I promised Raggedy Ann a few images last Friday for today, but could not find a Photo Blog essay.

Raggedy Ann

Don`t Have a Cow

Greetings fellow Caucusapiens and other species reading these words. I am off on an adventure this weekend. I driving Sweetie to see her mother, brother and sister. I am full of anxiety, but I know this may be the last time.

As we all know, the history of music began in 1956. However there was music before then. We've been able to figure out what it sounded like, thanks to rock carvings.

Today we'll talk about some of this pre-historic music... the Western Civ kind.

A lute, a flute and ...

In 1941, the animators at Walt Disney's Studio went on strike. The business had grown from a few people to a 1200 person working place, but in all that time the wages had stayed quite low for all but a few at the very top. Were you to check the credits of any of the cartoons from this period, you would notice that not a single animators name was credited, only Walt Disney himself.

So tomorrow my employment specialist wants to take me to a few places she applied to on my behalf. No doubt they'll tell me they don't do anything face to face anymore and that everything is done online now because that's the default response. Even when I do get to introduce myself to a higher-up, it never really goes anywhere. You simply can't get your foot in the door in the IT world.

I learned recently that the new guy at the cigarette store, he is a genuine hero.

Like everyone who works there, this young man, he is Syrian. And, like too many of them, he is tangled up, in deep blue, with the immigration authorities, of the Americans. Because, and for no reason that makes any sense to any decent human being, these Syrians, they must "prove," to these authorities, that they should be "allowed," to remain in the United States. Otherwise, they shall be "removed."

This, is preposterous. Because Syria, it is a charnel house. Everyone in the world, with a bomb, they are at present, hurling it onto Syria, or handing it over to someone else, to hurl. All three of the empires—Eurasia, Eastasia, Oceania—are amuck there. Anyone who is Syrian, who manages to get out of the place, needs to be welcomed, and immediately, wherever they might happen to land. The immigration authorities of the Americans, they have no right, to require any Syrians, to run any gauntlets. The job of these authorities, it should be to confer citizenship, if that is what is wanted, and at once—together, with fulsome apologies.

Each of the Syrians at the cigarette store, s/he has a different story. Because all of the humans, they are different from one another. Even, as they are all the same. If these people, they want to tell me their story, I listen. But. I do not pry.

The other evening, this man, he told me his story. Seems there came the time, when he came of the age, in which he would be drafted, into the Syrian military. "I don't want to be in a war," he said. "I do not want to be shooting anybody." And so, he left Syria. And then, eventually, in the course of things, he made his way, here. "Sometimes, yes, I will watch war in a movie," he said. "But I don't want, to shoot any people."

Absolutely: goddam: right.

Not only should this young man be permitted to remain in the United States, but a statue should be cast of him, that will then be placed on a float, that will be towed, slowly, down all the streets, in all the lands, in all the world, with softspeakers, that will broadcast, from the float, his story, and also encourage, all and every one else, in all the world, to do, as he has done.

Because, the very first thing, that needs to happen, before anything else can, is that all the humans, in all the armies, in all the world, need to put down the guns, and walk away. If everyone were as this young man, all the armed conflicts, in all the world, would, in this instant, cease. All of the people, in all the politics, all of the generals, all of the weaponsmakers, they are but big impotent mouths, without the millions of humans, who pick up the gun, and then go out, and shoot, and kill, as they are told.