I do not like cute.
There are several things I refuse to watch: Game of Thrones, The Mandalorian, that Gal Gadot movie. None of them speak to my weltanschauung. I will also avoid the teevee show "Queen's Gambit", because my late brother was heavily involved in chess, and I miss him. He passed away several years ago.
It's been a roller coaster of a year.
Social moorings have included a pipe smokers FB page which I enjoy, bitching about Trump (I'm beginning to sound like a broken record), shared outrage over the nutballs, conspiracy theorists, right wingers. And talking about food. All food is cultural appropriation; without the Aztecs, Dutch, Chinese, and Italians, we'd have nothing.
[Aztecs: chilies, tomatoes, corn, cacao. Dutch: orange-hued carrots, kale, many varieties of now common vegetables originally bred in Netherlandish market-gardens, still life with bread and oysters, donuts and cookies. Chinese: soy sauce, vegetables uncommon in shops catering primarily to Whites, stir-frying, rice stick noodles. Italians: potable wines, eggplant Parmigiana, tiramisu, coffee beverages. All of them: many other borrowings, ideas, re-shapings, and transformations.]
Bread, cheese, onions, turnips.
Cheese and salt fish.
Sausage.
This is a gross simplification, of course. That, too, is a cultural borrowing (from the nutballs, conspiracy theorists, and right wingers, primarily), but you get the idea.
To put it differently, social media has kept me grounded. You too?
One other thing has contributed greatly to my sanity.
Illustrating.
Here are the things I've drawn using the Paint programme on my computer in the latter part of December:
Judging from these examples, my sanity may be on less secure footing than I thought. There is a self-referential obsessiveness here.
Regarding Baby Yoda, a friend has this to say: "Grogu is an annoying, cardboard, cutsie-toy which has absolutely detracted from what could be a somewhat decent show. By over-focusing on the "wow" aspect of the little green smegma-stain the production has utterly come off the rails, using the attempted emotional draw of an excessively cloying blob of green plastic to overcome faults and plot holes which otherwise have ruined the show. There has not a been a good "Star Wars" production since 1980, and it's because of cute shit like Grogu, Ewoks, Jar Jar, and related offensive absurdities." [John O.]
Another friend says this: "The team behind Mandalorian has somehow tapped into the magic of Kurosawa's Yojimbo, Leone's Man-with-no-name trilogy, and borrowed heavily from Lone Wolf & Cub. I think you'd really enjoy it." [Mr. Sid]
My personal take is that we mustn't fight over animatronic muppets. Like the copier in Office Space, we must destroy it.
Baby Yoda gives me weltschmerz, existenzangst, identitätskrise, gicht, and zweifelhaft. What the Italians lump together under the term "agita".
On second thought, I do not look like Baby Yoda at all. I am human, not a lizard.
AFTER THOUGHT
Tea, coffee, stuffed animals, arguing, and smoking my pipes.
Plus chili paste, Chinese foods, and cookies.
That's really what kept me same.
Also visiting SF Chinese Hospital for periodic doctor's appointments and picking up refills and my bank for paperwork. Those along with work are human contact.
Permanently missing in the vortex: any significant companionship of the opposite gender, a social life, visiting museums or bookstores, and going out to eat and people watch.
Those will come again, probably in the last few months of the next year.
TOBACCO INDEX
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