It’s noon, and I’m still lying in bed, trying to decide whether it’s worth getting up today. I just glanced at the headlines in the hope of finding something positive to write about, and instead I found more of the old SSDD: Same Shit, Different Day.

And now I’m feeling brain dead . . . or maybe it’s just wishful thinking.

To put things in perspective, the high point of my day yesterday was when my doctor’s office called to reschedule next week’s appointment because my doctor has broken his leg in a skiing accident.

In my favor, my first thought was how terrible that was for him . . . though that was immediately followed by relief that I wouldn’t have to go out on Monday. It was just a routine checkup, but it felt like too much effort. And his misfortune turned out to be the best part of my day.

That is not a good thing!

*. *. *

Okay, it’s now 1:30 p.m. I’m out of bed, dressed, and have read past the headlines to the guts of the news reports. And I feel myself getting fired up once more as I read about the people out there fighting for “truth, justice, and the American way” (remember that?).

People like Senator Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), who has quite literally risked his own neck to travel to El Salvador, where he has met with the tyrannical president of that country, as well as with deportee Kilmar Abrego Garcia, in an attempt to have Abrego Garcia returned to the U.S. after his wrongful deportation by the Trump administration.

And people like the honest journalists who continue to report — whether from actual war zones, or from political “war zones” such as Washington, D.C., and Moscow — in order to disseminate facts that allow us to distinguish between the truth and the politicians’ lies.

And I know that I can’t keep quiet for long. My words may not reach more than a handful of people; but the mere act of speaking out (or writing) about the injustices we are witnessing in today’s world acts as a catharsis for me . . . and, quite frankly, as a sop for my conscience, because — like most of us — I feel helpless to actually effect any meaningful change in the course of world events.

But my fingers can still find the right letters on the keyboard. So here I am — back at it, doing what I can, and hoping you’ll stay tuned and join in. Because it’s only by shouting out that we will ultimately be heard.

And because doing nothing is simply not an option, when this is what we’re fighting for:

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
4/18/25

It’s also Patriots’ Day — the 250th anniversary of Paul Revere’s ride — an event in American history that was drummed into the heads of every child in New England in the good old days . . . the days when love of country was celebrated and patriotism trumped tyranny, not the other way around. (Yes, that was a play on words — glad you noticed.)

We were made to read Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s famous poem each year on the 18th of April to be sure we didn’t forget the origins of our hard-won freedoms . . . and I can still recite the first verse from memory.

But we are living in far different times, when expressions of patriotism have come to be considered trite, maudlin, unfashionable . . . and now, tragically, sometimes even dangerous.

But other types of poetry are still around, including haiku, which — while deceptively simple-looking — is devilishly tricky to accomplish. But, this being both National Haiku Poetry Day and Patriots’ Day, I thought I’d try my hand at it. I call this:

Haiku for Washington, D.C.

Cherry blossoms bloom,
New people in the White House.
Cancel spring this year.

I know, I know . . . haiku are supposed to be lovely and uplifting, celebrating the beauty of life and of nature. But it’s hard to see the beauty today through the cloud of doom hanging over everything.

And it just keeps getting harder.

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
4/18/25

. . . and this little piggy may save a human life.

If you’re at all squeamish, have a problem with the thought of blood or internal organs, are a lifetime member of PETA, or are strictly vegetarian, you may want to skip this next paragraph. But I find it medically fascinating.

I’ve just read about a potentially history-making procedure, still in the research stage, that would enable a person with sudden liver failure to be temporarily kept functioning by being attached to a genetically-edited pig’s liver in a dialysis-like treatment, while awaiting a suitable transplant. The process would filter the person’s blood, doing the work of their own liver so the organ could rest and possibly heal itself. [Lauran Neergaard, ABC News, April 15, 2025.]

(Livers are famously very good at repairing and regenerating themselves. Too bad more of our organs can’t do that.)

Okay, enough detail. Those of you with sensitive natures may resume reading now.

*. *. *

Aside from the exciting medical implications of such a procedure, the article caught my attention because of my own past experience with pig parts.

No, not pork chops or BLTs. I’m talking about surgical tissue. To clarify:

Some 25 or 30 years ago, I was experiencing pain in my right shoulder, which my orthopedic surgeon diagnosed as a torn rotator cuff. It was disabling enough that I agreed to schedule surgery, and I came through it without complication.

After a couple of days in the hospital, and several more days of recuperating at home, I had an appointment for a follow-up with my surgeon at his office. Being one of Washington, D.C.’s leading orthopedists, he also taught at a local medical school, and frequently had students in his office to observe as part of their studies. On the occasion of my visit, there was a young male student present who appeared very much in awe of his professor.

I, on the other hand, knew my doctor very well . . . which meant that I was aware, not only of his surgical skills, but also of his wicked sense of humor, and I was prepared to hear just about anything from him at any time.

As he checked the results of his artistry on my shoulder, he simultaneously explained the procedure to his student, and described how — once he had cut into my arm — he had found the rotator cuff to be so badly torn as to be beyond repair without the use of extraneous tissue. And at the time, there was a new procedure — approved, but still considered somewhat experimental — using porcine tissue: the tissue of a pig. And there just happened to be some available at that hospital at that precise time.

Listening to him, I thought, “What fun! I’m a medical guinea pig.” (Pun intended.)

But then the doctor segued into a tale of dinner at his home the very night following my surgery . . . which happened to have been the first night of Passover. His family were gathered for the Seder, and somehow the conversation turned to the unusual procedure that he had just performed. As he spoke, he noticed his college-student son frowning in puzzlement, and asked what was wrong . . . whereupon the son said:

“Dad, I have an ethical question. Please explain to me how you could transplant the tissue of a pig into the body of a Jewish woman without her permission — and on the eve of Passover, no less??!!!”

At that point in the story, I happened to glance at the young medical student, whose eyes had widened in what appeared to be abject fear. He was obviously expecting me to explode in anger . . . or collapse in distress, at the very least.

He clearly had never met me, and made the mistake of assuming I was a “normal” person. So he stared in disbelief as I calmly asked my doctor what he had said to his son, and received the following reply:

“I told him that I couldn’t very well wake you in the middle of surgery to ask your permission. And besides, I said, you don’t know this woman. She would have told me that that was my job, not hers, and to just get on with it.”

And he was right. But the student was sure I was some sort of madwoman when, instead of going postal on the doctor, I burst out laughing and announced that hereafter my right shoulder would have its own name — “Babe” — in honor of one of my daughter’s favorite childhood story books.

And so it came to be. I immediately went on a search for the perfect little pig pin, which I proudly wore on the right shoulder of my jackets for many years thereafter . . . and, of course, whenever I had occasion to visit my orthopedist.

*. *. *

So, while some of you may think of pigs as dirty, messy, grunty, swill-eating creatures, I will always have a special place for them in my heart . . . and my right shoulder.

And a nice, neat scar to prove it.

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
4/17/25

A few months ago, there was much ado in the news about multiple sightings of what appeared to be drones in the skies near military facilities in various parts of the world, including the U.K. and the eastern U.S. It was beginning to feel like a replay of Orson Welles’ “War of the Worlds,” but with visuals.

And then . . . nothing.

Lots of far-fetched theories, and some attempts by various governments to assure us that there was nothing to worry about even though they claimed to have no idea what was going on . . . but no real explanation.

And now we are learning that the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is testing systems to detect drones in New Jersey — where hundreds of drone sightings were originally reported. Not that there’s anything to be concerned about . . .

The FAA’s Center of Excellence for UAS Research is using off-the-shelf drones (officially known as Unmanned Aerial Systems) of various sizes and shapes to determine whether their presence can be picked up by a combination of systems including Remote ID, Acoustic Array, and X-Band radar, and to determine whether they might interfere with FAA or aircraft navigation systems. [Pete Muntean, CNN, April 15, 2025.]

As for those earlier sightings in November and December, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy has labelled it the New Jersey “drone fiasco under the last administration,” and assured the public:

“This administration has taken a completely different approach, radical transparency. The FAA is doing this to ensure we can properly detect drones in our airspace and make sure they don’t interfere with airplane navigation systems . . . This is about protecting our national security and American safety.” [Id.]

(Sure . . . it’s all Joe Biden’s fault. The world is obviously much safer under Donald Trump’s inspired guidance.)

Looking at Duffy’s statement, two things leap out at me:

First, that “radical transparency” — on any topic — most assuredly would be a “completely different approach” for this administration; and

Second, we still don’t know what those earlier sightings were. The FAA says that more than 100 drones are sighted near airports each month. Maybe so . . . but whose are they, and why aren’t they being destroyed? Aren’t they violating protected air space?

In fact, congressional reports have said that U.S. Navy and Secret Service tests of anti-drone systems in Washington, D.C., last month caused collision alerts to go off in several planes preparing to land at Reagan National Airport. [Id.]

So is the anti-drone technology as great a danger to aviation as the drones themselves? Presumably, that’s the purpose of the tests in New Jersey.

But it’s okay, because “Officials have urged calm and emphasized there is no evidence suggesting the sightings posed a security threat.” [Id.]

I can see it’s going to be another one of those nights.

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
4/17/25

Although it’s difficult to quantify the various items on Donald Trump’s ever-growing bucket list for his second administration, I would have to rank his desire to make Canada the 51st state of the United States in the top ten of his “most bizarre” pipe dreams.

Canada, of course, is a country rich in natural resources, including those rare earth minerals he has been so focused on lately (even demanding them in payment from Ukraine for having helped defend them for the past three years), and thus understandably desirable.

And it now turns out that there is another resource — one associated with a tiny, sparsely-inhabited island in the waters off the coast of both the U.S. state of Maine and the Canadian province of New Brunswick — that could be of great interest to Trump. It is known as Machias Seal Island; and the 277 square miles of sea surrounding it, known as the Grey Zone, has been the subject of dispute since the late 1700s. In 1984, an international court ruling awarded both countries fishing rights to the area. [Anthony Zurcher, BBC, April 14, 2025.]

The priceless resource in which those icy waters abound is the incomparably ugly — and incomparably delicious — Maine lobster.

Or Canadian lobster — depending on where you live.

The two countries have each laid claim to the island and the surrounding waters, which would include the resident lobsters. And, despite the long history of friendly relations between Canada and the U.S., it has remained something of a bone of contention . . . to say the least. John Drouin, a U.S. lobsterman in the Grey Zone for some 30 years, has described the ongoing battle between Canadians and Americans each summer season to be first to place their lobster traps:

“People have literally lost parts of their bodies, have had concussions, [their] head smashed and everything.” [Id.]

Ouch! And this, of course, has now been magnified by Trump’s acquisitive designs on Canada, Greenland, and whatever piece of property he sets his sights on next.

I’ve been to both the far eastern and far western parts of Canada, and have wonderful memories of both trips . . . particularly the genuine friendliness of the people I met. The first trip involved a cruise from Boston to Portland to Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island, then down the St. Lawrence Seaway to Quebec City and Montreal. One of our shore excursions included a memorable boiled lobster lunch at a seafood shack by the shore, during which I had to instruct a family of U.S. midwesterners in the fine art of dissecting the beasts and locating the edible parts. As a native New Englander, I’ve also eaten many another Maine lobster in my lifetime. And believe me, they are worth fighting over.

I’m not here to arbitrate the territorial dispute over Machias Seal Island and its aquatic crustaceans. But, looking at the above map, I can’t help wondering what Donald Trump would think if the Canadian government suddenly decided to take a cue from his own methodology and change its maps, declaring that area — now known as the Gulf of Maine — to be the “Gulf of Canada.”

Eh?

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
4/16/25

On Sunday, April 13th, a Russian missile attack on a civilian neighborhood in the Ukrainian city of Sumy killed 35 people, including two children in a playground, and injured 117 others.

This followed by just nine days a similar attack in President Volodymyr Zelensky’s home town of Kryvyi Rih, in which 20 people — nine of them children — were killed, and another 70 or more wounded.

And on Monday, April 14th, Donald Trump blamed Ukraine’s president for having started the war . . . the very one the Russians refer to as their “special military operation,” and which the whole world witnessed as Russian troops invaded Ukrainian territory on February 24, 2022.

But, from some parallel universe in which Trump’s psyche apparently lives, he would have us believe that “Millions of people [are] dead because of three people. Let’s say Putin number one, let’s say Biden who had no idea what the hell he was doing, number two, and Zelensky.” [Yang Tian and Ian Aikman, BBC News, April 15, 2025.]

“You don’t start a war against someone 20 times your size and then hope that people give you some missiles,” he continued, adding that Zelensky was “always looking to purchase missiles. When you start a war, you got to know you can win.” [Id.]

Ignoring the fact that not “millions of people” (as falsely stated by Trump) have been killed in this war to date, let’s instead focus on the intentional lie — perpetrated by Vladimir Putin from the very beginning — that Ukraine was in any way responsible for the decimation of its own country over the past three years.

That very lie has been picked up and repeated by Trump as he continues to court Putin as his new best friend. He even — after first describing the Sumy attack as merely “terrible” — said on Monday that he had been told Russia had “made a mistake.” [Id.]

Who allegedly told him, and why he chose to believe it, remain a mystery. But the Kremlin has said — without providing evidence — that it had actually targeted a supposed meeting of Ukrainian soldiers, and that 60 of them had been killed in the attack. [Id.]

And that, apparently, is good enough for Donald Trump.

*. *. *

Trump is right about one thing, though: You do not start a war against a country 20 times your size and strength. And Volodymyr Zelensky is smart enough to know that. Neither he, nor anyone else in Ukraine, invited Russia to invade their country; nor did they in any way pose a threat to Russia’s safety or sovereignty.

In truth, Vladimir Putin — still mourning the breakup of the Soviet Union as “the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the century” — wants nothing less than to seize Ukraine as part of Russia’s territory. He illegally claimed the Crimean Peninsula in 2014, and still holds it; and since his invasion of 2022, he has similarly claimed the Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson regions. He won’t be satisfied until he has all the rest as well.

To blame the victim — to suggest, without basis in fact, that Volodymyr Zelensky bears any responsibility for Vladimir Putin’s actions — is despicable and indefensible. It is akin to blaming Poland for Nazi Germany’s invasion of 1939.

And it requires an immediate apology.

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
4/16/25

Is it just coincidence that the Latin word “Dei” translates to the English word “God”? Or is the current drive to eliminate Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) in America also an attempt to eliminate God? Perhaps the goal is to crown new gods, represented by golden idols, for people to worship, obey, and sacrifice to.

It has happened before.

Far-fetched, you say? It can’t happen here? Is that what you think?

Really?

Well, then you may not have heard of the newest edict from the U.S. Department of State (including its overseas embassies), ordering its employees to report any instances of co-workers displaying “anti-Christian bias” — as part of its compliance with the newest executive order supporting those of Christian faith working in the federal government. [Robbie Gramer and Nahal Toosi, Politico, April 11, 2025.]

What constitutes “Christian” values is unclear, though presumably it is meant to denote support for right-wing ultra-conservatism, and not necessarily the elimination of other religions . . . yet.

According to an internal cable, DOS will be working with the Trump administration’s task force to gather information “involving anti-religious bias during the last presidential administration,” including collecting examples of such bias through anonymous employee report forms. [Id.]

My first thought was that Pavlik Morozov ** had come back to life and was working at the State Department.

** Pavlik Morozov was a 12-year-old Russian peasant boy — a charter member of the Young Pioneers branch of Stalin’s Komsomol (Communist Youth) — who became famous in 1932 for denouncing his own father to the Soviet authorities for allegedly selling favors to kulaks (wealthier peasants who resisted the collectivization of Russia’s farmlands). He also accused other peasants of hoarding their grain in order to protect it from seizure by the authorities. His father was imprisoned and ultimately executed. And for his misplaced loyalty, Pavlik himself was killed, just shy of his 14th birthday, by those he had turned against.

And I immediately saw this latest executive order for what it truly is: a poorly-disguised attempt to emulate the Stalinist regime of the 1930s, ‘40s and ‘50s, when co-workers, neighbors, friends, and even family members turned against each other in a frenzied race to be first to curry favor with the Kremlin . . . and to save their own skins.

And this is what our country — for nearly 250 years the shining example of democracy for the rest of the world, and a beacon of light to the downtrodden of every land — is being reduced to:

— Deportation, not only of illegal immigrants or those guilty of committing serious crimes while here, but of any and all who fail to meet newly-established, onerous standards, or dare to speak openly against administration policy;

— Exclusivity: the exclusion and punishment of all who do not fit a prescribed mold, reminiscent of Hitler’s vision of the so-called “Aryan” man: White, Anglo-Saxon, Christian . . . and straight;

— Intolerance, of any who do not live up to the standards of the autocrat who would be emperor.

And to accelerate the process, we — beginning with those who work in the federal government, at some universities, and even at major law firms — are not simply being encouraged, but actually ordered, to become a nation of snitches and sycophants.

Are we going to let it continue, buying into false promises and ignoring reality, until it is too late to reverse course? The Russians did, when they thought that even Bolshevism would be better than the reign of the Tsar; and the German people fell into the same trap when they took the word of a madman and his brown-shirted thugs.

Aren’t we smarter than that?

Please . . . we can’t let it happen here.

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
4/15/25

Some emperors fiddle while their empires burn; others play golf . . . all at the expense of the lowly citizens.

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
4/15/25

It all started, as one might expect, in early childhood. It was during World War II, when there were nightly blackouts, and the ambient light that used to filter through our windows from the street and the neighbors’ houses was no longer there. After trying for a while to fall asleep, I would tiptoe into my parents’ room, shake my mother awake, and whisper, “I had a bad dream. Can I rest with you?”

“Rest,” of course, meant stay there — her arm wrapped securely around me — for the remainder of the night.

Eventually, the war ended, streetlights were turned back on, and I outgrew the need for my mother’s protection.

Until some 40 years later.

I was visiting my boss and his wife at their summer home on a lake in the beautiful State of Maine. There were no street lights around the lake, of course; and the five or six other houses in the area were scattered along the lakeshore and nowhere near each other. The first night, when I settled down in the guest bedroom and turned off the bedside lamp, I suddenly learned what it meant to be totally, terrifyingly blind.

And then I saw it: a tiny red dot of light across the room, like the eye of some small, other-worldly creature come to . . . well, who knows what? But then I remembered that there was a fax machine in that room, so that the boss could keep in touch with the office. (This was pre-cell phones and pre-internet, remember.)

I thought of leaving the lamp on all night, but if I’d been found out, I never would have lived it down. So that little red light was my only beacon, my directional guide to the door in case I had to get up during the night for any reason. By focusing on it, I eventually got to sleep, with the aid of the call of the loons outside my window. (Not the crazy neighbors . . . real loons. It was actually quite lovely.)

Of course, when I returned to my urban home, I was no longer thrust into total darkness at night. But the die had been cast; I found that I fell asleep best with the light from the television glaring at me and the volume turned up full-blast. I set it to turn itself off after an hour, by which time it had worked its magic.

Then I had the nightmare. I dreamt that someone — a tall, blond man — was breaking into my apartment. I woke with a start, and the dream had been so real, I got out of bed, turned on the light, and inspected the entire apartment — the hallway door, balcony door, and every corner of every room — before going back to bed . . . leaving the foyer light on that night and every night thereafter.

But our lives change, and now I live in a rural area, though in a residential neighborhood and not on a lake. My TV is in my den, not my bedroom. At this stage of my life, the nocturnal calls of nature (no, not the loons) have become the rule rather than the exception, and my bathroom is outside my bedroom and down a short hallway. Not wanting to bang into the walls or run over the cat and risk waking the rest of the household, I need a little bit of light. And so I leave my closet light on, with the door nearly shut but not quite, and the light on my phone guides me the rest of the way.

At least, that’s my excuse.

Okay, that last part was probably far too much information, but I couldn’t think of another way to bring this tale to a close.

Necessity, they say, is the mother of invention. Old age, on the other hand, is just a mother.

*. *. *

So, whatever the experts say about dousing all ambient light in order to gain a better quality of sleep, I ignore them. I may be the exception to the general rule, but if no one minds, I’m going to continue sleeping with my night light, thank you.

I may even adopt a teddy bear for extra comfort.

But maybe just a bit smaller.

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
4/15/25

That’s the way things worked when the world was relatively sane, and our biggest worry was the Covid pandemic. But those halcyon days are behind us.

Now I find myself waking to wonder, not only what day it is, but whether the terrible things I’m remembering are segments of my last dream, or a too-real memory of yesterday’s news.

And then I make my first major mistake of the day: I check the news headlines. Today, for example, I learned the following:

Headline #1: “White House and El Salvador’s president make clear mistakenly deported man won’t be returned to US.”

That “deported man” is, of course, Salvadoran citizen Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia, whose “mistaken” deportation has been much in the news lately.

During a meeting between Donald Trump and El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele today, the latter unequivocally stated in response to CNN’s Kaitlan Collins:

“I hope you’re not suggesting that I smuggle a terrorist into the United States. How can I smuggle a terrorist into the United States? Of course I’m not going to do it. The question is preposterous.” [Kaitlan Collins and Kevin Liptak, CNN, April 14, 2025.]

Despite having said last week that he would comply with the Supreme Court’s ruling, Trump refused to respond to questions from the press. But he did say — speaking to members of his administration, including Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Attorney General Pam Bondi, and deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller — that the U.S. does not have the power to return Abrego Garcia. According to Bondi:

“That’s up to El Salvador if they want to return him. That’s not up to us. The Supreme Court ruled that if El Salvador wants to return him … we would facilitate it: meaning, provide a plane.” [Id.]

And there you have it — Trump doing another 180, this time shifting responsibility to the Supreme Court’s admittedly weak wording of its otherwise correct decision, wherein they ordered Trump to “facilitate,” rather than “effectuate” Abrego Garcia’s return.

The administration is now saying it’s “not up to us” to bring back the man they illegally deported in the first place. That is, of course, total bullshit.

I ask you: When has Donald Trump ever hesitated to apply pressure on another person, another institution — or another country — in order to achieve his goals? NEVER . . . that’s when. But suddenly, there’s nothing he can do for this man who was granted asylum and has been living in the U.S. legally, with his family, without so much as a traffic violation, for six years? I repeat:

*. *. *

Headline #2: “Dozens Killed In ‘Horrific’ Russian Missile Strike, Prompting Global Condemnation.”

In the second major attack against civilians in the past ten days, Russia has bombarded the Ukrainian city of Sumy with a missile strike that left at least 34 people dead, and at least another 117 — including 15 children — severely injured. [RFE/RL, April 14, 2025.]

The Kremlin, of course, repeated the same old refrain, denying that the two attacks targeted civilian infrastructure. Really? Then what would they call this:

At the risk of sounding like my own broken record, I have to say it one more time: Vladimir Putin has zero intention of bringing this war to an end, other than in his own time and on his own terms.

And Donald Trump — who campaigned on a promise (along with others, equally untrue) that he would bring the war to an end “within 24 hours” — continues to schmooze Putin into “normalizing” diplomatic relations.

*. *. *

And that’s just a small sampling of one day’s news. Is it any wonder I choose to sleep until noon on most days?

I’m simply afraid to wake up.

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
4/14/25