Stand Up or Stare at the Table?

Saturday, June 13, 2026. It's the Satyr's day . . . Thunderstorms are in the forecasts for Green Country. Morning rains are to give way to some sun for most of the day with the storms returning overnight and into tomorrow morning. Strong Southerlies and a high in the low 90's are anticipated for TulseyTown.

. . . how surreal it is that we live in a time in which this is so routine — that the leader of the country uses the powers of his office to ensure his opponents are charged with crimes as punishment for having exercised their First Amendment rights — that such updates arrive almost casually. Like sports scores. – Miles Taylor, Stand Up or Stare at the Table? Defiance, 6.12.26

Standing up:

The Washington National Opera is suing for its endowment.

The artists noted for their large-scale, site-specific environmental installations, Christo and Jeanne-Claude, were both born on this day in 1935, in Bulgaria and Morocco, respectively.

Irish poet William Butler Yeats was born today in 1865, Sandymount, Dublin, Ireland. One of the greatest English-language poets of the 20th century as well as dramatist, and prose writer, he received the Nobel Prize for Literature.

One of the most influential British artists of the 20th and 21st centuries, David Hockney died Thursday, at the age of eighty-eight, after a seven-decade career that included painting, digital drawings, photography, theatre-staging, etchings, collage.

There’s no reason even to consider reducing Social Security benefits or raising the age of eligibility. The logical and necessary response is simply to raise the cap, Mike Johnson and other Republican shills for the oligarchs to the contrary notwithstanding. – Robert Reich, the REAL reason Social Security is in trouble, substack 6.12.26

Following up. – Joyce Vance, in Civil Discourse

Down By The Salley Gardens

Down by the salley gardens

my love and I did meet;

She passed the salley gardens

with little snow-white feet.

She bid me take love easy,

as the leaves grow on the tree;

But I, being young and foolish,

with her would not agree.

In a field by the river

my love and I did stand,

And on my leaning shoulder

she laid her snow-white hand.

She bid me take life easy,

as the grass grows on the weirs;

But I was young and foolish,

and now am full of tears.

– William Butler Yeats.