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*Rainy morning. It feels good. We have had a few light showers earlier this month but today is the real thing. It was time.The street and the cars parked alongside the curb are covered with leaves from gingko trees. More like gold than yellow. Day after Thanksgiving is a holiday except for those who work in stores. Big day for bargain hunters storming the gates early in the morning. Parking lots full of drivers looking for rare empty spots. Fender benders; frayed tempers. I can imagine the cash registers making ka-ching, ka-ching sound. Good for the economy and some people get pleasure out of it.Rain drops on windowPhoto credit: stock.xchng (sciucanessa79@virgilio.it)Gingko LeavesPhoto credit: stock.xchng (typographica@gmail.com)A few more days of rain before AC and I can go walk through groves of oak and redwood trees to look for chanterelles. It is very rewarding when we come across a especially bountiful patch and fill our bags. After a few hours we sit down to have sandwiches and talk of pleasant things or just enjoy the forest around us. I cook risotto with chanterelles and a sprinkling of saffron to add color. For making soup I add diced potato to give it body. Soup tastes especially good on cold evenings.

* On this day as we gather with families and friends, let us spend a few moments to think about the emptiness in the hearts of those who are suffering from losses. We can tilt the balance of being the half who "love the other half". In memory of those who died in Iraq. Let us not forget the hapless civilians who became victims of warring factions, the civilians whose deaths are described by some as "collateral damage".U.S. Soldiers: 2102 Injured: 15568Iraqi Civilians: Minimum 27094 Maximum 30538*Every Thanksgiving Day, Jon Carroll of The San Francisco Chronicle writes a column that I urge everyone to read. Excerpt: "And the final bead on the string is for this very Thanksgiving, this particular Thursday, and the people with whom we will be sharing it. Whoever they are and whatever the circumstances that have brought us together, we will today be celebrating with them the gift of life and the persistence of charity in a world that seems bent on ending one and denying the other."*Now, to Yehuda Amichai. Half The People In The World Half the people in the world love the other half,half the people hate the other half.Must I because of this half and that half go wanderingand changing ceaselessly like rain in its cycle,must I sleep among rocks, and grow rugged likethe trunks of olive trees,and hear the moon barking at me,and camouflage my love with worries,and sprout like frightened grass between the railroadtracks,and live underground like a mole,and remain with roots and not with branches, and notfeel my cheek against the cheek of angels, andlove in the first cave, and marry my wifebeneath a canopy of beams that support the earth,and act out my death, always till the last breath andthe last words and without ever understanding,and put flagpoles on top of my house and a bob shelterunderneath. And go out on roads made only forreturning and go through all the appallingstations—cat,stick,fire,water,butcher,between the kid and the angel of death?Half the people love,half the people hate.And where is my place between such well-matched halves,and through what crack will I see the white housingprojects of my dreams and the bare foot runnerson the sands or, at least, the waving of a girl'skerchief, beside the mound?---Yehuda AmichaiTranslated by Chana Bloch And Stephen Mitchell*

It Gets "Curiouser and Curiouser"* "The Queen had one way of settling all difficulties, great or small. “Off with his head!” she said without even looking around." (Lewis Carroll ,1832–1898, British author, mathematician, clergyman. Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland). Lot of buzz about the existence of a secret memo reported to contain details of a meeting between Prime Minister Blair and President Bush in April 2004 when the president expressed his desire to bomb al Jazeera TV station in Doha, Qatar. The British press has been muzzled by invocation of Official Secrets Act from publishing the details. "World News Roundup" by Jefferson Morley in the Washington Post covers the subject well. Additional coverage by John Plunkett in The Guardian and by Rosemary Bennet and Tim Reid in Times Online.Excerpts: Under a front-page headline “Bush plot to bomb his ally” in the Daily Mirror yesterday, a secret minute of the conversation in April 2004 records the President allegedly suggesting that he would like to bomb the channel’s studios in Doha, capital of Qatar. Richard Wallace, the Editor of the Daily Mirror, said last night: “We made No 10 fully aware of the intention to publish and were given ‘no comment’ officially or unofficially. Suddenly 24 hours later we are threatened under Section 5.” (Times onLine Nov.23, 2005) An international journalists group today demanded "complete disclosure" from the British and American governments over reports that the US considered attacking the al-Jazeera HQ in the Qatar capital, Doha. The International Federation of Journalists claimed that 16 journalists and other media staff have died at the hands of US forces in Iraq, adding that the deaths had not been properly investigated. (The Guardian, Nov.23, 2005)

"Maligning Murtha" *President Bush using the Good Cop, Bad Cop strategy ? He is sort of desperate. Learned from The Guardian that he went to Mongolia and praised his hosts for sending 160 troops to "coalition" forces in Iraq. In his Media Notes column, Howard Kurtz , Washington Post ,reports about the vicious attacks on Rep. Murtha by Republicans to shore up support for the president. "Anyway, Schmidt's defenders say she didn't realize Murtha had been a Marine. But her Ohio nickname will probably stick, thanks to this NYT profile: "She grew up in the rough-and-tumble of a family auto racing business, went through concealed-weapons training, and bears a local nickname seldom applied to shrinking violets: 'Mean Jean.'" ...

All of us need a "Long night for the soul" *"Bush at the Tipping Point",by Howard Finemann in Newsweek "As friends describe it, Rep. Jack Murtha of Pennsylvania had been searching his soul for months, seeking guidance on what to do in Congress about Iraq. "I think he was going through what we Catholics call a 'long night of the soul'," said Rep. Rosa DeLauro of Connecticut." Jack Murtha's call for immediate withdrawal isn't likely to take shape unless....unless there is a groundswell to force it. Could happen if the attrition rate for our soldiers continues at the current rate (67 so far this month).There is another side of the war which must not be forgotten. It is the use of overt and covert means by us to win at any cost. From torture of prisoners, secret prisons in "friendly" countries which have been paid in cash or kind to allow such facilities, to use of white phosphorus, we have lost the right to claim high moral ground. We have become like the enemy."Propaganda nightmare of chemical hypocrisy" by Bronwen Maddox, Timesonline November 17th edition: "HOW damaged is the US by the row over its use of white phosphorus in Fallujah last year? On the facts available now, it is within the letter of the law, even though it has not signed the most relevant protocol on the use of the weapon." Excerpts: But even if it considers itself on firm legal ground, it has created a nightmare of public relations at the point when it is trying to court support in Europe and the Middle East. Allegations of unusual weapons have been around since the assault. The US denied them, until internet bloggers unearthed personal accounts by the US military. On Tuesday Pentagon spokesman Lieutenant-Colonel Barry Venable said that the substance had been used as an “incendiary weapon against enemy combatants”, contradicting earlier statements by the London and Rome ambassadors, and the State Department website. If there was anything that could make perceptions worse, it was the military slang of “shake and bake” attacks, phosphorus being the “bake” part. It will take a lot of work by Karen Hughes, the President’s emissary, to improve the American image abroad, to make up for the incendiary effect on hearts and minds. *Paul Reynolds, BBC, on November 17, 2005: "White Phosphorus: Weapon On Edge": The Pentagon's admission - despite earlier denials - that US troops used white phosphorus as a weapon in Falluja last year is more than a public relations issue - it has opened up a debate about the use of this weapon in modern warfare. ...

Yehuda Amichai*Czeslaw Milosz*Joseph Brodsky*Seamus Heaney * Hike with a Woman When after hours of walking You suddenly discover That the body of the woman striding beside you Is not made for A march of war, That her thighs grow heavy And her buttocks move like a tired flock You are filled with great joy For the world Where women are like this." ---Yehuda Amichai (1924-2000 ), translated by Harold Schimmel Falling in Love "Tomber amourex. To fall in love. Does it occur suddenly or gradually ? If gradually, when is the moment "already" ? I would fall in love with a monkey made of rags. With a plywood squirrel. With a botanical atlas. With an oriole. With a ferret. With a marten in a picture. With the forest one sees to the right when riding in a cart to Jaszuny. With a poem by a little-known poet. With human beings whose names still move me. And always the object of love was enveloped in erotic fantasy or was submitted, as in Stendhal, to a "cristallisation", so it is frightful to think of that object as it was, naked among the naked things, and of the fairy tales about it one invents. Yes, I was often in love with something or someone. Yet falling in love is not the same as being able to love. That is something different." ---Czeslaw Milosz (1911-2004), translated from Polish by the author and Robert Haas New Life "In the new life, a cloud is better than the bright sun. The rain akin to self-knowledge, appears perpetual. On the other hand, an unexpected train You don't wait for alone on a platform arrives on schedule. A sail is passing its judgment on the horizon's lie. The eye tracks the sinking soap, though it's the foam that is famous. And should anyone ask you "Who are you ?", you reply "Who--I ? I am nobody", as Ulysses once muttered to Polyphemus." --Joseph Brodsky (1940-1996) Song "A rowan like a lipsticked girl. Between the by-road and the main road Alder trees at a wet and dripping distance Stand off among the rushes. There are the mud-flowers of dialect And the immortelles of perfect pitch And that moment when the bird sings very close To the music of what happens." ---Seamus Heaney

Fall of a giant and no one to blame but himself*No excuse, none. Reading details of Bob Edward's silence about being told of Valerie Plame gave me a sick feeling. No matter what spin is put on it by the Washington Post and Bob Edward, it stinks. The difference between him and Ms Run Amok of NY Times ? Not much.

*A blogger,Croweagle ,who lives in Ottawa, Canada, wrote about kicking leaves while walking in the woods. Joyful. Just reading about it and looking at his picture made me feel good. It happens. There are times when a simple act, a gesture, a kind word, a smile from a stranger can lifts one's spirits. "The falling leavesfall and pile up; the rainbeats on the rain."---Gyodai (translated by Harold Henderson)

*A gem in Newsweek. "Profound Portraits" by Malcolm Jones is about the works of a photographer that I never heard of. "Mike Disfarmer was the local photographer in Heber Springs, Ark. (pop. 3,800), from 1915 until he died in 1959." The 18 black and white images (can be viewed as a slide show) are stunning. Don't miss them.

Consternation in the Bush Camp*November Death Toll*"Murtha's Moment", Eleanor Clift's commentary in Newsweek, makes it clear why the president and his cohorts are running scared. "Pennsylvania Democrat John Murtha is a burly ex-Marine with a Bronze Star and two Purple Hearts who rarely speaks to the press. But he came out of the shadows Thursday to call for a complete pullout from Iraq within six months. “Our military has done everything that’s been asked of them. It is time to bring them home,” he said. Murtha’s hawkish record on military matters made his announcement all the more surprising. “It’s like George W. Bush saying he wants to raise taxes,” says Lawrence Korb, a defense analyst who served in the Reagan administration." Out of 51 deaths in the first sixteen days of November confirmed by DOD 38 were in their 20's (see below). Five names yet to be confirmed. From The Washington Post:"MURTHA: I like guys who've never been there that criticize us who've been there. I like that. I like guys who got five deferments and never been there and send people to war, and then don't like to hear suggestions about what needs to be done. ...