It reached 33°C today, and opening the apartment building door to step onto street asphalt was rather like turning one's face into the air stream of a warm hair dryer.
While trees and shrubbery have been pleasingly green late into August this year, thanks to the abundant rainfall, the grass on the median was looking suddenly golden and scorched again.
I went shopping for vegetables and fruit (apples, a yellow squash, mini-cucumbers, and onions, all grown in Germany, as well as red tomatoes on the vine that are probably from France), chocolate and milk and quark, lemon sorbet and salted caramel ice cream, this evening.
Although the shop sells organic produce and is presumably ecologically conscientious, that doesn't prevent it from cranking up its air conditioning: to the point that as you pass through the sliding doors, you practically enter a Swedish ice hotel.
Along the way I admired the dust on the huge windows of two long-abandoned businesses. Torn-up posters haven't been cleared away in months and have been joined by more posters for blockbuster music events: at the Berlin Philharmonic halls and elsewhere.
It feels like a failing of Berlin's or Germany's government that many shops lie empty as rents rise and e-commerce thrives, while affordable housing and dignified accommodations for vulnerable groups (including women's shelters) dwindle. There's an empty shop in our building, and the manager is concerned about losing the income: replacing the small 'to let' sign with a larger one, then replacing that large sign with an even larger one....
On the other hand, J. tells me – with the benefit of professional knowledge – that the official standards and requirements for residences are different and much higher than for office spaces.
Besides I cooked late lunch or early dinner: a "Huevos Hyacinth" recipe of cold cuts, tomatoes, egg, and cheese from The Pioneer Woman Cooks.
***
For reasons even I can't fully explain, I put myself through 15 hours or more of the Democratic National Convention, this past week. It started with wanting to know more about the mechanics of US politics, which I haven't closely followed in a while. It ended with a sleep deficit.
That said, many things felt worthwhile:
Hearing the Chicks sing the national anthem.
I enjoyed Democrats being less defensive about the 45th president, for example in the speeches of Barack and Michelle Obama.
Michelle Obama's no-nonsense demeanour made her speech stand out. I'd read the days before that Barack Obama had more or less pitched a fit in private to employees at the idea of Kamala Harris becoming the next president, but both she and her husband presented convincing endorsements.
I thought it was also interesting that other Democrats who spoke the following day made reference to the Obama's speeches. It left the impression that the pair are still considered as philosophical or strategic mentors in the Democratic Party.
I think an investigation and proper prosecution of Clinton's own misdeeds is overdue. (In a different speech, it was also a bit concerning in this – hopefully – less macho, misogynistic, and mafia-happy day and age to hear the grandson of JFK say that JFK was 'his hero.') But I did think it was interesting to hear Bill Clinton's perspective on Trump. ('He creates chaos, and then he sort of curates it, as if it were precious art,' was one quotation that I noted down.).
The perspectives of Republicans who want to vote for the Democratic Party in 2024 were interesting, too. ('John McCain’s Republican Party is gone, and we don’t owe a damn thing to what’s been left behind.’)
Kenan Thompson's bit, where the actor from Saturday Night Live said of the Heritage Foundation's capacious political programme Project 2025: 'Ever seen a document that can kill democracy and a small animal at the same time?'
The children of Tim Walz, and some of the speakers, did give the impression of having their feet on the ground and being genuinely decent, not just intimidatingly polished and elite.
J.B. Pritzker: The governor of Illinois made a few necessary points. (e.g. After working in an American company in recent years, I was relieved when Pritzker used his speech to say that African Americans and Latino Americans should not be derided as 'Diversity, Equity and Inclusion hires' for having the supposed 'audacity' of being successful while not being White.)
Pritzker's withering words about Trump stuck with me because they had the ring of truth:
'Everything he's achieved in his own life was by hurting someone else.'
Jadedly, I felt there was a lot of truth-fudging, hagiography and 'baloney' in the Convention. But there was also a bedrock of genuine, undeniable conviction: It is not possible for any properly informed citizen to re-elect the 45th President, if they care for the US.
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