Those little individual silver platters the condiments come in Indian restaurants are very cool. Also good for fingers.
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I needed to go to a place with multiple locations today, when I searched up “find locations closest to you” it came back with Rockville. That one’s only closest if I were traveling by helicopter, otherwise there’s a large river in the way.
Plus, I’ve already been to Rockville before, and Mike Mills advised me not to go back.
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Haven’t been here in a while so I thought I’d drop in. Life is going okay. Classes for spring quarter and the academic year ended last week—next week is finals. I’m taking two weeks off end of June/beginning of July. Heading to San Diego for a conference and possibly a very quick trip to the zoo. Hoping to find some time to get to the DC area to see my dude. Currently enjoying some time in the sun after what feels like six months of rain.
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They played a concert this morning, at a local venue where I’ve seen other bands. There were, I don’t know, 15 elementary-aged bands from the music schools (not just hers, but a couple locations). Her band played “Seven Nation Army” and a One Direction song, I think it’s called “What Makes You Beautiful”. It was pretty cool and I’m super proud of her. 
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Hey! It’s been a minute.
Last night, i saw Pylon Reenactment Society for the second time this year when they played at Boggs Social, a tiny venue here in Atlanta. I messaged a friend who lives nearby beforehand and ended up hanging out with him at the tables outside of the Boggs bar, since he was dogsitting and had brought the dog along with him. At one point, Vanessa, who fronts Pylon/Pylon Reenactment Society, sat at the adjacent table and asked about the dog. We walked over and talked to her for several minutes. That was one of those moments when I was keeping a cool exterior demeanor and, on the inside, was thinking “Oh my God, I am talking with Vanessa from Pylon!”
The CBS interview with R.E.M. was a popular topic in the crowd last night. I love the extended interview with the band, just for seeing them sitting together again.
I am close to 28 years as a State employee and have been busy with work lately, with a few great concerts (Echo and the Bunnymen, Slowdive/Drab Majesty, Nation of Language, Interpol, Vision Video, etc.) keeping things lively in my spare time.
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Update on my daughter’s band! They played at a brewery/restaurant the other night. I wasn’t entirely sure how the clientele would take a group of 10 year olds singing and playing, but they were super supportive.
The band has played 4 times now publicly, so my daughter has tied me for number of public performances. 
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That’s so cool!. I’ve watched a few kid bands on youtube, they are a delight & pretty good too!
Stuff that wasn’t on the Murmurs Inspectorjason bingo list 20 years ago…
I’m here in Athens, Georgia for a two-day goth music festival at 40 Watt.
I volunteered for the Athens, Georgia Harris /Walz downtown campaign office for a few hours just now to kill some time early in the day until the second night of the festival gets underway. One of the neighborhood canvas people was a five-foot-tall woman who did not want to go door-to-door campaigning in Athens neighborhoods by herself, so she asked me to go tag along for company. We went to about 30 houses, leaving flyers and taking to a couple of people. Most folks were either not home or didn’t answer doors, but I was told that this was the norm.
One of the other volunteers at the office was the guitarist of a well-loved Athens band (not R.E.M.). He recognized me from my having attended their shows and from my having seen them three times this year.
I work for state government, so I am careful not to be overtly political on social media (aside from busting misinformation) or in a local home city capacity, so this gave me a chance to help the cause under the radar by volunteering out of town in my state.
I’ll probably wear the T-shirt around my own stomping grounds for a couple of weeks just to gauge reactions, though.
I never thought, 20 years ago on Murmurs, that I would be walking door to door in Athens trying to get people to vote Democrat, but here we are.
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Hiked up Old Rag mountain with my son yesterday. I hurt.
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I’m Australian, my country has ties with the U.S. I’m a feeling a bit sad. Trump is chaotic in my opinion. I wonder how the $$$billion nuclear submarine deal our PM Albanese struck up with Joe Biden pans out with Trump. It scares me that we have to spend so much money on defense.
Down here, our PM is buying votes, free Technical and further Education courses if he is elected next year and also reducing university student debt. The X twitteratti are giving him a bashing, “It’s tax payers money not yours to buy votes” I’m guessing they probably working people who got or are getting nothing and are paying high rent or morgages etc.
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I have so many friends and rellies in the States who will be in tears over this election result. I’m not thrilled either, but I’m at enough of a remove to feel disappointed but not distraught. I’ve lived in England almost 40 years now. It’s not what I wanted, but it’s what’s we’ve got. I don’t understand how he pulled it off, but there it is. I have 2 kids living abroad from us, but one’s in Austria and the other in Australia. That helps. A lot.
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Is America fundamentally sexist? Are there too many people who don’t think a woman can be president? I’m not trying to troll here, I’m genuinely asking. I’ve never been to the US, but everyone I’ve ever met from there has (outwardly at least) been lovely.
But that is now twice that a despicable, dangerously unintelligent, criminal, divisive, punchline of a prick has beaten a highly qualified opponent to the presidency. Both times, the opponent was a woman. The time he lost, he was up against a man.
So, as a Scot, living far away and watching from a distance, I’m wondering if gender is a factor. Cos, fuck me, I’m utterly gobsmacked at the amount of people who have voted for him.
As if the rape, the misogyny, the felonies weren’t enough, I really though the “eating the cats, eating the dogs” thing would be the end of him. I thought it was the clearest sign yet that, if he ever had a functioning mind, it was now long gone. And people would see that. He was being mocked by 8-year-olds on Instagram for fucks sake.
But alas, no. How does anyone vote for this cunt? I’m sure there are some Trump fans on here. Law of averages. So, I’m genuinely asking: dafuq?
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Is America fundamentally sexist?
Yes.
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Yanno, part of me feels like he cheated his way in somehow. He has no integrity, decency and as you said, he sounds insane to put it kindly. The one thing he does have is money. Lots and lots of it. Also unscrupulous friends in high places. There are plenty of regular working Americans who love Trump, but hard to imagine the numbers in this election. I put part of the blame on Biden. I believe he promised to support Kamala Harris after his first term. Maybe I’m misinformed. That man clung to the presidency when he was doddering around and chatting shite. Everyone could see he has dementia. If Kamala had been given the time and support Biden pissed away, she might have had a chance. The whole thing really sucks.
ETA- Do I sound like a conspiracy theorist? I’m just so dumbfounded. I can’t fathom it.
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This is sad. 
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I know how you feel. You don’t sound like a conspiracy theorist. But I know how you feel. I do too. It is completely unfathomable.
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I had voted Republican all my life, but I switched sides early on during President Obama’s second term. I liked Obama a lot, but I also sensed a notable tonal change in the Republican Party towards extreme evangelicalism and conspiratorial nonsense. I was dumbfounded when Republicans started asking to see Obama’s birth certificate and all of that.
I voted for Hillary Clinton in 2016. That was the first time that I had ever voted the Democrat ticket. In my eyes, the 2016 Election drew a line in the sand between Republicans who had moral compasses and the Republicans who did not. My family, all of whom are still fervent Trump supporters, all thought that I had lost my mind when I told them that I was voting for Hillary Clinton.
During the next few years, as I saw many family members and friends whom I had respected so much during my younger years fall full-tilt into the Trump cult and endorse many of the outlandish right wing conspiracy theories, I started to wonder what else these people had taught me during my younger years was wrong. I spent a lot of time reexamining my past assumptions, realizing that all of the negative stuff that I had been taught about Jimmy Carter when I was younger was wrong and realizing that many of our current woes can be traced back to Reagan’s reversal of many of FDR’s New Deal implementations.
During the old Murmurs forum days, I vocally supported George W. Bush and helmed quite a few heated debates with many of you here as such. I still believe that my conscience was in the right place back then, even though I have since changed my mind on a few issues. Our frame of reference for what is normal has shifted quite a bit since then, though. The Trump crowd thinks of Joe Biden as some insanely leftist radical, but there are only a few degrees of separation between Biden today and George W. Bush circa the early 2000s. By contrast, Trump and his followers are not actually Republicans. They are authoritarians. The MAGA crowd has swayed the Republican party so far into extremism that I do not see myself ever voting for a Republican candidate again on general principle.
In response to Binky’s question (“Is America fundamentally sexist?”), the answer is yes.
There are many deep-seeded religion things here in America that we all really should get past. More than that, though, many people here in America are clinging to some rose-tinted ideal of a 1950s Leave It to Beaver/The Andy Griffifth Show Americana that never actually existed in the first place. I would rather help America move forward towards a future where all ethnicities, gender orientations, and walks of life have the freedom to offer their strengths to form a whole that is greater than the sum of its parts. Many Americans here do not share my inclusionary optimism, though.
I volunteered for the Kamala Harris campaign, I attended a Kamala Harris rally here in Atlanta this past weekend, and I proudly voted for Kamala Harris on the first day of early voting here in Georgia. I am not surprised by the end result, though. I am saddened, but not surprised.
My act of rebellion against Trump’s victory last night is to keep working towards being the best version of myself. America has elected a President who gives us all permission to be the worst versions of ourselves, but I would rather strive towards being the best version of myself.
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One thing that really disturbed me throughout this election is people calling the Biden/Harris administration genocidal. Of all the footage of the “Free Palestine”:protests I’ve seen, and there were many. I did not see one fucking peace sign amongst them. Did anyone? And these protests included people who appeared to have no generational ties with the Middle East. Also, after the slaughter and kidnapping of Jews on Oct. 7/23, the glee, clapping & cheering that went on, that really left me disgusted. How is one supposed to strike a peace deal with mentality like that? I believe Trump is unfit to be a world leader, he’s a good con artist, let’s see if he can “end all wars” as he said he would.
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This is perhaps the most disturbing thing about politics today, and not just in the USA. Over here, the current Labour party bears more resemblance to the Tories of 10 years ago, than any previous incarnation of Labour. The Tories, meanwhile, have shifted even further to the right, and have evolved into our version of Trump’s Republican party. There has, across the world, been a seismic shift to the right.
I trace it back to Brexit/Trump, and I blame two things:
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The fundamental cowardice of politicians, who will say and do anything to retain power. (See: every republican who criticised Trump endlessly, right up until the point where he won. The VP-elect, is perhaps the most striking example of this, but there are many, many others.)
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The extreme gullibility/stupidity/whatever you want to call it of voters, who have become increasingly susceptible to manipulation, primarily via social media.
It has to be said, the pandemic and its associated conspiracy theories didn’t help either, in terms of creating a crazy sub-section of society that absolutely revels in the kind of divisive, hateful, ill-informed, and ultimately dangerous rhetoric of the likes of Trump. It made us stupider and nastier.
I have no idea how or if it will change. For the first time in human history, I think we’re regressing as a species, socially and intellectually. It’s a really ugly time.
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This is in my head today. I don’t know if I believe it right now, but I want to.
“All the people gather, fly to carry each his burden
We are young despite the years
We are concern, we are hope despite the times”
I’m in Canada, about 10 miles from the US border. I am relatively safe (though we have our own potential right wing dictatorial asshat to deal with in the upcoming election).
This has been a hard week.
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