Things I have thought about this morning, in no particular order:

• Do children swear in Switzerland?
• How much does a shared sense of humor encourage fascism?
• Why can I find an image of Bill the Cat immediately and not find a demonstration planned in my city for today? If there isn’t one, why not?
• Why do I often feel as if people are giving me the side-eye when I do go to a demonstration? Is it because I hate carrying signs? I like being able to disappear onto a bus after a demonstration, it’s true, and it’s awkward to do that carrying a large sign. Also, I have shoulder problems. Mostly it’s because I don’t do things I don’t want to do.
• I’m an introvert and though I like having conversations on the bus, I tend to get annoyed by people striking up conversations with me when they look as if they never ever ride the bus unless they are going to or from a demonstration. And yes, I mean genteel-looking, nervous, elderly white people carrying signs, who aren’t sure they actually want to sit down on the plastic seats because someone else has sat there at some point. They see me carrying a sign and they look relieved. I get it. I’m on the bus because I don’t have a car any more and it’s how I get around.
• It’s not their fault they look nervous. My friend rides a motorcycle and works in a prison, and she’s nervous about riding the bus. I’m just impatient with all of them, that’s all. It’s a bus. People take the bus all the time, with perfect equanimity.
• My mother used to work at a hospital in a tough area of Philly, and she used to roll up her car windows when she got onto Girard Avenue, which is a block away from where I live now.
• Should I donate the space heater, the humidifier, and the fans to the organization that picks them up from my front step, or should I put them out on the sidewalk with a “FREE” sign? I have good luck either way, but it’s going to snow.
• Most of the protests in my area are absolutely packed with people my age and race, probably because it’s safer for us. It won’t affect our careers to get arrested and we are slightly less likely to be attacked by the police.
• Though tell that to my friend who got tear-gassed in the face while she was zip-tied and seated. She is not only white, she is pretty and slender. Maybe it was the shared sense of humor police have.
• I need to get another box of tissues and some eyedrops, that reminds me.
• The grandchild was on his last nerve yesterday and yet my adult kid was still trying to get him to say “Please” and “Thank you.” I admire the tenacity of both of them but seriously they both needed to read the room.
• Why does my friend want to meet for coffee tomorrow morning? I know why she says she wants to, which is that it might snow Sunday. But why does she really want to? Huh?
• What am I going to do today? I already have enough groceries. I know, I’ll go for a long walk. Maybe I’ll happen upon a demonstration. I’ll take the bus when I get tired.
• I hung out with my kid in the coffee shop yesterday, and then the family came over for dinner later on, so I can’t go hang out with my kid today, even though it’s supposed to snow Sunday.
• My acquaintance complained that the forecasts are all over the place. I probably should have said that Trump cut the NOAA and the NWS so it’s not surprising. But I already told her that tariffs punish consumers in the USA more than they punish manufacturers in other countries, so maybe overkill?
• I should not have bought this jacket. It makes me look like a snowball. But at least I’m warm.
• I am fortunate. I have a new furnace, and food. I renewed my TSA Pre-Check even though I’m not planning to travel any time soon, and in May I’ll renew my passport, and then maybe it won’t be a problem if I’m arrested, especially if I haven’t actually broken any laws and I’m white so they let me go.
• I should check in with my friend who went to Mexico to get dental care. I gather it didn’t go super well.
• Maybe I’ll get something done today. Let me check my list. I already did a load of laundry and scraped the litter pan, so that’s done.
• I put the trash out last night, forgetting Monday was Martin Luther King Day. I wish he was still alive. He would be causing some serious trouble right now. No, he wouldn’t, he would be in his 90s, but you know what I mean.
• Breakfast, that’s what the next thing is.