OK, one more thought about politics. Trump’s support by evangelical Christians, explained.

It seems I’ve gone from being fairly obsessed about politics and writing about it often to…not so much. I suppose the dual punch of deaths in the family and getting sick make it tough to get too worked up about anything else. Plus when I really dig in and read the news, it seems hopeless. The Republican party has become a nihilistic authoritarian religious cult, so nothing they do surprises me. And the Democrats, bless them, can’t seem to get out of their own way. They’re (we’re) terrible at messaging, terrible at prioritization, have no “long game” like the Republicans’ Federalist Society. And the Republicans generally have wealthy people on their side, due to their positions on tax cuts. Hopeless.

One political quote really stood out for me this week. In the Georgia Senate race between Herschel Walker, an ignorant, amoral weirdo – and Raphael Warnock, a thoughtful, intelligent person – a Republican party spokesperson had this to say.

Dana Loesch, a former spokesperson for the National Rifle Association and a former writer and editor for the right-wing media outlet Breitbart, made the position of party leaders clear: “I don’t care if Herschel Walker paid to abort endangered baby eagles,” she said. “I want control of the Senate.”

There you have it. Power and control at all costs, principles be damned. It’s hard to beat a team that doesn’t play by any rules. Anyway, that’s about all the political outrage I can summon up today. It’ll have to do.

A few pictures from the two non-sick days in the past week. First, from the St. James Art Fair.

Who knew that wooden flowers could be so beautiful?

And is it a surprise I got sick after a cross-country airplane ride and then was part of this small gathering at the fair?

Whatever we were selling, he wasn’t buying it. Skeptical Jesse.

Evidence of the autofocus and depth of field problems I’m having with the 35mm prime lens. I’m sure if I had taken this with my iPhone it would be perfect. 🙁

What an excellent day. Woke up feeling near normal, had bison chili for lunch, a nice walk beside Willow Lake, then home. Got a call from a client who needs some rapid-delivery work I can provide over the next 48 hours instead of watching TV all day, so that’ll pay for the trip and then some. And now, one of my all time favorite movies just came on – 1981’s Body Heat, with William Hurt and Kathleen Turner. I watched that one and Casablanca with friends for my 30th birthday “party”. It’s a classic. Pretty risque in the first 30 minutes, but still a classic.

I’ve got three days before I have to go back into the funeral service zone. Work or play I’m looking forward to those three days.

McSweeney’s captures the joy of air travel post-pandemic. It’s maybe a little exaggerated, but mostly true. It’s a shitshow.

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My stepmother’s obituary was published today. She drafted it and I edited it. That’s my second obituary, and I hope it’s a very long time before I have to write or edit another one.

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I’m feeling better and have some ambition to get out in the world today. I think I’ll visit the pub in Anchorage for their bison-elk chili. Healthy, rich, and satisfying.

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Great headline and sadly ironic story in The Daily Beast: Irony Meter Explodes as Migrants Lured TO Florida for Hurricane Ian Cleanup. Yeah, the GOP hates immigrants until there’s hard work to do for minimum wage.

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I thought today’s Wordle answer was really difficult. An odd word with spelling at odds with its pronunciation. Took me five guesses.

One thing about being alone is you can listen to any music at any volume and not worry if you’re irritating others. It’s wonderful. But now I can’t get Tame Impala songs out of my head. Day and night, I hear KG’s catchy rhythms and lyrics. Could be worse, but man, it’s incessant. A true ear worm.

I’ve also noticed that a lot of the characters in his official videos are the session players he uses for live performances. My favorite is the big Russian-looking dude in the Lost in Yesterday video – he plays keyboards. And the unfortunate main character in Let It Happen is a guitarist. KG has a tight little team.

Another long day in isolation. This certainly wasn’t what I had in mind when I planned to be in Louisville this week, but…no plan survives first contact with the enemy, and I’m certain this virus is the enemy. I lost the battle this week, but I expect to win the war by changing tactics.

I’m binge-watching The Terminal List. In previous posts I wrote about the books by Jack Carr – I liked them a lot, but the military and gun worship got to be a bit much. The series is much the same, but I’m enjoying it. I don’t love the casting of the main characters – Chris Pratt and Constance Wu are NOT who I had in mind for Reece and Katie, but they’re growing on me. Pratt’s wild-eyed version of Reece is hard to reconcile with the stoic character in the books, and I have a hard time seeing them get together in later seasons. But I think Amazon has already OK’d season 2, so we’ll see.

I also watched a gloomy though good movie called Downeast. Part love story, part gangster movie, set in a small Maine fishing town. Really interesting.

I watched 13 Minutes, a movie about a tornado hitting a town in Oklahoma. Kind of timely, given Florida this week. Decent movie, and anything starring Paz Vega is worth a look.

I also watched more than a little of the Dunhill Championship from Scotland, with play at The Old Course, Carnoustie and Kingsbarn. Legendary courses, and it’s always fun to see the pros struggling with links golf. I’ll never forget my round at Carnoustie.

Rough day yesterday, but today is starting better. Thanks to the food and drugs delivered by my daughter, the fever is gone and I’m functional again. Looking forward to another day watching TV and reading.

One of the things I watched yesterday was the very last episode of The Expanse, just for old time’s sake. They ended the screen version in a good place, with a focus on the two main characters just taking a break to hold on to each other. The book series ended in a very, very different place, with my favorite character Amos becoming the unlikely savior of humanity.

I woke up this morning with a weird thought fully formed, about how to describe The Expanse succinctly. Funny how the mind works while asleep. It goes something like this:

• What if humanity founded a rich interplanetary civilization across the solar system? What would that look like?
• And what if that civilization was disrupted by the sudden ability to travel to the stars via giant gateways? What would that do to the civilization?
• Answer those two questions by following a dozen compelling characters’ lives during that disruption, and you’ve got The Expanse.

It’s simple in retrospect, but it was genius to come up with those ideas and create such a rich story around them. Thank you, James SA Corey.

Since arriving in Louisville, I’ve experienced…a lot. A wide range of weather, locales, emotions, and wellness.

The travel day Wednesday was long – delays in San Diego led to arriving later than expected. I came into town expecting to go to eastern KY on Thursday to visit my very ill stepmom one last time and start making arrangements for her inevitable passing. As it turns out, she died while I was somewhere over Missouri, about an hour before landing. So with a heavy heart I made the trip to Ashland on Thursday to begin the post-passing cleanup of accounts and possessions.

The weather in Ashland was gloomy and cold. Scottish weather without the golf, the single malt or the salmon. With the help of some generous friends and family, we managed to clear out my stepmom’s apartment – a huge task, complicated by two things. One, she was a hoarder, and every available space was crammed with stuff. And secondly, the assisted living facility staff somehow decided it would be a good idea to go into her apartment and sort through everything in search of items they might want, with no family there. I still can’t believe they did this, and I’m considering what action to take. When I arrived at noon Thursday it looked like a crime scene – clothes, shoes, purses and knick-knacks all over the floors and bed, just tossed around. I had to set aside my outrage and stay focused on the tasks – empty the apartment, get rid of the trash, sort through things that family might want to keep, and donate the rest to a women’s shelter. And make all the funeral arrangements.

It was a long, morose day, made more difficult by my weird lingering symptom – inability to control body temperature. Just a little effort and I’m sweating buckets. Tossing a couple of dozen heavy bags of garbage into a head-high dumpster would have been tough on a healthy day, so that was a challenge. But we got through it all – again, thanks to friends and family who helped – and I made my weary way back down the highway to Louisville.

The day after, Friday, could not have been more different. A nearly perfect day. Perfect weather and a trip to the St. James At Fair with brothers, Emily, Greg and the grandsons. What a great event. We walked and gawked for a few hours, bought a few things and then decided to find a good place for a late lunch. Greg took us to Monnick’s in Schnitzelburg, a nondescript brewpub with excellent beer and even better food. Plus they had a shady back patio where we could eat outside and the kids could run around. It was a happy day.

After a nap, I returned to E&G’s house and spent a great couple of hours just playing with the boys. They love the attention, and their joy is infectious. Just what I needed, and I left worn out but happy.

That was yesterday. After a mostly-sleepless night, today appears to be my reminder that I’m still not 100% well. Overdid it yesterday and today I simply want to rest and get rid of the something’s-definitely-wrong feeling. I don’t think this is a full-blown recurrence of Covid, but…it’s definitely a residual of some kind. If I feel bad again tomorrow I’ll get tested.