oh, time is short and days are sweet

 and passion rules the arrow that flies

A million faces at my feet but all I see are dark eyes  (Dylan)

yesterday, while on duty and in uniform; a 61 year old EMS lt. was stabbed to death on the streets of Astoria. Allison Russo was a 24 year Veteran of the FDNY and she was nearing Retirement. She spent time in the aftermath of 9/11 at the pit of ground zero, like so many others in that line of service. A loner, probably deranged, scumbag decided that yesterday was her last day on the planet. maybe the assailant was too far gone mentally to be deterred by crime & punishment, but we'll never know. In a lawless land where anything goes and politicians vilify everyone that wears a uniform, murders like this are just a matter of time. Of all the shitstorm of stories we have to wade through daily while choking down our coffee...this one really bothered me.....when Armageddon comes and goes when anyone really remember her sacrifice all these years ? hopefully the people she helped over the years will stop today and acknowledge her passing...not that it matters.

Some mother’s child has gone astray, she can’t find him anywhere

But I can hear another drum beating for the dead that rise

Whom nature’s beast fears as they come,  and all I see are dark eyes

i just wonder

  if you shouldn't feel

less concern about the deep unreal (Hunter-Garcia)

this world is spinning towards a calamity the likes of which we may never have seen before and it's all by design....you see the worse things get, the easier it becomes for rulers to impose their will, extinguish freedoms, steal wealth, and force compliance......i'll try to be brief.

nobody is that dumb.....the gas shortages are by design to inflict economic pain....this administration has killed pipelines, banned drilling and fracking and emptied our strategic reserves....again....NOBODY is that dumb. the other day there was an attack on the Nord Stream Pipeline ( Not Nordstrom Kamala) which will dramatically reduce or entirely postpone the amount of Natural gas that can be shipped from Russia to Germany this winter. A Former Polish defense minister is accusing the USA of the attack, while others are accusing Russia of sabotaging their own pipeline to further punish the EU and launch a smear campaign against the west...we ALL know Putin would never blow up his own pipeline...if he want to punish Western Europe he may turnoff the tap, but blowing it up would be counter-productive....it makes sense that the good ol USA was behind the explosion....at the end of the day it doesn't matter...what does matter is now the Angela merkel has dismantled Germany's Nuclear power industry, people will die this long cold winter while others will simply go broke.

In the USA FEMA has said that we may not have enough oil in our strategic reserves to withstand a prolonged shut down in the Gulf as a result of Hurricane IAN or the next storm...meanwhile POTUS has been tapping into our reserves and selling that oil to China....i'm not kidding, look it up if you think i am .......think ABC and CBS care to report that?  instead, they are already talking about more federal spending to subsidize Heating and Electric costs for low income people this winter. they are clearly hellbent on bankrupting this nation , and as inflation continues to roar, the Federal reserve Chairman Powell is saying we NEED 1.2 Million layoffs to slow the tide......people can't pay rent, electric bills  or fill up their cars with gasoline and we are going to layoff 1.2 million people......it's by design friends, and it's already too late. ....keep our friends and family in the Great State of Florida in your thoughts and prayers today as Ian makes its agonizingly slow approach...if Alvarez is on the beach in Panama City, I hope he has a bottle of the Jack to keep him company.

New ones comin as the old ones go

Everything's movin here but much too slowly

Little bit quicker and we might have time

to say 'how do you do?" before we're left behind

i was walking down the street early this morning

Past the graveyard, voices whisper to me.

I was walking down the street, early this morning

And the silver tears of rain hung from the leaves

And I swear I heard the voices singing to me (Concrete Blonde)

if you listen carefully to the written words above you can hear Jehnette Napolitano's haunting, powerful voice sharing a song as only she could. I hate this month with a passion.....as our country , our world teeters on the brink of crossing over into the oblivion i feel it's too late. I don't think we can come all the way back this time.....the pendelum will continue swing back and forth...but each time it swings back it stops a few inches shy of previous high-water mark. A full generation is growing up with senseless crime as the norm, elderly citizens are prisoners in their own homes. saturday night in Wildwood Nj an illegal pop up party with vehicle stunts was held on the main avenue. 500 cars descended on the sleepy off season seaside town and proceeded to drag race and spin doughnuts on main street. in 2 separate incidents innocent people out for dinner were killed when first a car went airborne and crashed into a vehicle in the oncoming lane (killing the driver instantly) and a few blocks away a car jumped the curb and slammed through a liquor store window (killing a pedestrian unlucky enough to be on the sidewalk). wildwood police said they were faced with an invasion and were unmanned and unable to control the throngs....too bad buck tooth murphy sent 75 State Troopers to Puerto Rico to help with heavy rains.....the poor tax paying citizens in wildwood could have used them.

in howard beach a 30 year old woman was followed off the train and savagely beaten because she refused to talk to her attacker while on the train...this animal has an interesting rap sheet.....as a 14 year old misunderstood stymie he beat his Grandmother to death in bklyn because she refused to give him money....as a 20 year old he stabbed someone while in Creedmore in the face and neck and permanently disfigured the individual ....oh and of course he was out on parole.

in reality no lives matter....no lives have value to the dark side of society...and the darkness is overtaking the light....as we crawl excruciatingly slowly through autumn to the winter of certain death, the good in society are like the poor people of wildwood....outmanned and overmatched.

in queens yesterday a man was shoplifting in a Rite Aid.....they called Police and he fled.....he ran across the street and tried to drag a 57 year old man out of his car to steal the vehicle....he drove over  the double line up onto the street and through the front window of a KFC.....at a time when shoplifting is no longer even prosecuted if the theft is below $1,000 , why would this suspect up his own charges to grand theft auto, kidnapping, reckless endangerment and or attempted murder ?  because at the end of the day nothing matters.....it's all just a game...when there are no consequences for your action there are no deterrents to criminal behavior.

i continue to retreat, retreat, retreat...to a simpler time....i disappear into my beer with my music and memories to keep me company, some real and some were just not sure yet....today we give thanks to Jehnette

And on the bus today, I met the queen of L.A.

At least she said she was and who am I to say?

She was sixty-five and full of life,

She had purple-painted cheeks

And glitter on her eyes

And the troll on the corner, I flipped him a quarter

And he looked at me and smiled.

He wasn't abused, he wasn't confused,

He had nothing to gain and less to lose in Hollywood

Oh WOW! Thought I'd be out of here by now.

Still in Hollywood!

society is dead

 no lyrics, just a statement.

websters defines society as the aggregate of people living together in a more or less ordered community.

here in the United Staes of America, in the dying month of 2022; there is no order or community.

i just returned from a week in Folly Beach SC, and i am convinced that this country is beyond saving. what was already a slow decline of civilization seems to have been exacerbated by the pandemic/isolation/shutdown. Most of the people i encountered had an aggravated chip on their shoulder... a feeling that someone owed them something...that they had been taken advantage of and were not going to let that happen again, that they were the victim of the world and out for revenge. everyone seems to think that they should be first in line, that everything costs too much and if they succumb and pay the prices of admission anyway, then they should certainly get more, more, more than they were promised. the rare acts of civility that were witnessed felt forced and disingenuous....an obvious pandering by white America to the blacks to prove that they were ON their side....i wonder if the blacks are shrewd enough to see through it. and the phony religious people, the ones who are so blessed and accept everything as Gods will or a Gift from God; well they are the rudest human beings around. There also is a bizarre trend of people opening up to strangers, telling or retelling their entire life story, reshaping, omitting details   and painting a self-portrait of how they see themselves or wish others to see them.  One lady on the train talked across the aisle (loud enough for me to hear 2 rows in front) about her three marriages....her first husband and father of her children was an unhappy man and she left him for the good of her sons.....husband #2 was her childhood sweetheart who never matured, he unfortunately had a bitter divorce and spoiled his own children...so much so that she had to divorce him because again, she didn't want her kids to be exposed to those bad habits...husband 3 was absolutely wonderful and her ultimate soul mate...she met him 1 year ago and they married 6 months ago......she lives with him in Charleston sometimes, but refused to sell her home in Wilson, NC, where she spends weeks at a time alone ...probably banging the lawn guy, mailman and any other swinging dick that passes by the house while good old #3 is slaving away to keep his soulmate happy.....but why, why on earth do i need to know any of this ? then there was the 80 year old black woman who thinks business class means that the train is her home office and she is allowed to WFT (work from train)...with her fake, aw shucks southern drawl, speaking to people on the phone (LOUD) as the sweet little old lady, polite and a bit of a simpleton....all an act....as soon as she hung up she would call someone else and bitch about the person she just sucked up to....telling everyone that she's 79 but keeps working cuz she loves to help people...fraud....and these were the good ones.

the train home left Charleston at 9:00 am, but the last leg  at 8:00 on a Friday night from DC was worthy of a short story...i think if i read a full description of the train i would be skeptical....i would assume this was a collection from years of travel combined into one train story for the benefit of the reader...but i assure you this collection of insanity was not only on the same train, but within 2 rows in either direction of my fucking seat...i am the magnet for crazy...i used to enjoy being the craziest person on mass transit, the drunken maniac that other people didn't want to sit near....now i blend into the background. Across the aisle was a black lady that got on in Fayetteville and was drinking vodka and sweet tea for 6 hours before she had an epiphany that our train wasn't really Business Class , but Coach Class with assigned seats, she bitched, moaned and slurred her words to anyone that would listen...until another black woman who worked for Amtrak but was off duty sat in the seat next to her...within minutes they were arguing and threatening to have each other thrown off the train...the Amtrak lady put in her earplugs and started singing gospel songs loudly, the Drunk switched seats and started a new conversation with a bicyclist across the aisle ( this is isn't business class, this is coach, this isn't business class) the bike rider was a special douchebag....60 years old...rode his bike from Pittsburgh to DC and now was taking the train home to Westchester....total loser....wearing gym shorts with his bike and helmet stored in the overheard .....he went on to tell her he has a son with aspergers syndrome and the kid was a fucking pain in the ass....never settles down and was driving this POS crazy...then came the black guy with a French bulldog in a crate, he was a breeder and he was selling Coco and delivering the dog to someone in NYC....of course the crate didn't fit in the overhead so COCO was placed next to the garbage bin that was overflowing at the front of the car in the wheel chair reserved section, and the Breeder took his seat next to the bike guy in front of me.....scumbag hipster gets on with an electric scooter that doesn't fit anywhere...walks up and down the train 10 or 15 times...as if a secret compartment was going to suddenly appear that would be big enough for him and his man bun and his scooter....then come the drunks....two people in their late 40's with 4 bags , and they couldn't stand up or speak.....hammered and wasted are not fair adjectives....these 2 were beyond bombed.....they collapsed into the handicapped seats one row ahead of me and across the aisle....and immediately start talking to Coco and demanding to buy the dog.........conductor makes an announcement, THIS TRAIN IS SOLDOUT....if you don't have a ticket , get off now.......guess who doesn't have a ticket ?? 10 minutes after departure here comes to conductor into this wing of Bellevue to check tickets...the drunks are asleep; he wakes them up.... the guy takes out a wad of cash to buy a ticket on a soldout train...conductor says he is going to throw him off the train at the next stop...Baltimore....i can envision a 90 minute delay as we wait for the Cops to board the train and escort these drunks OFF....it's 9:00pm i left my hotel at 7:30 am...i have an uber scheduled to pick me up in Metropark at 11:00pm,....a 90 minute delay will push me to 1:30 am and obviously i would have to reschedule my pickup......thankfully the drunk says he bought tickets but he can't find his phone...conductor looks him up and confirms he has coach tix and they just have to leave business class.....drunk lady starts rambling again, THIS is Not Business Class, this is not Business class...they move to the Cafe Car.....the Cafe Car has been closed since Alexandria...the angry spoon that was running the cafe car has been on her dinner break and told everyone that she doesn't have any of the complimentary beverages because everything was expired...our fault ? nope, she blames the strike that was actually averted the day before....don't try to figure that out...thankfully we had a cooler bag with a 12 pack of pints each that we have been drinking since Chucktown......THIS is NOT Business Class, Business class has tables and free beverages......THIS is NOT Business class.....eventually we approach Trenton....1 more fucking stop...3 separate sets of  police vehicles with emergency lights flashing in the blocks around the station....but the drunks decide they are getting off the train...or he is.....she is passed out....conductor tells him this is NOT NY , this is Trenton.....drunk wants off....steps onto the platform......then wants to get back on but is standing on the platform arguing with the conductor....here we go.....conductor tells him to sit down and shut up or he's calling the cops....i am starting to think i should get off here and call Uber....thankfully the drunk sits down.........we get to Metropark....we decide to take the elevator because we have 4 bags....elevator opens......20 year old kid lying on the floor of the elevator convulsing, heroin overdose hopefully.....unfazed we take the stairs....

that being said, Folly Beach was nice.....great bars, friendly people.... sadly we encountered 2 girls at different coffee shops that could not make change....oh no, they had the physical pennies, dimes, nickels etc.....but their "machines" weren't working and telling them that if it costs $7.54 and the customer gives you $8 dollars ......how much do you give them back?  not a joke or an exaggeration ...these weren't teens or foreign nationals working on summer visas....these were mid 20's American females...ones that probably took 100K in student loans to go to East Carolina and get banged at Frat parties for 4 years...unable to make change with a machine........well, like i said....society is dead.