Not with a bang but a slither

The rattlesnake, like all snakes, is a noble creature– beautiful and graceful, and generally quite peaceable– like this golden beauty that crossed my path at Arastradero Preserve today. So it is completely inaccurate and unfair of me to apply the noun form of slither– a perfectly honorable mode of transit– as a pejorative for the behavior of the bottom-dwellers associated with our president.

It's somehow so disappointing that what will probably bring the bastard down is not some grand conspiracy with Putin to steal the election, but the cumulative litany of petty and venal tax evasions, frauds, payolas, sweaty one-night stands, and back-room deals. Which is not to say I'm convinced that he's not the Manchurian Candidate or a serial rapist.

Oh, and apologies to all you bottom-dwelling flounders, carp, tubeworms, skates, and larvae. Nothing against you guys either.

Killer Trees

Get me out, cut me down...
Yikes!

What it is

Aretha at Muscle Shoals

Alicia had it right... goosebumps.

Aretha Franklin at Muscle Shoals from Course Media on Vimeo.

Ouch

Dwight Garner, reviewing Nate Chinen's new book of jazz criticism:

He writes about “tracing a historicist agenda that actualized in the 1970s.” The composer Anthony Braxton’s music “utilized proprietary strategies.” Vijay Iyer’s dissertation “helped frame his personal interface with the piano.” The saxophonist Joshua Redman “prioritized an agenda of direct emotional clarity.” Sentences like these prioritize an agenda of not being able to stay entirely awake.

The most perfect 15-second TV commercial ever?

Apparently there is a longer version that provides context, but frankly I like the mystery and gentle melancholy here. Lovely.

Pull me under

Thanks for this one Lisa!

California burning

Taking the long way home from Carson Pass a week ago, Aidan and I drove southeast and back over Sonora Pass on 108. We passed this resort just one day before the fire started that would destroy it. The new normal, some say.

Can Music Be Perfect? Vol. 81

What's the big deal about Kanye? Yeah, stupid tweets, Kim Kardashian, and all that bullshit. But fellow old white folks... listen up...

Carson Pass once more

Aidan and I got up there for a quick overnight at Woods Lake earlier this week. Smoke from the Ferguson and/or Carr fires obscured the views much of the time, but the flowers were still lovely. In the meadows, lacy white angelica has replaced the lupines of two weeks ago... dusty rose paintbrush adds a splash of color. We also paid a visit to the Columns of the Giants along Route 108. Nifty columnar lave rocks. Alas, it was also the trip during which my trusty Asolo boots finally gave out. Bummer.

Rethinking voting rights restrictions

Can't we just restrict suffrage to college-educated women?

These plots are revealing in a number of ways. The discontinuous break of non-college white men from blue to red coincides almost exactly with Obama's election in 2008, and if anything has grown under Trump. The same Obama break appears among white men with college degrees, although they clearly have soured with the GOP since Trump. What's a little unclear to me is how the Dems held the White House for eight years, given these generic party preferences. I'm sure the political scientists have an answer.