There Exists

Smile

noreply@blogger.com (S. Scheider) — Sun, 17 Apr 2022 21:56:00 +0000

Smile though your heart is aching
Smile even though it's breaking
When there are clouds in the sky, you'll get by
If you smile through your fear and sorrow
Smile and maybe tomorrow
You'll see the sun come shining through for you
Light up your face with gladness
Hide every trace of sadness
Although a tear may be ever so near
That's the time you must keep on trying
Smile, what's the use of crying?
You'll find that life is still worthwhile
If you just smile
That's the time you must keep on trying
Smile, what's the use of crying?
You'll find that life is still worthwhile
If you just smile

- Charlie Chaplin, John turner, and Geoffery Parsons, "Smile", 1954

20220417 - Easter

noreply@blogger.com (S. Scheider) — Sun, 17 Apr 2022 12:59:00 +0000

Enjoy the Memorial - or - Happy Easter - or - Sameach Pesach, depending on your denomination. Greetings from our little tin can by the sea, where my wonderful wife, Wendy, and I try to survive through the pandemic and me having stage IV colon cancer. In the news, we have Russia and Ukraine at war, which was instigated by Russia. This has become a war of attrition on the Ukraine and I hope that they survive it. This war threatens US involvement, since NATO countries are on Ukraine's western borders. This was a wake-up call for the EU. For far too long, they have not funded their defenses, instead relying on US involvement. Time for them to put on the big boy panties.

The pandemic is still going strong, though the case numbers have become even more vague than they once were. Once the at home test became available, many positives went unreported, and that continues. The CDC is relying on samples from wastewater treatment plants to measure the spread of COVID. This may be sound for cities, but rural areas are missed, since many of those homes do not have their sanitary sent to a central processing plant. Easter will be a spreader event.

Global warming continues unabated. In fact, the Rus-Ukr war has exacerbated it. As it turns out, Russia supplies a good deal of oil and gas to the EU states. Without it, the EU is left to supplement their energy needs with coal. The US is trying to shore up inventories in the EU, but it has nearly doubled the price of gasoline at the pump in the US. We were out on Friday and our neighborhood Wa-Wa gas station showed $3.98/gal. The feds have released oil from the strategic reserve as well as extended the use of ethanol in the fuel to try and keep the price down. However, economics dictates that price moves up are rapid, moves down are slow. This is termed "the stickiness of menu pricing." It was once blamed on reprinting the "menu" or updating the advertised price. In this digital age, that is hardly a factor, though the stickiness persists and I expect that the gluttonous oil companies will ensure that the drop in price will be as slow as they can possibly make it.

Black lives matter? Well, it has certainly quieted over the past year. The latest efforts are not to defund the police, but, rather, to fund them and retrain them. I'll offer up my opinion - there is no reason for a police to have a swat team. Every state already has a National Guard that can be quickly called up. They should be the ones with bomb disposal capability and they should handle terrorist situations. That would take a good bit of the police budget. Same money, but different pots. With the National Guard option, you have very few "lifers", where the police force, especially swat, are all "lifers." It's the insertion of new blood that maintains the integrity of the organization, not the seniority of position.

All along the watchtower, princes kept the view
While all the women came and went, barefoot servants, too
Outside in the distance a wildcat did growl
Two riders were approaching, the wind began to howl
- Bob Dylan, "All along the Watchtower", John Wesley Harding, Dwarf Music, 1968

20220329 - a million

noreply@blogger.com (S. Scheider) — Wed, 30 Mar 2022 00:14:00 +0000

One million people in the US have died from COVID-19. There were no buglers playing taps, no politicians offering condolences, no churches ringing bells.

'Cause we don't sing the same song anymore
And now your offering is silent requiem
Dorothy Heyward, Du Bose Heyward, George Gershwin, Ira Gershwin, "Requiem", Jump Little Children, Between the Dim & the Dark, 2004

The one millionth loss-of-life due to COVD was marked on May 14, 2022. Evidently, politicians count differently than others. There was a presidential speech, and bells tolled at the National Cathedral. Because of those that refused to be inoculated, over 300,000 of these deaths are considered to be avoidable. Another failure of our education system.

20220312 - another year

noreply@blogger.com (S. Scheider) — Sat, 12 Mar 2022 14:16:00 +0000

Scope	Cases	Deaths
Worldwide	455,762,085	6,059,562
United States	81,154,960	993,044
Florida	5,868,632	71,853
Pinellas County	209,713	3,195

Greetings from our little tin can by the sea where Wendy and I try to survive through the COVID-19 pandemic. The numbers to the left show the current state of the pandemic. After two years, and several "vaccines", the numbers keep climbing. Many people haven't even been injected once with a "vaccine". I keep quoting "vaccine" because it's a misnomer. "Injection" would have been a better word. "Vaccine" carries the onus of one-and-done - I get the shot, and I'm protected against the virus. That's not how it works, and as people began to realize this, they called "foul" and basically tossed all scientific explanation out the window. Unfortunately, our governor is one of them. He has chosen to kill people in favor of raking in taxes from snowbirds and vacationers. Since snowbirds and vacationers are not counted in our case and death totals, he doesn't care. They come here, catch it and take it home to kill even more. We're just resuming "normal" levels after the holiday peak due to the omicron variant. There's talk now to view COVID-19 as endemic, something that has to be dealt with seasonally. As they do that, more will die. I hope that I don't catch it - dying of cancer with friends nearby is one thing, but dying in isolation due to COVID is quite another. I expect that this will continue, so I will post another update for year three if I can.

All I see turns to brown
As the sun burns the ground
And my eyes fill with sand
As I scan this wasted land
Try to find, try to find the way I feel
- Led Zeppelin, "Kashmir", Physical Graffiti, Led Zeppelin, 1975

The Boat People

noreply@blogger.com (S. Scheider) — Wed, 19 Jan 2022 11:00:00 +0000

The Boat People

Wendy and I were married by John Bull on October 7, 2000 upon the top deck of the Betsy Ann Riverboat in the Alabama River off the shore of Montgomery, Alabama. The event was the talk of Prattville, Alabama. We had many relatives and friends come from out-of-state, and the day was sunny, though a bit breezy and cool. The entertainment was by Mr. Henry Pugh and his rendition of Louis Armstrong's “What a Wonderful World” cemented it as “our song” from then on. It was very memorable!

We'll fast forward to Tuesday, January 16, 2001. I am at my desk in a trailer between two paper machine buildings, checking email and filling in a spreadsheet of some sort. Wendy is at home making plans for a trip to Denver later that year. Wendy received a call from the Autauga County Probate Office.

Wendy: “Hello.”

Probate clerk: “Is this Mrs. Scheider?”

Wendy: “Yes, this is she.”

Probate clerk: “Mrs. Scheider, I don't know how to tell you this...”

Wendy: “Well, just say it and we'll go from there.”

Probate clerk: “Okay - Mrs. Scheider, the state is refusing to recognize your marriage this past October.”

Wendy: “Can they do that?”

Probate clerk: “Yes, ma'am, and they have.”

Wendy: “Oh – I must call my husband!”

Wendy then called me on the phone at my desk. I recognized that the caller ID showed my home number.

Steve: “Howdy cutie.”

Wendy: “Honey, I just received a call from the Autauga County Probate Office about our marriage license. They say that the state isn't accepting it.”

Steve: “Really?”

Wendy: “Yes, really.”

Steve: “Well, I think that John Bull should know about it, so we should call him. And we'll need another marriage license, so please call the Probate Office and see when we can get in for one of those.”

Wendy: “I'll do that. John Bull and the Probate Office. Got it. Love you!”

Steve: “Love you too!”

Wendy then found John Bull's number in our home telephone book and gave him a call.

John Bull: “Hello!”

Wendy: “Hello, is this John Bull?”

John Bull: “Yes it is, how can I help you?”

Wendy: “John, I'm Wendy Scheider, you married me and my husband back in October on the Betsy Ann Riverboat. Do you remember us?”

John Bull: “I do a lot of weddings...”

Wendy: “John, the Autauga County Probate Office is telling me that the state is refusing to acknowledge our wedding.”

John Bull: “What?”

Wendy: “Yeah, John, they're not accepting our marriage license.”

John Bull: “Oh... I've been performing weddings for ten years and I haven't had a problem and I have a wedding scheduled for this Saturday. Let me make some calls, Mrs. Scheider, and I'll call you back.”

Wendy: “Okay, John.”

Then Wendy turned to handling the second task with the Probate office.

Probate clerk: “Hello? Autauga County Probate.”

Wendy: “Hello, I'm Wendy Scheider, and I spoke with someone from your office earlier. They told me that the state wouldn't recognize my marriage to my husband last October, so I'd like to schedule a time for us to pick up a new marriage license.”

Probate clerk: “Well, you could pick up the marriage license any day that the two of you are available to come down to the probate office. But if you would like to be married by the Probate Judge, that's done on Friday afternoon.”

Wendy: “Is there an availability this coming Friday?”

Probate clerk: “Yes, there is – at two o'clock.”

Wendy: “That's fantastic! Please schedule us for that time.”

Probate clerk: “Okay, please arrive at about 1:45 so we can have both of you fill out the license prior to the wedding.”

Wendy: “We will! Thank you! Bye!”

Wendy then called me back. Steve: “Howdy cutie!”

Wendy: “Hi honey, ready to marry me again?”

Steve: “I'll marry you as many times as it takes, cutie.”

Wendy: “Well that's great, because we will have another one on Friday at two o'clock.”

Steve: “Where?”

Wendy: “At the Probate Office. We go there at 1:45 and fill out the marriage license, and the Probate Judge will marry us at two. Is that okay?”

Steve: “I'll ask for Friday afternoon off. It should be okay. Any news with John Bull?”

Wendy: “He was shocked, so he's checking on things on his end. He has a wedding this Saturday that he has to officiate and I'm sure this is going to change how that goes off.”

Steve: “I'm sure. Okay, cutie, let me ask Mel for Friday afternoon off. I'll call you right back.”

Wendy: “Okay, love you!”

Steve: “Love you, too!”

I then walked down to the other end of the trailer, where my boss' office was. Mel was staring at trends on the computer screen. I walked in and greeted him: “Hi Mel!”

Mel: “Hi.”

Steve: “Mel, do you mind if I take off Friday afternoon? I'm going to get married.”

Mel: “Didn't you already do that?” (Mel was at our wedding on the Betsy Ann riverboat.)

Steve: “Yeah, I did, but I have to do it again. The state won't recognize our wedding, so we'll get it done by the Probate Judge. He has an opening this Friday, so we're going to do it then.”

Mel: “Yeah, okay – do you need witnesses or anything?”

Steve: “I don't think so, but I'll check and let you know.”

I walked back to my desk and called Wendy.

Wendy: “Hello.”

Steve: “Howdy, cutie. I talked to Mel and we're a go for Friday. Do we need any witnesses, or will Probate provide them?”

Wendy: “I don't know about witnesses. I can check on that a little later. John Bull called back.”

Steve: “Really? What did he have to say?”

Wendy: “He was very apologetic – he found out that it is true that our marriage wasn't acknowledged by the state. It was because it was performed on water.”

Steve: “Oh. So he has a work around for his wedding on Saturday, then. Good for him.”

Wendy: “I told him about us getting remarried with the Probate Judge, and he said that he and his wife would be our witnesses if we need them.”

Steve: “I think that there's folks in the Probate Office that can do that. We can check, but I thank him for the offer.”

Wendy: “I think so, too.”

Steve: “Well, cutie, I have to get back to work. I'll see you when I get home. Love you!”

Wendy: “Love you, too!”

As it turns out, the office staff of the Probate Judge are more than happy to stand in as witnesses for weddings, so we were covered. The Probate Judge at that time, January 2001, was Al Booth. I'll pick up the tale on that Friday at the Probate Office.

Probate clerk: “Hello! Can I help you?”

Wendy: “Hi! I'm Wendy Scheider, and this is my husband, Steve. We're here for a marriage license.”

Probate clerk: “Ok... Here's the form – your information goes here and his is over there.”

Wendy: “We also have a two o'clock appointment with the Judge for the wedding.”

Probate clerk: “Two o'clock... let me see, let me see... hah! Are you the 'boat people'?”

Wendy: “Yes, our first marriage was on the Betsy Ann Riverboat...”

Probate clerk, calling to everyone else in the office: “Hey, everyone, come here – it's the 'boat people'!”

And folks appeared as if out of the woodwork to show the nicely framed forms that we would be getting along with other items and to dole out congratulatory hugs and handshakes. I looked at Wendy and said: “I guess that we're the 'boat people' now.”

Wendy to me: “It appears so.”

It took a few minutes for the din to die down and for the usual reserved office banter to return. During this time, I shook hands with over a dozen folks that I have never met. We were guided into the Judge's office, where the ceremony would take place.

Probate clerk: “Judge, these are the Scheider's and they are here to be married today.”

Judge Al Booth, standing to greet us: “Hello! That's great! A marriage is an institution...”

Wendy: “Judge... pardon me for interrupting, but do you know who we are?”

Judge Booth took a long gaze at both of us: “No, I don't know you – should I know you?”

Wendy: “We're the 'boat people'.”

The Judge's eyes widened as the 'boat people' title suddenly made everything self explanatory. Judge: “We have real nice certificates for you two, I think that they're...”

Wendy: “I have some certificates at home, Judge, and they're not worth a red cent. Will this marriage take?”

Judge Al Booth: “Yes, I can assure you that I can preside over weddings and that this will take. So we'll just skip to the important stuff.”

Steve: “One moment, please. Have I been committing fraud? After all, I have Wendy listed on insurance forms and the like.”

Judge Al Booth: “Since you presented one another as husband and wife on the riverboat, that act would allow your marriage to fall under 'common law', so, no, you haven't been committing fraud.”

The Judge looked at both of us and asked: “Any more questions?”

We shook our heads. Wendy: “No”; Steve: “Not from me.”

Judge Al Booth then had us recite our vows affirming with “I dos.”

And with that, Wendy and Steve were remarried as the 'boat people'.

The Betsy Ann Riverboat

The Betsy Ann was the victim of Montgomery politics in the worst way. The politicians decided to open a minor league baseball field for the Montgomery Biscuits, a farm team for the Tampa Bay Rays. Along with the field was a shopping area with many restaurants. In order to make way for the renovation, the paddle-wheeler had to be displaced. It moored up in Wetumpka for a number of years, and when the field was ready, the Betsy Ann wasn't invited back. Instead, the politicians decided that the larger Harriott II paddle-wheeler was a better fit for the Montgomery waterfront. After her sale and a series of destinations, the Betsy Ann now calls Biloxi, MS home.

John Bull

When we came to reserve the Betsy Ann, John told me that he and his father originally owned the Betsy Ann and that they performed all their own maintenance, outside of cleaning the keel. John was also very active in the blues scene in Montgomery. He was a headliner for any of the blues festivals in the Montgomery area. That has never changed, and John continues to play the harmonica whenever and where ever he can. And it was that connection that landed Henry Pugh for our wedding. John was disheartened to leave the Montgomery waterfront and further frustrated when his ship wasn't invited back. However, when the politicians decided to use the Harriott II, they found that there was one man fit to move the boat from its location on the east coast and pilot it up the river to the waterfront slip at Montgomery, and that was John Bull. After some dealing, John also became the Captain and maintainer for the Hariott II, and we enjoyed a trip on the Hariott II to celebrate our tenth anniversary. That day was John Bull's last day to Captain the craft, and we were certain to shake his hand as we left.

Henry Pugh

Mr. Pugh was a fantastic keyboardist and singer. His rendition of “What a Wonderful World” became “our song” to Wendy and me. When we cruised onboard the Harriott II, Henry was playing, and we approached him and told him our tale of the Betsy Ann and that it was ten years ago. He smiled and played “What a Wonderful World” for us and we swayed and danced close and I recalled our wedding day. Henry passed away on August 15, 2020 due to complications with COVID-19. His memory will always be carried in our hearts.

Al Booth

Judge Al Booth served as the Judge of Probate for Autauga County Alabama from 2000 through 2018. In 2019, he pleaded guilty to one count of misdemeanor ethics violation after a Grand Jury indictment as part of a plea deal. At the time of his trial, he was the county's Republican Party Chairman.

20220116 Thesaurus: coward

noreply@blogger.com (S. Scheider) — Thu, 06 Jan 2022 10:27:00 +0000

Executive:

Donald Trump
Mark Meadows

Senate:

Tommy Tuberville, Ala.
Rick Scott, Fla.
Roger Marshall, Kan.
John Kennedy, La.
Cindy Hyde-Smith, Miss.
Josh Hawley, Mo.
Ted Cruz, Texas
Cynthia Lummis, Wyo.

House:

Robert B. Aderholt, Ala.
Mo Brooks, Ala.
Jerry Carl, Ala.
Barry Moore, Ala.
Gary Palmer, Ala.
Mike Rogers, Ala.
Andy Biggs, Ariz.
Paul Gosar, Ariz.
Debbie Lesko, Ariz.
David Schweikert, Ariz.
Rick Crawford, Ark.
Ken Calvert, Calif.
Mike Garcia, Calif.
Darrell Issa, Calif.
Doug LaMalfa, Calif.
Kevin McCarthy, Calif.
Devin Nunes, Calif.
Jay Obernolte, Calif.
Lauren Boebert, Colo.
Doug Lamborn, Colo.
Kat Cammack, Fla.
Mario Diaz-Balart, Fla.
Byron Donalds, Fla.
Neal Dunn, Fla.
Scott Franklin, Fla.
Matt Gaetz, Fla.
Carlos Gimenez, Fla.
Brian Mast, Fla.
Bill Posey, Fla.
John Rutherford, Fla.
Greg Steube, Fla.
Daniel Webster, Fla.
Rick Allen, Ga.
Earl L. "Buddy" Carter, Ga.
Andrew Clyde, Ga.
Marjorie Taylor Greene, Ga.
Jody Hice, Ga.
Barry Loudermilk, Ga.
Russ Fulcher, Idaho
Mike Bost, Ill.
Mary Miller, Ill.
Jim Baird, Ind.
Jim Banks, Ind.
Greg Pence, Ind.
Jackie Walorski, Ind.
Ron Estes, Kan.
Jacob LaTurner, Kan.
Tracey Mann, Kan.
Harold Rogers, Ky.
Garret Graves, La.
Clay Higgins, La.
Mike Johnson, La.
Steve Scalise, La.
Andy Harris, Md.
Jack Bergman, Mich.
Lisa McClain, Mich.
Tim Walberg, Mich.
Michelle Fischbach, Minn.
Jim Hagedorn, Minn.
Michael Guest, Miss.
Trent Kelly, Miss.
Steven Palazzo, Miss.
Sam Graves, Mo.
Vicky Hartzler, Mo.
Billy Long, Mo.
Blaine Luetkemeyer, Mo.
Jason Smith, Mo.
Matt Rosendale, Mont.
Dan Bishop, N.C.
Ted Budd, N.C.
Madison Cawthorn, N.C.
Virginia Foxx, N.C.
Richard Hudson, N.C.
Gregory F. Murphy, N.C.
David Rouzer, N.C.
Jeff Van Drew, N.J.
Yvette Herrell, N.M.
Chris Jacobs, N.Y.
Nicole Malliotakis, N.Y.
Elise M. Stefanik, N.Y.
Lee Zeldin, N.Y.
Adrian Smith, Neb.
Steve Chabot, Ohio
Warren Davidson, Ohio
Bob Gibbs, Ohio
Bill Johnson, Ohio
Jim Jordan, Ohio
Stephanie Bice, Okla.
Tom Cole, Okla.
Kevin Hern, Okla.
Frank Lucas, Okla.
Markwayne Mullin, Okla.
Cliff Bentz, Ore.
John Joyce, Pa.
Fred Keller, Pa.
Mike Kelly, Pa.
Daniel Meuser, Pa.
Scott Perry, Pa.
Guy Reschenthaler, Pa.
Lloyd Smucker, Pa.
Glenn Thompson, Pa.
Jeff Duncan, S.C.
Ralph Norman, S.C.
Tom Rice, S.C.
William Timmons, S.C.
Joe Wilson, S.C.
Tim Burchett, Tenn.
Scott DesJarlais, Tenn.
Chuck Fleischmann, Tenn.
Mark E. Green, Tenn.
Diana Harshbarger, Tenn.
David Kustoff, Tenn.
John Rose, Tenn.
Jodey Arrington, Texas
Brian Babin, Texas
Michael C. Burgess, Texas
John R. Carter, Texas
Michael Cloud, Texas
Pat Fallon, Texas
Louie Gohmert, Texas
Lance Gooden, Texas
Ronny Jackson, Texas
Troy Nehls, Texas
August Pfluger, Texas
Pete Sessions, Texas
Beth Van Duyne, Texas
Randy Weber, Texas
Roger Williams, Texas
Ron Wright, Texas
Burgess Owens, Utah
Chris Stewart, Utah
Ben Cline, Va.
Bob Good, Va.
Morgan Griffith, Va.
Robert J. Wittman, Va.
Carol Miller, W.Va.
Alexander X. Mooney, W.Va.
Scott Fitzgerald, Wis.
Tom Tiffany, Wis.

The above are parties that supported the January 6th insurrection in 2021. Over 10,000 others implemented the siege on the capitol. All are disgraceful cowards, yet many still occupy seats in Washington. Unfortunately, the same democracy that these individuals would discard is saving their collective butt. However, no one is above the law.

Howdy and greetings from our tin can by the sea. Sorry for the ominous preface, but someone's gotta state it upfront - the republican party has become a party of cowardice. I'm not exactly enthralled with the democrats, either - they don't know what they want to be when they grow up - but the republicans are a good-old-boys-old-white-men party whose demographic is dying. And in those dying gasps, it's condoning every act of cowardice imaginable.

Just a note: if you are elected, then you are considered a leader, so ready or not, LEAD! Too often those that should be leading instead hide behind aggregates in order to diffuse their cowardice among many.

Part of me is sickened that we are "remembering" the acts on 1/6/2021, and part of me says that it will be changed in the retelling if we don't baseline it. Here's a video from the New York Times to help with the baseline.

We also have COVID's omicron variant running amok and it looks like we'll be dealing with inflation for the beginning of the year. Global warming? It's here and there's not much of a coordinated plan to reduce green house gases that are fueling it. Diversity? 2021 saw improvements in board level demographics, however, the needle moved from 14% to 16%. Considering that 50% of the world is female, that's a huge underrepresentation. At this rate, we will cross 50% in 2039. Why is it moving so slow? Ask a member of the good-old-boys-old-white-men party.

You're searching for good times
But just wait and see
You'll come running back (I said, don't worry darling)
You'll come running back (spend the rest of my life with you, baby)
You'll come running back to me
- The Rolling Stones, "Time is on My Side", 12 X 5, The Rolling Stones, 1964

Monday's Child

noreply@blogger.com (S. Scheider) — Sun, 26 Dec 2021 19:05:00 +0000

Monday's Child

Monday's child is fair of face,

Tuesday's child is full of grace.

Wednesday's child is full of woe,

Thursday's child has far to go.

Friday's child is loving and giving,

Saturday's child works hard for a living.

And the child born on the Sabbath day

Is bonny and blithe, good and gay.

20211225 The Holidays

noreply@blogger.com (S. Scheider) — Sat, 25 Dec 2021 19:28:00 +0000

Happy holidays from our little tin can by the sea!

Not the best of years. I have cancer and I have been told that I will be fighting some form of cancer for the rest of my life. The statistics are grim - only 14% of those diagnosed with stage 4 colorectal cancer survive 5 years after diagnosis. My oncologist has told me that the longest she has had someone survive after that same diagnosis is ten years, and they died from brain cancer. So, I try to mitigate that reality by waking up and celebrating it. Every wake-up is a win!

I learned that Mr. Henry Pugh, the man that played keyboard and sang at our wedding, passed away on August 15, 2020. His rendition of Louis Armstrong's "What a wonderful world" will always be in our hearts. Since he sang it on our wedding day, it has always been "our" song. We celebrated our 10th anniversary by listening to Mr. Pugh while aboard the Harriott II riverboat in Montgomery, Alabama. The Hariott II replaced the Betsy Ann at the slip in Montgomery. Mr. Pugh was 83 and he died of COVID-19.

20211130 End of the Season

noreply@blogger.com (S. Scheider) — Wed, 01 Dec 2021 01:48:00 +0000

That's a wrap for 2021. Only one had us move to the hotel - Elsa. Now we enter a quiet time until next May when the Atlantic heats back up.

Like a train that stops at every station,
We all deal with trials and tribulations
Fear hangs the fellow that ties up his years
Entangled in yellow and cries all his tears
Changes come before we can go
Learn to see them before we're too old
Don't just take me for tryin' to be heavy
Understand, it's time to get ready for the storm
- Stevie Ray Vaughan, "Couldn't Stand the Weather", Couldn't Stand the Weather, Stevie Ray Vaughan and Double Trouble, 1984

20211127 Omicron

noreply@blogger.com (S. Scheider) — Sun, 28 Nov 2021 02:56:00 +0000

The newest variant of Sars-Covid-19 has surfaced and has been designated as "omicron". This one is displacing the highly virulent delta variant, which implies that it is more successful at surviving from one host to the next. There are three questions: 1. is it more contagious than the delta variant; 2. what is it's lethality as compared to the delta variant; 3. will the existing medicines (vaccines, suppressants) be effective against it? The clock is running as omicron is already on three continents. This will make for a difficult holiday season.

That ignorance and hate
May mourn the dead
It is believing
It is believing
- The Beatles, "Tomorrow Never Knows", Revolver, 1966

20211124 - Corona Virus Part 26 - BLM 15

noreply@blogger.com (S. Scheider) — Wed, 24 Nov 2021 20:33:00 +0000

Howdy and welcome back to our little tin can by the sea. Tomorrow is Thanksgiving, and I wish that I could be sitting at the tables of all of my friends and family, but not this year. We've been doing well as we adapt to my life with cancer. I am still optimistic that it will be eradicated from my body, but part of me knows that only 16% of people that contract stage 4 colon cancer live more than five years after being diagnosed. I still try to stay chipper and I often say, "Every wakeup is a win!"

No numbers. At this point, they are meaningless. Our governor has tailored the reported data so that Florida looks good. Meanwhile, people die. The delta variant has razed the unvaccinated and it will continue to do so. With over 90 million still unvaxxed in the US, it has a plethora of hosts. I'll do an annual post again in March, to mark year two.

The real reason that I'm blogging today is that the verdict for the death of Ahmaud Arbery came back today. This is how it was reported by Rachel Tillman of Spectrum News:

Gregory McMichael, his son Travis McMichael, and neighbor William “Roddie” Bryan each faced nine counts of malice murder, felony murder, aggravated assault, false imprisonment and criminal attempt to commit a felony.
Travis McMichael, 35, was found guilty of all charges against him, including malice murder and felony murder.
Greg McMichael, 65, was found not guilty of malice murder, but was found guilty on all other counts, including felony murder, assault and false imprisonment.
Bryan was found not guilty on one count each of malice murder, felony murder and aggravated assault, but was found guilty on six other charges including felony murder, aggravated assault, false imprisonment and attempt to commit a felony.
All three men will be required to stay in custody until their sentencing hearing, a date for which has not yet been announced.
The men face minimum sentences of life in prison. It is up to the judge to decide whether that comes with or without the possibility of parole.

Revenge is not Justice. Does this "right" compensate for all of the "wrongs"? No, and it was to be swept under the rug initially, if not for a video of the event authored by Bryan. The Georgia's DA office is still biased. The Georgia police are still biased. Many of the citizens of Georgia are biased. This has not changed that, but that is where the work needs to be done, one mind at a time.

To that end, the following was reported by the New York Times:

Judge Timothy R. Walmsley of Savannah was tapped to preside over the Arbery case in 2020 after all five judges in Glynn County, Ga., where the shooting occurred, recused themselves.

That needs to be fixed.

We're on a mission in the everlastin' light that shines
A revelation of the truth in chapters of our minds
- Michael Jackson, "We are here to change the world", The Ultimate Collection, from the film Captain EO, Disney, 1986

A Great Recipe for Nut Horns

noreply@blogger.com (S. Scheider) — Wed, 17 Nov 2021 17:29:00 +0000

This was given to me by Mrs. Dorothy Lucot, who had it on her refrigerator for years. It is a newspaper clipping from either the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette or the Pittsburgh Press back in the 1970s.

20211101 There is a season

noreply@blogger.com (S. Scheider) — Mon, 01 Nov 2021 20:05:00 +0000

The above chart shows the air conditioner (cyan lines) giving over to the heater (orange lines) last night. That marks the beginning of the cool-down here in Florida. It was 57 degrees on the lanai this morning when we left for my chemo appointment (brrr!)

A Matter of Inconvenience

noreply@blogger.com (S. Scheider) — Wed, 27 Oct 2021 18:07:00 +0000

As I sat next to the Pharmacy counter in our local Publix, I decided to count the number of people that were not properly wearing a mask. This included masks worn around the chin, gators of any form, masks exposing the nose, and no mask at all. I excluded children in my count. During the wait of nearly an hour, I counted 37 unmasked patrons. They covered a wide range of ages, from teenagers to elderly and a broud swath of demographics.

I then realized the reason that they were maskless - it's inconvenient. Forget the rest of the hogwash of rights, religious exceptions, medical exceptions, and the like - these people are just too damn lazy to care about another human being other than themselves. Three of the unmasked that I counted were mothers with children in tow. I feel for those kids since they have at least one parent that doesn't care at all.

Cancer blog

noreply@blogger.com (S. Scheider) — Mon, 18 Oct 2021 19:22:00 +0000

Howdy folks,

I have begun a separate blog for my cancer journey. Here is the URL: https://www.caringbridge.org/visit/everywakeupisawin . I did this to make it easier for people looking for cancer information to be able to find it on one blog site.

We WILL beat this together!

Steve

Me and music

noreply@blogger.com (S. Scheider) — Wed, 06 Oct 2021 23:08:00 +0000

Yes, this is me with my brown 1975 ES-335 stunning the crowd on amature night in Albany, NY circa 1997. Oddly, of the 35 years that I played guitar, this is the only photo I have of myself playing guitar. I gifted this particular guitar to Jeremy Douglas as well as my black 1990 ES-335. My daughter has my wine 1985 ES-335TD. The only other electric that I owned was a 1992 cream Fender Telecaster, but it was stolen at baggage claim in Montgomery, AL after flying home from a party at Alf's in Phoenix, AZ.

I loved the blues and I truely loved playing the guitar. It started when I was 11 and I received an acoustic guitar for my birthday. I learned some chords and how to play "Billy Boy" before diving into "Innagaddadavida" and "Sunshine of Your Love". I had a lot of frustration with that guitar, mostly because I didn't know anyone else that played. My brother, Carl, had a guitar and he could play "Classical Gas" on it. So, I got the sheet music and transcribed it to tabular and tried to get it down. At about 15, I picked up a classical guitar, which was just in time to learn Led Zepplin's "Stairway to Heaven". That I could do. At Carnegie-Mellon, we would meet up in Schenley Park and play - maybe 10 to 15 of us - guitars, bongos, flutes, saxes, you name it. It was music for music's sake. I played with a couple of friends at one frat - mainly the Doors Morrison Hotel. At the time, I was trying to teach myself through various books, like Fredrick Noad's "Solo Guitar Playing". After a year of playing with others, I picked up both volumes of Ted Greene's "Jazz Guitar: Single Note Soloing." I learned a lot from those books. I wish that I could remember everything that it laid out, but I tried to follow note mistakes with mode changes, which had mixed results. I also picked up Tommy Tedesco's "For Guitar Player's Only." Awesome book - more about the business side of music, and the stories in it are hilarious. One thing that I learned from it was "never turn down a chance to play." I learned a lot through that sentence. It also bit me when I didn't follow it. At 20, I dabbled in writing classical pieces, but I soon realized my limitations there. With those beginnings, I entered the Navy and occasionally picked up the guitar and played. It was more like meditation than practice - I had a standard routine - pentatonics, then minors, then augmented, then major, then this song, then that one... etc. But in those days, I preferred listening to music over playing it.

During my Carnegie-Mellon days, I ran across the Gibson ES-335. The little (tiny) local guitar shop had a walnut one in the front window that I would salivate over, but I could not afford it no matter how long I starved. This desire was fed by the Jazz Crusaders' with Larry Carlton "Crusaders 1" and literally everything by BB King. In 1990, I ordered a black ES 335 directly from Gibson. When it arrived, I cried. I took a week off an played it until my callouses hurt. Then I picked up a little Mesa Boogie 0.22 and it was the perfect fit for me. When I landed in Phoenix, AZ I found out that my workmates had a band and they were open to anyone playing with them. The band was named "Attack of the 50 foot woman band" after the Daryl Hannah movie of the same name. There were times when we played that there were four of us and sometimes twenty. It was a blast for me. Those folks liked a lot of Neil Young and early 70s rock, which was right up my alley. We had two very solid lead guitarists and the vocalist played guitar, so I tried to be a bridge between the bass and the keyboards (when we had some) and I became the rhythm guitarist. I also had a Tascam 6 by 2 mixing board so I picked up a small Peavy PA system and we were off to the races. While in Phoenix, I also picked up an Ovation 1312 Ultra and I had a piezo pickup installed in it. It was sweet sounding, but it wasn't very friendly for me to play; my belly and it's curved back made for an unstable combo. I also picked up a wine colored ES 335TD, which was very different. It wanted to scream. During the days in Phoenix, I became a member of the Phoenix Blues Society, which was awesome. I met so many legends at the events and the monthly club meetings. It was also nice to meet the various bar owners and learn the locaitons of the blues bars around town. On many Fridays, the gang from work would have some wings at a bar and maybe venture out afterward. On a couple of occasions, we went to the Biltmore in Scottsdale and sat in a section behind the stage. We could see the stage, since we were off to the side, but we were in our own world, just enjoying the music. usually jazz. I ended up in a small town near Montgomery, AL and that's where I picked up my charlie brown ES 335. When I got it, the action was set ridiculously high and the whole neck was warped. After a good bit of scouring, I found a Gibson certified luthier in Alpharetta, GA. These were old stomping grounds for me, so I packed up and drove over there one weekend to drop off the guitar for some neck work. I had brought the action back down, but there was a good deal of fret buzz. The luthier looked it over and asked how far he could go, since it had a pre 1975 serial number. I asked him to keep the neck, but refretting was fine. After about a month, he called me up and said that it was ready. Boy, was it ever! He took the warp out of the neck and he refitted the bridge along with all new fret wires. It played like a dream. I picked up a couple cases from him for the brown and wine ES 335s and headed back to Alabama (with a Gibson on my knee). Around this time, I met Jeremy Douglas who was a sweet guitar player. So, as a late wedding present, I gave him my black ES 335. Fifteen years later, he received my brown one, too. In Alabama, I didn't play much (all work and no play) so the guitars were idle. My daughter asked for the wine ES 335 TD, which I happily gave her. To this day, I don't think that she has plugged it into an amp. I gave the Ovation away to a friend's son who is trying to make it as a pro guitarist. It'll be one more sound for him.

So, I'm guitarless with arthritis, MS, and cancer. Maybe I can learn how to play the harmonica...

20211004 Sars-CoV-19 700,000

noreply@blogger.com (S. Scheider) — Sun, 03 Oct 2021 18:04:00 +0000

One white flag for each death in the US from COVID-19. I have lost three friends to this pandemic.

Entire article from The Smithsonian is here. 😢

I've seen fire and I've seen rain
I've seen sunny days that I thought would never end
I've seen lonely times when I could not find a friend
But I always thought that I'd see you again
- James Taylor, "Fire and Rain", Sweet Baby James, 1970

The haves and havenots

noreply@blogger.com (S. Scheider) — Wed, 29 Sep 2021 16:01:00 +0000

Before drawing too many conclusions regarding this chart, note that the coloration is biased. Instead of going from 0 to 100 percent, this goes from 2.4 to 32.2 percent. With that caveat, it's interesting to see that there are definitive edges along state borders, which implies that the generation of an uninsured constituency is a matter of state policy.

Music heals

noreply@blogger.com (S. Scheider) — Sun, 19 Sep 2021 09:35:00 +0000

Welcome address to freshman parents at Boston Conservatory, given by Karl Paulnack, pianist and director of music division at Ithaca College.

“One of my parents' deepest fears, I suspect, is that society would not properly value me as a musician, that I wouldn't be appreciated. I had very good grades in high school, I was good in science and math, and they imagined that as a doctor or a research chemist or an engineer, I might be more appreciated than I would be as a musician. I still remember my mother's remark when I announced my decision to apply to music school-she said, "you're WASTING your SAT scores." On some level, I think, my parents were not sure themselves what the value of music was, what its purpose was. And they LOVED music, they listened to classical music all the time. They just weren't really clear about its function. So let me talk about that a little bit, because we live in a society that puts music in the "arts and entertainment" section of the newspaper, and serious music, the kind your kids are about to engage in, has absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with entertainment, in fact it's the opposite of entertainment. Let me talk a little bit about music, and how it works.

The first people to understand how music really works were the ancient Greeks. And this is going to fascinate you; the Greeks said that music and astronomy were two sides of the same coin. Astronomy was seen as the study of relationships between observable, permanent, external objects, and music was seen as the study of relationships between invisible, internal, hidden objects. Music has a way of finding the big, invisible moving pieces inside our hearts and souls and helping us figure out the position of things inside us. Let me give you some examples of how this works.

One of the most profound musical compositions of all time is the Quartet for the End of Time written by French composer Olivier Messiaen in 1940. Messiaen was 31 years old when France entered the war against Nazi Germany. He was captured by the Germans in June of 1940, sent across Germany in a cattle car and imprisoned in a concentration camp. He was fortunate to find a sympathetic prison guard who gave him paper and a place to compose. There were three other musicians in the camp, a cellist, a violinist, and a clarinetist, and Messiaen wrote his quartet with these specific players in mind. It was performed in January 1941 for four thousand prisoners and guards in the prison camp. Today it is one of the most famous masterworks in the repertoire.

Given what we have since learned about life in the concentration camps, why would anyone in his right mind waste time and energy writing or playing music? There was barely enough energy on a good day to find food and water, to avoid a beating, to stay warm, to escape torture - why would anyone bother with music? And yet - from the camps, we have poetry, we have music, we have visual art; it wasn't just this one fanatic Messiaen; many, many people created art.

Why? Well, in a place where people are only focused on survival, on the bare necessities, the obvious conclusion is that art must be, somehow, essential for life. The camps were without money, without hope, without commerce, without recreation, without basic respect, but they were not without art. Art is part of survival; art is part of the human spirit, an unquenchable expression of who we are. Art is one of the ways in which we say, "I am alive, and my life has meaning."

On September 12, 2001 I was a resident of Manhattan. That morning I reached a new understanding of my art and its relationship to the world. I sat down at the piano that morning at 10 AM to practice as was my daily routine; I did it by force of habit, without thinking about it. I lifted the cover on the keyboard, and opened my music, and put my hands on the keys and took my hands off the keys. And I sat there and thought, does this even matter? Isn't this completely irrelevant?

Playing the piano right now, given what happened in this city yesterday, seems silly, absurd, irreverent, pointless. Why am I here? What place has a musician in this moment in time? Who needs a piano player right now? I was completely lost.

And then I, along with the rest of New York, went through the journey of getting through that week. I did not play the piano that day, and in fact I contemplated briefly whether I would ever want to play the piano again. And then I observed how we got through the day.

At least in my neighborhood, we didn't shoot hoops or play Scrabble. We didn't play cards to pass the time, we didn't watch TV, we didn't shop, we most certainly did not go to the mall. The first organized activity that I saw in New York, that same day, was singing. People sang. People sang around fire houses, people sang "We Shall Overcome". Lots of people sang America the Beautiful. The first organized public event that I remember was the Brahms Requiem, later that week, at Lincoln Center, with the New York Philharmonic.

The first organized public expression of grief, our first communal response to that historic event, was a concert. That was the beginning of a sense that life might go on. The US Military secured the airspace, but recovery was led by the arts, and by music in particular, that very night.

From these two experiences, I have come to understand that music is not part of "arts and entertainment" as the newspaper section would have us believe. It's not a luxury, a lavish thing that we fund from leftovers of our budgets, not a plaything or an amusement or a pass time. Music is a basic need of human survival. Music is one of the ways we make sense of our lives, one of the ways in which we express feelings when we have no words, a way for us to understand things with our hearts when we can't with our minds.

Some of you may know Samuel Barber's heart wrenchingly beautiful piece Adagio for Strings. If you don't know it by that name, then some of you may know it as the background music which accompanied the Oliver Stone movie Platoon, a film about the Vietnam War. If you know that piece of music either way, you know it has the ability to crack your heart open like a walnut; it can make you cry over sadness you didn't know you had. Music can slip beneath our conscious reality to get at what's really going on inside us the way a good therapist does.

I bet that you have never been to a wedding where there was absolutely no music. There might have been only a little music, there might have been some really bad music, but I bet you there was some music. And something very predictable happens at weddings - people get all pent up with all kinds of emotions, and then there's some musical moment where the action of the wedding stops and someone sings or plays the flute or something. And even if the music is lame, even if the quality isn't good, predictably 30 or 40 percent of the people who are going to cry at a wedding, cry a couple of moments after the music starts. Why? The Greeks.

Music allows us to move around those big invisible pieces of ourselves and rearrange our insides so that we can express what we feel even when we can't talk about it. Can you imagine watching Indiana Jones or Superman or Star Wars with the dialogue but no music? What is it about the music swelling up at just the right moment in ET so that all the softies in the audience start crying at exactly the same moment? I guarantee you if you showed the movie with the music stripped out, it wouldn't happen that way.

The Greeks: Music is the understanding of the relationship between invisible internal objects.

I'll give you one more example, the story of the most important concert of my life. I must tell you I have played a little less than a thousand concerts in my life so far. I have played in places that I thought were important. I like playing in Carnegie Hall; I enjoyed playing in Paris; it made me very happy to please the critics in St. Petersburg. I have played for people I thought were important; music critics of major newspapers, foreign heads of state. The most important concert of my entire life took place in a nursing home in Fargo, ND, about 4 years ago.

I was playing with a very dear friend of mine who is a violinist. We began, as we often do, with Aaron Copland's Sonata, which was written during World War II and dedicated to a young friend of Copland's, a young pilot who was shot down during the war. Now we often talk to our audiences about the pieces we are going to play rather than providing them with written program notes. But in this case, because we began the concert with this piece, we decided to talk about the piece later in the program and to just come out and play the music without explanation.

Midway through the piece, an elderly man seated in a wheelchair near the front of the concert hall began to weep. This man, whom I later met, was clearly a soldier-even in his 70's, it was clear from his buzz-cut hair, square jaw and general demeanor that he had spent a good deal of his life in the military. I thought it a little bit odd that someone would be moved to tears by that particular movement of that particular piece, but it wasn't the first time I've heard crying in a concert and we went on with the concert and finished the piece.

When we came out to play the next piece on the program, we decided to talk about both the first and second pieces, and we described the circumstances in which the Copland was written and mentioned its dedication to a downed pilot. The man in the front of the audience became so disturbed that he had to leave the auditorium. I honestly figured that we would not see him again, but he did come backstage afterwards, tears and all, to explain himself.

What he told us was this: "During World War II, I was a pilot, and I was in an aerial combat situation where one of my team's planes was hit. I watched my friend bail out, and watched his parachute open, but the Japanese planes which had engaged us returned and machine gunned across the parachute chords so as to separate the parachute from the pilot, and I watched my friend drop away into the ocean, realizing that he was lost. I have not thought about this for many years, but during that first piece of music you played, this memory returned to me so vividly that it was as though I was reliving it. I didn't understand why this was happening, why now, but then when you came out to explain that this piece of music was written to commemorate a lost pilot, it was a little more than I could handle. How does the music do that? How did it find those feelings and those memories in me?"

Remember the Greeks: music is the study of invisible relationships between internal objects. This concert in Fargo was the most important work I have ever done. For me to play for this old soldier and help him connect, somehow, with Aaron Copland, and to connect their memories of their lost friends, to help him remember and mourn his friend, this is my work. This is why music matters.

What follows is part of the talk I will give to this year's freshman class when I welcome them a few days from now. The responsibility I will charge your sons and daughters with is this:

"If we were a medical school, and you were here as a med student practicing appendectomies, you'd take your work very seriously because you would imagine that some night at two AM someone is going to waltz into your emergency room and you're going to have to save their life.

Well, my friends, someday at 8 PM someone is going to walk into your concert hall and bring you a mind that is confused, a heart that is overwhelmed, a soul that is weary. Whether they go out whole again will depend partly on how well you do your craft.

You're not here to become an entertainer, and you don't have to sell yourself. The truth is you don't have anything to sell; being a musician isn't about dispensing a product, like selling used Chevies. I'm not an entertainer; I'm a lot closer to a paramedic, a firefighter, a rescue worker. You're here to become a sort of therapist for the human soul, a spiritual version of a chiropractor, physical therapist, someone who works with our insides to see if they get things to line up, to see if we can come into harmony with ourselves and be healthy and happy and well.

Frankly, ladies and gentlemen, I expect you not only to master music; I expect you to save the planet. If there is a future wave of wellness on this planet, of harmony, of peace, of an end to war, of mutual understanding, of equality, of fairness, I don't expect it will come from a government, a military force or a corporation. I no longer even expect it to come from the religions of the world, which together seem to have brought us as much war as they have peace. If there is a future of peace for humankind, if there is to be an understanding of how these invisible, internal things should fit together, I expect it will come from the artists, because that's what we do. As in the concentration camp and the evening of 9/11, the artists are the ones who might be able to help us with our internal, invisible lives."

20210721 Covid Snapshot

noreply@blogger.com (S. Scheider) — Thu, 22 Jul 2021 02:04:00 +0000

COVID cases are trending up again. This time, it is in the summer, but with few masks and fewer restrictions. The saving grace is that the "vaccines" are preventing deaths, and the vaccinated that are symptomatic are much less likely to be hospitalized or die. I'm vaccinated and I'd like to portray some sense of optimism, but I'm at a loss right now. I pray that this surge does not affect my family nor my friends.

For the unvaccinated and those dispensing lies: Ex 20:13

2021 Memorial Day

noreply@blogger.com (S. Scheider) — Sun, 30 May 2021 15:12:00 +0000

These are the numbers that we honor on Memorial Day this year. I'm sorry that this statistic exists. We must do better.

Exodus 20:13

I Worried

noreply@blogger.com (S. Scheider) — Wed, 05 May 2021 10:34:00 +0000

by Mary Oliver

I worried a lot. Will the garden grow, will the rivers
flow in the right direction, will the earth turn
as it was taught, and if not how shall
I correct it?

Was I right, was I wrong, will I be forgiven,
can I do better?

Will I ever be able to sing, even the sparrows
can do it and I am, well,
hopeless.

Is my eyesight fading or am I just imagining it,
am I going to get rheumatism,
lockjaw, dementia?

Finally I saw that worrying had come to nothing.
And gave it up. And took my old body
and went out into the morning,
and sang.

20210314 - a year

noreply@blogger.com (S. Scheider) — Sun, 14 Mar 2021 09:43:00 +0000

Scope	Cases	Deaths
Worldwide	120,094,542	2,660,516
United States	30,043,662	546,605
Florida	1,973,109	32,252
Pinellas County	68,912	1,501

Greetings from our little tin can by the sea where Wendy and I try to survive through the COVID-19 pandemic. It has been quite a year since originally going into lockdown. The numbers to the left show the current state of the pandemic. Testing has been down because people are now more interested in the "vaccines" than they are in avoiding COVID. Since I anticipate that this pandemic will still be going on next year at this time, I'll pass another installment of the numbers at that time. I'm sorry for all those that died and all of those that suffered, my daughter and her husband included. So much of this suffering was needless and it was all fueled by capitalism.

Sometimes I feel
Sometimes I feel
Like I've been tied
To the whipping post
Tied to the whipping post
Tied to the whipping post
Good Lord, I feel like I'm dying
- Gregg Allman, "Whipping Post", The Allman Brothers Band, 1971

Cancer timeline

noreply@blogger.com (S. Scheider) — Fri, 26 Feb 2021 19:24:00 +0000

I have opened a new blog for my journey with cancer. The cancer timeline has been relocated here. I will maintain updates to that post on that timeline. Thanks!

The Road not Taken

noreply@blogger.com (S. Scheider) — Wed, 24 Feb 2021 12:25:00 +0000

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,

And sorry I could not travel both

And be one traveler, long I stood

And looked down one as far as I could

To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,

And having perhaps the better claim,

Because it was grassy and wanted wear;

Though as for that the passing there

Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay

In leaves no step had trodden black.

Oh, I kept the first for another day!

Yet knowing how way leads on to way,

I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh

Somewhere ages and ages hence:

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—

I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference.

- Robert Frost