74. Going to the Dark side

Previous - 73. Aftermath + retirement

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After the election

I probably know some Trump supporters but I don't hear much from them. I do know many people on the other extreme and I have to say that it is interesting to see how they are responding to the election results. The Kumbaya faction is itching for a fight, just like the Trump supporters. 

My Burkean conservative bias should be familiar to anyone reading this, so you shouldn't be surprised that I find this amusing. We all want The People to speak up for themselves and decide policy until The People disagree with us. Granted, Trump supporters are still a minority of the population, and a substantial percentage of those supporters are simply sexist men (and women) who won't vote for a female pack leader, but still, there's a very large number of people that Progressives would like to disenfranchise here.

And they don't see this as a problem.

A day later

People on the left continue to grow more shrill. There's no doubt in my mind that the most extreme, like the anarchists trashing Oakland every night, didn't vote for Clinton. The logic of being irate when the candidate you didn't support loses is Trumpian, when you think about it. 

I continue to think this was actually about the best outcome we could have gotten -- the worse alternatives being Cruz, Pence, or Rubio. The lesson I hope someone is noticing is that the Parties need to regain control of their nomination processes. How do we get back to the smoke filled rooms where everything was decided? No sane party would have nominated either of these people. They both have too much emotional and legal baggage. Since my Representative is the Queen of the Democratic money machine, I may actually writer her a letter. 

This also got me thinking about revolutions in general, since both sides are so eager for a fight. I know not everyone is a history buff, but have they really not noticed the results of the Arab Spring? Can they really not see that revolution almost always makes things worse?

And that got me thinking about the American Revolution -- the great exception. Or not, because the purpose of the American Revolution was really to maintain the status quo that existed in the Colonies. Technically they were part of the United Kingdom and subject to the the King, but they were mostly self-governing. Not much changed after the Revolution aside from having no one to stop their exploitation of the Midwest or trans-Appalachian area. It wasn't really a revolution in the social sense. It was more like a band of pirates deciding they could ignore the Pirate King and do as they pleased. (Maybe I should teach U.S. History during my retirement. Lesson 1: "Our slave owning, pirate Forefathers.")

La Boulangerie de San Francisco

I had my favorite bread pudding breakfast this morning. What I previously referred to as "the 2nd best French bakery cafe," has finally reopened one of their locations in my part of town following the reorganizing and renaming of the business after Starbucks' decision to close down La Boulange. 

The location near me is about 80% identical to the way it looked before -- the pastries look and taste about the same -- but, so far there is absolutely no signage, for reasons I can't imagine. You'd think they would at least have temporary signs up pending their final signage, but no. And they've been open for at least a week as I happened to walk past and noticed they were back about a week ago. Whatever. The price for my bread pudding was a little higher, but it had always been a steal. And the portion was smaller, but it had been almost too large before, so I have no complaints.

However, they are no longer the 2nd, but the 3rd best French bakery cafe, as another wonderful bakery has opened up in the interim. Since the 1st and 2nd bakeries are not convenient to me, and since the 3rd is still quite good and now, again, only five blocks away, I don't have any problem with their not ranking as high. Interestingly, though not surprisingly, the new #2 is located in the same upscale neighborhood where the old #2 started, Pacific Heights. (I just checked and b. patisserie opened a couple years before La Boulange was shuttered.)

A Century of Wisdom

Not sure if this is the best or worst time to be reading a book dealing with the Holocaust. In chapter seven we learn that it wasn't until Alice was quite old and had moved to London to be near her son that she started studying philosophy at the University of the Third Age -- a sort of Cambridge extension program for the elderly. She seems to have been mostly interested in Spinoza, though Schopenhauer and Nietzsche are also mentioned. Alice had the advantage of reading the latter two in German but I don't know if she could read Latin. 

Spinoza is an interesting philosopher. And it doesn't hurt that I imagine he and Hume with sling-shots sending little thought missiles against the glass windows of the edifice Descartes had built. It's curious that, today, his thought is best known through the derivative writings of Mary Baker Eddy, but at least she didn't abuse his ideas as so many did with Nietzsche. 

Spinoza's writings are also not inconsistent (to put it as passively as possible) with pantheism, so, again, a reason for me to approve. Because he is was also a child of the Sephardic Jewish diaspora that Braudel associates with the development of western capitalism, I probably should read him again. I'm not sure if it is his ideas or his Jewishness that causes him to tend to stand alone in the history of modern western philosophy. It is obvious how you connect people like Descartes, Hume, Kant, and Hegel to people before and after, but I can't really think of a disciple of Spinoza. (Wiki suggests Santayana and Wittgenstein, but that isn't until the 20th century.) 

Wiki also records the following, Baruch de Espinoza became the first secular Jew of modern Europe.^[58] This alludes to his having been expelled from his Jewish community but never having converted to Christianity. This is interesting as, at least so far in the book, nothing has been said about Alice's faith during or after her time in the camps.

Her biographer claims she continued to attend classes into her 104th year. I believe that would mean she studied philosophy for around 20 years -- impressive. It would be interesting to know what classes she took over that long period of time. Toward the end was she revisiting favorite subjects or still looking for new things to learn? And what is it like teaching a class of students with that level of familiarity with the subject? Could be heaven, could be hell.

Next - 75. Life + History

73. Aftermath + retirement

Previous - 72. Election night 2016

Aftermath

All the people who wanted change (the Bernie Sanders enthusiasts) and who couldn't bring themselves to vote for Clinton (who was just as bad as the Republicans) are now upset. And all the liberal/progressive organizations are swarming like fund-raising flies.  

Acts of God

The other day I was having lunch with a friend at BrainWash when a crazy person walked up and sat at one of the tables on the sidewalk (we were inside). After sitting there for a while, he got up, picked up his cafe table, and threw it into the near lane of the (busy) street. The table broke into pieces and he walked away down an alley, kicking things and making more noise. 

Several of us retrieved the shards of the table which the bus-boy took inside. They now have one fewer table outside. No one called the cops since that would just be a waste of everyone's time.

Thinking about this today, it occurred to me that this guy was a bit like a dust-devil -- a common phenomena in Arizona where the heat, independent of any other weather event, causes small, tornado like winds that can do minor damage to cars or lawn furniture or the like. It's just something that happens and you can't do anything about it but clean up after.

Cantonese

This morning I was sitting waiting to get my blood drawn for tests and listening to the Cantonese being spoken around me. As I understand it, syllables have a different meaning depending on the pitch. This makes me think that Cantonese could be a great analogue for QED with the syllable being an electron and the pitch representing its energy state. I still have no idea how you would represent QCD with sound, though I'm sure it would sound interesting as quarks (for instance) have so many different qualities.

But what I was noticing this morning is that it must not be the absolute pitch but rather the relative pitch that determines the meaning. There was a woman with a particularly high (and annoying) voice and other people speaking in lower ranges. 

Spacetime is relative, but, I think, in either QED or QCD energy states are absolute. But recalling what Oliver Sacks wrote about people with absolute pitch, it shouldn't be too hard for those people to create a code where words (or phrases) had a different meaning at different pitches. Now that would be a tough code to break, and you could use it over any phone line or even on radio or TV.

My Medium retirement plan

The delight of a steady supply of content. That sentence should be a sub-head but I don't usually do that so, there it is. 

Today, once again, I spent the bulk of my afternoon in the Peet's on Market trying to catch up on my Medium backlog. So, nothing new, except that it occurred to me how great it was to read through so many pieces on so many subjects. I'm still months behind, and therefore out of sync, but couldn't help responding to some of the military articles. With the physics and astrophysics articles I could restrain myself, but I really wanted to chime in from time to time. There was just so much great content to consider. 

At some point I'm going to have to stop doing my greening work. I'm feeling better than I did last year, and keeping in shape all year round will undoubtedly prolong my "career," but I'm already starting to deal with turning 65 next year and I have reason to believe that I won't be getting any younger. 

It's very French (and very optimistic) to use le petite mort to mean orgasm and not sleep. For me the months between October and April are le petite retirement. I'm still doing my HOA work; I'm still keeping in shape for next summer; but I have to acknowledge that at some point in the future this is going to be my life. 

Today I read about QCD, controversies concerning both dark energy and dark matter, plus several other topics, and I had lunch at Bun Mee where I savored my favorite crispy tofu Vietnamese sandwich. I can do this.

Next - 74. Going to the dark side

72. Election night 2016

Previous - 71. Election 2016 + Alice

After voting

I'm trying to avoid the news. By habit, I clicked on The Chron's website and saw that the Presidential election was close in key states... the way it's looked all along. I'm going to ignore it tonight while I still can.

My assumption all along has been that Trump would win. I hoped to be wrong, but that would surprise me. The worst part is that I think it may be necessary for Trump to win. People who think more-or-less like I do aren't going to make allowances for Trumps constituency until we are forced to. The question is, will this be too much for the American experiment in democracy? 

On the other hand, another question is how will Trump deal with the visibility and inherent problems of holding a really impossible office. This could turn out to be a "Be careful what you wish for" situation. I've always said you had to be crazy to want the job, now we get to see how a crazy person handles it. The historian in me is curious.

And is there a way to achieve some kind of synthesis from our current dialectic? Can we find a way to peacefully find a middle ground or will we follow the example of the Roman Republic and descend into a cycle of violent swings from one extreme to another? Frankly, I don't see how this has a happy outcome.

And here's a really depressing thought: It could be best that it isn't the side with all the guns that comes out of this election feeling cheated.

Post Script

I still don't know the outcome, still avoiding all media. As influenced by the Roman Republic as the Founding Fathers were, they were also the children of the Enlightenment so they neglected to include the Roman institution of Dictator in our constitution. When the Roman people went nuts, or the military situation was especially dire, the Senate would appoint a Dictator to reestablish order. And it usually worked... until Caesar came along and it didn't. We may get a chance to see if this was another of their mistakes, like the 2nd Amendment -- though I still don't see how anyone can interpret those words the way they are currently interpreted.

Next - 73. Aftermath + retirement

71. Election 2016 + Alice

Previous - 70. A new book

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Preparing to vote

I spent a large portion of Sunday working through my Voter Information Pamphlet & Sample Ballot. At least I have an easy choice at the top of the ballot, but the rest is a total mess. I like my candidate for U.S. Senate and State Assembly. I have to vote for Pelosi, my U.S. Representative. I refuse to vote for my City Supervisor but can't really vote for the person running against him either. In the other races I have to choose the lesser evil -- as at the top -- or follow endorsements for the minor offices with candidates I've never heard of. Such is democracy. And that's the easy part.

Next we come to the State and City Propositions. There are 17 State Propositions but I've only voted (yes or no) for 13 of them -- the others I either can't make sense of or I could go either way on. Then there 25 City and BART or School District propositions where I've voted for 22. 

I'm proud to say that in a number of these cases I've voted against my inclination because the Proposition would set a bad example or cause problems in addition to what it's intended to fix. In some cases it's really hard to know if voting yes or no would reflect my true opinion or achieve what was possibly intended. And of course they throw all these Propositions at us because our elected officials can't do their jobs and settle this themselves. In some cases I'm hoping I'm sending a message about what I really want or don't want, but in other cases I'm not sure what message, if any, I'm sending. 

And if Tuesday goes as I expect, no one will be paying much attention to these local issues anyway.

A Century of Wisdom

I'm up to Chapter three and now Alice and her young son are in a camp -- though a very nice one where she continues to perform on the piano. 

Back in Prague she was raised in a quintessentially bourgeois-Jewish family with Franz Kafka as a close family friend. Most of her immediate family escaped to Palestine on the last train out of Czechoslovakia. She, and her husband and child, remained behind with her mother for what seemed like good reasons before Munich.

What do I mean by "quintessentially bourgeois-Jewish family?" They were well educated, very musical, well connected, involved in trade. Her mother was raised Orthodox, her father was a merchant. A year or two ago I would have thought nothing of this, but now I can't help viewing them -- along with Primo Levi's family in Turin and Oliver Sacks' family in London -- through the eyes of Dostoevsky and Ford. Thus I have to ask, To what extent were the Jews hated for being ur-bourgeois as opposed to being religious. (Sorry for the German prefix to a French adjective.) 

I know this sounds far-fetched, but stick with me a moment. I've never paid much attention to what anti-semites were saying, going all the way back to that Austrian red-neck Morton covers in A Nervous Splendor. So what do I know? First, there's Fernand Braudel's argument that the origin of European capitalism is intertwined with the history of the Jews displaced from Iberia after 1492. Then there's an account I read a long time ago of anti-Jewish riots in the south of Germany back in some earlier century. (Sorry I can't be more specific.) There was a pattern to the violence against the Jews back then: The wandering Jews would settle in a community and offer credit. Things would be fine for a time but then the economy would go south, and when the local Christians could no longer keep up with their payments, it would be discovered that some Jew or other had tricked a Christian into smuggling a wafer (the body of Christ) out of a church and giving it to the Jew who then proceeded to torture it. The Jews implicated were attacked and the rest of the Jewish community fled. 

Now this sounds completely nonsensical, of course, but what I read into it is that religion was just a tool the locals used to attack people they had a grudge against for economic reasons. Dostoevsky and Ford are not blatantly antisemitic, but it is clear in both The Brothers Karamazov and Parade's End that Jews are a part of -- and possibly a symbol of -- the bourgeois values they see as undermining the natural, Tory order. And, with Braudel in mind again, this is not wrong. (Mann is less interested in this line of reasoning -- Naphtha not withstanding -- because he was raised in an equally bourgeois, though, gentile, family.) 

I really don't want to do the research -- read antisemitic writings of the time, and Nazi dogma -- but I'm curious about how much the Nazis were opposed to other aspects of bourgeois life like science and technology and the importance of merit vs birth. 

A Faustian history of WW2

It would be impossible to pick the strangest section of Part 2 of Faust, but the battle section right after Faust returns to Germany from Greece would have to be in the running. If we accept that Faust (with Mephisto's assistance) represents the bourgeois spirit, then you can almost see this passage as an allegory for the Allied victory in both theaters in WW2. Wait, stay with me for just a minute...

The Allied victory was based largely on technological/scientific magic: The Bomb is the most obvious example of this, but there's also crytoanalysis, radar (by the end of the war radar sets small enough to fit in artillery shells), and the by then routine magic of modern industry with the exploitation of coal, oil, and everything else that can be mined from the Earth. 

And it's worth remembering that deception played an important role in both Faust's battle plans and in the Allied battle plans (the British at the 2nd Battle of El Alamein and the American crossing of the Rhine being two good examples.)


Faust - Part 2 - Act IV Scenes I-III (Headland:Battle)

FaustNow, powerfully, streams pour on streams,10725

Sweeping from gorges with redoubled gleams,

A river now throws up an arching veil:

Pours over the rocky level in a tide,

Runs foaming down, on every side,

And, stepwise, hurls itself into the dale.10730

What use their fine, heroic resistance?

The vast wave roars, and fills the distance.

I shudder myself at this wild waterfall.

MephistophelesI can see nothing of these watery lies,

They only serve for fooling human eyes,10735

I delight instead in wonders that befall.

In companies, their men plunge down,

The fools imagine that they’ll drown,

While free to breathe, on solid ground,

With swimming strokes, they run around.10740

It’s bewildering them all.

(The Ravens return.)

I’ll praise you to the noble Master: but see,

If you’d like to display your own mastery,

Hurry to the glowing smithy,

Where the dwarf folk never weary,10745

Hammering sparks from steel and stone.

Ask for, once you’ve chattered first,

A fire to shine: sparkle, and burst,

The finest that man’s ever known.

It’s true that far off lightning flashes,10750

And stars that fall in sudden dashes,

Can happen any summer’s night:

But lightning in the tangled bushes,

And stars that fizzle in the rushes,

They’re not such a common sight.10755

Don’t trouble about my command,

Ask first, then afterwards demand.

(The Ravens fly off. All takes place as ordered.)

Darkness cloaks the enemy!

Their footsteps meet uncertainty!

Everywhere are wandering flares,10760

And those sudden blinding glares!

It’s all beautiful indeed,

Now some noise is what we need.

-Source

Next - 72. Election night 2016

1. In which we begin

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New blog

I've published three previous "blogs" but I've always cheated before. These were projects I created and edited over time and then finally published in blog format. This time I want to do something in real time. I may come back later and edit, but I will publish whatever I think of writing on a given day. Spontaneity will be my watchword. (That may be a better name for the blog.) (Reading this years later I'm sorry to say that not only did this "real time" aspect not happen, but I had even forgotten that was the plan. Maybe I will try getting back to this.)

I'm sure I will also alter the format as I proceed.

Starting...

You'd think this would be the place for me to describe what all is on my mind at the moment, but I'm here in part to escape all that, so, no.  I will say that it's a lovely summer in San Francisco -- which means it's been cold to sort-of-warm with our usual mid-day sun book-ended by fog blowing off the Pacific. Yesterday the marine layer was particularly low and dense and when I walked out into our alley, just after 7am, the air smelled of the beach. Quite wonderful. 

I used to think that maybe someday I would move to Seattle or Portland for the even cooler and rainier weather, but whenever I'm up there it is sunny and hot; so now I think of moving out to the west edge of SF bordering the beach. The Outside Lands are like a different city, and it takes forever to get out there by bus or light rail. It still has a beach town vibe -- though one wonders how long that can last the way SF is getting built up.

Martha Grimes & Emma Graham (hint: like Superman & Clark Kent)

I'm also near the end of one of my favorite books, Cold Flat Junction by Martha Grimes. I think this is my third reading. At this point I'm only allowing myself to read one short chapter at a time, so as to draw out the time I have before the book ends. There are two sequels to this, the second book in the series, but I think this is the best of the four so I'm savoring it. 

If I was teaching creative writing, I would assign The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery to teach the concepts of foreshadowing and misdirection. Then I would forbid my students to read Martha Grimes' Emma Graham novels because they so spectacularly violate all the rules of novelistic conservation. (There's probably a good technical term for this, but I can't be bothered to look it up because I'm just so spontaneous.) What I mean are the conventions in novels -- and even more so on screen -- that if you introduce something (a gun, say) you have to use it, and if you introduce a character -- give that character a name and a personality -- they have to play a role in the plot of the story. 

It's like Martha Grimes' books are haunted by characters that sprang up almost against the author's wishes and who then not only refuse to leave but demand additional scenes. My fallback position, since I couldn't really forbid the reading of these novels, would be to use her as an example for characterization. Delbert, the taxi driver, is my favorite example of this. I was surprised to discover this reading of Hotel Paradise, the first novel in this series, that Delbert didn't yet have a personality in the first book. His only role is to transport Emma from place to place in the interest of her investigations, so there's no reason he should have a personality. But, slowly, he has gained one. It seems that with every ride we see him a little more clearly and I know by the end he will be one of my favorite, mostly irritating to Emma, characters while serving no purpose at all (aside from his driving) in furthering the plot.

Really starting...

Well this is not auspicious. I've been so involved in the real world problems I'm trying to avoid, that it's now been a week since I wrote the above. I completed Cold Flat Junction and immediately moved on to Belle Ruin -- for me the equivalent of lighting the next cigarette with the dying embers of the prior one.

But this time I'm really going to do it.

Presidential election

I'm not looking forward to the next three months -- and I'm not referring to the problems facing my HomeOwners Association, but rather the Presidential election. I avoided almost all the coverage of the Republican convention besides what flashed at me on The Onion, YouTube, and Facebook. So far the begging for Democratic contributions is annoying me as much as the Republican oratorical idiocy. 

It's beginning to look like America may need to consider something more like a city manager/mayor form of government. We may need a high visibility office for everyone to see while the actual work of government is done by a more professional federal manager. Mind you, I don't think this is actually possible, I'm just saying it would make sense. This is also a way of saying that we need a legal guardian since we seem no longer capable of making important decisions for ourselves. Historically, this is interesting -- though painful to observe.

To cope with my HOA problems I really ought to be drinking more or abusing drugs -- like a normal person. But that doesn't work very well for me (so far) so I seem to be eating out more instead. Partly this is because there has been an amazing racket coming up from directly below my unit the past several weeks, as concrete and dirt and old walls were removed and then replaced with new ones after studs and joists and posts and beams were all fastened together in a truly impressive way. The racket should be coming to an end next week. 

Unfortunately, three of my neighborhood hangouts -- where I would normally be hanging out more -- are owned by the unit owner I'm attempting to force to vacate his unit so we can complete our seismic work. Normally I never see him, but the day after I sent out an assertive email he walked into the pizzeria where i was eating. Awkward. Since then I've avoided his establishments. 

I'm doing a really bad job of avoiding this topic, aren't I? 

Berkeley Kite Festival

Next weekend is the Berekely Kite Festival, one of my favorite events. Work-wise it's problematic: The event is stretched over a large area (on top of an old landfill on the edge of the Bay) and Berkeley city crews pick up the bags of trash we collect and don't much care where they go. We have to fight to get our sorted compost in the dedicated compost truck. This is even more of a problem at the end of the day as they make their final pass through the event with the trucks picking up all the remaining bags. 

But, the kites are spectacular in the (usually momentarily) blue sky mid-day, with SF and the Bay to the west and the Berkeley Hills rising to the east. As with Berkeley 4th of July (on the other, south, side of the Marina) it isn't easy to get in and out of this event, you end up walking a long way, but it's worth the trouble. The International Dragon Boat Races on Treasure Island is even better (and easier to access), but that's still two months in the future.

Apple Stores

We're still years from the opening of our new (Central) subway, which runs almost underneath my building, but the new Apple Store opened some weeks ago now. 

I much prefer the look of the store in Portland, 

but this location (by Foster + Partners) features massive, multi-story, sliding glass doors that open the store to both the sidewalk and Union Square to the south, and a courtyard, featuring a Ruth Osawa fountain I'm very fond of, on the north. 

I have no reason to be in the store (my only Apple product is my original iPod Nano with a battery so dead I have to leave it plugged in all the time) but I did stroll through once just to see what it was like. 

Every time I pass it's packed with people -- doing what I'm not sure. I wish Google would take over their old store location, down Stockton at Ellis, for Chromebooks. I wouldn't mind having access to a Genius Bar for Chrome and Chromebook questions. Not that I have that many at the moment.

...Now

Next - 2. Change