PopWars

While President Obama is on vacation I’ve been thinking about this whole “proportional response’ concept. It strikes me as rather small minded, as barbaric as the bible’s “eye for an eye,” but with a little time maybe the US can come up with a creative way of conveying how uncool the hacking and threats are. Was David and Goliath proportional?

A witty response, an idea so clever that it begins to turn the tables on the dictator would be proportional. Instead of airdropping dvd copies of the sophomoric movie on North Koreans maybe they could figure out a way to solicit Hollywood movie concepts from the North Koreans. Could the CIA be any more creative than the “creative” types at Sony?

In Louise‘s comment to my last post she pointed out that there are two sides to the sign I had shown so as I passed by today I stopped for another photo. Peggi had to explain this one to me. It is way beyond Catholicism.

A few weeks back we visited a couple of nearby funeral homes to get estimates on direct burial costs. My dad wanted to prepay for himself and my mom so the money, according to state law, would go into an M&T account to cover costs at the time their deaths. Peggi and I are thinking we should be doing this as well. Costs are not locked in, of course, so we probably have a few years if we’re lucky.

My dad made a decision on the home and called back the contact at Newcomer on Empire Boulevard to ask if he could draw up a bill and send it out. The contact said it should be done in person so he set up an appointment for this morning at 9:30. My dad had his check book and a different fellow, a big burly guy in in a suit, met us at the door. I said I had an appointment with the contact. The big guy told us he would take care of us and abruptly asked, “Names?” I wasn’t even sure it was a question but I spoke our names without using any verbs or prepositions, just the two pronouns. He took us downstairs past the showrooms with the ornate caskets and golden bibles and into a conference room with a poster of two hands clasped in prayer. A large monitor hung over the table with Microsoft Windows 7’s blue start-up screen. I pulled out my iPad and read the notes aloud from our first meeting with the contact.

The big guy asked what kind of casket we wanted and I said there is no casket, it is a “direct burial with the body in a shroud.” He said they must use some special machinery to lower the body.” My dad was squirming and raising his eyebrows. The next few exchanges were more awkward and ruder still. My dad said, I think we’ll take our business elsewhere and we got up. I turned back to the guy at the glass door as we were leaving and said, “You have a funny attitude.” He said, “Have a nice day, sir” and he looked the door behind us.

I have worked for myself most of my life and I’ve run into all sorts but I can’t think of any situation where the the deal was done, the specifics were settled on, the check was all but written for two customers and two more potential customers were in the office and the guy blows up the deal.

I’m so happy that Roz Chast’s brilliant memoir, “Can’t We Talk About Something More Pleasant?” was chosen as one of the New York Times 10 best books of the year. It addressed the absurdity of issues like these with mountains of grace and humor.

The local American football team, “the Bills,” are on a winning streak but I can’t bring myself to watch them for some reason. My neighbor says he is “afraid to watch them” so he records the game and looks at the highlights if they win. Last weekend we watched the final Major League Soccer game of the year, a game between Los Angeles and New England. It was Donovan’s last game of his career and they won but it was a sort of sad game. We caught a Premier League game this weekend between West Ham United and Sunderland and the difference in the level of play was quite remarkable. I can see why the US’s national team coach is encouraging our player to play overseas.

We recently became aware of the Spanish activist group, “FLO6x8.” Sort of a Flamenco Flash Mob they combine incredible music, passion, performance and a deep culture while trying to affect change. Watch them disrupt the Spanish Parliament.