i'm sure my neighbors love this

because it is camp season, i do some bugling.

it's nice to have some snazzy bugle calls to help people know it's time to move. mostly i just play assembly when it's time for everyone to meet and Go To A Thing and i play taps for close of camp, which is at variance to military usage, but it's how girl scouts ceremonially close a day.

yeah, i CAN play retreat, but it's kind of arcane for the purpose.

anyway, if you're going to bugle, you have to PRACTICE bugling.  i try to keep the exercises to a minimum and in the mid-morning, but in the evenings at home i blow tattoo and then an hour later i blow taps.

funny, but any loud parties going on in the neighborhood become mellow gatherings after tattoo and i don't care if they stay up after taps.

in a couple months i have gotten pretty decent at it, and i think it sounds pretty.

too stupid to live

today i saw a young man about whom, i am sure, people will say "such a tragedy" and "couldn't have been prevented"-

he was riding a skateboard downhill on the main road from jericho into richmond, which is a road on which a person on a bicycle can easily coast up to 45 MPH, and he was going fast. taking up a whole lane (as he should, moving at the speed of traffic), and not wearing a helmet.

WHILE LOOKING AT HIS PHONE.

rotifers

rotifers are an ancient species. they have their own phylum. in some of their species whether or not they reproduce sexually is a heritable trait. one species has not been known to have any males in it for millions of years.

and here is a little video i made of some i found in my backyard.

because these days you can do this on your phone.

excuse me, young people, while i get all amazed at the speed of technological advances in my lifetime.

uh, anyway:

nationalism is bad

i'm from vermont.

i love my town and my mountains, because i am of this place.

your town is probably pretty cool too.

also your mountains. or your lake. or your seashore.

go, local sports team.

people by and large are awesome.

but look around. fascism is on the rise. nationalism is on the rise. wherever there is an in-group trying to keep everyone else out, somebody is making money off of that. somebody is consolidating their own power by making others fear outsiders. somebody is exploiting you.


if somebody is selling you an agenda that doesn't include dignity for all, don't buy it. if your country doesn't define itself by its care for the least among you, your country is shitty. you have a duty to act.