Rude awakening, twice in a row!

I'm trying to round up GOTV friends from the next state over to come to my city for the opera, and a few had been AWOL with texts...

Until a Monday when one texted me at like 5:50am, waking me right up out of bed since I had my phone sound on for the alarm (she's a teacher, she texted me before school started)...

And then the next day, a Tuesday, when another one texted me atr like 5:50am again, waking me up right up out of bed again since I had my phone sound on again (she has some sort of job and was getting back home after a late shift, and decided to reply to my text then).

Rewarding encounter...

I approached a library colleague who I hadn't met about unionization, and someone else I had talked to had already told her about it, and she was excited!

First time that that had happened, and I was stoked.

So rewarding.

Advice of a Hungarian friend on how she survives Orban:

1) Read the news once a week, on a day when you're on an even keel.

2) Stick to your people and "tune out" when you're in environments with his supporters (e.g. on public transportation, turn on your music).

3) Focus on daily life, and maybe local things that you have control over and can change...

She told me that this was the way for me to survive Trump with my soul and my happiness intact.

I think I'm going to follow that advice, and focus on my freelance writing and my local unionization efforts.

Anecdote of a bartender from a new brewery taproom bar the other week:

Back when he was college and in a fraternity, everyone got back from summer vacation and opened up the fraternity house again for the year, and when they were doing that, they discovered that someone had left a bunch of chicken legs in the freezer all summer long.

And, they had shut electricity down in the house all summer.

The smell was so bad in the kitchen, he actually started having involuntary gags that were escalating to the point of a vomit, and he had to back away...

"Hey, let me get that," this one guy was like, though, and barging through the crowd was one his frat brother who had grown up above a funeral home.

As it turns out, the guy put on gloves, but otherwise he got all the rotten wings out without a mask, and the smell didn't faze him one bit.

"I bet that freezer must have stank after that," I was like.

"It did," he was like.  "We had to throw it out."

"So why didn't you just chuck it out with all the rotten legs in it?", I was like.

"Too heavy," he was like.

Anecdote of my new landlord (3 of 3): Talk while repairing deadbolt.

After he put some W-40 on the front door's deadbolt and got it working again, he showed me how to work the door.

"You gotta push in when you lock it," he was like, showing me.  "See?".

Then, he was like, "You could leave it loose, but that way it's easier for someone to kick down the door.  That's not gonna happen in this neighborhood, but hey, if they do, what a surprise they're gonna get, it'll hold and totally kick back at 'em!"

When he said that, too, he seemed almost gleeful, his face just good-natured and radiant.

Anecdote of my new landlord (2 of 3): Talk while repairing toilet.

While he repaired the slow water leak in my toilet, he was saying he wanted to replace the tank with one of those variable flush toilets, where you can press one button to use a gallon for pee, and 1.6 gallons to use for the other stuff.

"I like to save water and money, man," he was like.

I then started telling him how I was transitioning careers, hopefully into renewables, and had been learning a lot about energy efficiency.

"Hey, it's the future, man!", he was like.

Anecdote of my new landlord (1 of 3): Answering machine.

The other week I called up my new landlord, and his message on his answering machine was :

Automated voice:  "Please leave a message, for..."

Record voice (in low drawn out voice): "Jooooooooooooooooeeeeeeee..."

. . .