Words again....

I swear I'm going to get certified one of these days... was thinking about this entry as I went to get my cigarettes and 'groceries'. And there was a very fine mist, not really rain, you know?

And then it hit me, and I busted out laughing in the middle of the intersection.

In German, the word 'Mist' means garbage, or when used as an expletive, as in 'Ach, MIST!' it means, 'oh crap!' It only borders on the vulgar...

This after we have had five weeks of the finest Fall weather I have seen in years, not that I go out much. But warm, sunny, just beautiful. It finally broke last Saturday with a thunderstorm, and it cooled down enough that people turned on their heat a little for the first time this year, but only in the evening to take off a bit of a chill.

Mon-Weds it was cool nights and in the mornings, but comfortable throughout the daytime.

Whatever, I used my little 'joke' on the tobacconist and the cashier at the snoopermarket, so-called because everyone checks out whatever everyone else is buying.

It got some smiles and a laugh. 'Is that really true?' one girl asked. 'Honest, it is...'

Well--- over the weekend, I found that my take on Apple was sort of well-founded, but it was worse than I had thought. I'd assumed that their products were purely American-made. Turns out they aren't and the German press is still lamenting the late St. Steve Jobs, gawwd love 'em, the vultures....

Chris Hayes had a very interesting guest on his show UP over the weekend. Guy named Mike Daisey. He has a one-man show called 'The Agony and the Ecstasy of Steve Jobs'. Hayes played a short clip and it looked quite funny... about the planned obsolescence aspect of the products. Biting satire...

But Daisey once posed as a businessman in order to tour the factory producing I-phones, and Tablets, and what-not------ in CHINA. (He was researching his show..)

Tha's right, only the designs and the know-how originate in the US. And factories in China produce them for a song.

The working conditions are horrific. Twelve hour shifts on an assembly line... and no breaks, if you please. The company had to put up netting along the roof because they had several cases of people jumping off of it and killing themselves. (gee, I wonder why...) And there was something a bit murky about minerals used in the products which can only be obtained from the Congo, but they really didn't go into that.

And of course, China doesn't have EPA regulations, so they can pollute as much as they please. This guy talked to people who had sent their children to school in other provinces because theirs had become a 'cancer cluster'. But anything to make a living, right?

The discussion made a lasting impression, and others kept asking, 'why is this coming out NOW?' Hmmm, I dunno, maybe because the company loves to litigate?

So when I think of all those shiny, pretty things which the company made people think are so indispensible in their lives, and the vast amounts of profit they made with their astronomical prices for the consumer... it sort of makes me throw up in my mouf.

Let's see, what else in new? Herman Cane (Cain? have never seen it written and too lazy to check...) is a real hum-dinger example of what I meant below about if you're poor, it's your own damned fault.

He's bought it hook-line and sinker, all right. Telling some asshat on a Sunday show that they should stop wanting to take from the rich and word-for-word gave the Rethug manifesto... if you fail, it's your own fault.

Bill Maher was more than disturbed with his comments, it really got him.. To paraphrase, he said he tells jokes, someone can play ball well and get paid obscene amounts of money, but teachers, police and firepeople aren't 'worthy' of being paid better? He got very agitated. That was on Rachel Maddow's show.

And have been turning an eye to my own backyard this week. It's as I thought... the financial crisis is gonna blow up nationalistic animosities and fuck everyone over.

Our own rabble-rousing 'newspaper', and I use the term loosely, had screaming headlines because the mess we're in is because of the 'lazy Greeks'. (errm, hey guys, ever heard of Goldman Sachs?) The Czechs are accusing the Germans of Großdeutsche ambitions... sort of like, wanting to take over Europe and the word has Nazi subtext to it. Slovakia's government just toppled because they couldn't agree on a bail-out plan, and no one ever writes anything about who is really the catalyst in the whole mess. (Schlamassel, I love that word, sounds like what it means....)

If the animosities bubble up to the surface... well, a house divided will weaken the Euro, and the US would 'lurrv' that. But there are other dangers involved.

And I see they want to reinstate customs at borders again... mostly to stop illegal immigration, because the countries on the outlying areas 'aren't doing enough' to stem the tide. Sound familiar?

As my beloved Mom used to say, 'I tell ya and tell ya... do ya listen? NO.'

(Her 'sayings' are still in my head to this day... and they were smart and for every occasion you can think of.)

It's always 'give 'em what they wanna hear', or to quote Billy Flynn in 'Chicago' 'Razzle-dazzle them, and they'll never catch wise...'

In other words, and it's the word for it... it's 'show-biz'. It's MIST in the German sense of the word.