Society broken

I recently read the following in a news report: “Elected officials are also turning book banning into another wedge issue in the culture wars.”

The word “war” gets diluted by being used for situations that are not a war. The “cola wars” or local “gas wars” are examples.

 

I do wonder why some people appear ready to fight in these culture wars. I met a man who was about 5 years older than me at a neighbor's house last weekend. It didn’t take long for him to start his recruiting talk for his side of the culture war. I had mentioned having visited Arizona just before the pandemic. He threw out some negative comments about immigrants in Arizona. I can’t imagine that’s the only thing he could say about Arizona. I suggested we talk about less political things. I recall saying, “while I don’t know much about flowers I would rather talk about the nice flowers here.” We eventually left the war behind in our conversation.

 

Was my reaction different because he was on the other side than me in this so-called war? Maybe I would have joined in by criticizing the former Liar-in-Chief if his comment had matched my view.

War is not the answer. The culture war is not a real war but promoting it does agitate people and can result in tragic events such as the Jan. 6 2021 attack on Congress.

 

NBC news reported a scary story of how militia groups are using local emergencies in California to recruit people and get good PR. The NBC story's link.

What a change from 20 years ago. Post 9/11/2001, (from https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2021/09/02/two-decades-later-the-enduring-legacy-of-9-11/)

“..the public largely set aside political differences and rallied in support of the nation’s major institutions, as well as its political leadership. In October 2001, 60% of adults expressed trust in the federal government – a level not reached in the previous three decades, nor approached in the two decades since then.”

I’m not saying we should remain quiet about what we see as wrong. We should dial down the anger. Peacefully demonstrate. Let's try to have a civil discussion.

I chose to avoid engaging with this culture warrior. I’m glad I didn’t bother to confront a guy with views I considered extreme rightwing. I’m fairly certain he picked up that our views differed. We don’t need to shout. I might mention him to my neighbor in the future because I’ve known my neighbor for many years. He is not a warrior. However he might have different views than me. I don’t recall ever talking politics with him.

 

Take a deep breath, feel like I’m chokin’ 

Everything is broken.

 

 Ok, not everything is broken. But there are too many things broken.

 

A real deadly war is going on as I write this. I suspect most Ukrainians would not call our cultural issues a war.  

Searching for something to say

Feeling like I ought to sleep 

Spinning room is sinking deep 

Searching for something to say

 

Those words were playing in my headphones when I thought, yes I feel that way. Ok, most all time the room is not spinning or sinking but I never know what to expect in these crazy times.

 

These lines come from the Chicago song "25 or 6 to 4" (personal note - I never felt very comfortable sitting cross-legged on the floor)

 

staring too long and hard

 

Like others, I wondered what this song was about. It's about what to write about in your next blog post. No, it was about trying to compose a song over a long night.

 

Life is a struggle even without others creating tragedies such as insurrections, war and other atrocities. Too many issues to cover in a blog post.

 

Tomorrow there will another televised report from the 
House Jan. 6 committee. Are enough people paying attention?

 

 

Can't you just see it in his face?

Here are a few lines from the Monkees’ song “Words” that remind of that former orange headed president and his close friends.

But all I can hear are those
Words that never were true
Spoken to help nobody but you
Words with lies inside

Cheers, The Billing Team

If you have any questions about this invoice, (some not toll free prefixed number) Toll-Free for help.

Just got an email from "the billing team" at a software company that I thought might not even exist anymore. I knew that I had NEVER purchased any of their products so it didn't take much examination to believe it was a dumb scam.

 

The first check I make is looking at the real "from" email address. I do this be clicking on the "from" email line. It is actually not hard to have your message show whatever you want on that "from" line. I played around with changing mine to Elvis.

 

Here's a selection from the spam email:

If you have any questions about this invoice, (Toll-Free) for help.
you have 24 hours to refund this charge from the transaction date without being charged.
It may take a few days for this transaction to appear in your account.
Please don't reply to this email.
Cheers,

The Billing Team 

Upon investigating the phone number I found the area code was for Hawaii (808). I'm guessing 808 looks like a toll free number. Of course many mobile plans today have unlimited free calling to any North American number so why bother?

 

Surf and Scam

 

At first I thought this scammer is living nicely in Hawaii. I later found I could even buy an Hawaiian area code number online (I didn't). The service is for businesses to appear local.

I didn't call "The Billing Team" number. I did forward the scam email to my internet provider Comcast.

          

next

          

The One-who-reads-fiction recently got David Sedaris's "Happy-Go-Lucky" book. I was flipping through it. It has an odd opening quote by Sigmond C. Monster. I googled it and found this interview of Sedaris on the daily beast. David tells a story about being at a book signing in London and asking the audience an odd request. 

I was talking about that onstage in London. And I said, "You know, when I sign your book, I’d love to know what you called a girl’s vagina in your house growing up." And every person had a different… not every person but, like, so many people had a different word, that was just a family word. I remember a neighbor of ours, growing up, said to her daughter: Suzie, get your hands away from your Suzie. I never heard anybody else call it a Suzie.

I laughed. Now I might never be able to meet a Suzie again without thinking of this.

Here's a song I discovered on youtube. It's different. It has no connection to anything else in the post. Enjoy.

I'm just Lisleman burning out his fuse up here alone