Don's Tuesday Column

THE WAY I SEE IT   by Don Polson   Red Bluff Daily News   1/02/2024

Pet peeves, irritations, growls

As a new year greets—even threatens—us, some previously unexpressed observations have built up, disturbing this otherwise sanguine veneer. With tongue-firmly-in-cheek—sanguine? Hardly.

I’d like to unload on things closest to home but, other than the apparently unrepairable street surface of Kimball Road between the Triangle mobile home park (a rather suggestive name, no?) and the Community Center, I’ve no complaints. Ironically, the divots, seams and patches do function as speed bumps for traffic going past Meteer Elementary school.

Other than wishing one of our cats had a prettier “meow” than the little squawk she endlessly emits to remind us of our life’s obligation to feed her, there’s not much disappointment in our home life. I could be both honest and delusional to hope that yard work might stay done rather than reemerging the next day or week. I’ll show that lot full of weeds—if I don’t water it, eventually I won’t need to mow it. So there.

Then, the things that start to “fry my grits”: Holiday movies that not only seem to have one basic plot—single woman no longer in relationship is sent to some far away un-citified town where some local guy with a (fill-in-blank) position goes from irritating her to, well, you know. They apparently can’t allow a single second of scene or dialogue without chirpy background music. Is it all really so bland that we have to be distracted by minor orchestral fluff? Elevator occupants would revolt to have to listen.

Speaking of TV-related irritations, was it an industry memo that hit on the brilliant marketing scheme of having young, unappealing people doing goofy, frenetic dancing to the point that you say, “What the heck was that product, anyway”? Is it some dastardly Chinese Communist plot to soften us up such that thinly-disguised troops flood America’s streets dancing like fools and we all just shrug our shoulders and ignore them while they take over?

Which came first, the food producers whose best interests are to have every conceivable type of food be so loaded with fat, salt, sugar and artificial flavors that they become quasi-addictive? Or, the brilliant marketing strategy of plastering us with ads showing mostly young, fit active people seemingly fulfilling their life’s purpose by stuffing their mouths with that same food? Ignore the reality of morbidly obese lay-abouts sitting by themselves, eyes glued to screens, stuffing their mouths with snacks that account for an entire extra meal.

Watching movies from various decades, you may have noticed that if there’s a marching band from the 1970s, to a young man or woman they all seem to fit into uniforms of modest to skinny size, with an occasional “big-boned” chubby person. If you watched yesterday’s New Years Day Rose parade, you might have noticed the predominance of the “full figure” onesie uniforms.

It’s no mystery. Boomers and to an extent Gen X-ers had meals, between which occurred work, recreation, and activities without tiny screens and sedentary snack-munching. The meals used to be made of things from grocery shelves, not fast-food take-out. Grocery-sourced food could never taste as addictively good as that found in bags, fast-food counters and such. Eating occurred when stomachs were registering as “empty,” not simply when mouths had nothing in them.

On thin ice here: How is it that most couples on TV and in ads are inter-racial couples when the national statistics show that about 1-in-10 or fewer married couples are of mixed race—not that there’s anything wrong with that (Seinfeld saying). America should celebrate the progress we’ve made over the last century of minorities integrating into all parts of society, basically implementing Dr. Martin Luther King’s vision of people being judged on their character rather than skin color.

It deeply concerns me to see not only apparent re-segregation going on in colleges but also the reprehensible “reverse racism” of “whites are not alright” in classrooms, board rooms, training sessions, our military and media. Never has a nation taken in, welcomed, and culturally integrated so many races and nationalities; we should be, and generally are, moving beyond racial and background differences to determine who we associate, work or worship with. That doesn’t suit the agenda of division, suspicion and hatred being fomented by the political, “woke” progressives seeking not harmony, but animosity in America.

Not to be left out: 1) Everything about Taylor Swift drives me to distraction, hitting the mute button, and changing the channel. 2) California’s far-left political class welcomes a) illegal immigrants with Medicaid-without-papers; b) one-third of America’s homeless with “if it feels good, do it” tolerance; and c) drive the income producers that fund about 99 percent of our budget to Arizona, Texas, Florida and anywhere-but-here for lower taxes, and traditional common-sense conservatism.

3) I growl to see Democrats strain, stretch and shred the Constitution to remove Donald Trump from primary and other ballots. That same (un-) Democratic party has sued to remove Green, “No Labels” and other third parties from ballots in Arizona, Texas, Montana, North Carolina and elsewhere. Sounds like they can’t handle the competition; maybe folks don’t like what they’re selling.