Back in the day when I had time for reading (grade/high school, parts of college) I would binge-read authors – literary fiction – much like I’ll today binge-watch a TV show on DVD/streaming.

Hemingway, Vonnegut, Steinbeck, Joyce (no, not Finnegan’s Wake), Faulkner and so on. Not all writings, but the bulk of the biggies, novels and (often) short story collections.

In the last decade or two, it’s rare that I read more than one book – very rarely two – by a contemporary author (in the last 50 years or so). I no longer appear to have favorite authors, I now have favorite books.

Not that that’s a bad thing.

Two exceptions to this rule are William Styron and, more recently, Jane Hamilton.

I just finished a fourth Hamilton novel: Disobedience. It happens to be the most recently published of her books I’ve read, but I’ve read them out of order. I’m not waiting patiently for her latest to come out and devouring it, I just read as I find this or that book interesting. Disobedience came out in 2000, and the previous Hamilton book I read, her first, came out in 1988: The Book of Ruth (brilliant, shocking and unexpected).

Compared to The Book or Ruth (a PEN/Hemingway Award winner) and my personal favorite, A Map of the World, Disobedience was a disappointment.

It starts off strong – the first graphs of Disobedience and A Map of the World are so strong, so encompassing that you just need to read the rest of the book.

Sadly, Disobedience doesn’t hold up.

It’s a story about the Shaw family, transplanted from Vermont to Chicago, and is narrated by the family’s 17-year-old son, Henry/Hank. The gist of the story is that Henry finds, by accidentally(?) accessing his mom’s email account (“Liza38” – it has to be an AOL account, as it does take place sometime around or before 2000), that his mom is having an affair. The book, narrated in past tense, describes the year or so that follows the initial discovery.

That’s the main arc of the story – him snooping around the letters sent and received by his mom and her partner in disobedience, as well as his mother’s emails to a female friend, where she more straight-forwardly outlines details of the affair: the good, the bad, the confusing. The guilt and the amour.

But there is an inordinate amount of time devoted to Henry’s younger sister, Elvira, a high school-aged goth who is a Civil War Reenactor, and obsessed with all things post- and ante-bellum, as well. But mainly the War. Their father, a history teacher, is slowly (weirdly, why the delay?) revealed to be just as big a Civil War buff as his daughter. I was expecting some sort of issue between the two to suddenly emerge, but it never did.

The ending of the book really rotates around the daughter, which is odd given that the book is narrated by the son and mainly focuses on his reactions to his mother’s choices.

At bottom, the book is about how each character in the book finds their own place in the world. It’s about missteps, adjustments and acceptance.

It’s well written and full of quirky details. For example, the narrator (the son, Henry) almost never writes about his “father” – he’s just “Kevin” or “Kevin Shaw.”

For his mom, she’s “Liza98,” “Elizabeth,” “Liz” and so on.

There are some other interesting characters, notably a school friend (Karen) who is described in dress and conversation like she’s an artsy thirty-some year old, but she’s just a high-school senior. And there is a beautiful woman Henry meets at a summer camp whom he, of course, lusts after.

All in all, the book just didn’t click, and the ending just did not resonate on any level. The narrator’s tone was problematic, as well: He was writing in past tense, and it seems like he had already graduated college and film school, and Henry sounds like Holden Caufield, but with a solid grasp of literature and nuances of language. That’s an odd mix.

Will I read another Hamilton book? Absolutely. She’s a good writer and, as a bonus, sets her tales in or around Chicago (I’m from the burbs). So when a character thinks about getting a job as a lifeguard….at Fullerton Beach, it adds a little something.

And while she didn’t quite pull it off here as well as she did in A Short History of a Prince, it’s a gutsy move for a woman to write the novel from the first-person point of view of a male, and – in this case – a horny 17-year-old male.

So maybe one of her more recent books has something to say to me.

I have many mixed thoughts about our leaving Afghanistan, but this former vet’s tweets (made into a Medium post) is a fast, visceral take on the whole affair as it was unfolding.

Wow, this seems to be really resonating with folks. I'm kind of blown away

I made this post into an article, if that's a thing that people want:https://t.co/PJsvy2EOmf

— Laura Jedeed (@LauraJedeed) August 15, 2021

If you aren’t getting vaxxed bc you don’t trust doctors, why are you going to the hospital when you get sick?

— Stephanie Ruhle (@SRuhle) August 13, 2021

From CDC.gov

Over at Newsweek, there is an opinion piece that spells out why the author – a mother and a former educator and preschool director – isn’t vaccinated: No, the Unvaccinated Aren’t Selfish or Ignorant. Here’s Why I’m Not Vaxxed.

It’s not terribly persuasive.

Reading the article, the author comes across as well informed and not at all Qanon driven.

However, the whole crux of her argument comes down to two data points:

1. Anecdotal personal contact with those possibly harmed by the vaccine – One who died “reportedly” from side affects of the vaccine, and two others whose health was allegedly harmed (not fatally) by the vaccine.
2. Information – good and bad – is being suppressed/ is confusing – She cites studies have not gotten the publicity she deems is warranted, and shifting guidance by the CDC and other vaccine mouthpieces.

As to the first, she cites just the three cases (under the guise of “If I personally know these three, there must be X more out there!”), only one fatal – and that one “reportedly.”

Are there risks from the vaccine? Absolutely. There are risks to anything like this, especially with the volume: There are currently – in the US alone – 196k people with at least one dose. Get 196k people to eat a bag of Skittles^TM and some are not going to handle it well. And some symptoms will be unrelated to the candy consumed. Just the law of large numbers.

And we know that the vaccines work: Currently, 0.5% of those hospitalized for COVID are vaccinated, and only 0.01% of deaths from COVID are vaccinated.

As of today, there are more than 620k COVID deaths in the US, and the daily number of infections and deaths dropped steadily once people began getting vaccinated. Right now, we are in the midst of a pandemic of the unvaccinated, and it’s driving the fourth wave of the virus – and we have something close to a preventative measure now: the vaccine.

So get the shot, if not for yourself but for others you may come into contact with so you don’t pass it to them. You may be strong enough to weather the infection, but not everyone is. This is where I believe those who deliberately chose to not get vaccinated are selfish (religious and health reasons aside). If the virus was not communicable, go at it without a shot – it’s only you who are at risk. But this is not the case. You’re potentially putting others at risk.

The second point – data available/data suppressed – is a bit muddled.

I agree that there are conflicting messages out of just the CDC, to focus on one organization. It was just yesterday that the CDC gave the go-ahead (actually urged) women who are nursing, pregnant or who want to get pregnant to get the vaccine. Yes, a little late in the game.

But we are continually learning about the vaccine: The CDC (and others) will get some things wrong and have to adjust, but they are trying to not put out information before they are sure. That’s just good science. It’s also good PR because if you keep having to withdraw “facts” about COVID, it’s a way to quickly lose credibility.

As far as suppressing/censoring alternative information, well, again, not promoting unvetted studies or ideas is good science. If the data holds up to peer review and can be duplicated, let’s take a closer look at the same and perhaps promote it in a vigorous manner.

Look and guidance/suppression through this lens: Children under 12 are not currently allowed to get the vaccine. From what we know today, most children could probably tolerate the vaccine. But until there is enough data to support safely vaccinating younger children, it should be off the table, for two reasons:

• This science isn’t there yet to give the thumbs up. And you can’t go with your gut on a decision of this magnitude.
• Imagine if a little more testing showed we needed to tweak the vaccine to account for pre-pubescent bodies – but we had already given the go-ahead and some (even a small number of) children died or were harmed in lesser ways. That would be an avoidable tragedy.

The author also says information is getting censored, and then she supplies a link to the censored story… That’s not censorship, it’s just information many (say, the CDC) don’t find compelling, at least yet.

I said this woman’s argument was unpersuasive. And, to me, it is.

But to be fair, she writes that she is not trying to persuade one way or another; she just wanted to give her reasons for not getting vaccinated, and to explain – as the title says – that not everyone like her is selfish or ignorant.

Fair enough. And she’s entitled to her opinions and authority over her body.

But I still think this is dangerous and selfish – in 2020, the world was essentially parazlyed by COVID. In 2021, we got as close to a magic bullet as we could with the vaccines. Things drifted back to normal (in the developed countries, including the US); masks came off.

But in June 2021, after falling to the lowest infection levels since the beginning of the pandemic, the US is now in its fourth wave, with infection levels spiking to the second highest levels ever, exceed only by the turn of the year (2020/2021) spike when the pandemic was nine-to-ten months old and, crucially, we didn’t yet have mass vaccinations!

It’s a pandemic of the unvaccinated – imagine where we’d be today if even a quarter of those currently vaccinated thought like this woman.

I don’t want to imagine that.

Over the weekend (7/24/2021), we went to our first art fair since COVID landed, the Geneva, IL art fair.

As part of our day trip, we had lunch in a bar – for me, the first time I’d been in a restaurant, or any non-shopping area, since February 2020 (except for work).

It was as hot as hell – 90° – but there was an occasional breeze, so it wasn’t unbearable.

The tents of art, because of COVID, were spaced about 10 feet apart, so the breeze was able to cut across the street on which the fair was parked. In the past, the three blocks of vinyl tents formed a solid wall on either side of the street, making any breeze a rarity.

The show was a little disappointing – the limited number of entrants (due to COVID protocols) made for less to look at. However, it was nice to get out there and just see something for a change. We enjoy just checking out what is there; always hoping to come across something different.

When I was looking for places to eat in Geneva earlier in the week, one thing that struck me was there were few – if any – places where you could “build” a burger. You know, “I’d like the [bar name] burger with cheddar and bacon” and so on.

Now, it seems like most places had a roster of burgers to choose from that were all tricked out. Odd, to me. To get what you want you have to get there by subtraction, not addition.

We ate at the Geneva Ale House, and they had a bunch of burgers, as well, but at least it had one – the Ale House Burger – that had what I wanted (bacon, cheese, grilled onions). I just had to subtract the fried egg (what is with all the burgers topped with a fried egg? I like fried eggs, but…).

Beer, burger, fries. Nothing exceptional but hit the spot.

As did wandering around Geneva and the art.

Not a great adventure, but good to get out and see things. It’s been a long time for me.

From CDC.gov

I was going to whine a bit about how the COVID vaccine has remained political – instead of science based — and because of that we’re starting to dig ourselves deeper into the COVID hole.

But over at Talking Points Memo, a TPM reader wrote in and spelled things out more clearly than I could:

It’s worth pausing every so often to admire (if that’s the right word) the sheer insanity of the pandemic situation in the United States. Specifically: despite the widespread availability of vaccines for Covid; despite the fact that the vaccines are free; despite the fact that they are astonishingly effective at preventing a disease that is frequently fatal and often results in long-term disability; despite the fact that mass vaccination is clearly the only way we’re going to get out of the Covid pandemic that doesn’t involve mass suffering and trauma on an unimaginable scale; nonetheless, the US vaccination campaign is failing.

And it’s failing because of politics (and stupidity, but that’s another entry…).

The same people wailing about how the Covid vaccine is just a way to inject a tracking microchip are probably clutching their smartphones, which are GIANT trackers that collect more information about you than most would be comfortable with.

Vaccines were supposed to be the silver bullet that ended the pandemic, allowed us to take off masks and congregate again. And in areas where people made the effort to get vaccinated, that has become a reality.

Yet in the other, primarily Red areas….

Here’s an idea – As the Republicans tried to scare people about the Affordable Cara Act (ACA) by calling it Obamacare, why not use the same trick for the Covid vaccines: Call them Trump vaccines!

Why not? To be fair, they were developed during his administration, and stroking Trump’s ego would probably get him to repeat the phrase non-stop. Suddenly, the vaccines would be politically acceptable.

Hey, it’ll never happen, but I can dream, can’t I?

Rain is never good in a Hemingway novel – it’s invariably portends something somber/sad.

But after I had got them out and shut the door and turned off the light it wasn’t any good. It was like saying good-bye to a statue. After a while I went out and left the hospital and walked back to the hotel in the rain.

— A Farewell to Arms, last lines

Similarly, pop rock songs about rain are often dark (Dylan’s A Hard Rain’s Going to Fall, for example).

But moving past the dark songs, it’s surprising just how many songs have (at least) “rain” in the title – some sad, some boisterous, some just, well, mention rain. In no particular order:

• A Hard Rain’s Going to Fall – Bob Dylan
• Rainy Day Women #12 and 35 – Bob Dylan (just a silly song)
• Who’ll Stop the Rain? – Creedence Clearwater Revival (CCR)
• Have You Ever Seen the Rain? – CCR, again
• In the Early Morning Rain – Gordon Lightfoot (I heard an early version of this song – not the one on “Gord’s Gold” – and he sounds like he’s trying to do the Dylan nasal sound. Not pretty.)
• Rainy Day People – Gordon Lightfoot
• Let It Rain – Eric Claption (with Derek and the Dominos?)
• Rain – The Beatles (Not on any album; B side of Paperback Writer – not really well known)
• Fool in the Rain – The Beatles
• Like a Rainbow – Rolling Stones (OK – a stretch, but one of my favorite Stones songs. So peppy!)
• Fire and Rain – James Taylor
• Purple Rain – Prince
• It’s Raining Men – The Weather Girls (I had to look that up. Classic camp!)
• Here Comes the Rain Again – Eurythmics
• The Rain Song – Led Zeppelin
• Rainy Days and Mondays – The Carpenters (before I started listening to the radio: released in 1971)
• Rainy Night in Georgia – Written by Tony Joe White in 1967; popularized by Brook Benton in 1970.
• Raindrop Keep Falling on My Head – B.J. Thomas (you think he’d have those initials today? I only like this because it was in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, and used effectively.)
• Red Rain – Peter Gabriel (solo, after Genesis. The “So” album)
• Famous Blue Raincoat – Leonard Cohen (yeah, a stretch, but a great song. Jennifer Warnes does a great cover of this song – and other Cohen favorites – on her “Famous Blue Raincoat” album.)

I deliberately left out Singing in the Rain just because…

Could also pad out the list with “thunder” references (You Love the Thunder, Jackson Browne; Thunder Road, Bruce Springstein), but I didn’t go there.

Also, off the top of my head I can’t think of any other “thunder” songs.

This book, a collection of essays about nature (flora/fauna) was a disappointment – I had read great reviews about her H is for Hawk book, so I thought this book would be a good intro to her writing,

I guess it was, and it was not anywhere as good as expected.

The essays were more – to me – like diary entries than essays. Just didn’t have the gravitas of EB White or James McPhee (who does?).

She writes well, and decidedly knows whats she’s talking about – be it ducks or bugs (a favorite of mine – really) – it’s interesting but not compelling.

Again, less than I expected.

I’m probably not going to read H is for Hawk.

Hmmm…..

Recently watched Ken Burns’ latest documentary, Hemingway.

Like all Burns’ (with Lynn Novick) ) work, this was meticulous, well done and had some incredible (old) photography, both stills and movies..

While Hemingway is one of my favorite authors, and Burns/Novick probably my favorite documentations, this one just didn’t do it for me. Mind you, well done and a deep dive on the controversial author, it seemed, surprisingly, empty. Don’t exactly know why.

It’s a three-part documentary (two hours for each segment:

• A Writer – learning his craft, working as a journalist, and becoming a very successful writer – first short stories, and then the early novels.
• The Avatar – A better name for this section should be “The Myth” – Hemingway was as much a myth as he was a writer: Big game hunter, traveler, consummate alcoholic, rubbing elbows with other famous writers, actors and – especially – other women.
• The Blank Page – The later years, the destructive behavior and the decline of his abilities, with some notable exceptions, the great A Moveable Feast (published posthumously).

The first part was my favorite; this era is when the Hemingway I like was doing his best work, and gathering experiences (ambulance driver in the First World War) that would help fuel future works.

The third part was interesting as it really showed how Hemingway’s later life was – full of booze, erratic behavior, womanizing and so on. A lot of what was presented was new to me, and I’ve read a lot about Hemingway.

Burns/Novick are scheduled to come out with a Frank Lloyd Wright documentary in April 2021; high hopes for this one, as well. Hemingway and Wright are somewhat similar characters: both womanizers, 20th Century giants in their respective fields, and – especially – both held themselves in higher regard than others did.

From CDC.gov

I had my first covid shot Thursday, April 22, had my second and final shot Monday May 10th. (Pfizer)

While the process went quicker this time (my appointment was at 8:30am, just after opening), this shot put me on my ass. I felt fine the day of the shot, but the next day (today) I just slept for a good part of the day: chills, headache etc.

That’s why I took the day after the shot off, just in case there were issues.

Feeling better already (it’s about 3pm), and by tomorrow I expect everything to be back to normal.

Small price to pay.

Update 5/14/2021: Yep, it kicked me in the ass. Got vaccine Monday, all was good. Tuesday I had flu-like symptoms (aches, chills, fatigue), and I tried to sleep it off. Couple of nights of night sweats – nothing worse – and I’m fully healed. And on the road to fully vaccinated (5/24).

Again, no issues – felt crappy for a spell (which means the vaccine is working), but shortly I will be a shield for myself and others against something that has killed 550k+ in the US alone.

Night sweats? Beats dying. Beats passing this on to others….

Be a Man (or woman) – get vaccinated, dammit!