A Walk on the Dark Side

Melanie comes home tomorrow! I'm really excited to see her; she has been gone for too long.

Last week at work Steve told me about a beautiful cemetery in the 20th arrondissement called Père Lachaise. Each year it welcomes over 3.5 million visitors, making it the most visited cemetery on the planet.

Earlier today I took a long walk to check it out. I'm still pretty depressed about the election so my destination seemed like an appropriate complement to my melancholia.

I got off to a bit of a late start so by the time I reached the 20th the sun was starting to go down. Here are some photos I snapped while I still had some light:

This is one of the paths leading into the cemetery

Oscar Wilde, Honoré de Balzac, Frédéric Chopin, Édith Piaf, and Molière are buried or entombed here 

This is one of the three World War I memorials at Père Lachaise

As you would expect, it is a very quiet and peaceful place... rather unusual for Paris

The cemetery was established in 1804, which is practically modern for this part of the world

Some of the structures were breathtaking

I liked the way the fading sunlight filtered through the windows of this mausoleum

WHAT... THE... HELL...

It's two days after the election and I'm still in a state of shock. Donald Trump is going to be the next President of the United States? How is that possible? What is wrong with people?

I had work the next day so I only stayed up until about 2:00 AM watching the returns.  When I went to bed Trump was leading in Florida but the polls weren't closed yet. There were no other big surprises so I feel asleep feeling pretty confident.

The next morning I climbed out of bed at about 7:00 AM, turned on my computer, expecting to see news of Hillary's victory, and nearly fell out of my chair. I was literally shocked to my core.

Over the last few days I've read some great articles about the election, about Trump, and about the possible ramifications of his presidency. I think my own efforts to write something profound and intelligent would pale in comparison, so I'm going to turn -- as I often do in times of great stress -- to humor:

After reading the headlines I posted THIS to Facebook

A few hours later the news really hit me in the gut, and I shared this [non-funny] comment:

There are SO MANY reasons to be terrified right now, but for the moment I'm most afraid for my Muslim and LGBTQ friends (and future family) back home. 

I'm so glad it's raining in Paris today... because in the rain no one can tell if you're crying.

In retrospect that sounds overly dramatic, but I was pretty devastated.

In recent years I've been intrigued (and a little disturbed) by all the "our world is just a computer simulation" theories out there. Even Elon Musk has said, "There’s a billion to one chance we’re living in base reality." That got me thinking about the election and I posted this to Facebook:

The entity in charge of the simulation we probably live in must have gotten REALLY bored. 

(Like when you get tired of playing "The Sims" so you start doing wackadoodle shit just to see what will happen.)

I shared some other posts I found online. This one really made me laugh:

This gave me my first post-election smile

I was pretty proud of this Facebook post:

John McCain said something very similar after his election. (I probably saw it and forgot.)

Reddit also had some great comments and humor. I thought this one was really clever:

It's going to be very easy for Trump to build his wall... 

'Cuz people everywhere are shitting bricks right now."

I'll probably have more thoughts about all of this after it sinks in a little more... 

Melanie is Heading Home

Unfortunately, Melanie's mother is having some issues with her throat and will probably need surgery.  Her primary doctor is in Seattle so she has to go there for the procedure.

Autumn offered to take care of her Grandma, but between two jobs and graduate school she obviously doesn't have a lot of spare time, so Melanie is flying to Seattle to help out. She leaves on the 6th and comes back on the 20th.

Not much else is going on with me at the moment. Of course, the election is dominating the news right now. How in the hell did Donald Trump get this close to the White House??? There's no way he's going to win, of course, but the fact that he got so close to our nuclear codes is troubling to say the least.

Here's a picture of Donald, making fun of a disabled person