dolores666's photos with the keyword: Obituaries

If you must have weapons choose them carefully and economically. Don’t buy BAE Systems or Lockheed Martin’s crap. Develop your own. And remember the advice given in The Karate Kid: never use them in anger, only as defence. Or deterrent…:-) Obituary Special. I was saving this here doodle for the weekend but, hey! life is short. Not for the latest not-at-all-dearly departed, though. At the ripe age of 88, after a lifetime of overachievement in the field of calculated mendacity and sadistic obfuscation, not to mention the spewing of fuse-blowing aphorisms, Donald “Duck” Rumsfeld has finally kicked the bucket, and not a day too soon. But no, I’ll not be cracking open that bottle of Beluga Gold Line I’m hiding under the bed. That I’m saving for Henry Kissinger’s demise (Provided the wee bastard doesn’t manage to outlive me, that is.) Meanwhile let us rejoice in a very small way at a very small piece of good news. Of course there’s plenty more where he came from but every little helps, dontyouknow. So today instead of un po’ di mu’, I love you and leave you with a link to some of his best verbal bollocks. Enjoy. “There are known knowns, things we know that we know; and there are known unknowns, things that we know we don’t know. But there are also unknown unknowns, things we do not know we don’t know.” [And, to quote, imperfectly, either The Two Johns (Bird & Fortune) or Rory Bremner: "Then there are the things we know we knew but we no longer know because we shredded them"] “If you can't solve a problem, make it bigger.” www.azquotes.com/author/12769-Donald_Rumsfeld

In Memoriam. Julio Anguita. May 2020. The good die young they say. The good oldies die, too. Briefly, the good die. Whilst the bastards seem to thrive like venomous weeds. Well, probably Entropy IS the Mother of Us All indeed. Two little Haida birds have come to join me in my grief. Another light gone from my increasingly darker sky. Another lucid mind, another clean heart gone up the cypress path. Another twin soul leaves the fraught stage. And I here, like a lemon, feeling once more like a serial orphan. Fortunately he’s leaving behind a substantial heritage. We shall not see his like again but with a bit of luck we’ll see pretty good approximations. And, as I never tire of saying, perhaps is a good thing he’s gone now, before things get so unbelievably ugly that even the stoutest of hearts might feel tempted to throw the sponge, or pawn the towel, or whatever it is that one does when ones gives up an curls up and croaks. Personally I often have the feeling that maybe it is time my subatomic particles joined the club of the Dearly Departed. And then my particles, and Rosa’s particles and don Julio’s particles’ and William “Billy the Kid”’s particles and my friend Ash’s particles can get together and have a good gossip and play Race you to Alpha Centauri! games with the neutrinos. Losing games, I know, but it’s the though, the intention wot counts. Goodbye, don Julito, darling mine. I raise my glass and my fist to you. You live, even in death. Here, have a nice article/obituary and a peek with soundtrack & all at the man himself (Spanish only), and un po’ di suitable mu’. Also a grand week, if you can get it. www.youtube.com/watch?v=NDODFIcW4qg blogs.publico.es/juan-carlos-monedero/2020/05/16/erase-una-vez-un-comunista-a-julio-anguita www.youtube.com/watch?v=n_-YPLLxLFg www.youtube.com/watch?v=zrm3A_2Iur8

Doggie Dirge. A quick modest tribute to a beloved departed dog, Kabubi, my little brother’s hound. He was 13 years old and he had had a jolly good innings, really, but all the same, it has been a wrench, especially for my brother who was totally besotted with him. May Bumba receive his subatomic particles and let them frolic amongst the stars, where they belong. And because you can’t have a wake, memorial or funereal whatnot without music, here’s link to a song that is not terribly relevant except for a) it’s about a dog and b) I adore Rafael Farina. www.youtube.com/watch?v=bloo6RrogPs

A sad Solstice. One of the pillars of my sanity and major luminary of my skyline, William Blum, died on December 9th, aged 85, after a long and fruitful career in the field of calling a spade a spade and tossing spanners into The Man’s propaganda machine. His wonderful Anti-Empire Reports opened many an eye to the facts of political life in the 20th and 21st centuries and strengthened my conviction that no, I’m not mad, bad and dangerous to know and that no, I’m not alone. We all miss him something chronic and I feel, once more, like a serial orphan. Still, the old sun has reached its peak and the young one is pushing its way upwards and onwards. Very, very soon the dreaded seasonal lunacy will be over and before we know it the first buds will be popping their tiny heads out and the snow drops will raise their small voices to say Hey, we’re alive again. Whoopee! Have a wonderful Solstice, comadres and compadres. And carry on best you can. Life is short and often sucks but it’s all we have, really. That and love. Here go a few links to the one and only William “Billy the Kid” Blum, a guy who shot from the hip and hardly ever missed, in case you are curious about what the fuss is all about. His site: williamblum.org His last Anti-Empire Report: williamblum.org/aer/read/160 And his legacy (we hope): covertactionmagazine.com/index.php/2018/12/09/william-blum-dead-at-85

Old news, small news and a somewhat late celebration But it’s the thought that counts. I’m looking forward to the next hagiographiotic* obituary we’ll be assaulted with. Why, it might even be that of Henry Kissinger (one lives in hope) and then we’ll be told what a nice man he was and how he brought lasting peace and prosperity to the Chilean people and so forth. *Yes. A hybrid of hagiographic and idiotic. Lovely language, English, innit? socialistworker.org/2004-1/485/485_06_BushDynasty.php One of the many articles reminding us we’re not mad, bad or dangerous to know…:-) For more: duckduckgo.com/?q=george+hw+bush+war+criminal&t=ffhp&ia=web

Alien Altarpiece. I (from the Enigmatic Alien Cults series.) In Memoriam. Antonio Fraguas de Pablo “Forges”. 17 January 1942 – 22 February 2018 Last week another loved one, one of those I've never met but who had been with me from way, way back, climbed the cypress' path, to put it with The Poet (Salvador Espriu). Antonio Fraguas de Pablo “Forges" left the world of matter and passed on into legend and cartoon heaven. He left us, his devoted life-long buffs, desolate, bereft and deprived. He left a vast and wondrous legacy, however. His gently biting humour, his irreverence, his love of life and of his beloved country and its languages will live and linger for as long as there's ink and paper or pixels and screens. Back then, even long before Spain transitioned from the Middle Ages to Modernity, Forges was there for us with his Blasillos and his Marianos and his Conchas, his funcionarios and chupatintas, his corrupt politicians and his shipwrecked chaps, and his multifarious army of characters, both human and animal, all of them invariably sporting spectacles (yes, even his sardines wore glasses). In them dark days, the natives of "clean and noble, cultured, rich, free, clever and happy"* countries had existentialist philosophers and Noam Chomsky. We had Forges. On hindsight, and given that I never cared one fig for Sartre or his girlfriend, thatChomsky appears to have gone gaga, and that I've come to regard most Anglo-Saxons as a bunch of barbarians, I'm so very grateful I was born where and when I was. So, being a devout atheist yet feeling the need to formalize an expression of my grief, I betook myself to the shrine of the Great Un-Cognizable Celestial Auntie to pray for don Antonio's subatomic particles. May they fare well and far, and fill the universe with their irrepressible joy, their kind-hearted sarcasm and their love. The pilgrimage was great fun and very educational, although most of the really juicy questions went unanswered, as I suspected they would. Like: is Auntie pregnant? If yes, who is the father of the fierce-looking maybe-baby that may or may not squat in her cryptic womb? Why are the two custodian FattyBumbums there? Have they taken to moonlighting as "security" to dodgy demiurges? And, most puzzling of all, why the scroll at Madamina's feet bears a fragment of a poem by Joan Salvat-Papasseit? Never mind. It's the thought that counts. And the willingness to ask the questions, especially the awkward ones. Here's a few links to the dearly departed stuff, mostly for the benefit of Spanish-speakers: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antonio_Fraguas_de_Pablo es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forges elpais.com/cultura/2018/02/22/actualidad/1519268111_985350.html www.forges.com/#bienvenido *Again, Salvador Espriu. Assaig de cántic en el temple

Something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue; never mind the sixpence in my shoe –for one thing, they don’t make them anymore. This is for Ursula K. Le Guin, who died peacefully in her bed a few days ago, aged 88, after a long life of dreaming and dreaming damned well. Ah, yes, the girl could dream like nobody’s business. So here is my tribute wot contains all the four ingredients for an alchemical marriage that happened a while back, when I was young and foolish and good Sci-Fi-starved. Borges said once that nobody likes owing anything to their contemporaries. This is, if it is at all, rubbish. We all owe lots of things to lots of people so it’s a waste of time liking the fact or not. Personally I rather owe to of my age group (or near-age group) that to some centuries old geezer whose ideas were dodgy to begin with but yet linger, and linger, and liiiiiiinger (oy vey!), instead of laying quietly in the intellectual elephant’s graveyard where they belong. In fact, for this modest loving homage, I’ve borrowed from myself, look, you! Bye bye, Ursy. Fare thee well, give my regards to the sub-atomic particles and see you soon(ish).