"In many ways, you can interpret 'cope' as a political reflection of the verb 'seethe,' which was frequently deployed by the energized class of MAGA YouTubers and podcasters..."

"... to roast rank-and-file liberals who were horrified by Trump’s buffoonery and malice throughout his administration, and to celebrate their impotent anger. (This picture of a young woman screaming in agony at the 2016 inauguration became something of a stand-in for the typical seething Democrat.)... [T]o command someone to 'seethe' was part of owning the libs. But the libs themselves have slowly started to appropriate the confrontational, 4Chan-poisoned language of a post-Trump internet—we currently inhabit a country where sitting senators are sharing Dark Brandon memes...."

From "The Audacity of Cope/Laughing at other people’s politics-related sadness is fun, actually" by Luke Winkie (Slate)(click through if only for the illustration).

"I changed the door panels on an old 56 Chevy, and replaced some old floor tiles, made some landscape paintings, wrote a song called 'You Don’t Say.'"

"I listened to Peggy Lee records. Things like that. I reread 'Rime of the Ancient Mariner' a few times over. What a story that is. What a poem. If there’d been any opium laying around, I probably would have been down for a while. I listened to The Mothers of Invention record Freak Out!, that I hadn’t heard in a long, long time. What an eloquent record. 'Hungry Freaks, Daddy,' and the other one, 'Who Are the Brain Police,' perfect songs for the pandemic."

That is what Bob Dylan (says he) did during the lockdown.

Let's all read "Rime of the Ancient Mariner" for Bob.

And I had done a hellish thing,
And it would work 'em woe:
For all averred, I had killed the bird
That made the breeze to blow. 

As for Zappa, he was alerting us to "The emptiness that's you inside" ("Hungry Freaks, Daddy") and raising the question whether the people we know are melted plastic and soft chrome ("Who Are the Brain Police?").

The perfection for the pandemic of "Brain Police" must have to do with the long middle section repeating "I think I'm gonna die" and "I'm gonna die." It's interesting to picture Bob grooving on that and thinking How eloquent... perhaps while laying floor tiles.

"I think these [social media] sites bring happiness to a lot of people. Some people even discover love there. I think it’s a wonderful thing."

Said Bob Dylan, making me imagine that Bob read that New York Times article about Meade and me. 

He says: "These sites can bring pleasure and infinite joy to millions. It’s like opening a window that’s been shut forever, and letting the light in. It’s fantastic if you’re a sociable person; the communication lines are wide open. A lot of incredible things you can do on these forums. You can refashion anything, blot out memories and change history. It’s boundless. But they can divide and separate us, as well. Turn people against each other."

"I never watch anything foul smelling or evil. Nothing disgusting; nothing dog ass. I’m a religious person."

"I read the scriptures a lot, meditate and pray, light candles in church. I believe in damnation and salvation, as well as predestination. The Five Books of Moses, Pauline Epistles, Invocation of the Saints, all of it."

Said Bob Dylan, asked if he streams movies on Netflix to relax.

But that word "relax" did not resonate with him. He's already relaxed — "too relaxed... like a flat tire; totally unmotivated, positively lifeless." So he says. But that doesn't mean he's looking for things to stimulate him, because it "takes a lot to get me stimulated" and he's "excessively sensitive," so he's liable to go from totally inert to "restless and fidgety." There's no "middle ground." 

On or off. One extreme or the other. Maybe that works for someone who performs on stage and then must spend so much time in a travel routine. He can fall asleep "at any time." He also says "I can write songs anywhere at any time."

He muses — comically — about songwriters who have a routine: "I heard Tom Paxton has one. I’ve wondered sometimes about going to visit Don McLean, see how he does it."

"I’m unaware of the current debate about separating the art from the artist. It’s news to me. Maybe it’s an academic thing."

Said Bob Dylan, asked about "the current debate separating the art from the artist."

That will give the academics studying Bob something to think about. 

At the Monday Night Café...

... you can talk about whatever you want.

(Too cold today to go out and get a picture.)

The reason to stay out the road is that "it’s a perfect way to stay anonymous, and still be a member of the social order."

"You’re the master of your fate. You manipulate reality and move through time and space with the proper attitude. It’s not an easy path to take, not fun and games, it’s no Disney World. It’s an open space, with concrete pillars and an iron floor, with obligations and sacrifices. It’s a path, and destiny put some of us on that path, in that position. It’s not for everybody."

Said Bob Dylan, quoted in an interview the Wall Street Journal's Jeff Slate published at bobdylan.com. 

"Sam Bankman-Fried Said to Agree to Extradition After Chaotic Hearing."

The NYT reports. 

Wearing a navy blue suit and a white shirt unbuttoned at the cuff, he slumped in his seat, with his head down and his leg shaking. Soon the proceedings were thrown into turmoil. “Whatever trail got him here this morning, it did not involve me,” [SBF's lawyer Jerone] Roberts told the judge in front of a packed courtroom. He said Mr. Bankman-Fried’s court appearance had happened “prematurely” and without his involvement.

After 10 days, a jury has found Harvey Weinstein guilty of rape, forced oral copulation and a third sexual misconduct.

WaPo reports. 

This was the former Hollywood producer’s second criminal trial; he is currently serving a 23-year sentence in New York state prison, though he was granted an appeal earlier this year. The convictions were related to one victim. The jury was unable to reach a verdict on three other counts, and Weinstein was acquitted of a sexual battery allegation made by another woman....

"The House Jan. 6 committee voted Monday to recommend the Justice Department pursue a batch of criminal charges against former President Donald Trump..."

 CNN reports the unsurprising news. 

"[T[he committee's co-Chair, Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., said... that "among the most shameful" findings of the committee was that Trump sat in the White House watching the violence unfold on TV on Jan. 6, but did nothing, even as advisors and allies begged him to call off the rioters. "This was an utter moral failure," Cheney said of Trump's inaction. "No man who would behave that way, at that moment in time can ever serve in any position of authority in our nation again. He is unfit for any office."

"They’re unable to see properly, they’re confused, they’re having hallucinations. And we’re talking about scary hallucinations; it’s nothing that’s fun."

Said Darren Roberts, quoted in "How Can Tainted Spinach Cause Hallucinations? A food recall from Australia sheds light on an unusual aspect of brain chemistry" (NYT).

The belief is that there's some other plant in there with the spinach and that it's "'anticholinergic syndrome,' a type of poisoning mainly caused by plants in the Solanaceae family, which includes nightshade, jimson weed and mandrake root."

"The House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol will hold its last public meeting on Monday afternoon..."

"The panel is... expected to vote on referring Mr. Trump to the Justice Department on charges of insurrection, obstruction of an official proceeding of Congress and conspiracy to defraud the United States.... Referrals against Mr. Trump would not carry any legal weight or compel the Justice Department to take any action, but they would send a powerful signal.... In a statement, Steven Cheung, a spokesman for Mr. Trump, dismissed the committee’s planned actions on Monday as those of a 'kangaroo court' that held 'show trials by Never Trump partisans who are a stain on this country’s history.'...

The NYT reports.

"Bidin' My Time."

That amazing video was entirely new to me and just uncovered as a consequence of getting involved in the word "abide" — see the first post of today — after Elon Musk used it in a tweet that polls about whether he should step down as "head of Twitter."

And please note: I had absolutely no thought — until I began this sentence — of gesturing — even in the slightest — at the homophonic name of the President of the United States. But feel free to rewrite the Gershwin lyrics... or just leave them as is:

Next year, next year
Somethin's bound to happen
This year, this year
I'll just keep on nappin'

"A confrontation between a member of Elon Musk’s security team and an alleged stalker that Musk blamed on a Twitter account that tracked his jet..."

"... took place at a gas station 26 miles from Los Angeles International Airport and 23 hours after the @ElonJet account had last located the jet’s whereabouts. The timing and location of the confrontation cast doubt on Musk’s assertion that the account had posted real-time 'assassination coordinates' that threatened his family and led to the confrontation...."

WaPo reports. 

It depends on what the meaning of "abide by" is.

 

That came right after: "Going forward, there will be a vote for major policy changes. My apologies. Won’t happen again."

How can that work? He said "there will be a vote" not that he will do whatever wins, and he can have changes without a vote by deeming them non-major. Now, he did specify — in the vote about whether he should step down as "head of Twitter" — that he "will abide by the results," but what does it really mean to "abide by" the results of a poll? Where's the wiggle room?

At the Sunday Night Café…

 … you can talk about whatever you want.