Floodbath: The Beginning

In where I talk about what happened the first week of May.

It was about 9:30 when the power went out. Wasn’t my first clue as to what was about to transpire later on that dank grey morning. The first clue came much earlier. Weekends — early — gave me my only unfettered access to the plasma, before the kids were awake to monopolize the TV with Nickelodeon and Sprout. I usually spend that time replaying glory days in the form of NCAA Football on the Playstation.

The wind was howling and the sun had not yet risen. I hadn’t noticed, though, too busy calling audibles and switching pixellated defenses. I could only think I better save the game at some point before the power went out.

At nine, I got my usual early morning guest, the Little Dork, waiting for his turn to play some Lego Batman with me, his weekend fiesta of video game joy. It would be his last chance. The power outage cut short his fun.

When the TV shut off abruptly my first thought was about breakfast. My parents didn’t live far from us, and would provide, with their giant kitchen with it’s multiple ovens, a nice place to make my massive fruit pancake/bacon feast. I roused everyone out of their slumber and went outside to take a look around.

Their were already others outside walking around, taking stock of the weather. The water was rushing from everyone’s roofs in the condominium complex, creating a swishing stream of water at the edge of the perfectly lined carports. The water seemed a bit high, but nothing to worry about.

Perhaps if I’d gone to the back yard I might have been worried.

I was only out looking for the source of the power outage, perhaps a downed wire or blown transformer. I thought I’d heard a boom in the distance, but I wasn’t sure. I did see pools of water building up, but still nothing to worry about, yet.

I went back inside our place. We took our time getting ready. Since the power was out, the previous night’s round of grocery shopping was in danger of succumbing to the stresses of room temperature. We packed meat in our environmentally friendly shopping bags (insulated) while Little Dork dilly dallied and Little Psychick begged for attention. Little Dork was always excited to eat breakfast out of the home on the weekends and so did not need the usual rounds of begging and cajoling him to put on his shoes. Little Psychick, not being of age to handle such tasks on her own, and suffering an ear infection we would later discover, needed assistance, and so I was searching through the week’s laundry for her socks.

Our next door neighbor knocked on our door, frantically. She was wearing a shower cap and pajamas, this women who was never seen without designer jeans and full make up, freshly done hair, had come out in the pouring rain without and umbrella and was clearly upset.

“They’re coming in boats!” she said. “We’re trapped, it’s flooding!” She invited us to wait upstairs in her place (since we only had one floor). She told us she was worried about the kids. Which was nice, but I didn’t believe her about one thing.

I didn’t disbelieve her about the flooding. We’d had to take several detours the day before on the way to a kid’s birthday party. Sure enough, the water had risen rapidly. To our left, at one end of our row of condos, a car was half way submerged. To our right, I couldn’t see.

I didn’t believe her about being trapped. I didn’t want to, I suppose. Perhaps I had, playing in the back of my mind, visions of people in New Orleans standing on top of their submerged house shaking impotent fists at the sky. That was not going to be me.

My fifth step outside was into a sinkhole, maybe it was an open sewage drain. I dropped right down and was soaked to the waist. As I crawled out a woman walked by with her dog, strangely smiling. To the north of our place was a grassy area that doubled as a playground. Just big enough for an SUV to drive through. Though people had started to move their cars out of the water’s way, they hadn’t completely blocked off the path to the next parking lot. The next parking lot would take us to an area not yet submerged.

As I walked back to our place I could finally see the right side, muddy brown water had swallowed cars and half of homes and signposts and bushes. People were standing outside their homes on the patches of grass that had not been consumed just watching the water rise and muttering to each other. They all had a look of disbelief — panic had not set in — or fear or anticipation. Perhaps they were already waiting for rescue.

Back at our place Psychick was packing the car with groceries. Fear had clearly set in here. She was talking to our neighbor but all I could say was “get in the car” more loudly each time someone hesitated or thought about questioning what we were about to do. What were we about to do? Get the fuck out. The kids were rapidly becoming aware that this trip to grandma’s house would not be without some peril.

Oh, the plan was not foolproof. I could have underestimated the speed of the flooding. The exit street could have been just as bad. We could have gotten stuck in the mud in the grassy knoll leading to the next parking lot. Some fool could have blocked off my planned path to escape.

I dropped the shift column into all wheel drive and squeezed through the small maze of vehicles in the guest parking area, where others had ended their quest for safety. Mud and grass spewed where the ground was already soaked, but eventually we reached more solid footing. One right onto pavement and two lefts and we were gone.

Fortunately there was no problems getting to grandma’s house. No one in their quiet neighborhood was scurrying or peeping out the window. Home free, of sorts. But trouble followed me that day.

My father had informed me over the cell phone that their basement was flooding. The aged home had cracks in the masonry through which water had found its path of least resistance. My father was outside dressed like a cross between Shaft and Crocodile Dundee, bearing a shovel. His plan to save his man cave from total destruction was to dig a trench around the front of the house to drain water into the mud below. So that meant I would be digging a trench around the front of the house.

And dig I did, already drenched, as if I was going to save the farm.

I never did get breakfast.

(cont)

flooding

As I waded ass-deep in sewage infested rainwater this weekend I thought that this madness might possibly make a good blog post. But between trying to close a contract and next fiscal year’s budget proposals and a sick kid and wading ass-deep in sewage infested rainwater I might not have the time. Perhaps in due time, friends, perhaps.

Why Are You Here?

Let me tell you.

I decided to take a peak at my stats since this blog has been active (wow like 4 years, and I probably wrote in two of those years, lol)

The top referrers:
ye olde Nashville is Talking (RIP)
Crooks and Liars
Racialicious
Kleinheider’s sites old and new
Firedog Lake.
The old faultline.org blog (now Coyote Chronicles) linked to a page that was not counted by WP.com until later but I would guess that it would have ranked higher.
Rachel’s Tavern (now similarly quiet. This is what happens when you have kids)
Tiny Cat Pants

You would think that either the Scene or the Tennessean’s blogs would have figured into that mix. Go figure.

Top search results:
Performance artist Ms Peaches brought the most people here.
Then some variations of:
Battlestar Galactica
The Wire
Cowboy Bebop movie
AZN TV
Stuff White People Like
Tarheel Basketball

“Sinbad” got 93 hits.

so then of course course then the posts on Ms Peaches have the biggest hit count besides the “home page”

Then the post on Cowboy Bebop and anime
Japanese hip hop fashion
the series on cultural appropriation
people trying to find out what happened to AZNTV came here alot
this thing, which also gave one of the most awesomest comments this blog has received.
Some post about Obama with a deliberately incendiary title.

Paints some kinda picture . . . .

Brooklyn’s Finest – Review

Brooklyn’s Finest
Dir: Antoine Fuqua
Don Cheadle
Wesley Snipes
Ethan Hawke
Richard Gere

Whatever you think of the films of action flick director Antoine Fuqua, note that he’s managed to accomplish something that Spike Lee couldn’t; helping Denzel Washington win a Best Actor Oscar. It was the thunderous, malevolent performance in a loud, malevolent film, Fuqua’s Training Day.

Fuqua’s latest, Brooklyn’s Finest, brings more noise – gun claps and malicious roars – as well as more crooked cops and honorable crooks. Even with performances from the cast that are equal to the previous work (all the actors seem desperate to breath life into their characters), the film is ultimately less enjoyable.

Lay blame at the feet of the writer for a plot that seems cobbled together from 80’s urban dramas and The Wire with an attempt at Robert Altman style plot weaving. We follow the stress filled lives of three cops; Don Cheadle’s undercover brother, Ethan Hawke’s desperate narc and Richard Gere as a soon to retire cop detached from the world around him.

Modern movie archetypes abound, what with Wesley Snipes playing that honorable hood just out of jail, (the brilliant) Will Patton as Cheadle’s immediate superior, and Shannon Kane as the hooker, the only person with whom Gere’s cop can communicate his feelings. Things seem so familiar and the themes so obvious and heavy handed (money is bad! Stealing it worse!) that you may wonder how your 10 bucks could have been better spent.

Lurking within the rote crooked cop drama, however, is timely take on the state of the American worker and the American dream. Rather than observe Cheadle’s undercover cop as a cop who begins to sympathize too much with his targets, view him as middle management working hard for a promotion he’s never intended to receive, the carrot of “Detective First Grade” being dangled in front of him as he burns out on a corporate treadmill chasing the golden shield. Don’t simply think of Hawke’s character as a crooked cop jacking thugs for their paper. He’s a working stiff driven to psychopathic behavior from society’s insistence that without a grand home and picket fence he’s a failure as a man. Gere’s worn out cop has taken a bite of the American dream and choked on it, finding it tasteless and dry. The only way to avoid life’s inevitable disappointments and pains are not to live it at all. Clock in, clock out, go home.

Unfortunately, a more focused world view like this is never explored; I had to squint real hard to pick it out, and all the bloodletting and hand wringing tends to obscure philosophical truths. Sure, Fuqua and Martin touch on hot button issues like overzealous cops and racism along the way, but they seem raised to preach rather than teach. While the way each lead resolves his plot line may satisfy morally and viscerally, once you realize what this film could have been you’ll be a little disappointed with the outcome.

2 ½ stars (if you must)

subtract 1 star if you hate Sydney Lumet, whose work this film reminded me of.

‘Whites are People Too’: Why Some White People are Stating the Obvious

Swain needs to explain that last paragraph. Exactly how has the President’s policies “heightened” existing racial turmoil? Which policies? Cash for Clunkers?

Also, editors need to explain how that last paragraph got by them. You present an idea, you must support it.

The only thing Swain is right about is that “these people” are not part of a “radical fringe.” That doesn’t validate their opinions, it just means that many hold them. Swain conflates the two, that their opinions are valid because they are building public mass.
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

Gandalf’s New Edict

During an online discussion in which the subject refers to infidelity and celebrity, the longer the discussion goes on, the probability that the name “Bill Clinton” will be invoked approaches one.

USA 2 Brasil 3 : afterthoughts

The US side was impressive in just about all points of the game in the first 45 minutes. The Brasil side was frustrated by their inability to penetrate down the center and take players on 1 v 1, evidenced by a lot of shots from 25 ft out or more. While the US didn’t have much better results connecting passes and breaking down the Brasil defense in the middle, they took advantage of counter attacks and advantage of having one of the better keepers in the Premier League. What’s more, Kaka was totally out of the run of play.

Everyone expected Brasil to score in the 2nd half and they did not disappoint, getting one mad early. Brasil came alive and continued to pressure down the flanks and the US either caved or were just worn out from the hard defensive effort.

Jozy Altodore, who will be a very good striker for some team, seemed to be out of it at a time when the US really needed a goal. He looked tired. He didn’t seem to be making a lot of long runs in the first half so I don’t know what happened. I called on him to be subbed for earlier than he was but there was really no one to replace what he can do, provide some great athleticism as a striker, a big kid who can run and hold off defenders. I thought the midfield was looking for Dempsy too much. Maybe they didn’t have confidence in Altodore, and Davies was immediately surrounded by three Brasil defenders as soon as he got a touch. I guess those guys are kind of new and the team was looking to vets like Donovan and Dempsy for leadership.

Donovan was interviewed post-game and said that it’s time to stop with the moral victories for US soccer. The team has some pieces to end that trend of almost getting there, and they obviously have the desire (that’s one thing that’s always been a character of US soccer, grit, determination, etc). US needs to put it all together.

But Brasil showed desire too, you have to give them the fist tap, they really willed themselves back into the game and forced the issue. After that goal that was not a goal I think they knew they had a win in hand. The team really showed emotion at the end, not like other Brasil sides who really expected to win. I guess they’ve been under a lot of pressure at home for the way they’ve been playing lately and perhaps the US side was not the only one on the pitch with something to prove.

Tim Howard was man of the match.

What Don’t Michael Jackson and OJ Simpson Have in Common

Kleinheider asks us these questions:

Now, of course, I understand the concept of innocent until proven guilty. I do. But I thought that we all had come to the conclusion that Jacko was about as innocent of child molestation as O.J. was of killing Nicole.

Was I wrong?

Because if O.J. dies and I have to watch film of him playing football and people honoring and mourning his death, I’ll lose it. I’m gonna need a heads up on that one, so let me know. . .

What is the difference between O.J. Simpson and Michael Jackson? Because I don’t see one. How can the charges of child molestation be the sidebar to a story about a gifted singer, dancer, marketer and producer?

One obvious difference is that hundreds of millions of people loved Michael Jackson and millions of those people thought, and still believe he was wrongly accused, likely set up for extortion. I would not argue that OJ Simpson enjoyed anywhere near that kind of adoration. Like Larry King said about Michael, this one someone who claimed to know him personally, “It was hard to like Michael and it was hard not to.”

But, OJ Simpson was accused of a crime with baggage that was in our ugly past punished publicly with mob justice. Simpson’s alleged violations of the social trust were something that some bragged about dealing with. Jackson’s alleged crime is something that becomes an ugly secret.

That said, it is ridiculous to expect people to behave about their beloved superstar in anyway other than they have, given that Jackson could be considered to have passed on a long time ago, the Jackson they loved seemed to no longer exist. So of course they’re looking back on halcyon days.

There will be plenty of time to get at the root of the crimes Jackson was accused of. I’m sure there are people dying to get on record now that he’s dead. But to wonder aloud why this is not the lede is grandstanding.

Childhood’s End

I was no more than four years old the first time I saw Michael Jackson, which would make him around, oh, 12 or 13 at the time. It was my first concert, The Commodores and The Jacksons, and there were probably never more afros in one place than there were that night. Well, okay, in a bigger venue than I saw him in, there probably were. I sat on my late brother’s shoulders as soon as “that other band” was finished. Michael wasn’t my favorite Jackson (Jermaine, until Janet made her appearance) but I did feel an affinity for this kid – he didn’t seem that much older than me – spinning and twirling with that boy’s choir soprano.

I’m not sure how long those Jackson boys remained a favorite, until I was six, seven? Was I even old enough to have a legitimate favorite in those days? By the time I was the same age as Michael was when I saw him live, I’d moved on. The Police. Queen. Gap Band. Cameo.

And girls.

Yeah, I watched “Charlie’s Angels.” I was partial to Kate Jackson myself. Or Jaclyn Smith. Not much into blondes. But eventually I succumbed to Farrah Fawcett’s charms. I think it was that iconic poster. Either that or the fact that she was married to the Six Million Dollar Man at one point. Like many other young men my age, Farrah took a place on my wall in between Donna Summer and Tony Dorsett.

But, I moved on. Farrah came down from the wall sometime during high school, likely replaced by Denise “Vanity” Mathews, which was kismet, since despite Michael’s massive success with Off the Wall and Thriller I considered Prince much more worthy of my time and money.

As much fun as it was in the midst of Michael mania in those days, being accused of looking like him (clearly in pre nose-job days), Michael’s music seemed to me trivial and fluff. It was fun to watch his videos, moonwalk for those people who believed it to be a skill innate in all Black kids, consider buying a “Thriller jacket.” I didn’t go any deeper with Mike. He was growing into the role prescribed him, a pop music superstar. I could not follow, for I too grew in a different direction.

I no longer put up posters of scantily clad celebutantes, and Michael Jordan replaced Michael Jackson. Oh, I still listened to his music, Jackson’s attempts to recreate Thriller’s success all – expectedly – missing the mark. Prince followed up his massive success from Purple Rain with a 180 degree turn, cementing that Prince was the man and Michael was a marionette on MTV. Even as Michael grew increasingly peculiar in the public eye and his fame grew, I defended him to his detractors but had long stopped spending money on his music.

It was more than mere taste change. What he did was no longer relevant other than watching MTV’s breathless anticipation over how much he would spend on his next video shoot. Michael seemed obsessed with record sales, something I had little interest in, and gravitated towards artists who seemed at least to be less interested at topping their last place on Billboard. That was always an argument in support of Jackson fandom, wasn’t it? “He makin’ money though!” I didn’t want my musical choices validated by others in that way.

And I haven’t even mentioned hip hop.

While Jackson’s career was always within my peripheral vision, Farrah Fawcett had dropped into the dustbin of history. I don’t think I thought about her at all in the years between that movie Saturn 3. I was glad for her work in The Apostle the same way you’re happy to see an old elementary school classmate had made it big.

I never saw Michael have that same kind of artistic renaissance. But as details about his childlike lifestyle surfaced I grew to empathize. I don’t have a giant Batman and Superman in my bed room and no time for games but I do covet my son’s super hero collection. I understand the yearning for those times when responsibilities were light and you had to be home before dark. And in that empathy lies a wish that Michael would have received what he hoped for.

I’m not mourning Jackson’s passing and I’m rarely motivated to write about celebrity deaths. Maybe there’s a little kid in me who is.

AW HELL NAW, etc. Notes on this Sherri Goforth/Kleinheider Kerfluffle

Apparently, this foolish Email with an old fashioned racist cartoon that Sherri Goforth forwarded has caught the attention of even the harpies at The View. And I mean harpies in the most respectful way I can.

I’ve been trying to recall Goforth from back in the day. I remember the name but I can’t place a face.

The local blogger/print columnist/right leaning libertarian Adam Kleinheider was taken to task by local bloggers and the alt.weakly (ha I kid you guys) for holding back on blogging about the Goforth Email until — gasp — LATE IN THE EVENING, a choice he addressed in a recent blog post.

When he says it’s not a story, I tend to agree. On the scale of racism @ War Memorial this rates about a 6. My sense of outrage was not tweaked a smidge. Stupid is as stupid does, as they say (said), and I tend to expect stupid coming from that side of the swamp these days.

BUT

ACK knows, there are no civilians in the legislature. You get hired by your connections. She’s not some impartial innocent babe among wolves, especially after two decades in the same spot? GEEETDAHFUGOUTTAHEAH. I expected more from the lad, frankly.

Here’s the other thing about it, an ancillary effect, that I don’t like. Look in the links to ACK’s response to the situation. So many are coming from right wing hacks who are looking for ANY reason to excuse Goforth’s stupidity, and they’re latching on to Goforth’s lower status position.

Is racism any less because it comes from a “secretary?”

If you’re going to ignore this Goforth thing, ignore it because you don’t expect any better from this lot. If you’re holding yourself out as one who covers this legislative body, your editorial judgment should tell you to type out a few lines about it.

I also thought about breaking my silence (taking time out from an overbearingly busy schedule) to comment on Carol Swain’s most recent wave of her handkerchief. But I’ll leave it to Jack and some of the astute commenters in the thread.