MUSINGS IN THE EARLY AM

     Almost four in the morning and I have been at the computer for close to two hours. It is both a gift and a curse to be up in the middle of the night when no one is around. That is the gift. One can hear one's own thoughts and take the time to think things through, yet on the other hand, one is craving the luxury of sleep, the ability to close one's eyes and get another blissful and blessed few more hours of sleep.
     But, instead, here I sit, reading headlines and stories, doing crosswords and even Sudoku which I do not necessarily love. And here I sit getting even more sad and perhaps resigned to the fact that things never change. Israel's Maccabi  Tel Aviv team won a championship in Europe by beating the Real Madrid team. Instead of taking the loss as that, no, it became the excuse for a vile outpouring of over 18,000 tweets on an anti Semitic hashtag. 29% of  adults in Spain are anti Semitic according to a survey so how much has changed since 1492 and the horrific years of the Inquisition? Now the mine disaster in Turkey is being blamed on the Jews because an owner has a Jewish son-in-law! People throw bananas at sports figures they do not like and who are of a different color. Will we never learn? Will baseless hatred never stop?
What is its point and where does it get us, the human race? Certainly no further along in solving our problems.
     Here in our own little world, CV, the situation is not really all that different. Baseless hatred? Jealousy? Desire for power? Even more nefarious reasons? These and other base emotions keep our UCO administrative body from making use of all its residents and their talents and instead induces bad feelings and worse. Today is Challenge Day 18.
Where are the answers to my requests for committee placements? To date, there are none aside from one excuse.
     If one looks at the sign in sheets of  meetings in UCO there are now the same names over and over again, with few guests of opposition to the present administration. There are a few stalwarts who have continued to fight the good fight, those who prevented the administration from going through with a LIFT for $140,000 for Hastings, but it is hard to be the only one in the room to naysay, to be made to feel unwelcome and unwanted. People have given up. How sad for us.
     And thus concludes the musings of the night.