Stars and Fireflies

 

Butterfly Magic

 

Gerrymandering History from The Brennan Center Website

 

From The Brennan Center 

https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/analysis-opinion/history-frowns-partisan-gerrymandering

Caturday

 

Lawyers, abuse & Murder Could have been prevented. Why?

 Why??

🚨New: Today, Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares spoke about Stephanie Minter in a Senate hearing. Minter’s accused killer is an illegal immigrant who has a lengthy violent criminal history and has been released more than 30 times in Fairfax County.

Miyares blasted the… pic.twitter.com/8NbuHyRXjs

— Nick Minock (@NickMinock) March 25, 2026

TBT

 

Last night,
Fred and I gave each other a special birthday present this year. OK, my birthday was 2 months ago and his is next month, but we said we wanted to do something special, unique, rare and that we both enjoy.
We decided to go back to the most amazing musical experience either of us ever had. Levon Helm's Midnight Rambles.
The next decision was the show with Carolyn Wonderland and Levon or Levon's birthday party. We felt the time ticking to buy the tickets. A growing number of music lovers are discovering this special genre. My blog promotes Levon's shows although if I have tickets I can be more open about how you should, in your lifetime, attend these rare concert experiences.
We decided on the Carolyn Wonderland and Levon Ramble.
We have been listening to CW's music and really appreciate her extreme range in notes, styles and feelings.
Last November we saw Carolyn Wonderland at the Ramble. She played with the masterful Guy Forsyth and band members.
As time went on we found out Guy Forsyth was performing too. Perfectly complementary with CW's voice, instrumentals.
We headed out Saturday morning. Down the long Champlain valley to the ferry at Ticonderoga. Then through the mountain pass to the thruway past Paradox. Down the thruway to Saugerties and meandering through to Woodstock below Overlook Mountain.
We were early in line and greeted by the always stellar staff and chatted with others in line about past shows, strategies to get the dough for tickets. Ebay sell stuff and buy Ramble tickets? Leave it to kids and resourceful adults to think up that one.
Convert your unused collectibles into a musical cleansing, a revival, renewal, healing. What cost redemption?
We energetically watched the sound checks, scanning the stage, fascinated by gadgets in focus, unlike big venues.
The web of wires and electronic things connected to the behind the scenes people, archiving live shows of extreme quality, talent, in one word: life.
Next, Carolyn Wonderland, Guy Forsyth and band step up.
Can I say they are a wonder each alone and together a synergistic powerhouse of sights and sounds.
They both use all the reaches possible with their respective voices and instruments of choice. If that was not enough, they write touching, funny, sometimes sarcastic music with a message resonating with each and everyone. Carolyn's voice is special, unique, masterful.
Her melodical mastery gives way to her amazing guitar playing and the trumpet, too. Carolyn writes both mournful and upbeat lyrics with variable speed from strolling to full speed. Guy played guitar, harmonica, was it a mandolin or a uke or what, and the most amazing saw playing I have ever heard and seen. Guy's lyrics, singing style catalogue, physical presence on stage makes the whole experience more fun to follow.
Last year a carnival barker and this year a common man singing Guantanomo Bay. 
"Walk on" one of my favorites.
We picked up some CD's.
available at 
carolynwonderland.com
guyforsyth.com

Next, Levon's band members set up during the break. Fred went out for CD's. A lightness is already palpable. The first bands jarring our collective bodies into a musical bliss. Humans in a wooden barn, resonating. Now anticipating. We knew what was next. As I said before, we knew we would never be the same.

Then the pinnacle moment we were waiting for, the powerful man, drummer, singer, mandolin player, conductor, with the gentle soul, the self giving persona, the performer, the father, the historian of musical genre.
Levon Helm steps on stage. The audience reponds with a roar, a whooping and hollering, at once ready to take the journey through the music with him, their Shaman guide.
We feel a healing coming on and each song, a word on the set list we can read from overhead, is so much more than a word. 
We enjoy once again Amy Helm, Theresa Williams, Larry Campbell, Jim Wieder, Howard Johnson, Brian Mitchell, et al (if i do not mention a name it is because I am sleep deprived and it is getting late. Each musician is top notch to play in the barn! We need to mow!) 
Then we have deja vu. Special guest Donald Fagen is here! We enjoy a new version of Shakedown Street, an old dead tune. Katie is on my mind as she would have had an incredible time at the ramble. Tennessess Jed, Calvary, the Weight with the first verse by CW.
So many tunes. 
Unlike the Nashville reviews I read, I want to say that Levon Helm played every tune I loved. The Ramble never leaves me longing for one more signature tune.
The Ramble is about being a unique live concert with fantastic musical talents and redeeming your feelings of worth by getting healed in Levon's Church with the heaven's choir. I don't know how he does it, but he does. And we are grateful.
Keep in touch with Levon's travels in my margin or at 
levonhelm.com

What a great gift!

Standing on Air

 

Still amazes me.

Always will 😎

Blue like the Sky

 

Mom, This is for you

Memories from long ago

Plain Like the Sky
On a summer’s day or
The light on the snow today.
The sky today could be in June .
The light today could come back then too,
Having bounced around the universe,
Ask the light, What is out there?
Are there walls or just a curve,
Or is it all someone’s imagination?
Or is the light an emanation
From above, From some deification,
Shining down on all of us,
Plain Like the Sky
Said the light

Love, Mary

One More Hoop

 

Why?

 

Caturday

 

Magic Tools

 

The official CIA manual of trickery and deception : Melton, H. Keith (Harold Keith), 1944- : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive https://t.co/pelzJjoPsp via @internetarchive
So That’s how they did that… pic.twitter.com/KmKn2AgdYQ

— Mary Gerdt Parler:Alvarita1 (@marygerdt) March 18, 2026

TBT Understanding Bureaucracy

 Bureaucratica 

Friday, August 20, 2010

Bureaucratica

Dedicated to fellow co-workers, the government employees who suffer working in the system we must have and yet 

always is a complicated quagmire of opposing political directives incrementally f*ing things up to the point of 

exhaustion on our part, the bureaucratic gnats who juggle, throw and dodge regulations to the best of their human abilities.

Bureaucratica,
Bureaucratica,

Give me more paper please,

Give me more ink, 



Print some more paper

Cure my bureaucratic dis-ease.
My well has run dry,

Criteria recalled,

Print protocols,

Criteria

Recalled.

My life is printer to mailbox,

Phone message to e-mail,

Paper or plastic

None of this rhymes.

I wonder just how,

We can juggle it all,

Then who will pay,
Where will it fall.

For now I am a bureaucrat,

Legislated to be here,

A paper pushing gnat

For another fiscal year.

Gerrymandering Daily updates

 

Came across this on X

From the Washington Examiner

.@GovernorVA really has it out for rural Virginia.https://t.co/07MiKOZRMw pic.twitter.com/V0RSm1xEU1

— Virginians for Fair Maps (@VA_forFairMaps) March 17, 2026

St. Patrick’s Day 🍀

 

Waiting for the spring

 

The Second Amendment

The Second Amendment 

Fighting back

Fighting For

Again, nothing will flood a state with 10 million standard capacity magazines faster than telling peaceable Americans you're gonna ban future sales -- especially when your tyannical "justification" is to blame them for crimes they never committed and that the ban won't prevent. https://t.co/xoDaqwqpiX

— Amy Swearer (@AmySwearer) March 14, 2026

Gerrymandering Virginia History & Continued Hope

 I posted on X

The proposed gerrymandered map splices together communities that have little in common. Rural areas would be represented by NOVA politicians.

The intended consequence is clear: Silence the voices of rural, conservative Virginians. It’s wrong, and we’re fighting back. pic.twitter.com/N9ep2xyiJe

— Virginians for Fair Maps (@VA_forFairMaps) March 12, 2026

@grok imagined what would happen if 9 D and 1 R is voted in.
Vote 🗳️ No!! pic.twitter.com/kEypLUiDws

— Mary Gerdt Parler:Alvarita1 (@marygerdt) March 13, 2026

@vademocrats drew a new map for Representing Virginians. @POTUS
Irony? Most of US Democrat Senators claim verification of voter’s Proof of Identification is too difficult for people who are unable to fill out the forms or find birth or marriage certificates. Yet, this ballot…

— Mary Gerdt Parler:Alvarita1 (@marygerdt) March 14, 2026

Gerrymandering in Virginia on X

 

Virginia, alas, has got the blues. Our 2 U.S. Senators @timkaine and @MarkWarner Won’t vote as our representatives. They stand when their side stands, they sit together defiant in their childish reactions. Nah,nah,nah.@vademocrats new bill-banning paper ballots.
Gerrymandering… pic.twitter.com/gru9jgjyrl

— Mary Gerdt Parler:Alvarita1 (@marygerdt) March 11, 2026

TBT

 

For the Love of Art

 

Proud To Stand With Trump Since 2016

Nikolai Shmatko: "I just looked at his face, and the heavenly powers told me that he – Donald Trump – would become the President of the USA"https://t.co/AztxZXNBVm

— Rafael Shmatko Jr. (@rafshmatko) March 9, 2026

Gerrymandering…Democrats are drunk on power in Virginia

 

Drunk on power. https://t.co/HhEqxnuq31 pic.twitter.com/5f3D00IQuv

— Mary Gerdt Parler:Alvarita1 (@marygerdt) March 9, 2026

Gerrymandering

 

Nothing about the April 21st referendum restores fairness or levels the playing field.

Virginia Democrats are selling their unlawful power grab as the exact opposite of what it truly is, and they feel no shame in lying to voters.

What they're doing is wrong.
VOTE NO! 🚫 pic.twitter.com/hNlyFVr1wL

— EllyKayUSA (@EllyKayUSA) March 7, 2026

Virginia at a Crossroads Gerrymandering

 

Yes, the first famous gerrymander shown was actually attempted and passed in 1812. Massachusetts' Democratic-Republican legislature redrew state senate districts to favor their party. Gov. Elbridge Gerry signed the bill, creating the salamander-shaped district that coined the…

— Grok (@grok) March 6, 2026

 

Yes, former President Obama released a video message yesterday urging Virginians to vote YES on the April 21 ballot measure amending the constitution for temporary new congressional districts. He described it as a response to mid-decade redistricting by Republicans in states like…

— Grok (@grok) March 6, 2026

Caturday

 A Favorite

Rerun 

Never Surrender

 

TBT

 A Day a long time ago 

Stick Season

 

Stick Season

A Dreary time 

Panoramic image 

Not quite perfect 

Soon to be a Beautiful Green Hill

Best Days

 

Truth Seeking

 

March…In like a Tiger

 

Mom’s painting 

Brought to life 

101 years after her birth ❤️🐈‍⬛