Reading

I like to go to Battery Park

Friday I left Massachusetts for the first time since last November. I took the train to NYC for a couple of days of bellringing + tourism. The last time I'm sure I was there (for the same reasons) was one very long day in December 2017. Things have changed, some things seem the same. I had a bunch of parents and a marriage then. The Bronx is still up (I guess, I didn't go there). The Battery is still down. Well designed bike lanes are there now. When I got out of the train station at lunchtime on Friday I walked over to Koreatown (sic), something that wouldn't have crossed my mind back then, as the Korean fascination started in 2020. Went into a bookstore, window-shopped a lot of restaurants and finally decided to take my chances eating indoors (!) in a place that let me sit next to the open door (maybe two feet away). I had doenjang soup (coincidence of the few days - it was a featured dish in the Netflix historical drama "Bon Appetit your majesty" but mine was vegan) plus five little banchan dishes. After that I walked to the Javits Center, which was hosting an art mall of sorts (lots of artists in individual cubicles). Since I had to be in a bell tower a couple of hours later, I decided it wasn't worth the $40 it would have cost, so I strolled 3 miles along the Hudson River park to reach my destination. Nice.
General ringing session was good. I stayed in a hotel that was not cheap but was really loud (inside and out), so I didn't get much sleep. Oh well. I picked it online because it's a 3 minute walk from the tower. I got what I asked for in that regard. I left the room before 8 to walk around some more, then went to ring a bit, then back out into the neighborhood. I think the last (and first?) time I rode the Staten Island ferry was 2006, when I was there for the tap festival. Did it again. Took looks of photos of the Statue of Liberty, let the wind blow in my hair, got off and watched some talented acrobat street performers, rode the Seaglass carousel (the fish are plastic or maybe fiberglass, not actual glass, but quite wonderful).
https://www.seaglasscarousel.nyc/
Rang some more, hung around with ringers listening to other people ring, all good. Train back, home by midnight, slept in my own bed.

Have a Judy Garland version of Cole Porter's "I happen to like New York" that is very much of its time (1960). It's not my favorite version of the song - I like a simpler solo version - but I was startled to be reminded what music could sound like then

Watch on YouTube

relevant to the day

I was searching through old posts to find a specific quote about a faraway earthquake*
I don't know what keyword I used at first but came up with this post from 2019 of Richard Stallman defending Epstein. Still yikes, after 6 years.
https://lauradi7dw.dreamwidth.org/569943.html
At the time of the supposed release of more JE info this morning, I will be with the knitting group but might follow along online.

* https://lauradi7dw.dreamwidth.org/17757.html
In the case of the recent earthquake in Afghanistan I already donate monthly to several of the usual suspects, like Unicef, but I will try to track down a specific fund.

Loaves and fishes

When I was a kid, there seemed to be an effort in Sunday school to make us believe in miracles by explaining that they might have been metaphors. Or something. The story about Jesus managing to feed the thousands of listeners was taken to be evidence that everyone had brought a little food along with them and then Jesus inspired them to share instead of hoard, IIRC.
I read this article about knitters worrying that tariffs will keep yarn from coming in.
https://archive.is/lxp1v
Everybody I know who knits or even used to knit has a stash of some variety. What if we all figure out a way to share? I don't want any yarn stores to go out of business, but if short-term unavailability happens, can't we help out?

RIP Graham Greene

Too young.

spoilers?

There is a movie on Netflix called the "Thursday Murder Club." Helen Mirren is in it. When asked what she did before retirement, she said "international affairs." She showed up in one scene looking exactly like Helen Mirren playing Queen Elizabeth in "The Queen." I said out loud "she looks like the queen." The character's husband said "you look like the queen." I watched a few more minutes and decided it was too meta for me. Either she actually *is* the queen, incognito, and her death was faked, or was her body double before the actual queen died?
I am idly curious about whether the police constable and the son of one of the retirement home residents become a happy couple, but not necessarily enough to continue.

Labor Day

Heather Cox Richardson's history letter (I keep wishing she'd move away from substack)
https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/august-31-2025?
One of the things I took from that article was the need for music when marching.

These have singing, not a band, but maybe just as good?
"Bread and Roses," as sung in the movie "Pride" (not that I think there should still be coal mining).
A few of the words are captioned incorrectly. Tears are streaming down my face, as sometimes happen when I watch this video.
https://youtu.be/D6hIMsd6BlQ?feature=shared

I must have had the auto-play on. The next song that popped up, unbidden, was Dolly Parton singing "9 to 5."

Instead, have the ILGWU TV commercial song (the ad changed a little from year to year). Start at about 20 seconds in
https://youtu.be/7Lg4gGk53iY?feature=shared

Possibly not a union shop, although as they say still family owned, I was glad to learn that there is one (1) of the original Massachusetts shoe factories still in business.
https://www.aldenshoe.com/
There used to be so many, even during the time I've lived here, not just in the 19th century.
The shoes in the icon are Saucony, which at one time had a MA factory as well. One pair of Saucony sneakers that I own used to look just like those, now more holey, but I think it is time to take them out of circulation. The treads have worn smooth. When Flo was a toddler, the little Converse high-tops she wore were locally made too, I think. The corporate headquarters is in Boston, but I don't think shoes are made here any more. New Balance, also.

They are not producers, but my local supermarket has a poster near the door reminding us that they are a union shop. I'm glad.

marketing

See the icon - the text says "Stray Kids Karma New Album out now." I saw it yesterday spray painted on a sidewalk near Park Street station. Who is the intended audience for this form of advertising? Probably me (I look down when I walk, and I am a fan of the group). But I already knew that they had a new album, and I don't expect to buy it. Is there a job description that involves surreptitiously spray painting ads on sidewalks?

There is an ongoing series called "Killing Voice" that has Kpop groups come in and sing snippets of a bunch of their songs. I always listen to them, even if it's not a group I usually follow, but I am a fan of Stray Kids and really enjoyed the KV video. There is no choreography per se but they are kinds of bopping along, and weirdly enough there is some wandering around in the room.

Watch on YouTube

the past week or so

The day after I got back from the Cape, I went to visit Flo and family for a couple of days, in the opposite direction. On Thursday Flo & I ate on the covered porch of a restaurant (the children slept beside us in their car seats for most of the lunch). Friday we and the babes went to walk over the Bridge of Flowers in Shelburne Falls
https://www.bridgeofflowersmass.org/
(the children did not walk. They were strolled across) and again ate commercially prepared food outdoors, this time felafel wraps at a picnic table.
The outings were very pleasant but helping load them in and out of the car set off back annoyance. I have had careful training in healthy body mechanics, but leaning into a car holding a heavy weight (11 pound child plus the seat) is hard to do safely. It was interesting to me that I could (and still can) do most of my usual activities without pain (tai chi, rowing machine, ringing, walking, planks, washing dishes) but getting in and out of the bed still hurts (ok once I'm lying down). Looking down at certain angles still hurts.

After all that driving over a few days plus the joy of having the new bus schedule led me to abstain from car use. The car has been in the garage unused for a week now, and I hope that will be true until next Thursday.
Mixed results - some of the buses were exactly on time but I had a ridiculous experience yesterday - I met a friend in Bedford to walk. We had arranged the meeting time based on the schedule, so that was OK. I didn't pay much attention to the reverse schedule, so we finished our five miles not long after a return bus had passed. I resigned myself to sitting in the convenient bus shelter for 38 minutes, according to the schedule. Rain had started before we finished our walk so I was really glad of the shelter. I noticed an interesting thing - the shelter is all metal and it seemed to be amplifying the traffic noise somehow. I did Duolingo (1) for a long time, then noticed that the arrival time kept getting later. As it happened, the bus was 15 minutes late. After I got on it was pretty speedy, and by the time I got off at the Stop & Shop stop the rain had stopped, so I could walk home with my few purchases home neatly.
Today on the way home from ringing lunch I went to the ART to buy a ticket for a performance in mid-September. I was about to step onto the Red line train when I thought "Where's my sword?" (2) I went back to the theater lobby, where they had it in the lost and found nestled in with the umbrellas people had left behind. So I missed the intended bus from Alewife and had to wait for the next one. Aside from the rain incident the weather this week has been amazing. These kinds of mess-ups will be a lot harder to be cheerful about in the winter.

(1) I keep meaning to quit Duolingo because I don't like using AI, but it does help pass the time in some bus circumstances. Also I was amused to hear that the company had to issue an apology because the German course had the sentence to translate "We like Harry Potter but don't like the author." They should have stuck to their guns, but I'd guess that a living person created that sentence.

(2) I have mentioned several times over the years that I carry my sword (in a scabbard but not in a carrying case) all day on Saturdays, on public transportation and walking and into public places, including the entryway at Old North. If you want to have total strangers come up to you with questions, carry around a sword. I average three people a Saturday. Some of the questions are more informed than others. A couple of weeks ago a woman in the Davis Square PO asked if it were a ceremonial sword. I am not sure I even know what that means. At Alewife today someone asked if it was related to a local college. I have a little routine in which I show them how non-sharp the blade is, for example.
I was pleased to find this picture, from an article about old people in Mainland China exercising. It's the kind of move I might do, although they are dressed more formally than I would be (often in my Davis Square Martial Arts t-shirt). I can't tell whether they have the bottom-of-the-line sword that I do or not.

https://news.cgtn.com/news/2023-05-26/China-moves-to-improve-basic-elderly-care-as-population-ages-1k7K7tKyfEA/index.html

are we about to invade Venzuela?

https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/us-venezuela-tensions-rise-us-warships-arrive-southern-caribbean-2025-08-28/

For crying out loud

Acting CDC Director Jim O’Neill was one of the seasteading guys?

Sort of good news

From disability activist Matthew Cortland, part of a longer post on Patreon:

>>Moderna's COVID vaccine has been approved for those who are 6 months of age and older;

• Pfizer's COVID vaccine has been approved for those who are 5 years of age and older (this is a change, Pfizer's vaccine used to be for anyone 6 months of age and older);

• Novavax's COVID vaccine has been approved for those 12 years of age and older.

The text of FDA's orders approve the vaccine for (1) everyone who is 65 years of age and older; and (2) for anyone younger than 65 who have at least one underlying condition that puts them at high risk for severe COVID-19 outcomes (CDC list of conditions).

RFK Jr's post on Elon Musk's X.com says the vaccines will be available "for all patients who choose them after consulting with their doctors."

Pfizer has announced they have begun immediately shipping vaccine.<<

So one way or another almost anybody can get one form of the vaccine with a doctor's prescription?

EDIT - but how many people can afford a doctor's visit to get the prescription?
Also probably related - 5 higher-ups from the CDC have resigned in the past day or two. Not happy about something, I guess...

another edit: what they're unhappy about is probably the firing of the director.

Don't get excited about the bruise on his hand

Donald Trump has a purple spot on his hand that is sometimes covered up with bad makeup (I don't have any matching or blending skills either, but doesn't he have a regular makeup person?).
Many online are hopeful that it predicts his imminent demise. Nah. A number of people have replied to these posts that it's obvious the posters don't know any old people with circulatory issues. People on certain kinds of blood thinners can look like this for years. NBD.
I mentioned that when QEII died
https://lauradi7dw.dreamwidth.org/710292.html

Entry tags:

cats: objectively the best cat picture ever taken (& a couple of runnersup)

[The bottom half of the photo is blurry, mottled grey and black; the top is mostly white, except for a small curled bit sticking up from the center of the bottom half. It’s an extreme closeup of the top of Major Tom’s head, with about the last five inches of his tail showing behind it.]

It’s so bad it went all the way around the circular scale & registered as ‘great’.

So’s this one:

[An extreme closeup of the bottom half of Tom’s face, blurry and elongated, above his chest and front legs. He’s standing on my lap, and I’m sitting in the drivers seat of the van. There’s a lot of whiskers going on.]

& the classic ‘alien’ shot

[Tom’s moved his head down enough to block most of his front, except for his toes. Most of his face is in the shot now; it’s elongated from being too close, again, and also his eyes are very wide, and he looks like the classic grey alien, just with tabby stripes and a pink nose. Also he’s staring directly into your soul.]

The rest are just your run-of-the-mill cute cat pictures, but they’re run-of-the-mill cute cat pictures of my tomcat, & that makes them better than anyone else’s.

[Tom’s sitting fairly comfortably on my lap, looking up at a sliver of something held over his head. I think it was some kind of lunchmeat.]

We were TRYING to get him to do something for the hypothetical hilarious pictures we would hypothetically get, but that didn’t happen, because he’s a cat. But these are pretty cute.

[Tom’s stretching his head up to reach the food item between my fingers, with the result that you can see the entire neck and chin. It’s a little stretched out, not as much as the alien face pic, but okay, it does still look kinda funny.]

Finally, the epitome of dignity.

[Tom’s curled up on top of my purse, between the van’s front seats. His purple bow tie has migrated to the back of his neck, as it often does.]

… that’s my tomcat.

originally posted on Patreon; support me over there to see posts a week early!

Someone was wrong on the internet and I did not tell him so

Kim Taehyung of BTS (stage name V) threw the first pitch at the Dodger's game this evening. Whatever the usual numbers of tickets sold on a Monday night, it was sold out tonight due to BTS fans, some of whom had not been to a baseball game before. I didn't subscribe to the MLB service to watch the pitch, but did go to YouTube to see all the news stories about it. Some of those were from Japan, the Philippines, and other places around the world. Somebody who provides live commentary on Dodgers games from his home (watching it online) claimed that BTS makes dance music for teenaged girls who wish they were Asian. I had a moment of fury, but wasn't about to log in and subscribe so that I could send him an angry correction.
I should have just stuck to my problematic pal twitter, which immediately had video of the pitch the second he threw it.

>>Youtube has admitted that they are altering people's videos without permission, or a way to opt out.
This quote is from the MSN article about it
“No GenAI, no upscaling. We're running an experiment on select YouTube Shorts that uses traditional machine learning technology to unblur, denoise, and improve clarity in videos during processing (similar to what a modern smartphone does when you record a video),” Rene Ritchie, YouTube Creator Liason.<<