I saw one of these today. I had just pulled my kayak up onto the beach at Annawamscutt and it jumped up and landed on a little green tangle of seaweed a couple of feet away. I thought it was a grasshopper. But when I got closer, there was no mistaking it. Those dots. “I am supposed to squish you,” I said to it. So I did. I took a random clamshell and crushed it into the sand. Feeling rather triumphant, I splashed along the waterline in my bare feet for a while and then saw another one. This one was in the water. Actually it was on top of the water, perhaps borne up by the surface tension against its spread wings, and looked like it was swimming, trying to get to the rocks next to the dock, the red patch on its exposed underwings like a tiny life vest. “No way,” I said, and drowned it with my foot. On the way back through the cove, I saw more lantern flies on the water, all swimming with intent toward some object – a boat hull, a mooring float – that would allow it to crawl up out of the water and dry off. There are plenty of hungry fish in the cove, but none of them were getting anywhere near this bug. I reached out with my paddle and sank a few of them as I went past, but there were too many of them out there. It’s over. We’re doomed.

All will be well, the thinking goes, if the red people and the blue people would just sit down for some talk therapy and give a little to the other side. In earlier times this may have been sage advice. Today it is a delusion. American democracy is failing because it is under direct attack, and the attack is not coming equally from both sides. The movement described in this book isn’t looking for a seat at the noisy table of American democracy; it wants to burn down the house.

— Katherine Stewart, Money, Lies, and God, 4

“It was in Poland that Einsatzgruppen were to fulfill their mission as ‘ideological soldiers’ by eliminating the educated classes of a defeated enemy. (They were in some sense killing their peers: fifteen of the twenty-five Einsatzgruppe and Einsatzkommando commanders had doctorates.) In Operation Tannenberg, Heydrich wanted the Einsatzgruppen to render ‘the upper levels of society’ harmless by murdering sixty-one thousand Polish citizens. As Hitler put it, ‘only a nation whose upper levels are destroyed can be pushed into the ranks of slavery.’ The ultimate goal of this decapitation project was to ‘destroy Poland’ as a functioning society. By killing the most accomplished Poles, the Einsatzgruppen were to make Poland resemble the German racist-fantasy of the country, and leave the society incapable of resisting German rule.”

— Timothy Snyder, Bloodlands: Europe Between Hitler and Stalin

“‘Asked whether she believes other professors might be encouraged to leave the United States, Shore wrote that she believes many of her colleagues will consider relocating due to the current political climate, which she deemed an ‘American descent into fascism.’

“‘I don’t feel confident that American universities will manage to mobilize to protect either their students or their faculty,’ Shore said.”

Three prominent Yale professors depart for Canadian university, citing Trump fears, Yale Daily News, 8-28-25.

Why a professor of fascism left the US: ‘The lesson of 1933 is – you get out’, The Guardian, 6-16-25

Op-ed video, New York Times, 5-14-25

An extensive study of police body cam video reels posted to Facebook during the summer of 2025 has yielded the following about traffic stops:

You know you are in trouble when the officer asks you to step out of the vehicle. This request an be made in a number of different ways, from a friendly appeal to a barked order, but it turns out to be nonnegotiable. You can exit willingly or not. If you select the not option, they will be pulling your body from the car like a sweet little shucked oyster, and down on your belly you’ll go, face pressed to the sidewalk, with your arms pinned behind your back.

You should not have been drinking, or have expired tags, or have lately sideswiped several cars in the Target parking lot and gaily driven away. Likewise, do not have a suspended license or priors of any kind. You should also not have just ridden up over your neighbor’s lawn and taken out his porch with your front end.

A word on field sobriety tests. There are several. Stand with your feet together, arms by your sides. Please follow the tip of this pen with your eyes without moving your head. Next, walk nine heel-to-toe steps forward, then turn around and walk nine back. You’ll also be standing on one foot and counting aloud one-one thousand, two-one thousand, three-one thousand until I tell you to stop. Realize that if the officer asks you to agree to do these tests, he or she believes you are going to fail them.

When you fail them, they will impound your car, and while the tow truck is coming they will “take an inventory” of its interior. No, they do not need a warrant to do this. Because you are already in cuffs, sitting in the back seat of the cruiser, you will have no say in the matter. Please do not have any material in the car that will incriminate you further, such as multiple half-full bottles of vodka, or a box of hypodermic needles, or miscellaneous pill containers rattling around in your purse, or a locked pouch stuffed suspiciously under the passenger seat that is discovered to contain a semi-automatic handgun and a loaded magazine.

These people wearing badges are dealing with daily human craziness you have never imagined. They have seen it all. Assume their behavior is influenced by good law-enforcement training, delusions of messianic power, and vast unresolved personal trauma, unevenly distributed. Many of them are just trying to stay alive. Don’t argue. Give them your ID and proof of insurance. Do not make jokes. All the evidence indicates that it is not their job to be your friend.

Other tips:

• Do not be female or male or any other gender.
• Do not have brown skin or an accent.
• Do not be hysterical or surly or say “I am afraid to get out of the car.”
• Do not be living in your car, for heaven’s sake.
• Do not be a single parent with a baby in the back in a carseat.
• Do not ask “What did I do?”
• Do not roll up the window, shift your car into drive, and flee at high speed. They will chase you, and everything will get much worse. They are much better drivers than you are.
• Do not say “Wait, I have to call my mother.”
• Do not say “Really, bro?”
• Do not say “I know my rights.” No, you don’t. At the moment, you have no rights except the right to remain silent.

Somebody has to do something, and it’s just incredibly pathetic that it has to be us.

— Jerry Garcia

I’ve been a little short lately. Just found this random Bolivian peso note my brother handed me after coming home from his job as a chef on the cruise line. I googled it. The Bolivian boliviano is called the BOB. The figure pictured here is Juana Azurduy de Padilla (1780-1862), highly regarded in Bolivia and Argentina as a guerrilla independence hero. As a result of her rambunctious girlhood, she was sent to a Peruvian nunnery, where she styled herself after Joan of Arc. After the nuns had enough of this and tossed her out, she got involved with indigenous revolts against the Spanish silver mines. She could shoot and ride. Along with her husband, she joined the revolution as a military leader and fought for years against the colonial occupation. She was a gifted recruiter, even assembling a battle-hardened force of female fighters she called her Amazonas. Generals gave her their swords in tribute. Meanwhile, she bore five children. After her husband was captured and beheaded by the Spanish royalists, she rose to the rank of commander, directing a force of 6,000 men. Simon Bolivar remarked that the country should be named after her instead. Turns out, one mil pesos bolivianos is worth around $145 U.S. dollars. That would help my bottom line these days, but no one would exchange the bill. My bank said, “We don’t do business with Bolivia.”

Left to right, from top: blackeyed susan, catalpa, orange cosmos, marigold, milkweed, partridge pea, trailing bean, wild carrot, wisteria. Click image for full size.