Wednesday, October 19, 2016

Germ City, There's No Hope Looking Down Those Fire-Engine Throats



I started reading Eduardo Galeano's Mirrors two years ago and now, my fifth? sixth? seventh? time start-to-ending it, I don't think I'll ever finish. Three or four of these - what to call them? blurbs? capsules? bullets? punches? - between a heavy dinner's Gass of The Tunnel and the binge eating of Potus, perspective delivered. It's nothing more or less than power's width, length, and depth in all its brutal simple history. I bought an eBook version yesterday so I have it on my phone for daily litany, it occurred to me after I bought it I could post some here as photos snapped on the phone. Do you want them? Won't be everyday, won't be start to finish. If you don't I won't.




Also too, remember the radio station I sent email applications to volunteer in the hopes of getting a show? They emailed!

We are looking for volunteers to work the door at a long-running (nearly 30 years!) Halloween benefit in Takoma Park on October 29. Here's the Facebook page for the party with more info. This year, proceeds will go to groups includingTakoma Radio, Partners in Health and Nonviolence International. 
We are looking for energetic people who aren't afraid to ask guests for the $15 - $50 suggested donation at the door.To sign up for a shift, click here. (Volunteers must be 21+.) Volunteers will get to enjoy the party for free when they're not working their shifts!

Sorry to meatloaf you, but I would do anything for a radio show, but I won't do that.

UPDATE! I emailed ten minutes ago:

Hello Tatyana, thank you for the email.
I'll be out of town on Halloween weekend (and I'm not a halloweener anyway), but PLEASE send me email the next time you need volunteers or anything. I am very much interested in helping out at the station.

Is true - Earthgirl and I will be in Shenandoah for three-day weekend hiking. Is true - I am not a halloweener.

Tatiana wrote back immediately!

Will do, thanks Jeff!

I will play Dog Faced Hermans my first show.














ON THE SUBJECT OF DOCTORS

James Tate

I like to see doctors cough.
What kind of human being
would grab all your money
just when you're down?
I'm not saying they enjoy this:
"Sorry, Mr. Rodriguez, that's it,
no hope! You might as well
hand over your wallet." Hell no,
they'd rather be playing golf
and swapping jokes about our feet.

Some of them smoke marijuana
and are alcoholics, and their moral
turpitude is famous: who gets to see
most sex organs in the world? Not
poets. With the hours they keep
they need drugs more than anyone.
Germ city, there's no hope
looking down those fire-engine throats.
They're bound to get sick themselves
sometime; and I happen to be there
myself in a high fever
taking my plastic medicine seriously
with the doctors, who are dying.



5 comments:

  1. p 257 of mirrors reminds me of a dictum of lawrence berra

    in theory there's no difference between theory and practice; in practice, there is

    that saying is, i believe, actually from yogi - whereas "you never know when something surprising might happen" is my own coinage, admittedly modeled after the master

    speaking of alcoholic doctors as tate's poem does - and this is a true story albeit from a time decades ago - i was at the medical clinic at the state univ of new york at buffalo - it was after lunchtime - a young woman came out of one of the examination rooms in tears - a middle aged female nurse spoke to her for a while - i got the impression that the doctor had said or done something distressing after a two-martini lunch - the nurse was in a grim mood but not a surprised mood - i had seen that doctor another time on my own behalf and was a bit surprised at the alcohol on his breath but nothing untoward happened to me on that occasion

    and speaking of behavior along and across gender lines i wonder how much play the latest national enquirer expose of hillary will get in the corporate media - not very much i would expect although it seems pretty well attested and certain aspects of it have been rumored for many years - i wonder if the issue is going to be on sale locally in the supermarkets and drug stores as it should be although the distributors may decide to exercise their discretion in the interest of not overly annoying the powerful - i may buy a copy if it's five dollars or less - ok, $5.95 tops - despite what you may hear from your tv the outcome of the election is not yet determined

    this is the future - you got to live it, or live with it, or get out of the way

    the same will be true next month, and next year, and so on

    at my local library i have requested galeano's mirrors, and also scorcese's documentary about bob dylan, "no direction home"


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  2. I'm starting to think you intentionally mis-link to see who's clicking. Tell me I'm wrong.

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  3. My Class Book Report: Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels wrote The Commie Manifesto because they were looking for energetic people who weren't afraid to ask guests for a $15 - $50 suggested donation. There were also things in the book about cats, barbers, and being civil. Goethe stuck something in there about grey-green stuff, as he usually did, but he was polite about it. Volunteers got to enjoy the Communist party for free when they weren't working their shifts, but after 1991 they had to pay that cover charge. And PTT and PPTT. Because Freedom.

    Special Musical Addition: Beethoven invented music in prison. Because freedom. And he did something with mock Princes, or Fake Sovereigns Formerly Known As Princes. That wasn't clear. But he got his revenge by erasing / rubbing out Napoleon in that Vienna. Afterwards he was all turned around, to a big ovation. Yay!

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  4. i liked the galeano and would like to see more from time to time

    marx and barbers - with regard to bertrand russell's paradox - the village barber who shaves all the men who do not shave themselves - who shaves the barber? (givens: the barber is a man, and all men in the village are shaved) - marx distinguishes between the barber as an individual and the barber as employee/proprietor

    marx and cats - http://tinyurl.com/hnlgqz2

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  5. I spoke up too late. I like the Galeano. I'll keep it in mind next time I get to a used book store. Thanks as always my generous and most erudite friend.

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