Posts Tagged ‘Politics’
July 1, 2017
At some point, I decided this was the year I was going to get over my fear of grilling. Last night, I grilled a steak using a Bobby Flay recipe. And asparagus on the grill: c’est magnifique! Put the spears in a plastic bag with olive oil, salt, pepper, a couple other spices and grilled them for three minutes on high. I’m hooked.
So today I went to the market and got boneless pork chops and was going to broil them about half an hour ago but thunder rattled the house and rain fell from the skies. My mouth turned down. However, the sun has returned and I am going to try it, pork chops on the grill.
It is Friday, June 30th, as I write, the beginning of the long 4th of July weekend. As I ran an errand near the train station, I saw visitors piling off the train, bags in hand, being greeted by friends, relatives, lovers and others. Zagat, today, sent an email which had an article about 8 reasons to take the drive to Hudson; all of them being restaurants.
You can read the article here.
As someone who is here most of the time now, I took a bit of umbrage with the list. It included Grazin’, a diner restaurant with local beef and I will need to give it another try because when I was there, it wasn’t good and the wine was south of awful.
It included Fish & Game, which is, I’ve heard, a good restaurant and I haven’t been there because it opened with an attitude. I’ve been around the carousel too many times to need attitude. [Hey, once I had “my table” at Ma Maison in Los Angeles, which was cool while it lasted.]
It included, deservedly, Swoon Kitchen Bar. I don’t go there often; my ex left me for one of the waiters there; that has weighed on me ever since but it is great.
It did not include, and I think it should have, my beloved Red Dot, which is one of the hubs of Hudson nor did it include Ca’Mea, which I think should have gotten a mention nor Vico, which has upped its game lately.
We are a food town.
And now, in a break in the rain, I did grill but not the pork chops I bought as most of the recipes for grilling told me I should brine the chops and that takes some time so I grilled some sausage and finished my asparagus. Oh, so good.
Beyond my little world, it has been a bit mad.
Our President has created a twitter storm over his tweets about Mika Brzezinski’s “bleeding face lift.”
Even Paul Ryan found it too much.
Several news sources, including conservative ones, thought maybe he should have been in a meeting rather than tweeting. But no, President Trump was tweeting and creating a painful moment for his party.
And, today, NASA had to issue a statement it was not operating a slave state on Mars; it was NOT sending children there to be body parts for future colonists, a claim made by a guest on “The Alex Jones Show,” which airs on 118 radio stations. Alex Jones is most famous for claiming that the Sandy Hook massacre was staged and was interviewed by Megyn Kelly on her new NBC show, which isn’t doing so well.
As I sit here in my very hygge cottage, I am astounded by what is going on out there. We have a President who seems devoted to Twitter attacks more than he is about governing and who, according to a variety of reports, starts his day at 6:30 AM speaking to lawyers about that pesky Russian matter.
And he is going to meet with Putin at the G 20 Conference and has been asking his advisors what he can offer Vladimir Putin. What?
There are times I feel I am living in an alternative universe. And I know I am not the only one.
So, doesn’t it make sense I want to conquer my fear of grilling? That’s concrete in a world that seems spinning out of control.
Tags:Alex Jones, Bleeding Face Lift, Bobby Flay, Ca'Mea, Donald Trump, Fish & Game, G 20, Grazin, Grilling, Hudson NY, Mars, Media, Megyn Kelly, Mike Brzezinki, NASA, Paul Ryan, Politics, Putin, Red Dot, Swood Kitchen Bar, technology, Twitter, Vico, Zagat
Posted in 2016 Election, Claverack, Columbia County, Elections, Entertainment, Greene County New York, Hudson New York, Hygge, Life, Literature, Mat Tombers, Mathew Tombers, Matthew Tombers, Media, Political, Political Commentary, Politics, Putin, Social Commentary, Television, Trump, Uncategorized | Leave a Comment »
June 5, 2017
The pearl grey of twilight is settling on the Hudson Valley and I’m playing the Joan Baez station from Amazon Prime Music in the background, wrapped in the warmth of a fleece pullover as the day has been infused with a chill closer to October than June.
We have had 4.5 inches more rain than normal this year. Last year was a drought; this year a flood. Saturday started with rain and then became a brilliant early spring day – except it’s not quite early spring anymore.
At the Farmer’s Market, I picked up fair trade coffee and some incredible chevre from an amazing artisanal cheese maker that I discovered at the winter market. In a way, I feel disloyal to the other cheese purveyors I frequent and her cheeses are over the top wonderful. She is in the market, center aisle, on the east end. Goats and Gourmets.
And all this is very hygge. And oh, my god! Do I need hygge right now!
Donald Trump has removed us from the Paris Climate Accords. It was not unexpected and it is disappointing. As I watch, from my point of view, I am witnessing the President of this country diminish us with every move he makes.
It is something that saddens me every day and I know I must live with this for the rest of his term, be it four or eight years. All this impeachment talk is not very real as it is hard, as it should be, to impeach a president. It’s my hope that we will have only one term of this man and that the country will elect someone in 2020 who will deal with the very real problems we face.
Trump trumpeted he would spend money to restore the infrastructure of this country which is in desperate need of restoration. His plan for that seems, to me, a little incoherent.
As is my custom, from my Catholic childhood, I light candles at church on Sunday when I come back from communion. One candle is for me. Call me selfish but one candle is just for me. Another is for the people I know who are having health issues. It includes the daughter of my friend Clark Bunting, whose daughter suffered a traumatic brain injury and the son of a former boyfriend who has a son who also suffers from that and seems to be doing well as well as all the others I know who are dealing with health issues.
And I light a candle for Donald Trump and the world in which we are living, praying we will get through this.
Then I light a candle for all the things I said I would light a candle about and have forgotten.
It is very comforting for me to do this.
One of the reasons I attend Christ Church is that I am getting older and at some point, in this getting older process, I won’t be here and I would like a community of people to mourn me. Christ Church will. In the last few years, I have become an integral part of that community. My coffee hours after the 10:30 service are legendary as are the Easter brunches I have organized the last two years.
And I would like there to be a great good party on the deck of the cottage or, if that’s not possible, at the Red Dot. I’m part of that community also.
It’s my hope it will be some long time before there will need to be a celebration but I am laying the ground work for that. That, too, is hygge for me.
Sitting here in the cottage, I am grateful and that is so comforting, to be grateful.
Tags:Christ Church Episcopal, General, Home, Hudson Farmer's Market, Hudson New York, Hygge, Media, Paris Climate Accord, Politics, Trump
Posted in 2016 Election, Civil Rights, Claverack, Columbia County, Greene County New York, Hudson New York, Hygge, Life, Literature, Mat Tombers, Mathew Tombers, Matthew Tombers, Media, Paris Climate Accords, Social Commentary, Trump, Uncategorized | 2 Comments »
May 7, 2017
“It was a dark and stormy night,” is the much-parodied opening line of Bulwer-Lytton’s novel, “Paul Clifford.” But it was a dark and stormy night Friday night in Columbia County; wind whipped, too. Around 4 in the afternoon, the wind blew out the power as I was running errands to prep for a dinner party I was giving that evening.
Knowing that National Grid might not meet their expectation that power would return by 5:30, I made a quick detour and bought a dozen candles. It was a wise investment; power only returned at about four on Saturday. There were a half dozen of us, who dined, bathed by candlelight, looking our best. In her later years, Madame du Pompadour only allowed herself to be seen by candlelight. She was wise.
Martinis were ready in a pitcher and we toasted our decision not to cancel dinner. We managed to not discuss politics [an increasingly difficult thing to avoid]; we laughed and since there was no background music, it was the sound of our voices which danced through the night. It seemed as if we were in the first half of the 19th century or doing glamourous glamping in our own time.
We made the evening work. It was magic.
When I woke Saturday, a tree from the opposite bank had fallen into the creek and the morning air thrummed with the sounds of neighbors’ generators as there was no power. Out of habit, I asked Alexa for the weather and was met by stony silence. We were cut off. From each other.
Eventually, I did my morning errands. The Post Office lot was crowded with folks discussing what they had suffered during the night and driving into town, one home had lost five trees. Farther down, a great old pine had been uprooted, never to again be adorned by Christmas lights.
The Farmer’s Market was sparsely populated by vendors, most probably at home dealing with the storm’s effects. I realized there was little I could buy as it might all go bad before power returned. National Grid was estimating now that it would be about midnight on Saturday.
In an interesting way today, when I was at the Post Office, looking around at the klatches of men talking, and it was all men, I felt I was looking at a scene in “Midsomer Murders,” a British mystery series that started in 1997 and is still going. The village was gathering at the Post Office to talk about the storm.
It made me feel like I was a part of a community. A little like the community Jessica Fletcher had in “Murder, She Wrote.” Except we’re not in Maine and we don’t have as much death as Jessica encountered in her little town in Maine.
With my batteries now exhausted on all my toys, I ensconced myself at the far end of the bar at the Red Dot, close to an outlet, and charged my laptop and phone. And had superb Eggs Benedict on potato latkes with a side of American bacon. Totally, totally decadent. If in Hudson on a weekend day, indulge yourself. The Red Dot’s Mark makes the most succulent Eggs Benedict this side of paradise and, at this point in life, I have had a bunch. And when I am on the other side, I want to know I can order his up whenever I want. Please God.
Do you notice how I am avoiding anything substantive?
Sometimes you just have to do that. Give yourself a little breathing space in all the craziness.
Because it is crazy out there.
It is just unbelievable to me. Whenever I look at the news, I just go: WTF.
So, I have taken a moment to not worry. To celebrate my life and the joys I experience on a daily basis, knowing I must return to the dialogue soon.
Tags:Bulwer-Lytton, Claverack Creek, Claverack Post Office, Friends, General, Hygge, It was a dark and stormy night, Mat Tombers, Mathew Tombers, Matt Tombers, Matthew Tombers, Media, Party, Politics, Prayer, technology
Posted in 2016 Election, Claverack, Columbia County, Elections, Entertainment, Greene County New York, Hudson New York, Hygge, Mat Tombers, Mathew Tombers, Matthew Tombers, Media, Political, Political Commentary, Politics, Social Commentary, Television, Trump, Uncategorized | 1 Comment »
March 3, 2017
It has been about ten days since I’ve written; I just went back and looked. Last time, I was on Saba, writing when I wasn’t able to sleep. Tonight, I am back at my dining room table, floodlights on, looking out over the creek, having just returned from Coyote Flaco with Pierre, sharing chicken fajitas.
When I reached the cottage this afternoon, I felt I’d been away for a week, at least. Monday morning, I went down to DC for some meetings for the Miller Center on the Presidency and then to New York last night to have a wonderful dinner with my friends, David and Annette Fox. It’s a quarterly event; we gather at their marvelous UWS apartment, order Indian and catch up on our lives.
It is very hygge. As was the dinner party I gave last Friday night for Fayal Greene, her husband, David, Ginna and Don Moore, Lionel and Pierre. Leek soup, sautéed scallops in a brown butter sauce, and carrots in a lemony oil garlic sauce, with a baked polenta to die for, followed by a flourless chocolate cake provided by Ginna and Don, via David the baker.
It was an extraordinary evening.
And I, at least, need evenings like this to keep me sane in these extraordinary times.
On Tuesday evening, in Washington, after an early dinner with my friends Matthew and Anne, which followed drinks with my ex-partner and his now fiancé, I watched the address to Congress by our President, Donald Trump.
To the great relief of almost the entire world, he did not go off the rails and sounded presidential. It was, Tuesday night, all about the delivery. Wednesday morning people started to parse what he said. Even the conservative writers that I read, and I do read some, found a lot of flaws with the speech.
Short on specifics.
Fact checkers found a lot of fault, pointing out Trump claimed as victories some things which had been in play for a year at some corporations. Ford isn’t keeping production in the US because of Trump; they are pulling back on their Mexican plans because those plants would have built small cars and people aren’t buying them. They’re buying gas guzzlers because gas is cheapish again.
When talking with David and Annette, I said that if Trump had not held it together last night, his presidency would have begun to unravel. He would actually be President but, in reality, his claim to power would have begun collapsing. Lots of people on his side of the aisle are slightly unhinged by his behavior. McCain and Graham are frankly, I think, apoplectic.
And he held it together and while he should have been able to take a victory lap, Wednesday morning brought the revelation that Attorney General Jeff Sessions, who had said in confirmation meetings he had not met with any Russians in the run-up to the election, actually had two meetings with the Russian Ambassador, one in his office on Capitol Hill.
Republicans are excusing while Democrats and some Republicans are accusing.
This is a wild ride and I’ve never seen anything like it.
Sessions has since recused himself from all investigations regarding anything Russian but there are those on both sides of the aisle who smell blood in the water.
While we were having political meltdowns, Amazon’s vaulted cloud computing world went offline yesterday for 4 hours and 17 minutes because of a typo in a command. OOPS.
It’s a little scary. 150,000 websites were affected. Amazon is the king of cloud storage and that’s a big oops for the King. I would not have wanted to be the head of that division yesterday.
And, before Tuesday’s Trump speech, we had the foll der wall of the biggest Oscar mistake in history. First “La La Land” was announced as Best Picture but it really was “Moonlight.” Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway were humiliated and PwC, the accountants, were more than humiliated. They handed out a wrong envelope.
OOPS.
When it happened, I was safely in the arms of Morpheus, having strange dreams of Mike Bloomberg dating the pastor of my church, Mother Eileen.
Snap Inc. had a very successful opening on the market today; it was the biggest initial offering since Facebook and they have a rocky road to travel and they are a force to be reckoned with and it will be wonderful to see how it plays out. The next Facebook? Or the next troubled tech company, which is where Twitter is today.
It’s time for me to say goodnight.
By hygge. Regardless of your political persuasion, it will help us all get through.
Tags:Apple, celebrities, Christian, computers, Current Events, General, Google, GOP, Home, Hubble Telescope, Iraq, Islam, Istanbul, life, Mars, Media, NASA, Netflix, newspapers, Politics, reconciliation, Soho, Star Wars, technology, Terrorism, Texas, Wireless, Yahoo
Posted in 2016 Election, Claverack, Columbia County, Daesh, depression, Education, Elections, Entertainment, European Refugee Crisis, Gay, Gay Liberation, Great Recession, Greek Debt Crisis, Greene County New York, Hillary Clinton, Hollywood, Homelessness, Howard Bloom, Hudson New York, Income Inequality, IS, Mat Tombers, Mathew Tombers, Media, Mideast, Nazis, Obama, Political, Political Commentary, Politics, Social Commentary, Space Exploration, St. Paul's Cathedral, Syria, Taliban, Television, Trump, Uncategorized | Leave a Comment »
February 20, 2017
My day began at 4:00 AM EST, 5:00 AM AST [Atlantic Standard Time] on the sun blessed isle of Saba where I woke, finished packing, drank some coffee and was picked up by my friends on the island and went to the airport to begin an epic journey back to Claverack. Cars, planes, automobiles and trains. Had them all covered today.
Flying to St. Martin, I went on to New York and from New York went by train to Hudson, got to my car and came home.
Earlier this week, I was wide awake in the early hours of the day and now I am awake in the late hours of the night and so, instead of staring at the ceiling, decided to open the laptop and do a letter…
When I came into the drive, I realized how hard this winter has been on the gravel drive and I have some work to do in the spring to redistribute the gravel pushed aside by the snow plow.
It did feel wonderful to pull into the drive and see the little cottage, all snug and waiting. Coming in, I turned up the heat a bit, made myself a martini and started to unpack. Some things I shipped home from Miami as they would have been burdensome to carry out to Saba and back. One of them was a winter coat, keeping with me only a lighter one. A wise choice as when I stepped off the plane in New York it was almost balmy. It was so warm; I almost didn’t need my fleece pullover.
As I rode in the taxi to Penn Station for the train part of the trip, we were held up by road work and I contemplated the extraordinary world in which we live.
My friend, Jan, was afraid I would spend the next four years overflowing with anger at Trump. I’m not. I don’t have the energy for that. Often I am bemused, disgusted, concerned, frightened, surprised, shocked. But not angry. Not yet.
As I was driving in from JFK, I was thinking about his comment in speech yesterday about what happened in Sweden last night. Nothing happened in Sweden last night. Our President baffled an entire nation, wondering if there was something he knew they didn’t. He didn’t. It seems he conflated a Tucker Carlson interview into something that wasn’t – or something like that.
The Swedish Government asked for a clarification and President Trump tweeted that he was referring to a Fox News report about Swedes and immigration and rising crime. But he did say “last night.”
The Swedes are wondering if his tweet was the official response they requested. The State Department hasn’t gotten back to them.
And I wrote about Shep Smith in my last letter, the Fox News anchor of “The Majority Report” taking on the untruthfulness of President Trump. The very thought of anyone at Fox News taking on Donald Trump brings a smile to my face. How could it not?
Alas for them, he has also labelled them as “fake news.” Or maybe it is alas for him? Fox News is the media organ of choice for his base and if they are questioning him…
So, no, I am not angry. Yet. And I am an activist. Our little group, Blue DOT Hudson Indivisible is now up to about two hundred members and growing. We’re demanding accountability from our Representative in Congress, John Faso, and our Senators, Kristin Gillibrand and Charles Schumer. Faso is Republican and Gillibrand and Schumer are Democrats. No one is off the hook here.
It is interesting that historians are listing Obama as the 12th best President in our history. If you’re interested in the list, look here.
Tomorrow, after all, is President’s Day.
There will be a march in DC to say “Not My President,” to let Donald know where he stands with some people.
In New York today, music mogul Russell Simons, once a longtime Trump friend, organized an “I am a Muslim, too” gathering to protest Trump’s positions on his Muslim brothers.
Friends of mine were there. If I had been in the city, I might have been though my discomfort with crowds has grown as I have grown older.
And I am glad I have grown older. It gives me some good perspective. It helps me realize that while I have no children, I do have a responsibility to the next generations. And it is interesting to accept that I have that responsibility.
Tags:Claverack Cottage, Donald Trump, Fox News, I am Muslim too, JFK, Mat Tombers, Mathew Tombers, Media, New York, Not My President March, Obama, Penn Station, Politics, Russell Simons, Saba, St. Martin, Sweden, The Donald, Times Square
Posted in Claverack, Columbia County, Elections, Entertainment, Hudson New York, Life, Literature, Mat Tombers, Mathew Tombers, Media, Mideast, Obama, Political, Political Commentary, Politics, Social Commentary, Television, Trump, Uncategorized | Leave a Comment »
February 12, 2017
Around me, I am listening to a mélange of English, Spanish, Italian, French and German.
I am not in Claverack, NY but on the veranda of my hotel in Miami Beach, a cloudy morning having given way to clear blue skies with a gentle breeze blowing off the beach a short block away, sipping my third very good cappuccino of the day.
Waking just after seven, I have spent most of my morning here. First, a light breakfast with my friend Nick Stuart, before he left for what is now a rainy New York, later, reading the New York Times on my new iPhone 7 Plus, much easier than on my old 5s.
Reading the news is a bemusing event these days. It may just be me but it seems the Administrative Branch of our government is in disarray while the Legislative Branch appears as if it’s a group of old white men braying their success at owning the joint with the Judicial Branch holding the center of sanity.
There is a young man named Stephen Miller who is a Trumpian True Believer, architect of the Travel Ban and, before this, on the staff of Senator Jeff Sessions. Previously known for his avalanches of ideological emails to fellow Congressional staffers, he is now close to and closely listened to by President Trump. He is 31 and shaping policy. We must watch him as he will be influential in the coming months, whatever your political persuasion.
Apparently, his secretive nature was part of the reason the Travel Ban wasn’t thoroughly vetted.
He made the rounds of the Sunday morning shows trumpeting the ways Trump will combat the unanimous decision of the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals to refuse to reinstate the ban.
When George Stephanopoulos asked him about the report that Michael Flynn discussed sanctions against Russia with that country’s ambassador before Flynn was sworn in as White House national security adviser, he had nothing to say, not having been given anything to say by the White House.
On NBC, Miller couldn’t comment on whether the President still had confidence in Flynn. He also continues to assert there was mass voter fraud, causing Trump to lose the popular vote. Saying so, doesn’t make it so, Mr. Miller. If it is true, please show some evidence. He states facts without proof, a great “gas lighting” technique.
Steve Bannon, Lord Vizier, is being scrutinized for a 2014 speech he gave at a Vatican Conference in which he referenced Julius Evola, darling of Italian Fascists. It also appears Bannon, who is Catholic, is shimmying up to a group of Vatican insiders who believe Pope Francis is destroying the Church.
Kellyanne Conway, Counselor to President Trump, was herself “counseled” per Press Secretary Spicer because she encouraged people to go out and buy “Ivanka’s stuff,” from the White House Briefing Room. That crosses an ethical line, most people agree. Perhaps not the President, who was unhappy with Spicer’s choice of the word “counselled.”
The Office of Government Ethics had its website melt down with complaints.
Ivanka has had her line dropped from Nordstrom’s because it was underperforming, which elicited a scolding tweet from the President, and then Nordstrom’s found its stock jumping 5%.
Apparently, Ivanka and Kellyanne have had words: Kellyanne, don’t mention me or my products on television!
Poor Spicer. He’s lost face with the President because Melissa McCarthy portrayed him on a SNL skit; the program is having its highest ratings in twenty years as a certain element in the country breathlessly waits for its next Trump skewer, though last night’s skit with Kellyanne Conway doing a “Fatal Attraction” on Jake Tapper caused me to grimace but SNL isn’t always known for its taste.
It is with unconscious competence I have chosen to be away now. Claverack was pummeled with 12 inches of snow with another twelve about to batter it. Hopefully, it will be over by the time I return.
Last night, I attended my friends’ party for the fifth anniversary of their art gallery, Williams – McCall, in South Beach. Their chef was last seen providing the food for the Patriots at the Super Bowl.
So right now, I am going to finish this, do a bit more culling of emails and then head to the beach for a bit of sunbathing. While I am not at home, this is traveling hygge.
Tags:9th Circuit Court of Appeals, Administrative Branch, celebrities, Claverack, Friends, General, George Stephanopoulos, Hygge, Islam, Ivanka Trump, Jeff Sessions, Judicial Branch, Julius Evola, Legislative Branch, Media, Miami Beach, Michael Flynn, NBC, Nordstom's, NSA, Party, Politics, Pope Francis, South Beach, Stephen Miller, Steve Bannon, Travel Ban, Trump, Voter Fraud, Williams-McCall Gallery
Posted in 2016 Election, Civil Rights, Columbia County, Entertainment, Hollywood, Hudson New York, Mat Tombers, Mathew Tombers, Media, Mideast, Political, Political Commentary, Politics, Social Commentary, Television, Trump, Uncategorized | Leave a Comment »
January 9, 2017
Outside the cottage, it is a cold winter night. It’s sixteen degrees and feels like three, per my Weather Channel App. Tonight, I will be leaving the kitchen cupboard doors open and the faucets dripping. So far, so good. No frozen pipes yet.
Soft jazz is playing on the Echo and its Alexa technology was the hit of this year’s Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. Auto manufacturers are integrating Alexa into their vehicles. It is, apparently, the “Killer App” of this year’s CES, which was, apparently, all about technology coming to automobiles.
Alan Murray, who is CEO of Fortune Magazine and Chief Content Officer for Time, Inc. writes a daily blog called the “CEO Daily.” I suggest you subscribe. He wrote this week, from CES, that all companies are becoming technology companies. It also appears, to me, that all companies are becoming media companies. It is a huge transformation that is going on.
Despite all the rhetoric about jobs being lost to China and Mexico [and some are], the biggest danger to jobs everywhere is the rise of Artificial Intelligence. A Japanese insurance company is laying off several dozen people because it has found software they feel will do a better job than the people, an offshoot of IBM’s super brain Watson.
Because of where the cottage is located, I have trouble with my mobile signal. I have a micro-cell. It has been giving me trouble tonight. When I phoned AT&T, I had an entire conversation with a gentleman who was not, in fact, anyone. He was an AI interface.
There is an Echo in my home and so I am experiencing the Alexa technology first hand. Amazing!
Great fun and a little disconcerting. And more and more jobs will be lost to AI in the years to come because we are looking at technology to replace us. There are a lot of Uber drivers out there but what happens to them when self-driving cars become common? What happens to all the long-haul truck drivers when there are self-driving trucks? What happens to all the crews of ships when we have self-piloting ships?
We are on the way to being replaced by technology. And we need to figure this out. Because it is happening.
Donald Trump is going to be sworn in as President of these United States. A lot of folks voted for him, I think, because he was addressing the issue of job degradation which has been going on but, I think, it was a backward-looking view because the real worry right now, globally, is not moving jobs off shore. That is so 2000. It is about the fact we are losing jobs to Artificial Intelligence. That is so 2017. And I don’t hear Trump addressing that.
Since I was a kid, I have loved science fiction and I am living in an age which would have been science fiction when I was a child. Excuse me, I just ask Alexa for a new jazz station and I get it. I ask her for the weather; I get it. It’s amazing and now we must deal with the job realities of what we’re doing because jobs will disappear as we create more and more devices to take care of us.
In airports, we have all seen the iPad devices that let us order what we want which is then delivered by a human. In about two years, there will be robots which will take care of that. What happens to those human servers?
Oh, and does anyone remember Hoot-Smalley? It was a bill passed in Congress to restrict trade after the stock market crashed. It created the Great Depression and I am fearing we will do something like this with the Trump Administration.
Look, I’m lucky. I am in the third act of my life; I have ridden the great American boom of the last half of the Twentieth Century to the max. Not rich, not poor, full of life experiences I never thought I would have. Every day I do my best to remember to be grateful.
And I hope I am not Louis XV, saying “after me, the deluge.”
Tags:After me the deluge, AI, Alexa, Artificial Intelligence, CES, Echo, Google, Great Depression, Home, Hoot Smalley, iPad, Louis XV, Media, Politics, Science Fiction, technology, theaters
Posted in 2016 Election, AT&T, Claverack, Hollywood, Hudson New York, Income Inequality, Life, Mat Tombers, Mathew Tombers, Media, Political Commentary, Politics, Social Commentary, Television, Trump, Uncategorized | 1 Comment »
January 6, 2017
For several nights now, I have attempted to write a letter. A few sentences have dribbled out onto the digital page and then I abandon my effort, feeling unsatisfied, bereft of words. And hit delete.
When I spoke to my brother this morning, as we do most days, he, too, finds it difficult to think about, talk about or read about anything political. He, too, feels bereft of thought and words.
Here I am in my cottage, Christmas bunting still glistening in the lights of my trees, the playlist, “Classical for Deep Thought” playing on my Echo. And I am in deep thought.
A close relative of mine who voted for Trump has been forwarding me vicious articles on Hillary Clinton and the Obamas. Going online, I seek to find out if there is any truth to these awful stories. Most of it is balderdash concocted out of a single thread of reality. “Unproven” is what Snopes says.
There seems no point in letting my relative know that it mostly or all balderdash. They don’t want to know. This is their truth.
So, it is that for the last few nights, I have hidden out in the cottage where all things are good, listening to music, watching Netflix [just finished “Medici”]. I have been working on my consulting assignment for the Miller Center for the Presidency [oh, irony!] at the University of Virginia and diverting myself with helping some friends in California on the bible for a fictional series on which they are working. It allows me to live another life.
Glancing at the evening headlines, I winced. Republicans are working to defund Planned Parenthood. Trump rebuts our spy agencies and doesn’t quite accept that Russia hacked us. Certainly, not to help him.
And, oh my! Putin’s popularity among Republicans is rising! Why am I so not happy about that?
The Chinese are telling Trump to stop tweeting and that will probably only cause him to tweet more.
Trump has said that “torture works.” Now that he is President Elect, human rights groups around the world are fearful that his remarks will embolden leaders who find torture a very reasonable way of getting their way.
It is just a discouraging world.
Republicans have been determined to unravel Obamacare since it was initiated. They now will probably get their way. My concern is that I haven’t seen any credible alternatives from them and, whatever you think of the flawed system that is the Affordable Care Act [aka Obamacare], there are far fewer uninsured than there have been.
Which also doesn’t much change the reality that while we spend more per capita on health care we are in the middle of pack in terms of health care results.
Look, Donald Trump is the President Elect. I wish him well.
I am so concerned. This Presidency feels as if it is going to upend the order we have come to accept for at least the last eighty years. And that makes me concerned.
If it goes really bad, I hope my youthful activism will return and I will do my best to protest. And I didn’t think at my age I would be asked for my youthful activism to return but it just might have to!
We will all have to see. The roller coaster is leaving the station.
At least I have broken out of the paralysis of the last few days and written something.
We all care. God bless America. And God help us all.
Tags:Christmas, Claverack, Claverack Cottage, Claverack Creek, Donald Trump, General, Hillary Clinton, Media, Obamacare, Politics, Presidency, Putin, Repbulcans, Snopes, The Donald, The Obamas, Trump
Posted in 2016 Election, Hillary Clinton, Hollywood, Hudson New York, Mathew Tombers, Media, Political, Political Commentary, Politics, Putin, Social Commentary, Television, Trump, Uncategorized | 2 Comments »
December 20, 2016
A few hours ago, I asked Alexa to play the Holiday Station from Amazon Prime and Christmas carols have been floating through the house since then. The lights are illuminating the creek and I have sat down, at last, to write a letter. The last one was nine days ago, which is unusual for me. Normally, I write every two or three days.
The frenzy of prepping for Christmas has given me ample excuses to not think about the world…
Two Christmas trees grace the cottage; one small real one, bedecked with as many ornaments as it bear and an artificial white tree, which has been my tradition for years now.
The first Christmas after my partner left, I went to the lot where we had purchased our trees and found myself paralyzed, not wanting to get out of the car and so I didn’t. Decorating our trees had always been a big thing and I couldn’t imagine how to get through that Christmas.
So I did the unthinkable; I went to Walmart and bought a pre-lit white Christmas tree which was the silliest thing I could think of doing and it made my Christmas. It was so silly, I laughed, which was what I needed to do that year. And a personal tradition was born…
A white Christmas tree adorned with all the ornaments that matter. There are a few from my mother, one White House ornament given to me by Buddy, who helped decorate the actual White House Christmas tree. He is gone, lost to AIDS before anything could be done and I have the ornament he gave me and it has a place of pride every year.
There are the wonderful crystal ornaments Lionel and Pierre have given me the last few years, two Christopher Radko ornaments from when I was on the Board of Governors for the TV Academy, ornaments I purchased the first year I was working at Discovery – that was an animal themed Christmas.
In the last twenty-four hours, I have made 16 quiches. It has been my tradition for the last some years to bake quiches for my friends and neighbors and there are still a few more to be made but I have made most of them and will spend some of tomorrow delivering them.
My kitchen is not quite a catastrophe…
All of this is part of my life and a welcome distraction.
Today, Donald Trump’s election to the Presidency was ratified by the Electoral College, a fact I am still having a hard time getting my head around, which is why I seem to especially devoted to the Food Section of the New York Times.
At least twelve are dead as a result of lorry crashing into a Christmas market in Berlin.
The Russian Ambassador to Turkey was shot dead today in Ankara.
Aleppo is a catastrophe we grieve but seem to have no way to respond to and I still wonder about the boy in the photograph from months ago. He will haunt me to the day I die. Is he safe?
It seems I may never rest until I know and I may never know but I keep seeing that photo…
And as Christmas approaches, I am so grateful to be here, in the cottage, decorated as best I could for this most wonderful holiday, listening to Christmas music…
The world is always in trouble and it will continue to be that way. And I will work to find ways to feel like I am helping the world not be in as much trouble as it is. Maybe I will succeed, a little bit…
Tags:AIDS, Christmas, Christopher Radko, Discovery, Donald Trump, Mat Tombers, Mathew Tombers, Media, Politics, TV Academy, Walmart
Posted in 2016 Election, Claverack, Columbia County, Elections, Entertainment, Hudson New York, Mat Tombers, Mathew Tombers, Media, Mideast, Political, Political Commentary, Social Commentary, Uncategorized | Leave a Comment »
November 17, 2016
It has been a spring like day today in Claverack; the temperature scraped sixty degrees and it was possible to walk around with only a light jacket. It was delightful and I reveled in the day. Patches of yellow leaves float like Ophelia down the creek.
In this hard time, I have very little to say.
There is a popular blogger I follow named Shelly Palmer. He wrote a blog today that I read and then tweeted but what was most important for me was that we, the Republic which is the United States of America, has been through times like this before and we have survived.
This is what George Washington wrote to a friend about why he did not seek a third term as President.
“The line between Parties,” Washington wrote Trumbull, had become “so clearly drawn” that politicians would “regard neither truth nor decency; attacking every character, without respect to persons – Public or Private, – who happen to differ from themselves in Politics.” Washington wrote that, even if he were willing to run for president again, as a Federalist, “I am thoroughly convinced I should not draw a single vote from the Anti-federal side.” For Washington, the nation’s political parties had soured discourse and created a climate in which, as he predicted in his 1796 farewell address, “unprincipled men will be enabled to subvert the power of the people and to usurp for themselves the reins of government.” Referring to the Democratic-Republicans, Washington wrote, “Let that party set up a broomstick, and call it a true son of Liberty, a Democrat, or give it any other epithet that will suit their purpose, and it will command their votes in toto!”
The times we are living in have been experienced before and we will survive what is coming and will, hopefully, emerge as an even better Republic than we are today.
It is what I pray for at church on Sundays when I light my candles for all the things for which I have said I would light candles: myself, the family of a friend who recently passed after a horrific battle against brain cancer, the daughter of a friend whose daughter has traumatic brain issues, for my family, for peace in this agonized world.
It was a tradition started when I was in high school after a group of us went sailing; a storm came up and we had to swim to shore when the boat capsized. All of us, except one, were Catholic and we walked to our parish that night and lit candles for our survival, which was not assured. People waded out into the water to help us to land, exhausted as we were from the efforts of swimming too far with inadequate lifebelts, through waves that had been unmatched.
So I now will light a candle for the Republic every Sunday I attend church and pray we survive this time that seems so riven.
Let us find hope in the fact our Republic has been through times as troubling as this and has survived.
Tags:George Washington, Mat Tombers, Mathew Tombers, Media, Politics, Shelly Palmer, The American Republic
Posted in 2016 Election, Claverack, Columbia County, Elections, Hillary Clinton, Hollywood, Hudson New York, Literature, Mat Tombers, Mathew Tombers, Media, Political, Political Commentary, Politics, Social Commentary, Television, Trump, Uncategorized | Leave a Comment »
Letter from the Vineyard 
Letter from Claverack June 30th, 2017 Beginning the weekend of the 4th…
July 1, 2017At some point, I decided this was the year I was going to get over my fear of grilling. Last night, I grilled a steak using a Bobby Flay recipe. And asparagus on the grill: c’est magnifique! Put the spears in a plastic bag with olive oil, salt, pepper, a couple other spices and grilled them for three minutes on high. I’m hooked.
So today I went to the market and got boneless pork chops and was going to broil them about half an hour ago but thunder rattled the house and rain fell from the skies. My mouth turned down. However, the sun has returned and I am going to try it, pork chops on the grill.
It is Friday, June 30th, as I write, the beginning of the long 4th of July weekend. As I ran an errand near the train station, I saw visitors piling off the train, bags in hand, being greeted by friends, relatives, lovers and others. Zagat, today, sent an email which had an article about 8 reasons to take the drive to Hudson; all of them being restaurants.
You can read the article here.
As someone who is here most of the time now, I took a bit of umbrage with the list. It included Grazin’, a diner restaurant with local beef and I will need to give it another try because when I was there, it wasn’t good and the wine was south of awful.
It included Fish & Game, which is, I’ve heard, a good restaurant and I haven’t been there because it opened with an attitude. I’ve been around the carousel too many times to need attitude. [Hey, once I had “my table” at Ma Maison in Los Angeles, which was cool while it lasted.]
It included, deservedly, Swoon Kitchen Bar. I don’t go there often; my ex left me for one of the waiters there; that has weighed on me ever since but it is great.
It did not include, and I think it should have, my beloved Red Dot, which is one of the hubs of Hudson nor did it include Ca’Mea, which I think should have gotten a mention nor Vico, which has upped its game lately.
We are a food town.
And now, in a break in the rain, I did grill but not the pork chops I bought as most of the recipes for grilling told me I should brine the chops and that takes some time so I grilled some sausage and finished my asparagus. Oh, so good.
Beyond my little world, it has been a bit mad.
Our President has created a twitter storm over his tweets about Mika Brzezinski’s “bleeding face lift.”
Even Paul Ryan found it too much.
Several news sources, including conservative ones, thought maybe he should have been in a meeting rather than tweeting. But no, President Trump was tweeting and creating a painful moment for his party.
And, today, NASA had to issue a statement it was not operating a slave state on Mars; it was NOT sending children there to be body parts for future colonists, a claim made by a guest on “The Alex Jones Show,” which airs on 118 radio stations. Alex Jones is most famous for claiming that the Sandy Hook massacre was staged and was interviewed by Megyn Kelly on her new NBC show, which isn’t doing so well.
As I sit here in my very hygge cottage, I am astounded by what is going on out there. We have a President who seems devoted to Twitter attacks more than he is about governing and who, according to a variety of reports, starts his day at 6:30 AM speaking to lawyers about that pesky Russian matter.
And he is going to meet with Putin at the G 20 Conference and has been asking his advisors what he can offer Vladimir Putin. What?
There are times I feel I am living in an alternative universe. And I know I am not the only one.
So, doesn’t it make sense I want to conquer my fear of grilling? That’s concrete in a world that seems spinning out of control.
Tags:Alex Jones, Bleeding Face Lift, Bobby Flay, Ca'Mea, Donald Trump, Fish & Game, G 20, Grazin, Grilling, Hudson NY, Mars, Media, Megyn Kelly, Mike Brzezinki, NASA, Paul Ryan, Politics, Putin, Red Dot, Swood Kitchen Bar, technology, Twitter, Vico, Zagat
Posted in 2016 Election, Claverack, Columbia County, Elections, Entertainment, Greene County New York, Hudson New York, Hygge, Life, Literature, Mat Tombers, Mathew Tombers, Matthew Tombers, Media, Political, Political Commentary, Politics, Putin, Social Commentary, Television, Trump, Uncategorized | Leave a Comment »