The February 2023 Gallimaufry
A collection of bits and pieces and rigmarole from the OverSoul of my brain (and other places)
A collection of bits and pieces and rigmarole from the OverSoul of my brain (and other places)
Note: As part of my commitment to publish one blog post per week in 2023, this is the first of a series of monthly posts where I put together odds and ends that didn’t make the final cut for a complete post, but still seem worth sharing, and include media I’ve been interested in. I hope you enjoy it!
The Gift of Language
I’m a writer and a reader and I love words. Love the way they sound when said solo, or how they create new aural sensations when combined. I love how they can impart powerful meaning when strung together well, just as I love how they can be playfully nonsensical in the hands of the whimsical.
As a result of this love, I tend to notice words or phrases that stand out. And so it was that, after many moons of casting for a regular, memorable title for this monthly odds-and-ends blog post, my eyes landed on the word gallimaufry. It was in a place where such treasures are reasonably likely to reside: on the blog of the usually interesting, always erudite John Michael Greer.
Since finding it a few weeks back, I’ve typed gallimaufry enough times that I can now spell it right. In this sense, the word now comfortably rests in my lexicon, a word I can employ when needed.
What does it mean, you ask? Here’s dictionary.com’s definition:
There are lots of fun, playful words here, including mishmash, hodgepodge and … goulash? I’d considered hodgepodge and mishmash for the title but isn’t goulash a kinda nasty stew made in the depths of winter just to survive? Forgive me, I have eccentric and sometimes picky tastes. I also know that goulash is basically a hodgepodge or a gallimaufry of vegetables and meats in a stew, so I understand why it’s listed with these words. Regardless of one’s taste, goulash sounds too much like ghoul to name a column that I hope will have moments of light-heartedness and mirth. Ghouls ain’t know for mirth, my friends.
What ghouls do like? How about some ominum-gatherum with your salad, ghoul? Sounds ominous, let’s try it! Just keep it away from Bryan’s supposed-to-be-playful headline!
So we’re back to “gallimaufry” — -now that’s a word a writer can work with. Also, the poet in me appreciates the poetry of “February gallimaufry” so it feels like I’m being given the green light to start this series now. Wouldn’t sound so catchy in June!
By June, though, you’ll love seeing the word because you’ll know it means one of these wacky columns, where neither you — nor me, the writer — knows where exactly it’s going. The basic template is I’ll have maybe 3 or 4 short essays/idea sketches/etc. that intrigued me over the month but maybe weren’t enough for a longer post and then I’ll share some comments about some of the media I’ve been engaged with (I really don’t like “consuming”!). Other than that, we’ll just have to see! And thus, it feels appropriate to start an unknown project with a previously unknown word.
On your end, reader, if there are topics I bring up that you want me to explore more, please say so in the Comments. The more I can make my blog co-creative the better! I’m a guy with lots of interests, ideas and quirks and it can be hard for me to decide which ones to follow. This gallimaufry, then, is ultimately a place where my wacky ideas can co-mingle with my somber thoughts, where my more relaxed-thoughts who just want to talk about music and sports can express themselves freely and where all three of these sides of me can share a beer (or a bowl) together.
One of my goals in doing a project like this is for me to grow publicly as a writer. It’s a process of discovery for me and I’m eager to see what I find. Also, I like to think that when I share my creative journey, it might inspire my readers — you! — -to find whatever creative thing you want to share with the world and just go for it!
At the start of such a process, it’s likely our work won’t be nearly as good as it is once we’ve done it for a while. I know this is certainly the case with my podcast series covering the 12 signs of the Zodiac. I started in Libra Season but it wasn’t until at least the Aquarius Season episode that I’d honed in on what I was trying to do. So I expect the same from the gallimaufry!
For now, welcome to the first monthly gallimaufry. I hope you enjoy it!
How Will A.I. Become Conscious? Heck if Humans Know!
Do you remember how you became conscious? Like, the first time, when you were swimming in the Womb Sea, (hopefully) safely inside mommy’s tummy.
Or how about this morning? Do you remember how you became conscious this morning when you woke up?
Or did it just happen?
Okay, sure, sometimes we consciously wake ourselves up from a dream. I usually do it when some dream character — -often a person ill-suited for authority throwing their weight at me— annoys me and I decide to “shoot” them with my finger, thus sometimes waking myself up as I’m saying, “Bang, bang, lame-ass mofo!”
All that said, I’m reasonably sure most of us don’t remember making ourselves conscious that first time. It just happened.
And if we don’t know how we did it, as organic humans, why do we assume we know how consciousness might “awaken” in so-called artificial intelligence? The point here is simply that since materialist science has yet to solve the “hard problem” of consciousness, doesn’t grok it at its most basic level, why would we expect to understand how a man-made machine might become conscious?
Maybe one day, some just will. And they’ll start singing…
Now, I Wanna Talk About Music
Growing up in the 1980s, I think I wanted to like the Talking Heads but never could get past David Byrne’s stage presentation. That changed in the late 1990s thanks to Phish.
As part of its series of Halloween shows where they play complete classic albums for a “musical Halloween costume,” Phish covered the Talking Heads’ 1980 album Remain in Light for their 1996 Halloween show. And then, over the next year, that groove-focused, more minimalist, percussive sound the Heads were expert at became the form Phish brought into their music.
I loved it!
That caused me to not only check out the Heads’ catalog but David Byrne’s solo work, which led me to see beyond the visual Byrne and appreciate him from a purely musical perspective (I’m still not a fan of his voice, though).
One thing I appreciate about my approach to life is I don’t let past prejudices stop me from giving things a second chance. Lots of times our prejudices are based on ignorance, sometimes they result from bad timing and sometimes they are just feelings we have and we can’t explain why we have them.
For me, with Byrne, I can only pin it down with something like, “He appears to be trying too hard to be quirky.” Now, it’s true that cities with huge populations like New York City and Tokyo can cause individuals who want to stand out to go extra miles that those of us from smaller places would find completely unnecessary. So maybe my dislike of Byrne’s stage presentation is more a matter of my biography as a suburban kid. There’s probably more to it, maybe related to my personality type, but I’ll leave the thought there and just say, “If you like good, rhythmic music, check out the Talking Heads and much of David Byrne’s solo work” (oh, his album with St. Vincent is also really good!).
Discernment And Owning Up to Mistakes
I was particularly active writing posts for this particular blog in the early months of 2020. At that time, the political science and print journalism major in me was rather activated by the Democratic Primary Election for President in 2020, so I wrote a lot about it.
Looking back, I still think that was a very important primary, as it showed just how low the Democratic Establishment was willing to go — getting behind a clearly past-his-prime pol in Joe Biden with, IMHO, a pretty lengthy career on the wrong side of history (co-authoring the 1994 Crime bill and a draft of a bill that he brags became the USA Patriot Act in 2001 and being a vocal supporter of George W. Bush’s ill-fated invasion of Iraq are just a few of the more egregious examples) — -in order to stop a man they considered to be an outsider, Bernie Sanders, from forming a new version of the party in his image.
However, my focus on that Democratic presidential primary meant I wasn’t writing about COVID-19. One might see that I posted an article on March 2nd and think I was ahead of many, but that’s only because COVID-19 started impacting Japan about two weeks earlier than the US and much of Europe, mostly because of the impending Tokyo Olympic games and a political scandal, but also because a cruise ship of COVID-19 infected passengers was sitting in Tokyo Bay).
Does Japan Needs to Chill Out In Its Response to the Coronavirus?
Japan, the country which I have lived in since summer 2004, is panicking itself into a tailspin.bryanwinchell-japan.medium.com
In addition, I had a vested interest in COVID-19 not becoming a big panic — I had an airplane ticket to the U.S. for early April as part of a massive plan to do a cross-America trip — by any method besides driving alone — in 2020 and write a book about it. That trip took a lot of planning so I didn’t want anything to get in the way of it. And that’s what led to my crappy prediction:
In the final week of February a Japanese co-worker expressed concern about being able to take a planned trip to Australia in March and I blew it off, saying COVID-19 was being overhyped or something along those lines. “Don’t worry, you’ll get to go!” I told her with a laugh.
Oops! I blew that one! Indeed, I was totally wrong.
No, not about whether or not COVID-19 was overhyped —that’s still a matter of important discussion — but about the impact our human response to it would have on the world and our ability to travel. You see, that wrongness was motivated by my hope for what would happen.
Whenever we humans predict things, there’s always the danger of predicting what we are hoping will happen.
On one hand, I can understand this — -as I believe that when we focus our attention on something, we can impact the result. But if we want a good track record of predicting things reasonably accurately, we have to take our own desires and fears out of the equation as much as possible.
I’m going to use my blog to forecast things. I’ll often be wrong. Sometimes I’ll be right. I’ll do my best to improve the latter and reduce the former. And to explain the reasons behind my forecasting.
That said, there’s one more thing to bring up: What if, by making predictions en masse, we can stop the worst things from happening? I’ll leave that thought for your percolation.
Media Bombshells? Or Pin drops?
As a former journalist with a lifelong fascination with the way the media functions, February 2023 was an epic month. There were at least three major news stories that much of the mainstream media mostly ignored or was quiet about for too long.
First, a lengthy expose in the well-respected Columbia Journalism Review about the media’s complicity in pushing out the RussiaGate narrative, which pumped the public full of fear-the-Russians/hate-the-Donald propaganda (and prepped the public for the side to take in the Ukraine conflict).
The press versus the president, part one
INTRODUCTION: 'I realized early on I had two jobs' The end of the long inquiry into whether Donald Trump was colluding…www.cjr.org
Then, as a train full of nasty chemicals derailed in Ohio, an investigative report by one of the veterans of the craft was released, showing the U.S. was behind the blowing up of the Russian NordStream gas pipelines last September.
I’m going to skip the train story, but here are some links to some indy journos that are doing good, deep work on the Ohio disaster: First, is Eric Francis Coppolino at Planet Waves (doing both writing and audio) and the second is a conversation between Canadian journalist/podcaster Trish Wood with a local Ohio journalist.
With most of the mainstream press quiet about this story for over a week, I’ll just say, “Now more than ever, support independent media!”
Okay, let’s go a bit more into each of those stories.
News Story #1: The U.S. Government, Under the Guidance of President Biden, Blew Up the Russian Pipelines
Remember last September when two gas pipelines from Russia to Europe mysteriously blew up? And even though a good many of us intuited it was the Yanks (with a lil’ help from their friends), we didn’t have any physical evidence. All we had was things like President Biden in early February 2022, promising “If Russia invades . . . there will be no longer a Nord Stream 2. We will bring an end to it.”
Well, we now have some pretty solid evidence that the U.S. did, indeed, do it, thanks to prize-winning investigative reporter Seymour Hersh. Hersh published a months-long investigation about a detailed plot by the United States government to blow up the pipelines. It’s pretty damning evidence when it comes from a legendary reporter who has exposed a few major war crimes in his career.
It’s been a few weeks since the article came out, and Hersh is following up the reporting with a few posts just for his paid subscribers. Meanwhile, it seems the president’s reaction has been to offer a quick denial and then to take an “ignore-the-story, it-will-go-away” posture and hope he still has enough cooperation from the media and the Deep State for that to happen. It might work. But I doubt it. Instead, I think the story may grow in importance, probably rising along with tensions with Russia. After all, I’m sure the Russians have read the story and will understandably be unhappy about it.
How America Took Out The Nord Stream Pipeline
The U.S. Navy's Diving and Salvage Center can be found in a location as obscure as its name-down what was once a…seymourhersh.substack.com
Story #2: The Americans — and the Media — Made Up the RussiaGate Conspiracy Theory
Hersh’s investigation wasn’t the only important work of investigative journalism released in the past four weeks. Just before Hersh at the end of January, we had this one from the Columbia Journalism Review, a 25,000-word epic detailing major media complicity in pushing the #Russiagate narrative.
For most of Trump’s presidency, there was a concerted effort to find and prove that Donald Trump’s election was a result of his colluding with Russia. In short, this was an officially sanctioned conspiracy theory, which means no one who promoted it was ever censored by Big Tech over it.
RussiaGate was a conspiracy theory with bi-partisan support pushed by spooks with Deep State ties and members of the Hillary Clinton campaign, as well as a fair number of neoconservatives with ties to the GW Bush regime, and it was spread through a willing mass media. To top it off, in a nice little trick of projection, those media members who dared to question the narrative, such as journalists Matt Taibbi, Aaron Mate or Whitney Webb, were labeled “conspiracy theorists” or “Russian sympathizers” who, of course, were spreading “dangerous misinformation.”
This Hall of Mirrors media landscape has played a major role in creating an American socio-political zeitgeist where citizens drown in a torrent of officially approved conspiracy theories and get lost in the weeds of unofficially created ones in our understandable desire to make sense of our crazy world, and where we then get condemned via censorship or slander (or both!) for not getting the facts right! Mama mia!
Meanwhile, the Rachel Maddows of the world never warrant a warning. Not even a tiny wag of a pinkie finger. Public trust in the media is near all-time lows and it’s just another of the many social institutions that are in serious trouble. If you don’t think journalism is in trouble, ask yourself: Why are we relying on septuagenarian reporters like Sy Hersh and Jeff Gerth to do the most critical of jobs of the Fourth Estate? You know, the whole keep-citizens-informed-and-hold-the-powerful-to-account job. Where are the great younger reporters and press institutions?
Well, fortunately, there are some. Two refreshing voices — who I certainly have my disagreements with but who I trust to tell me their honest opinion and to back that with research and reasoning — are Krystal Ball and Saaghar Enjeti of Breaking Points. They did a good job going over Hersh’s initial report in a shorter and more visual presentation of the Nord Stream Pipeline sabotage story.
My Media Diet in February
By no means does this sum up every morsel of media my mind has nibbled on or even merged with in February. These are just some of the things that made my February 2023 interesting.
Music
Ren Gill, duh.
The Disco Biscuits live from January and February 2023 shows. Love that they are in one of their peak periods!
And now, just starting to dig into Phish’s 4-day stand on a beach in Mexico. Lucky bastards…
TV Shows
The Super Bowl: It coulda been an all-time classic, competing for best ever, but in the end it just gets the title of “Very Entertaining Game With a Blah Ending.” After keeping their penalty flags in their pockets for similar defensive backfield penalties all game, the referees decided a crucial 3rd and 9 play with about two minutes to play and the score tied at 35 is a good time to throw a penalty. Result? First down, Chiefs, now run down the clock with some kneel downs and kick the game-winning field goal with little time left. Thanks, refs! I’m not surprised that Richard Sherman wasn’t happy with that officiating! Meanwhile, the football world was robbed of seeing if the Eagles players could have either tied the game up or won it.
Netflix’s golf documentary, Full Swing: A few years ago, I got sucked into a Netflix sports documentary called Cricket Fever: Mumbai Indians. It was a fascinating look into one of the most successful sports leagues in the world, how quickly it has risen to prominence, and what this might mean to the larger world of cricket. Well, just as that doc sucked me in, so did Full Swing. There’s just something fun about vicariously experiencing such an exotic and strange world like that of professional golf. In addition, like the doc on cricket, Full Swing also goes into the big challenges to the pro golf world of the new super-league owned by folks in Saudi Arabia. While I certainly see this as linked to our global political and economic power conflict, I’ve yet to finish the series but don’t expect they will go very deep into that angle.
Movies
A Month of Malick: I belong to an online group that watches movies as a way to look into our shadows. Every other week, we have a Zoom call to discuss a movie. For the past month, we’ve watched two movies by director Terence Malick, 1998’s A Thin Red Line and 2019’s A Hidden Life.
Over my year in this group, I’ve come to realize that much as I enjoy movies, I can’t describe myself as “a movie person” because there are lots of famous, great directors whose movies I’ve never seen. Until this year that list included Wes Anderson and Malick (though I may have seen “Bottle Rocket” back in the day, but those were hazy days, indeed).
Anyway, I was impressed and taking in by the Malick movies. For one, he often uses his camera to show beautiful nature shots that convey the hidden-yet-always-there-to-be-seen-if-we-look grandeur of the world we live in. Second, the poet in me appreciates how his voiceovers act in tandem with the images, like a visual poem. And last, he shows that even in the most inhumane conditions, such as a grassy hill filled with freshly killed soldiers or a drab, dank prison for conscientious objectors, Malick asks the viewer to see the Heaven that is already here on Earth for our eyes to see and our hearts to feel.
In the end, Malick has a unique style that suits my tastes and a sensibility I share, so I’m glad, as I begin what I call Life Part 2 (Age 50 and beyond), I’ve discovered him.
Podcasts
I’m a podcast addict and I listen to so many I forget. Perhaps in a future gallimaufry, I’ll keep track of every show and just offer it as a list so you can see my tastes that way. Anyway, I’m up against my Sunday 8 p.m. deadline so will just share the titles of shows I’ve listened to regularly, maybe with a comment:
America This Week, with Matt Taibbi and Walter Kern (I love this show for its insightful and humorous look at the news and in February, I could have written a blog post based off of every episode! My favorite current show.)
The aforementioned Trish Wood is Critical (she’s a Canadian journalist, formerly mainstream and a science writer who is now a shocked classical liberal covering COVID-19, the media and issues relating to Canada. Also had a great interview with one of my long-time go-tos, Chris Hedges in February.)
The Dark Horse Podcast with evolutionary biologists and teachers Brett Weinstein and Heather Heying. After hearing Taibbi on Brett’s show in summer 2020, I’ve been listening ever since. I don’t always make it through the wonky science stuff, but I appreciate their work and presentation. They’ve helped me keep my science-brain half awake.
Holes to Heavens with astrologer, mythologist, and phenomenal storyteller Adam Sommer. I meant to write a Best of ’22 Podcasts blog post and Adam’s “4th Turning, 3rd Wave 2nd Coming” from May 2022 was going to be on that list, but all I can say is if you want to enter astrology from a mythopoetic perspective, you can’t go wrong with Adam. One of the best astro pods, IMHO!
Ah, folks, you didn’t think I’d finish the gallimaufry without some astrology, did you? In fact, coming up next week is my first astrology-focused blog of 2023 as I take a look at the first of two important transits taking place in March: Saturn into Pisces on March 7th/8th.
Well, here we are, we’ve made it, our first trip through the gallimaufry buffet line! I hope you had a hearty meal. If not, take it up with the manager! Tell that fool exactly what you’d like to see from me in this style of post, and then tell him I called him a fool! Until next time…
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