no brain to drain

“when the president does it, that means that it is not illegal.” – richard m. nixon,  may 1977,

plutarch – “an imbalance between rich and poor is the oldest and most fatal ailment of all republics.”

in america, “the top 1 percent of households now have more wealth than the bottom 90 percent combined.” – bill moyers, published 1.5.2007 in the nation 

george bush’s brain dome
can not be alone
it will never save the day
has no meat on bone
bio-scum from some clown clone
it is inside slave to pay

that’s my tanka toy – a tanka is a japanese poem of 5 lines featuring 5 – 7 – 5 – 7 – 7 syllables…essentially 2 haikus slapped together. i added a 5 syllable title, so offer my apologies to purists.  i take that back – academics and purists should apologize to me, to all of us, for boring the world to tears.

elvis presley was 72 years old the 8th… 42 years of that very much alive, 30 years lucratively dead… 24 years of performing.  he’s made more dead than he ever did alive.  can’t wait until i die and get a raise.  of course, i make zero now, so even 2 pennies on my eyes would be a raise…. raise the dead.

the croation couple who gave us homegrown pickles and eggs last week said we were the only americans they’ve ever met.  now they realize not all americans are assholes.

speaking of anal orifices, the u.s. attacked yet another country this morning – somalia.  way to go america.  since world war 2, not one year has gone by without the u.s.a. bombing some country – frequently multiple countries in a single year.  for defenders of the peace, we’re awfully violent. and for folk who hold our sovereignty so highly, we don’t have much respect for the borders of others.  since whirl war 2, we’ve invaded korea, grenada, haiti, cuba, iraq, somalia, viet nam, the dominican republic, afghanistan, and many others – some of them more than once.  we’ve kill and overthrow democratically elected leaders whenever we feel like it – especially those of our neighbors in latin america.  you know, america just isn’t a very nice nation.  we seem to fit all the symptoms of a rogue nation according to noam chomsky – we seem to be the united states of hypocrisy.

kathy&i are going to trieste italy for 1 day tomorrow, then 2 days in venice. come back sunday.  blog monday.  february 10th we’ll begin 2 months in the village of abeilhan in the south of france about 100 kilometers from spain.  after france, we’ll try to get to prague for a couple months.  then thailand for another 3 months.  following that, we might have to come home cuz we could be broke.  this has been far more expensive than we thot it would be.  there is no free lunch.  i guess in my heart i always knew that.  but even if we end up with nothing, this has been the bargain of our life.  more people should travel the off roads of the world – the experiences there are deeper, richer.

i’ve given up trying to find grass.  can’t afford it anyway.  reality wants me to get stoned, reality will bring me grass.  it don’t pay to fight the flow.

 at the post office, the clerk talking to kathy saw me by her and said in english, oh, here’s the father.  i should have leaned over and given her an unfatherly kiss.