Why didn’t I think of it sooner? I’m getting straight on the phone to the White House as I think I’ve found the solution to the whole wall problem. Within hours, I could bring to a halt the shutdown that is crippling America. I could be next year’s Time Magazine Person of the Year. I might get freedom of the City of Washington. I could become President Trump’s New Best Friend.
Category: My America
As far as I can make out, the basics of American Football are that a lot of men in Hannibal Lecter style masks and Dallas style shoulder pads run out onto a field and throw something the same shape as a rugby ball. Then, just as they’re getting into their stride, they are tackled and brought to the ground. Next, everything stops. I have no idea why. Is there a tea-break?
I suspect that Eva Whatsherface, like every other thin woman in LA in particular, enjoys playing with the occasional salad – without dressing (are you crazy?) – and, to this end, I am now perfecting the art of steering a leaf around my plate, without ever consuming it, while giving the impression that I am stuffing my face.
Having decided, some weeks previous, to audition for The Voice USA and encouraged by my friend Ruth on an apartment-hunting trip to LA, I’d filled in the form late at night. Ruth assured me that she’d be my friend in the wings, telling the viewing audience about my tough life and how many obstacles I had overcome on my “journey”. We rehearsed it quite a few times. Alcohol had been consumed.
I genuinely don’t shop a lot. I don’t like the music, the crowds, and breaking the zips struggling in and out of things designed for a bonsai tribe.
Those hungry, widescreen Texans in Vegas really bug me. Who starts queuing for the All You Can Eat Buffet at 5am, for goodness sake? I tell you, they are going to consume every last morsel they can if it kills them. Forget building a wall to keep immigrants out, President Trump, just transport an army of buffet-bound Texans to the border; I guarantee no one will be able to get past them.
Los Angeles still seems like the obvious alternative. I love the West Coast weather and, as a place to escape the summer humidity and winter winds of New York, it’s a great contrast. The problem is that the things I love about it are the things I dislike, too. Film, TV, showbiz and media are my passions in a life that I am grateful every day to be a part of. But then there is the downside of all that – the people struggling to make it in those areas and, invariably, being disappointed: the scent of hope, the reek of failure.
On the night that Hillary Clinton conceded defeat to Trump, I cried tears of despair. Racism, sexism, the language of intolerance, anger and hatred that would not have seemed out of place at a Nuremberg rally – I was not alone in thinking that we are living in dangerous times. The fact that Trump’s ongoing message is shrouded in what many believe to be the language of safety, caring and sharing makes it all the more frightening.
We are complex beings who carry baggage and gather more as life goes on. This, however, I do know: we progress only by understanding, or at least trying to understand. I keep going back to quoting Ephesians: Be kind to one another.
Here’s the thing: “If you tell a big enough lie and tell it frequently enough, it will be believed.” Adolph Hitler. He also said: “It is not truth that matters, it’s victory.” Sound like anyone you know?