Early in the Apple ... a Memory

In the early 1970s I had the good fortune to live on one of the most beautiful blocks in Manhattan. West 76th Street just off Central Park.

At that time there was a old man who also lived there. He could be seen regularly walking his old grizzled dog. And, surreptitiously dropping Corn kernels for the Pigeons. Now, if you live in New York City you either love the sight of those birds, or you detest them. They seem to be there just to soil every windowsill in town.

There was also a young man who lived in my row house building who did not like the man feeding those Pigeons. One day the old man saw him and went into an apoplectic rage; screaming and yelling. Very upset.

I asked the young man what was that all about. Well, he took it upon himself to stop the old guy from feeding the birds. One day when the fellow was walking his dog, dropping feed on the sidewalk, our young friend ran out of the house and sprinkled sugar on top of the corn.

And then, in a dramatic voice, he said to the old man, "And ... now, the Pigeons DIE!"

Many years later ...

What are the odds of this happening?

I was walking east on the block just off Riverside Drive on 86th Street. Mid-block I saw a Pigeon on the sidewalk maybe twenty feet away, directly in my path. When I spotted it, the Pigeon somehow seemed to spot me too. Immediately it flew toward me. Going upward at some precisely calibrated moment and angle, it let loose a dropping ... and it landed directly on my forehead, between my eyebrows. On my so-called "third eye" spot. It was warm and soothing to feel. True story. I swear. Kismet? 

Uncle Därnholdt-Zigismunt von Braunswieger und Stroopwafeln Wronski. 

In some parts just ... That Darn Wronski! Or, the more familiar, "Darnski".

As you might expect from the writings of this one Wronski, for the most part we Wronski's have a way with words. Darnski, too; perhaps one of the top tier penmeisters of the clan. 

He lived in Germany since immigrating there from Piekło as an infant. Why they left is anyone's guess; could be that the name of the town, Piekło, is the exact same word that is used to describe ‘hell’ in Polish. Apparently, it was ... well named.

Darnski is the one who coined the German idiomatic expression, "Ich kann mit setztzen". Literally, it's what one says when you see something particularly scrumptiliceous ... "I could sit in it". 

He also did the whole Bavarian thing to the hilt. Trademark lederhosen. Pewter capped tankard. That impossible smoking pipe. 

And, then, there's that overly appropriated name. If you delved into its true origins you'd find yourself in a little food store in Bad Tölz-Wolfratshausen. That's the German language for you. They aren't too much for invention of specific, pithy coinages. Just kept adding another name upon name for variations on any particular thing. And, another. Good for the sciences, however. 

He was quite the talker too. Smoking...drinking...and, yackin'.  Quite the party animal. Here he is in Fasching mode [that bacchanal time in Germany celebrating in exuberant manner before the Lenten observances].

There's more. But, with the Wronski's there always is. 

For now ... Tschüß!

And, if you want to really know from Wronski, here's the full compendium of those folks.

Jewish Buddhism:

*Take only what is given. Own nothing but your robes and an alms bowl. Unless, of course, you have the closet space.

*Let your mind be as a floating cloud. Let your stillness be as the wooded glen. And sit up straight. You'll never meet the Buddha with posture like that!

*There is no escaping karma. In a previous life, you never called, you never wrote, you never visited. And whose fault was that?

*Wherever you go, there you are. Your luggage is another story.

*To practice Zen and the art of Jewish motorcycle maintenance, do the following: Get rid of the motorcycle. What were you thinking?

*Learn of the pine from the pine. Learn of the bamboo from the bamboo. Learn of the kugel from the kugel.

*Be aware of your body. Be aware of your perceptions. Keep in mind that not every physical sensation is a symptom of a terminal illness.

*If there is no self, whose arthritis is this?

*Breathe in. Breathe out. Breathe in. Breathe out. Forget this and attaining Enlightenment will be the least of your problems.

*The Tao has no expectations.
The Tao demands nothing of others.
The Tao does not speak.
The Tao does not blame.
The Tao does not take sides.
The Tao is not Jewish.

*Drink tea and nourish life. With the first sip, joy.
With the second, satisfaction. With the third, Danish.

*The Buddha taught that one should practice loving-kindness to all sentient beings. Still, would it kill you to find a nice sentient being who happens to be Jewish?

*Be patient and achieve all things. Be impatient and achieve all things faster.

*In nature, there is no good or bad, better or worse. The wind may blow or not. The flowering branch grows long or short. Do not judge or prefer. Ask only, "Is it good for the Jews?"

*To Find the Buddha, look within.
Deep inside you are ten thousand flowers.
Each flower blossoms ten thousand times.
Each blossom has ten thousand petals.
You might want to see a specialist.

*Be here now. Be someplace else later. Is that so complicated?

*The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single oy.

*If you wish to know The Way, don't ask for directions. Argue.

*Zen is not easy. It takes effort to attain nothingness. And then what do you have?Bopkis.

The Career of George H. W. Bush

By Arun Gupta on Facebook December 3, 2018

Having read new material on and re-familiarized myself with the career of George Herbert Walker Bush, I am floored.

The amount of criminality, corruption, dictators, death squads, and drug dealing he enabled during his shadowy intrigues in office up to the presidency far outstrips anything Donald Trump has done.

This is no exaggeration. Bush set up a secret government with CIA chief William Casey. Bush subverted FBI investigations and independent counsel Lawrence Walsh. He lied to, stonewalled, and withheld evidence from Walsh who concluded the conspiracy went up to and included Reagan and Bush. Right before leaving office in December 1992, Bush pardoned six Iran-Contra figures, sparing himself from being called as a witness and possibly criminal prosecution.

George Bush Sr. trashed the Constitution and rule of law. He was an architect of the state terror, corruption, and lawlessness that gave rise to Trump. But Bush actually conspired and committed virtually all the types of crimes and misdeeds Trump may or may not have committed.

Bush did even worse. His legacy includes the horror show in Central America that remains as refugees flee violence and poverty. He used veterans of the Phoenix Program, the CIA death squad in Vietnam, to organize torture and murder in El Salvador while running the illegal scheme to arm the Contras.

Bush was tied to the BCCI and BNL banking scandals where billions of dollars were funneled to Saddam Hussein so he could buy weapons during the time when he gassed 5,000 Kurds to death in Halabja. The bank scandals involved laundering Saudi funds for the Contras. That illegal war saw Bush's office and the CIA enable and ignore a drug-smuggling network by the Medellin Cartel, cartels, the Contras, Panama's Manuel Noriega, and notorious freelancers like Barry Seal who shipped in many tens of thousands of pounds of cocaine, feeding the crack wars that decimated cities devastated by Reagan's neoliberal policies.

Bush oversaw the destructive invasions of Panama and Iraq. His death squad network and senior officials like Cheney, Rumsfeld, Perle, Powell, Abrams, and Negroponte returned with a vengeance after 9/11 creating the killing fields of Iraq, the global war on terror, the worldwide torture and black site gulags, and a destabilized Middle East.

Mind you, I'm not even mentioning his criminal sons, choosing Clarence Thomas to replace Thurgood Marshall, Willie Horton ads, the hostility to the AIDS crisis, indifference to the Rodney King riots, the war on unions, the poor, and cities, the staggering concentration of wealth.

Just to be clear, I think Trump is a grave danger. But he is very different than Bush. He is the danger of the cultish dictator, the ethnonationalist autocrat. As he is incompetent, he only can rule by tantrum and tweet, however. Bush was far smarter. His destruction involved knowing how to use the levers of power.

Here is some reading material. Start with this excellent Rolling Stone report on the secret government, death squads, Israelis, and drug smuggling. It covers the period before Oliver North comes along, who was used as a fall-guy. This era is when the alternative press shined. The Progressive, The Nation, Mother Jones, Village Voice, and other lefty outlets broke many important stories.

These reports show the media, Congress, and the courts all failed to do their job and hold the Reagan-Bush White House accountable. Trump's lawlessness is nothing new. He is just the latest and most extreme iteration of a system that's been broken and bankrupt for more than 30 years.

Read the executive summary in Lawrence Walsh's final report on Iran-Contra.

This article by Parry details how Reagan used Argentinian dirty war veterans to train the Contras, as well as how U.S.-backed right-wing coup in Bolivia encouraged cocaine production and smuggling to fund anti-Communist dirty wars.


For books, read:

Family of Secrets by Russ Baker
American Dynasty, Kevin Philipps

Dark Alliance: The CIA, the Contras, and the Cocaine Explosion, Gary Webb

The Iran-Contra Connection: Secret Teams and Covert Operations in Reagan Era, Jonathan Marshall and Peter Dale Scott

Lost History, Robert Parry

Firewall: The Iran-Contra Conspiracy and Cover-up, Lawrence Walsh

Crimes of a President: New Revelations on the Conspiracy and Cover Up in the Bush and Reagan Administration, Joel Bainerman

The Dirty Secrets of George Bush Rolling Stone 

How Gravity Affects the Human Body

Links to Websites for Reference ...

ROLFINK

YOUR STANDING ON EARTH

GRAVITY MATTERS

ON EARTH BALANCE

IT’S GRAVITY I RECKON

R.U.W.G. [Are You With Gravity?]

GRAPHIC GRAVITY

GRAVITY ACE

Farmers Markets 2018

 First fresh pick. Montclair May 5, 2018

Ricky of Ricky's Produce and Michele July 29, 2018

Fresh Produce Montclair May 5

Ran into only crony Patrick May 5

Male Model May 5

Kaytlynn at City Green Clifton NJ June 29

Hillview Farms Gilette NJ October 12

At Hillview Farms

Hillview Farms Celebrating 152 Years!

Hillview Farms Store

Just Us Chickens Hillview Farms 

Mr. Jim Materazzo Montclair Farmers Market May 5

Jeannie and Molly Montclair October 14

Jim and Molly

The Boss Montclair October 13

Joe and Daughter Molly

Kids and Squash Montclair October 13

Schultheis Farms Paterson Farmers Market October 13, 2018

Shopping at Paterson October 13

See the Other Farmers Markets

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We all live with [in] Gravity. Everybody knows that. Gravity pulls on you. We all know that. It’s an unavoidable fact. Everyone knows that too. When you design any structure, it’s got to be plumb and square. Anyone who designs or constructs buildings knows that.

Yet, for all we know about the force of Gravity for almost everything, insofar as it relates to how our own bodies develop — how things stack up — we are mainly self-taught. Trial and error. Not much direct awareness or conscious engagement .

Rolf Structural Integration balances the body with the gravitational field of the earth. It is a peerless and definitive training for living unstressed, even, level, easily upright. Healthy, strong, good looking, effective.

Balancing the body with Gravity is a lifetime endeavor. It's really an integral part of the life curriculum. Rolf Structural Integration makes it active and consciously participatory.

Problem is that though we get bigger and stronger as we mature, we don't automatically develop structure — how things come to stack up and fit. That is learned. Add in a mix of unresolved accidents and traumas, bad habits, improper instruction, modelling ourselves after significant others who don't exhibit proper structure in their own make up ... we arrive at adulthood with a random mix of imbalances and compensations firmly anchored in our very flesh. Most live in default and below their potential for balance in their bodily stance. Most lived resigned to that's just the way it is.

Good News! Since the body is plastic and adaptive, with knowledgeable guidance we can very easily and gracefully live into the kind of balanced body arrangement which is our birthright. Which is correct and healthy based on Anatomical design and the dictates of Gravity and its Physics.

It's a choice. It does take some doing. Well worth it. Take the step.

If you've read this far and are saying to yourself that you don't need this, nothing's wrong ... please note well. Rolf Structural Integration is not for when something is wrong. It's for the average healthy person who wants to up their game in terms of productivity, enjoyment, athletics, or performing arts. When "something happens" that is for your choice of therapist to address the problematic symptom. Balancing the body may have many positive health effects toward relieving symptoms of chronic pain and stress. More, it's a stand alone goal the benefits of which you can imagine if you take a few moments and consider how bodily balance is a master key to unlocking full potential and creative expressiveness.

Mystical Pizza

I've been on a spiritual quest. Many starts, and stops. Blind alleys. Mistaken ideas. Disabused illusions. Grandiose allusions. A few contusions. Ablutions. Absolutions. 

One thing that has been my touchstone on the material plane: Pizza Pie. In fact, I love Pizza so much, I have undertaken a separate quest to discover and share the perfect Pizza recipe. Read that here.

Now I live in New Jersey — where Pizza Parlors are as ubiquitous as Taquerias* in Phoenix.  

* [Funny thing, though. A Taqueria has just opened a block away from my house. Could it be a harbinger of an "invasion". But, let's not get into the current tendency to create word wars over verbalizations; especially so when we are raging progressives hard wired to oppose the current administration (Trump!) at any and all turns.]

So the perennial question regarding the trusty Pizza Pie is this: 

How come when it's round it comes in a square box, and cut into triangle slices? Really! How come?

Here we leave the world of concepts and verbal constructions. Merely gaze at the image with the revealed mystical insight and realize the ineffable TRUTH within yourself!

  

Taxi Dave 2018

Taxing Cab Stories 2018

"How's it hangin'? 
"I'm David S. Pumpkins! 
"And, I'm gonna scare the hell out of YOU! 
"Any questions?"

Watch This:

Gotcha! Drinking AND Driving!

Stop!!!


Did you see me?"


"Make it snappy, bud, I only got 5 minutes."


"Take me to your leader."

Yo, Jeff! Here's a bright new idea. How about getting better bags at your new supermarket? The ones with weak, breakable handles need to be double bagged. A better bag might cost a little more, but a net savings.

"I'm not only gonna tell you what to think, I'm gonna tell you how to drive. Bitch!"

He's my neighbor. Slightly higher on the mountain, however.

 Dude? "No, Dud!"

"Sesame Street ... Do you know the way?"

I'm down with the message. But, I gotta say ... your demeanor outside that temple! And, hanging with a prostitute???

"Columbus may have discovered America, but my Vaughn here discovered the Oyster!" I asked her to explain, and she said it was when he went "yodeling in the canyon". 

"What do I have to say to get your vote?"

[We should admire rhetorical flexibility in our political leaders.]

 It is a thing I'm pondering how such a bold faced [IMHO] opportunistic panderer can get away with casting himself as a patriot. I would imagine the good Senator would do the right thing, all things being equal. I don't believe he's out to do bad, as such. But, if winning an election requires bad, then he's my guy to dress that pig in a sequined strapless gown.

"If I tell you how to get there, you can be sure it's the best way! And ... Get me to the White House, 2020! 2024, the latest!"

Yes, ma'am. I'll put cruise control in "PANDERING" mode.

Recently saw a clip of Senator Kamala Harris asserting how she was speaking truth to power.

The shibboeth "Speaking truth to power" seems to have evolved to the point of conferring actual factual truth on what another is saying, or upon the one making a claim of doing so.

And, there now seems to be a whole class of citizens who need not think beyond their knee jerk salute of ascent to whomever makes such a claim.

All the obvious outraged energy notwiithstanding, I can't help bt think that more than a few of the vehement protesters have become unwitting pawns in a political game.

And, lest someone come at me for saying this and branding me a imbecile right winger, I see speechifying on all sides passing around their convenient and rousing statements as truth. When in fact all that's really intended is to prod you into agreement by stroking your prejudices and preexisting biases.

Madamme De Gaule [who didn't speak much English and was considered rather a prude], what in your own life is the most important thing?

"Ha ... PEE ... ness."

"No, I'm not really a pirate. But, do you have change for a dabloon?"

Hey, guys, there's no smoking in this cab!

"It's alright, we're French."

"I could'a been a contender!"

Beatles fans? Or, Democrats?

Ye! 2024!

"Ah-wanchu-go-dowtow!"

Bitch! Please!

"Pr-r-r-r-r-t! E-E-E-E-yow!"

HUGE: Certainly larger than life.

"Will my Wampum be sufficient?"

Her story was compelling ... and credible.

"It was a party. Somewhere in London. I think it was London; West End. I remember that much because it was posh; could've been Shepherd's Bush. Can't say for sure.

"And ... Dear Madge will back me up on this!***  

"Anyhow ... I saw him there. We got on well enough. At first. Then when I was leaving the WC after a tinkle, he came out of nowhere and picked me up like a caveman, and carried me into the laundry room. He threw me down on a pile of laundry — I didn't mind, and that's how come I knew it was rather a posh affair: because the linens were still fairly well pressed and smelling of Lavender sachet. 

"Wordlessly he piled on top of me on that pile and began to explore, let's just say, 'between the sheets'. Long story short, he had his way. 

"Then he stopped!"

Driver: That must've been a relief.

"No, not really!"

Driver: How come?

"He stopped!!!"

*** In an interesting bit of astonishing true synchronicity to other recent current events, Dear Madge has no recollection of any of this.

"We want to go to town!"

OK. I won't watch.

I liked you when you were a singer.

I'd like to drive away with it.

"I was nuts for her!"

Omarosa? Where you bin?

"Well, there's been the Mueller Probe, Cohen, Manifort, Papadopoulos, Aretha, Kavanaugh, #MeToo, Sessions, Rosenstein, Khashoggi, now the 'Caravan' ... and, all the rest of it. You do know I had a book out?"

[Short attention span of the citizenry. Short! Nil!]

"Memory Lane":

"Right over there. The house with the two doors."

Hey, Lady. Don't I know you from somewhere?

"I didn't want to say anything. You went past my stop."

"It DID happen in Vegas!"

"Any questions?"

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