I got woken at quarter to six by someone who was out on the balcony in the building across from me telephoning on his handy. (Cell phone.) LOUDLY.
Hokay, happens...
Rode the bus across town, and pushed Peter over to the apothecary, to get his medicines, and had a harpy who drove me fucking crazy over something he needed, because it wasn't on the receipt, and it isn't anything good, but they gave him so much antibitotics, he shits himself if he doesn't take it and I am the one who gets to clean up the mess.
Am having a health problem of my own, and every exertion leaves me panting like a fucking dog in August, and haven't been to my own doctor because, a.) I have a lung infection at best, and b.) I don't want to know....
So I refused to go this week, you know?
I stay home a lot and sleep in the hope it will go away, but it isn't.
WHEN I can sleep. First Peter woke me up with news about a new time to go to hospital. Ok....
I hardly fell asleep, and there are two harpies in the building across the court from me who went off the charts for raging hormones, and screamed me awake. I have no idea what it was about.... but being wakened up rudely on a hot summer's day, screamed out the window that they should STFU.
And then for the upteenth time, my cell phone went off, and it is only for emergency calls from Peter, and once again it was from someone in Germany, telling me I could win a GMX auto, had taken part in a lottery, and I never did that in my life. And it eats up my credit on it. I was pissed off.
Meanwhile, I got an e-mail I do not know how to answer, and it was in caps.
Nothing mean, he is just not versed in internet courtesy.
So I thought the reign of terror was over. And then the phone rang again. Fredy.
Fredy contacted me a couple of weeks ago via a dating service I had forgotten about. And really really wants to meet me. I assume his name is really Friedrich. And was in Graz last Friday, and wanted to meet me, but I couldn't have him in my house, as Werner was stilll freaking out on my sofa cushions before I kicked him out....
(Some things get to be really too much, you know?)
So there he was again.... Fredy. At nine p.m. and randy in Carynthia, seemingly... I guess he didn't like getting put off politely, or something. I do not know the slightest fact about this person, but he seemingly is interested in me. He has the thickest carynthian dialect I have ever heard.
That is absurd, and not rational. And went all 'paternal' and asshole on me. I need to see a doctor, and then go to see him, and he will make it all better, because he's hung, or something.
Sigh.
Where was he five years ago?
That is not where I AM right now...
Am concerned about maybe a lung infection, emphysema, maybe cancer, and the clown car pulls up and distracts me to the point where I could jump outta winder, except mine isn't high enough up.
OK, W. is going up before court for supposedly having broken and entered his ex's house and beat her up, which I do not believe for a moment. If that were the case, he would have beat on me for watching Rachel Maddow, because he hates her with a passion.
The crazy ladies with the raging hormones are currently screaming full blast across the way. Sound like cats.
Oh. Ok..... The po-lice are over there now, and some of the sound is diminishing.
Our Po-lice only come if someone calls them, and then it had better be important, because otherwise YOU get bitched at.
That is the difference.
Hokay, I have heard of freaky Fridays, but this one beats everything....
Just found this, and it hit a nerve...
So many people I went to school with were inducted into the armed forces, and landed in Viet Nam as cannon fodder. And the ones who came back weren't recognisable any more. They were damaged almost beyond repair. And am sure that things today are even worse.
It is never about what is good.... people just get sent there.... Take a look...
I do NOT want you to know how disgusted I am...
The birther thing was bad enough.
The Deather mode is really so fucked up that even Hitler wouldn't have thought it up, but seemingly, there are Hitlers in Murka. 'Bama is gonna kill all seniors.' Because they are getting fucking big bucks from the pharmaceutical firms and insurances, and they have this 'AGENDA'. Scare old people to death, and we get tons and tons of money!
I am so fucking speechless.... I don't know what to write, I really don't.
Oh, I knew that they would come up with something so nefarious it would be to throw up for. I suspected it.
Here, God is gonna punish us again with a bad thunderstorm.
It is thundering close to my house, and the rain is pouring down.
Butcha know what? It'a just a storm....
I so wish that would be what you all wanted....
So shortened....
No one over here denies care for people of any age, and the older they are, the sooner they get mended.
No one fucking WAITS for anything. Especially if it is dire...
Jeebus, Fuck, and Christ on a mule and the fucking donkey or TRex he rode in on, hey...
(I try to be nasty to ALL beliefs...)
Ok, he's on message, at least.....
I spent the morning listening to the fucking assholes who are in the pockets of national health insurances, and have spoken about my dealings and awesome disappointments with them in a post below... And was awestruck by the outright lies that are coming out on this debate, especially how the Administration is gonna kill our grandparents, and make those of us who have living ones frightened, oh yeah... And going off on how the system is Nazism. The lobbyists are doing one hell of a bang-up job on that.
I do not know what the fuck parallel universe I am living in at the moment. Some of those birthers think it is like that sci-fi movie, Logan's Run, and when you turn a certain age... you're gonna have to leave the world at thirty to better it for the rest of the community, or something.
Obama is doing everything to try to remedy that. And I swear, if the assholes defeat his plan... I never wanna hear anyone complain again. Call your Congress Critters and Senators, and let them know all that isn't an option, and you want a public option, or better still, a single payer option. It IS about your health, dammit...
I have been thinking about the Gates case... for a change.... it's class war
The entire uproar over the Prof. Dr. Gates incident, and Obama becoming involved has gotten under my fucking skin.
Gates did no wrong, he was in his own house. Whatever happened there was heated to heated words, and the man was wrongly arrested. Tapes show that the policeman over-exaggerated his reasons for going beyond the bounds of what the law is.
But the issue goes far deeper. And I do not think it is even about race any more. But yes that is a factor....
But is about police, and how they have their perceptions changed so that everyone, virtually everyone, is a potential perp.
That was a big one in one of my sociology courses at UNH.
Now, seemingly, the arresting officer is supposed to be one of the good guys. But something went terribly wrong.
I do not believe it was racially motivated for one second. It was also a class struggle.
I grew up in a 'poor' neighborhood. I got some modicum of success, but only worked three blocks away from my home. And closed shop late, dropped the money for the day into the bank in a locked zip bag, and went home. Five minute's walk away. Except....
Every time there was a rookie on the beat.... I got stopped, with yelling, 'Up against the WALL!! NOW!.' And then I got frisked for weapons. And then a gatling gun of questions...
'Where are you coming from?' 'Where are you going to?' 'WHO are your parents?' (they didn't wanna get into trouble after all....) And an ID. And then 'Don't you KNOW that if something happens here you will be the first to be suspected?'
Now, am talking about a town of about 100,ooo people at the time. And there was only one family of color in the entire place. And it didn't happen just once. It happened often.
But I must have come across as indigent, because I was working my ASS off to get some education, and didn't have 'da upper-class clothes' at the time. And I couldn't afford a car, so anyone out walking on the street at that time of night was suspect, regardless of color. It is their somewhat distorted view of the world.
And I soon learned---you don't lip those people off, and you say, 'Yes, Sir, No, Sir' or you are going to be in a world of trouble
That was what it was like, is all, so sometimes I think I can understand about how you are perceived can get you nearly into hot water. Nowadays, I suppose I would be tazed or something...
What I am trying to say is that the whole incident went much deeper. I read that Professor Gates had 'nice paintings' in his house. Whatever that means. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but I guess they were good, and valuable...
And the arresting officer probably went off the charts, because 'the perp' was living in a standard he is never going to afford. The released tapes show that he did not tell the truth about what the arrest.
It is always about class stuff in the end...
So my take is, he got in there, beautiful house, and the cop flipped out, and it ended up about class.
I have the sneaking suspicion that THAT was what that was about.
Flash mobs... I love the concept....
This got taken off from below, for some reason, so trying another....
And then there was this weird one in Antwerp, Belgium at their train station....
I mean, really, 'The Sound of Music'??? Hokay...
But it took the inimitable John Aravosis to show us how things like this happen. He is currently in Paris, cat-sitting, and had a very interesting video, following it. The link is here. I kept wondering how these things happen... And I love the concept. A mess of people turning up and amazing an unsuspecting public, and then just disappearing after a few minutes.
If you look for flash mob on YouTube, it takes on all sorts of fun variations. At the moment, it is more musical, and seemingly, those people work hard just to delight people. Just fully cool, if you ask me...
Since someone commented on The Naked Cowboy...
This is how my father first saw him, but on the streets of Vienna.
And he whispered, 'Who IS that????!!!' It was our version of naked cowboy....
If I had been quck witted at the time and fully out, I would have answered, 'Oh, he thinks he is in a pageant, and wants to be Miss Congeniality...' Except I wasn't.
He was out to get world peace. Yup. Miss Congeniality, all right.
To hand him credit, he was received in Russia and China, I think....
The name meant water, air, light, sun.
Some people are just creative, you know, and not afraid to hang it all out?
Well, it brought back memories of people who were creative and ballsy.
I love a conspiracy theory... Jon Stewart had a good one for the Birthers
About the birf certificate. This is funny...
| The Daily Show With Jon Stewart | Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c | |||
| The Born Identity | ||||
| ||||
Ok, A last post about health care, and then I am gonna shut up for a while
Back in 72, I was insured. Best you could get, hey... it was absolutely stunning, till you got the fucking bill....
So I got up one day, and whaddaya know.... I couldn't even put on my pants.
Yes, it was embarrassing, and it was very painful.
So my father drove me to the hospital. I was 20, I believe. And insured, ohhh. I had managed to kill my twin brother in utero, and he stuck at the bottom of my spine, and wanted to kill me back.
Now this isn't an everyday thing, but happens often. So I went in overnight, got my twin finally out of my body....
And later the bill.
My twin was fucking expensive, after the fact. My insurance was very expensive after the fact...
So yes, I spent ten percent of everything. EVERYTHING.
That meant ten per cent of the room, ten percent of the operating room, ten percent of the anaesthast, ten per cent of the surgeon, ten per cent of every pill I got.
It was a rip-off!
My bill for those two days was ONE THOUSAND DOLLARS! In 1972.
AND THAT WAS THE BEST THAT YOU COULD GET AT THE TIME!
You get the best scags ever, if they think they can take you down, or rob your pockets....
This has to stop, and what Obama wants to do, is the right thing.
I get really, really angry, when I see idjits who are fully covered themselves wanting to stop the reform, although they are fully covered themselves, break into the process, and want to stop the President, at the cost of their people's health and insurance. They disgust me.
Oh, we need another intervention....
G. Gordon Liddy is going ON about Obama not being an American, a real birther. The problem is, he is so damned confused, you say, 'hokay'. And go on about your business...
Have fun with this. It is like watching a zombie film from the Fifties.
Here.
Sometimes I wish I were twelve years old again, going to the movies on a Saturday, and someone like him would come on screen, and would make you very very frightened. That was 'fun'. This stuff seems to be meant for real!
Every time I See these clowns, I get bloody angry...
So which is it? You want health care? Yes, it is gonna cost something. Nothing is for nothing, for Pete's sake. But every time I see John fucking Boehner's face, I want to punch him half dead. Some people's lives are at stake, but these assholes are playing politics and being sore losers at the cost of those who are losing them. And that disgusts me.
link HERE
Someone should give Boehner some REAL blue eyes..... if I had my druthers...
And oh yes... if Boehner isn't the biggist gay in government right now, I am going to have to get my gaydar fixed, guaranteed, because he sets off all my alarms, and not in a good way.
And Mitch McConnell remains a turtle, and will never become a ninja....
Hmmm things aren't always what you think....
I was looking back at some things on my blog today... and found that the videos I put in were suddenly deleted. Or considered unappropriate for some reason. Or not viewable outside the US, mostly because the shows haven't aired here.
Well.... how can you share something on a supposedly free network, and get censored? Because if I am advocating something, it is fucking advertisement.
Something is up on the internets, and I do not think it will be any fucking good to anyone, but I suppose that is what the Massa's want.
Meanwhile..... it's still fun.
This is a very astute assessment of a situation...
I often link to Pam Spaulding, because she goes beyond the usual dimensions of discussions on topics that are important to me, and gives them depth, and importance. So go HERE
Now, please. And read and consider. Thank you.
I was on the main square this morning...
Was downtown this morning. The African guys were discussing something or other in their own lingo, but often throw in English words, hey....
And an Austrian package delivering service team were taking a well deserved break. And eating something. So thin, hey...
And OMFG! La Strada is going to begin, and Peter will be in hospital! That will only be half the fun. For those who do not know, it is a street artist festival, but far, far more than that. I would push him anywhere they decide to play. Ok, was afraid that would happen.... Stay tuned. La Strada can be beautiful, and will try to take wonderful photos....
And I go here every week, but never noticed the cupids.
Am so angry ... and a memory... from 1976
Carl.
Carl drove an ambulance in Manchester, NH. His job drove him to despair. And I will NEVER forget the night we sat down, and he told me about the horrible things that were happening back then.
Drivng people in the middle of heart attacks to one hospital, getting rejected because they weren't insured, and racing across the city to the next one, a Catholic one.... only to be rejected...
And the patient died.
He poured this out to me one evening, and cried. Cried out of frustration, feeling helpless, and pure anger.
So what the fuck are people doing now to correct it? It has only gotten worse.
Over the years, I heard 'HMO'S
Uh-huh.
Am so hoping that this won't turn into someone's BRAIN FART, and just---- blow away..... Wheee.
Just when you think, hey.... Naked cowboy wants to run for mayor of New York City...
I've heard of this person before...
Yup, that is what the city needs, all right.... We used to have a guy named Waluliso who ran through Vienna in a toga and a bay leaf crown, and preach peace. He was bat-shit crazy. But funny, and sort of delightful. The name was an acronym, for the four elements in German.
Meet the NYC brand, and smile.... NSFW
Liars and the lying liars who run the media
And take money from the pharma and insurance industries.
These people make me sick. Literally.
Forty years ago, they put men on the moon....
Was just reading some comments at Americablog, people reminiscing about where they were forty years ago yesterday, and what they felt about it as children.
So I added mine. I was at my aunt's house in NH. An awful lot of my extended family was there, although I am not sure if we were actually there to watch, or if it was some other fete...
I was ten. It was exciting for us all, and amazing, mind-boggling.
Presiding over the event was my maternal step-grandmother, and she was approaching her 100th birtday. My cousins and I always used to say she looked like George Washington on the one dollar bill. (that was affectionately kidding, btw...)
And as the transmission went on, she got really put out with us, because she didn't believe it for one second. And 'pitied' us for being so gullible. 'It's staged,' she said. 'Everyone KNOWS that there is no air up there to breathe.'
Who would of thought she was the grandma of all the conspiracy theorists to follow her in the following decades?
Hadn't thought of it in a long while, but had to smile.
At least it was more fun than begging my other grandmother to watch Alan Shepard get shot into space. It was a fine day, and according to her, children belonged outside, getting fresh air. (She still had black and white tee-vee.) She relented, but on one condition: we had to kneel and pray a rosary, facing the wall away from the tee-vee, so we did it all right, craning our necks to see the screen, and doing Hail Marys and Our Fathers to beat the band.
It is funny to me to relate that now, but at the time, I was really pissed off.
Tja, defining moments in history. It always amazes me that one event causes an indelible mark on collective consciousness. You know where you were, what you were doing, shared your feelings... It doesn't happen that often, thank goodness. Although I prefer the ones where your jaw drops for amazement, delight, the ones that make you feel proud, although it isn't your personal acheivement....
I shouldn't have gotten up this afternoon....
What sort of governor did NH choose, and I'm sick of hearing about Jugghead. Where is Archie? And yes, those memories are so buried in the past that I get vague about it. But enough to make me uneasy.
Link here.
Oh, fine.... now I know why I went off the charts today...
oooh.... to be read here. Am two days ahead of schedule....
I guess I am losing it....
I have just wanted to sleep afternoons lately. Is that a crime or something? Good, I wanted to dream nice dreams, and the photo isn't in my neighborhood, but causes me mirth when I go by to get Peter''s meds, and always think, 'Where's the cabana boy...'
It cheers me up. Yes, weird, but makes me chuckle.
What doees NOT make me smile are the new people over the way who come out onto the balcony when I am fucking trying to SLEEP.
And it is always women from Afrika, and they have voices, oh boy, they have voices.
Thunderstorms don't wake me. Unless it hails.
But you get one of them on the balcony going ON and ON, about nothing personal that I can see, and you get one very ANGRY RenB. And it is a sneakret, but if someone wakes me out of a deep sleep... get the FUCK out of my way, because I am NOT nice. EVER.
They love to party on weekends, and it can drive you absolutely nuts. But they are young, ok, they should do their thing, and will find ear-plugs. BUT....
During the week... I want SILENCE.
But this person wouldn't shut up. Why is it that they can't telephone in the privacy of their own homes, but have to go out on the balconies, and shout out their blather into the world, hey? Why?
So why to I have to shut all my windows in the middle of the summer, just to help drown them out?
And it doesn't work, for Pete's sake?
So for the first time in my stellar carreer... I yelled outta winder. Because whoever it was woke me up, and I was pissed off.
And it came out 'English' because I was woken out of a deep sleep. So it was 'STFU'!
(Tja, I go native, but she was doing English....)
Because she was doing the same.
They have to learn something about just respecting other's peoples' privacy, but they seem to think, ' If I go out and shout everything into the world, no one is going to understand it anyway, so fuck everyone else.' That isn't the way it works.
And yes, am the Grinch, and yes, I should be better, but you can't always have your 'druthers....
Just a reminder.....
Good concert to be heard on Austria radio one about 1 p.m. US Eastern time. And the link is here. I hope some people really enjoy it.
2:20 pm EST... There is a 25 minute intermission at present. The first part was quite beautiful. Everyone is in fine voice and have such clarity, you can just shake your head in wonder at how effortless it sounds. Oh good, we're back. I hope someone else was able to turn in, the connection is very good.
Oh... parts of the city flooded yesterday....
We've had so many thunderstorms and terrible rains, the ground couldn't absorb any more.
The districts in the north like Andritz, and St. Peter in the South got hit hardest, it seems...
Here a link to some pictures.
Today we learned that we got 78 litres of rain per square meter of ground in a four hour period. That's a lot of water, all right....
Hokay.....
It is raining here in sheets. No one in their right mind would leave the house. No one.
Except me, I guess, and a handful of people on the busses.
I was really really sour. But groceries had to be bought for the weekend, and so on... Everything closes down at five p.m. today after all....
And it wasn't just raining, Preciousses... it pissed down in sheets, with thunder and lightning, and I hate that stuff.
Haven't done a 'riding the busses' post of late. But this is classic. I had to transfer, and there were two seemingly run-down guys in the middle of a 'very important discussion'. The first I heard was:
'He paid fourty thousand dollars for medication, EVERY MONTH! Hell, I drink five BEERS a day, and am ok....'
And I thought, 'WHAA?'
But it got better....
'And then those nose jobs, he was schiach.'
That is dialect for ugly.
The other guy: 'Oh yeah, he was always schiach.'
And then he added... 'But that is what happens when you get famous. THAT was schiach. And then the parasites GET you.'
They were talking about Michael Jackson.
Well just knock me to hell, hey.
I see no hope in reporting any more from here.
If the men on the street just fixate on that.
Sad, sad, sad...
Legends....
Woke up to learn that Walter Cronkite passed on yesterday. For people of my age, he was the news. He had integrity, often some wit, was truly a journalist, and shaped the knowledge of everyday events for generations of Americans.
Since a lot of people are sharing anecdotes and memories, here is one of mine which illustrates that he also had a fine sense of humour. He did a documentary in and about Vienna in the early Sixties, I think it was, which was shown here on local television as a re-run some years back. Probably in honor of a round birthday, or something. And throughout the documentary, he kept showing Viennese people on the streets, and everyone seemed to be carrying briefcases.
He found that 'mysterious', and kept asking, 'I wonder what is in all those briefcases..?'
At the end of the hour, he finally revealed what was in them. Most people were using them as lunch boxes. It was mischievous, and far funnier in the watching than in my relating it. But I liked that aspect of his personality as well.
R.I.P.
I have always loved and respected Rachel Maddow
Since I found her on the internets, and am grateful to follow her wherever her news stories take her. She and her team is thorough, interesting, and she is one bull-dog when it comes to issues.
Yesterday she took on the despicable Pat Buchanan.
For all the fireworks, there was no disrespect, although heated discussion. They didn't cross yell against one another like on Faux News. And I don't know how she could gather one ounce of respect for her 'colleague' but she did it.
It was a tour de force.
And she remained the respectable person I have learned to appreciate fully, meanwhile.
THIS is how you put them down....
Sunday we get a new fun concert to listen to....
Nicholas Harnoncourt is going to direct Händl's last piece of music, Jeptha. Händl went blind half-way through composing it, seemingly. I remember attending a concert of one of his very early compostitions, and being thrilled by it. So it will be another, what goes around comes around concert. It was seemingly his last composition.
If anyone comes around, it seems you can tune in per internet, so this is going to be on Sunday 7 pm our time, which would be 1 pm Eastern time. The instructions for hearing it world-wide are here. Unfortunately only in German. Or you can try it via this link on the day of the transmission, and hope it works. So far it does. And the latter has a download link so that you can hear it more than once if you like it.
It will be performed in the Stephaniensaal, which has perfect acoustics. Picture above. Am sure it will be something very special.
Mark it on your calendars, ok? If anyone finds a better link to hear Österreich 1 in the meanwhile, please tell me so I can pass it on in time. Thank you.
Just a ps... am willing to bet that Donna Leon will be there for the premiere. Most of you won't know who that is. But she is crazy for Händl, lives in Venice, teaches English lit at a university on the mainland, and writes very interesting murder mysteries that sell thousands and thousands of copies throughout German speaking territory. Sort of a Patricia Highsmith, who fled the US, and invented the most amoral thugs ever written. Leon's main figure has morals. And she is crazy for opera, and Händl in particular, so I imagine she will be here. I met her at a book signing some years ago. And she was surprised that I had read the book, because it looked pristine. And I assured her I had, and she sort of twinkled at me, eyes sparkling, and asked 'Was I BAD?' And I said, 'My dear, you should have gone much further. Upon which she laughed so heartily, it made my day.
The US doesn't publish her books, btw. She belongs to us central Europeans.
Lindsey fucking Graham just went down on Sotomayer
On gay marriage. He was DISGUSTING.
Sotomayor is good But the fucking closeted Lindsey Graham is off the charts.
Disgusting much?
Drive me under the bed. And she is good.
The Rethugs....
HAVE TO BE THE WORST THINGS THAT EVER HAPPENED TO THE US.
Came home, ventilator going, and watching the Sonja Sotomayor hearings.
If I were her.... I would have done a wrestling thing with her, and stomped him with three midgets before he got a second question out.
Oh yes, forgot she is a latina. (So why do they find Eva Longoria so hot, huh?)
Today's questions are absolutely insufferable, and grand-standing on the part of the Senate members.
Where is the barf bucket?
And she seems to be well grounded. What they are doing is humiliating for her. She's been on the circuit for over eighteen years, and knows what she is doing....
Gawwd...
This has been running around for a couple of weeks now...
Betty Bowers is the best Christian on the face of this earth. And she explains what traditional marriage is as per the Bible.
The link is here.
You will not like it.
As to gay people, we DO have an agenda. I didn't know this. But found it on a thread on Daily Kos....
- Wake up
- Eat breakfast
- Go to work
- finish work and go home
- Eat dinner
- Destroy all straight marriages and turn everyone gay
Still working on that last one... (/snark)
Does that mean I'm dangerous? No wonder I normally stay home.
The Sotomayor hearings....
I had never seen Senate hearings for a prospective Supreme Court judge televised before.
And am disgusted. Talk about grandstanding much?
For nearly eighty minutes, the oh-SO-important senators glorified themselves with ----oh how important and astute they are. It was disgusting.
Lindsey Graham wins best closeted man of the year, and bitch.
Just sayin'
Single payer health care... here we go again....
Since the debate on health care in the US is heating up muchly, and the lies are so great and nefarious, a little incident from today to illustrate what I have been saying for three quarters of a year now.
I was 'ear witness' to a one-sided phone call from the hospital that Peter took while I was there today. It was the third such in the last week and a half. He has to be fit to get the second operation, while they run a catheter down the artery in his leg and will put in three to four stents.
So, ok, Peter hasn't wanted to go back there and put himself through it. And was playing for time, telling her that the antibiotics were still causing him diahrrea, which is true enough, as I know.... unfortunately. So she told him today to stop taking the antibiotics, speak with his GP on Wednesday, and then CALL HER, so she can schedule him ASAP.
Before the call, he had been his stubborn defiant self, and so I had to hang out the bad little brother. And give him some cold hard factoids that he did not want to hear. One of them was, do you KNOW how many uninsured Americans would be grateful to get that treatment and can NOT? ' He said, 'They can have my place...' And me, through gritted teeth, 'Unfortunately, it doesn't work that way.' (He gets most of my rants on this topic, btw...)
After the call, he was quiet, and said he would stop the med, and go in.
Now let's go over this again, shall we? He got to choose his doctors. He got excellent care in hospital. He never got a bill. He will not get a bill for the next one. Long wait? They are practically chasing him down to come in and get it the hell done. The only reason it has taken a month is that after you have one of those done, and stents in the arteries around your heart put in is because they want a patient to recover from that before proceeding forward.
There was a co-pay for hospital stays. Pro year they take you for 120 Euros, last I heard, maybe it is somewhat more now. Pro year.
There was an incredible interview on Bill Moyers a few days ago with a CEO of Cigna. And how they smeared Michael Moore's last film 'Sicko'. And a clip of him asking people in the UK how much they were paying, how much did a couple have to pay to get their new-born baby out, where the billing department was, and so on, and everyone was saying 'we didn't pay anything'.
And I found that clip disingenuous. Of course they paid. In the taxes on their salaries. And it is a pretty good percentage of it, and here, the employers also pay into the system as well. Halfsies, so to speak.
But... it also goes to covering the unemployed, the chronically ill, and a small percentage of deadbeats who know how to work the system. (I have always said it isn't perfect...)
And I for one, have always found that I didn't mind paying that tax, because I knew that if something untoward would happen to me, I would be well taken care of. As it turned out, something did, and it was long, painful, and really really bad. But had its' upside.
Because when that happens, you aren't lying in a hospital bed, going nuts about how your are going to pay your rent and your bills, because you still get your basic salary, and that is such a load off your mind, you can concentrate on recovering, and getting out of there as fast as possible. And back to your normal life.
Certainly, there are people who are selfish, and don't care about their fellow human beings. That hasn't changed since Dickens' time, for sure.... He had a lot to say about certain sorts of people who believed that those who were unfortunate brought it on themselves because 'they didn't make an effort', or something like that.
But really.... to think I'm helping to pay for health care for someone less fortunate than me even though I am normally healthy never bothered me in the least.
The FACT is, you get older, and then something gets you. And then you are grateful you paid all that money in because then it is you who are the needy person and getting help.
To close these thoughts... I do not think I ever heard of hospitals calling patients as above and telling them to get off their asses. So I wouldn't call that system negative. Considering there are no bills attached. We both have paid our dues, believe me.
But at least we don't have to be afraid....
To get to something serious.......
Fire Dog Lake is a fantastic site full of very capable and interesting people who really are experts in researching what they report.
Marcy Wheeler is probably the most astute wonderful and very exact people of the ladies at 'the lake'.
It has become common wisdom that Fridays are the info dump when it comes to the government releasing info. In the hope that the US will be busy with their weekend, and it goes into the black hole of forgetfulness.
So the CIA finally released a report yesterday confirming what a mess of people were reporting at the time at the beginning of the Afghanistan war, and the US was deep in responsibility for what happened.
It was about a massacre of over 3000 people, if not more. Killed in containers. And buried in the desert. Under supervision of the US forces. Because, you see, they said if the Taliban gave up their arms, and surrendered, nothing would happen to them.
And then they killed them.
The link is here.
And a ballsy Brit did a documentary on it, way back, but no one paid attention.
HERE.
It is fifty minutes long, and difficult to watch.
Under the line? The truth will come out.
These are things that upset me muchly. Why, WHY, are the Americans so fucking afraid of accountability, and bringing people to justice if they broke the rules? WHY are they afraid of finally bringing some accountability to what the previous administration did? WHY don't they have the fucking spine to stand up to the bullies and hold them to account?
Yup, it will come down to money in the end.
But it isn't about that. It is about being moral. And just. And they were not.
The fact that the new administration is blocking any kind of investigation resulting in some sort of retribution and punishment for acting outside of world-wide existing laws is spineless.
The news above is not 'news'. It was reported, and the reporters were denigrated.
I never want to hear about mass destruction of any sort of people again as something inherently evil and specifically attributable to one nation of people.
Everybody can look in their own mirror, as far as I am concerned....
Have never been much for kissing in public....
Except if I were 'in-lurv'.
The audacity! Joni Mitchell had a song titled, 'In France, they kiss on Main Street.' She was exaggerating. I think....
Something like this happened where I live. A super-duper restaurant, Italian, and they just threw the customers out. How fan-tastic. A boycott was immediately organised.
What a bunch of malarky...
here...
NOW I am chagrined. and angry...
I waited a full day to cool off, but am still angry.
What year are we in? 1949, or something? Or is everybody heading back that way...
It doesn't matter, I guess.
here...
Kicking kids out of the pool because it reflects a 'bad complexion'.
Say WHAAT?
Fuckers.
Nice that they taught over 60 kids that they were not wanted because of the color of their skin. Right. 'Complexion'.
My ass!
It reminded me of a scene in the much underrated film 'Crazy in Alabama'. I think I will watch it again, just so I can get angrier, and find something to DO about it. Just sayin'.
After I throw up, that is....
And for those who don't know the film... the summary is here.
And oh yes... in case you watch it... Melanie Griffith kills her abusive husband, drives to Hollywood with his head in a hat box, wanting to achieve fame by getting a gig on Bewitched. So two threads. One funny, the other deadly serious, and then they blend. Rod Steiger was wonderful, btw....
And yes, just watched it again. It's still as powerful for me as it was when I bought it several years ago. Moreso. Because I thought that shit was OVER.
I just changed the number, sixty not eighty. I wrote it from the first reports. It still doesn't help those poor kids one whit.
Guess I underestimated Bruno's impact
In an interview with Matt Lauer, he learned that the Austrian ambassador to the UK has formally asked for a boycott of his film. 'Bruno's' reaction was a classic Austrian one, and set me off laughing. Even though the accent is way, way off.
You can see it here
It is the lower left clip, and comes at the end of it.
Now this is getting into scary territory....
Who the hell thinks up laws like they have in Wisconsin? So glad I never grew up there.... And Dad... as much as you love the Green Bay Packers, and have been there.... Not to mention what they did to you when you wanted to fly there... don't you think those people are sorta kinda weird?
Now THIS brings back memories....
When Fawlty Towers was first telecast here, we took devilish delight in it, because we wished we could have been as crazy as John Cleese. (Of Monty Python fame...)
And be so cheeky and fresh.... Enjoy.
As clarification for anyone just stumbling on this... I used to work in a hotel...
This is all I have to say
About Sarah Palin and her resignation. Found at Jesus' General, and loved it.
America doesn't realise what is going to hit it..... NSFW
The film Bruno is going to open. To clarify, it is comic Sascha Baron Cohen in a new role after creating Borat.
There is a link to a Digg interview here but be careful. He is outrageous, and has caused controversy once again. And between us, that is the worst so-called Austrian-English accent I have ever heard. But I do not think the country will go up in arms as Kasakstan did with Borat.
The 'proper' activists are already screaming 'stereotype' and we don't need more. I see it differently. As exposing those who react negatively, and it is very much biting satire.
As evidenced by the following magazine cover:
I thought I was going to go somewhere
Turns out I won't be able to. Am very disappointed, and pissed off to the hilt.
The video to this is very long...
A conference that runs one and one half hour long with two of my very favorite Bloggers, about blogging, in Sweden, and what one can acheive if one wishes.
It has a mess of infos and new insights, and well worth watching.
HERE
Just one thing more today.... Breaking news....
Michael Jackson is still dead.
So why is he still 'breaking news?' Let him rest in peace, and turn on the cd's or the records, if that is your way of mourning, but the hysteria is really unbearable. There are other things going on in the world? Oh yes.
No one knows who the Uighers are? If you had been watching Rachel Maddow the last weeks, you would know what that is about... Some got half massacred today, and many seriously hurt. They are a partly Turkish minority in China.
But it was Jacko all the time....
I really pushed the envelope today. My 'patience' is sort of thin at the moment. I got bad news from my bank. And am pissed. So when W. got onto a screed about fucking dead Waldheim as saint Ronnie of Austria, I really lost my patience. And told him to STFU, he can have his opinion, but I don't want to hear about that lying opportunistic asshole in my house.
He's sulking in the kitchen, and washing the dishes and banging them about.
Swell.
There are days that are difficult. Oooo-hooo!
Oh well, tomorrow he will be under ground at least... And that is all I have to say about Michael Jackson's passing. He made good music, and I just don't understand the cult about some people, whether it is about Frank Sinatra, or Elvis-maybe-he-is-still-alive Presley, or now this. The music survived. They left legacies for generations to enjoy, and that is more than most people can do. But the rest leaves me cold.
I have the feeling... ok, will see. I hate it when someone makes me so angry, I literally see RED.
Interesting....
Just watched a live streamed press conference from Moscow after Obama met with Medvedev. And just set off a tirade, I tell you, TIRADE, because I criticised the fact that his advisors couldn't even train him to pronounce the names of the people he will be talking to, and had talked to. That is disrespectful, and may seem trivial, but it is important. If you 'respect' someone, you at least pronounce their names correctly. You know?
And got yelled at... I was being 'satiric'. I wasn't. It grates on the ears, and drives me crazy to hear someone intelligent pronouncing Putin in such a way it sounds like the German for a turkey schnitzel.
The rest seemed like some sort of a progress toward lessening the tensions between the US and Russia.
But one little factoid will certainly slip between the cracks. One of the agreements reached today was veddy interesting. Russia had banned the import of US beef, for fear of spreading 'mad cow disease'. They now agreed to rescind that, which will bring the US one billion dollars in exports.
It was just a little sentence, but okaaayyyy...
For anyone who reads the blogger Chris in Paris on Americablog, he has often, very often, gone after the food processing plants in the US who consolidated the central slaughter houses and have apalling sanitary conditions.
I hope they have a real good time with it. So...what does the US get in return?
Music still in my head....
I found this You Tube today. The third movement of Gershwin's concerto in F, third movement. Good stuff.... The concert took place in Rumania, Seiji Osawa conducted, the pianist is Italian, and yes, blind.
Oh, how nice, and what a full circle this makes...
When I first arrived, the friend who help get me started surprised me with a ticket to a guest run of Porgy and Bess at the opera.
I was stunned off my ass in the upper balcony. Wonderful.
We have a summer arts festival run by Nicholas Harnoncourt. He is a direct descendant of the Archduke Johann, who was a brother of the last Kaiser, and did much for the state.
And all of a sudden, there were posters up that he was going to do a concert version of 'Porgy and Bess' here. And I tried to get a ticket, oh boy did I try....
I haven't mentioned that Harnoncourt is a bloody GENIUS. He is a stickler for sticking to the original score, never messes around with the tempi much, he brings it as it was written.
And every time I have attended one of his concerts, I learned. I didn't like Haydn all that much, church music? He gave an evening of other things that showed the humour and joy in his personality, and pieces that were absolutely wonderful.
And so many other things.
Whatever, I was disappointed. I couldn't get any kind of ticket for this concert version of Porgy and Bess.
I do not know if any of you have ever seen it, but it is overwhelmingly good. And it was a breakthrough in American theater. African Americans on stage, hey.... In the forties, or something.
But the historical meaning is less than the musical one. Sure, it borders on opera. And it is tragic, and ends horribly.... Even over thirty years later, I still have this image in my mind of Porgy, an amputee, wheeling himself out on a board, going to New York to find his Bess.
(Sort of hard to figure, right?)
Whatever, the good news is.... the national radio is going to broadcast it LIVE and in Dolby tonite. And I am so looking forward to it I could just piss my pants for joy. I finally get something I pay for.
(Yes, you have to pay tee-vee and radio fees here, and ignore them since they went to minimum info on EVERYTHING.)
Wish me a nice evening. Have to sleep two hours, and then I get to hear something wonderful. And if the fucking Couch Critter decides to drive me crazy, will throw him out of my house for three hours.
Am not in the mood for that.
Update: am listening to a live broadcast. Could cry at not having a ticket to be there. Musically, a revelation. Am enjoying totally.
The Arnold Schönberg Chor ist so good, it's to die for. I like most of the soloists. The woman singing Bess has a marvelous voice, but I would wish she had a better enunciation, she leaves me confused.
Update 2: The second half was breath-taking. There is a huge storm sequence. And Harnoncourt inserted some score that has never been publicly performed before. The sudden calm, and insect noises, and African drums... Even W. perked up at that one, said, that sounds like 'Africa at night.' And I replied, 'That is what he intended it to be..' The audience went nuts at the end.
During the intermission, a moderator gave a mess of info on background. Was astounded to learn that the orchestra was composed of 144 musicians!!!! And how they sounded, hey! To die for. The soprano who sang Bess had a wonderful voice... but was somewhat unclear in the enunciation, and that was the only drawback to the entire performance.
And I so wish I could have been there. But it was beautifully done, and very complex.
And links to the photos of what that looked like are here.
Update 3: Thanks to musicfiend76 below for the correction. During the intermission I was being berated by someone in my apt. who just did not understand the music, and seemingly I misheard, and musicfiend is correct, of course. And yes, it is Harnoncourt who is 80.
Now I KNOW that the internets are addictve...
And FUCK the channel who suddenly made The Daily Show and The Colbert Report unavailable outside the US without even offering an alternative.
Those are the two fixed shows that I watch every day, even with the commercials. And for the last thirty six hours? Nada. Complaints are coming in from all over the world, seemingly. If they are going to be such dick-heads, they could at least offer a pay-for-view alternative, but not just make everyone go cold turkey, without warning. There are thousands of people abroad who understand and love satire. Just saying.
And have been getting a LOT of things where I go, and get the message that streaming is not allowed outside of the US, and cannot watch what the fuck it was about. They seem to increase lately. Insideous. Most of them are probably protecting their selling rights abroad, so we don't get to see any of it until it has already aired on local tee-vee.
Are these people so bloody blind? If you see it, you will want to call your local stations and ask them to run it, for fuck's sake.
Oh well, I guess that is how Wall Street went down the tubes... Greed. And blinkers as to what is really the story. Nothing new.
And JYES! I have withdrawal symptoms! A day without Steven is a very grey day---with thunderstorms of jinormous proportions. And do NOT try to convince me otherwise.
Update: whatever the problems were, they got fixed, and I get caught up on everything in ninety minutes. But for a major network to break down for two days? Weak.
Life is so unfair! And an unexpected burial... Shit.
A few weeks ago, the son of my favorite guest in the Mühlgasse was reading the paper in the kitchen in the morning, and then just fell over onto the floor and was unconcious.
His mother is a schoolfriend of Peter's mother and his Aunt. Gisela, but no one called her that. Her schoolfriends call her 'Gisi', and Peter and his mother called her 'Giselle', which is a figure in a ballet.
She was always my most preferred Austrian guest in the house Peter and I lived in. Always with us on the high holidays, and in between, when she could get out of the house. Peter flew her to Frankfurt twice to visit his aunt, and they had adventures she can still recount, and it was very nice of him to do that. She spent a lot of time with his mother when she was dying in hospital. So, 'family'. Seemingly all schoolgirls together, you know?
And did I spoil her? Always did. She had one quirk. Would only eat fowl. I turned up so many variations on that that she was always amazed.
And in all those years, there was talk about her son. But until last summer, I never met him. For the past several years, Giselle hasn't been able to leave the one room in her house that she is kind of constricted to. And I went out there with Peter's aunt and his neices to visit with her last summer. She was sort of a recluse, meanwhile.
Her son was working in Vienna, came home every weekend to check on her, not to mention the horridays, and was a very dutiful, caring son. Seemingly shy, nice, from what I could tell, and reticent.
And I was the first person she called. Blew me right out of the water. That was a difficult call...
Gieselle is gonna turn ninety in a couple of days, btw....
Her son was under 65, because he wasn't retired yet.
(A lot of women had children late during WWII, you know?)
Whatever, I was trying to figure out a way to find out how he was, but that was just impossible, as he was intensive care, and he was paralysed on one side, the speech part of his brain was destroyed, and so on. There was no way in hell I could have found out.
Whatever, a friend of hers said she would drive her to hospital on Tuesday, (yesterday), so she could see him. And when she got there? He had died the night before, and they hadn't notified her yet.
How fucking nice. Ninety year old people should NOT outlive their children.
Now she has to arrange everything, and she does NOT want any help. (We offered...)
Now comes the 'fun' part. There was something in her son's past. He was staying with Peter's Aunt and Uncle in Frankfurt when he was young, and got into some trouble in the red-light district near the train station there. We never learned what the hell happened, but it was always a thing... if Giselle got moufy, they referred to it, and she went suddenly quiet. And changed the subject.
For years there have been rumours circulating that he had another life in Vienna, and a life partner. Stands to reason that if had been a woman, he would have brought her to meet her sometime in all the decades.... Tja, BINGO... and how terribly terribly sad.
As for Giselle, she was over-protective of anything at all that concerned her son. We have to remember that she is the product of another century with other values. But on the other hand, when she was visiting us, she got such a kick out of how we interacted, and was fully ok with it. We never pushed it in her face, but she is really no Dummkopf.
Maybe... just maybe... she was upset that her only son didn't have the courage to share the other part of his life with her, and things might have been totally different, have no idea, but maybe....
What FLOORED me? I believe I was the first person she called to tell me what had happened to her son.
That was one of the hardest telephone calls I have EVER had to take.
I hope I did well. I cried inside.... for her.
At least her son never regained consciousness, and they said he wasn't in pain.
I hope that is true.
Another thing that has been running through my mind at the moment.... wtf is going on with his significant other? Can you imagine having your friend go to look after his mother one weekend, and he doesn't come back, and you aren't allowed to call, or find out how he IS, or know what happened? That's been running through my mind these past two weeks.... How absolutely, completely terrible.
Which brings us back to the 'honesty' issue.... Better to be honest and out front. If you get rejected, they didn't deserve you in the first place. And if they do accept you, you sleep better nights, believe me.
So... have been moufing off, mind-surfing on the keyboard, true.
And in the next few days, am going to have to attend a fucking funeral. Again, as so many times before. Only this time, am going to be angry inside that he seemingly didn't have the fucking BALLS to tel the truth.
I have never thought that it pays off to hide in a closet or under the bed, just so people don't get their collective panties in a twist.....
What a fuck-up. And DAMN him for not having the fucking balls to come out.
Does this put a different light on things for you?
Better to tell the truth, hey....
