Occupation of Independence

Several times on this blog, I have quoted Samuel Johnson 's "...as I have gotten older, I have come to call a man a good man on easier terms than before." (not an exact quote.) A corollary is to have humbler expectations of the human condition.  And that approach certainly works with You Tube .  AI rubbish is ruining You Tube.  But what can a person do about it? It has helped me to focus on some of You Tube's successes, such as musical performances .  Although it really makes no sense to make a video of instrumental music or singing, it is still a good and free way to become acquainted with music you didn't know about.  And for opera , a video does make sense. Thanks to a few seconds of opera in a movie I was rewatching, the "noooo more Rice Krispies , they're all gone, the Riiiiice Kriiiiispies!" song was brought to my attention.  You Tube had several versions of the song available.  They are all wonderful.  My favorite  "Vesti la Giubba...

The wild burros -- maybe we should call them feral -- are entertaining me this winter.  The 'grass' is so green and thick, you'd think they would be getting fat.  Maybe it would be worth reading up on the burro lifestyle , but I am usually disappointed when I look something up on Wikipedia . Anyway, I am camped in a new area and the burros are back.  I hear them braying at night.  When do they sleep?  But none have walked up to my screen door to panhandle.

  I got an email from a financial website on Substack, entitled Pivot and Flow (J.L. Bernstein).  At first I was inclined to delete it, but held up for some reason.  Then the story hit me like a punch in the gut. "She Bought a Burrito on an Interest-Free Installment Plan She's 28, sitting in her car in the Chipotle parking lot, her thumb hovering over 'Pay in 4.' It's a $34 order.  Two burritos, chips, a drink.  Her son's inside with her mom.  He's seven and he asked for Chipotle because his friend's family gets Chipotle and he wanted to know what it tastes like. She knows she shouldn't.  But her checking account has $47 until Friday.  Rent took everything.  The light bill ate the rest.  She picked up an extra shift but that won't hit until next week.  She clicks 'Pay in 4.' Here's what we built: a system so elegant that a mother can finance her son's first burrito with no human interaction at all.  No bank teller to look her i...

 There certainly are real news events happening everyday that are worth paying attention to.  But from another point of view, specific events are not strategic.  The over-arching strategy of the Adelson-Trump-Netanyahu regime is to get Americans used to the idea that militarized goons working for Washington DC are entitled to use IDF (Israeli Defense Force) tactics and methods both outside and inside America. Once IDF methods come to be seen as normal law enforcement methods, then the genocide in Gaza will not even be news anymore.  That would be  the Promised Land  for Adelson-Trump-Netanyahu. In the meantime I need to think about something pleasant, like the wettest winter in years, in the Arizona desert: Here is a nice scene in central Utah that has nothing to do with this post: