Surfing Zillow in Santorini

… Team by team, reporters baffled, trumped, tethered, cropped

Look at that low plane, fine, then

Uh oh, overflow, population, common group

But it'll do, save yourself, serve yourself

World serves its own needs, listen to your heart bleed

Tell me with the Rapture and the reverent in the right, right

You vitriolic, patriotic, slam fight, bright light

Feeling pretty psyched

… It's the end of the world as we know it

It's the end of the world as we know it

It's the end of the world as we know it and I feel fine

-Michael Stipe, REM

You know it's only going to get better when you (I) roll over to turn off the alarm, so I can wake up P with a somewhat less jarring sound than the clanging of digital bells, and the headline on Drudge that fills the screen says simply "DEBATE CATASTROPHE".

The real catastrophe is that these two are the only choices our electoral system produced.

Not to sound Panglossian, but I see this striking of an iceberg in June as something of a blessing. We've all known this was an issue, Biden's age and capacity to take on the most difficult job on the planet for another four years. What if the convention had already happened? What if this debate debacle had happened in, say, mid-October? There's still time.

Peg's probably right that nothing last night is going to move the polls or cause someone who was a die-hard for either candidate to switch to the other side. The problem here is that the campaign is so, so close (an indictment of our voting populace in and of itself), that what some in the press call the "uninformed electorate", folks who aren't paying attention to the gathering clouds of fascism because it's all an abstraction compared with figuring out how to make the next car payment or afford day care, are collectively going to decide the next election. And the message they're hearing, which was reinforced last night, is that the incumbent is too old, and things were somehow better in 2019 under the felon's watch.

So the thought arises that maybe we need to move to Greece after Trump wins and the revenge tour begins. Of course, western Europe seems to be tumbling into its own abyss of authoritarian, illiberal governance. Maybe go somewhere beyond the reach of the despots? Good luck. To the extent such a place exists, it's probably disappearing under the waves due to climate change.

My mind wanders to the image from National Lampoon decades ago, of Hitler on the lam hiding out on a South Seas Island.

The article was entitled, as I recall, "Stranger in Paradise", and one shot in the photo essay featured Hitler naked from the waist down (from behind, you sick person) on a solitary walk down the beach, a la Nixon at San Clemente. Hilarious.

Playing the part of Nero while Rome burned, Peg and I missed the debate as we danced together on a perfect June evening at the Radisson's outdoor event space, gliding in a two-step that took us outside ourselves for a moment. Thanks Mom, wherever you are, for insisting I learn to dance, at least a little.

Time to wash up and run to Canandaigua to pick up the Chris Craft and take it to the mechanic with the goal of getting the engine running consistently. If the weather cooperates this weekend, maybe P and I will find ourselves out on the lake with a picnic lunch in our old wooden boat.