Cars & Drones & Destruction

How is your day going? It’s a beautiful spring day here with warm temps and singing birds and tulip flowers on the ground. The sun is shining and people are smiling.

Cars

 

Have you noticed how many ‘white’ cars there are now?

I don’t know if people are buying new cars to beat the tariffs or just spending their tax returns, but there are a lot of new white cars driving around my neighborhood. I can tell they are new and sparkling by the reflective coating they cover cars now. If I shaved, I could use a side panel as a mirror. I won’t get into the weird configurations of lights making these motor (or battery) vehicles look like something from sci-fi.

White is characterized by the equal reflection or emission of all wavelengths of the visible spectrum of light, lacking any distinctive hue. Don’t know why this has become so popular for brands like VW or Benz or that L brand or the one with the four rings or the one wearing a T? Don’t know if they are all EVs, but there are some new posts next to the street with extension cords.

Drones

Seems wars are going into mechanical robot fighting now. When these ‘drones’ started out they were toys. My brother had a remote flying toy plane that we would take down to the schoolyard and fly it around with the space needed until it got tangled up in trees or wires or crashed and broke. There was early flying software that was fun to practice being a pilot without going into the rain. I could take off and fly around but I couldn’t land. I’d just crash. Another reason not to be a pilot.

My experience with flying was walking out on the tarmac and walking up the stairs carrying suitcases before passengers walked through a tube into the plane without weather. My cousin got a pilot’s license and flew me down to Wilmington in his father’s piper cub so I sat in the co-pilot’s seat. I’ve ridden in a helicopter and was shoved out of an airplane to parachute, but I don’t like heights. Bridges and hi-rise buildings make me weak. Even my second floor can wobble my knees.

There are real estate drones in the neighborhood doing fly overs of people’s lawns to sell their $0,000,000.00 houses. I don’t intend to shoot them down but I do worry they will get tangled in my tall trees. Now and then I used to hear a plane fly overhead at night with a spotlight shining down into yards and streets. They were circling around a crime scene, so I stayed inside and locked the doors.

If drones are the new sign of warfare, maybe tanks and boats and airplanes can shoot and bomb using AI while humans shelter in place to become targets?  

Destruction

 

Along with all the political silliness raising people’s blood pressure, there are daily reports of disasters. Wild fires, bombings, earthquakes, floods are just a few of the destruction going on around the world (and luckily not in my neighborhood, so far). You can choose your speculation on causes as live TV shows the results of other’s misery. There have been pictures of destruction from previous wars, but these current pictures give pause in its scale.

How long did it take to rebuild Dresden or Berlin? How much money did it take to pay for the rebuild of Richmond after it burnt down in the civil war?

What inspires people to pick up the rubble and haul it to another place to dump, then go back and start over again? There was a reason that place was constructed in the first place. A railroad, a river, a highway was a good cause to form a gathering of buildings that become offices, homes, schools, churches, medical centers, libraries, banks, municipal airports, ballparks, taverns and dining establishments, etc.

Then a disaster hits and everything is wiped out. Where do the people (survivors) go? How do they shelter from the elements? What do they eat? Where do they poop? Where do they get medical care? Where are they educated? If the disaster is too devastating, do you struggle to rebuild a former life, or move onto another place leaving memories and rubble behind? Without the reminders of disasters we’d have not antiquities in the museums.

These are the recent thoughts as the season changes. I won’t buy or drive a white car the cost of my house. I don’t want to fly a drone but will fear the sound of them as an invasion to privacy. I will continue to watch the news from various sources but the pictures of man’s inhumanity to man is unavoidable. Why we continue to inflect harm on others for frivolous reasons as a way another speaks or believes or dresses or has sexual preferences? Does this follow the ’10 Commandments’ taught in school now?

If you do not assimilate with your neighbors by purchasing a white car, you will no longer fit into the grand scheme? If a drone appears in your window, are you losing more of your identity than what is being downloaded from your telephone?  If someone comes by and knocks on your door and ask if they can live on your expansive space for theirs has been destroyed by unimaginable violence and they are just seeking a place of peace, would you let them in?

Just the thoughts for a day. Hope you enjoyed the awaking of spring and have a nice evening.

Tomorrow is another day.

Rogue

 

Recently, I’ve heard the word ‘rogue’ applied to our current political situation. I remember hearing about a ‘rogue elephant’ that had left the herd and was stomping through villages, but not associated to people… or a culture.

I’ve known or associated with some ‘bad’ people. I don’t know all the backstory history of how they made their decisions or who they fell in with or mental deficiencies that took them down that path to become an outlaw or just a rule bender. Some have been an offender to pay a fine for speeding and some have been fatal. Some are incarcerated, some have vanished and many are dead. Yet, I never thought of any of them as ‘rogue’.

Rogue is a noun. Rogue is described as a dishonest, untrustworthy person; scoundrel: We were traveling in secret to avoid running into rogues and thieves. Synonyms: swindler, quack, mountebank, cheat, trickster, villain.

When a person "goes rogue," they are acting independently and unpredictably, often disregarding rules or expectations, sometimes to the point of behaving erratically or dangerously. 

My father was a bootlegger. He worked for private clubs during prohibition and probably knew some shady characters. He may have been a scoundrel, but I don’t think he ever went rogue.

Rogues often get a bad rap, their name evoking images of rule-breakers and troublemakers. Yet, throughout history, rogues have played a crucial role in driving progress. They are the innovators, the disruptors, the ones unafraid to challenge norms and question authority.

With that said, is today’s political situation progressing into a new world order we don’t understand yet or tearing down the house to be a ‘better’ one? Our elected and confirmed governmental officals are shaking the tree from the usual boring bureaucratically decision making we’ve all be accustomed to a seemingly shock and awe approach to finding and eliminating waste to establish a leaner, cleaner more efficient system to take our money and spend it on what a government is suppose to provide for the citizens of the land.

Governments, at all levels (local, state, and federal), provide a wide array of services and programs, including essential infrastructure, public safety, education, healthcare, social welfare, and economic stability, all funded through taxation.

Jigaboos

The other day I came across a word I hadn’t heard in some time.

A contemptuous term used to refer to a Black person. This word, along with other words that were used as a deployable yet acceptable reference to a different race were not part of my vocabulary when I was growing up, but I did hear them.

 Words like Pickaninny, Jezebel, Stepin Fetchit, Buckwheat, Sambo, Stymie, coon, n-word, negra, Negro, Black, Colored, African American, Aunt Jemima, Uncle Remos, Black Buck are still used today in some areas as a demeaning form of an insult to a different race.

  There are plenty of others.

Chink, Speck, Cracker, Fritz, Gook, Gringo, Hike, Honky, Hun, Hymie, Injun, Jungle Bunny, Kraut, Limey, Nip, Polack, Redneck, Hillbilly, Spade, Uncle Tom, Wetback, White Trash, Wop…

There are other words to describe people who you approve of like cutie pie, sweetie, hunk, burning love, hubba hubba…

These could also be taken as offensive or appreciated.

Every year there are new words to describe discuss with another race or gender or character. Boomer, woke, influencer or labeled by a political party. The worst consistent connotations of disrupted and demeaning words relate to religious beliefs.

As our culture continues to grow and shift our bias and beliefs will continue to come up with new words to express our lack of understanding. We react to words by our interpretations.

So, I present the word ‘jigaboo’. This is not to be offensive or upsetting but as a word that rolls off the tongue. I have no idea who came up with the word. I never added it to my vocabulary because I had no idea what it meant, yet I’m sure I heard it.

With all the medical terms that sound like they come from some alien planet or just a bunch of vowels and consonants thrown together, the word ‘jigaboo’ could be used in a new context.

The doctor says that bump on your back is a ‘jigaboo’. In the military you can say, “I served on the ‘jigaboo’”. Step up to the bar and order a ‘jigaboo’. 

 Make that a double...

Push Back

 

When young and a rule is handed down from the parents, you may not agree but there is nothing you can do. They feed you and shelter you and cloth you and teach you and they rule the roost. You can have a tizzy fit or kick your feet in the air or scream, but you will not win. You do not have a say in the matter. To top it off, you may lose privileges like movie time or dessert or may be sent to solitary confinement in your bedroom incarceration. As long as you live under the roof with your parents, they are the law. You can lose you allowance, be grounded or lost access to the car keys.

Moving out and living on your own might seem a rewarding and freeing action, but there is always someone else making the rules and laying down the law. The boss tells you when you have to be at work and what you are paid. The church tells you right from wrong. The police tell you when you are driving too fast. All have consequences.

Even romantic relationships have their squabbles over who left the lid off the peanut butter jar or their underwear on the bathroom floor. The defiant ones may yell and scream and have a tizzy fit until they kiss and makeup.

Pushing back from feeling wronged takes many turns. You can write your congress representative to change a law. You can paint a poster, staple it to a stick and walk around the streets yelling. You can sit in on meetings, like the city council or the PTA, to make your opinion heard. You can debate your case only if the other side is listening. Fisticuffs doesn’t solve the issue and road rage, while perhaps releasing the anger, only increases the potential for (perhaps deadly) confrontation.

In these trying times, the popular push back is to post an offensive meme on social media. It may give a chuckle or gather more likes and responsive comments, but it doesn’t solve the problem.

Being at an age where keeping my blood pressure under control reduces my expression of anger or frustration to those things out of my control. If physically threatened, I’ll push back as a last resort. Otherwise, I can’t tell the difference between the Nightly News and skits on SNL.

 

*No one noticed the ‘pull’ handle on the ‘push’ door

Contempt of Court

 

We have elected representatives who are good looking and have a nice family and speak well enough to gather together and make laws for our entire society to obey. As we know anytime you get a group of people together, like a family dinner or a cocktail party, cannot decide on any subject. Check out the school board. Check out the city council. Check out the PTA. Check out the board room.

Still, the law is declared and written down and distributed to all like the 10 commandments.

Obey the law

As wonderful lemmings, we follow the rules until they become obsolete or boring. The elected leaders then listen to the complaints of the public at town hall meetings and write amendments or a brand-new law.

If you decide to disobey a law, from jaywalking to shooting up a school, there are organizations to protect the rest of the public from your bad behavior and will detain you and question you and fine you with a ticket or incarcerate you and possibly kill you.

If you admit to the guilt of breaking the law, you get a mark on the record and move on. If you disagree with the charge, you can come before a judge to plea your case. After hearing your testimony, the judge (and/or jury of your peers) will decide whether the charge will be dismissed or find you guilty to pay the punishment.

What if you don’t show up?

The court can order that you be sequestered or additional fines or order authorities to arrest and place in incarceration.

Contempt of court is an act of disrespect or disobedience towards a court or interference with its orderly process, which can be classified as criminal or civil, and direct or indirect. 

If you have enough funds, you can appeal the court’s decision. Another attempt to plea your case, perhaps to another judge who may have a different interpretation of the law, with new evidence or more charts and figures in the presentation to get you off the hook.

Weeks or months or years of battling the judicial system you case may go up to the Supreme Court of the land. These nine judges must agree on a verdict that will be the final decision. They may be unanimous or have a split decision or send it back to the lower courts to futz around with some more.

While not perfect, this is the system we have chosen to resolve conflicts with our social interaction to maintain order. It is our selection of good vs evil.

Investment

 

What do you invest in? Stocks? Bonds? Real Estate? Cyber? Family?

Of course, you invest in family. That is the responsibility associated with procreation.

What about yourself?

Do you invest in the time and effort to stay healthy? Do you invest in all the bling and toys you want but don’t need? How is your circadian rhythm?

What is your Return on Investment?

How long are your relationships? Do you invest the time and effort and possibly money to keep a relationship going before losing interest?

If you have disposable income to invest outside the necessities of life, are you making a profit? It is all a gamble. You can buy a house and do all the tinkering with it only to have it burn down. You can invest in an expensive driving machine only to have it depreciate after leaving the lot. You can invest in a fine fashionable coat only to find out it was constructed in a foreign land with little quality control standards and the pockets fall out. You can invest in a distant vacation only to find you are staying in a room full of bed bugs and eating some kind of foreign food that does not agree with your normal digestion functionality. You can invest in your children only to find they have desires of their own and may follow the temptations of pleasure. You may invest in a fine dining experience only to find it was nothing more than a heat up meal from Casco. You may invest in fine works of art only to find it was an AI duplication with not value.

Do you invest in dreams? Do you tithe to the denomination of your choice? Do you adopt orphans? Do you send donations to scientific research hoping to find the answers of the unknown or cure to death? Do you invest in someone’s else’s faithful disasters or woes hoping to aid without expectations of repayment?

The return of investment is the dopamine rush of being a good person. It won’t make you wealthy or the envy of your neighbors, but it is worth it.

The Gift

 

A gift is usually given from one to another to show a sign of affection. It may be a small trinket or a holiday surprise. It may be valuable or just in a memory.

Look around your house. All those items sitting on tables, stuffed away in closets or cubits are gifts. They may be gifts from someone else or a gift to yourself.

At a certain age, as the end of time approaches, one may divide these gifts to another in a will or last testimony. Others may wind up in an estate or yard sale. Most gifts are not returned to the sender as it shows a lack of appreciation for the effort.

The most cherished and emotionally invaluable gift will become ‘stuff’ that must be hidden, passed on, sold or disposed of. The original intent to be given are long lost history.

When the giver, rewarded in smiles and appreciation to be enjoyed for years, sees someone else pick it up and use it causes pause. When this ‘gift’ was created, it did not know who would purchase it or who it was intended for.

Now it would become someone else’s treasure.