Old Christmas Lights

 As I said in yesterday's post, the Trump International Hotel is actively excluding the public this month from its lobby, even though it is a public space since the property, the Old Post Office Pavillon, belongs to the federal government and is leased to the failed businessman.  Here is the Christmas Tree inside the space from 2019.

I was very disappointed that I couldn't get into the Library of Congress this year to see its tree, despite presenting myself for admittance on two different days.  Once the library was closed to the public per its current posted hours (closed Monday and Tuesday) and the second time, a Wednesday, I was told that reservations were required on that day to be admitted, a dictate I was told, on the spot, that came down "that morning," particular to that day for undisclosed reasons.  Here is the tree from 2019.

The Peace Officers Tree is a live tree outside the DC Courthouse that is short, a transplant of recent years, from around 2017 I believe, when the live tree formerly there was suddenly gone.  Here is a picture of it from perhaps 2015 when it was tall and robust, before it vanished, to be resurrected later in the form of a newly planted tree.

The National Tree used to be a more spectacular display than its current version.  Here is the tree from around 2012.

The Christmas Lights

(The Union Station tree.)  Every year I venture to the District to perambulate about to see the beautiful Christmas Trees there. I used to sometimes do it at night, running, sometimes leading a group of runners from the Ellipse ( the National Christmas Tree) to Capitol Hill (the Congressional Tree) and many of the points in between. Indoors, outdoors, most are beautiful. Those years when I was injured I used a Capital Bikeshare bike to get about to see whatever trees I could find, as I did this year in two trips to the District earlier this month.  (My tree.)

The Great Pandemic made it hard these last two years, many of the indoor venues were closed up tight, especially last year, and many outdoor sites were scaled back.  But I continued the tradition and here are some of the pictures from this year.  (The Peace Officers Tree.  Each ornament represents a local fallen police officer over the years.)

The most beautiful tree was the tree inside the Willard Hotel.  I really wanted to see the Library of Congress tree, which I saw in 2019 and considered then to be the most beautiful tree I had ever seen in the District, but it was closed on the Monday when I went this year and I was denied entry on the Wednesday when I went when it was supposed to be open.  I was told on that day it was "Reservations Only" although there was absolutely no line and they hadn't made that qualification apparent on the Monday when I had talked to them about when I could come back.  Too bad!  (The inside Willard Hotel tree.)

A great tree every year is on the outdoor plaza at the Canadian Embassy where it overlooks Pennsylvania Avenue towards the Capitol.  It's across the street from the FTC, where I worked for a quarter century.  (O Canada!)

The Congressional Tree on the lawn on the west side of the Capitol is always a great tree.  The Capitol backdropping it had a fresh coat of whitewash around its lower level, due to the murderous Maggot Mob that desecrated the People's House earlier this year as they tried to usurp our government as they pushed the Big Lie to invalidate a majority of the presidential votes cast last year.  (A wreath-like holiday decoration on the facing of the Smithsonian Textile Museum.)

There was a creche on the Ellipse, along with the National Tree and a small tree for each state or territory, and not much else. No Menorah or Santa's Shop or electric train running around the National Tree.  It used to be so much better.  (Meh.)

There were indoor trees at Union Station (no Norwegian mountain village this year), the Navy Memorial, the Hotel Monaco, the Smithsonian Castle and nice holly decorations around the enclosed central courtyard of the National Portrait Gallery.  New this year was a wreath-like decoration fronting one of the Smithsonian museums.  (The Smithsonian Castle Tree.)

There were stacks of coal heaped outside the Trump International Hotel where a sign warned away anyone entering who wasn't a guest or a gust of a guest.  This hotel inside the Postal Pavillon is leased from the federal government and is in effect public property and in years past has had a pretty tree, just as it probably has this year.  (The Congressional Tree.)

Meanwhile, I can't wait for this year to end.  The Boulder County wildfire spawned by 100 MPH winds even as I write this is burning up the very area where my rental investment property is.  I'll have to wait and see how that comes out.  One last kick in the ass by 2021 as it goes out?  (The interior courtyard space at the National Portrait Gallery.)

How Bad Was 2021?

 Well, it ain't over yet. But it's been bad, terrible in fact. And we came into the year with so much expectation that it would of course be better than 2020, it just had to be. But it was an unfulfilled expectations, majorly so.

First came the murderous right-wing riot at the Capitol on January 6th. The maggot mob want us to live under their thumbs and so they engaged in sedition, majorly so. They already turned the USSC into a radical far-right body with three stolen seats that doesn't even purport to represent the vast majority of Americans. How did seven Catholics get on the high court, with the holy see's perverted viewpoints on a woman's right to choose what's best for her own health and future (and her equal place in our society) and the separation of church and state. 

Trumpers claim, it's my body so I don't have to wear a mask (and I'm free to infect the rest of you with covid or delta or omicron) or get a vaccination so the rest of us can  get out of this covid miasma we're stuck in with the virus having free rein amongst the unvaccinated to bring variants and breakthrough cases to the 60% of us patriotic Americans who have rolled up our sleeves for ourselves and our loved ones but also for the common good. Then how can they exclude women from exercising control of their bodies in their choices for themselves. Effin illogical hypocrites.

This year has been the worst I have experienced since my disastrous multi-year quarter-million dollar divorce early this century which cost me extrajudicially my three children through the real phenomenon of Parental Alienation Syndrome (PAS) perpetrated, in my opinion by their mother and her unscrupulous coterie of "professionals, whois I believe a covert narcissist. Look up covert narcissism, it'll make your blood curdle. Only that half-decade was worse than this year has been. And next year and the year after that, and 2024 might be progressively worse yet. I fear for America and think it might break up into several nations as a result of the tyranny of the minority (the less populated, less productive and crazily evangelical  hinterland) that the likes of Mitch McConnell and his ilk have forced upon the majority for decades now through quirks in the constitution such as the electoral college and each state having two senators so California's teeming millions can be negated in the Senate by Wyoming's few hundred thousands.