Category: Uncategorized

Listening to Obama’s speech yesterday in Pennsylvania. Great speech. “We literally left this White House a pandemic playbook,” Obama said. “They probably used it to prop up a wobbly table somewhere.” More good bits.

“Korea identified its first case at the same time that the United States did. At the same time, their per capita death toll is just 1.3% of what ours is.”

“We know that he continues to do business with China because he’s got a secret Chinese bank account. How is that possible? How is that possible? A secret Chinese bank account. Listen, can you imagine if I had had a secret Chinese bank account when I was running for reelection. You think Fox News might have been a little concerned about that?”

“Donald Trump likes to claim he built this economy but America created 1.5 million more jobs in the last three years of the Obama-Biden administration than in the first three years of the Trump-Pence administration. How you figure that? And that was before he could blame the pandemic. Now, he did inherit the longest streak of job growth in American history but just like everything else he inherited, he messed it up.”

“Joe’s got a plan to create 10 million good clean energy jobs as part of a historic $2 trillion investment to fight climate change, to secure environmental justice. And he’ll pay for it by rolling back that tax cut for billionaires.”

“Where is this great plan to replace Obamacare? They’ve had 10 years to do it. There is no plan. They’ve never had one. Instead they’ve attacked the Affordable Care Act at every turn, driving up costs, driving up the uninsured.”

“The Environmental Protection Agency that’s supposed to protect our air and our water is right now run by an energy lobbyist that gives polluters free reign to dump unlimited poison into our air and water. The Labor Department that’s supposed to protect workers and their rights, right now it’s run by a corporate lobbyist who’s declared war on workers, guts protections to keep essential folks safe during a pandemic, makes it easier for big corporations to shortchange them on their wages. The Interior Department, that’s supposed to protect our public lands and wild spaces, our wildlife and our wilderness. And right now that’s run by an oil lobbyist who’s determined to sell them to the highest bidder.

“You’ve got the Education Department that’s supposed to give every kid a chance, and that’s run by a billionaire who guts rules designed to protect students from getting ripped off by for profit colleges and stiffs arm students looking for loan relief in the middle of an economic collapse. I mean, the person who runs Medicaid right now is doing their best to kick people off of Medicaid instead of sign them up for Medicaid.”

There are too many good bits! It’s a half an hour. Listen to the whole thing. And now I give you balloons. Some graffiti I passed by yesterday. It was just luminous.

This is new, doctors and nurses as symbols of death. Well, not new really, I just don’t remember them being used this way in my lifetime. But in this instance they are not the bringers of death, but the victims themselves. I think.

Cute properly masked pumpkins! I’m glad people are still decorating. Not as much as usual, but we still have time.

The Museum is open again now, and I walked up there yesterday, a four mile walk! Which reminds me. We’re supposed to walk 10,000 steps a day. That is roughly five miles. Who is actually walking that much every day? That’s a lot.

Much of the museum was closed off, but there was still plenty to see. It still amazes me how much I’ve come to love all the decorative arts wings. I used to be all about the paintings. Then photography. Photography seemed so much more alive. But now paintings feel living and breathing to me again. But when I walk through a decorative arts wing I’m all, “I want that. And this. And this.” I fantasize about finding something as beautiful in a second hand store somewhere remote.

Yesterday my favorite wing was 19th Century Sculpture and Decorative Arts 1850 – 1890. Did you know Sarah Bernhardt was a sculptor?? I didn’t. And a gifted sculptor. She made this of her husband after he died. (More below.)

Everyone’s favorite intense/grumpy composer. This is James von Stuck’s combination sculpture and painting of Beethoven, “modeled after his purported death-mask.” It seems so modern, but it’s dated 1900-1902.

There’s a new park at Pier 26, (along the West Side highway, between Hubert and No. Moore). My favorite parts are the deck chairs, lounge chairs, and swings, like the kind of swings they have on porches, that are placed along the pier. It’s like sitting on the deck of a boat. If I lived near here I’d take a book and curl up to read in one of these chairs.