3 July 2024
I awoke this morning at 7:30, an hour that’s not incredibly early, even for me. The blast furnace got turned on, yesterday, in my neck of the woods in Placer County, and I’ll be experiencing that nice dry heat for about a week to come. Getting up early to make use of temperatures below 100 degrees is the SOP (standard operating procedure) during the Week-Long-Heat Wave that can last ten days.
In my previous locale, in Newcastle, the Wall of Heat was the sensation during the typical California summer heat wave. Here, in my new abode, there’s just a dry hot condition in which I can dry my just-washed hair in no time! The scent of the roasting pine needles is delightful!
The new, and newer, residents of CA that I’ve encountered during the past 5-7 years haven’t a clue as to the weather, or weather patterns, in this region. They also don’t want to learn. That reaction tells me they’re not here for the long haul.
And living in CA, at least living fully, and successfully, is a long haul.
When first I arrived in the Golden State, one hit song, played non-stop, on the radio (a medium that’s seen much better days) was “All the Gold In California”.
Written by Larry Gatlin and sung by him and his brothers, this song was catchy, in the way that countrymusic truisms, once upon a musical time, sounded and felt.
The opening lyrics are:
All the gold in California is in a bank
in the middle of Beverly Hills
in somebody else’s name
so if you’re dreaming about California
it don’t matter at all
where you’ve played before
California’s a brand new game.
I didn’t find California a brand new game, at all, in 1979. In fact, I’d seen most of the games, gimmicks, scams, and swindles Back East, done far better. The usage of the term, Back East, in itself drew derision to me from the Natives.
In those days, “Back East” wasn’t forward thinking enough. And I do suppose that the residue of 1960s/1970s California, even in Sacramento (nicknamed Sacra-tomato), persisted well into the next decade. The Liberty-for-Only Me illusion is still going strong for certain delusional types in this State, those who have somehow failed to see that Corporatism is California Gold.
Corporatism, however, is based upon capitalism.
Despite the closed, endless-loop, loopy mindset of the monopoly-makers who comprise the Masters of the Universe, the consumer has to consent to BUY their wares. The issue of CONSENT, and the entire Age of Consent, have, however, been enormously and egregiously called into question.
Thus far, there’s not been an Official Edict to force the California citizenry to purchase Silicon Valley virtual commodities. The Digital Update Notifications though do give me pause (while I delete the message) as to the soundness of that thought.
Capitalism might be a brand new game for the Elites and their ignorant adherents, sycophants and apostles on the Left Coast.
That bank in the middle of Beverly Hills has been just about drained dry to payola pay for more recent parlays into porn and politics. Those two arenas presently are one-and-the-same. (Maybe they always have been.)
I agree with the opining that the dough is in somebody else’s name, although that identity remains unknown. The bank itself has most likely been off-shored and outsourced.
Larry & Brothers go on to twang-whine their whines about failure and frustration which, in JimmyCarterville & JerryBrownLand, were valid. I nonetheless didn’t concur with that harmonized harangue.
I’m more, much more, in tune with the lyrics of a hit song released in July 1989 on those ever-dwindling auditory air waves, a communication transmission that had become sorely strained by shrinkage of the band-width.
What a difference a decade (and Ronald Reagan) make!
George Strait, and his Ace in the Hole Band, are credited with this ditty written by Dennis Adkins:
Ace in the Hole.
I loved the song upon first listen, and love it still. It rose to Number 1 in no time, marking yet another, the Eighteenth Number 1 Single for George, his Eleventh in a row.
(You will notice that I’ve made use of S-P-E-L-L-I-N-G out the word, number, and the number itself, because the posted essay had been mangled by a most Microsofty trick, by the rottenApplepeople (which could be a hashtag) of hash-tagging and embedding any Arabic numeral in my text.
I DO NOT HASHTAG.
This sort of Big-Brother intrusiveness is what I go through daily, with Pages. That form of frustration Dear Hubby assures me would not occur with the MS choice. I explain that I gave up Word-Processing Short-cuts decades ago, when this entire obscenity of promising you privacy whilst grabbing hold of your privates first started.
And why is Mail trying to finish my words for me? I know where they’re going, even if they try to sabotage and re-route my thoughts! Hi-jacking my Essay does not endear you fascist-pigs to me!
Dear Hubby says that this very rude annoyance started with Microsoft. They then ask if the language-overlord stunt has helped him. He replies NO.)
I consider 1989 the watershed year for music in America, for America itself. That wall, The Berlin Wall, was built (in presto-time) to keep the citizenry IN, not to protect the Commies from invaders.
Freedom’s the ace in hole for patriots in the Land of the Free and Home of the Brave.
On this day, on every day, I celebrate freedom, more than ever before, cause it’s been a long time coming to America, and especially to California.