This is amazing, it’s 9:18 AM and I’m starting to write. I am a loyal DD fan, but Krispy Kreme has done wonders for my mental health. For the second day in a row, I walked to KK for my free doughnut. For the second day in a row, I did not keep falling asleep during the day. I still went to sleep too late, around 1 AM but I awoke, well-rested at 7:48 AM. Perhaps this is all the placebo effect, you can’t rule that out, but it’s good to not be tired all day. I’m not going to fall asleep while writing this. As soon as I wrote that I felt sleepy. The difficult thing about mental health problems is that are literally all in your head. The difference now is that I’m not giving in to the sleepiness and writing. I’m not going to justify it by saying that I didn’t get my eight hours of sleep. For years I got by on four to six hours of sleep a night.
Krispy Kreme was not the only destination for my walk, I also voted. Now you are confused. Voted? For what? My district had a special election for City Council. The other reason you might be confused is that you remember that I applied for an absentee ballot. I did but I never filled it out. I kept putting off the research on the candidates. I did it early on, but then forgot what I had decided. I knew my top pick was the environmentalist Jewish candidate and my second choice was the housing Latina woman. Strangely that is not how they are listed on the ballot. To make things more fun New York introduced rank choice voting. I hadn’t decided if I had a third candidate I cared to vote for. The election is nonpartisan, so party was no help. I think they are all Democrats. It’s the Bronx, we don’t have many Republicans here. I kept getting emails and even phone calls from a third candidate, Eric Dinowitz. That annoyed me and based on his endorsements he’s the clear establishment candidate, but his policies and character seem in the right place, so I made him my number three. I had to look to see his name and of the two candidates I voted for, Jessica Haller and Mino Lora. The other thing that held me back from voting by mail was that it requires a stamp. I don’t have no stinkin’ stamps. What I did was deposit it at my polling place. It was so empty that I could have taken the time to vote in person and not been at much risk. In the upcoming mayoral primary, I will probably just vote in person on election day. My polling place is far more convenient than the early voting location. On the other hand, as I intend on walking every day, I could walk to the early site. There might even be another Krispy Kreme nearby.
The people at the polling place were unusually nice. Every single one I encountered thanked me for voting. I’m sure the turnout was low. They made it easy to leave my absentee ballot. There was a box to deposit them in. You didn’t have to be registered in my district to use it. That’s another possibility for the future, get an absentee ballot and drop it at the most convenient polling place. That would have been nice for when I lived in Briarwood. There was a polling place that I passed about halfway to the one I was assigned to. That was ridiculous.
The election in the adjacent district was my loudly fought. On the way to KK, I encountered a great deal of electioneering. I saw one of those billboard trucks for one candidate. Another candidate was blasting loud music from his truck. People kept stopping me and asking if I voted. I had the “I voted” sticker on the bill of my cap. I just leaned over and pointed to it. There was a lot of enthusiasm in that district.
It was a terrible day for mask wearing. On the way home I did a survey and found only 24 people properly masked and 40 people whose noses I could see. I was very disappointed. Krispy Kreme was crowded when I got there, people were not keeping 6 feet apart, so I waited outside for the crowd to thin out. When I entered there was a party of three there, none properly masked, two nose peepers and one with her mask around her neck. After a half-a-million dead some people still don’t take COVID-19 seriously.
On Monday night I did something I haven’t done in ages; I watched a classic old movie. Old means older than I am. It was Sunset Blvd. That was a film I didn’t understand as a little kid but was strangely drawn to. It is so atmospheric. As a child it creeped me out but at the same time drew me in. It’s works that way as an adult. I now see that it’s a gothic novel with a Hollywood estate taking the place of the decrepit castle or English manor. The film can be summed up in one word, decay, physical, mental, and moral. It’s brilliant. Another film I was attracted to as a kid that I didn’t understand was The Apartment also directed by Wilder. The man could direct. He could also cast; the film is about a middle-aged silent film star, Norma Desmond, whose career went out with talkies. As Joe Gillis observes, she and her house are stuck in time like Mrs. Havisham from Great Expectations. As a kid I thought she was old, not 50, that was not so much because as a child I could not judge ages, but to me silent film stars had to be old. Back to casting, the film starred former silent film star Gloria Swanson. Her butler who was the director that discovered her, was played by silent film director Erich von Stroheim, who directed Swanson in films. There’s a bridge game with Norma’ old silent film friends, “The Wax Museum;” The other players were silent stars, Buster Keaton, Anna Q. Nilsson, and H.B. Warner. They were never named. Director Cecil B. DeMille played himself. In real life he directed Swanson and in the film Desmond. If you haven’t seen it, do so ASAP.
Gord’s Gold aired last night on Folk Music Notebook. If you missed it, it will be available to listen to on demand at Mixcloud, starting at noon. I was good yesterday and prepared the archive and sent in the setlist to the Folk DJ list. I started to prepare next week’s show. I realized I had never listened to the new album from JKLOL. I was able to get only halfway through before I had to go to sleep. That half I heard was fantastic. You’ll be hearing something from it on next week’s Gord’s Gold. JKLOL is Jefferson Hamer, Kristin Andeassen, Laura Balthrop, and Often Lawson White. I saw them perform once, at the House of Love. Jefferson and Kristin I know well. I know Laura through Kristin. They are all great. Lawson is new to me. If I had more than an hour a week I’d be playing them weekly until all my Gentle Listeners got to know them too. As part of my prep for next week’s show I’ll listen to the rest of the album. I have a backlog of music to listen to. The music by people I know are good gets top priority.
How well is the Krispy Kreme Diet working? I have finished writing before 10:30. That’s hours before I have found myself starting of late. It is not the “nutritional value” of the doughnuts that does the trick, but that it provides motivation for me to walk. The walking helps my mental health even more than my physical.
Wise Madness 