I turned on the Russian TV in the midst of some program and caught one of Putin’s propagandists delivering a sermon. 

“And then He came,” the man preached, his stupid little face shining with the reflected light of Revelation. “And he brought Life, Light, Truth and Hope to the world. It was a new spring of humanity. He, the great revolutionary, the Giver of change.”

Wow, look at how Jesusy these old KGB creeps suddenly got, I thought. 

“And his name is Donald Trump!” vociferated the propagandist suddenly. 

Well, it’s good to know he wasn’t taking the Lord’s name in vain, at least. 

Obviously, we haven’t gotten any merit pay in years. Hell, we don’t even get cost of living increases any more. Yet we still have to fill out endless merit paperwork. It feels like a cruel joke to waste all this time preparing documentation for merit pay that we’ll never get. 

I hate Rauner. 

Klara loves books. I know, what a shock. We only have every horizontal surface in this big house covered with books. She is trying to say the word “books” but for now it comes out as “boo.” There is no toy she likes more than her book collection.

Her favorite right now is “Eight Little Monkeys.” Her little face lights up with happiness whenever I start reading it to her. I think she likes it because I recite it in a singsong way and it’s repetitive and predictable. I have to read the monkeys to her at least 3 times a day.

Yesterday, I started reciting the monkeys to her while she was taking her bath. Klara was stunned. She started looking around, trying to see where the book was. It was shocking to her that the words were coming but the book was not there. She was equally stunned when N started reading the monkeys to her. She must have thought that only I could bring the words out of the book. 

It is beyond cute to see a child discover the joy of books.

Parenting is like teaching in the sense that you are much more a function than a person. If you make it about you as a person, a human being, you’ll be disappointed and miserable. 

For instance, N is unhappy because all of a sudden Klara seems to prefer me to him and wants to hang off my neck all the time. 

“What did I do wrong?” he asks. 

This is not about him, however. Just like it won’t be about him or me when at the age of 5 she’ll say, “I want to marry Daddy. Go away, Mamma.” Right now, she is undergoing the separation anxiety stage, which is normal at this age. It’s not about us as human beings. It’s about us as functions. 

Even when the children are very grown, even elderly, their parents are still much more functions than individuals to them. “This hairstyle doesn’t really suit you” carries an entirely different weight when said by a parent than by anybody else. 

It’s the same with teaching. Asking “But how can they lie to me or disrespect me” is a waste of time. You are not there. They are interacting with a function, not a person. Leave your self outside the classroom and you’ll be a fantastic teacher. 

So “Pat the Puppy” is one of those really great interactive books where babies can pet a furry animal, see themselves in a mirror, pull a tab and make a frog hop, make a toy squeak, etc. Klara loves this sort of thing. The problem with this particular one is that when it asks me to turn the wheel to see pictures of babies, the last one totally looks like Trump and Putin. 

See for yourself. What kind of ancient babies are these?

Freaks me out every day. 

I thought it would be a grand idea to give the kids at Klara’s birthday party little goody bags with small gifts. Nothing edible, of course, because half of the kids are from religious families with different dietary restrictions, and I don’t want to step all over that. Plus, you never know who’s allergic to what and whose parents are ideologically opposed to things like candy. 

So I headed to the dollar store and discovered that my brilliant invention already exists and it’s called “party favors.” There is a whole aisle of them at the store. 

It’s very hard to be original any more. 

The nonvoilent, nationwide National General Strike has been called for one week from tomorrow, with rallies up and down the country. The strikers have two demands for elected lawmakers: 1. Reaffirm your oath of office and unbounded compliance with the Constitution of the United States of America; and 2. Actively oppose any governmental language or action that violates any tenent of our Constitution.

Since everybody has their own vision of what violates the Constitution, this effort is doomed to failure from the start. If there is an entire institution dedicated to interpreting the Constitution in accordance with the demands of the moment and the current political climate, pretending that there are some immutable “tenents” (probably a mix between tenets and tenants) is a waste of time. 

Since the American people have decided* to plunge head on into the most hard-core form of the market state (a.k.a. whatever happens after the nation-state is demolished), the question is: what does it make sense to invest in intellectually? What subjects does it make sense to ponder and discuss?

Here is the list I came up with but feel free to add to it:

1. Personal productivity.

2. Time management. 

3. Body and health management. 

4. Local politics. 

5. Psychological health. 

6. Personal relationships in the age of fluidity.

7. How best to eradicate the remains of nation-state mentality from one’s way of seeing the world. 

The fight for resources and opportunities in the new state form is on. Those who entertain us on TV are very aware of it and are fighting for their share. 

Opportunities are massive but they are different and for different things than the ones we are used to. 

* What you decide is not about your rhetoric on the subject but about the result. Whatever Trump says, for instance, about wanting to strengthen the nation-state is useless if his actual actions lead in the opposite direction. 

Page 1 of a scholarly volume I’m beginning to read:

Diseases from Eurasia devastated the native population of America and Oceania. Syphilis moved from the New World to the Old. Europeans and their plants and animals invaded the Americas; the American potato, maize plant, and maniac spread throughout the New World. 

It’s funny how things going in one direction always devastate and invade. But the same kind of things going in the opposite direction innocuously move and spread. 

I have no idea why I was so shocked that Trump won. 

I don’t care to follow the news right now. All I will see is a replay of November 9. Democrats are getting clobbered on DeVos, on Sessions, on the SCOTUS pick. And as always, I’m sure they have fantastic excuses for all this losing. Not that I care to hear them again. 

We have a party of unhinged crazies and a party of pathetic losers. Of course, losers are more palatable than deranged maniacs. But as for mustering any enthusiasm for them, that’s beyond me.