elf Answers 

How much shall I love her?
For life, or not long?
               “Not long.”
 
Alas! When forget her?
In years, or by June?
               “By June.”
 
And whom woo I after?
No one, or a throng?
               “A throng.”
 
Of these shall I wed one
Long hence, or quite soon?
               “Quite soon.”
 
And which will my bride be?
The right or the wrong?
               “The wrong.”
 
And my remedy– what kind?
Wealth-wove, or earth-hewn?
               “Earth-hewn.”

Summer Reading

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Not Just for the Beach

Years ago, I used to take the bus to the beach, arriving in the late morning before the sun and sand got too hot, and bringing a book along. In the summer of 1968, I read all four novels of Lawrence Durrell’s Alexandria Quartet on Santa Monica Beach, near Lifeguard Station 12.

Now that I am retired, I don’t get up as early as I used to; but I still don’t like the heat of late afternoon on the sand. So I opt to read in the comfort of my apartment.

What do I like reading in the summer that I usually don’t read at other times of the year? Here is a quick summary, in no particular order:

  • The mystery novels of John D. MacDonald (especially his Travis McGee novels), Carl Hiaasen, and Elmore Leonard set in Florida. There is something about the state that produces interesting villains.
  • The 19th century travel books of Sir Richard F. Burton (no relation to the actor), which may be a little stiff and Victorian in their style, but, Lord, the man saw a lot. I used finished Goa and the Blue Mountains.
  • I don’t know why, but I enjoy re-reading the novels of William Faulkner when the weather is most hot and sticky in Southern California. I just re-read Sanctuary.
  • Science fiction and fantasy seem to be more fun during the summer. This year, I am re-reading Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings and re-seeing all the Sir Peter Jackson films.
  • While I am at it, let me put in a good word for my favorite sci-fi authors from Eastern Europe: Stanislaw Lem of Poland and Boris and Arkady Strugatsky of Russia. The Strugatsky Brothers’ Roadside Picnic is a super-great.
  • I love to read books about India when it’s hot outside. Particularly interesting are the histories of William Dalrymple.
  • Noir novels are always good, but have you ever tried reading French noir? Pascal Garnier, Boris Vian, and Jean-Patrick Manchette are excellent.

That’s all for now. I’m about to start re-reading some of Honoré de Balzac’s great fiction.

Scruffiness Is in My Blood

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My Father, An Unidentified Man, and My Uncle

As I looked at this old picture of my father and uncle, I realized something about myself. I’ve never exactly been a fashion plate. It goes all the way back to those two wild and crazy guys from Czechoslovakia, Elek and Emil Paris.

In a dark suit on the left is my father Elek. He has one knee on the ground and his shoes looked slightly scuffed. On the right is my Uncle Emil. He is not dirtying his suit my kneeling on the grass. And—what’s that?—he’s actually wearing spats. Also, note the cufflinks. I would not be surprised if my Dad were wearing a short-sleeved shirt under his suit coat, as I see not a hint of sleeve.

Sometimes, the habits of a lifetime have long antecedents, even though the Paris brothers were identical twins.

By the way, the picture dates back to before I was born in 1945.

Mayhem on the Road

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Keep Safe: There Are a Lot of Bad Drivers Out There

Martine and I have noticed that the highways of the United States have become more wild and woolly of late. To wit:

  • Particularly on residential streets, STOP signs are frequently ignored.
  • That also goes for traffic signals where one or two drivers typically crash a light when it turns red.
  • Drivers appear to get a frisson of pleasure by violating traffic laws if it gets them where they’re going a few milliseconds faster.
  • U-turns have become more common, not only on residential streets but on main roads.
  • The cell phone has become a major distraction, whether by talking or texting.
  • Los Angeles has decriminalized jaywalking at a time when accident rates of automobiles with pedestrians, cyclists, e-scooters, skateboarders, and others continue to rise.
  • Even when pedestrians cross at crosswalks and at street corners, they run the risk of being hit.

When one brings the matter up to the police, they complain that they don’t have enough officers to enforce the traffic laws. I suspect they would say this even if the police force was increased in size by a factor of three.

To survive, one has to drive like a Buddhist monk, with 100% of one’s attention on the road, and minimal flare-ups of road rage when one is confronted with an obvious violator. And that’s not easy to do!