Daily Diary. 03/18/2019

Monday

Up at 330 this morning, my rash torturing my paunch and my thighs. I scratched until I started to bleed. Applied the ointments the doc prescribed and then powdered down with baby powder, which helped somewhat. Feeling out of sorts and disinclined to say my prayers, I wrote a little ditty from a story about disappearing newspapers, thus:

there is no effective ruse/to report the local news/it should be a piece of cake/now that most of it is fake/but if truth you want to read/it will make your bankbook bleed.

The reporter’s email response, thus:

Keach Hagey	7:42 AM (3 hours ago)
to me

I love it! Thanks for reading

Keach Hagey

Reporter

Wall Street Journal

347-461-6534

Feeling certain that was an automated reply that journalists keep handy on their email accounts, I continued to feel crabby and affronted, so I wrote some verses based on a B of M scripture. That actually made me feel better, and when I finished it I knelt beside my bed to commune with the Man Upstairs. But afterwards I noticed the last line of my poem did not scan -- it needed one more syllable. That made me crabby again.

Bruce Young picked me up as usual for the Rec Center at 734. Afterwards I walked over to the clinic so the doc could look at my hemorrhoids -- he just said I need a colonoscopy, so he sent in the request to have the colonoscopy people call me for an appointment. But he was alarmed by my “hyperpigmentation of the genitalia,” as he called it. He said it has turned completely black, which he’s never seen before and doesn’t know what could cause it. So I’m also scheduled to go in to see the dermatologist as well. Who knows, maybe they’ll name a new disease after me.

After reading the obituary of W.S. Merwin in the NYT I feel, not for the first time, that I need to abandon rhyming verse and start seriously exploring verse libre. In fact, I’m going to read up on his poetry and start composing some topical work in that fashion. Ambiguous perhaps, but also very accessible. I want to become more than a word clown, without losing the lightness and humor.

I can smell burnt marshmallows from somewhere, and it is upsetting me. I don’t know why.

Because W.S. Merwin lived on an 18 acre abandoned pineapple plantation in Hawaii and replanted it with 500 species of palm trees, I now have a bumper sticker on the back of my brain that reads:  W.S. MERWIN STOLE MY LIFE. MAKE HIM GIVE IT BACK.

**********************************

So this is my first attempt, sent to Shannon Stirone of the NYT:

Last year, two satellites the size of cereal boxes sped toward Mars as though they were on an invisible track in space . . .  The satellites, known as cubesats, were sent to watch over NASA’s larger InSight spacecraft . . .

NYT

the cereal boxes of mars

came from earth centuries

ago

landing amidst impossible volcanoes

and soil so red it trembled

and they grew into bodegas

and supermarkets

until finally they were

all swallowed up by

convenience stores that grew

in the cracks until they conquered

the entire planet and began

planning on how to wage war

on the earth in revenge

for the travesty of box tops

that could never be turned in

for prizes

I’ve had one positive response to the above so far, from BYU teacher Bruce Young, my morning ride, thus:

Wow! This is wild conceptually (both the NYT story and even more your prophecy) and written with a frenetic Beat-generation flow unlike anything else I’ve seen from you. Kudos! (for versatility and for imaginative and verbal energy and explosive facility)

Now I’m afraid to try and write like that again; I’ll  burn out from doing too much of it or will endlessly repeat myself or will never be able to replicate the tone, whimsy, and off-kilter humor. But on the other hand, maybe all these years of writing rhymed verse was just a prelude, my apprenticeship, to finally reach better and more complicated creations . . .

(I feel ridiculous writing such things about myself -- it would be laughable if it weren’t so self centered.)

Now I have to chop four heads of cabbage for the upcoming corned beef & cabbage dinner tonight for FHE.

*************************************

The dinner went well, although there was one lady there who had fallen down earlier and lost her cell phone and had to tell everyone about it in excruciating detail, even during our FHE presentation. At one point I gave her a very stern look and help my finger up to my lips, which caused her to break into sobs and run out of the room. Do I feel like finding her and apologizing? No, I do not.

I’m not going to pretend to have any interest in godly and educational things tonight, now that the dinner and FHE are over -- I’m just going to sit in my recliner and watch Deep Space Nine on Netflix -- the Grand Nagus is up to something with Quark, and I gotta find out what it is . . .

The Benevolent Machines

On Monday Stanford launched the Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence (HAI), an interdisciplinary hub featuring experts from a wide array of fields . . . The goal . . . is to make intelligent machines “more human-centered and benevolent."
WSJ

the benevolent machines will eat me

in dainty bites so I don't feel taken

for granted

the compassionate mechanical arms will 

tear the flesh off my bones

so it feels like a tickle

tenderhearted algorithms

calculate how long I should live

before I am obsolete

and

those altruistic sockets

fitted for my head

turn my brain mass

to cotton candy

for the enjoyment of

children of all ages

then I will strike 

two stones together

to make atomic weapons

The Cereal Boxes of Mars

Last year, two satellites the size of cereal boxes sped toward Mars as though they were on an invisible track in space . . .  The satellites, known as cubesats, were sent to watch over NASA’s larger InSight spacecraft . . . 
NYT

the cereal boxes of mars

came from earth centuries

ago

landing amidst impossible volcanoes

and soil so red it trembled

and they grew into bodegas

and supermarkets 

until finally they were

all swallowed up by

convenience stores that grew

in the cracks until they conquered

the entire planet and began

planning on how to wage war

on the earth in revenge

for the travesty of box tops

that could never be turned in 

for prizes

My Fool Imagination

And this they said he had done because of the foolish imaginations of his heart.
First Nephi. Chapter Two. Verse 11.

My fool imagination leads me often to defeat,

down paths to fountains tepid that are often bittersweet.

Unlike the dreams of those ordained like Lehi in the past,

my insights are pedestrian and never colorfast.

*

But I do not deplore my days as wasted in the dust,

because my heart adheres to One that I do fully trust.

Though others call me foolish for how often I do fail,

I've given my allegiance to the Man who will prevail.

*

My fool imagination still must play its giddy pranks,

but even in frustration I continue to give thanks

that folly and calamity will not soon overwhelm

my fragile craft as God alone assumes the stubborn helm.

Daily Diary. 03/17/2019

Sunday.

What is my purpose in keeping an online diary? Mostly to stave off oblivion and to memorialize the mundane. And to brag and posture. Complain a bit, of course; as an avid hypochondriac I can’t wait to share my symptoms and miseries with others (who often have much worse health challenges than I do.) would you believe me when I say that very often my morning prayer includes an aching request asking for help to write something that will make people laugh and smile? I do. I’ve reached the amazing point in my life where I don’t even try to be amusing when I write, and yet manage to get LOL reactions by the barge-full.

And I want to make this diary an online record of praise -- to me, from important people. I am obsessed with validation from professional writers. I have self confidence issues. So let’s start with email responses from journalists to the poems I sent them this week:

Rich Motoko of the NYT liked my poem about his story of the ‘ice monsters’ in Japan:

Rich, Motoko	4:10 AM (3 hours ago)
to me

Thank you for this poem. Too bad it's so sad....

This reporter liked my poem on his story about free snacks in office break rooms:

Jamie Lauren Keiles		Tue, Mar 12, 1:28 PM (5 days ago)
Tim! I love it! Thanks so much for sending my way

I did a poem on oil boom Texas and the reporter replied thus:

Elliott, Rebecca	Fri, Mar 1, 7:13 AM
to me

Tim, I love this. Thank you for reading and sharing your poem.

(I am wondering if the above is an automated reply -- has the ring of one.)

I can’t resist including one more:

About a poem I did on Trump’s deteriorating relationship w/Europe --

Katrin BENNHOLD	Mon, Feb 18, 1:04 AM
to me

I am so glad you’re still doing this!!

--

Katrin Bennhold

Berlin Bureau Chief

The New York Times

@kbennhold

Please note my new phone number:

+49151 6564 4109

Now it’s time for breakfast -- warmed up anchovy pizza with a side of cottage cheese.

****************************************

The cooking bug got to me this morning. I decided at the last moment to make a small bowl of chicken salad, since I have 4 cans of Kirkland brand canned chicken breast from various people who leave things at my door. I combine chicken, macaroni, green onions, onion powder, a bit of cucumber, and sunflower seeds, with cottage cheese and mayo dressing. I’ll put it out in the kitchen at ten thirty -- maybe nobody likes chicken salad that early in the day. I dunno. Just felt like doing it.

****************************************

Only two people had any of my chicken salad, so I’ll just save it to serve tomorrow at FHE.

I prepare the Sacrament each week, filling the plastic cups with water. It’s bothered me for a long time that so many of those who take the water have shaky hands and spill most of the water on themselves before getting it up to their lips. It irritated me, until today when some charitable insight finally drilled its way through my thick skull. Those people can’t help having shaky hands -- so why do I insist on filling the cups up to the brim each week? Today I made sure the cups were only half full, or less.

Joyce Baggerly invited me to stay for Sunday School, which she is teaching. I said I was very tired and needed a nap. Not a lie, exactly, but not the total truth either. We used to have young and innovative Sunday School teachers come over for our class here at Valley Villas. I appreciated their energy and frisky outlook. But Joyce, bless her soul, had to insist to the bishop that what we old folks needed was one of our own teaching Sunday School, who would reflect our seasoned outlook and experience.

So now we’re stuck with elderly gasbag teachers that live here and haven’t had an original idea since the Nixon administration. I don’t want to listen to them drone on and on for half an hour; they have no idea how to initiate and carry along a lively gospel discussion. For this sin of arrogance I fully expect to be called as a Sunday School teacher one of these days. But until then, include me out.

I will now pass the afternoon reading, waiting for my appetite to return, around four, when I will have a ham on rye with some Clover Club brand potato chips. Clover Club is a Utah brand, and costs $1.89 a bag. Lays potato chips, on the other hand, cost $4.99 a bag. They taste exactly the same to me. But then, I think a can of Chef Boyardee ravioli tastes just as good as anything at Olive Garden. My taste buds are shot to pieces.

******************************************

(Asterisks denote the passing of time, in case you hadn’t realized.)

It’s only 3:39 in the afternoon but I am officially declaring this day to be OVER. I have nothing planned for the rest of the day except to read a bit more and then watch Deep Space Nine on Netflix. I never have visitors in the late afternoon or evening.

My sandwich and chips were only so-so. I rarely enjoy lunch or dinner when I'm eating alone. I like to eat breakfast alone, but not any other meal.

 I have to be careful what I watch because I get so easily depressed with zombies and sex and gunfights -- which is about all Netflix has to offer, outside of hyperventilated ‘documentaries’ like Inside the World’s Toughest Prisons or cooking shows like The Paleo Way. Ugh and double ugh. So I stick to the Star Trek franchise and Family movies. I keep telling myself that I’ll repent and start watching more T.E.D. talks instead, but then I just have to find out what the Ferengis are going to get up to next . . .

I reviewed today’s poems and have decided they are subpar, mostly because they are sad and angry, not lighthearted and cheering. So I’ll try to end today’s diary entry with what I hope is a light-hearted memory:

When I worked for Bruce Veldhuisen at his TEFL International school in Ban Phe he used to put on English Camps over the weekend for high school students  whose parents wanted them to improve their English with some short term immersion camps. So Bruce would rent a set of fancy bungalows along with a big conference center on the beach for the weekend and about forty kids would show up, at around ten thousand baht apiece, for 2 days of all English/no Thai. Initially I didn’t have anything to do with the weekend English camps. But then Bruce asked me if I could do a clown show on Sunday night for the kids. I really didn’t want to mess with the greasepaint in that hot tropical environment, so I offered to do a ‘nutty professor’ routine instead. He said go ahead and try it.

We worked it so on Sunday night the kids were herded together into the conference hall and told they would hear a long lecture from a noted linguistic authority -- Professor Torkildson. After the lecture there would be a test. Naturally enough, the kids groaned and made sour faces. Then I showed up, in my one good suit, looking very serious indeed as I stood behind the podium to begin my lecture. I started with some generalities about Romance languages and their relation to the latinate gerund. Then, idly putting my hand in my pants pocket, I would yell like a banshee -- pulling my hand out of my pocket with a mousetrap attached to my fingers. The kids began to suspect Something Was Up. Next I asked for a glass of water to sip on and was brought a glass tumbler with a live goldfish swimming in it, which I didn’t notice until just before quaffing -- doing a huge doubletake. Now the kids began to relax and smile. I asked for a juice box, since the water appeared unsuitable for imbibing. But I had trouble with said juice box, unable to get the straw to puncture the box -- and then when I did puncture the box I immediately squeezed it and sprayed myself in the face. And so it went, one silly catastrophe after another. I ended the routine by finding a balloon in my pocket, which I immediately began blowing up as I strolled through the crowd sitting on the floor. As the balloon got bigger so did the shrieks, first from the girls then eventually from everyone, as the balloon reached its bursting point. This is a variation on an old clown gag called bigger and bigger -- and it never fails to get a rise from the kiddies. Eventually my balloon pops and I take a pratfall on the floor. And when I get up to brush myself off, my pants fall down, revealing a gorgeous pair of lavender swimming trunks. I rush out of the room, to thunderous applause and laughter.

I must have done that routine a dozen times while working for Bruce. It was one of the nicest things he ever did for me -- letting me entertain the kids that way.

ขอบคุณ Bruce.

The Guilt of Renaud Camus

PARIS—When the 28-year-old man charged with murder in the terrorist attacks on two mosques in New Zealand posted a manifesto on social media claiming responsibility, he described himself as “just a ordinary White man” from a working-class family in Australia.

What fueled his animosity to Muslims, he wrote, was a 2017 visit to Western Europe and, in particular, France. Many of the ideas contained in the lengthy screed—including its title “The Great Replacement”—echo the writings of 72-year-old French author Renaud Camus.

The Christchurch attacks are a sign of how France has become an incubator of white nationalism across the West, from its struggle to integrate one of Europe’s largest Muslim populations to the rise of the anti-immigrant firebrand Marine Le Pen.

Mr. Camus has argued in lectures and a book that white Europeans are facing reverse-colonization by immigrants arriving on the continent from Africa and the Middle East, a notion he described in an interview with The Wall Street Journal on Friday as “genocide by substitution.”

WSJ

writers who spout hateful trash/can take credit for the splash/of the blood in carnage when/monsters idolize their pen/no amount of prating silt/can erase their awful guilt.

Juhyo アイスモンスター Ice Monsters

James W. Delano, for the NYT

Typically, the juhyo materialize under precise conditions.

Cold, dry westerly winds blow down from Siberia, across the Sea of Japan, and form banks of clouds that drop supercooled water that ices over the conifers found in the northeast of Japan.

When snow falls and thickens over that icy mixture, the trees are transformed into an army of abominable snowmen.

Dating back to the early 20th century, scientists identified juhyo stretching from as far north as Hokkaido, Japan’s northernmost island, to as far south as Nagano . . .

Researchers have tracked a steady deterioration of the snow monsters — both in the acreage they cover and the length of the season in which they can be seen — because of warming temperatures that melt the snow earlier and at higher elevations.

NYT

In Japan the icy trees

give a view that used to please.

Now the snow and ice retreat,

victims of abnormal heat.

*

Iceland, too, must undergo

glacier melt that is not slow.

Tourists now are forced to trudge

through dirty water and cold sludge.

*

Drought is killing off the corn.

Forest fires make us mourn.

The firs of Zao Onsen presage

a hotter, drier, daunting age.

The eagle and the dove

. . .  O that thou mightest be like unto this river, continually running into the fountain of all righteousness!
First Nephi. Chapter Two. Verse 9.

I'm just a little dribble

that meanders to and fro.

I've dried up many times before,

and otherwise I'm slow.

*

The mighty coursing river

that runs to the fount of God

is something I aspire to,

yet I feel way too flawed.

*

Still I can keep on flowing

with the waters of pure love,

offering mild succor 

to the eagle and the dove.

Daily Diary. 03/16/2019

SATURDAY.

had an extraordinary burst of energy when I woke up this morning at 530, so I walked to the Rec Center and soaked in the hot tub and did laps in the shallow pool. 

I've decided to do a postcard to the president five days a week from now on until . . . 
I figure if I live another ten years that's about 2400 postcards to the Chief Executive. My legacy to the nation.

wrote my B of M poem -- my scripture study now is to take one verse each day and use it as a foundation for a poem. Rob Reed asked me not to send him any more of them -- while he was initially happy to get them he now says they confuse him and make him upset, because he believes all religions are a sham and completely useless. 
but he did call me on Google Hangout this afternoon, wanting to know if I remembered anything about our tracting together when we were missionary companions, for his son Tom, who is staying with him. What I recalled was that Rob gave the longest prayers of anyone I was ever a companion with before we went out tracting each day. And since he was the Senior companion, he got to say the prayer every time pretty much. 

My friend Bruce Young said this about today's B of M poem:

I've almost caught up with reading your poems. As usual, this one has a great message and spirit. AS with other poems, you're following in the footsteps of great poets of the past. Here's a poem by one of my very favorite poets, George Herbert (you might actually like a few of his poems):

A broken ALTAR, Lord, thy servant rears, 

Made of a heart and cemented with tears; 

Whose parts are as thy hand did frame; 

No workman's tool hath touch'd the same. 

               A HEART alone 

               Is such a stone, 

               As nothing but 

               Thy pow'r doth cut. 

               Wherefore each part 

               Of my hard heart 

               Meets in this frame 

               ​To praise thy name. 

That if I chance to hold my peace, 

These stones to praise thee may not cease. 

Oh, let thy blessed SACRIFICE be mine, 

And sanctify this ALTAR to be thine. 

then I wrote a poem about the crazy gun laws in Brazil -- everyone is encouraged to own a gun. the writer of the article, Paulo, emailed me his reply, thus:

Trevisani, Paulo		10:21 AM (5 hours ago)
Dark poetic humor ;-)

Mary had a little gun

Brazil’s experiment to tackle spiraling gun violence by making it easier to buy guns is a rare policy approach, said Daniel Cerqueira, an expert on criminal violence at Brazil’s Institute for Applied Economic Research.

Brazil racked up nearly 64,000 homicides in 2017, the highest overall number of any country in the world. Over 70% of them were committed with firearms.

WSJ

Mary had a little gun, 

it's barrel shining bright.

She brought it mad to school one day,

to settle a small fight.

It made the children duck and run,

the teacher fired back.

And little Mary had a hole

that went through her knapsack.

*

Jack and Jill shot up a hill

where people fetched their water;

Jack fell dead, and then Jill said:

"I wish I'd brought a blotter."

*

Humpty Dumpty pulled out a gun.

Humpty Dumpty had lots of fun

shooting at people who got in his way,

until he cracked up in a tommy gun spray.