Category: 2025

Frankly, I just wanted to publish an empty page today, because that’s how empty, hollow, drained, sorrowful and exasperated I feel! What can one say that hasn’t been said, felt, expressed? I know that it will be over at some point. I know that! I am sure of it! So are you who are reading this! But witnessing it on a daily and hourly basis is agonizing, disheartening, disappointing and removes all the colors from my life leaving a drab, dismal scene of Horrors beyond Anything that I have ever witnessed in my eighty-two years of life on this Planet!

So I decided not to listen, or watch The Damn News, nor subject myself to The Daily Unfolding Drama In The White House Theater where this Administration with all its Executive Orders, New Fiats and its Budget is saying in Plain English: We are the White, Christian Supremacists and all of you Black, Brown and Purple Humans shall become Poorer, More Downtrodden, More Compliant and More Miserable! What could be More Undemocratic, More Unjust and More Arrogant than this?? So, instead of dwelling on this Dire Reality, I logged on to my DVR and decided to watch one of the FBI series that I usually tape. And, as I was watching, I was wondering who raises my blood pressure more: The Damn News, or Dick Wolf, the Genius Producer/Writer of the FBI and L&O series both of which I love? Probably both! However, at least with Dick Wolf I get the satisfaction and pleasure of knowing that the Bad Guys Were Caught, and that our Law Enforcement are Executing Their Job with Professionalism, Integrity and Diligence unlike most of the Disgraceful Political Leaders and Other Authorities on our Planet who seem to be driving us to a hell of their own making!! Fuck them all!

Aside from all the Disgraceful Leaders on this Miserable Planet, there are two who are exasperating the whole world: Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu both of whom have Gone Totally Rogue perhaps not realizing – or not caring – that Running Rogue is not Policy, and that Smashing Everything In Sight is not Politics! No, it is Not The Golden Age of America that Trump is Promising! Not at all! It is, rather, The Dark Ages of America! And I am not believing that this is the Horrid reality! How could it be? How have all those Aspirational Ideals and Values been made to Vanish? What Lawless World are we living in? Or, has it always been so and Trumpism has simply Exposed it and taken all the Masks, all the Illusions off? So Unbelievable! So Surreal!

As I mentioned, I watched shows that I have taped, especially as I simply cannot stand the totally Inane, Shrill and Mundane Advertisements! No Originality! None Whatsoever! And, while I am skipping over the ads, I glance at the TV and wonder what Merchandizing Department has come up with all those Ludicrous Drug Names? They are Absolutely Terrible! Madison Avenue Corporate Heads should all be Fired! Moreover, Dogs and Cats, we are told by the stupid advertisers, need to eat Healthful Foods, but You and I can continue eating the Toxin-filled Industrial Foods peddled by the Greedy, Unconscionable Food Corporations! Unbelievable!

So, other than watching my shows in order to escape my Sorrow & Torment, I cook! Today I am making Lenten Cauliflower Makloobeh (Pilaf). This dish, like so many others, always makes me think of my Mother and My Grandmothers. This is not only because they made the most delicious Makloobeh – amongst all their exquisite meals! – but because I feel them looking over my shoulder as I’m preparing it and whispering amongst themselves in total disbelief: She calls this Makloobeh? Tsk! Tsk! Here’s how I make it: I core the cauliflower and separate the florets, place them in a cooking pan, baste them with a mix of olive oil, salt and pepper and bake them at 425 degrees until they are browned. Meanwhile, and in a pot, I sauté an onion until it is slightly browned and rinse my rice. Once the florets are done I dump them on top of the onion, empty a pack, or two (depending on the amount of rice I’m using) of chicken broth, add salt, pepper and lots of cinnamon, the rinsed rice and cook until rice is done, scoop the mix onto a platter and serve! One hour, or so! Voila! All done! I serve Organic Meatballs on the side and a salad. Now My Mother and Grandmothers never served this as Lenten. They cooked the dish with chunks of lamb meat (some Palestinians I know use chicken pieces) and used that broth as their base, they deep fried the cauliflower florets, added their spices and rice, when cooked they turned the pot upside down so that it came out like a cake, sprinkled the top with fried pine nuts and Voila after three hours, or so! No wonder they were looking disdainfully over my shoulder! It is like that with most of the Palestinian dishes I make these days: shortcuts and expediency! Definitely not as Delicious! Moreover, their dishes Consistently Tasted The Exact Same, whilst mine are hardly ever Consistent! I Marvel at how these Wonderful Women Did That? I really do!

Another thing I did as I avoided The Damn News, and being that we were commemorating Memorial Day this week was to read over my post from April 15, 2014. It remains as poignant and true today as it was when I wrote it tearing up and inviting more Sorrow & Torment!! Sad!

And, lastly, adapting my own words at the end of that essay as they pertain to Gaza and the Palestinian Humans: may every leader and politician never have a day of peace, or a night free of as ghastly nightmares as they are making mine!

Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary defines Absurd as something ridiculously unreasonable, unsound, or incongruous; extremely silly or ridiculous; having no rational or orderly relationship to human life; meaningless.

Hence, it seems to me that The Ongoing Absurdity of this World and its Political Leaders can either sink us into a Deep Depression, or make us put on our Philosophical Hats. I have wavered between the two for a long time now. How about You?

For Instance: What does a “National Security Threat” mean to an average person? I would imagine that it might be “Enemy” Drones, Airplanes, Submarines or such flying around in our skies, or close to our shores. It might also mean a Cyber attack on our Vital Infrastructures, or Networks. There are many other scenarios that I am sure you can think of, but that are Equally, or More Serious. However, in the present state of our sad and chaotic affairs in this country we now consider: Movies, Books, Protests and Speech as National Security Threats. In this Democratic Republic of the United States of America we are now Banning Books, Imposing Tariffs on non-US produced Movies and Jailing/Deporting/Suing/Threatening those who are Protesting, or practicing Free Speech! If this is not the Epitome of Absurdity I don’t know what is! However, with many of Our Government Positions beginning from the Oval Office and on to our Cabinet Secretaries now being headed by Fox News hosts do we really have a functioning government, or just a tawdry television show? I believe it is the latter, and Never has it seemed to the World that we are less Trustworthy, or Reliable! Moreover, whether for educational purposes, or tourism we are now announcing to the World that we are an inhospitable destination and very few are flocking over to our shores! Who would have ever believed all this not so long ago?

Sometime during the past two weeks and while speaking of himself – as Trump is prone to do often – he described something he had said, or done as due to: braggadocio. I was very amused by his choice of this rarely used adjective and flattered myself for using it to describe him back in February! Perchance, I imagined, could he, Melania, Barron, or one of their assistants been reading my posts? That would be a hoot! I wish, though, that on the off chance that any of them do read my posts that they would give credence to other things I say. For instance we have heard Trump say on multiple occasions that he wants the Russia/Ukraine War to end because: “too many people are dying.” He’s right! But how short-sighted he must be to know that while he is uttering these words a Genocide has been underway in Gaza for over two years, as well as the recent three month Starvation Campaign where too many people are dying! If most of his utterances aren’t Extremely Absurd, then I don’t know what is! Even Jewish Humans who have lost parents, and/or grandparents in Hitler’s Terrible Holocaust are Protesting, Blogging and Writing about the Horrors of Gaza! And now he is in Saudi Arabia and other Gulf States as Rumors swirl around as to what more heartache is being cooked behind those closed meeting doors! What will our Qui Pro Quo par excellence President be concocting with these disappointing Arab Leaders, while Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank are suffering from the utmost cruelty? More Words and Palliatives? I dare not even think!

Trump’s Tariff Wars continue with no substantial results since he announced them! As I write this post the First Nation to negotiate a tariff deal was the United Kingdom, and that was a “nothing burger!” However, that deal is as incongruous as Keir Starmer’s “Coalition Of The Willing” that he proposed to counter Russia. Does this evoke Dubya and his Criminal Gang’s same nomenclature prior to destroying Iraq and the Middle East Region under false pretenses and lies? How idiotic! However, I continue to be astounded that Not One Politician, or Media Journalist talks about the Fact that China did not Hold A Gun To America’s Head and Make Us Rush By The thousands to Manufacture Our Products in that country. We, and our Greedy Runaway Capitalist Corporations CHOSE to do that. And then we have the Temerity to say that China Stole Our Jobs and Manufacturing Abilities and that’s why we need to raise the Tariffs on them? Really? Really!! More proof (as if we needed it!) of how Totally Screwed Up are our Politics! Again, if this does not sound Absurd then I don’t know what is!!!

On May 8 the Vatican Pomp and Circumstance was on full display as a New American Pope, Leo XIV was announced. From what we know about him so far it does not seem to me that this Pope is being silent regarding Authoritarianism in any of its forms, or about the Normalization in our World of wars, corruption, lies, starvation, annexation, narcissism, self-aggrandizement or any of these obnoxious traits. Do his words matter? This Skeptic will wait and see!

Putting my Ranting and Opining about politics aside for a bit, I was immensely delighted on May 7 to hear Amy and Nermeen on Democracy Now (where else would you hear of such important news?) talking to two of the women who had won their case against the convicted sexual abuser Gynecologist Robert Hadden who was sentenced to twenty years in jail for his multiple sexual assaults against hundreds and hundreds of Women almost all of them Pregnant, including Evelyn Yang who was amongst the first to speak out! Moreover, Gisele Pelicot and the Hundreds of Women who were also sexually assaulted by disgraceful men should be Proud of themselves for coming forward and exposing all these predators who should all be castrated! Preposterous!

Lastly, with one bombshell or another greeting us every morning I recalled a headline in 1992 of The Sun newspaper of the UK which had been relentless at the time in its drive to turn voters against the Labour Party and encouraged its readers to back the Conservatives by saying “If Kinnock, (the Labour Leader) wins today will the last person to leave Britain please turn out the lights.” And I feel that with the election of Trump – and unless a Miracle happens – we will soon be turning out the lights in this US of A! Who would have ever, ever believed that? Certainly not me!