 “I figure apartheid in the old South Africa didn’t end because of morality or outrage, but because of all the public toilets they had to build. See, there were four racial classifications: white, black, coloured, and Asian. Instead of building, let’s say in a public park, one restroom for each sex, and a single drinking fountain for everyone, the South Africans had to build eight bathrooms and four drinking fountains. Think about it. Cricket fields. Amusement parks -- suppose you owned a real small telephone-booth of a diner -- a place where you could only fit about five big eaters and you had to build eight restrooms? Crazy, huh? Then, of course, they had to build separate septic tanks, use separate sewers…”
Please give to the Police Protective Fund: P.O. Box 1084/ Schenectady, New York, New York 72301/ 877-343-2477
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 “It was a brick-oven summer: the wild grass on each side of the trail was waxen and yellow. The dusty black oaks withered in sun fright. The ponderosas looked tired and thirsty. It was fire season. One good drunken cigarette butt and the whole ridge would go. The sun squatted overhead, uh, heavy and fascistic. The powdery dirt of the old gold miner's track hugged the wall of steep hairpin cliffs. Below: splashin amidst giant boulders was the South Fork of the Yuba River, crystalline and clean mountain water. White, polished granite walls reflected the sunlight ten-fold. It was like being in the center of a hundred shinin mirrors; even I got sunburned at riverside durin fire season -- I stopped, stared across the river at the black mouth of an abandoned mine shaft, which cut through the solid rock of mountain. Over the years a slim finger of the river had been diverted through the half-mile cave, and it drawled from the lips of the tunnel like spittle from a stroke victim -- I was still breathin, home from Vietnam.” (from a novel by Kevin O'Kendley, slightly altered by suggestion).
Please give to the Wounded Warrior Project, National Processing Center: PO Box 758540/ Topeka, Kansas 66675/ 877-832-6997 Semite: “A member of any of various ancient and modern peoples originating in southwestern Asia, including the Akkadians, Canaanites, Phoenicians, Hebrews, and Arabs. 2. a Jew. 3. a member of any of the peoples descended from Shem, the eldest son of Noah.” - Dictionary.com
Please give to the Anti-Defamation League: 40 Court Street, #12/ Boston, Massachusetts 02108/ 617-406-6300  “I’m not gunna to get into the argument of Intelligent Creation versus Darwinian Accidental Evolution -- or that all life has just been a series of compounded and convoluted mistakes as scientists believe -- but the fact that the Trump Administration even exists could be a dramatic point against the Intelligent Creation crowd.” (Had some help with this one).
Please give to the Barbara Bush Children's Hospital (at Maine Medical Center): 22 Bramhall Street/ Portland, Maine 04101/ 207-662-0111 Happy President's Day...  “There’s a room, uh, with twenty-five white guys in it -- they run a Fortune 500 company… The, uh, men in the room see each other as, uh, whatever they might see each other as -- competitors, equals, allies. Some of the guys are good men, some bad; some are dysfunctional mutts like most of us… Some couldn’t imagine harmin anyone because of, uh, gender, color, through job opportunity, discrimination: some would find discrimination, uh, somewhat wrong; some not so wrong; some wouldn’t give a shit; some would discriminate as policy… Outside of the room there’s a brown lady, a black man -- uh, a Chinese lady, a Mexican man, a Russian lady -- no matter how the people outside the room see the people inside the room, they might see a room for white men only…”
Please see Carbuncle Moon post: 11/10/16 Please give to the Bangor area Homeless Shelter: 263 Main Street/ Bangor, Maine 04401/ 207-947-0092  “Donald Trump’s mother was an immigrant to the U.S. -- she fled Scotland because men there don’t wear underwear underneath their kilts. She found a good German-American man in New York City that wore underwear -- so she married him.”
Please give to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Case Postale 2500, CH-121 Geneve 2 Depot, Suisse/ 41 22 739 8111.  “24 years ago I, uh, was the only white guy in a six-man cell in L.A. County Jail. There were nine or ten guys in the cell -- three or four of us sleeping on the floor. A couple of months ago I was watching a CNN -- Lisa Ling -- special on L.A. County Jail. About 1 out of 4 guys were white. It was good to see real proof of the evolution of integration in our society.”  "When I was young I discovered that a woman's breasts weren't always the same size. I began to hope that someday with study, hard work, and heart, I'd, uh, have a job somewhere measurin individual breast-cup sizes at a custom bra facility. I'm still lookin for work."
“Officials in Pakistan say they have killed at least 39 suspected militants in a sweeping security crackdown a day after a massive bombing claimed by Islamic State (ISIS) killed 88 people and injured hundreds more at a crowded shrine.” - Guardian (U.K.)/2-17 I'm sorry for your loss... Please give to the Pakistan Red Crescent Society: Near Allama Iqbal Open University/ H-8, Islamabad, Pakistan/ Phone: +92-51-9250404  “There is good in the world, simple, uh, complex, dysfunctional -- perfect and not perfect. I'm related to outlaws that lived in America during the 1930s. They were bank robbers and horse thieves, uh, not er, ah, Gardai, uh, and priests, like my family in Ireland. I like to believe that if the O'Brien boys had come across a Klan lynchin they would have risked all, includin their lives to have stopped it: Good isn't perfect…” (I had some help with the dialogue/ edited 10/11/17)
Please give to Nor-Cal Inland Chapter of Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation (JDRF)/ 950 Fulton Avenue, Suite 150/ Sacramento, California, 95825/ 916-920-0790 “Guadalupe García de Rayos -- who inspired protests in Phoenix, Arizona, when she was detained Wednesday (2/8) during a routine check-in with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) -- was deported to Mexico on Thursday morning (2/9).
"García de Rayos, a 35-year-old mother of two, came to the United States illegally when she was 14 years old. She has been required to regularly check in with ICE officials since 2008, when she was caught using a fake Social Security Number to gain employment.” - Katie Reilly (2/9/17)/ Time Poverty can be both the inspiration and ruination of dreams; but the tipping point is at the heart of a nation. - (Poverty) Kevin O’Kendley Please give to Farm Worker Justice: 1126 16th Street NW, Suite 270/ Washington, DC 20036/ 202-293-5420 The 16th president of the United States, Abraham Lincoln, was born in Kentucky on February 12, 1809. He was assassinated on April 15, 1865, in Washington DC. - sources: Abraham Lincoln On-Line/Wikipedia
Please see Carbuncle Moon blog of 2/12/16. |
A carbuncle is a roiled mass of skin or a beautiful gem. The incredible gem is pictured in the logo below and at the bottom of the short story section...
Kevin O'Kendley is the owner of Carbuncle Moon, and the author of all original material -- cartoons, blogs, shorts, essays, articles -- on the website (there has been a very limited editorial input in some of my work). All quoted sources are noted. I am responsible for all posts. The only blogs not time-dated are those advertising nonprofits. All nonprofits are vetted, investigated, though after the summer of 2018 my vetting has lapsed: (6/1/21).
Kevin O'Kendley: P.O. Box 172, Winterport, Maine, 04496, and 200 P Street, A-32, Sacramento, California, 95814, [email protected]. Technical help is provided by an evolving computer genius, my son, Conor O'Kendley: A good kid with a great heart who can be reached at P.O. Box 172, Winterport, Maine, 04496. (Conor is in the Navy now, a swabby) Photography provided by a visual artist, my daughter, Caitlin O'Kendley: a young woman with a beautiful soul. (Caitlin is in college now, a media-journalism student) If your nonprofit is advertised on this site and you wish to have it removed please contact me at the above listed snail-mail or email address or use the contact form on the website. If you download a blog, cartoon, a short story -- or for any other reason -- and wish to donate $ to this site, its author and technical support personnel, please send donations to above listed addresses payable to Kevin O'Kendley. My family and I could use the dinero. All cartoons, blogs, and short stories are for sale. Categories |
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