My favorite nursery song is “1, 2, 3, 4, 5, once I caught a fish alive” because it’s the only one I can sing without going horribly off-key. I’m a singer from hell but I have great hearing and suffer whenever anybody sings off-key. The reason why I can sing this particular song is that I saw the score. Maybe I should buy a book of scores for these nursery rhymes and peruse it. 

There must be something wrong with an introduction to a new edition of a novel if I read it and think, “God, what a bad novel. I so don’t want to read it” only to start reading the novel and discover that it’s incredibly good.

I’m reviewing yet another book, and God, the writing is just killing me. It’s an important subject, I’m glad the book exists, but it’s so badly written that I can’t read more than a paragraph before needing a break. It’s full of sentences like “This poet’s work is very important work and he worked on it tirelessly, leaving a vast stock of important work.” 

I don’t know how to allude to this issue without sounding harsh but seriously, folks, how can one remain so completely unaware that this is not the way to write literary criticism?

As I mentioned before, our Chancellor is trying to give himself a raise while denying a puny little cost of living increase to everybody who is not an administrator or with the School of Pharmacy.

It’s during times like these that one realizes how good it is to be part of a union. I don’t feel in the least stressed because I know I’m not alone. There are many people who are working together to defeat the Trump-like little tyrant who is our top administrator. I do my small part and rely on others to do the rest. We are all in the same boat, nobody is isolated or left struggling in misery while everybody else pretends it’s not happening (like when people started to be kicked out by their doctors one by one and there was no union yet to stand in solidarity.)

Look at what’s happening in Florida. People need people. The neoliberal mentality of isolation and competitiveness as the highest forms of existence is defective. It’s downright dangerous at times. 

The only thing I like about Facebook is that it warns you that you are overusing it. It just told me, “You’ve posted for 2 days in a row, and everybody is noticing!” So OK, point taken, I’m going away. 

If only Amazon did that. Like in, “you already bought a book yesterday. Are you sure you need a new one? Have you read the previous one already? Really? Everybody is noticing that you haven’t.”

Also, now that I’m out of the infant section and into the toddler aisles, I can’t tell you, folks, how much of this “girl empowerment” stuff there is. Toys, books, clothing, backpacks, bibs, shoes, and on and on and on. Screaming “Girls are great!” at you from all sides. She persisted! Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s life story for 5-year-olds! And another one for 8-year-olds! Women who achieved! 

I feel vicariously embarrassed when I see people trying so damn hard. 

I don’t like all of these “Girls can do anything” and “I’m a girl, what’s your superpower?” logos. It’s totally protesting too much. It tells kids that there’s something wrong with girls that all these reassurances are needed. 

A pompous male reporter on MSNBC: “If you support capitalism, report people who are price-gouging. Trying to exploit people’s desperation is not capitalism!”

Oh, sweetie pie. It’s the essence of capitalism, you little dumb bit of fluff.

And just one more tiny little question on DACA. I’m seeing an enormous number of “I support DACA!” slogans on Twitter, Facebook and everywhere else. It’s an explosion, there are so many of them. I’m sure everybody who posted them is good, well-meaning person who genuinely doesn’t want anybody to suffer or get deported.

But here is what I need to understand. Why are there no posters saying, “I don’t support DACA, I support naturalization”, or “Keep DACA and make it a first step towards citizenship!”, or “DACA today, citizenship tomorrow!”, or “Dreamers should be citizens!” I put it up on my FB and got no support except from 3 people I know in person and know I can always count on. 

Tweets and FB posts don’t directly participate in the political process. You don’t have to be cautious and modest in your expectations. Dream big, say what you actually want. And that’s precisely what everybody is doing on every issue. Every issue, including this one. 

I think the most important thing right now is to take a tiny little break from “Trump is bad and I’m virtuous” and take an honest look at what’s happening.

For the first time, Russian officials started dropping hints that Kremlin might contribute to Trump’s impeachment. The calculation they have to make is simple: what will result in greater chaos, leaving him in place or bumping him out. He didn’t mishandle Harvey, so it inclined the scales towards bumping him out. 

Of course, he is likely to create a lot of chaos in the coming days because that’s his nature. The question is whether it’s enough chaos to satisfy the Russians.