Ringing in the New Year

DC Sports

What a run in Washington, DC sports.  The Washington Nationals played each deciding, make-or-break, baseball game down to the wire: winning Game 6 to pull ahead of the Houston Astros in what could have been sudden-death; and winning Game 7 on October 30th to cinch the championship.

This follows on the Washington Capitals'  hockey finesse, which in 2018 brought home the Stanley Cup. Washington, DC's insufferable football team, the Redskins, have yet to win a Super Bowl in my lifetime. Outside of the South and Midwest, football seems to have lost its luster, falling from its decades-long pinnacle in the American psyche on account of growing scandals over concussions and other debilitating injuries caused by the sport.

Woke Journalism at the Top 25 Universities

I picked up a copy of the Georgetown Voice, which is Georgetown University's longtime independent student paper. One featured article, "Problems at Home Don't Stay at Home", by Cheyenne Martin, stuck out from editorials on current affairs, and a shame piece on those rent-by-the-minute scooters.
It is a narrative of a student who worries about her loved one in a poorly-managed Tennessee prison.

This voice differs from elite student journalism of just a decade ago; when I first started reading the Georgetown Voice and its establishment cousin, The Hoya. Class, race and gender were not discussed; and if so, at an arm's length detachment. Good journalism back then stuck to the "5 W's", a patient and disinterested observer to world events. A generation of recent college graduates whose early careers have been characterized by socioeconomic struggle, I believe, have forced a reckoning in news rooms.

See:
https://georgetownvoice.com/2019/12/06/problems-at-home-dont-stay-at-home/

Merry Christmas!

Christmas season started for me on December 21^st, almost a month after Black Friday and weeks after many already maxed out their credit cards. I went to a big box store. It was late and I already had a long day that started before 4am. The ship and I had been at sea, almost continuously, for a month, and  we quietly pulled into port.   As I made my last Christmas purchases- mostly premeditated with a few impulse decisions, I was bumped into by other weary shoppers hustling like Olympic sprinters. 

They used to say that once the crowd talks about the stock market, it’s time to sell. But the post-election stock market surge kept good times rolling. So much so that one guy told me that his stock market gains were larger than his paycheck. I congratulated him on behalf of Uncle Sam, who appreciates the hard work of passive income by giving a lower tax rate. 

Conspicuous consumption is back, with new products to “solve” the problems of the rich and “mass affluent”. You can see a stream of “Happy Holiday” ads that make you forget the reasons for the season (the Temple in Jerusalem for Jews or Christ’s Birth for Christians), not to mention songs about bigger and better presents. 

The millennials have more enlightened  spending habits; they prefer to spend on priceless and timeless experiences. Plane tickets to visit faraway family?  It’s important. I whipped out a credit card, rented a car, loaded it with my Christmas trinkets, and drove home.  I spent two wonderful days with my family; now it was time to plan for an unforgettable New Year’s. Should I bring the nice secondhand Italian suit; or is that overkill for Norfolk, I thought? As I was driving back to work for a shift on Christmas Day, I heard a song that I haven’t heard before. Amazing, since it played the year I was born. The song was called “The Gift”, by Garth Brooks, and its protagonist is a poor orphan girl named Maria:

“There were diamonds and incense and perfumes in packages fit for a king;

but for one ragged bird in a small cage Maria had nothing to bring...

Just then the midnight bells rang out and the little bird started to sing
A song that no words could recapture, whose beauty was fit for a king”.

Merry, Joyous, Christmas to all.

Happy New Year, Pacific Ocean!

I know that some readers of my blog subscribe to an RSS feed. You receive updates for posts of all sizes and relevance. You suggested that I write a bit less, but more in depth, and I heeded your advice. Thank you for your patronage. The reason I am here is simply a technicality. The dateline posts in California time; so at 12am local time (DC) earlier today, it was 9pm out on the West Coast. When I celebrated 2011, folks in Seattle, Berkeley, and elsewhere on the West Coast were enjoying their last few hours of 2010. Moral of this post? Understand that sometimes the dateline on my posts can be a calendar day off the content I write about!
Happy New Year; the dateline reads Jan. 1 this time around, if California didn't drift too far into the Pacific overnight!

New Year 2011

Thank you to those special readers who made my Christmas extra-Merry. It means a lot to receive your thoughts and kind words. 2010 represented a decrease in quantity of posts, but, as I believe, an increase in quality. What I mean is that, in these last few months, I've started doing research for a number of the posts. Another factor is college. Although I got the bulk of my work out by November, some new colleges popped up on my list- and they were not Common App. I sent my last college essay (those take time to write well!) at 3pm today. I gave it to the postman passing by in the neighborhood. Some good news too: I received full acceptance to Univ. of Pittsburgh at Pittsburgh, and to the Maritime College of New York. A number of the other applications are still in the works. I must note that I made a good step forward at Maritime's neighbor across the Sound, the US Merchant Marines. I made sure to apply only to colleges where I'd be happy (not just ok with) to go come Fall semester, so I'm in a good position right now no matter what happens April 1.
Happy New Year as we head into year 2 of this new decade!

New Year Again

Gosh this year is almost over. Same with the decade, the one that has brought- lots of things good and bad. Here's to the next decade. The world will not end in 2012, so it's only good things ahead. Obama said it too. Geez, I didn't realize that the's already been president for almost a full year. Then there will be all those congressional, senatorial, and state elections for 2010.

For those who love to eat and see chickens

It's about 7pm in Silicon Valley this waning first day of 2009. In 19 days, the popular president elect will actually become president, and we will plant a bush back in Texas.

Sorry, the rest of this is not too vegetarian-friendly The fact that I acknowledge this is a good thing on the step to so-called ending cruelty.

On the subject of the day, chickens.
The chicken at Chick-Fil-A was quite superb as always. TGIT, and not Sunday!
At the quite new Dulles Town Center, I saw an unusual take on a calendar- Chickens
And I saw a chicken at the last farm between the Beltway and Leesburg.
Trying to find a BP (for which we have a rewards card valid until Saturday), we stopped at Boston Market to pick up dinner. The second chicken came for just $1.99. The chicken was indeed superb- the nicely browned skin and all. I recommend them too.

Not quite done

Oh, yeah, Blogger runs on West Coast time- it won't be New Year for a while, on their time.
Yes, and did we all enjoy our extra second too? I can't believeq it made so much news- not much happens at this time of year.

First Post, 09

Mission Acomplished
...8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Happy New Year! Right on the dot. Now what must I do this year?
Jan- Issue JMAG
See inauguration
Win big in school
Sometime later this year- start looking at colleges

Yeah, it'll all come into place.

Blog Book 2008 will be out soon- hot off the press!

2008

Is it a good year?
Oil hit $100 a barrel and stocks were the worst for the first trading day of a new year since 1983. Oil is bound to pass the $102 mark, the inflation-adjusted all-time high. But this year is going to be a good year, says the television psychic I saw yesterday. Feathered dresses are in style this winter, I heard, from the Today Show before I flipped the channel.

Impediments
It's the first working day of 2008! Of course I would have liked to blog on 1/1/08, the first (no buts no coconuts) day of the year, but here's why: viruses and a younger brother. No, those did not give me the flu, but that is what made my computer inaccessible yesterday and just about every day I missed blogging since Christmas. Virus program runs for hours on end, little brother is addicted to that game; Chris Sawyer's Locomotion. Not to attack him improperly, I must also say that he's been doing online high school applications. So there. While he's away in New York I take advantage of having a computer so conveniently ready for me. Have to be grateful for those times of uninterrupted web work.