While writing that note, I realized that maybe readers in general, coming to the blog this week, might find it useful to know what I'm thinking this week.
To wit.*
I am really conflicted how to handle current events (politics, price of oil, coronavirus) on the blog this week. I am in a good place practically and emotionally, but I know this is going to be difficult for a lot of folks (the politics, price of oil, coronavirus). But this is what makes it even more difficult for me.
I am home alone -- for four days, I am almost completely free --- on Saturday, yesterday, our son-in-law drove -- I kid you not -- to the DFW airport -- ten minutes away -- bought a ticket for himself and Sophia. And left. Simply flew away.
Earlier in the day I was trying to reach Sophia. She was with her dad but I wasn't getting any reply. Finally, a text message, "We're [Sophia and I] out and about."
They left last night. I did not know they had left until they were on the plane. I don't know when he told his wife (our older daughter) or the two older granddaughters, Sophia's older sisters. He may have waited until after he and Sophia had crossed the Rubicon (gone through TSA security in this case). Kiri, Arianna, and Olivia (mom and the two older daughters) were at a soccer tournament.
He simply got on the plane with Sophia, flew to Denver, rented an SUV, to go skiing this week. Sophia starts ski school tomorrow, Monday. They rented her stuff today. This will be Sophia's third year of skiing.
No one else in the family wanted to go skiing this year (long story). But he really, really wanted to go skiing, and Sophia, five years old, going on sixteen, is game for anything.
Sophia and I sent texts back and forth last night on the phone when she was either airborne or taxiing.
Today, she was on face-time twice with me. She is so excited. And I am so excited for her. What a great father-daughter trip.
So, I am free, free, free. The other two granddaughters need minimal Uber-support. The older one wants me to take her to the grocer to get meat tomorrow -- yes -- the vegan wants meat to make stew.
So, now I can stay up all night, listen to music, read the books I want to read, blog, but with the market in flux and people panicked about coronavirus I'm not sure how to approach the blog. But the blog, music, and reading all keep me going. If I quit one, I will get depressed. They say sharks need to keep moving to survive, for the water to rush over their gills; for me, it's blogging. I need to blog to survive. And the Bakken right now is a bit tedious -- same ol' same ol' -- and I want to write about other stuff but readers come to the site to read about the Bakken, not to read about stuff that interests me, other than just the Bakken.
So, I'm conflicted. All the time to blog to my heart's content but I don't want to offend anyone.
I guess we will all just have to wait to see what shows up on the blog.
Another sidebar: this technology is amazing and how Google tracks us is amazing.
I spent the last half hour trying to find images of the Glacier Express and the Rhaetian Railway and other trains we took while touring Switzerland back in 1986, or thereabouts. I went back to YouTube, and the first ad that popped up was some rail ad about touring the Grand Canyon by train, the Grand Canyon Railroad & Hotel, I believe. I kid you not.
That's why I'm posting Leonard Cohen's Anthem. It seems to fit all the emotions running through my head right now. Wow, Cohen was a great poet. I was given his autobiography as a Christmas present some years ago. I never read it. I had a world myth of Leonard Cohen and did not want to know anything other than the myth I had of him.
I think if Graham Greene had been a singer-poet he would have been Leonard Cohen's doppelgänger. I think they would have had a lot about which to talk.
Wow, speaking of doppelgängers, Debbie Harry/aka Blondie just walked in (I'm at a wi-fi coffee house). I think I will stay a bit longer than planned. LOL.
*To wit is now just a fixed expression. It's a shortened form of that is to wit meaning “that is to know; that is to say; namely”, from the English verb wit “to know”. This was a strong verb with past tense wot, as in “A garden is a lovesome thing, God wot”.]
The book I'm reading (actually re-reading): The Hare with Amber Eyes: A Hidden Inheritance, by Edmund de Waal, c. 2010. It's one of my top shelf books. I've given much of my library away. This is one book I will never give away. I've blogged about it before.
I think the China flu is overdone. And even if it sweeps through..shit happens. As for recession danger? So. We get those.
ReplyDeleteI'm not even as old as you and am sanguine.
You don't need to apologize for not getting caught up in the doomer vibes. A lot of that stuff is just media (you pay more attention to MSM than I do). Even if we have a bad recession, most people just get on with their lives.
Much appreciated. Thank you. I just posted today's "daily note" which sort of lets folks know how I feel about all this -- one might have to read between the lines, but I do agree with you.
DeleteFigured. I'm more blunt. ;-)
ReplyDeleteSome days I cross the line and say things that are more blunt and then wish I hadn't. LOL. There is no question that readers prefer "blunt, tell it like it is" than the wishy-washy middle-of-the-road I'm trying to maintain.
Delete