and the first thing I learned this morning is that Beasley lost to a trump nut.

WTF NC - I'm slowly gathering that the news is otherwise good for Dems but WTF NC.

place was jumping and Democrats were outside greeting voters.

I had to fight back the tears. Voting chokes me up especially when I am acutely aware of how important it is. I grew up in CA and we were pretty reliably blue. I've voted more here in NC than I did in my whole 52 years in CA.

I need to breathe because I'm so anxious. Not that we won't get the votes to win, but that republicans will not accept that they lost and will continue to make life miserable for the foreseeable future.

I lived in Raleigh from 2007 to 2016; now I live in Durham.

So WTF happened? All I have learned is that a 15-year-old white kid got a gun and started killing people. He is unnamed and in critical condition, somehow.

I just tried to watch a news conference and it simply enraged me. thoughts and prayers, Raleigh Strong, blah blah blah...I didn't watch it all because it frustrated me too much.

Aren't press conferences held to inform the public about events that are important to them? Instead they turn it into a pep rally?? For as long as I watched, I can say that not one of the speakers mentioned the glaring fact that A 15-YEAR-OLD was holding a deadly weapon in a public place - how did he get it? What kind of gun was it? Who is he? All i know about him is he's a white boy in camos killing people.

I want more. I want to know where he got the gun. I want to know if it was an assault weapon with no other function but to kill humans. I want to know how he came to be in critical condition.

I hurt for the victims and their families. I am beyond pissed at this culture, this sick, sick, culture, that we are all being forced to live in. Don't tell me how to feel. Just fucking tell me what happened and come as close as you can to WHY, because I'm thinking this kid may have been brainwashed by right wing and/or incel media. I'm also wondering how close he may be to the PTB, because of his continued anonymity.

I'll have to check out twitter and reddit. Maybe I'll get some answers there. seriously, the News and Observer and the people running that press conference did not provide them.

/rant off

ETA: Reddit did give me the shooter's name and also the news that the 16-year-old who was killed was his brother. so, go reddit.

My son is getting married in Cary on Saturday. It was to be an outdoor ceremony; Ian had other plans. On Sunday they were going to head out to their honeymoon resort, in Duck, NC. Ian had other plans.

I'm happy because they're perfect for each other. Rory, my youngest son, and I drove to NC from CA and arrived on 03Oct2007. She's born and raised NC and the sweetest and most loving person you'd ever want to meet.

I have high hopes for a new grandchild soon; it's been 15 years since the last one and I'm not getting any younger.

I'm happy because family is coming from the West Coast and so far, it looks like they'll all make it. Today is the big day for arrivals. My niece is possibly not landing until tomorrow so that might be dicey.

Well, gotta run out to the airport for the second time in 3 days (my oldest grandson arrived on Monday). this load is my oldest son and his youngest. Can't wait.

It's going to be beautiful, and I'm preparing a short toast that will include, if only obliquely, our unexpected visitor. I expected that Covid would be showing up, knew there might be rain, in NC on any day there might be rain, but the timing of Ian is as ironic as the purpose for this forum, which is: "Can't you see the sunshine. Discuss all things North Carolina."

All best thoughts and concern to the people bearing the brunt of this vicious storm from Cuba to Florida and beyond.

he needs to taken off the street asap. the list of crimes is nearly endless, take your pick and charge the motherfucker.

but according to Amazon Prime it was made in 2015.
It's about how unmarried mothers and their children were treated in Ireland all the way from the 1930s to the 1980s. It's about 795 babies in an unmarked graveyard, never acknowledged. It's about women who were taken away from their families to workhouses and then had their children taken from them. Many to be sold by the nuns.

Is this where we're headed? At the time the movie was made abortion was still not legal in Ireland. There's a sense throughout that these immoral, wayward women impregnated themselves - never a hint that the father should bear any responsibility at all.

The movie is not bad. There is worthwhile discussion about the power of the church in Ireland at the time, and about why Ireland wanted to portray itself as "pure" in comparison to "dirty" Britain. It is a full length documentary also available on Amazon prime.

All I could think is we're headed thataway - backward in time.

but it is so good today, I have laughed and laughed. Comedy gold does not get old. I never knew how many songs were out there just waiting for the hashtag #hawlinass

but first, this:
https://twitter.com/cwg18/status/1550480945035329538

https://twitter.com/ProjectLincoln/status/1550296699578482689

https://twitter.com/crustyruffles/status/1550306483233062917

https://twitter.com/ProjectLincoln/status/1550295285246660609

https://twitter.com/The_Mal_Gallery/status/1550297512506003456

https://twitter.com/The_Mal_Gallery/status/1550292500035895298

many more.

I posted one year ago today about the 20th anniversary of my daughter Bekah's death. It's come around again. 21 years ago today. Her world came to a crashing halt and her loved ones have been picking up the pieces ever since. This year is a hard anniversary. In another 13 days we will have been without her as long as we had her. I've been trying to work out with my counselor why this is so difficult for me.

It has to do with the enduring nature of grief, and I believe, the complicated nature of the grief associated with the loss of a child, further complicated by the violent nature of the loss and the denial of justice for her death.

Part of what complicates this grief is that I have to grieve not only for myself, but for my girl. She should be alive. I try to live FOR her, but I am mad FOR her too. There's no stopping the speculation on what her life would be today, if it hadn't been wiped out in a split second 21 years ago today. Children, a career...she was on the precipice of fulfilling all that her adult life promised.

And I miss her, so so much.

So yesterday my counselor asked me if I was a Marvel fan (I'm not), but then he quoted a line from one of the movies: "What is grief, if not love persevering?" I like that. Heaven knows I will never stop loving Bekah, so I suppose it does make sense that I will never stop grieving her loss. I just need to accept I guess, that July will never, ever be the same.


https://www.lapdonline.org/newsroom/hit-and-run-suspect-captured/

They're examining a doctor and going through his social media, web searches etc. This guy had hate for everyone and everything, especially Black people. He was interested in child porn. His defense has him sitting there in a checkered shirt and sweater vest looking like an All American kid.

You really have to wonder how the guns get into the hands of people who are screaming out warnings. I'm reading today that the Highland Park shooter had threatened to kill his own family a few years ago, then his father helped him acquire the weapons that he used to commit mass murder. WTF

This witness did a review and came up with a shitload of personality and other disorders in Cruz. However he is/was not psychotic though he tried to make up an imaginary bad guy who told him to commit his bad acts. Nothing according to this doctor would indicate that a mental health defense would be effective. He knew what he was doing. He's an All American kid I guess. A murderous maladjusted hater.

These people have always been among us. It's only in the past, i don't know, 20 years or so? that the gun lobby in concert with republicans and the NRA have given them the ability to commit mass murder. Our country is really sick. It's like among developed countries, we are that kid.

It's July. On 06Jul1980, my beautiful daughter was born. On 19Jul2001, she was killed. This is the year when I will have been without her as long as I had her, and it's turning me into a blubbering pile of goo.

I had counseling today and cried and cried. My counselor told me about a memorial garden in Raleigh and I arranged for a brick to be placed in her name. Cried and cried to the advocate I spoke to. She was great.

July has never been a good month for me mentally and psychologically since Bekah died. It consumes too much of my thoughts and overtakes my feelings. I guess I would say it's just the murder month and it always will be. No matter how strongly I believe that Bekah is with me and that I will see her when I die. No matter how much time has passed since the crime.

We go back to the beginning of the grief, and I must do now what I worked so, so hard to do then: lean into it. Here's a poem I wrote then, it's maybe my favorite of all the many poems I wrote then.

today’s paean to why

There's like a why ocean,
from which waves of why
either tease or soak
my grief-addled mind.
During why's high tide,
nearly drowned in why,
The world abounds with why
All I hear is the sound of why
If it tells me it will have to kill me

When why recedes it is still a mystery
Still cannot know it
while I must respect its immense power over me
Riptides of why swamp me regularly
when I'm rolled crazily around in why,
Powerless to dive away from why
Useless to try dominating why.

On the island why I stop to see
How perseverance can still abide in me
On the mainland why I walk the beach
Hope defying why, the why of life
Is easy to see
By my side or inside of me,
Your spirit your love accompanies
With the energy of a wave
that embodies a natural eternity.


https://www.lapdonline.org/newsroom/hit-and-run-suspect-captured/