Summertime, and the livin’ is easy … for a wall-hopping deer.
Summer is only just arriving down here, but it must have come a little earlier to this deer’s neighborhood.
We’ve been noticing deer poop in the grass, and caught glimpses on the wildlife cam of the jug-eared socialists nibbling nocturnally at the undersized fruit on the pear tree.
But yesterday, in broad daylight, I saw this one stroll casually from the street side of the house right through a neighbor’s gate. From there it was an easy leap into our back yard for a bit of tasty grass and a laydown in the shade.
What a brilliantly simple illustration for an essay on whether the “b” in “black” should be capitalized. I appropriated it from The Atlantic.
I made Juneteenth very famous, as you know.
No, I didn’t. And neither did that other peckerwood.
I’m not big on holidays. They were nothing to look forward to in the newspaper biz. Whether it’s Arbor Day or Zoo Lovers Day, the paper must appear. And no matter what capitalist fantasies motivate the business decisions at Gannett and Alden Global Capital, a newspaper won’t publish itself. Yet.
Once you’ve eaten a few dozen “holiday” meals at your desk while decoding a school-board story written by a functional alcoholic the term “holiday” loses all meaning.
Most holidays are dubious, anyway. Christmas? Sorry, not one of mine. Thanksgiving? Is that the one where George Washington threw his wooden teeth across the Potomac and killed a turkey perched in a cherry tree? Fourth of July? That’s the “Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness” one, right? Except for, you know, those people.
Then there’s Juneteenth. LIke Independence Day, it commemorates a beginning, a first step on a long march to a battle that seems to have no ending.
Though the celebration has its roots in Texas, I don’t recall hearing about it when I was in school down there. Too busy teaching us about how John Wayne fought Communism at the Alamo, I guess.
We never heard anything about the 1921 Tulsa Massacre, either.
And so I suffered from ignorance, a condition with which I continue to struggle. It, too, is a long march. The trick is to keep putting one foot ahead of the other while keeping your eyes, ears, and mind open.
Here’s something I stumbled across along the path. It drew my attention because I’m an old newshound, a retired copy editor, and I love watching the language as it tries to evolve to meet the times. It’s an article in The Atlantic by Kwame Anthony Appiah, a professor of philosophy and law at New York University, and it’s titled “The Case for Capitalizing the ‘B’ in ‘Black.'”
I’d like air that’s just a little less chewy, please. And thank you.
It’s a bad day to be an air-breathing organism.
InciWeb shows four fires in New Mexico, two in southwestern Colorado, and an even dozen in Arizona.
The Bush Fire northeast of Mesa is the biggie at 115,000 acres. That’s pretty country out there. Or it was, anyway.
As a consequence, we in the Duke City have been awarded an “Air Quality Alert” by the National Weather Service, and I will testify that the air is of very poor quality indeed. I’d send it back, but UPS says they won’t pick it up.
And there’s no telling when we might get a suitable replacement anyway, with the Bush Fire only 5 percent contained.
Though there apparently were more cops than Black Bandanas, New Mexico Highly Irregulars, or failed city council candidates at Monday’s Shootout at the Oñate Corral, nobody — the APD, the district attorney, or the state police — seem to have a choke hold on just who did what to whom and why, and what should happen to him. Them. Whatevs. Instead of occupying the moral high ground, they squabble over territory.
Fuck me running. No wonder everyone in this town is packing. Some days it just doesn’t matter if everybody at the dance is a cop except for you and the dude who shoots you. It’s the wild wild West out there.
As Thomas McGuane wrote in “Panama”:
Something about our republic makes us go armed. I myself am happier having a piece wthin reach, knowing if some goblin jumps into the path, it’s away with him. Here in Key West, we take our guns to parties.
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