[A Robin fledgling perched on an unused tomato cage in the middle of a patch of weeds next to the foundation of a small garage.]
Spring has definitely sprung here in West Michigan. After a week off from work I am re-acclimating myself to the daily grind. Work was busy, as was life, and everything was made busier by the schedule disruptions of a new crown on one of my teeth, a meeting of the Grand River Poetry Collective, a meeting of the Ann Arbor Science Fiction Convention, and a severe thunderstorm which blew through Thursday evening, which brought almost four inches of rain in an hour as well as several tornadoes.
But other than that, everything was business as usual.
Reading
I read Frank O’Hara’s Lunch Poems, and am now going through Jack Hirschman’s Front Lines, which I am quite enjoying. This is me making up for not having the mental capacity to enjoy poetry during National Poetry Month.
I just started reading Kraken Rider Z by David Estes and Dyrk Ashton. I know Dyrk from ConFusion, and have previously read his excellent Paternus Trilogy, so I have high hopes for this one. A hundred pages in, and it is pretty good!
Writing
Along with a return to reading poetry, I am writing a little more than usual, which is not difficult because anything more than “none” is more than usual.
Weekly Writing Prompt
Subject: Spiritual Beings, Kaiju
Setting: Small Town
Genre: Technothriller
Listening
Simple Minds, “Don’t You (Forget About Me)”, from the soundtrack to The Breakfast Club. This was the #1 song in the USA this week in 1985.
Interesting Links
- “Why the Democrats are still stuck in the past” (Paul Rosenberg, Salon)
- “Documenting the Damage: 100 Harmful Policies from the First 100 Days of the Second Trump Administration” (Brett Heinz) – Well-researched list of the many ways in which the guillotinable and compostable President Donald Trump, with the full-throated support of every conservative in the USA, is dismantling democracy and turning the country into a fascist oligarchy. This is what all American conservatives – especially the Christians – have wanted since the day America won its independence from England.
- “Trump can’t do ANYTHING for his base” (Cory Doctorow, Pluralistic)
- “They Looted Companies — Now They’re Looting the Government” (Lynn Parramore, Institute for New Economic Thinking)