Art is 80

“Dear Hannah Slovut-Einertson (author of today’s New York Times crossword puzzle):

You got me! I readily admit that I don’t know everything. Included among the things I don’t know are: The author of “Alice in Zombieland”, the father in “Full House”, Women’s Basketball player Beard’s first name, the first word in a ______ Marzano tomato, the antagonists in “Mulan”, the first name of actress Donovan in “Sabrina the Teen Age Witch”, the 1994 Red Chili Peppers album, or the NBA champs from 2000 to 2002. I don’t even know the 5 letter difference between Asian and African elephants, or an instrument known as a bell-piano. In fact, I don’t even know if it’s a bellpiano or a bell-piano. I know it’s a Saturday morning, but still……”

I looked you up, Hannah S-E. I see that you live in Minnesota and that you created your first crossword puzzle in 2017 for the first annual Giraffe Appreciation Potluck. Maybe that explains 29 across: “Giraffes lack them (they have ossicones)”. Maybe giraffes feature in all of your puzzles.

Okay, ossicones are “horn-like, skin-covered bone protuberances on the heads of giraffes and okapis, formed from ossified cartilage”. “Alice in Zombieland” was written by Gena Showalter, and is one of a series of young adult novels that imagines Alice in a wonderland peopled by zombies. Gee, Hannah, I am sorry I missed that one. Must put it on my list. After all, it did win the 2014 South Carolina Children’s, Junior and Young Adult Book Award. And after I read “Zombieland”, I will go on to the 69 other books that Showalter has written and published. My summer is now accounted for.

It looks like Basketball Beard is Alana Beard, who – I am embarrassed to say – played for seven or eight years for the Washington Mystics. The Mystics have been around now for 27 years and, like most Washington teams, have won their championship only once, in 2019. Alana Beard was gone by that time; she was with the Los Angeles Sparks. I congratulate her on her induction into the Hall of Fame last year. And here is something I find very interesting: she also played for 6 teams outside of America, including (just to pick one), the Wisla Can-Pack, in Krakow. While the Mystics were created in 1999, here is a statistic you might want to remember: the Can-Pack has been playing women’s basketball since 1906 (!!!!!) and has won the Polish title 25 times. Beard is one of 9 Americans who have, at one time or another, play for the team.

Oh, the name Can-Pack? The team (and a related school for basketball and hockey) is the (ta-da!) the name of a company headquartered in Krakow that (ta-da!) makes aluminum cans for beverages. This knowledge may come in handy.

The actress on “Sabrina, the Teen Age Witch” is Elisa Donovan. The reference to this show (apparently a sitcom that ran on ABC and WB for seven years, ending in 2003) proves that Hannah S-E and I watch very different TV shows. This show was apparently focused on a 16 year old girl who discovered she was a witch. Whether at the end of the series, she was still a 16 year old witch or a 23 year old witch, I don’t know, but if my math is correct, today Sabrina would be a 46 year old witch (and probably serving as a Republican Congresswoman from South Carolina). According to my phone, Elisa Donovan was a later addition to the show. She is not listed as one of the four main actors, so to know that Donovan’s first name is Elisa requires that you have paid particular attention to the series. Donovan played the role of Morgan Cavanaugh in the series (and no, Morgan Cavanaugh is not a law firm). You may remember that Morgan was “very shallow, superficial and over-assertive”. Sounds very appealing.

The Red Chili Peppers album from 1994 was “Out in L.A.”. Remember that one? Only 32 years ago; how could you forget? Want to check it out? The critics, so says my phone, gave it very negative reviews. That should be an incentive. Hannah, maybe your tastes are your own, not those of the masses. Guess what? That may be good. No criticism here.

Digression: Help me on this one. The AI write up of Out in L.A. contains the following mysterious sentence: “It was largely seen as a label-driven release capitalizing on the band’s later success.” Hmmmm. _

With a brief reference to “San” Marzano tomatoes (maybe I should have known that one), I will stop here. With my new knowledge, I will try to fill in the blanks.

And I will end with a welcome to our house guests, Simon and Rosie Aronin. Last night, Simon asked if I was going to be writing about Trump or dreams or restaurants. He did not get this one. But he was my inspiration.

May 1 (the universal workers’ holiday), May Day! May Day! May Day! (the universal distress call) and Trump Derangement Syndrome (current universal pandemic). Put ’em together. And what have you got? Let’s see.

Trump Derangement Syndrome. It’s not a disease. It’s not an affliction. It’s not a disability. It is a sign of intelligence.

How do you know if you, or someone else, suffers from TDS? One sign is disagreeing with virtually everything Trump does. This does not mean disagreeing with everything he does only because it is Trump who is doing it. People with TDS would disagree with these policies and activities no matter who was the president at the time. But on the other hand, because Trump is the despicable person he clearly is, someone with true TDS would loathe Trump as a man and president even if his policies were more acceptable.

But, while it is incorrect to call TDS a disease, it is not incorrect to say we “suffer” from Trump Derangement Syndrome. Suffering is an important part of having Trump Derangement Syndrome. Without suffering, this condition would not exist.

As the days of the Trump administration add up, it appears more and more that TDS is a chronic condition. The problem with chronic conditions is that you get used to them, they begin to be normalized, you learn to live with them and you stop fighting. Hopefully, this will not be the case this November when the mid-term elections roll around. It does appear that, perhaps for the first time,  TDS is a contagious condition, that it can spread from one person to another, or perhaps from one group of people to another. And it is clear that the only cure for the condition is the removal (some would say the 86 without meaning anything violent) of Trump from public power and public view.

Therefore, fighting TDS does not mean learning to love (or like, or tolerate) Donald Trump and does not mean forgetting that you have it. Fighting it (ironically as it may seem) means working hard to promote the spread of this devastating and contagious condition until it affects the majority of people throughout all 50 states and reaches a critical mass, and then extirpating its cause.

How would I do it? I’d have bumper stickers, and buttons, and hats and t-shirts, all with variations of “I have TDS and I’m proud of it” on it. I’d sponsor ads (if I had the resources) on TV and social media promoting the spread of TDS. I would be relentless.

It would appear that the current spread of TDS should be sufficient to give the House and (hopefully) the Senate to the Democrats in November. But there are dangerous movements on the horizon. The Supreme Court’s recent decision regarding the Louisiana congressional district drawn to gives Blacks representation in Congress has declared the creation of that district null and void, unconstitutionally racially gerrymandered. The Voting Rights Act, necessary to prevent exactly what we are seeing now, has been eviscerated, and the certain and quick redrawing of districts not only in Louisiana but undoubtedly in other red states as well, needs to be countered. How do you counter it? Spread TDS – convert the unconverted, and convince those with latent TDS that they have to vote in November.

Today is May 1, May Day. May Day is a universal holiday (official in some 90 countries, unofficial in others such as the USA) celebrating and validating the working class over the financial elite. In the US, under president Trump, the financial elite is more elite than ever, they operate without even a patina of morals or ethics, and the rich not only get richer, but get unbelievably richer, while so many just struggle on. But where are the May Day observances, the parades, the writings, the speeches? The voices seem to be silent.

These two important events: the spread of TDS and the message of May Day should be combined. TDS should be spread through peals of “MAY DAY! MAY DAY! MAY DAY!”, always three times. It is a universal sign of distress. And the entire universe (the entire human universe) is today under great stress.

Digression: May Day and May 1 are not genetically related. May 1 as a workers’ holiday actually stems from the throwing of a bomb into Haymarket Square in Chicago in the middle of a strike demonstration in 1886, the strikers trying to secure an 8 hour working day. May Day (three times) as a distress signal was developed in the 1920s by radio operators as a distress call easier to say than SOS, and it derives× from the French “m’aider”, meaning simply “help me”. Who knew?

No one today in this country today is touting TDS, observing May Day, or shouting May Day three times. We have missed the boat. Our oppositional leadership has failed us. We need to regather our forces.

I did not have a good night last night, and I woke up this morning feeling a bit off. When I say that I woke up, I am using that term a bit imprecisely, because one side of me would tell you that I was up all night. That, for whatever reason (none apparent), I just could not fall asleep. The other part of me, however, would disagree with that first side of me. It would tell me that I must have slept just fine. Otherwise, how could I have had a dream that (at least to that side of me) seemed to go on and on all night?

I know that most dreams disappear as soon as you wake, but I have never heard of remembering a dream that never occurred, so I have to give my second side some credence. On the other hand, if I slept all night, why do I feel that way I do? (A rhetorical question, please.)

What I remember is being in my car, stopped at a red light, somewhere near Dupont Circle. I looked out my window and saw a friend of mine (a youngish man, about 40 or so, which I think was my age) talking to a woman. I was near enough to hear what they were saying, although they did not see me. I was appalled by what I heard.

This friend (a real person – I could tell you who he was if I wanted to) was married to another friend of mine (I could tell you who she was, too, although in real life, they are not only not married, but I am sure they don’t know each other), and they seemed a happy couple, living with their young (3 or 4 year old) son in suburban Virginia. I did not know the woman my friend was speaking to that day, but my first assumption was that she was a lawyer, because they were talking about his plans to get a divorce.

Not only did the subject matter surprise me, but the content of their conversation was horrific. They were talking about how he was going to lie through the divorce process, how he was going to hide assets, what kind of promises he could make and then break without fear of enforcement, how she was going to have to deal with their son by herself. All sorts of things. And I could hear the conversation clearly.

The light turned green and I drove on. Strangely, I could still hear their conversation. It was coming through my car radio (which I had not turned on) loud and clear. I kept listening.

What should I do? I had a moral dilemma. Both of these people were good friends. Do I ignore what I heard? Or, more importantly, do I call up his wife and tell her what I heard? Warn her of what was coming her way so she could be prepared? But what if she was thinking the same way he was? What if neither of them were going to be honest during this process? What if the divorce had been in the works for some time? What would I be getting myself into? What would be the right choice? What would be the better choice?

I drove on and on. Soon, I did not know where I was. Somewhere in Montgomery County, I assumed. A major residential street with a green median strip down the middle. I realized I had better turn around – I was on a drive to nowhere, my mind muddled about my friends’ divorce. There was no place to turn left. I kept driving.

Eventually, I found a street to turn on. I am not sure why I didn’t make a u-turn and go back, but I didn’t. I took the left, and then another left assuming I was going parallel to the main road, but soon I realized I had no idea where I was or how to get back. (There was no GPS in this dream.) I kept going, turning now and then. I remember one street sign. The intersecting streets both started with an “H”. One was a real word – one just a bunch of letters that could not be pronounced. I was lost.

It was a neighborhood of middle class, and somewhat upper middle class, houses. Nothing else. I began to drive slowly up a hill, when I realize that I was having problems with my car. The accelerator did not accelerate the car. It went slower and slower, until it came to a stop. It would go no further.

A digression. In the dream, my reaction to this was “Boy, I have not had this problem with the car for a long time”. Of course, I have never had that problem with my car, have I? It was like, in the dream, I remembered having this problem at one time on a regular basis. In other words, in the dream, was I imagining other dreams that I never had? Or have I had many dreams where my car stopped working, none of which I remember, except that last night, I remembered…..in my dream?

Okay. I must have gotten out of the car, because I remember walking down a street with modest houses. I needed help, but I don’t remember how I went about getting it. I remember looking in windows of houses as I went by (I remember one woman, looking like she was in the 1950s, setting the dinner table).

I don’t remember how I got there, but suddenly I was in one of the houses. I must have let myself in looking for help, but I don’t know, but I hadn’t seen anyone in the house, I was very afraid of being discovered breaking in, and all I wanted to do was to get out. I started looking for a door. I went from room to room to room. This modest house seemed to have an unlimited supply of rooms, none of which had a door to the outside. Finally, I was in a room with a bright red door, leading out. I was very careful opening and closing it, because I didn’t want anyone to hear me. I got out.

I was relieved, walked down the driveway to the sidewalk, but realized I still needed help. A young woman was on the sidewalk; I assumed she lived nearby. She could see, I guess, that I was in some distress and asked me what was wrong. I told her I was lost and told her about my car and my experience presumably having broken into a house. She must have taken pity on me; she offered to help.

She asked where my car was. We looked for it, but I realized I had no idea where it was. And besides that, it couldn’t be driven. It was then I realized that I better call home and tell Edie I was delayed; I didn’t think I would give her all the details yet. I wanted to figure out what was going on first.

But then I realized I did not have my phone. I told my new friend (I never learned her name) that I didn’t have either my pocketbook or my phone. Of course, I don’t carry a pocketbook in real life, but I guess I did in this dream. I told her I never went anywhere without it. There seemed to be two choices. First, I left them in the car. Possible, but that would be very unusual. Second, I left them in the house that I had just escaped from. This seemed more likely, and the question then was how to retrieve them.

We were talking about that, when we turned a corner and found ourselves on a commercial street, a charming street, narrow and pedestrian, filled with shops and restaurants. She led me to the outdoor patio of a restaurant, and we sat at a table with another man, whom I assume she knew.

I grew impatient. I needed my purse and my phone. I wanted my car. I wanted to get home.

The woman who was helping me said that she agreed, but “first, we should have dinner.” I was not interested in dinner (we did not eat in the dream) and interrupted her by telling them the story of my divorcing friends, and asking what I should do. I do not think I got a response. I then asked if someone would come with me to the house I had broken into, because I was afraid to do it myself. They both said “yes”.

Before we could do anything, someone ran into the restaurant saying that my car had been found and was around the corner. I went and saw a car decorated as if for a parade of some sort. The decorations were extensive and brown. I ripped them off, and discovered that it was not my car. Nothing like my car.

The next (and last) thing I remember was seeing the woman who was speaking with my friend about his divorce. She was sitting on a chair on the sidewalk with a microphone in her hand, and I realized she was not a lawyer after all. She was a prophetess. And she, this time, was talking about ……. me!

The last thing I remember is me looking directly at her and mouthing (but not saying out loud): “You got me! You got me!”.

That was it.

(1) Even the good news started with a major frustration, and ended with a minor frustration. A day or two before we drove to St. Louis earlier this week, I received a mail notice from the District that I had been issued a ticket for not stopping at a stop sign. The fine was, because this is the District perhaps, $100, and if I didn’t pay it within a period of time, it would become a fine of $200. It was a photo ticket, and there were no point on my license to be lost, so I decided to pay it. Long experience told me that challenging a ticket, whatever the merits, was usually a waste of time and energy. So I sent in a check the day before we left town.

Yesterday, I received another piece of mail from the DMV. Knowing the news from the DMV was never good, I opened the envelope with a combination of trepidation and resignation. But lo and behold, the DMV was telling me that they had reviewed my citation (even without my having appealed it) and decided that the ticket was issued in error, and that it would be wiped from my record, and the $100 would be returned to me under separate cover. Wow!, I said (to myself), and then I read the fine print where it told me that I could expect the funds to be returned in about …… ten weeks.

(2) We have both a plastic trash bin (green) and a plastic recycling bin (blue) issued by the District and we have taxpayer paid pick up on each once a week. Both of our bins are quite old, and have various tears and rips, and need to be replaced. Even though it is the District that causes the damage to the bins when they throw them on the back of the trucks, it is the homeowner who must pay for the replacement. If you are over 60, the replacement cost (depending a bit on the size) is about $25 for each. I ordered both, but found on the website that only the recycle website said that I had to pay $25 for the bin before they would deliver it, and that I had to prove that I was 60 or older. I put a check, and a picture of my driver license in the mail. I received an email from the DMV that my new blue bin would be delivered on May 26, about 5 weeks from now. I also received a separate note saying that the green bin would be delivered the same day. But I hadn’t yet paid for that one – and the web page had not told me I had to in advance. So I am confused as to whether they will actually deliver the green one. Perhaps they will.

(3) Doctor’s appointment this morning. Set for 11:30. Arrived at 11:15. Sat in the waiting room until 12:50! Staff said several times: “She knows you are here. Nothing we can do.” At 12:50, doctor apologized nicely, and blamed it on an elderly Chinese patient with dementia who spoke only Cantonese, no English, and who had a translator who was trying to help by telephone. Is this a forgivable excuse?

(4) CVS. I should have been suspicious when I went to pick up a prescription and the two people in front of me each had problems with the semi-self serve computer system, slowing them up and resulting in my waiting for much longer than I had ever waited before. I then entered my prescription info and then gave the clerk two packages of probiotics. The probiotics were marked, as they always are, buy one, get the second one free.

The pharmacy is at the back of the store; the other clerks are in the front. The clerk at the pharmacy told me that, to get the 2 for 1 price, I had to buy it in front, rather than in the rear. It surprised me as I had bought the 2 for 1 probiotics at the pharmacy time after time, but I said okay.

I then went to the first. I gave the two boxes to the clerk and he rang them up with a separate payment for both. I explained they were 2 for 1, and he didn’t seem to believe me. So he made me walk back with him across the store so he could read the tag on the shelf. Then we walked back to the front, and asked me my phone number, so he could access the account. I gave him the phone number, he told me there was no such account, and that without an account I could not get the 2 for 1 arrangement. He was very testy, but there was a young woman who was also a clerk, and she was very, very nice (kudos to her parents) and suggested that I call CVS customer service. I told her that was a good idea and thanked her.

After I got home, I actually did call CVS customer service and was perturbed even further when the recorded answer said, on April 28, that service was slower than usual “because of the holiday season”. I guess it’s a pre-May Day rush.

In fact, a live person came on the phone almost immediately and was very, very helpful (kudos to his parents). He told me that the phone number on the account was changed to my cell phone number two months ago. Okay, I said, I will use that number from now on. But the only thing I could think of is that I changed, at the pharmacy, the phone number they should use to inform me about waiting prescriptions. I guess that changed the phone number everywhere in the wonderful world of CVS. Problem solved.

(5) Haberman. We were all set for a program towards the end of May at a large, exclusive residential condominium community filled with potential donors and interesting program participants, only to learn that our speaker had developed a conflict and would be out of the country on the day of the program. This in spite of several emails going back and forth confirming the date, the topic and the compensation. Nothing we can do about that. And it’s too late to arrange and publicize a substitute program. I am not happy about this one.

(6) And then there’s the weather.

(7) And the president

By the way, King Charles gave a very good speech. Did we make a mistake in 1776?

John Wilkes Booth. Charles Hinckley. Lee Harvey Oswald. Even Squeaky Fromme. They sound like assassins. But Cole Allen? Nah. Maybe a relief pitcher for the Dodgers.

Now, I guess it is the assumption of the White House that Allen was sitting in his house in Torrance, California, minding his own business, winding down his day, planning his next teaching assignment, when he decided, on a lark perhaps, to turn on Jimmy Kimmel and heard Kimmel joke about young Melania looking forward to her post-Trump years, after her almost 80 year old husband kicks the bucket. The joke (which none of us consider either tasteful or funny) tickled young Allen, who immediately decided to pack up his weapons, jump on the next Amtrak, check into the Washington Hilton, and attempt to make Melania’s dreams come true. “It’s the eighth inning,” Allen said to himself, “and time for me to show them what I have, to show them that my fastball can get their screwball.” And away he went.

And a beautiful ride it was. From the Pacific Ocean through the desert, the Rockies, the heartland, all the way to the shores of Lake Michigan and then beyond. He and his weaponry check into the Washington Hilton the night before the White House Correspondents Dinner, and he is treated like any not-quite-a-star major league reliever, and takes a room for two nights (that’s a guess) at $356 a night (according to Booking.com), leaving them credit card information to be processed after he departs. Whether he has $712 in his bank account to reimburse Visa or Discovery (used everywhere) or whomever was probably irrelevant to him, because he did not expect to leave the hotel alive. He thought he would more likely leave a martyr to the cause.

His plan to assassinate the leader of an independent (and major, truth be told) country was not well thought out, it appears. Or at least it did not turn out to have been well thought out. If his major target, Donald Trump, had been the assassin, rather than the target, he would have gone about it much differently. He would not have been so personally involved in the actual act itself. He would have stayed watching Jimmy Kimmel (and those other late night show hosts, all at the same time) in his personal quarters, and – say – asked his Pete (that is, Pete Hegseth, not Pete Buttigieg) to “take it from here”. And his Pete would have obliged, just as he did when Donald Trump did decide to assassinate the leader of another independent (and major, truth be told) country, the Ayatollah K.

A digression. Have you noticed that the parents who name their child Pete typically have last names that are hard to pronounce and spell? The Allens named their son Cole, not Pete. Had they named him Pete, history might have been different. No major league team would have called up a relief pitcher named Pete Allen. Not a chance. I asked AI about Major League Petes, and they told me about Pete Incavaglia, and Pete Vuckovich, among others. Who were the others? I am not going to list them because they destroy my theory.

Okay. Back to the main theme. I wouldn’t say that just because Trump himself acted as an assassin (indirectly) that he should be fair game for other assassins. Not at all. I, in fact, have been against assassination my entire life, and see no reason to change my opinion now. But just saying, there is some pot-calling-the-kettle-blackism here.

I immediately knew that the initial reaction of the Trump White House would be: if we had this event in the White House ballroom (to be constructed), this never would have happened. Maybe not. Maybe so. Maybe Cole Allen just would have needed a different approach. He might have been the guy hired to inflate the balloons, you know. So, I think this argument is specious (as if once the ballroom is completed, the president will never leave the White House grounds), and I must say that I am appalled by the letter that the Executive Department still known (to some) as the Department of Justice sent to the National Trust for Historic Preservation, telling the Trust that it is time for them to drop their law suit to stop the despoliation (why isn’t it “despoilation”?) of the White House grounds, telling the Trust that its continuation of the lawsuit puts the First Family at extreme risk. As if this would even be a reason to stop a lawsuit, if true. Think of all the litigation brought by or supported by the DOJ that puts all of us at extreme risk. For shame.

Now, as I said, I do not want to see Donald Trump become another target of assassination. But there are things I would like to see. I would like to see Donald Trump become so fearful of another attempted assassination that he decides that enough is enough and that he resigns the presidency, and moves back to Palm Beach, where he can golf and enjoy Jimmy Kimmel in (relative) peace.

Is that possible? As they say, truth is stranger than satire.

The big news of the day, according to several of the news sources I look at is that the fellow who attempted to break into the correspondents’ dinner and shoot the president was someone who didn’t like Donald Trump. It took the media some time to come to that conclusion, but it seemed pretty likely to me pretty quickly.

Like Donald Trump, I guess I reach conclusions by my gut. So what does my gut tell me about whether it would be less likely that a man such as Cole Allen could have breached security at the Washington Hilton more easily than at a ballroom on the grounds of the White House. Obviously, this is what President Trump would like you to conclude.

I am actually not certain. There certainly have been instances when White House security has been breached, and breaching a White House ball room would certainly create a challenge to potential breachers. A challenge that some perhaps would welcome. It would be unlikely, for certain, that a Cole Allen could get in position to rush a magnetometer, but there would be other opportunities. For example, a dinner such as Saturday night’s, which have several thousands of guests coming in, require all sorts of food and decorator and hospitality staffs, all kinds of equipment and supplies moving in, and so forth. The White House grounds would be open to many more people, and for a longer period of time, and that could lead to all sorts of problems.

Yes, it is easy to say that events like this week’s could not happen on the White House grounds, but don’t be so sure. And, if you are really so concerned about the president’s safety, you would keep the president more under wraps. Political rallies would be a no-no (certainly what happened at the Washington Hilton could happen at any political rally), as would the off-hand trips that presidents take to various parts of the country (and the world), virtually all of which are taken for political reasons. Chaos could erupt anywhere and the surprising thing is how seldom this in fact happens.

And, of course, Donald Trump being Donald Trump, he has to show his fortitude to the world by telling the White House Correspondents’ Association that they have to reschedule their dinner within 30 days. If this is done, it will be a miracle, but so far the WHCA has not told the president that it is impossible. But the only way this dinner could be scheduled at the Hilton would, I am sure, be to bump other activities there. There are very few nights (certainly very few weekend nights) when that hotel is not filled with activities, often involving the same ballroom where the dinner was held last Saturday. You have to book hotels in Washington for major events like this months, sometimes years (yes, years) in advance. I bet the Correspondents have the 2027 dinner already booked, maybe even the 2028.

And then there are the logistics for such a dinner. All of the businesses and organizations involved (to say nothing about WHCA members and their guests) who also have their activities scheduled over the next month. Any reprise of this dinner would involve many fewer people, I would guess. People have other things to do.

And then there is the cost. I don’t know how this dinner is paid for, but can you imagine the cost of putting on a dinner for 2,000 at the Washington Hilton. Especially, this dinner? Would you expect the WHCA (how much money do journalists have these days?) to foot this bill again? Do you expect the Hilton will not only make arrangements for the dinner to occur over the next month and, because all of this was “their fault” (even if you could argue that it was, which would be hard), they should pay for the Second Coming of our president to their midst? Is there insurance that covers cancellation or disruption based on a shooter? I doubt it, but obviously I don’t know.

And then there are the security issues. How would security be handled at a repeat event when the discussions seem to be revolving around security deficiencies at the event that was so abruptly disrupted? It will take time to devise a new security plan, and since the security breach apparently involved the failure of the hotel and the failure of the original security plan to check to make sure that those people staying at the hotel were not bringing in weapons.

So, all of this makes it very unlikely that there will be a second White House Correspondents’ dinner within the next four weeks.

And besides this, what about the general relationship between the president and the correspondence that cover him in the White House. It is obviously not the best, he has distorted the allowable press corps to enable right wing news organizations to take the place of many mainstream or left leaning organizations, and (as recently as the day after the aborted dinner – i.e., yesterday morning) Trump continues to berate the press and individual journalists in vicious and completely unacceptable terms. Yes, just yesterday, after agreeing to be interviewed on Sixty Minutes, Trump treated Nora O’Donnell as a drill sergeant treats a recruit only because she asked him something about the shooter’s purported “manifesto” contained in communications to family members.

In the meantime, there is a war going on the Trump has started but can not stop, there is corruption at the highest levels of our government, the Department of Homeland Security has still not been funded for the current fiscal year, our weaponry has been depleted and our budget deficit is growing precipitously, and we could go on and on.

I am going to stop here. Enough on this subject. You should now that when I sat down this morning, this was not going to be my topic at all (other than a brief mention), but that I was going to talk about the remarkable session yesterday we, at the Haberman Institute for Jewish Studies, had with Dr. Daniel Matt on aspects of Jewish mysticism and the Zohar. You don’t have to be Jewish to enjoy Levy’s Rye Bread (isn’t that the old slogan?), and you don’t have to be a Jewish mystic to enjoy listening to Daniel Matt talk about the Zohar.

Some other time.

Please be advised that this was written before the President’s 10:30 p.m. press conference.

You want a White House Ballroom? The chances have increased tonight, now that there was a shooting at the Washington Hilton where the President was to speak at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner. Wait and see. Trump couldn’t have organized this better.

The Washington Hilton is the standard venue for very big events like this, whether they involve the government or not. A few thousand people can be served dinner in the Hilton ballroom, and you can’t get that amount of room elsewhere.

But the Washington Hilton can be very problematic. It depends on your age whether you think that 40 years is a long time or not, but 40 years ago, Ronald Reagan was shot and almost killed as he left the ballroom. And now this.

There are other problems with the Hilton, and perhaps this would be the case anywhere. When there is a large event at the Hilton involving a president, security sets up a large perimeter around the hotel, blocking streets and cutting off traffic. When this happens at night, this is bad enough. But when it happens during the day, such as it does every year with the National Prayer Breakfast, when the traffic on Connecticut Avenue, a very major commuting street, is brought to a complete halt.

Argument after argument for a White House Ballroom. Clearly, no matter how hard the Hilton tries to protect its guests (and there is an extraordinary amount of attention to security), including when the guest list includes the president of the United States, there can be breaches. Maybe the same would be true if the event were held at the White House; but maybe not.

We don’t yet know what the attacker had in mind. Was he after the president, or was he going to fire randomly? But it does show that, even if the shooter’s final goal was not met, a shooter can cause a lot of damage and create a lot of havoc.

And, because any event like this tends to encourage others to follow suit, you have to worry about other possible attacks. And that would include attacks on synagogues, for example. Today, there were probably 500 or more at Adas Israel, all coming through one door, and everyone having to go through magnetometer. But how sensitive is that magnetometer? It is certainly not set at the level you have at airports or certain government buildings. And if an individual or group decided to storm the entrance, how much resistance could the guards put up? The entrance opens right into the large foyer leading to the various building venues, and people are always wandering back and forth. Clearly, there would be casualties, and evenings and events like tonight make you realize what unfortunately is possible.

Tomorrow (Sunday), we are spending most of the day at another DC area synagogue, B’nai Israel in Rockville at a Haberman Institute Day of Learning featuring scholar Daniel Matt teaching about the Zohar. When you think about how much time we, our family members, and others we know spend in Jewish institutions, it does make you wonder what might happen.

On the other hand (sorry, but this is where my mind is now), tragedy can strike anywhere. We just completed at 2000+ mile road trip with an 83 year old driver. How safe is that? And, just this week, there was a tragedy in St. Louis, when prominent St. Louis journalist and booster, Ray Hartmann was killed when he was simply driving on Highway 64 at the Highway 270 exit, a location about one half mile from where we were staying, and an intersection which we passed while in town last week. How was Hartmann killed? He did nothing wrong, nor did anyone else. He was killed when two tires on a semi-trailer truck exploded and flew at his car. Who would have thunk that possible?

POSTSCRIPT: the shooter was apparently a 31 year old Caltech graduate with no criminal record or known history of instability known to those who knew him as brilliant. You never can tell.

Last night, I wrote my post for this morning and, as is often the case, when I woke up and thought about it, I decided it wasn’t quite right. Not that it didn’t say anything, but it really didn’t say anything the way I wanted to say it. So I am starting over.

I often hear the question asked in the Jewish circles I tend to travel in, usually rhetorically, “are you a Zionist?”. Sometimes it is asked during a speech, or a sermon, and the answer, given by the speaker, is always the same: “of course, I support Israel”. For a long time, I thought that, if that question was asked directly to me, my answer would be: “it depends how you define Zionist”. And, I guess that it still the correct answer, and the word “Zionist” can have many definitions, none of which are ever really spelled out.

As I have said in this blog several times, I think the term “Zionist” should be retired, and relegated to history. One reason is that there really are several possible definitions of the term, and when one claims to be a Zionist, you don’t really know what that means (other than “I support Israel”, whatever that means). And for many, mostly those who do not “support Israel”, the word “Zionist” has become pejorative. “You are a Zionist? Away with you.” Who needs it?

I had to spend a fair amount of time in my car yesterday, driving from home to Wheaton to Union Station to home, and I listened to podcast interviews with two prominent, Israeli-born, Jewish, anti-Zionist academics, Professor Omer Bartov of Brown University, and Professor Emeritus Yakov Rabkin of the University of Montreal. I don’t want to put words into their mouths, but I would say that, while neither of them want to see Israel wiped off the earth or its Jewish citizens harmed, their anti-Zionism goes beyond being against the Netanyahu government’s policies, and goes to the entire concept that led to the foundation of the State of Israel in 1948.

They separate the religious concept of a “return to Zion” (as proclaimed daily in Jewish liturgy) from the concept of political Zionism, as developed in the late 19th century in Europe. They remark that the earliest European Zionists were for the most part not religious at all, often socialist, and that their reconciliation of their own belief systems, and the concept of the Jews having a right to particular real estate given to them by a God that they didn’t really believe in, was always very problematic. They remark that the most religious of Jews have often never supported the concept of political Zionism, believing that the return to the Promised Land would have to await the coming of the Messiah.

They talk about the reaction of most Jews 130 years or so ago to the then new Zionist movement. It was antagonistic and oppositional, often publicly so. In fact, it wasn’t until the end of the World War II and the understanding of the breadth of the Holocaust that the concept of a Jewish homeland in Palestine became more widely accepted. During the late 19th and early 20th centuries, when Jews were pouring out of the Russian empire (with the approval of the tsars, of course), less than 1% chose Palestine as a destination.

They also talk about who were the allies of the Zionists when the majority of Jews wanted nothing to do with barren Palestine. They were often the antisemites, those who wanted to give the Jews a place to go so that they would voluntarily leave the places where they were living. Lord Balfour, I heard one of them say, pressed for what became known as the Balfour declaration because he wanted to curtail Jewish immigration into England, and that the only cabinet member in Britain who opposed the Balfour Declaration was Edwin Montagu, the only Jewish member of the cabinet, who was afraid of the effect it would have on the Jews of England. They cite Theodor Herzl’s statement that the antisemites are our best allies.

The upshot of all of this is that Zionism and Judaism, or Zionism and the Jewish people, are far from necessary partners. They also recognize, of course, that Zionism as a movement has been radically successful. It went from a fringe movement of Central European intellectuals to a mass movement which ended with the formation of the State of Israel, and the movement to Israel of Jews not only from Europe (mainly survivors of the Holocaust), but from countries in the greater Middle East and North Africa, where there had never been a Zionist movement at all.

But the concept of a state for the Jewish people was to create a state like all others. It was not to make the Jewish people special, but to make the Jewish people a people like all others. And once the State was declared and populated, the Zionist movement had accomplished its political goals, and Israel would have been better off if at that time, it had lost its particular Zionist identity.

But the Jews who came to Israel, these two academics say, were conditioned from their previous homelands to be treated specially (negatively special, of course, for the most part) and to be suspicious of everyone around them, and to resort to violence when necessary to protect themselves. This ethos, which one of them said emanated from the Jews leaving Russia who formed the base of early Israeli political leadership, was carried over to Israel and influenced Israel’s views of neighboring countries. Of course, there was more than a base in reality for the fear of their neighbors, who after all didn’t want the Jews there in the first place. But, for these academics, Israel, after its victory in 1948, could have taken a very different approach to its neighbors than it did, and this could have resulted in something much different from the situation we find ourselves in today.

I am not arguing in support of the overall positions of either Orlov or Rabkin, but I find their arguments very interesting and thought provoking.

And it coincides with my belief that it is time to retire the word “Zionism”.

Throughout history, religion and political control have gone hand in hand. It wasn’t until the end of the 18th century, and the French and American revolutions, that the concept of separating church and state became a reality, spurred by anti-monarchial movements led primarily by Freemasons. This was progress, and became something that we take for granted.

This church- state separation did not take place in most Muslim countries, and – in spite of the lofty ideals in Israel’s Declaration of Independence – in this sense Israel has become more like its Muslim neighbors than its European founders first imagined it would. We have two peoples claiming the same land, as we have had since the Balfour Declaration was issued. The conflict will continue until new leadership arises on both sides willing to drop religious claims to the land. Where are those 18th century Freemasons now that we really need them?

Last night, we had dinner with our good friend Bruce, down from New York for the annual meeting of the American Society of International Law. We decided to go to one of the new restaurants in our neighborhood, BirdSong, a Thai restaurant which has received strong reviews. We had tried to get a reservation at BirdSong on a weekend several weeks ago and couldn’t, and I was looking forward to giving it a try. My reaction: disappointment.

The restaurant, on upper Connecticut Avenue in Chevy Chase, is in the spot formerly occupied by Blue 44, and has completely redone the space, taking a comfortable neighborhood restaurant and turning into a very generic restaurant space with no particular personality and certainly nothing to make it apparent that you are in a Thai restaurant. But that is irrelevant, in fact. Let’s get to more important things.

First, the good. The menu includes a number of specialty cocktails, a list that I almost always ignore. But for some reason last night, I gave them a close look, and I actually ordered one. The name (meaningless to me) was Krungthep Fruit Cart, a mixture of tequila, lychee, lemongrass, lime, and mezcal mist. In fact the ingredients were also meaningless to me, but the waiter told me that it tasted like a margarita, and that was enough for me. As a drink, it is smooth, half-way between sweet and not so sweet, and easily drinkable.

What is Krungthep anyway? It turns out it is Thai for City of Angels, and is a name often used to describe Bangkok. Who knew? In fact, the name of the various specialty cocktails are rather unique, and tell you nothing about the drink itself. For example (and only one example), what do you think a Ha-ha-ha is?

The second good thing to point out is that one of the restaurant’s appetizers, deep-fried chive cakes, are a perfect appetizer. Small, two-bite sized pancake like pieces, filled with fried chives (new to me) and a soy dip. Perfect start to a meal.

But then came the main dishes. I had a simple Thai fried rice with chicken, Bruce had a noodle dish with bok choy and chicken, and Edie had a vegaetarian red cabbage curry. The red cabbage curry was tasty and mild, but you had to want a bowlful of cabbage and little else. The fried rice and the noodle dish (called a ba mee) seemed okay. The fried rice was not too different from what you would get at a less expensive Thai restaurant, and perhaps not quite as tasty as you find in many (where basil is more prominent). But the chicken was not cooked with the fried rice, and it was not cooked with the noodle, bok choy combination. Identical chicken, in relatively large pieces, were just placed on top of the two dishes. It seems to me that this is a sign that the kitchen is placing ease of preparation over best preparation. I was disappointed. We probably will not return.

But it is only about a mile up the street, so very convenient. And that got me thinking about how many restaurants were less than a mile, or maybe a mile and a quarter from our house. The one block between Fessenden and Nebraska contains: a coffee shop, a Mexican restaurant, an American restaurant, an ice cream parlor, a pizza house, a French restaurant and an Italian restaurant. If you go towards town about three blocks to the next commercial block, you get a Thai restaurant, another pizza house, an Indian restaurant, a burger joint, and an Asian tea house. If you go north to the neighborhood of Birdsong, you also find a coffee shop, another pizza house, a breakfast-lunch cafe/bakery, a fancy seafood restaurant, a sandwich shop, a Subway, and a few others (like one called Skip) that I know little about. And finally, if you go a mile west to Wisconsin Avenue, you find yourself on a block with two pizza restaurants, a Chinese restaurant, a French restaurant, another French restaurant, an Indian restaurant, a Mexican restaurant, and another coffee shop. That is almost 30 restaurants within a mile and a quarter.

Some time ago, I listed the groceries within about the same distance – Giant, Mom’s, Safeway, Magruders, Trader Joe’s, Wegman’s, Whole Foods, and so on. No food desert here.

I have often made a point of discussing some books that I have recently read, and you may have noted that I have not done this in some time. That’s because, in spite of a strong reading start for 2026, over the past month or so, I have slowed down considerably. In fact, it took me over a month to read Howard Sachar’s Fairwell Espana: the World of the Sephardim Remembered. It was an unusual book for me to pick up off the shelf for several reasons. First, it is a long book, and second because Sachar wrote it over 30 years ago, and scholarship has changed since then, I am sure.

But he writes well, and I enjoyed my slow read. I just wish that I could retain more than I know I will. The book (which I think I already read, decades ago) was organized both chronologically and geographically. There were chapters about the history (good and bad) of the Jews of Spain and Portugal, but also separate chapters on the dispersion of Jews after 1492. These included chapters on Turkey (also good and bad), Italy (good and bad), North Africa (good and bad), France (good and bad), England (good and bad), Greece (good and bad), the Balkan countries (good and bad), Palestine (good and bad), Brazil (good and bad), Mexico (good and bad), and the Caribbean (good and bad).

In fact, each of these chapters was equally interesting. In virtually every place, Jews were at first welcomed and then, either because of religious ascendancy or commercial competition, were evicted or oppressed (or both). In each location, there were great successes, and there were very successful individuals (mostly, but not exclusively men) who accomplished much in many diverse fields. Some of these individuals are well known – Maimonides, Spinoza, Disraeli to name a few – within and outside of Jewish scholarly circles, and some of whom – Isaac Abravanel, Beatriz Mendes, David Reubeni, Shabbatai Zvi, to name an additional few – are less known outside of Jewish scholarly circles.

Generally, I would recommend this book becauses it is so comprehensive. Sachar references almost every thing of importance to his subject (with the exception of early Sephardim in the United States), and never seems to write too much or too little about anything. It is the kind of book that tells a full story if you read it cover to cover, like I have, or if you simply go to its lengthy and thorough index, and look up one individual, or one location.

While I have been reading this book, I have been doing additional family history work in connection with a presentation I will be making to a group early next month. I have found that I can reach back generations on both sides of my family, but on each side only by following one ancestral line; the others get lost. For example, I can go to my maternal grandfather, and to his grandmother, and keep going back until the 17th century following one line. And following a different line on my father’s side, I can go back further than that. Neither of these lines appear to include any reference to Sephardic Jews, even though I apparently had ancestors who lived in Italy and Turkey, among other places. My 23 and Me test concluded that I was 100% (or was it 98%) Ashkenazic Jewish. I guess that means that, even if I could follow back other ancestral lines, I would never find that I was a descendant of Moses Maimonides. A descendant of Rashi? That might be another story.

Two other things.

First, yes, Sachar does talk about Christopher Columbus. He doesn’t really give his opinion on whether Columbus’ ancestry to Italian or Spanish and, if Spanish, was it Jewish Spanish. He presents some of the arguments for why Columbus might have been Jewish, but then concludes that most scholars who have studied the question do not think that he was. I myself think that Columbus probably was Jewish based on several books I have read, and of course this conclusion was supported by recent DNA testing. But the DNA testing was not available to Sachar and I wonder how differently he would present his description of Columbus today.

Second, you know how some people look Jewish? The times I have been in Spain, I have always thought that many Spaniards, especially urban Spaniards, look Jewish, and I have read that perhaps 25% of Spaniards are descended from Jews who converted to Christianity during the 14th or 15th centuries. And when I say that these Spaniards look Jewish, I am comparing them to the people that belong to Adas Israel, my synagogue. In other words, I am comparing them primarily to Ashkenazic Jews, not Sephardic Jews. I don’t think this makes real life sense. The descendants of Jews in Spain would be the descendants of Sephardim, and the Sephardim and Ashkenazic Jews split long ago, perhaps during Roman time.

But, wait. Maybe this split was only a cultural split, a linguistic split, and to some extent a split in religious practice. Maybe it was not a genetic split at all. I say “maybe”, of course, because I don’t really know. My evidence is empirical, based on a number of trips to Spain where I could sit in cafes and look at the passers-by. That is not good evidence. But someone out there knows the answer to this. This is a question that has an answer if I ever heard one. Or is it?

And bananas? I just read that humans and bananas share 60% of their genes. If this ridiculous fact is correct, can it be surprising that Jews from Barcelona and Jews from Siberia look alike? And is it even more surprising that none of them resemble bananas?

So I was wrong when I suggested that the proposal to redo the Congressional districts in Virginia to favor the Democrats would not pass. Yesterday’s election showed that Virginia will have (barring Court interference) new districts at least for the 2026 midterms. The proposal to redo the districts passed by 3 percentage points, 51.5% to 48.5%, or by a little fewer than 100,000 votes in an overall vote of just over 3,000,000. But in the election for governor of the state (okay, the Commonwealth), only 5 months ago, Democrat Abigail Spanberger won by over 15%, so at least I was on the right track.

The GOP will of course run to the Courts, and will certainly forum shop for the right District judge in Virginia, but it will probably be a tall order, even for our Trump-tilting Supreme Court in light of previous decisions, but you never can tell. But will it will mean is that a quite purple state will be almost entirely represented by blue members of Congress. Is that alright? On the one hand, it looks unfair. On the other hand, if there is a full state race, say for a Senate seat, and the winner wins by one vote out of 3 million, the winner still wins and the losing party is out of luck. So maybe it is just a question of how you look at it.

As of now, it looks like there will be an extended ceasefire in Iran. For how long? For as long as Trump wants it to continue. It might never end; it might end by noon. We don’t know and the Iranian people don’t know. In the meantime, there seems to be no ceasefire in the Persian Gulf or in the Strait of Hormuz. Both sides seem to feel that they can do whatever they want (as long as they don’t attack each other, I guess), and the third party shippers and the worldwide customers are the victims. Just like the victims of the American strikes on Iran have been ordinary Iranians (by the numbers), if Iranian political and military leaders (by the percentages).

There seems to be a feeling in the United States that Iran is a country of democratic-leaning citizens and religiously radical leaders. I would suggest that this is not fully the case. As in most countries, the residents of large urban areas, more educated and worldly than their rural counterparts, tend to favor more sophisticated forms of government. So when you look at Tehran, where the large metropolitan area contains about 15% of the total population of the country, and in other major cities, you do have a lot of support for a different form of government. But the rural population is probably much more religiously conservative, and (this is a guess on my part) provides an outsized number of members of the IRGC and the military.

In other words, Iran, like other countries, is complex, and even if the majority of its residents would like to see a major governmental shift, the existing government, with its exclusive control of internal power, is not fully unrepresentative of the country. And clearly all elements of the country – religious or not, educated or not, governmental supporters or not – are very patriotic and do not want to see their country become a vassal of the United States of Trump.

So while Trump may think that Iran is just another Venezuela (assuming that Venezuela is just another Venezuela), it isn’t. Years ago (many, many years ago), I read through a Penguin paperback on the history of Iran by a man named Roman Ghirshman (no, I didn’t remember his name; had to Google the book, simply called Iran), a Ukrainian born, French archeologist who spent 30 years in Persia/Iran and died in Budapest. I remember (I think) that he started the book (written in 1954) saying that the Persians/Iranians felt that they lived in the center of the world, that their civilization was the oldest and most central to human history. And I remember scoffing at that, but – by the end of the book – thought that this might just be correct.

That’s all I remember. No details at all. But since then I have understood that, in dealing with Iran, we are dealing with a very proud, and very accomplished people. This is not Venezuela, a still young former Spanish colony in the tropics of South America.

So, que sera, sera (as Gogi Grant or Rosemary Clooney or someone else, but not Theresa Brewer, used to say), and as they still must say in Venezuela. We will see what happens in Iran. But a few things are clear: neither side wants to give in and neither side will, and neither side is trustworthy, meaning that the results of the negotiations (should they actually continue to take place) and the results on the ground may have nothing in common with each other. And whatever is decided by either on Tuesday can be undecided by Wednesday evening. We are playing a long game here.

I gotta run. Rockville calls.

Today is the referendum in Virginia as to whether its Congressional districts dhould be withdrawn to possibly give Democrats four more, and Republicans four fewer, seats. That is important, and as we drove almost 400 miles across the state last weekend, we saw many billboards on both sides of the issue.

Virginia is pretty purple. Its blue districts are blue and its red districts red. The governorship goes back and forth.

Odds say that the “yes” votes, the Democrats, will win by a small margin. Maybe so, but I am concerned. No Republican will vote for redistricting. And there are two kinds of Denocrats or left leaning independents who will. One consists of those who are strongly against gerrymandering as a matter of principle, no matter what the rationale. The other consists of moderates who voted for recently elected Democratic Governor Abigail Spanberger and who believe that she has moved too far to the left since her inauguration and who have developed a fear that other Democrats will do the same.

We shall see how many voters are in those two categories. And we shall see that soon.

I am sitting in the lobby of the Bethesda Endoscopy Center waiting for Edie to finish her colonoscopy. The prep ended with a 4 a.m. dose of whatever it’s called, and Edie was not the only one who woke up. Then, we needed to be up for real at about 6:45 to get here in time for her appointment. So, as I now sit in thr lobby, what I need more than anything is a good cup of coffee.

The Bethesda Endoscopy Center is not located in downtown Bethesda, but in that no man’s land that is no longer really Bethesda, but not quite yet Rockville. It is on Executive Boulevard, a street with 6 or 8 story contemporary office buildings, each on its own large, landscaped lot, surrounded by parking.

The Endoscopy Center shares the third floor of its building with an office of Capital Digestive Care. Don’t let anyone fool you. These two organizations look to be one.

There are, I am sure, state of the art facilities. They have everything you could possibly need. Except that longed for  cup of coffee. In fact, that cup of coffee can’t be found anywhere in the building.

There is also no coffee in the next building up the street. Or in the one after that. You have to walk three buildings away to find a cafe in an office building on Executive Boulevard.

I do wonder what type of offices are in these buildings. This one, and the one with the cafe, seem spacious and quiet. I think there is a marquis in the lobby. I should look. My phone tells me that there is a shared office suite at this address. That probably explains the young woman in the elevator who told me she wished someone opened a coffee shop in her office, that they have extra space.

The cafe is at 6120 Executive Blvd.

The cafe is on the lower level. There is a large conference center down there, where they were serving breakfast, and where I almost helped myself. The spread looked pretty good. There is also a Game Room where, even though it was dark, I spotted a ping pong table. Who knows what else they have there. And on the lobby floor, there seems to be a large day care center.

6120 did not have a lobby marquis. It has a desk for a receptionist, but it was unmanned. My phone though makes me think that interesting things go on there. The American Association of Anatomists, the American Physiological Society, and the American Society of Human Genetics are all there, along with a variety of medical and dental offices.

Well, I still have about an hour to wait. I think I have said enough for today. I brought Rachel Maddow’s Drift to read. I have now had enough coffee to give it a try.

I am not sure that I quoted Cole Porter exactly right above, but it’s close enough for government work. And speaking of government work, now that I am back home, I am able to look at a morning newspaper, in this case the NYT, and refresh my perspective on the world.

There are two articles on the front page of the NYT that caught my attention, and that you may want to look at. The first one is headlined “Syrians, Needing U.S. Help, Invoke Trump Name”. Looking at that headline, you might imagine that they are talking about a large movement composed of Syrians who need some assistance to navigate this world. But, no, they are talking about the Al-Khayyat family, led by three brothers who seem to control everything worth controlling in the new Syria. The article starts out by talking about the Al-Khayyat plan to build a mega-resort on the Syrian coast, and how for this to be accomplished they needed, among other things, the relaxation or elimination of sanctions against the company, and how they accomplished this by one simple move. They decided to name the resort after President Trump. The article goes on to discuss the corruption of the Al-Khayyat family and the corruption of the Trump family, and how while the Al-Khayyat family may be working in the way wealthy families normally work in Syria, the Trump family has turned American standards and morals upside down. No surprise here, but the article lays out the relationship between the two families very clearly and makes for very interesting reading. For example, while all this is going on, did you know that the Ivanka Jareds are helping finance a large Al-Khayyat family resort development in ……….. Albania?

The other article is “Justice Dept. Installs Trump Loyalist to Head Effort to Paint Foes as Conspirators”. The question is: “whether former federal officials committed crimes in investigating President Trump”. The investigation is being undertaken in Florida, using a grand jury supervised by good old Judge Aileen Cannon (Trump’s favorite) and headed by a new “counselor to the Attorney General”, Joseph diGenova. DiGenova, who is 81 years old and a former U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia, is a nut (that probably goes without saying; it is obvious or he would not have been selected for this task). I quote from Wikipedia: “He is known for promoting conspiracy theories about the Department of Justice and the FBI. He……frequently appeared on Fox News and Fox Business channels, until [he] used a November 2019 appearance to spread conspiracy theories about George Soros, leading to widespread calls for him to be banned from the network”.

It just goes on and on. And we have no idea, of course, what is happening with the war against Iran – I will say that the turns and twists are interesting and entertaining. I just wish they didn’t affect real people. My assumption is that things will probably work out before we go back to active war (my assumptions are right about 50% of the time, you know), and that there will be some accommodations on the Strait of Hormuz (hence the Strait of Trump/Hormuz, and the most beautiful strait of them all) that will satisfy the Iranians and the Trump family.

I also assume that the Trump family will be satisfied once things are more clarified in Gaza and they can begin to build their resorts there (perhaps with the Al-Khayyat family in tow). Today is Memorial Day in Israel, a serious day indeed, when everything stops and silence reigns for a short time, bringing all traffic to a halt in the country. And, of course, it is being memorialized at a time when the country is at war (ceasefire or no) with both Iran and Hezbollah in Lebanon, and yes still with Hamas in Gaza.

Let’s repeat what I have suggested before. The current government in Israel, which shows no real signs of changing or disappearing, will not be satisfied until Israel’s boundaries go from the sea (including all of Gaza) to the rivers (plural, because I am referring to the Jordan to the east and the Litani to the north). The theory is that these areas are all infested with Hamas and Hezbollah, and their Palestinian or Lebanese supporters, and the only way to rid the areas of mortal danger to Israel, is to engage in what is in effect ethnic cleansing, although this can never be admitted.

The problem is, that as much as this goes against both international law and the sense of morality that most of us have grown up with, it may be correct. It may be a question of Palestinian suffering today, or Israeli suffering tomorrow. And that, if the ethnic cleansing is not successful, Israel will always be in danger of attacks from across borders. This makes the moral judgment of what is going on now much more difficult that one would like it to be. And, as I have said several times, if the Netanayhu government is successful in pacifying (by whatever means) Gaza, southern Lebanon and the West Bank, so that Israel can live in security over the next 50 or 100 years, he will be a hero. And if he is not successful, or if his success is short lived, he will be a villain.

Whether it is what the next step regarding Iran should be, or what the next move for Israel should be against Iran or Iranian backed groups just over its borders….the world is just not as simple as one would like. But somethings are clear, like: Donald Trump is evil. There can be no equivocating on that.

Having now spent two straight nights at a Comfort Inn, I will say that I am not going to rush back soon. Not that there was anything particularly bad, but I just wouldn’t rush back. Well, a few things. In the hall, you could hear the conversations in every room. The breakfast had a large variety of things you don’t want to eat. On the other hand, very comfortable beds and today, an excellent shower.

Our driving day was to be only three hours, forty eight minutes. But I took care of that by stopping first at a McDonalds to get a coke because my mouth was dry. The very astute server in the sleekest, most modern McDonalds in the world told me that I was very lucky, that today he was allowed to sell a $1 senior coke to me, even though he could see how young I was.

And then I pulled off the road in Staunton (pronounced Stanton) to show Joan Woodrow Wilson’s birthplace.

Staunton is a beautiful town of about 25,000. It has extensive neighborhoods of beautiful, mostly older, homes, Wilson’s birthplace and presidential library, a well respected theater, and many trendy and (today) busy shops. Here is the Wilson library.

Staunton is also home to the Cabell Log House, built by a former enslaved man in 1869, and the center of a preservation effort. It is apparently one of the only existing log homes built by a freed slave in existence.

Throughout the trip, I have pointed out universities which I suggested Joam should consider, including of course Washington University in St. Louis. With each suggestion, Joan would tell me there was no chance. So when we got to Mary Baldwin University in Staunton, I told her I didn’t expect she would go there. Her response? ” I don’t know. I might want to go to college in Staunton.”

Her interest increased when we located a synagogue in Staunton.

It is a small synogogue with services only once or twice a month, but it has been operating for 150 years. We will see what effect Joan will have on it.

We had lunch at the Route 11 Diner in Woostock. What kind of a diner doesn’t serve breakfast after 11 a.m.? You guessed it. This kind! I reacted by eating my only meat of the trip. A Reuben. My reaction? Top quality. How do I judge a Reuben’s quality? By the ratio of sauerkraut to corned beef.

We continued up I-81 and then I-66. No problem until we got close to DC and the traffic picked up. But we were home by 3:30 and greeted by an important neighborhood resident, the Forest Hills fox.

You win some, you lose some. That is the teaching of today.

The goal of the day was to get within 4 hours of Washington, so we would have an easy day tomorrow. We accomplished that, but at a cost of a lot of highway driving with no diversions.

Of course we did have to stop for lunch. I got off the road about 1 p.m. My watch said it was noon, because I hadn’t taken the half hour it takes me to move it forward an hour, as I needed to do when we crossed Crossville, not long before we skirted Knoxville. The last time we traveled this route, Edie and I stopped at Oak Ridge and saw a number of sites dedicated to “the bomb”. This time, we just kept going.

Diversion. To change my Casio watch, you push the A button and hold it until the word “set” stops flashing. Then you push the B button 2 times. Then you push the C button 13 times. Then you push the A button again. See why I waited?

Well, at 1 Eastern time, noon Casio time, we got off the road to venture into Morristown TN. The two blocks that comprise downtown are unique in that there are two levels of establishments, the upper level reached by an outdoor walkway that also protects the street level sidewalks from hot sun and wet droplets.

Brilliant.

They also have a mailbox in the middle of the street.

Seen that anywhere else?

And, finally, they have a restaurant, The Little Dutch Restaurant, which has been in business since 1939. The current owners are not the original owners, and appear not to have figured out how a restaurant should operate, as they have only run it since 1973. Edie asked for the spinach quiche, right there on the menu. The waitress said they were sold out of spinach. I said that I would just have a tuna salad sandwich, but the waitress returned to the table to tell me they were out of tuna salad, too. Say, what? What were they missing? A can of tuna, a jar of mayonnaise, a jar of relish? She said, “But we can give you chicken salad. How’s that?” Edie got a Greek salad (pardon me, a Grecian salad), which came with a slab of feta about the size of a deck of cards. My chicken salad came on a dainty croissant, which had not been cut and was totally impossible to pick up, or to cut with a standard knife. As we left, the owner asked me how everything was. I said “fine”. He did not believe me for a second.

We drove on until we reached Roanoke, which looked like Boomtown, USA. Much has changed since my last visit. And all for the better, it seemed. And it was a top notch place twenty years or so ago.

Unfortunately, not one hotel in or around the city had a room. I was told there was the Miss Virginia contest, the Blue Ridge marathon, a baseball game, and more.

So here we are, about 15 miles further north, in a Comfort Inn room half the size and twice the price as the one in Lebanon last night. Go figure.

And, yes, supper at Angelle’s Diner was just fine. As has been the weather and scenery all day.

Before I get to today, our first day back on the road, let me tell you about yesterday at the St. Louis Zoo, always one of the highest ranked zoos in the country, which Wikipedia says has 16,000 animals, 25% more, for instance, than San Diego.

After we left the Art Museum, we had about 30 minutes to kill before our next engagement. We drove past the zoo and found a lucky parking space across from one of the two zoo entrances. Joan and I decided to take a quick look, to walk in and see the nearest animals and come back to the car.

Somehow, we walked to the center of the zoo, and saw no animals other than a flock of flamingos and a pond of stingrays.

Joan saw a sign that said that you could buy food to feed the stingrays for $2. I gave her the money and she took the receipt to the man at the gate who told her that the food was not sufficient, that she needed a $5 ticket. What’s more, he told her that because she wasn’t 14, I had to go in with her for another $5. So, it would be $12 to feed the stingrays, and neither of us wanted to do it that much, so Joan gave her receipt to another family. We then found the home of the red pandas, where there was a sign that said “We aren’t home today. Sorry.” And then various monkey homes, which were also all empty.

We concluded there were no animals at the zoo. We asked a zoo employee where they were and he told us the monkeys were in the monkey house because it might rain, and the monkey house entrance was far away. We had no  time to go there. We asked why the monkeys were removed when it rained. He had no answer, saying “I am not an animal person.” We all laughed at the strangeness of it all.

When we got to the zoo central plaza (all food and souvenirs), we realized we had better turn around and go back to the car. The only other animals we had seen were two ducks, and a number of squirrels.

As I said, there were two entrances. We tried to retrace our steps, but failed, and exited at the wrong place.

Well, we said, let’s walk around the outside until we see the car. How far can it be? We walked and walked, realizing we were in trouble. Then another zoo employee was walking the other way, off his shift and on the way to get his car. We asked him how far to the other entrance and he told us the quickest way was to double back, re-enter the zoo and retrace our steps. He then offered to walk with us and would not take no for an answer.

All in all, Joan and I each walked about 2 miles and the entire venture took about an hour. It also meant that we had walked in two separate directions from the center and had seen no additional animals. Oh, the second zoo man? He was not an animal man either. He was their HVAC guy. Our suspicions increased that the entire zoo was a fraud.

On our last night in town we had pizza and visited with good friends. This morning we had breakfast with cousins Donna and Ed, and then hit the road. What followed was a long day of driving with only one stop.

The stop?

Metropolis. Well, Metropolis IL. It was very disappointing. We saw the world’s largest Superman statue, and visited the cluttered seeming gift shop, overstocked with kitsch. We couldn’t bear to spend $24 to visit the unappealung looking Superman Museum with its 20,000 items. We had lunch at an adequate and very friendly Mexican restaurant, El Tequila, where you can find the largest and most bewildered Mexican Superman.

El hombre de acelo…

We drove through impressive downtown Nashville in rush hour (which means we drove very slowly) and got off the highway in Lebanon TN. By quirk of fate we found a 7 month old 19 seat restaurant. Run by a family of Laotian descent, it features  a pan-Asian cuisine. Because it is so small, and heimisch, we talked to the owner, his family/staff and some of the other customers, all of whom seemed to be regulars. The food gets an easy A.

And then? And then the skies opened up and we were lucky to get back to the hotel.

This is Joan. Yay, I get to be helpful.

Today we left Judy’s at around 9:30 and went to the Illusion Museum. BUT, I wanted to go to the store  known as IKEA! But, no.

From the Illusion Museum:

Next, we went to Crown Candy. G-pa got a tuna sandwich, grandma got an egg salad sandwich, and I got a grilled cheese. And ice cream.

Now the phone goes back to G-pa. He was my spelling editor.

The Museum of Illusion, at the St. Louis Foundry, like the City Museum, is great for a 10 11/12 year old. Crown Candy in North St. Louis has been around for 113 years. Their ice cream is top notch, they have a variety of candies, and their lunch menu is nothing to write home about.

From Crown, we continued north to Bellefontaine Cemetery, a 314 acre cemetery at its 175th birthday with over 87,000 graves. It is easy to get lost in Bellefontaine, as we proved today, trying to find the exit. A lot of famous people here. We found Adolphus Busch (Anheuser is somewhere here as well) and William S. Burroughs.

Then, on to the art museum

I showed Joan the Anselm Kiefers in the main lobby, but we spent the most time with Impressionists and their contemporaries. Joan was her thoughtful self.

For example, she noted that Matisse painted three women looking at a turtle, and noted that one pet it, one looked at it, and one was afraid of it. Different reactions to the same object.

She was also interested in Max Beckmann’s portrayal of New York City nightlife, analyzing every character and their roles.

And she was very hesitant to praise Adolph Ivon’s Genius of America (1867), which she didn’t think portrayed the unified America it was supposed to.

She thought the Blacks were portrayed in darkness and being patronized while the Whites were beung welcomed with open arms.

After that came the discovery that the world renowned 16,000 animal St. Louis zoo has only stingrays and flamingos. But that is too long of a story to tell now.

Still in St. Louis

We had lunch with old friends, and then dinner with other equally old friends, both at their residences. This had two advantages. It gave us delightful company. And we didn’t have to buy any meals. Joan came with us to both and bore the meals in good humor. My friend Stuart “insulted” her by suggesting that she inherited my sense of humor. I think this was after he asked her, “What have you planned for the future?”. Her response? “Middle school.”

By the way, when you and most of your friends are 83, the most common question no longer appears to be “So tell me what’s new?”

Now, it seems to be, “What day is it today?”. And this is a question that is asked over and over by each friend, about ten minutes apart.

Our morning, with Joan and her Aunt Michelle, was spent looking at the house I lived in through third grade at 7133 Delmar (now white, then dark red), and retracing the walk between my house and Flynn Park School. Then we looked at house I lived in through high school at 8590 Colonial Lane (also now white, and enlarged). Joan had already seen my high school.

We also went to see the house my Aunt Loraine and Uncle Sam lived in (now within walking distance of a Costco of all things), and then went to the cemetery where my parents, my four grandparents, and most of my aunts and uncles are buried.

But the highlight of the day was our almost three hour trip to the City Museum, just right for a ten year old. Mysterious tunnels to crawl through all over the 11 story former International Shoe Company building with a Ferris Wheel on the roof. For the adults, a mini-aquarium, and insect and taxidermy collection and much more.

And robots

Hard to break away. But glad we did.

I have no idea what is going on in the rest of the world. Is Trump still president? Has he renamed the Strait of Hormuz? Is Victor Orban going to try to ressurect his career and, if so, will he call it Orban Renewal? Is J.D. Vance going to defend the Pope? Can the Pope run for president and still wear his red shoes? Does he want to? 

Today is our last day here. No toasted ravioli, no Ted Drewes frozen custard. By the way, do you know that Ted Drewes has a kosher menu? Look at their website.

Where to go today. Joan wants the aquarium. Maybe the Art Museum. Could do the zoo. We shall see. Crown Candy for lunch?

So……a relatively quiet day in St. Louis yesterday largely devoted to family, and ending with dinner with first cousins all around. Here is our delightful dinner group, without my cousin Donna and me, who were too intent in our conversation to join in.

We did take a break from family for a few hours to show Joan the arch from up close. It is still here,

but I am sometimes a bit slow. I should have taken a picture with her in it. You know: Joan of Arch.

The rest of the day?

Lunch at a Vietnamese restaurant in University City. The pho was apparently good, but everything else, food and service, well under par. It’s called Pho Long. I would suggest staying away.

On the better news side, a bump in the road had dislodged something under our car, which we dragged along for 800 miles, or so. Dumb, I know. But it was not mechanical and was plastic, and I was worrried about a long delay to get it fixed. It turns out the Prius has a plastic undercoating to protect the car from water damage and the like. It got pretty messed up, but the magicians at the Firestone auto center were indeed able to perform magic by putting it back in place with a bunch of zip ties and telling me it should be okay until we get home. I hope. What was extraordinary was the charge for about 45 minutes of hard work. $22. If only the Vietnamese restaurant was as cheap.

Finally, the lemon meringue pie we brought to Donna’s last night. We had gone off I-70 at Highland IL because of a beckoning billboard advertising mile high (or maybe foot high) pies at the Blue Spring Cafe.

We had no idea how

it would be. It turned out to be the absolute best lemon meringue pie ever baked. No question about it.

We are overscheduled for today. Probably not the best idea. But we try to cram in what we can.

We are in St. Louis, having completed three days on the road.

At 10 a.m., we pulled into First Watch on W. 86th Street in Indianapolis to have brunch with my favorite third cousin, Susan Lite Lerner and my favorite third cousin by marriage, Charlie Lerner.

The brunch was made better by the addition to our table of Michelle’s old friend Jenna, her husband Ken and 5 year old daughter Shannon.

We could have sat at the table forever, but the line outside First Watch became lengthy, and our guilt got the better of us.

We drove west on I-70, passed Terre Haute, and crossed into Illinois. At the Casey IL exit, I noticed a sign that said that Casey had the biggest something or other, and I decided to pull off the road and see, since I needed gas anyway.

Well, it turns out that Casey has the biggest almost everything.

For example,

The biggest mousetrap.

The biggest mail box,

The biggest golf tee,

The biggest bird cage,

The biggest rocking chair. Can you find Joan in this picture? And one more

The biggest barber pole.

We were told by the man who runs the world’s largest see-saw (electronic), a retired minoster who seems to like his current job more than preaching the gospel that all of the large items in Casey have been built by the Bolin family which was determined to keep the town alive. They succeeded. Joan wants to move there.

Before leaving Casey, we were stopped at a railroad crossing, where the little engine that could pulled a train that was 170 cars long.

All day long, we followed the Hungarian election, the war in Iran, and the fate of Rep. Swalwell. Along with the Caps 3-0 victory over Pittsburgh, and the Nats 3 game sweep over the Brewers.

Two hours later, we were in St. Louis. A visit with cousins Donna and Ed followed by dinner with our host Judy at Oishi Sushi.

We will be here three whole days. Tomorrow is a family day to be spent with the Schnidman/Karfeld cousins.

1. The Strait is open. The war results in the Strait closing. The goal of the war? Open the Strait. We have lost here.
2. Iran always said they wanted no nuclear weapon. We start a war. Now they say they won’t agree to a peace treaty that precludes a nuclear weapon. We lose here.
3. Where do we win? We knocked out most of their military! But wait. We weren’t at risk from their military. So we can’t count this as a win.
4. And world approval? Lose. Moral ground? Lose. Wasting our resources? Lose. Inflation and affordability? Lose and lose.

You can’t deny any of this. But Trump says we won big.

25th amendment time.

No AI or sleight of hand here. This is Joan standing next an enormous something next to the front door of the Zanesville (Ohio) Museum of Art. Joan is not 3′ 6″, she is almost 5′ tall, so this is one big something.

We stopped by the museum today. We had been by about six months ago and thought Michelle and Joan would like it. It is a very well curated small museum. You can see much of its holdings of about 8000 objects online.

One of its best collections is its extensive ceramics and pottery collection, unsurprising as many of these pieces were crafted in Zanesville. Here are some random examples.

They also have some fine examples of paintings from well known European artists, from Ohio artists, and even from Grandma Moses.

Another one of their collection from the 1860s is both anonymous and extremely well done.

Before reaching Zanesville for lunch we drove through downtown Pittsburgh, maybe the first major downtown Joan has ever seen, other than Washington and New York. And she was clesrly interested in how different Pittsburgh and Washington looked in so many ways.

Clearly, this is not Washington.

We also stopped in the small Ohio town of Cadiz to see Clark Gable’s boyhood home.

Sadly, at least at this time of year, it is by appointment only. So we drove on.

But not before looking at the beautiful 1894 Harrison County Courthouse.

Other than that, pretty scenery, good food (Muddy Miser in Zanesville and Galo’s in Richmond IN), and an on time arrival in Richmond.

Nations beat the Brewers two games in a row.

Tomorrow…St. Louis.

We are off on another road trip to St. Louis. With us this time is our daughter Michelle, here with Edie at dinner tonight at the Union Grill in Washington PA

And our granddaughter Joan, on spring break this week.

Michelle and Joan are aunt and niece. Joan will turn 11 next month. Michelle is …. older.

We didn’t leave Washington DC until after 1, and stopped for lunch at the Urbana MD Waffle House, which I rate an A. It is sleek and clean and very friendly. And where else can you get three egg orders, a waffle, several orders of hash browns, toasts and grits, plus a coffee, for $35?

We then headed west on I-70 to Breezewood PA and then west on US 30 to Bedford, PA, a regular stop. We went into the Peppercorn Market and bought fig infused balsamic vinigar, which they import and which we had bought there before. Our talk with the always friendly proprietor was the highlight of the day.

This is the Peppercorn, filled with gourmet foods. It is a very well stocked place, but what is most interesting is the building constructed in 1758. The sign on the exterior of the building says that this is the only remaining building in the entire country with a connection to the French and Indian War.

I had been in this store twice before, but had never noticed the stairs going down to a basement covered by a sheet strong enough to walk on, and clear enough to see through. What is this?

It turns out that, during the French and Indian War, Ft. Bedford played a prominent role for the British. The building now housing the Peppercorn was used as a storage facility for armaments. The steps leading down led to a tunnel that went about 100 feet to the fort. The fort is no longer there, and the tunnel is blocked near the bottom of the steps. But this spring, archeologists from Temple U. are supposed to come and work on opening the tunnel to see what, if anything, is there.

Bit that is not all. He took us through a door in back of the into what looks like a living room. It is beautiful. Exposed old brick walls and a handsome old brick fireplace, original flooring, samples of wallpaper dating from the 18th century, and a ceiling with old joists.

This room, and perhaps more, date from the early 19th century. They believe the ceiling joists were taken from a building in the old fort. The room, perfectly furnished, is beautiful.

The interesting thing is that, when they bought the building, the proprietor knew none of this. All was discovered during its renovation. Even the beauty and history of this room was unknown, as the floors and ceiling had been plastered over and painted, and the floor covered by layers of linoleum. Everything they found was totally unexpected.  I didn’t get any photos, but go to fortifiedbedfordhouse.com, and you will learn more.

For some reason, GPS didn’t take us to I-70, but put us on PA Rte 31, a beautiful country road that goes through Somerset and Mt. Pleasant. We saw more cows everywhere than you normally see anywhere along with horses and sheep. A beautiful ride.

We had a fine dinner at the always crowded Union Grill in Washington PA, and retired to local Hampton Inn.

Tomorrow, to Indiana.