Sweater Weather Would Be Better Together

My thug name is 'Willie the Whiner,' because of my non-stop lamentations about our weather, no matter what our weather is at any given moment. I spend a lot of my life unhappy with the weather, but I am very pleased to live on a planet with an atmosphere, even when the current meteorology isn't to my taste. 

Truth is, I've never lived anywhere that didn't have four seasons (okay, in Greenland, north of the Arctic Circle, some of the seasons were more notional than others), but that doesn't mean I wouldn't like to try it out for myself, at least a little bit before deciding.

My mom had a lifelong dislike of winter and, most especially, snow. After retirement, she headed to Florida many years ago. I think the only reason she didn't move to Panama was that Cuba prevented the Florida peninsula from reaching there.

If anyone deserved the sun's warmth, it was Mom.

And judging from the weather forecasts, that's all the warmth a lot of us in the Northeast, and parts elsewhere, too, are going to have in the coming days. We had a LOT of snow last weekend, along with a lot of other folks, and there's a not inconsiderable amount still in the forecast.

I just had a memory of a daytimer AM station we listened to as kids when my parents had a vacation house in Pennsylvania, WARM, the Mighty 590. No matter how bitter the winter weather, you could always rely on the Ronnie Radio-Voice announcer to pass along the time and temperature in 'DEgrees' while demanding to know 'is it cold enough for you? It's only WARM for me!' Talk about the greatest little station in the nation, not.
-bill kenny

A Nose in Need

Our world is so complex, and our environment can be so complicated. 

Dust and pollen are big culprits, but food allergies are primary offenders.  

Runny nose, itchy eyes, and dry mouth are all reactions. Even sneezing.

No wisecracks, okay?
-bill kenny

No More for Me, I'm Driving

I had a dream last night that I was having a beer with Fred Rogers. Yes, that Fred Rogers of Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood, King Friday, Sarah Saturday, and Daniel Tiger. 

I'm assuming, in honor of Fred's hometown, we were drinking Rolling Rock Beer, though I don't remember seeing any green pony bottles in the dream. Nor were we wearing sweaters, so perhaps we weren't in Fred's Neighborhood. 

I stopped drinking alcohol four plus decades ago, so I was surprised to be cracking open a cold one with anybody, much less Fred Rogers. He seemed as surprised to be drinking with me as I was to be with him. 

In my dream, we got a little tipsy, and the bartender took our car keys and our shoes and suggested we wait for the trolley.
-bill kenny.

Tales from Tennessee Tuxedo's Textbook

Suspect you didn't miss this in your news summary from last week, courtesy of President "Man, Woman, Person, Camera, TV," showing off his mastery of geography. Yet again.

As those who follow Dora the Explorer well know, Greenland is the VERY LARGE island in the North Atlantic. Try this mnemonic: Greenland, Australia, Iceland, Indonesia, Coney Island. Okay, four out of five.

I was surprised the microphones that picked him up repeatedly misidentifying the object of his affections didn't record the sound of those Davos Devotees present, facepalming and wishing they were elsewhere. 

Perhaps they knew, as soon as he returned to the Land of the Round Doorknobs, he'd top himself. They didn't have to wait long.

I spent a year in Greenland, or 364 more days than our Vice-President has, and NEVER saw a penguin, not a single one, ever. Not because of bad luck but because there aren't any; they live in Antarctica.
Thank you for your attention to this matter.
-bill kenny 

Hunker Down

Good news for everyone who got a Flexible Flyer for Christmas, and the weekend and this snowstorm ain't even half over yet. 

No matter how important you believe it to be for you to be somewhere other than where you are right now, you're wrong. Stay where you are, maybe until Tuesday. If not at this moment, then quite soon, motion and movement will be more hypothetical than actual.

My health is such now that all I can do is watch the weather worsen as my neighbors bail me out and try to stay ahead of the snowfall. My shoveling days, like my lawn-mowing days, are now over forever. You'd think the snow would stop falling, or the grass would stop growing, but no, not a chance.  
-bill kenny

As NOT Seen at the Norwich Harbor

In light of this weekend's weather forecast, I believed for at least a New York Minute that we had a true news story. 

I suspect billion-dollar lawsuits aren't as effective against bears as they are against broadcast news outlets.But I'd pay money to watch him try.
-bill kenny 

Is There More to This than That?

Idle thoughts fill up my head sometimes (there's plenty of room, I'll admit). 

For instance, whatever happened to the Haitians in Ohio whom the President, then a candidate for office in 2024, insisted were eating the dogs and cats? 

Sort of like those Migrant Caravans from South America that were going to obliterate our (white guy) way of life. Poof! They're gone, it seems, at least from our news coverage. And sort of on the same topic, are there really more 'illegals' in Minnesota than in Florida or Texas, or is ICE just way more circumspect in red states? 

Perhaps all of them are waiting to see if they will qualify for that $2000 tariff rebate check that President Trump has repeatedly promised. Hint: NOPE. And don't bring up his replacement for the Affordable Care Act, which is apparently a little stage-struck as it's yet to be unveiled. 

I'm starting to think that if Greenland had been the location of where the Epstein Files were archived, the somewhat keen interest our nation's Chief Executive is showing might be somewhat dampened, if not extinguished entirely.

All of these puzzlements to me pale in comparison to whatever became of those drug-running speedboats from Venezuela that were flooding Miami and all of Florida with fentanyl, necessitating our armed forces to sink them on the open seas and murder their crewmen? Strange how the war on drugs ended when the US won the war on oil. Curiouser and curiouser. 
-bill kenny

Smile!

I watched a small group of folks the other day in front of our beautiful and very historic City Hall, pose for a group photo. The photographer/choreographer positioned all of them carefully, getting the building as the backdrop, and then announced loudly, "Count to Three and Say Cheese."  

I figure we Americans say cheese, though I suspect French people say Camembert, and it wouldn't surprise me if Germans say Liederkranz. Next time you encounter Dora the Explorer, ask her and get back to me. 

Turophiles are quick to point out that, technically, American cheese is NOT cheese, but 'processed cheese food', and none of the nations around the world that pride themselves on their cheese will ever let us forget it.  

We might be able to foster greater and widespread acceptance with some adroit public relations, starting with the Gulf of American Cheese. Or not.
-bill kenny

If....

It might be easier to just seize Epstein Island, little buddies. Oops!

Thank you for your attention to this matter.
-bill kenny

One Year On

Beware of Darkness.
-bill kenny

 

Honoring the Dreamer, Living His Dream

Today we celebrate the 97th birthday of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

I hope you read about the deaths of American icons, JFK, Dr. King, and Bobby Kennedy, in history class in school. If you're too young, I was alive for all three and lack the words to tell you what we were like as a nation before each of their passings. I trust you'll believe me when I tell you that we are a better nation, if not always better people, because they lived.

I was a high school sophomore, a pimply, too-loud, white preppie kid, wandering around our nation's capital, Washington D. C., on a school trip my father organized that ended up right through the middle of Resurrection City, at the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, just weeks after Dr. King's assassination.

I was stunned at the scale and scope of the settlement, the audacity and eloquence of the vision that propelled and compelled it into existence, and the pervasiveness of the poverty and despair that made it inevitable and necessary. Reinventing American society so that the reasons why it had to be done would become history and aren't a part of our present or future is a piece of the legacy of Dr. King.

Today, across the country, there are ceremonies and commemorations. Ours in Norwich at City Hall starts at half past one this afternoon with some speeching, a little preaching (I suspect), as well as singing followed by a march to Evans Memorial African Methodist Episcopal Church for warming words on what is usually a typical New England winter's day and then we'll all go home, back to the lives we lead and the people we are.

Perhaps this year we'll seize a moment from whatever we do today to celebrate the dream of Dr. King, make it our own, and keep it in our hearts. And then, beginning tomorrow for all the tomorrows which remain, use that dream as a fulcrum, as he did, to change the world. Again.
-bill kenny 

"...Or Perish as Fools"

I'm never sure if it's proper to wish another person a happy Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s Birthday or not, but if so, I wish you one, and I wish he could have had a few more himself. 

Few people in my lifetime have shaped circumstances and events as much as he--the election and then murder of John Kennedy, the murder of Robert Kennedy, the arrival of The Beatles (don't shake your head, what they did was reorder the universe), and, of course, the extraordinary life, lessons, and death of Dr. King.

America could not possibly have been here now, in this place and time, if not for those (of all races and creeds) who struggled to set us on a better and bigger and more inclusive course 'back then'.

This weekend as we observe the 97th anniversary of Dr. King's birthday, I hope we remember all of those forced to ride in the backs of buses, to drink from separate water fountains, to eat elsewhere in luncheonettes (and a hundred thousand other inhuman indignities from fire hoses, billy clubs and attack dogs to caustic, cutting remarks through flaming crosses and burned out churches) who helped us to be here.

It's important, I think, that we don't allow the passage of years to dim the memory of Dr. King's life and work. Those were dangerous times in which he (and we) lived, and if you arrived on the planet after he was murdered, when you look at American history of that era, it's hard to believe we were those people. 

But, and here's my glass-half-full guy typing now, we've gotten from that place to here. There's a long road ahead of us, all of us, and these are not the easiest of times in which to continue our travels, but we can, because we have.

A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. Here in Norwich, tomorrow, and across the country, there will be/are nearly countless observances of Dr. King's life. I hope you have the opportunity to join with others who will assemble in front of Norwich City Hall in the shadow of the Freedom Bell at David Ruggles Courtyard at one-thirty to share a celebration of the life that was, and be saddened, for the life that is no more.

It's a short march after some remarks from City Hall around the corner to the Evans Memorial AME Zion Church at 2 McKinley Avenue. And afterward, when each of us returns to the world we have created, why not try a little harder, a little longer, and, if necessary, a little louder to not just make a difference, but to be the difference. 
-bill kenny

Pursuing Justice

This coming Monday is a federal holiday celebrating the 97th birthday of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. 

And a good day to not only make a difference but to be the difference.
-bill kenny 

Sound of Distant Thundar

Downpour incoming.

Après moi le déluge.
-bill kenny

Wag the Dog

Venezuela. 

Greenland.

Cuba.

Iran. 

Keep flooding the zone with $hit. 

Meanwhile.

Eyes on the prize (Hint: NOT the Nobel Peace...)
-bill kenny

Rewarming an Old Joke

From my long-ago days of third-grade stand-up comedy, "What happens when ducks fly upside down?" "They quack up."

Please remember to finish your juice boxes and leave a tip for your server. I'll be here all week. Try the veal.

If they really do quack up, what do they sound like? Serious question, sort of.
-bill kenny

.  

Helping Hands

The Minute Men are a part of the history of our region and a national treasure. They were the original first responders, even before we were a country. In the two and a half centuries since we declared our independence, we've had minute men and women of every kind for every challenge. Be it in response to attacks of war through economic calamity, to catastrophic acts of nature, their response has always been immediate and unquestioning.

Perhaps we should put some time back on the clock to see if there are still minute men among us. If we start at our local level, we can be a partner for those in the state capitol, and then together with other states, across the country, we can go national.

Here in Norwich, we have a target-rich environment for those wishing to extend a helping hand. There isn't a neighborhood that doesn't have a household in need of a shoveled walkway or a friendly face to visit with a snow-bound senior citizen or to read a child an after-school story, so a caregiver has fifteen minutes of 'me time' before starting supper. None of that costs any of us anything, but its worth is incalculable and its impact beyond measurement.

Speaking of children, the Board of Education has regular monthly meetings at Kelly STEAM Middle Magnet School. Here's your chance to see how far along the new construction has come, to learn more about where the Norwich Public School system is heading, and to hear firsthand about what our children and teachers are involved in. Perhaps, most importantly, it's your opportunity to make your voice for informed choice heard.

We spend so much time talking about downtown economic development, we forget it's also where people live and work. Too many of us use the Chelsea District as a shortcut to get us from one place to another. Too late, we discover we're nowhere at all.

And sometimes, we're so focused on just downtown, it's hard for someone who lives on Jail Hill or in Taftville (to name just two places) to believe anyone, anywhere cares about his street or her neighborhood. Sometimes we really are ten villages in search of a city. And other times we get tired of trying to carry everyone on our back and forget we don't have to do it alone-that's why we've chosen to live in our city so we can help one another.

A lot of what needs to be done takes resources we don't have (yet), and figuring out how to acquire them will be part of that job. Many others cannot happen overnight but will take months, or in some cases, years. But other things in the immediate here and now only take a minute, if we have the time and the desire to help.
-bill kenny 

Kick Starting Monday

New week, full calendar, busy day. Need something to move the needle?

Presto! 

You're welcome.
-bill kenny 

How About a Statute of Limitations?

We are approaching a dozen days into 2026 and I'm still getting wished a 'happy new year' by folks on the phone and in stores. Huh?

When do we stop doing that to each other? I was raised by wolves (short, grey Irish ones I believe) and we never learned about this stuff in etiquette classes. When has the ship officially sailed on extending best wishes (even) after the year has changed?

Is there a cut-off date and is it published in USA Today in the lower right hand on the front page? Perhaps, like one of those tests of the Emergency Broadcasting System, is there a public service television announcement on the 'use by' date?

Don't get me wrong-I'm just trying to sort out why the after school high school helper at the grocery can't cut me a break in the greetings and felicitations department when I stop in to shop. 

I don't even know the kid and more often than not when I glance at the name tag, I assume the Dymo label maker threw up since the name makes no sense to me (say what you will-my generation had names you could attempt with some confidence to pronounce.) Meanwhile everyday I'm still getting a 'happy new year!'

To be clear, if you've not seen someone for some time, perhaps they dropped off the face of the earth, by all means meet 'em and greet 'em.

The year (only) has 365 days in it. How many more are we going to spend wishing one another a happy remainder of it. A halt to all of this can't start soon enough, that's for sure. Synchronize your watches and calendars.
-bill kenny

From a Trickle to a Torrent

Remember the early days of consumer internet? Compuserve, America Online, dial-up modems, and "You've Got Mail." Then there were bulletin boards, and then out of the primordial electronic soup came social media (and some not-so-social).

We sent each other cat memes (and still do) and epic fail video clips, as well as a variety of 'thought you'd like to see this' items, whether they were liked or not. Our need to tell them exceeded their need to care, but no matter.

Newspapers and television (cable and/or otherwise) were for serious news until, at some point (I always think the attacks of 9/11 were the impetus), we were afraid to be alone with our thoughts. Every waiting room, be it a doctor's office, the lounge at the fitness center, the arrival/departure terminals in airports, everybody had a news channel on, not that they were paying attention to those screens, as we fixated on the screens of our smartphones.   

Somewhere, we decided that if we read it online, it had to be true. Some bozo named Sergei, sitting at a computer somewhere in Carjackistan, had as much credence as a reporter for the New York Times. And the longer we've lived, the more dense (and opaque) the information sources have become, until we can't tell fact from fiction. 

And for many, far too many, that's a good thing. Dishonest players in the media arena don't want to argue truth from lies; they want to confuse us so we can't distinguish between them until we give up. 

Don't let them win.
-bill kenny

"Do You Have a Conscience?"

From the same people who re-branded the assault by the YeeHawdists of Vanilla Isis on our Capitol a moment longer than five years ago comes the murder by Stephen Miller's Brownshirts of Renee Nicole Good, apparently part of Donald Trump's RLS, Radical Leftist Scum.  

The murder is horrific enough, but the lies attempting to cover up the murder are obscene. I came of age with the killings at Jackson State and Kent State. I had refused to believe we could ever again have such state-sponsored violence visited on ordinary citizens on the streets of any American city. No longer.

Arrest Donald Trump and his criminal cabal for murder. Now.
-bill kenny

OK, Boomer

I'm part of the Baby Boomer generation, born to those called The Greatest Generation. No one has ever called me that, nor would they ever have reason to do so.

I stare in the mirror every morning and barely recognize the face staring back. I realize that I look old, because I am old, except I remember my grandparents, the first 'old' people in my life, and to my mind, I look nothing like them. And yet, to my children and their generational cohort, I'm a relic of a bygone era. 

Some days, in addition to being a relic, I'm a punchline for the universe's practical joke. While I was nursing aches and pains that I don't recall having yesterday, I fell across an article I definitely do not  need, "How To Be Old."  How convenient.

I've spent a lifetime singing My Generation, and now, in my dotage, I get to be serenaded by Your Generation.
-bill kenny

Art Carney Is Smiling

As a kid, I watched repeats of The Honeymooners with Jackie Gleason and Art Carney. Gleason played a bus driver, Ralph Kramden, and Carney was Ed Norton, a 'sanitation engineer' (a sewer worker). I was thinking of Art the other day when I met an "Instagram influencer."

I spent about fifteen minutes talking with them, and aside from learning that they have 'over 10,000 followers, ' I still have zero idea what it is they do or are. Sadly, I don't really have an excuse, since we conducted the entire conversation in English, a language they purport to be a master of and with which I have a more than passing familiarity. 

We use language to obfuscate instead of explain. I watched a program on ViceTV (there's a depressing channel on cable, right up there with NewsMax and Bravo) on gang deaths in Chicago at some point in the past, and the producers interviewed someone they identified as a 'professional conversationalist.' He was joined at various points in the show by a person who purported to be a 'street historian.' Yosemite? 

What happened to 'doctor, lawyer, mechanic, dental assistant, etc '? Do you know what an 'impressions manager' is? How about an 'improver'? Do you know anyone who is a 'change ninja'? Seriously. I feel like what I am, 'an old man yelling at the clouds in the sky.' All these made up titles telling me what the holder is should make them feel good and proud of themselves, but none of them tell me what that person does.

Growing up, I wanted to be a baseball player, an astronaut, and the President of the United States. Now, I aspire to become a reinventor, and dare anyone to figure out what I do. 
-bill kenny

1984 + 42

"He who controls the past, controls the future." By George, I think Orwell is on to something, but I'm not sure attempting to rewrite the past is the same thing as controlling it. I guess a nod is as good as a wink to a blind horse.

Five years ago today, a putsch was attempted in our nation's capital, and this guy became a meme.

As long as there are people alive, there will be people who remember.
-bill kenny

Nothing Have I Gained

It's the first Monday of the New Year, and it still has that fresh-from-the-oven aroma. I'm glad I was born a human since I lack any special skills or abilities that would have enabled me to survive to anywhere near my current age as any other life form on this planet. 

No other species divides the rotation of the earth around the sun in quite the rigid and unyielding demarcations we create-and let's be honest here, we are very good at it. Because we wind up with extra hours and fractions of time that accumulate as merrily we roll along, every four years we have a leap year, though this isn't one of those. 

I've never known anyone born on the Leap Day (if that's what February 29 is called), but I've read enough stories about the birthday celebrations and such to be happy that my mother had the good sense to wait until Spring to have me.

Meanwhile, it's a new calendar page, but the challenges and opportunities look very familiar, don't they? We need to resolve if such a formality is, indeed, required, to move from the 'talking about a problem' to 'finding a solution' (use of the indefinite article is deliberate there. I'm always disquieted by folks who tell me they have found 'the' way rather than 'a' way. (Not that I don't admire their confidence; I just don't share it.)

My concern in this New Year, much like in the one just passed (and many of those before that), is that we get distracted while addressing a situation, and end up accepting less than our best effort as a solution, leaving undone the very thing we meant to do. 

And then at the end of the day, or the end of a life, we don't reflect on where we started and how we got there, but rather turn the page and begin again, oblivious that we've lost a day but are no wiser or better for its passing.
-bill kenny

Humpty Dumpty Definitions

"Sovereignty is generally defined as supreme, independent control and lawmaking authority over a territory. It is expressed through the power to rule and make law. 

Sovereignty entails hierarchy within a state as well as external autonomy, which refers to the ability of a state to act independently in international affairs. In any state, sovereignty is assigned to the person, body, or institution that has the ultimate authority over its citizens and the power to modify existing laws.

In political theory, sovereignty is a substantive term designating supreme legitimate authority over some polity. According to international law, sovereign states are all considered equal, and no state has the right to interfere in the internal affairs of another sovereign state."

"When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor less."

The United States appears to have gone Through the Looking Glass since oh-bright-early yesterday morning. I'm wondering if FIFA will want its imaginary Peace Prize returned now that our President has gotten close to starting a third world war. 

Every accusation proves to be a confession. Uncanny.
-bill kenny 

I'm on the Way

There's far too much of 2026 to go to already be defeated by the scale and scope of what could be or happen. I mention this because I ran into someone yesterday who was already fretting about how things he has yet to do may turn out and how he might never be able to compensate for the misses of shots he hasn't taken yet.

It's hard to cheer someone up who's that committed to being sad, it really is, and one of the things I've promised myself for this year is to stop wasting my (finite) energy on helping those who do not wish to be helped. 

I came home after encountering this Eeyore-type person and caught up, via Facebook, with an acquaintance and his wife as their newborn infant was facing a health challenge. I was struck by the upbeat tone of his typed words on the screen as he shared his concerns.

Both of them were planning on only one outcome, and in the course of the day, that proved to be the case. I smiled, reading his update later, thinking about how blessed that little one is to be raised in a family with a relentless sense of optimism about what tomorrow and the day after tomorrow may hold. 

There is a difference between seizing the day and embracing it and everything that comes with it, good and bad. Perhaps this could be the year we each make it a point to find that out for ourselves. Let's get lost, me and you-an ocean and a rock is nothing to me.

-bill kenny

Onwards!

I'm still crossing out the "25" and rewriting it as "26" on checks, but aside from that, the new year is off to an uneventful start (not that I'm complaining). I have a new hobby: cleaning and dressing the site on my lower stomach where the peritoneal dialysis catheter and tube were placed. 

This coming week, I hope to learn how to use the machine that, combined with the dextrose solution, will fill, dwell, and drain my kidneys. I have already learned that the object is to drain more out than I put in. The better I get at all of this, the longer I will live, and that's a deal too good to pass up. 

And you? Without being too nosy, did you make resolutions? And have you already broken one or more of them? I don't think the Guinness World Records people keep track, so you can safely claim whatever you wish and however you will. Of course, escaping your own judgment will be harder to do since you know best your own tricks and traps.

I have hopes for 2026-not resolutions. I hope this year to be a better person to people I've known already in my life and to whom I have been less than kind (unless they're a$$holes, in which case, no deal). I'll also hope to not allow the past to color the future and accept I cannot be forgiven for sins I've not yet committed (and the same is true for everyone else).

It's a new year, and I appreciate having lived to see its dawn. We can go anywhere and do anything. We just have to decide and then agree on what anything will look like. Let's go.
-bill kenny  

Time Flies

If you always do what you've always done, you'll always get what you've always gotten. This is how Norwich, Connecticut, finds itself today as the new year dawns, and many of us who live here are both surprised and disappointed at the same tired results. 

I don't pretend to know if it's true as well where you live, though I have my suspicions. President Jimmy Carter, perhaps presciently almost five decades ago, called it the "American Malaise." I think he belled that cat, especially in light of the year, just passed, that too many of us experienced.

Where I live, Norwich, Connecticut, is a city struggling to dig itself out of a hole that pessimism and cynicism (and a double dollop of greed and shortsightedness) spent decades creating. Some days are better than others, and the key for us is to string together a bunch of those better days.

This past November, we elected a new Board of Education, as well as a new Mayor and a new City Council (both with a mixture of new faces and experienced hands). 

Some might say we were spoiled for choice. And yet voter turnout, the critical element of any effort to improve where we call home, was barely above 54% of all registered voters (there's a skosh more than 12,000 of us registered in a city of close to 40,000 total)

We can't seem to shake a feeling that government is something done to us rather than for us, and that foreboding seems to trump (pun intended) the brave talk about revitalization, mill rates, enterprise zones, zoning variances, and the other nouns, verbs, and gerunds of political grammar. We all need to do better.

Perhaps too often at times, we have allowed everyone (and anyone) with a self-printed business card that says 'developer' to talk with us about how little of our money will be needed to get our fences whitewashed, only to find out, too late, we’re on the hook to buy the brushes, the whitewash, the paint and, sometimes, even the fences. 

We choose to forget that everything, including missed opportunities, comes with a price and a cost. We wait for someone, somewhere, to rescue us overnight from a situation that has taken decades to develop to the point we are at now, and cast about for someone to blame as part of any attempt to find a solution. 

Those whom we’ve elected will soon enough feel the sting of our disappointment if they fail to guess what we want before we ourselves know what that might be, or how to achieve it.  

We need to learn to speak and work with one another to better use ideas, ideals, and words to build bridges that join rather than walls that continue to divide. The New Year started today. What better time to begin again?
-bill kenny