Category Archives: Personal stories

by

New Year’s Resolutions?

Resolutions to read

Anyone have resolutions for 2022?

As usual, I have some. As usual, the first two are to get more exercise and to eat healthier. In 2021, I changed my diet to a mostly plant-based diet and bought a bike. For a while, I was walking every day (usually down to Stony Brook Village) but that tapered off. To keep me more accountable with my resolutions I am posting some here:

  • Eat better
  • Get more exercise
  • Start a podcast (by the end of February)
  • Put up a TikTok video every day
  • Put together a packet for the late night shows
  • Write every day
  • Perform every day

Looking for something to read? How about this awesome book?

My friend, Nicole Willson published a novel in 2021. I bought it to support her but I cannot stress enough how much I enjoyed it. (The cat enjoyed chewing on the cover) Tidepool renewed my interest in horror fiction. I used to love reading horror but moved away from the genre as my life calmed down. Nicole is a great writer. One of my favorite pieces by her is The World Spinner. If you have “read more” on your list of resolutions for 2022, I cannot recommend this writer enough. Once I started Tidepool, I could not put it down. That is a the telltale sign of a good story and good writing. Check. It. Out. You’ll thank me later.

I am still working to end #genocide, will you help?

We made real progress in 2021. Here are a few things we accomplished:

  • Progress for Myanmar: Kirin Beer and Harry Winston stopped helping the Burmese military. Facebook shut down some of their accounts and Chevron cut some of their payments (more needs to be done on both fronts). The Burma Act of 2021 was introduced (it still needs to pass and be signed into law).
  • The Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act became law.
  • Several cities passed anti-genocide resolutions. Educating people about #genocide and other mass atrocities is crucial in this fight. No Business with Genocide is working with other localities on passage of more of the same.

You can read more about my work in this area and how you can help here.

by

Hello, 2022!

2022

How did you say goodbye to 2021 and hello to 2022?

Say hello to 2022! Were you up watching Andy Cohen get hammered and tell off Bill deBlasio? Maybe you watched Myley Cyrus experience a “wardrobe malfunction.” I did neither. I ordered a pizza (peppers, onions & mushrooms) and did a Zoom show. Then I went to sleep. Well, I went to bed and watched The Truman Show until I fell asleep. No ball dropping for me!

Also, my neighborhood was very quiet. I think I heard some fireworks this morning but nothing on New Year’s!

The new version of Windows has turned me into my mother

She has been upset with the updates to Windows and other applications she uses. I don’t normally have an issue with them. Things change all of the time. Why get upset? Well, I am not thrilled with the updates to Windows. I gave in to the pressure to update a few days ago and am not all that happy with the results.

Anyone else feel that way? I sure hope that is not some indicator of how 2022 is going to pan out. If it is, we all need to hold on because it’s gonna be a bumpy ride. I can kind of understand how frustrated my mother gets.

Movies I was told were great but left me wondering what all the fuss was about

Someone I know told me that Eyes Wide Shut was Stanley Kubrick’s best film. He also said it was the “most dense and most cryptic.” I watched it last night. What am I missing? I know I am so late to the party that it ended but this will be on my mind until I write about it to here goes.

  • First of all, the timing was all wrong. Tom Cruise’s (Bill) character finds out about the death of the woman who rescued him from the orgy by reading about it in the newspaper. The woman was sent to the hospital that morning. That is not enough time to get it into the paper he is reading. I think if the movie took place over a longer time period a lot more would make sense. It’s only 48 hours.
  • Then, they leave a lot on the table. Bill goes to the orgy party after Nicole Kidman’s Alice tells him she saw a Naval officer when they were on vacation and was so enamored by him that she wanted to give up her whole life. Bill becomes obsessed with cheating on her and goes to the orgy party but … who are these masked orgy people? We get the sense they are the rich and powerful elite (Jeffrey Epstein anyone?) but we never really learn who they are. If you introduce a gun in act one of a play, you need to use that gun in act 2. That never happened here and I was left feeling it was a lot of mental masturbation without the climax.
  • Everyone in this movie wants to have sex all the time. Bill is nearly seduced by two people at the party the coupe goes to at the start of the movie. Alice is nearly seduced by a mysterious man at the same soiree. When Bill goes looking for the friend that got him into the orgy, the hotel guy practically falls over himself wanted to sleep with Bill. I get it. The core of the movie is the sex cult but do we need to be hit over the head with it? Kubrick thinks so. I do not.
  • The teasers for this movie all feature the Chris Isaak song, “Baby did a bad, bad thing” but what bad thing did these people do? Alice looks at a hot guy and has a dream of being unfaithful (which makes her feel super guilty and she tells Bill all about it). Bill goes to an orgy party and thinks about being unfaithul (at the party and with a prostitute) but he doesn’t actually cheat. He also confesses to Alice what happened. What bad thing did they do? Be human?

This movie took forever to make and runs a very long time and yet it was totally empty. Someone, tell me what I am missing because I just don’t get it. Best Kubrick film? Hardly. Though I thought 2001 was boring, it was better. And then you have to compare this to The Shining and A Clockwork Orange and I don’t know how anyone thinks this was better.

Maybe you can explain it to me. Leave me a message in the comments if you want.

I know that movie came out in 1999 (a great year for movies) but I am often slow to watch certain things. Next week, I will review movies from 2000. In 2041, I will review movies from 2022.

by

A look back at the year that was 2021

2021 sucked as much as 2020

Before we all leave 2021 behind, it is good to reflect on everything that happened

For a lot of reasons, the last few years have sucked. In February 2020, I did a great show in Greenwich Village (at the Greenwich Village Comedy Club) and thought This is going to be my year! Three weeks later, everything in New York shut down and 2020 was no one’s year. Unless you count Covid 19, it was its year.

Things seemed to be looking up at the start of 2021. Joe Biden would be coming into the White House and Donald Trump would be leaving. There were a number of covid vaccines about to be approved. Sanity had prevailed and maybe the pandemic would end.

On January 6, pro-Trumpers rioted on the mall and stormed the capitol building. No one could have known at the time that the year was going to be decided that day. Chuck Todd once called the era we are living in the “post facts” era. He was right. Trump supporters believe that he won the election. One told me Trump received 81 million votes (that was Biden’s number). I have no idea what right-wing site he was reading but when I pointed him to the Federal Election Commission (FEC), he told me that the FEC is a leftie organization and couldn’t be trusted.

Justice made a comeback this year

There were some really good things that happened. Police officers Derek Chauvin and Kim Potter were convicted. I was surprised in both instances as cops in the past have gotten off when they kill people. The men who stalked Ahmaud Arbery and killed him were convicted. Ghislaine Maxwell, Jeffrey Epstein’s second in command, was convicted. R. Kelly was convicted.

These convictions don’t undo the wrongs committed. George Floyd and Arbery are still dead. The women and girls tormented by Maxwell and Kelly still have to live with what happened but it is a start.

George W. Bush was right about pandemics

How often do I tout things Dubya said? Rarely.

If we wait for a pandemic to appear, it will be too late to prepare.

George W. Bush in 2005

In 2005, Dubywa went on vacation and read John M. Barry’s The Great Influenza. He was so taken by the book and its message that he set up the office of pandemic preparedness in the White House (Trump effectively closed it down when he moved in). Bush saw the message of the book wasn’t “the 1918 flu was really bad” but that pandemics can happen anytime. I know people who blame the Chinese government for the current pandemic. While they are not blameless, this was a long time coming.

Back in 2006, I started worrying about bird flu. It wasn’t until 2013 that I blogged about it. I have read The Great Influenza and other books about deadly flu outbreaks. Most start in Asia. A pig can harbor a bird and a human virus at the same time. Viruses in pigs can mutate and now you have a deadly flu that can infect people. This is what scientists think happened in 1918 flu (if you are wondering why it was called the “Spanish Flu,” that is because this was during WWI and media outlets were banned from reporting on the disease everywhere but in Spain).

So things started opening up in the spring and then the Delta variant hit. I was vaccinated in April/May. By the fall, I thought things for vaccinated people were looking up. Then Omicron hit and the world started shrinking again. Now I had to cancel an event I was planning for Paul Rusesabagina. I am very sad about that.

We made progress against genocide in 2021

It is easy to only see the bad things that happen. In December, I delivered some petitions to Harry Winston asking the jeweler to stop sourcing #GenocideGems from Myanmar. Ten minutes after we left, they announced they would do just that. In February, Kirin Beer ended its relationship with the Myanmar military.

A few weeks ago, President Biden signed the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act into law. There are good reasons to think Secretary Blinken will declare what has happened to the Rohingya is a genocide. Gainesville, Florida passed an anti-genocide resolution. We are working with other localities and cities to get more of these passed. No government should profit from or fund genocide.

So, by 2021. I really hope 2022 is better.

PS. You can still lower your tax bill for 2021 AND help me fight genocide by donating to this.

by

I pledge allegiance …

the pledge

Today is National Pledge of Allegiance Day

When I was in the first grade, I stopped saying the pledge in class because I wasn’t sure if I believed in god and didn’t like that the pledge had “under god” in it. What I didn’t know is that the pledge has been revised several times.

It started out:

“I pledge allegiance to my Flag and the Republic for which it stands, one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.”

Original pledge, written in 1892

When Congress made the pledge official on December 28, 1945, it was:

“I pledge allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.”

Official version in 1945

Of course, during the Cold War and at the height of the nation’s anti-communist paranoia, it was changed again. In 1954, “under god” was added. The men who founded this nation were not religious zealots like we have today. They didn’t think god had any place in government, hence their appreciation for the separation of church and state. Now, back when I was six and already on the path to hell, I could have just not said “under god” but that didn’t occur to me until later so I just didn’t say anything

Fruitcakes for everyone!

Does anyone like them? Not me! But yesterday was National Fruitcake Day. Accordingly, I think I put a TikTok video up about Donald Trump. His snowflake supporters got all upset, how dare you say Trump never supported the vaccine! He got it last December! Pull your head out of CNN’s ass!

Wow. Don’t I need to watch CNN to get my head up its ass? Guess not. If you haven’t checked out my channel there, please do. You’ll thank me later.

Want to do some good and lower your tax bill?

There are still a few days left in 2021. If you want to donate to a great cause, make my work against genocide possible and lower your tax bill, please donate to No Business with Genocide. It would mean the world to me. Thank you!

PS. I remain pissed off about Annie. Check out why here.

by

Omicron comes to town

omicron

The other day was National Crossword puzzle day!

Omicron is on everyone’s mind but I am starting with something light. I was so excited to blog about this important holiday and you may not think I am serious but I am all too serious. Don’t believe me? If you were around me on any day that the NY Times has a rebus puzzle, you would not think I am not serious.

“What is a rebus puzzle?” Good question! That’s where they put MORE THAN ONE LETTER OR A DIGIT in a square and it MAKES ME CRAZY! Well, crazier than I normally am. The first time I saw one of these, I thought my head was going to explode. Seriously. And you don’t want to be around me when they get their facts wrong!

The first thing I do every day is the Times’ crossword. I LOVE IT! There is even a movie, Wordplay, about people who do and love crossword puzzles. If you are like me and love them, check it out!

Omicron is not a transformer, though it is transforming life

This week, New York City is once again the epicenter of covid activity thanks to the omicron variety. Not only that but the part of town where I hang out the most is the epicenter of the epicenter. That’s right! Greenwich Village is one of the hottest spots (for omicron) in the city.

Over the last seven days, for every 100,000 Manhattan residents, about 1,672 have been infected, the city said in a transmission chart on its COVID data site.

Source: NYC Health

And that’s just an average – in some Manhattan neighborhoods, the numbers are astronomically higher. In Greenwich Village and SoHo, it’s 2,927 cases per 100,000; in Chelsea, 2,513 per 100,000.

Source: NBC4 NY

This matters to me because when I go into the city, my number one destination is MacDougal Street, which is in the heart of the Village. Great. I thought I was getting my booster shot yesterday but had the date wrong. D’Oh!

Why I am still working to end genocide

Tomorrow is Christmas Eve. This will mark Paul Rusesabagin’s second Christmas behind bars. Please check out the piece I wrote for Medium.

And yes, I am still angry about Annie.