Thoughts from the ammo line

[Valin]

Power Line:

Scott Johnson

August 7, 2015

Ammo Grrrll returns with DAYENU – Meditation on the Anniversary of Michael Brown’s Death. She writes:

 

As has been pointed out many, many times recently, when dozens of young Black men a week get killed by other Black men, it doesn’t even make a ripple in the Black Lives Matter crowd. I once saw the following one-paragraph summation in the Chicago paper on about page 32: “A 16-year-old youth was killed Saturday night when he was stabbed in the head with a screwdriver by his friend in a fight over who would get to drive the car they had just stolen.”(Screwdrivers kill. Clearly, they should be banned. Not for nothing is my house a Screwdriver-Free Zone.)

 

But let that same “16-year-old youth” (who could easily be 6’2” and 250 lbs.) get shot by a cop of a different color, pursuing the stolen car and it’s “he only had a screwdriver and some Skittles!” So let’s revisit the original incident where this year-long round of riots all began. I have a few additional thoughts on the Michael Brown disaster if you will bear with me. They are not amusing ones, I’m sorry to say. Some days there’s just nothing funny to say, your mission as a Friday humorist, notwithstanding. Next week, I promise.

 

Near the end of the Passover Seder, the celebrants sing a song called “Dayenu” which means “It would have been enough.” It goes on for roughly as long as I was in labor, (17 hours, in case it comes up on a quiz show) but the idea of it is a hymn of praise and thanks to the Almighty saying, “If you had just brought us out of Egypt” Dayenu. It would have been enough. “If you would have only parted the Red Sea,” Dayenu. It would have been enough. “If you had only given us the Torah.” Dayenu. You get the idea.

 

This song came unbidden to my mind as I thought about all the chances Michael Brown had to save his own life.

 

(Snip)

 

[Valin]

Thoughts from the ammo line
Scott Johnson
August 14, 2015
Ammo Grrrll appears this week in the guise of CURMUDGEON GRRRLL. She writes:

Even though I have been Ammo Grrrll for a couple of years now, for this week I am feeling a bit cranky and would like to be known as Curmudgeon Grrrll. And feelings – as we all know – are paramount. Especially for someone in a protected class of grievance-mongers, which, fortunately for me, includes women. In fact, call me Caitlyn Curmudgeon. Why not?

 

Curmudgeonery (getting wrapped around the axle about relatively minor things) is one of the sure signs you have passed from “late, late middle age” right into senior-ocity. Another sign is when you vigorously wave goodbye and slap yourself around with your triceps, but that’s for another day. To the Curmudgeon, it feels like the last vestige of The Goode Olde Days is gone and nothing has changed for the better. Not a thing. Unless you count medical advances, flat-screen televisions, smart phones, ethnic food, UPS, central air-conditioning, email, The Internet in general, Skyping, stamps you stick instead of lick, cupholders in cars and movie theatres, or Amazon. Okay, a LOT of stuff is better, but I’m still feeling cranky.

 

I think when the epitaph of civilization is written, that it will be traced to the day that “party” became a verb instead of a noun. This really bugged me. A party was a nice event that used to involve either balloons, cake, ice cream, and presents, or much later, adult beverages in nice glasses, canapes, and pretty clothes. I loved parties.

 

Now when an idiot (def.: someone much younger than me, possibly more attractive, probably tattooed) says, “Woohoo! Let’s party!” — or worse yet, “par-tay!” — he means, “Let’s drink until we throw up. That sounds fun.” Our son showed us a cable tv show in which people drank till they threw up, that’s it, the whole show, another sign of the Apocalypse.

 

(Snip)