In Summary: * This has been a quietly successful Monday. Two main chores: my weekly laundry, all done early; and a grocery shopping trip to Walmart, got what I intended and stayed within my budget.

The Rangers are scheduled to play the A's tonight with a start time of 7:05 PM CDT, I may try to catch at least the first few innings before heading to bed. We'll see how that goes.

Prayers, etc.: * I have a daily prayer regimen I try to follow throughout the day from early morning, as soon as I roll out of bed, until head hits pillow at night.

Health Metrics: * bw= 226.97 lbs. * bp= 152/87 (66)

Exercise: * morning stretches, balance exercises, kegel pelvic floor exercises, half squats, calf raises, wall push-ups, BP breathing exercises, pilates

Diet: * 05:30 – 1 banana * 06:20 – 1 slice of lemon meringue pie * 08:10 – cottage cheese * 09:30 – 1 hot dog & bun * 13:20 – sausage, scrambled eggs, biscuits and jam, pancakes * 16:15 – 1 fresh apple * 17:10 – 1 slice of lemon meringue pie

Activities, Chores, etc.: * 04:15 – listen to local news talk radio * 05:00 – bank accounts activity monitored . * 05:26 – read, write, pray, follow news reports from various sources, surf the socials, listen to music, nap * 06:55 – start my weekly laundry * 12:10 to 13:10 – grocery shopping * 13:20 – lunch * 14:30 – an afternoon spent mostly listening to relaxing music and working on my chess

Chess: * 16:00 – moved in all pending CC games, winning one, losing another, and started one new one

In Summary: * This has been a quietly successful Monday. Two main chores: my weekly laundry, all done early; and a grocery shopping trip to Walmart, got what I intended and stayed within my budget.

The Rangers are scheduled to play the A's tonight with a start time of 7:05 PM CDT, I may try to catch at least the first few innings before heading to bed. We'll see how that goes.

Prayers, etc.: * I have a daily prayer regimen I try to follow throughout the day from early morning, as soon as I roll out of bed, until head hits pillow at night.

Health Metrics: * bw= 226.97 lbs. * bp= 152/87 (66)

Exercise: * morning stretches, balance exercises, kegel pelvic floor exercises, half squats, calf raises, wall push-ups, BP breathing exercises, pilates

Diet: * 05:30 – 1 banana * 06:20 – 1 slice of lemon meringue pie * 08:10 – cottage cheese * 09:30 – 1 hot dog & bun * 13:20 – sausage, scrambled eggs, biscuits and jam, pancakes * 16:15 – 1 fresh apple * 17:10 – 1 slice of lemon meringue pie

Activities, Chores, etc.: * 04:15 – listen to local news talk radio * 05:00 – bank accounts activity monitored . * 05:26 – read, write, pray, follow news reports from various sources, surf the socials, listen to music, nap * 06:55 – start my weekly laundry * 12:10 to 13:10 – grocery shopping * 13:20 – lunch * 14:30 – an afternoon spent mostly listening to relaxing music and working on my chess

Chess: * 16:00 – moved in all pending CC games, winning one, losing another, and started one new one

To end the month of August with Blaugust, I wanted to write about some lessons learned.

I will reach my 15 blog posts goal as I publish this one, which is great! I did it! 🙌

One thing Blaugust helped me with was to lower my expectations, meaning, less perfectionism. I usually have an idea to write a blog post, and then I want to write a structured post, with intro, development and conclusion. And get all the references right, and edit it perfectly, and add the right images, and so on. Doing all of that takes time, and I realized I don’t have that much time anymore. Blaugust helped me see that I can break a few self-imposed rules about what a “proper” blog post needs to be.

And that means that I can share my thoughts while they are still fresh, without being over-polished. Not all posts need to have a conclusion, I can just throw away some thoughts and hit publish and that’s okay.

The post No big deal was from a draft I started two years ago and had never published because I thought it wasn’t good enough.

The post The only woman in the room was written during a lunch break, and I didn’t worry too much about structure.

The post Iron Maiden: Run for your Lives 2026 was written in a hotel lobby on some downtime before I left to catch a train. And I hit publish in the train station lobby minutes before entering said train. And that meant there were some typos in that post, which were corrected when I saw them.

All these really pushed me out of my comfort zone, and I’m glad they did!

But also, I don’t have that much energy anymore. Aging is real, and with it comes a shift in priorities where protecting my time and energy matters far more than obsessing over an ideal draft. Between work, personal life, house chores, reading, blogging, my well-being routines and whatever else, I have to be intentional about where my energy goes.

I planned on reading more of the other blogs participating, and I did read a few, here are some blog posts I enjoyed from which I discovered new bloggers for my RSS feed:

• Kobo vs Kindle – Divergent Rays
• Blaugust 2026 Group Project: Tell Us About Your Very First Blog – GamerLady P Blog
• The Internet Doesn't Exist – Matt's Blog
• I Don’t Want to Be the Product: Returning to the Tiny Internet – Pour The Coffee
• My Writing Workflow – Heart Soul Machine

Looking back on this month, I am so happy I decided to participate in Blaugust. It was exactly the push I needed to re-evaluate my relationship with writing and get back into a healthy rhythm. Writing 15 posts per month might be my upper monthly limit as of right now, and that’s okay!

Congrats to everyone else who took part this year! It doesn’t matter if you hit your goal, posted once or just spent the month reading along. I believe we’ve all learned something! It’s great to see that there are people interested in keeping the personal web alive and delightfully imperfect!

Post 15 of #Blaugust #NoisyMusings #blogging

Another Q-R Checkmate. Again playing White, but this time coming at the Black King from the right side of the board. This CC tournament game began on 03 August and ended a few minutes ago when my 25. Qxh7# delivered the mating move, my Queen being covered by my h4 Rook. The games in this tournament are being played with a comfortable 2 days allowed per move time control. Position of pieces at game's end is shown above, and our full move record below:

1. d4 d5 2. h3 Nc6 3. Nf3 Nf6 4. Nc3 e6 5. a3 Bd6 6. e3 O-O 7. Bb5 Qd7 8. O-O a6 9. Bxc6 Qxc6 10. Ne5 Qe8 11. Re1 Be7 12. e4 dxe4 13. b4 Bd6 14. Nc4 b6 15. Nxe4 Nxe4 16. Rxe4 Qc6 17. Qd3 Bb7 18. f3 b5 19. Na5 Qb6 20. Nxb7 Qxb7 21. Rh4 e5 22. dxe5 Bxe5 23. Rb1 Rad8 24. Qf5 Qd5 25. Qxh7#

And the adventure continues.

Like most Bostonians when he was mayor, I met Tom Menino a couple of times. (This isn’t an exaggeration. I saw a poll or something the last time he ran for re-election that said that over fifty percent of Bostonians had met Menino personally). He seemed affable, and his complete inability to do competent public speaking was strangely charming.

I don’t have any personal animus, is what I’m saying. People revere Menino largely because he seemed like a good guy. Which may be true. But he wasn’t good for Boston, and I think it’s really important to acknowledge this lest a present or future mayor repeat his mistakes.

Menino neglected Boston Public Schools and failed to address the affordability crisis which began when he was mayor and continues to this day. But I’d like to talk about Menino’s most visible and worst legacy: The Seaport.

Basically Menino looked at a chunk of Boston real estate that featured some working fishing piers, the place where people embark on cruises, an outdoor concert venue and a ton of parking lots and said, “let’s put a neighborhood there!”

Now, this isn’t, on its face, a terrible idea. Oh wait, yes it is, because climate change is going to put the whole area underwater eventually, and we’ll probably have to spend billions of taxpayer dollars on sea walls or other mitigation strategies to keep it from turning into Waterworld.

Okay, okay, but let’s put climate change on the back burner just like everyone else does and say creating a new neighborhood out of what is mostly parking lots is not in itself a terrible idea.

Except what arose was not a real neighborhood, but rather a neoliberal YIMBY* hellscape. If you’re not familiar…well, this video sums it up nicely. The Seaport is, as the video says, a collection of sterile offices, hotels, and luxury apartment buildings. Though people live there, it feels immediately off for reasons that can be hard to pinpoint. You get the sense you’re in a simulacrum of a neighborhood.

This is in part because it’s got no public services at all. That’s the neoliberal part! There are park-like spaces in the Seaport, but they’re not actual city parks maintained at public expense, and their private owners can repurpose them at any time. (Also since they are not public property, they can keep any protests or other undesirable gatherings out). There are no schools. There is no public library. There are no police or fire stations. There are also very limited views of the water in this waterfront neighborhood. Yes, there is a public sidewalk that runs along the water, but if you really want to sit and enjoy the view, you need to pay for a restaurant table or live on the upper floor of one of the apartment buildings.

The problem here isn’t really the existence of The Seaport so much as the fact that with high approval ratings and strong political clout, this is what Menino chose for his bold, legacy-defining initiative. What might he have done for the real neighborhoods of the city had he devoted his energy to improving the city rather than building a playground for rich suburbanites who will move out as soon as their kids reach school age?

I don’t know the exact mechanics, somehow Menino got the Commonwealth involved in this idiocy as well, building the “Silver Line,” which is a tunnel that buses run in, to serve the Seaport. The Silver Line stations in the Seaport are beautiful, and nearly empty, because rich people don’t use public transportation, and especially not buses. Recent MBTA usage data shows the Red, Blue, and Green lines all serving over 100k passengers per day, with the Blue Line serving about 50k and the Silver Line dead last at about 30k passengers. And that’s with passengers from the useful part of the Silver Line (Nubian Square to Downtown, where the bus runs above ground) pumping up the numbers.

This happened while the rest of the MBTA system, the parts that people actually use, nearly fell apart from decades of deferred maintenance that the system is only now starting to recover from. What if, instead of building tunnels and beautiful stations for buses that are rarely used, the MBTA had made everybody else’s buses free? Or just maintained the tracks and signals so we wouldn’t have had to endure closures and shutdowns?

What might Boston have been like if we’d had a mayor whose vision for the city wasn’t just “turn a chunk of the city over to developers”? Could we have kept the rest of the city affordable or made it more liveable? Might our children learn in buildings with functioning HVAC systems? (Most Boston Public Schools do not have ventilation systems, which leads to illness and absenteeism, but nobody wants to put their “education reform” money into giving BPS students and staff breathable air).

The problem isn’t just that we have a neighborhood for wealthy white people; it’s that the Seaport aesthetic and economics are coming for the rest of the city. And that’s why I say Menino ruined Boston. Boston is unaffordable and difficult to get around in. Kids who grow up here have to move to Randolph or Brockton or somewhere else that they can actually afford to live. We bring tens of thousands of young people here every academic year, and we’re losing them immediately after graduation because Boston is less and less livable. Even if you live in the Seaport.

We need bold action to save this city. But our only model for bold action is the creation of The Seaport. Is there anyone out there with a vision for the city that actually includes people who live here? If so, could you please stand up?

*YIMBY is a religious cult comprised mostly of white men who worship the invisible hand of the free market. They have been blessed by the god of late capitalism and, because they took econ 101, believe that the affordability crisis is a simple matter of supply and demand, and if we just capitalism harder, we can make housing affordable. This is a faith-based movement impervious to rational argument.

O meu pai não era uma pessoa de escrever. Foi uma pessoa que não pôde completar os estudos mas foi uma pessoa que sempre me ensinou a importância de estudar. Eu adoro escrever. É o meu escape para todo o turbilhão de ideias, emoções e conceitos que me surge ao longo da vida. Estive sem escrever mais de 20 anos. Estive sem escrever as minhas emoções, os meus pensamentos livres, troquei essa escrita por uma escrita cientifica, igualmente importante durante esses 20 anos. Acredito que as emoções são sentidas com uma intensidade apenas durante um período e com o tempo e com a rotina acabam por se perder, envoltas numa neblina, como se tivesse sido em outra vida. Acredito que colocar em palavras aquilo que sentimos, nos permite voltar a sentir, a viver de forma mais real um determinado momento. Acredito que escrever nos permite olhar para trás e cuidar, amar, e empatizar com a nossa própria história. O meu pai não era uma pessoa de escrever, ele era a pessoa do abraço apertado, do sorriso sincero, do amar fácil. Talvez ele escrevia na vida das pessoas assim. Neste momento, tenho ainda esperança de ser surpreendida por ele, mesmo não sendo ele uma pessoa de escrever quem sabe apareça uma carta perdida, um possível bilhete de ultimas palavras que o pudesse trazer pelo menos mais uma vez para perto de mim. Tenho 41 anos da sua voz comigo mas neste momento tenho medo de esquecer essa voz que tanto me acolhia. Acho que se tiver que listar um arrependimento é não ter gravado mais a sua voz... Eu fecho os olhos e sim consigo ouvir e sentir, preciso que essa memória auditiva me acompanhe sempre e que não seja como as emoções que vivemos, que ao fim de um tempo não conseguimos sentir igual porque não foram escritas. Sinto falta das tuas palavras pai.

Sketchbook 63 Flipthrough July 2025

https://vimeo.com/1101416922/7edd97d69d?share=copy&fl=sv&fe=ci

Feel and sense.

Taste the world. If weight comes, carry it. No feeling is final and happiness is not a destination.

December 2025

Riding back from the national palace in Portugal.

LB narrates her life, relating it to the book she is reading ‘Hamilton’, written based on his letters. I mention that what made Van Gogh famous was his letters exchanged with his brother, Theo. She rings in that she is a huge Van Gogh fan, having visited the museum in Amsterdam.

The timing reminded me of A Walk in the Clouds... just serendipity. Dusk was coming on and rain was beginning to blacken the village roof and cobbles while we sped down the mountain. Automatic for the People working its way through me. Mentioned Starry Night. Then the fields. Then the end.

Hitting the mark much?

Van Gogh has always frightened me—not because of the myth of madness, but because of the proximity. His hunger to see the world exactly as it was and then render it honestly. His inability to numb himself. His dependence on beauty as oxygen. I want to be this man. I fear being this man! Color and motion aren't just tools, but vitality. He was an observer, a recorder. A collector and a keeper.

Automatic is the kind of record that understands levels of awareness and how dangerous it can be to see so clearly.

Ignorance, as you know, is bliss.

Drive

Surrender... but not giving up or in. A voice speaking to youth, to momentum and inevitability. It isn’t despairing—it’s acknowledging that much of life happens whether we want it to or not. Age is a good example. Responsibility accumulates like porcelain clowns. Ever wonder how you got ALL THAT stuff in to your home? One grain of sand at a time, that's how. We wake up mid-journey look at life objectively and realize we didn’t choose the road, only what lane we're in and how fast we walk.

Try Not To Breathe

Closer to the fear. Not death as spectacle, but death as inheritance—watching parents age, preparing for losses before they arrive. It doesn’t beg for escape. It steadies itself and says: this is not a failure of love; this is love doing its work.

And that work is vital. The steady moving toward the goal. Van Gogh didn’t lack passion. He lacked relief.

The Sidewinder Sleeps Tonite

Misalignment—about speaking clearly and still not being understood. Van Gogh wrote letter after letter trying to translate himself to a world that didn’t have the vocabulary yet. I write too. I record. I shape sentences like bridges, hoping someone will cross them. And a thankful at least one has.

That impulse isn’t insanity. It’s loneliness looking for language.

Everybody Hurts

Pain, but not drama. Embracing the hurt without anasthesia. It simply says: stay. Don’t convert suffering into identity. Don’t mistake pain for destiny. That song exists because sensitive people nneed permission to endure without explanation.

The instrumental pause that follows feels essential—space for the nervous system to exhale. Silence as care. One wonders how different Van Gogh’s story might have been if embracing had been offered instead of judgment.

Sweetness Follows

The quiet moral center. Not happiness. Not redemption. Sweetness. Something modest and survivable that comes after loss if one remains present long enough to notice it. Van Gogh never lived to see the sweetness that followed his work. I am still alive inside mine. That difference matters.

Monty Got a Raw Deal

Beware the mythmaking. Against flattening human beings into cautionary tales or romantic archetypes. Van Gogh has been turned into a symbol at the expense of his humanity, and sensitive men are still quietly harmed by the suggestion that suffering is the price of authenticity. It isn’t.

Ignoreland

Anger exist without letting it rule. The world is unjust. Loud. Brash. Careless. Clashing symbols. Feeling despair in response doesn’t mean one is broken—it means one is awake.

Star Me Kitten

A whisper. Intimacy without performance. The desire not to be rescued or exalted, but simply seen while tired. This is where I felt myself soften. This is what I want most often: rest inside connection.

Man on the Moon

Pushing back against myth again. Meaning lives in contradiction. Humor and grief are not enemies. Neither are reason and wonder. Van Gogh was not a symbol. I am not a verdict!

Nightswimming

mourns innocence without declaring the future bankrupt. It remembers moments of alignment and insists they mattered simply because they existed. That insistence feels important when fear whispers that happiness is something other people reach and I somehow missed.

Find the River

No command. No solution. Just acceptance. Stop fighting the current. Stop demanding a final judgment on a life that is still in motion.

---

Van Gogh didn’t die because he never found happiness. He died because he lived in a time that didn’t know how to care for minds like his. He lacked support, treatment, and rest.

Romanticizing his end does violence to the living.

I am not standing alone in a field. I am in a car, in Portugal, with music, conversation, memory, and tears that come from recognition—not from collapse. Fear visited me. But fear is not prophecy.

If Automatic for the People teaches anything:

sensitivity is not madness. Awareness is not doom. Happiness is not a permanent destination one either reaches or fails to reach.

More like moments of alignment—music at dusk, a shared admiration, a hand on the rail.

And for now, that is enough.

---

Automatic for the People

REM – 1992

---

“Drive”

Smack, crack, bushwhacked Tie another one to your racks, baby Hey kids, rock and roll Nobody tells you where to go, baby

What if I ride, what if you walk? What if you rock around the clock? Tick-tock, tick-tock What if you did, what if you walk? What if you tried to get off, baby?

Hey, kids, where are you? Nobody tells you what to do, baby Hey kids, shake a leg Maybe you're crazy in the head, baby

Maybe you did, maybe you walked Maybe you rocked around the clock Tick-tock, tick-tock Maybe I ride, maybe you walk Maybe I drive to get off, baby

Hey kids, shake a leg Maybe you're crazy in the head, baby Ollie, ollie, ollie ollie ollie Ollie ollie in come free, baby

Hey, kids, where are you? Nobody tells you what to do, baby

Smack, crack, shack-a-lack Tie another one to your backs, baby Hey kids, rock and roll Nobody tells you where to go, baby

Maybe you did, maybe you walk Maybe you rock around the clock Tick-tock, tick-tock Maybe I ride, maybe you walk Maybe I drive to get off, baby

Hey kids, where are you? Nobody tells you what to do, baby Hey kids, rock and roll Nobody tells you where to go, baby, baby, baby

“Try Not To Breathe”

I will try not to breathe. I can hold my head still with my hands at my knees. These eyes are the eyes of the old, shiver and fold. I will try not to breathe. This decision is mine. I have lived a full life And these are the eyes that I want you to remember. Oh.

I need something to fly over my grave again. I need something to breathe. I will try not to burden you. I can hold these inside. I will hold my breath Until all these shivers subside, Just look in my eyes.

I will try not to worry you. I have seen things that you will never see. Leave it to memory me. I shudder to breathe. I want you to remember. Oh. (you will never see) I need something to fly (something to fly) Over my grave again. (you will never see)

I need something to breathe. (something to breathe) Baby, don't shiver now. Why do you shiver now? (I will see things you will never see) I need something to fly (something to fly) Over my grave again. (I will see things you will never see) I need something to breathe. Oh. Oh. Oh.

I will try not to worry you. I have seen things that you will never see. Leave it to memory me. Don't dare me to breathe. I want you to remember. Oh. (you will never see) I need something to fly (something to fly) Over my grave again. (you will never see)

I need something to breathe. (something to breathe) Baby, don't shiver now. Why do you shiver now? (I will see things you will never see) I need something to breathe. (something to breathe – I have seen things you will never see) I want you to remember.

“The Sidewinder Sleeps Tonite”

This here is the place where I will be staying There isn't a number, you can call the pay phone Let it ring a long, long, long, long time If I don't pick up, hang up, call back, let it ring some more, oh If I don't pick up, pick up The sidewinder sleeps, sleeps, sleeps in a coil

Call me when you try to wake her up, call me when you try to wake her Call me when you try to wake her up, call me when you try to wake her Call me when you try to wake her up, call me when you try to wake her, oh

There are scratches all around the coin slot Like a heartbeat, baby trying to wake up But this machine can only swallow money You can't lay a patch by computer design It's just a lot of stupid, stupid signs

Tell her Tell her she can kiss my ass Then laugh and say that you were only kidding That way she'll know that it's really, really, really, really me

Call me when you try to wake her up, call me when you try to wake her Call me when you try to wake her up, call me when you try to wake her Call me when you try to wake her up, call me when you try to wake her, oh

Baby, instant soup doesn't really grab me Today I need something more sub-sub-sub-substantial A can of beans or black-eyed peas, some Nescafe and ice A candy bar, a falling star, or a reading from Doctor Seuss

Call me when you try to wake her up, call me when you try to wake her Call me when you try to wake her up, call me when you try to wake her Call me when you try to wake her up, call me when you try to wake her, oh

The cat in the hat came back, wrecked a lot of havoc on the way Always had a smile and a reason to pretend But their world has flat backgrounds and little need to sleep but to dream The sidewinder sleeps on his back

Call me when you try to wake her up, call me when you try to wake her Call me when you try to wake her up, call me when you try to wake her I can always sleep standing up. Call me when you try to wake her, oh

Call me when you try to wake her up, call me when you try to wake her Call me when you try to wake her up, call me when you try to wake her I can always sleep standing up. Call me when you try to wake her, oh

Call me when you try to wake her up, call me when you try to wake her I can always sleep standing up, call me when you try to wake her I can always sleep standing up. Call me when you try to wake her, oh

We've got to moogie, moogie, move on this one

“Everybody Hurts”

When the day is long And the night, the night is yours alone When you're sure you've had enough Of this life, well hang on

Don't let yourself go 'Cause everybody cries And everybody hurts sometimes

Sometimes everything is wrong Now it's time to sing along When your day is night alone (Hold on, hold on) If you feel like letting go (Hold on) If you think you've had too much Of this life, well hang on

'Cause everybody hurts Take comfort in your friends Everybody hurts Don't throw your hand, oh no

Don't throw your hand If you feel like you're alone No, no, no, you are not alone

If you're on your own in this life The days and nights are long When you think you've had too much of this life to hang on

Well, everybody hurts sometimes Everybody cries And everybody hurts sometimes And everybody hurts sometimes

So hold on, hold on Hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on Everybody hurts

No, no, no, no you are not alone

“Sweetness Follows”

Readying to bury your father and your mother What did you think when you lost another? I used to wonder, why did you bother? Distanced from one, blind to the other

Listen here my sister and my brother What would you care if you lost the other? I always wonder, why did we bother? Distanced from one, blind to the other

Oh, but sweetness follows

It's these little things, they can pull you under Live your life filled with joy and wonder I always knew this altogether thunder Was lost in our little lives

Oh, but sweetness follows Oh, but sweetness follows

It's these little things, they can pull you under Live your life filled with joy and thunder Yeah, yeah we were altogether Lost in our little lives

Oh, but sweetness follows Oh, but sweetness follows

“Monty Got A Raw Deal”

Monty this seems strange to me. The movies had that movie thing, But nonsense has a welcome ring And heroes don't come easily. Now, nonsense isn't new to me. I know my head, I know my feet, But mischief knocked me in the knees. Said, Just let go. Just let go.

I saw the ocean meet the man. I saw you buried in the sand. A friend was there to hold your hand, Said, Walk on by. So, I went walking through the street. I saw you strung up in a tree. A woman knelt there said to me, Said, Hold your tongue, man. Hold your tongue.

You don't owe me anything. You don't want this sympathy. (waste your breath) Don't you waste your breath. (waste your breath) For the silver screen.

That nonsense doesn't mean a thing, They tried to bust you in a sting, But virtue isn't everything So, don't waste time. Now, here's a rhyme that you can steal. Put this on your reel to reel. Mischief threw a rotten deal. Monty's laying low. He is laying low. Just let go, just let go.

You don't owe me anything. You don't want this sympathy. (waste your breath) Don't you waste your breath. (waste your breath) Monty this seems strange to me.

“Ignoreland”

These bastards stole their power from The victims of the us v. them years Wrecking all things virtuous and true The undermining social democratic Downhill slide into abysmal Lost lamb off the precipice into The trickle down run-off pool

They hypnotized the summer 1979 Marched into the capital Brooding duplicitous, wicked and able, media-ready Heartless and labeled, super U.S. citizen, super achiever Mega ultra power dosing, relax defense, defense, defense, defense

(Yeah, yeah, yeah) Ignoreland (Yeah, yeah, yeah) Ignoreland (Yeah, yeah, yeah)

The information nation took Their clues from all the sound-bite gluttons 1980, '84, '88 '92 too, too How to be what you can be Jump jam junking your energies How to walk in dignity With throw-up on your shoes

They amplified the autumn 1979 Calculate the capital Up the republic my skinny ass, TV tells a million lies The paper's terrified to report, anything that isn't handed On a presidential spoon, I'm just profoundly frustrated By all this, so — you, man

(Yeah, yeah, yeah) Ignoreland (Yeah, yeah, yeah) Ignoreland

If they weren't there we would have created them Maybe, it is true But I'm resentful all the same Someone's got to take the blame

I know that this is vitriol No solution, spleen-venting But I feel better having screamed Don't you?

They desecrate the winter 1979 Capital collateral Brooding duplicitous, wicked and able, media-ready Heartless and labeled, super U.S. citizen, super achiever Mega ultra power dosing, relax, defense, defense, defense, defense Yeah, yeah, yeah

(Yeah, yeah, yeah) Ignoreland (Yeah, yeah, yeah) Ignoreland (Yeah, yeah, yeah) Ignoreland (Yeah, yeah, yeah)

“Star Me Kitten”

Keys cut, three for the price of one And nothing's free, but guaranteed for a lifetime's use I've changed the locks, and you can't have one You, you know the other two

The brakes have worn so thin that you could hear I hear them screeching through the door from our driveway Hey, love, look into your glovebox heart What is there for me inside, this love is tired I've changed the locks, have I misplaced you?

Have we lost our minds? Will this never end? It could depend on your take

You, me, we used to be on fire If keys are all that stand between Can I throw in the ring? No gasoline, just star me, kitten You are wild, and I'm in your possession Nothing's free, so star me, kitten

I'm in your possession So star me, kitten

“Man On The Moon”

Mott the Hoople and the game of Life yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah Andy Kaufman in the wrestling match yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah Monopoly, Twenty one, checkers, and chess yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah Mister Fred Blassie in a breakfast mess yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah Let's play Twister, let's play Risk yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah I'll see you in heaven if you make the list yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah

Now, Andy did you hear about this one? Tell me, are you locked in the punch? Andy are you goofing on Elvis? Hey, baby Are we losing touch?

If you believed they put a man on the moon Man on the moon If you believe there's nothing up his sleeve Then nothing is cool

Moses went walking with the staff of wood yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah Newton got beaned by the apple good yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah Egypt was troubled by the horrible asp yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah Mister Charles Darwin had the gall to ask yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah

Now, Andy did you hear about this one? Tell me, are you locked in the punch? Andy are you goofing on Elvis? Hey, baby Are you having fun?

If you believed they put a man on the moon Man on the moon If you believe there's nothing up his sleeve Then nothing is cool

Here's a little agit for the never-believer yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah Here's a little ghost for the offering yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah Here's a truck stop instead of Saint Peter's yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah Mister Andy Kaufman's gone wrestling yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah

Now, Andy did you hear about this one? Tell me, are you locked in the punch? Andy are you goofing on Elvis? Hey, baby Are we losing touch?

If you believed they put a man on the moon Man on the moon If you believe there's nothing up his sleeve Then nothing is cool

If you believed they put a man on the moon Man on the moon If you believe there's nothing up his sleeve Then nothing is cool

If you believed they put a man on the moon Man on the moon If you believe there's nothing up his sleeve Then nothing is cool

If you believed they put a man on the moon Man on the moon If you believe there's nothing up his sleeve Then nothing is cool

“Nightswimming”

Nightswimming deserves a quiet night

The photograph on the dashboard taken years ago, turned around backwards so the windshield shows. Every street light reveals a picture in reverse Still it's so much clearer

I forgot my shirt at the water's edge The moon is low tonight

Nightswimming deserves a quiet night I'm not sure all these people understand It's not like years ago The fear of getting caught The recklessness in water They cannot see me naked These things they go away Replaced by every day

Nightswimming, remembering that night September's coming soon I'm pining for the moon And what if there were two Side by side in orbit around the fairest sun? The bright tide forever drawn Could not describe nightswimming

You, I thought I knew you You, I cannot judge You, I thought you knew me This one laughing quietly Underneath my breath Nightswimming

The photograph reflects Every street light a reminder Nightswimming Deserves a quiet night Deserves a quiet night

“Find The River”

Hey now, little speedyhead The read on the speed-meter says You have to go to task in the city Where people drown and people serve Don't be shy, your just deserts Is only just light years to go

Me, my thoughts are flower strewn Ocean storm, bayberry moon I have got to leave to find my way Watch the road and memorize This life that passed before my eyes And nothing is going my way

The ocean is the river's goal A need to leave the water knows We're closer now than light years to go

I have got to find the river Bergamot and vetiver Run through my head and fall away Leave the road and memorize This life that passed before my eyes And nothing is going my way

There's no one left to take the lead But I tell you and you can see We're closer now than light years to go Pick up here and chase the ride The river empties to the tide Fall into the ocean

The river to the ocean goes A fortune for the undertow None of this is going my way There is nothing left to throw Of ginger, lemon, indigo Coriander stem and rose of hay Strength and courage overrides The privileged and weary eyes Of river poet search naiveté Pick up here and chase the ride The river empties to the tide All of this is coming your way

#nonfiction #books #memoir #history #war

During World War I, a British archeologist singlehandedly forged a multitude of Arabian tribes into a unified army, leading them to victory over a decaying Ottoman Empire, in so doing bringing Arabia into the modern world, i.e. that of Western-style national statehood. This hero would become the legend known as Lawrence of Arabia, the white man who donned desert garb and with his Arabian comrades conquered Damascus. At least, that’s the story of the movie, as I understand. The story told by T.E. Lawrence himself in his autobiographical Seven Pillars of Wisdom is rather more complex and ambiguous.

Seven Pillars of Wisdom is Lawrence’s own account of his role in the Arab Revolt, written some years after events from his notes and diaries (though most were lost) and going through several iterations before its final version. From the outset, Lawrence recognises that the Arab Revolt played only a minor part in the Allied victory in World War I, and that if it was critical to this victory, it was so in the sense that British authors tend to ascribe a sense of crucial importance to any single operation because it was part of the totality of the war effort (see also dambusters etc.). Nor does Lawrence suggest he tells his story because he was uniquely instrumental to the events of the Arab Revolt. By his own words, he tells his story because he was there. As such, he is as much, or perhaps even more, of an unreliable narrator as you might expect. Nevertheless, Seven Pillars of Wisdom is assuredly not a heroic tale or adventure novel about how good old British pluck saved the day. Instead, we accompany a profoundly emotionally conflicted man into a struggle where he is forever doomed to be an outsider to both his own and his adopted peoples. On top of which Lawrence is emblematic of so many of the pathologies of 1920s English repressedness that his memoir could double as a psychoanalytical field manual. Seven Pillars of Wisdom is now the sort of historical artefact that requires a 100 page introduction (which my copy duly has), and on the whole, the surface level war story of a few brave fighters facing overwhelming odds is the least interesting part of it.

Events, dear boy, events

Its nature as a memoir rather than a novel means that Seven Pillars of Wisdom lacks an overall plot, at least in the traditional narrative sense. There is a trajectory, starting in the deserts of the Hejaz in 1916 and terminating with the fall of Damascus in 1918. Damascus is Lawrence’s lodestar from the very beginning, but with the book written after events unfolded, it is hard not to suspect some of this is a backward projection. The narrating Lawrence at any point in the book is always a superposition of the contemporaneous Lawrence in situ and the future Lawrence telling his story with the benefit of hindsight. Combined with his literary writing style and tendency to embark on long introspective digressions, all this makes Seven Pillars of Wisdom oscillate unsteadily between being a memoir, a historical account, and a war story.

Real life is much messier than a story, with less structure, and hence Lawrence’s retelling often feels like a series of disconnected events following one after the other without much in the way of connecting tissue. Seven Pillars of Wisdom presents the reader with a constant procession of people, places and communities, many of whom are introduced with an assumed familiarity, only to never be seen again. Keeping track of the manifold characters and places isn’t made easier by Lawrence’s refusal to adhere to a single rule for transliteration from Arabic to English. With Lawrence rushing between villages, riverbeds, oases and most importantly, railway lines, always in the company of an rotating cast of comrades, there is simply too much going on, a significant part of which would be considered irrelevant digression from a narrative perspective. There is a sense in which Seven Pillars of Wisdom truly is ‘one battle after another’, with its endless sequence of skirmishes, reconnoitres, and a truly astonishing level of destruction levelled at railway lines.

War of manoeuvre

Lawrence’s account of the campaign in Arabia contrasts markedly with the common understanding of World War I as fought on the Western Front. Where the the latter is remembered as a war of stasis, the Arab Revolt is a mobile guerrilla war predicated precisely on refusing a pitched battle with the enemy. The Arabian forces use stealth and mobility, tying down the Ottomans in a futile defence of their extended supply lines. In the first chapters of Seven Pillars of Wisdom, Lawrence muses on contemporary military theory and its applicability, or lack thereof, to the situation in Arabia, foreshadowing the contrast between wars of position and wars of manoeuvre that we see developed a decade later by Antonio Gramsci. Compared to the masses of forces involved elsewhere in the war, the Arab forces are pitifully limited in number, ill-equipped and riven with internal tribal rivalries. Even within the Middle Eastern theatre of war, the Arab Revolt is a side-show to the main event, which is the British and French advance against the Ottoman Empire. Lawrence himself is fully aware of this, and Seven Pillars of Wisdom never pretends the fight to be anything else.

Given Lawrence’s knowledge that the Revolt will only play a minor part on a secondary front within the Great War, his determination to claim victory is not based on the strategic value of his efforts, but a professed desire to help the Hashemite dynasty, in particular Crown Prince Faisal I, secure a truly independent Arab State. This is to be achieved through a combination of direct conquest of the lands to be incorporated into the putative Arab Kingdom, consolidating the variegated tribes into a single national body politic, and lending sufficient assistance to the British to gain standing as a reliable ally. It is this latter consideration that causes Lawrence no end of anguish, given his fears that Britain will in the end do what serves the Empire, even if it means reneging on its promises to its Arab allies. Time and again Lawrence returns to the feeling he is a traitor, engaged in a deception against the Arabian tribes whose fealty he is working to enlist for Faisal, and it is no surprise that on entering Damascus, victory tastes bitter to him.

Complex white saviour

Lawrence’s constant unease about the trustworthiness of his British superiors towards the Arab forces is only one part of the profound emotional turmoil that afflicts him, which means Seven Pillars of Wisdom is not the straightforward Orientalist white saviour narrative that I had come to expect. At a surface level, the Orientalism is definitely there, with a white man leading a motley collection of noble savages towards their destiny, i.e. a modern, European-style nation state. Below the surface however, Lawrence is aware that his leadership is less to do with the innate superiority of the white race, and more with his role as a conduit for British rifles, money and supplies for the Arab cause, as well as his status as a neutral outsider with no stake in the many inter-tribal rivalries flaring across a still divided Arabian peninsula. Significant parts of the book are devoted to Lawrence describing debilitating illnesses, fatigue and lack of endurance compared to his fellow guerrillas, even as his experience with desert warfare increases. Conversely, once he has adopted the indigenous ways of living with the desert, Lawrence can only gaze in bemusement on his compatriots who refuse to exchange their patently unsuitable khaki uniforms for the much more appropriate indigenous dress. Although he does not articulate this explicitly, one gets the sense that Lawrence is well aware that British supremacy is not due to the innate superiority of the white master race, but the result of being the ones holding the Vickers machine guns.

Not that this means the racism and Orientalism isn’t there. In keeping with Western sensibilities of the era, Lawrence cannot help but essentialise his Arab comrades, as well as every other people, including the English. It makes for a pervasive but also uncommitted and inconstant racism, with Lawrence readily pronouncing on the innate characteristics of the Arab race on one page, only to completely deviate from all of this in his detailed psychological profiles of the most prominent members of the Revolt or his most intimate companions. There is something intriguing about seeing the racist logic operate so openly on the page, with Lawrence unable to grasp how the immense diversity of personas and communities he describes directly contradicts the generalising tenets of his racist ideology. Time and again Lawrence will make sweeping pronouncements about Arabs, Turks, Indians or the French, only for these to immediately break down in his recounting of the actual people he meets. Even the Turks, who come in for most of Lawrence’s spite, are humanised when encountered as individuals, in particular the conscripts, prisoners of war, and the many casualties. His role in the Revolt makes Lawrence acutely aware of the great variety across the Arabian tribes he encounters, and while he is unable to divest himself of a belief in some inherent ‘desert culture’, the racism on display in Seven Pillars of Wisdom is of a completely different nature than our prevailing ‘clash of civilisations’ discourse, which lets Western leaders launder their realpolitik via some putative grand theory of history. The idea of unified ‘Christian’ and ‘Islamic’ cultural blocs will have seemed patently absurd to Lawrence, engaged as he was in enlisting the aid of Arab muslims against their Turkish overlords as part of a protracted European ‘civil war’.

Nor is it only his deep ambivalence over his role in the Revolt that causes Lawrence anguish. From his writing emerges a profile of a conflicted man profoundly repulsed by all things physical, most of all his own body, and hence with a deep-seated envy of people who inhabit their bodies with ease. Time and again Lawrence seems to seek bodily transcendence in the harshness of the desert, but this remains always beyond his reach. Neither is he intellectually confident, for while he is an educated man, he is not a trained soldier and therefore feels inferior to the military command in which he is embedded. If it were not for his duty to king, country and the Revolt, Lawrence might plausibly have taken the road of Frank Herbert’s [Dune Messiah](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DuneMessiah “Dune Messiah – Wikipedia”)_ and walked into the desert to disappear forever.

Imperial mandates

I cannot help but wonder to what degree the recurring episodes of self-loathing were retroactively amplified by the developments that followed the end of World War I. As Lawrence was writing his memoirs on return to England in the 1920s, the Arab state that he helped bring into being was destroyed in its infancy by French colonial forces, exercising their ‘mandate’ to Lebanon and Syria as agreed with Britain in the infamous Sykes-Picot agreement, of which Lawrence was probably already aware when fighting with his Arab irregulars. Only a few years later, Arabia is indeed unified, but not under the Hashemite dynasty of Faisal I, but under the rival house of Saud, again with connivance and support of the British. Within a decade of the conquest of Damascus, everything that Lawrence told his Arab comrades they were fighting for has been crushed, one way or another, by the European Powers, endorsed in this by the nascent League of Nations. It is the beginning of a long series of betrayals that endures to this day, which includes Mandate for Palestine, the Nakba, the Suez Crisis, the assassination of Iran’s Mossadegh and the invasions of Iraq, Libya, and Iran, as well as the unwavering support for Israel’s military adventurism and ethnic cleansing of the Palestinian people. Seen in the light of the abject failure of the League of Nations to defend Arabian right to statehood in the 1920s, is it any wonder that the newly established Arab nations of the 1940s were disinclined to abide by a United Nations decree that the better half of Palestine was to be awarded to its recently arrived minority Jewish population?

Over a hundred years after its first publication, Seven Pillars of Wisdom is mainly interesting as a historical artefact that shows both the continuities and discontinuities of Western involvement in the Middle East. The British Empire has been eclipsed by the United States and its Israeli vassal as the primary imperial force, but the subordination of people’s right to self-determination to Western national interests remains. Direct colonial subjugation has disappeared, replaced by indirect economic control. And the racism is still there, but now grounded in Islamophobia rather than Orientalist essentialism. From the perspective of a family in Syria, Iran, or Palestine today, it must seem that everything changes so that everything can stay the same. The question is how many more white saviours they must suffer before they can take charge of their own destinies.

Notes & Suggestions

• An unavoidable comparison on reading Seven Pillars of Wisdom is with Frank Herbert’s Dune, for which it was a direct inspiration. In between the fighting and travelling, Lawrence gives a great deal of attention to the desert itself: the different compositions of sand and stone, the shape and topography, the sensation of various environments. Echoes of the desert, the Bedouin, and the outsider become leader can all be found in Dune. This essay offers an interesting discussion of the similarities, differences, and varying degrees of Orientalism in both books.
• Lawrence’s account of the exercise of imperial power is by its nature personal and small in scale. For an impersonal and macro-level account of how colonial policies readily sacrificed the lives of millions on the altar of imperial ambition, Late Victorian Holocausts gives a gruesome account of the catastrophic famines inflicted on European colonies in the 19th century as a consequence of their forcible integration into the global market.
• The Palestine Solidarity Campaign is the main British organisation campaigning to secure Palestinian rights and defend them against the ongoing occupation and genocide.

• Leviathan Falls (The Expanse #9) by James S.A. Corey, 529p: I didn’t want it to end, but all good sagas must come to a close. We see what’s left of the Rocinante crew as fugitives, now joined by Teresa Duarte (daughter of the Laconian high consul, Winston Duarte). There is a lot going on as bizarre, physics-bending anomalies begin to manifest within the ring space, threatening the existence of humanity. It’s tense, and full of high stakes with interesting viewpoints from Colonel Tanaka and Elvi. I think it was a satisfying conclusion to the series even though it does not answer all the questions. Sometimes, knowing less is better.
• Platform Decay (The Murderbot Diaries #8) by Martha Wells, 256p: Another adventure with Murderbot. Very consistently good, delivering the usual cynical humor and inner monologues. To be honest, nothing in particular stood out to me, but it is still a solid comfort read.
• Cryoburn (Vorkosigan Saga (Publication Order) #14) by Lois McMaster Bujold, 345p: We get into cryogenics shenanigans and politics with Miles investigating a major “cryocorp” called WhiteChrys, on the distant planet of Kibou-daini. I enjoyed the three different POVs: Miles, his Armsman Roic, and a local boy called Jin Sato. We also get to see Raven, a cryo-revival specialist from the Durona Group who assisted in reviving Miles after his death on Jackson's Whole in a previous book. Another great book in the Vorkosigan saga, that brings me closer to finishing the series!

Post 14 of #Blaugust #readinglist #books #reading

22 August 2026

Ruba brought a copy of Turner's Last Sketchbook (published by Yale University Press London in 2024, a roughly 7x4.5 inch “facsimile of the last known intact sketchbook by J. M. W. Turner”) to coffee. Perfect before my upcoming travels. Amidst the mental clutter that has formed while getting ready to uproot everything again, here was the simple, powerful fact of a practice. On the move with only water and a few colors at hand, his eye hones relationships; between colors, forms and space, forms and material. All with a thinness of application that serves as a constant reminder to revere.

People continue to ask me for directions on the street. One today, six this month, and I would say upwards of thirty across this whole year. Is that an uncommon amount? Feels like it. Especially because I'm definitely not the person to ask.

20 August 2026

Skee Mask—Resort (2024)

I've made some progress on Foolish Earth Creatures this month, although most of that has been filling out chapter structures with placeholder text so there's nothing very interesting to show. Unless you find this kind of thing interesting:

One fun thing about writing a new kind of game is that you get to reinvent your whole work process! When I started writing Foolish Earth Creatures I went straight into writing first-draft text in order to get the hang of the game's 'voice', but now I've been working on the game for a while I don't need to do that. What I've settled on is to start by writing a bare-bones outline for each chapter with simple placeholder text, then to do progressively more detailed placeholder structures, then first-draft text, and eventually (although I haven't got to this stage yet) the final text. Right now I've got placeholder outlines for nearly the whole game, so I've decided to do the outlines for the last few chapters before I go back to writing the first drafts.

My placeholder writing got faster when I realised that I didn't need to think of solutions to the player's problems at this point, I can just put “[[Correct option]] / [[Incorrect option]]” and move on!

I should have the rest of the game's placeholder structure done in the next few days, and hopefully by next month's developer diary I should have most of a first draft.

PLACEHOLDER: Can our hero do the thing? Find out next month!

#FoolishEarthCreatures #DevDiary

speed of hearts

Friendship is an arrangement by which we undertake to exchange small favors for big ones. Count your life by friends and your age by smiles.

I had a long conversation with a young friend last night. He's been struggling with an addiction to pornography for the last year and a half. He's young and frustrated because it's an old demon he thought he had conquered more than a decade ago.

But moving to an emotionally and spiritually challenging place was biting off a bit more than he was ready to chew.

Personally, I didn't do enough to help him. I could have been more present, engaged and more of a friend. But the Keeper was battling his own dragons.

His frustration stems from what seems like an impossible task: to slay the desire for something he hates. And speaking to him, he has all of the barriers in place that one can have to stay governed.

But it isn't a knowledge problem, it's a matter of the heart. Knowing what to do and having the power to do it are different things. This seems to be a plague that is afflicting millions of young people, male and female.

In my opinion, and experience, the greatest asset we can have in fighting heart failure is to FEEL loved.

THINK: don't offer a lecture to someone who needs a hug.

Again, it isn't enough to know that you are; you must feel it. Constantly. Friends are critical in this. Honest, genuine and close friends. Those sticking closer than a brother. Those born for times of distress.

I think this is the blow that opened the crack of my friend's weakness. Too often he was seen as a resource and not nearly enough as someone to laugh and cry and share quiet moments.

When you feel lost, used and forgotten, it's easy to reach for that which makes you feel something else. Something good.

My friend is now considering a relocation.

Smart, but I hate to see him go. We need more men like him here—men capable of displacing the narrow thinking that too often controls the actions and decisions of those charged with taking the lead. Not malicious or bitter men, but men who have become so accustomed to managing every detail that they can no longer see the difference between micromanaging and shepherding.

So, I'm doing what I can to be a friend, as I have for some time. As I work to heal, I hope that I can help him do the same thing.

Prayer, time and hard work are the tools in my arsenal, which is enough. According to God's word, with Him, all things are possible.

Jesus, I think, knew what he was talking about.

---

#essay

Our Father Who art in Heaven Hallowed be Thy name Thy Kingdom come Thy will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven Give us this day our daily Bread And forgive us our trespasses As we forgive those who trespass against us And lead us not into temptation But deliver us from evil

Amen

Jesus is Lord! Come Lord Jesus!

Come Lord Jesus! Christ is Lord!

Eyes on screens see with no sense of true scale The cosmos can be reduced to an inch The colors of reality made pale And all can be rearranged with a pinch Do you want to erode your will to live? Do you want to see without being seen? Do you want to waste what you have to give? All this and more can be found on the screen. Stop! Do you remember your childhood? When your mirror was your parents' faces, When the veil was thin, between you and Good, And love and hate not warped, public races? Go outside if you want to remember. Love on the scale of love, and no other.

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#poetry #sonnet

Thank you for reading! I greatly regret that I will most likely never be able to meet you in person and shake your hand, but perhaps we can virtually shake hands via my newsletter, social media, or a cup of coffee sent over the wire. They are poor substitutes, but they can be a real grace in this intractable world.

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