Neither as a spectacle of entertainment, nor as a thing to get involved in, I’ve never understood American national politics. I think we went as a family to vote in 1976 at the local firehouse, but in memory this exercise in democracy was a tediously orderly affair.
A couple weeks later, I was in Moscow celebrating Thanksgiving at Spaso House in what turned out to be an scandal. The party coincided with the appointment of Malcom Toon as US ambassador to the USSR. Security the next day tried to find out who slept in his unoccupied bed.
I ask you: Whom do you choose for US president, an inveterate liar and convicted felon or an octogenerian who loses his train of thought?
Everything in adulthood has led me to wonder why there isn’t less circus in national election campaigns: I spent the relevant passage of All the King’s Men wondering why Broderick Crawford was in the movie. What, after all, are a tent and some animals and men dressed as clowns compared to the rich reward of hours spent feasting on sweet, opiate television or clicking from one TikTok to the next, or fidgeting after too much benzedrine.
Someone has changed the butt on Reitarska we wrote about on Day 853 and replenished cards citing Article 75 of the Geneval Convention.
Today is Constitution Day in Ukraine. We celebrated by launching guided AASM (Armement Air-Sol Modulaire) Hammer bombs from MiG-29s on Russian positions. Yes, they’re French.
And, finally, some time this week – during the time it took for my aging, perforated brain to wrap itself around (come to accept, perhaps) the fairly rudimentary and time-proven concept that a variable created inside a function won’t necessarily be available the next time the function is called – the price of rasberries at the market dropped from UAH 400 to UAH 250/kilogram.