Politics, RattleBag and Rhubarb, The Sex Wars

What is a man?

Now that the odious Matt Walsh has given us the answer to “What is a Woman?” we must now turn to the male of the species and ask: What is a man? According to Walsh, by the way, a woman is someone who needs a man to open a pickle jar. This information comes right at the end of his…

Continue Reading

Art, Film, Photography, Books, Poetry, Politics, RattleBag and Rhubarb

All Our Yesterdays with the #1936Club

There was a period in the early 1960s when my parents had a television (in those days you rented) and one of the programs I liked to watch was All Our Yesterdays produced by Granada Television. It was a look back in time based on the newsreel footage of that week twenty-five years ago –  a week-by-week journey through the…

Continue Reading

Books, Politics, RattleBag and Rhubarb, WW2

What ho! George Orwell and Cancel Culture

Few things in this war have been more morally disgusting than the present hunt after traitors and Quislings. At best it is largely the punishment of the guilty by the guilty. In England the fiercest tirades against Quislings are uttered by Conservatives who were practising appeasement in 1938 and Communists who were advocating it in 1940. –George Orwell P.G.Wodehouse –…

Continue Reading

Politics, RattleBag and Rhubarb

A COVID Plea to County Government

A plea to County government for assistance to residents to keep us as safe as possible during the COVID vaccine roll-out Positive COVID cases are rising in Dutchess County at an alarming rate, and the threat of the UK, and perhaps other, more infectious variants are on the horizon if not already here. While the vaccine roll-out has begun, it…

Continue Reading

Politics, RattleBag and Rhubarb

Eat my leek!

As previously reported in Shakespeare has had enough, a random assortment of Shakespeare’s characters – disturbed and distressed by political leadership – got together to prepare for an intervention. I invited them over, which was probably a bit of a mistake as they were all eager to participate and the logistics of social distancing were a bit of a challenge.…

Continue Reading

Politics, RattleBag and Rhubarb

Shakespeare Has Had Enough

Disturbed and distressed by political leadership, a random assortment of Shakespeare’s characters got together to prepare for an intervention. And then they confronted the villain himself and gave him the what for. We’ll have to wait for the next act to see what happened next. 

Art, Film, Photography, Poetry, Politics, RattleBag and Rhubarb

Wisdom of the Ages

Looks like having government officials who are Ignorant and Stupid is nothing new. Chinese poet Su Tung-Po nailed it centuries ago.  I was browsing through the International Times for 1969 – the way one does. And there – amid the fevered, underground, counter-cultural world of macrobiotics, head shop ads, rock and roll, anarchy, activism, and psychedelia as seen from North…

Continue Reading

Politics, RattleBag and Rhubarb

Hopeful Signs

I am always a bit astonished when I see tRump signs at people’s houses. And I ask myself: “Who are these people? What on earth can they be thinking?” There’s three on our route to our usual walk  – not just signs of course, but mega flags trumpeting the household fascist tendencies, racism, and misogyny to the world. And looks…

Continue Reading

City and Country, Politics, RattleBag and Rhubarb

Anarchy in New York: The Mayhem Continues

As we know the tRump misadministration has – for reasons of its own – declared New York City to be a jurisdiction of anarchy, violence and property destruction. This is Part Two. Part One is here. The Justice Department declared New York City A place of Anarchy, violence and Property losses. Live from New York City where folks Continue Their…

Continue Reading

City and Country, Politics, RattleBag and Rhubarb

Anarchy in New York City

The US Department of ‘Justice’ declared this week that New York City — along with Portland and Seattle — to be a “jurisdiction permitting violence and destruction property.”  Allegedly our state and local government are permitting anarchy, violence, and destruction So of course I had to take a look. So far, this is what I can report: Weather: Warm, sunny,…

Continue Reading

Food, Poetry, Politics, RattleBag and Rhubarb

In the Salon with Gertrude Stein

It takes a lot of time to be a genius, you have to sit around so much doing nothing, really doing nothing.– Gertrude Stein  As you know from my earlier post I have recently been chatting with Gertrude Stein about her life and particularly aspects of her work Tender Buttons (1914). This was all facilitated by my early acquaintance with…

Continue Reading

Politics, RattleBag and Rhubarb

What Grocery Stores and Retail Outlets Should Be Doing in NY

Dear Friends and Neighbors: Based on personal observations and reports from others, many, if not most, grocery stores and other essential retail outlets in our area do not appear to be in compliance with the current New York State Department of Health (NYSDOH) “Guidance for Cleaning and Disinfection for COVID-19 For Retail Stores.” How We, as Individual Citizens, Can Help…

Continue Reading

Books, Politics, RattleBag and Rhubarb

COVIDIOTS 2020 and Hellish Trumpery

So many parallels between our current pandemic and the plague that swept through London in 1665, at least as described by Daniel Defoe in Journal  of the Plague Year.  It’s a novel, written many years later in – 1722 – by a remarkably talented fabulator. So always good to take it with a shovel of salt. But here’s one big…

Continue Reading

Art, Film, Photography, Politics, RattleBag and Rhubarb, WW2

About Isms He was Never Wrong: George Orwell at the Café Royal

George Orwell had an interesting chance encounter with a blasé conspiracy theorist at the Café Royal in 1940. (See left). The young man is in the grip of a dangerous fallacy. As always with autocracy and totalitarianism,  Orwell nails it. The fallacy is to believe that under a dictatorial government you can be free inside. Quite a number of people console themselves…

Continue Reading

Books, Politics, RattleBag and Rhubarb, WW2

Much Ado About Deception and Delusion: Kate Atkinson’s Transcription and London 1940

The sandwich was no comfort, it was a pale limp thing a long way from the déjeuner sur l’herbe of her imagination. . . . Recently she had bought a new book, by Elizabeth David — A Book of Mediterranean Food. A hopeful purchase. The only olive oil she could find was sold in her local chemist in a small bottle. ‘For softening…

Continue Reading