ON THE AVENUES: I won’t belong to any Dry January that would have me as a member.

What shall we use
To fill the empty spaces
Where we used to talk?
How shall I fill
The final places?
How should I complete the wall?
-- Roger Waters

Earlier this week I donned headphones and listened to Pink Floyd’s album The Wall for the first time in ages. It didn’t occur to me that it had been almost exactly 40 years since the record's release. The Wall came out in late 1979, and by summer of 1980 it was everywhere, unavoidable and inescapable.

Here's a confession: Pot never really was my go-to substance, but admittedly some of my friends and I smoked a good bit of it listening to The Wall, and I've never regretted a single toke.

Seeing as my default setting, then as now, is to resist simpler (simplistic?) pleasures, it wasn’t enough for me to enjoy the music this week. I felt compelled to catch up on my reading, and into the unremitting rabbit hole of internet archives I dove.

The Wall isn’t the only instance of a massively popular rock band sternly meditating on the torturous aftershocks of stardom, but it’s the most commercially successful example. That’s because Waters, for all his vitriolic rhetoric likening rock shows to combat, wasn’t really a punk. He was a populist. It didn’t matter that he hated actual people: He still sought, perhaps unconsciously, their acceptance, because like all insecure rock stars, the only thing Waters feared more than Pink Floyd being huge was Pink Floyd not being huge.

Vitriolic rhetoric?

Now there’s something I can unequivocally endorse.

In chemistry, a vitriol is a sulfate. The word derives from the Latin vitriolum, or “glassy.” Apparently this is because “the crystals of several metallic surfaces resemble pieces of colored glass.”

At some point after the fall of Rome, vitriol came to be used to describe sulfuric acid, which has caustic, bitter, corrosive and pungent characteristics. Then in the late 1700s someone thought to transfer the word to the realm of human thoughts and feelings, hence vitriol, used to indicate harsh, bitter, caustic and corrosive criticism or comments.

I love this word, vitriol. The synonyms read like a who’s who of the reactions inspired in me by the sheer insipidity of life in New Gahania.

• nastiness
• sarcasm
• venom
• disdain
• hatefulness
• hostility
• malevolence
• maliciousness
• virulence
• acrimoniousness

In my interior world, these terms are to the practice of principled polemics what certain spices …

• Cumin
• Coriander
• Mustard seeds
• Ginger
• Garam masala
• Turmeric
• Cinnamon
• Cardamom
• Spicy red chile pepper

… are to Indian cuisine.

Curry meets contempt, and souls are unburdened.

---

As months of the year go, January doesn’t get any respect. In fact quite a lot of vitriol is aimed in January’s general direction; in addition to being cold, dark and seasonally depressed, all those tax materials aren’t going to organize themselves, and January is when you resolve to wait until the second week of April to get started.

Trust me on this. Every damn year, try as I might.

But as if January weren’t already dire enough, some folks now insist on prefacing it with a tremendously gloomy adjective, redolent of defeatism and despair: Dry, as in Dry January.

It’s bad enough that bizarre pretend-substances like Michelob Ultra, “hard” seltzer and peanut butter “whiskey” pass through human lips, much less that after eleven months solid of all you people swallowing them -- c'mon, it’s not really drinking, is it? -- you're compelled to invent social media strategies to, um, "get healthy," though only for a very short time.

What’s left without booze, milk? It's a horrifying thought. If ever there was a valid rationale for “drying out,” the proper liquid of exclusion would be milk. It’s liquid snot, nasty and not tasty in any way.

Milk is an aesthetic and culinary outrage on a par with Chick-fil-A and Taco Hell.

Milk is a conspiracy foisted on us by the multinational diary lobby.

Milk has no reason to exist for adult consumption apart from the utility of making it into cheese or ice cream.

Once I had a dream in which I was drinking milk and commenting about how perfectly it paired with fish and chips, and this nightmarishness hounded me for months.

Booze is the preferred antidote to this and most other conditions, although make my Russian black, not white. But how on earth does a guy self-medicate during Dry January?

My most malevolent assessments of Dry January are reserved for the planet’s killjoy health fascists, and there’s nothing like the condition of their preferred “dryness” to escalate the vitriol. This makes me appreciate Alain Ducasse even more.

French chef Alain Ducasse, an outspoken opponent of Dry January, has launched an initiative to entice patrons of his restaurants to drink more during the first month of the year, not less.

“I like swimming against the tide,” he told AFP on Tuesday, announcing plans to proffer top bottles of Burgundy and Bordeaux at knockdown prices to encourage diners to order wine by the bottle rather than by the glass.

“I’m obsessed with selling wine,” Ducasse said, adding that he was horrified to see customers in New York order iced tea with their lunch instead of wine.

Ducasse is right. I dislike iced tea almost as much as milk.

---

Listen, just think of me as the harmless reincarnation of comedian Don Rickles. It's nothing whatever personal with regard to anyone who currently is dry in January, or any other time. It's not that I object to health and well-being. I’ve been known to grudgingly contemplate largely unattainable ideals like these, and even put them into practice on widely scattered occasions.

However, like so many other facets of modern life, I’d appreciate greater attention to a daily foundation of quiet achievement and genuine merit rather than a Facebook-driven reliance on asinine hashtags, memes and hysteria.

Esther Mobley is the wine critic for the San Francisco Chronicle. For her, “responsible drinking” is an everyday consideration, one not confined to a particular month or period.

Those of us who write professionally about booze seldom address the issue of problematic drinking, probably to our detriment. I’m unmoved by arguments against Dry January that focus on the negative impacts they’d have on the wine industry: It’s not my job to defend any industry, and wineries ought to have to win customers’ business in sober-curious times as well as indulgent eras. In fact, it’s in the booze industry’s long-term interest that its customers become introspective about their health.

The reason I’m not doing Dry January, however, is because I consider it a more meaningful achievement to practice responsible drinking year-round.

That's my stand, but pay no attention to me. I've become comfortably numb, with or without the milk (or the cream liqueur) of human kindness.

---

Recent columns:

January 9: ON THE AVENUES: Elusive sounds of silence.

January 2: ON THE AVENUES: On patience, grieving, puzzles and a necessary sabbatical.

December 26: ON THE AVENUES: Four more years? Heaven help us all, but there are five reasons to be optimistic.

December 21: ON THE AVENUES HOLIDAY SPECIAL: Truth, lies, music, and a trick of the Christmas tale (2019 Remix).

Fear.

Perhaps there are valid criticisms of the author's arguments, but to me, it's the overall tone of fear. It's especially true here in New Albany. The fear is primal.

America's Cities Are Still Too Afraid to Make Driving Unappealing, by Emily Badger (Atlantic Cities)

... My commuting choices — just like everyone's — are the sum of the advantages of one transportation mode weighed against the downsides of all other options. Or, more succinctly: my feelings about the bus are mediated by what I'm thinking about my car.

At a macro level, this decision-process implies that there are two ways to shift more commuters out of single-occupancy vehicles and into other modes of transportation, whether that's biking, carpooling, walking, or transit. We can incentivize transit by making all of those other options more attractive. Or we can disincentivize driving by making it less so. What's become increasingly apparent in the United States is that we'll only get so far playing to the first strategy without incorporating the second ...

... The question is really how far we can get down the path of least resistance, pursuing only the politically easy tactics. If the goal at the end of the day is changing behavior, how much can you really achieve by showing people a nice new bike lane?

Exactly where is the opposition to law enforcement and street reform?

Grace Transue won't let up -- and why should she?

Her complaints to the Board of Works appear to have fallen on inattentive ears, but when the bookseller followed up with a devastating survey of non-enforcement patterns, the squirming became palpable, and qualifications began being issued far more often than actual speeding tickets.

In effect, as the bookseller pithily has observed, those with the misfortune of having their property values and quality of life compromised by lawless arterial streets -- ones that exist primarily to ease the passage of non-New Albanian pass-through commuters with little if any benefit to the city as a whole -- are being asked not to believe what their own eyes glimpse hourly throughout the day, but to trust the city's nervous assertion that there are no problems ... nothing to see here ... move along.

Meanwhile, we're all being asked to accept that the "quality of life" rationale for a megabuck public aquatics center is obvious, self-evident and need not be seriously debated ... but the very same considerations cannot be applied to the regeneration of core neighborhoods, where the mere existence of outmoded arterial streets actively negates the impact of monies spent to stabilize the very same area.

Last week a source in City Hall told the Green Mouse that in spite of oft-expressed public viewpoints like Grace's (and the East Spring Street Neighborhood Association for a full decade running, and 30+ independent businesses signing on to our emblem campaign), the current administration doesn't believe the general public has a firm opinion about two-way streets, and as such, City Hall absolutely must have a study affording political cover prior to simply lifting a finger to the breeze and noting the wind's current direction.

The only possible explanation for such persistent timidity on the part of a team that won election with more than 50% of the vote against three challengers COMBINED is that current opposition to street reform is coming from the ranks of the local Democratic Party's own elders and grandees. It's the only conceivable source of influence that makes sense. After all, the municipal GOP barely exists apart from Ed Clere's personalized brand. Jeff Gahan's electoral mandate is like no other in recent memory, and it's early in the term, long before the next city election. The air is heavy with propitiousness, and yet the deer remains frozen in the headlights of a reckless vehicle barreling down Elm Street.

Why the fear?

Apart from the seemingly bottomless vapidity of Bob Caesar, exactly where is the opposition to law enforcement and street reform?

Anyone?

Bueller?

CHEERS AND JEERS — For Nov. 16-17

READER JEERS

... to a lack of attention.

It has been over a month since I went to the New Albany Board of Public Works and Safety about the speeding on East Elm Street, and still there hasn’t been anything done about it by the administration of the New Albany Police Department.

I am wondering if there hasn’t been any attempt to curtail the speeding because someone doesn’t want to have any kind of history of the speeding when the decision has to be made about changing this street to two-way traffic. Whatever, how much longer will the NAPD allow speeding on East Elm Street?

— Grace Transue, New Albany

Pierce: "And, of course, this was not about race because nothing is ever about race."

Pierce says it well, as usual. This is what this case means. That is precisely why so many seem happy about it. They are as paranoid and as fatalistic and as likely to be armed as Zimmerman. Their imaginations do not extend beyond the boundaries of their own fear and there is nothing they fear more than a disruption or recalibration of those boundaries. They have been validated by the system that created them, again. They are the system.

What George Zimmerman Can Do Now, Charles P. Pierce (Esquire)

Calm is prevailing. For now. At least, that's something.

However, in theory, at least, here is what is now possible. Some night very soon, if he so chooses, George Zimmerman can load his piece, tuck it into the back of his pants, climb into his SUV, and drive around Sanford, Florida looking for assholes and fucking punks who are walking through neighborhoods where he, George Zimmerman, defender of law and order, doesn't think they belong. He can drive around Sanford, Florida and check out anyone who is dressed in such a manner as might frighten the average citizen who has been fed a daily diet of "Scary Black Kids" by their local news and by their favorite radio personalities, and who is dressed in such a manner as might seem inappropriate to their surroundings as determined by George Zimmerman, crimebuster. He can drive around Sanford, Florida until he spots an asshole or a fucking punk and then he can get out of his SUV, his piece tucked into the back of his pants, and he can stalk the asshole or the fucking punk, the one who is in the wrong neighborhood, or who is dressed inappropriately, at least according to George Zimmerman, protector of peace. If the asshole, or the fucking punk, turns around and objects to being stalked -- or, worse, if the asshole, or the fucking punk, decides physically to confront the person stalking him -- then George Zimmerman can whip out the piece from the back of his pants and shoot the asshole, or the fucking punk, dead right there on the spot. This can happen tonight. That is now possible. Hunting licenses are now available and it's open season on assholes, fucking punks, and kids who wear hoodies at night in neighborhoods where they do not belong, at least according to George Zimmerman, defender of law and order, crimebuster, and protector of the peace, because that is what American society has told George Zimmerman, and all the rest of us, is the just outcome of what happened on one dark and rainy night in February of 2012.

Reich: "We the People, and the New American Civil War."

This is a topic so obvious that quite a few of us have tried to ignore it. On the election's eve, don't expect encouraging reading.

We the People, and the New American Civil War, by Robert Reich (Huffington Post)

The vitriol is worse is worse than I ever recall. Worse than the Palin-induced smarmy 2008. Worse than the swift-boat lies of 2004. Worse, even, than the anything-goes craziness of 2000 and its ensuing bitterness.

It's almost a civil war. I know families in which close relatives are no longer speaking. A dating service says Democrats won't even consider going out with Republicans, and vice versa. My email and twitter feeds contain messages from strangers I wouldn't share with my granddaughter ...

I've been reading American Civil War history since I was a babe in the burbs, and there is an accumulated weight of recollection as to the intensity of feeling that took little to ignite into vitriol worse than what is being described by Reich. It was a nasty time, it took a century to even begin recovering from it, and now we seem intent on repeating aspects of it. I attribute this to sheer, unalloyed ignorance of history. Maybe it would be better to omit history, and simply refer to our abundance of just plain ignorance. Back to Reich:

 ... But I think the degree of venom we're experiencing has deeper roots.

The nation is becoming browner and blacker. Most children born in California are now minorities. In a few years America as a whole will be a majority of minorities. Meanwhile, women have been gaining economic power. Their median wage hasn't yet caught up with men, but it's getting close. And with more women getting college degrees than men, their pay will surely exceed male pay in a few years. At the same time, men without college degrees continue to lose economic ground. Adjusted for inflation, their median wage is lower than it was three decades ago.

In other words, white working-class men have been on the losing end of a huge demographic and economic shift. That's made them a tinder-box of frustration and anger -- eagerly ignited by Fox News, Rush Limbaugh, and other pedlars of petulance, including an increasing number of Republicans who have gained political power by fanning the flames.

What's the hourly council pay rate for dithering? Come hither and find out.

It must be spring break/NCAA tournament/sock darning time, because the Tribune turned to a "freelance writer living in Louisville" to cover last evening's numbingly predictable exercise in congenital city council futility.

Speaking of webvertising, did you know that when you click through to a Tribune link from NAC, you're providing the newspaper's web ad sales team with valuable ammo to close the deal? If you're thinking of placing such an ad, shouldn't you just run it here, and cut out the Alabama state pension system?

Sssshhh ... we don't want anyone to know that this is "just" a blog. It might compromise our rampant journalistic integrity. So, it's on to the links. First, Mr. Jones:

New Albany City Council postpones vote on sewer rates, by Michael L. Jones (Tribune)

... 5th District Councilwoman Diane McCartin-Benedetti was clearly perturbed that the council refused to vote on the ordinance Thursday night. McCartin-Benedetti said other members of the board were offering solutions without specifics and wasting precious time. If the city defaults on its bond debt servicing, the state could put the sewer system in receivership.

“This rate from the state could go away, that’s really what upsets me,” McCartin-Benedetti said. “I don’t want to be responsible for something going into receivership while I’m in office, you don’t know what that can do to us. If we keep talking about this and no one is coming out with figures, I say we should meet every single night, all of us. Every single night until we hammer this out and come to an agreement.”

Evidently, it was so bad that even the customarily upbeat Mrs. Baird regretted two and a half hours that she'll never get back.

ALL TALK AND NO ACTION (Voice of the People blog)

There is not much to report about the city council meeting tonight. The meeting lasted from 7:30 to 10:00 and virtually nothing was accomplished.

I ran into Maury Goldeberg earlier in the day, and he asked for a breaking blog update last evening. Obviously, there was nothing to update, other than a report that Steve Price accused fellow council members of thinking and studying, and vowed to vote against sewer rate increases three times, even though he is allowed only one vote. Consequently, perhaps Price's council tenure is the joke referred to by Maury in his blog entry:

City Council Meeting, March 18, 2010 (New Albany Today blog)

I was not in attendance this evening ... when I learned what transpired at the meeting tonight shook my head and uttered the phrase: "What A Joke"!