"1491"

(a re-imagining of prince's "1999")

I was dreamin' when i wrote this, forgive me if it goes astray
But when i woke up this mornin', could've sworn it was judgment day
America on trial by a jury of buffalo
shouting genocide and rape, you know i didn't want to know
Say say nuke away KKK climate change, oops, party done
So tonight we're gonna party like it's 1491
I was dreamin' when i wrote this, so sue me if it ain't too clear
But when i woke up this mornin' could've sworn it was judgment year
Humanity on trial by a jury of dodo birds
Deforestation and dead oceans, was all i really heard
Say say nuke away KKK climate change, oops, party done
So tonight we're gonna party like it's 1491
If you won't get naked, don't bother knockin' on my door
I got a goddess in my pocket and baby she's ready to roar
Everybody's got a gun, we could all die any day
But before we let that happen, let's dance the night away

Say say nuke away KKK climate change, oops, party done
So tonight we're gonna party like it's 1491

1491

Don't you wanna go, 1491? (repeat)

quandary

You're sitting in a park alone, on a beautiful afternoon. Perhaps making a little music for the world.
Someone wanders along and sits. Their energy is light, airy, and thoroughly entranced. They listen to you, chattering and singing with joy.
You quickly realize that their ecstatic state was not facilitated by oxygen alone. They're tripping. You're no pharmacology expert, but you suspect either mushrooms or acid.
They ask for pot, which you give them. But you have no paper or fire. They ask for water, which you give them. This person makes your heart swell, freed as they are from the utter meanness of what we call "normal life". You feel instantly protective, especially as no one else comes along looking for them.
Then the moral quandary begins. They get up and wander away. Should you follow, to make sure they're shepherded and safe? That could take many hours. Surely others will care for her, as you're in the epicenter of the mind-expanding culture, in Golden Gate Park by Hippie Hill?
Well...not necessarily. There is a dark side to that reality, as we're all pretty much incapable of not acting like shit when we come down (and even when we're high, the violence this society teaches us may manifest). There's also a large homeless contingent that calls this green space home. Some of that can be lovely - interactions with people who have a broader, more free perspective. But the homeless are treated horrifically by society, and horrible input will always rebound. There's also mental imbalance. Acts of violence both subtle and gross, are all too common.
To make this quandary more acute, this person is the epitome of predatory vulnerability. A fifteenish female.
What would you do if it were your child?
But following her presents problems. If she's moved on from you in her trip state, your continued presence could become a dark thing to her. You've been meaning for a while to get a new jacket. Your current one, which you got for free, has a dour feel to it, as it's of military color and design. I need a colorful jacket with turtles all over it! I decide that should be the new benchmark for any clothing i wear - something that a tripping person would find happy fun.
If you follow her, you could also invite the ire of those who might react unfavorably to a lone man following a female teenager around. There's so much paranoia in this world...justifiably so, sadly.
You decide that she's in a safe place, in the bright light of day with happy folk around. You continue playing your songs.
A few minutes later, you realize she left a purse and phone. There seems to be a wallet inside. Maybe she'll wander back...
An hour later, she hasn't returned. The shadows are lengthening, and you're feeling ill at ease over what's happened. You shoulder her purse, and set off in the direction she went. You spend the next twenty minutes biking every trail in a half-mile radius, talking to strangers. No one's seen her. A couple of teenagers think i should leave her purse where we were, but that just feels like begging for it to be stolen.
She'd told you that her phone was dead. Should you take her purse home, to search for contact information or get the phone working? A little voice inside you whispers "DON'T GET INVOLVED". If something horrible has happened, and you show up saying "Here's her purse!", all sorts of life-shattering ugliness could befall you. Should you find the nearest police station, to drop off the purse and tell what you know? Being rounded up (or just sought) by the police could turn her trip into a nightmare...if not immediately, then in repercussions from her parents or guardians, who may react harshly. Parental hypocrisy can know no bounds.
Home is nearby, so you go there. You plug in her dead phone, but quickly realize a flaw there - you don't have her password. You open the wallet, but there's only cash and a lone credit card. In retrospect, i didn't even look at the card to see her name. I go back to the phone, and get a break - i find a way to make the most recent calls appear without the password. I see a number with which she had multiple contacts, and call. I'm soon talking to someone who seems to be a housemate. She says that the mother can't come to the phone, as her english is broken, but that someone is coming for the purse. A couple hours later, an uncle arrives. We have a warm chat for five minutes. She's in the hospital being treated for dehydration, but his energy tells me she's fine. I hold back from saying that i knew she was tripping, only saying that she seemed "out of it".
It's funny...the fact that she asked for water tells me that on some level maybe she knew exactly what was happening. And her happy attitude makes me think the trip wasn't accidental. If those things were true, WHY was she alone?
How would i act if it happened again? A friend says i should have called the police...which is probably the most pragmatic path toward insuring her safety and my own irreproachability. But that choice feels a bit inhumyn, to say nothing of the bureaucratic disruption it would bring upon everyone involved, plus the increased anger and blame that might fall upon this teen. Should i have tried to find some teenagers willing to adopt her?
Another day in this strange world of alienation and escapism. There are all sorts of darknesses i'll never be able to protect her from, but i hope her trip had a happy come-down...

"Catching Fire"

(How Cooking Made Us Human)
-by richard wrangham
2009
A fascinating argument for how crucial the development of fire and cooking was for our species. Indeed, much of wrangham's case can be boiled down (ha!) to this - we are the animal who cooks. Mind you, i'm not impressed by "sets us apart" arguments. They're generally self-serving rationalizations, and are almost always (or just always) wrong. But richard's most coherent contribution to our understanding of humyn nature seems to be a de-pantsing of the standoff between meat-eaters and vegetarians. He shows that the caloric intake between those two groups is essentially identical, and that the only genuine dietary divide is between cookers and raw-foodists. With incomplete and occasionally contradictory evidence that's compelling nonetheless, he shows that a raw diet is a ticket to oblivion, and that we're entirely adapted to cooked food, and the much higher caloric intake it provides. He argues that cooking was the gateway to our large brains, as cooking frees up time and energy for intricate, brain-building social activities (indeed, it demands such, as surplus resources and differentiated social roles require much higher social sophistication). Other apes spend hours a day simply chewing, and digesting raw food requires higher amounts of energy. Ergo, cooking is the key to more time and energy. Wrangham also negates the theory that sex is the basis of our mating system (wimyn get resources/protection/status, while men get a guarantee of paternity). He argues that food is what drives mating. In virtually every humyn society, wimyn are the ones who prepare the reliable daily calories without which we would perish. In return, wimyn get a male's protection. He takes some leaps of intuition regarding gender roles and brain growth, but his essential point, that mating is about economics rather than sex, seems unassailable.
Wrangham, a biological anthropologist, also dives into the flaws in our nutritional-labeling system, and how those approximations ignore the higher metabolic costs of raw food. He contributes to the obesity discussion, proposing that our innate preference for high-calorie foods is our downfall when surplus becomes too great. Fat has the lowest digestive cost of any food, so we're particularly susceptible to too much fat. Thin people tend to burn more energy during digestion - there's a chicken/egg relationship there we don't yet understand, but in any case there seems to be a level on which thinness and obesity are both self-maintaining.
He offers fascinating particulars along the way. He says that bread is one of the few cooked foods that chemically reverts to a harder-to-digest state, which explains our preference for fresh (or freshly-toasted) bread. It turns out that's not just taste preference.
Wrangham's writing flows seamlessly, and this book is a necessary addition to our understanding of humyn nature.

"Doctor Who"

Oh, the curious, cornucopic conglomeration that is DOCTOR WHO. The most enduring TV sci fi franchise (edging out TREK by three years), yet almost entirely unknown to many on this side of the pond. And for good reason - across the incarnations, there is a singular absence of intelligence or vision. It's mainly just the high-spirited skewerings of scary monsters. But if your expectations are low it can be good fun, especially after the 2005 rebirth - still not smart, but they found creative writers who could do dialogue with a vengeance.
The best thing about the franchise is the doctor's presence on the list of action icons who do not (and will not!) use a gun - just a wealth of wit and pluck (plus a good sonic screwdriver), even against alien armadas. Pip pip! Eventually, they found a way to embrace the silliness of the product, yet layer it in a cocoon of sharp dialogue and resonant characterizations. The show takes itself entirely seriously...and yet not at all (no mean feat). The most iconic WHO villains are the daleks, little green aliens encased in clumsy-looking battle turrets who shout "Exterminate! Exterminate!!" Ah, the lighter side of genocide...
There have been thirteen doctors (give or take), all the same character, a trick pulled off by having the doctor be a last-of-his-kind (give or take) alien who lives for centuries and can "reincarnate" into a new version of themself (a self-serving boon for producers faced with an actor ready to "move on", or desirous of a salary bump?). There have also been a parade of "companions", usually humyn (and often, ahem, female and dewy), who travel with the doctor through time and space in a quaint little ship shaped like a police call box, which is larger inside than out. The companions are a lens with which the audience can identify, patriarchal eye candy, and plot device requiring the doctor's exposition...they often however, rose above that (though it must also be mentioned, the very occasional episodes with no companion at all were usually fantastic). The franchise can be divided into three eras: the 60s-70s in which the doctors were faintly sinister, the writing quaint and plodding, and the sexism rampant, the 80s which showed more heart and glimmers of feminist enlightenment, and the 00s-present which are tight and bright and perhaps finally over the sexist hump. If you want to see the show at its occasionally-breathtaking best, view the modern-era christmas episodes.
This review is based on incomplete knowledge...indeed, how could it be otherwise when the BBC in the 60s often threw away episodes once they'd aired? Of the classic doctors, i've seen only a handful of episodes...but enough to offer this guide.
DOCTORS
#1 (1963-66)
William hartnell (THE MOUSE THAT ROARED, HEAVEN'S ABOVE!) is a cranky old oh-so-british fusspot, with fine presence.
#2 (1966-69)
Patrick troughton (TREASURE ISLAND, SINBAD AND THE EYE OF THE TIGER) is twee and droll, but oh that deadly-slow writing the brits could crank out...
#3 (1970-74)
John pertwee (A FUNNY THING HAPPENED ON THE WAY TO THE FORUM, WORZEL GUMMIDGE) - rock-solid.
#4 (1974-81)
Tom baker (THE GOLDEN VOYAGE OF SINBAD, THE ZANY ADVENTURES OF ROBIN HOOD) is thoroughly earnest and smarter-than-you. Why has history chosen him as the most iconic doctor? The vagaries of chemistry. He's also he longest-tenured doctor, at seven seasons.
#5 (1982-84)
Peter davison (ALL CREATURES GREAT AND SMALL, THE HITCHHIKER'S GUIDE TO THE GALAXY) is likable, but a bit wooden and vanilla.
#6 (1984-1986)
Colin baker (THE BROTHERS, DOCTORS) - serviceable, yet dull.
#7 (1987-1989)
Sylvester mccoy (DRACULA, THE HOBBIT 1-3) is the first doctor with a puckish glint...yet the writing still feels faintly forced.
#8 (1996)
Paul mcgann (EMPIRE OF THE SUN, ALIEN 3) is brilliant...and wasted on an abortive reboot (with eric roberts and will sasso!). If we're going to acknowledge one-offs, john hurt turned in a gem in 2013, and a couple of peter cushing telefilms supposedly exist too.
#9 (2005)
Christopher eccleston (EXISTENZ, AMELIA), my first doctor...a bias which makes him shine undeservedly bright? Or is he the actor the franchise had been looking for for four decades? Objectively, i know it was the writing which made a quantum leap...yet my golly did they get the right guy. After one stellar season (the shortest-tenured doctor), he moved on, alas.
#10 (2005-10)
David tennant (NATIVITY! 2: DANGER IN THE MANGER, THE SARAH JANE ADVENTURES) slipped in seamlessly and owned the character for three superlative seasons.
#11 (2010-13)
Matt smith (CHRISTOPHER AND HIS KIND, MAPPELTHORPE) toppled the seemingly-insurmountable baker and eccleston. The bar had become ridiculously high, yet he pirouettes over with a twinkle in his eye. Combining frankensteinian facial features with sad puppy eyes, even when he's serious he's so very, very fun. The greatest doctor ever.
#12 (2014-17)
Peter capaldi (LOCAL HERO, DANGEROUS LIAISONS) - um...an old white guy? Not that there's anything wrong with old, but paired with one of the aforementioned dewy females?? A resounding clomp in the wrong direction. In all fairness, he's perfectly lovely, but why didn't he have the integrity to stand up to the producers and say, "I am entirely wrong for this part. Science fiction is supposed to spur social progress, not follow it, and you've been sitting on your asses for decades now"?
#13 (2017-present)
Jodie whitaker (VENUS, GET SANTA) - review pending...but about bloody time.
COMPANIONS
There were often (and sometimes only) subsidiary, part-time companions, which makes it hard to compile a best-of list. Here's my attempt (though my unfamiliarity with the full history may short-change deserving entries):
SARAH JANE SMITH (86 episodes, pertwee/baker, 1973-2010)
Elisabeth sladen (TAKE MY WIFE, THE SARAH JANE ADVENTURES) eventually did fifty-five spin-off episodes as well. Smart and no-nonsense.
LEELA (40 episodes, baker, 1977-78)
Okay, i confess, i've never seen a single louise jameson (EASTENDERS, FACE VALUE) episode. But they might fall into that transcendent "so-bad-it's-brilliant" category. She's a primitive female who wears animal skins and kills with abandon, while the doctor tries to "civilize" her. Patriarchally noxious? Absolutely. But if you're going to be awful, let's be awful all the way, i say.
PERI BROWN (34 episodes, davison/c. baker, 1984-1993)
Ah, nicola bryant (BLACKADDER'S CHRISTMAS CAROL, PARTING SHOTS)...is it possible to rail against sexist eye candyism, yet also enjoy it? Apparently, yes.
ACE (31 episodes, mccoy, 1987-1989)
The final companion of the classic era, sophie aldred (TREE FU TOM, BOB THE BUILDER) puts the spark in spark plug.
ROSE TYLER (35 episodes, eccleston/tennant, 2005-13)
With saucy pluck, billie piper (SECRET DIARY OF A CALL GIRL, PENNY DREADFUL) was the perfect reboot companion...without her, it might have been 1996 all over again.
MARTHA JONES (20 episodes, tennant, 2006-10)
Freema agyeman (SENSE8, TORCHWOOD) is so unself-consciously rock-solid that future generations will entirely miss the significance of her pigmentation.
AMY POND (36 episodes, smith, 2008-13)
Karen gillan (GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY 1-2, JUMANJI: WELCOME TO THE JUNGLE) has delightful chemistry with the doctor...but with her fiance/husband rory, not so much.
CLARA OSWALD (40 episodes, smith/capaldi, 2012-17)
Jenna coleman (VICTORIA, ME BEFORE YOU), probably the only companion perfect for any doctor of any era.
AND DON'T FORGET...
Who else took a spin on the WHO wheel? Why, bill kerr, john cleese, burt kwouk, simon pegg, anthony head, kylie minogue, alex kingston, james corden, michael gambon, meredith vieira, richard e. grant, david warner, diana rigg, warwick davis, and ian mckellan!

"Sunflowers"

S.T.H.O.L.T.B.I.D.
(songs to hear one last time before i die)
-Wynton Marsalis Septet
I apologize for any disparaging thing i've ever said about wynton. Maybe i'd always been disinclined to favor him, because he came off as a poseur seeking miles' "greatest trumpeter" mantle. That perception may have zero basis in reality. Still, it always seemed there wasn't much soul beneath his technical wizardry.
I apologize...because of this song he wrote and performed. It's a full expression of music's magic...it lifts and transports you and drops you down, then flies you away again...once or twice you may even find yourself upside-down, laughing. The intricacies of rhythm, the interplay of instruments in his arrangement...just breathtaking. One can only cry at being alive to appreciate this. Thank you, wynton.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PaGA-lZ7Jlk