The Curmudgeon

File this under "One more reason to await the arrival of outside cooking season": the Bacon Explosion. Bacon stuffed in sausage and wrapped in bacon, then barbecued.

Oh. My. Goodness.

"Cake", in this instance, is an outside temperature above 0 F.

We've been dutiful little Minnesotans- taking the icy slaps with minimal whining. It isn't like we're asking for a THAW, just a temp without a minus sign. And the weather folk promised.

But it is a lie.

Bastages.

Sad, sad news today for your Curmudgeon. Peter Freyne- a journalist landmark of Vermont- has passed. I cannot eulogize him any better than has been done at Seven Days, where he did a good deal of his reportage.

When I lived in Vermont, and specifically when I lived in Burlington, I made sure and double sure that I got the weekly alternative journal Seven Days each and every week. Yeah, I was (and am) a nut for alternative free weeklies- and Seven Days did not disappoint. Every issue- the first thing I did was to look for Freyne's stuff- it was how I learned the political landscape of Vermont.

Even when I moved here, I would still check online to catch Freyne and check up on the goings-on in Vermont.

I fondly recall meeting Peter, a decade ago. We had an evening of drinks and a great conversation- an actual pubhouse dialogue. He was just out for the evening, and I was there unwinding after another day of rocking the line at the restaurant, catching the Bruins game.

Our conversation went all over the map- conceptually, politically, and geographically. We toasted Royko and Slats Grobnik, we lamented the way the small farmers in the Midwest and in New England were being strangled into a toxic submission, we reminisced fondly of the glory days, and the not-so-glory days of the Blackhawks. We talked of the unique, independent spirit of politics in Vermont. Ireland, and whisky, and beers, and how the art of conversation was being lost. It was a great night for me, and after that, we'd always greet each other when we'd bump into each other out and about in ole 'Burlap.

Requiem in pax, Peter. Hope you're gonna keep 'em honest there.

Okay, so we here in Minnesota are heading into what has been billed as the coldest week of the winter so far. Given that this is Minnesota, and it is January, perhaps it is not surprising news. Still, we are deep into winter, and have been long inured to what that means: life is a cold, windy, snowy trek which takes place a great deal in darkness. This 'arctic air mass invasion' (do we really need to keep extending military metaphors into every facet of life? really?) has nonetheless been getting attention and mention for nearly a week now- which to this Curmudgeon's mind means but one thing:

It is gonna be freaking nasty this week.

I offer the above observation to the many people who are now crowing about Franken's apparent victory in the Senate race. I can't help but notice that MANY of them are, well, not here in Minnesota. They're not Minnesotans on vacation, in exile, or anything of the sort. These folks are just really psyched that their choice for our representation in the Senate has won. Personally, I'd kinda like to make the choices of my representation myself. Anyway- this is for them:

Please, when you decide to do more crowing about "Senator Al Franken", at least acknowledge that you are cheering from outside. Or, alternately, make also the mention of how this is truly the land of the ice and snow, where commuters can't drive and political gas-bags blow.

Your Curmudgeon hopes he will not feel compelled to be writing any more about this topic, but he fears that this is not the case.

If pressed for kind words about Minnesota or Minnesotans, the first thing this Curmudgeon would mention is that the people of this state get hockey. The appetite for the sport is on par with my own, and I do appreciate that.

After the dizzying crush of the holidays, as the New year's dawn reveals that lo, what we have to face is a crushing slog through January and February and a sloshing slog of March- it is then perhaps that hockey seems never so welcome. Next week, FSN will do their Hockey Day-Minnesota (an idea borrowed from the Canadian Broadcasting Company's Hockey Day in Canada), a celebration of the sport at all levels and venues. In February, the CBC will have their own fete.

Today, though, there is hockey a plenty for me. A Bruins matinee, and a full schedule of hockey tonight, including Hockey Night in Canada... If ya want to find me, I'll be at the house, watching hockey.

If there is a more sorry sack of spineless shit excuse for a Senate Majority Leader than Harry "I have to borrow my balls from Mitch McConnell's handpurse" Reid, your Curmudgeon isn't sure he even wants to know about it. For entirely too long, the nation has waited for the Democratic Party to act like, well, just act. The time for waiting needs to be over. It is time for leaders to lead.

We've heard the "be patient- let the Democratic party get a real majority in the Senate" line, and so we waited. We waited and waited and watched the shameless and brazen cabal of Republicans throw out threat after threat of filibuster- not actual filibusters, just the threat of a filibuster. We saw how this pretty much ensured that damn precious little (save the open rape of the treasury by the wealthy elite) happened, and how this lack of action was placed on the plate of the Democratic party come elections.

And the Democratic Party won HUGE across the board despite that.

So now that the Democratic Party has that 'real majority' in the Senate, has there been any sign of leadership? Nope. The first and most obvious, most easy step would have been to drum Joe Lieberman out of the party caucus. No more chairing committees, no more of his droopydawg jowls flapping for the criminal cabal and the loyalist rethugs, none of it. It didn't happen, of course, and the Joe Lieberman who stood at the RNC and supported Grampy McSame and Milfy Winksandflirts, the Joe Lieberman who questioned Obama's patriotism, that Joe Lieberman was welcomed back into the fold, with vapid and flaccid promises of new-found loyalty.

It really shouldn't come as any surprise then, now that the 111th Congress has begun, that Harry Reid has continued to be a craven coward and let the tempo be set by the minority party, the party who overwhelmingly lost in November. The stimulus bill which President Elect Obama wanted ready for his signature at Day One- nah, that is off til February now. And when it comes to seating new Senators- even provisionally- well that would require stones well beyond Reid's feeble ability.

A Curmudgeonly bit of advice to the Democratic Leadership- whatever little bit of patience vested in you is dwindling quickly. It is time to start leading, and that means taking action. Leading means not backing down from weak-willed challenges. Leading means forcing the damn issue. The nation is facing some very dicey times, and continuing to be the collaborateur with the political factions and failed ideologies which have wrought this nightmare will not save the day.