So Trump got indicted yesterday. Though no one knows what the charges are, my gut tells me he will be acquitted. The guy is good at weaseling out of stuff. Can’t deny it, nothing sticks to him. But I will say that it has been long over due for a former president to face an indictment. And I mean that in the principle sense. Article I, Section 3 of the Constitution states that after a president is convicted by the Senate that the president “shall nevertheless be liable and subject to indictment, trial, judgment and punishment, according to law.” To me, this says that The Founders believed and wanted the president not to be above the law. This was an expected situation, and it’s kind’a amazing that it took this long to happen.
Son Heung-min made a public comment about Conte leaving Tottenham. Son somehow felt he was partially responsible due to his lack of production on the pitch. He is right that he hasn’t played his best football this season, but if player productivity was the issue, then there are like ten other guys on that team who need to also step up admit that as well. Ah… the season’s over anyway…
But the Cubs won their opener! As of right now, we are undefeated!
I was thinking that someone should just write a list-article on all the nations that solved their gun problems, specifically, how they did it.
Maybe if the piece had some cutesy click-bait name like “You Won’t Believe How These Five Nations Solved Their Mass Shooting Problem.”
I wish I had a better point to make rather than throwing weak-ass jokes and snide comments at a serious problem.
But the fact of the matter is that the gun debate was lost when no one did anything after Sandy Hook. No laws were passed, and not a single politician suffered for voting against doing anything. Collectively, we all admitted that this is a problem that we don’t want to solve. We prefer to have guns and dead children. We would rather see people walking around with AR-15’s that do anything about stopping all of suicides that happen though the use of guns. We prefer to have open carry than protect people from domestic violence.
I do feel hopeless.
I worry every day when I drop my kid off at school.
I worry about my family members who are teachers.
Maybe we should just give in to Republicans and allow everyone to have a gun, especially teachers. I mean, we don’t trust teachers with books, but we can trust them with a gun. Build walls around schools, and make them little forts of learning. Give people access to mental health support, which might be a form of health care, but I am sure we could come up with a good conservative label for it, like FREEDOM ROBUSTNESS!!! All of this would cost money, and I am sure that Republicans will come up with some way to expand the government without raising taxes. We should call their bluff, and say yes to everything they propose.
I mean, let’s see what will happen. Clearly, it’s okay if a few more kids are killed as we wait.
(The short story “Alisa” by Lyudmila Ulitskaya appeared in the April 3rd, 2023 issue of The New Yorker.)
(Yes, I will SPOIL this story.)
Illustration by Golden Cosmos
The story “Alisa” by Lyudmila Ulitskaya is translated from the Russian, by Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky. But I’m pretty sure you knew that from the title of this post. When it comes to translated works, I often wonder how different the piece sounds in its original language. In college, I read three different translations of “The Cherry Orchard” and though the plot stayed the same, the tone of each version was radically different. This was a thought that crossed my mind as I read “Alisa.”
“Alisa” is a tight little story that I found myself drawn into quickly. The piece focuses on Alisa, a woman who is in nearly perfect health at sixty-four. She lives alone, has no family, and after a brief fainting spell, begins to think that she would rather commit suicide than get to the point where she will need someone to take care of her. She finds a doctor whom she asks for sleeping pills, and she is honest with her intentions. The doctor, Alexander, doesn’t agree right away, but soon they start on a relationship that leads to them getting married. I want to leave it there, though I will spoil the story a little later, I want to leave a few surprises for you.
What impressed me with this story was that it went in two different directions, and tied up wonderfully together. This was a well-structured, and built story. At first I thought I was getting the tried and true “reason to live” story, such as Alisa wants to die, but then she finds love and wants to live. And she does find love, with those moments of between her and Alexander being very poignant and tender. As their love grows, Alisa never forgets that even with a commitment of marriage, nothing lasts forever. So, when Alexander is killed in a car crash on his way to the hospital to see his daughter and new granddaughter, the surprise is in how he died, but not that he died. Ulitskaya did a very good sleight of hand/misdirection of foreshadowing, laying out the clue, but not in the way you expected. And when Alisa decides to raise Alexander’s granddaughter, as the mother slips into mental illness and cannot take care of the child, there are clear moments that preceded this decision, where it was shone to us why Alisa would come to this conclusion. All of this leading to a satisfying conclusion where Alisa has grown and changed from where we first met her, while also allowing Alisa to retain a quality of her character that still hasn’t changed. Again, I don’t want to ruin the last line of the story, but it’s fits very well with the narrative and tone.
Which gets me back to my first question about the translation and the original tone of the story. In this case, I didn’t find myself wonder if something was lost. The intention and tone were clear, and worked together in a very effective story. Maybe it was just a “reason to live” story, but I left feeling satisfied that Alisa got to have that time with Alexander, and that she was happy where her life had taken her.
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Welp! It happened. Conte and Tottenham have gone their separate ways. I don’t think anyone is surprised by this. The season was not working out as expected, and when the “most terrible/awfulness week ever” occurred where Spurs got knocked out of the FA Cup, lost in the Premiere League, and then got bounced out of the Champions League, everyone knew Conte was about to lose his job. I think the Conte press conference, the one after the Southampton 3-3 draw, was just Conte acknowledging that he’s about to get fired, so I might as well speak my mind.
So, where does this leave Tottenham with ten games left to go in the Premiere League season?
Currently, Cristian Stellini has been named the interim head coach, which makes sense as he was Conte’s assistant coach at Spurs. Right now, as Tottenham is in fourth place, it would appear that his mission is to keep the team in fourth, which qualifies them for next seasons Champions League, if not move up the table.
But, with this team, that seems like rather tall order. I don’t think they have a chance in hell of catching Man City, let alone Arsenal. And though Man United is one point ahead of Spurs, and Newcastle is two points behind, both of those clubs have two more games left to play on their schedule as compared to Tottenham. And, Spurs have both of those clubs left on their schedule, which means they are now must wins. In fact, Tottenham cannot afford to come out of any of these ten matches with no points.
Then there is the biggest issue that is looming over the Summer; Harry Kane. Will he be back? It felt like Conte was brought in specifically to help this team win trophies, which at this point in Kane’s career, that’s the boxes he wants to tick. And I know I have been saying this for the past three seasons, but this Summer just might be the one where Harry goes to another club that is in a better position to win.
It’s all too bad. I did like Conte. I thought he brought a passion to the club that Tottenham had been missing. But his passion did not translate onto the pitch. Under Conte this season, the team was always slow to start, and got behind early. They never looked like they wanted to win so much as they were trying not to lose.
So long, Antonio Conte. I appreciated your effort.
The wife and I have been taking tours of other schools around NYC. The kid is in a good school, but we just wanted to see what else is out there – weighing options. On all of these tours, they offer the parents free water, which is normal. But having done a couple of these now, I noticed that there are two different types of people when it comes to free water; either you take the water because you are thirsty, or you take the water only because it’s free.
Princeton is the only team left in the Men’s NCAA Basketball tournament that is a double digit ranked team. And as such, I have to keep rooting for them. And I am supporting FAU as they are #9. Also, I am really going out of my way to hope and pray that Alabama and Houston lose tonight. Even though I have a funny feeling Alabama could take the whole thing.
I get distracted very easily. For the past half hour, I went down a rabbit hole of looking at information on the death of Horatio Nelson. Why? No real reason. I know that he was shot and killed at the Battle of Trafalgar, but I didn’t know much more that that. After he died, his body was placed in a cask of brandy mixed with camphor and myrrh. I am assuming that this was a normal way to preserve a body for a long voyage back home, but did that mean that the Royal Navy had casks of brandy on ships for this reason? Or was it that a cask of brandy was the only thing around that could be used? I couldn’t find any information to answer that question. See… I got distracted.
