I have a thing for masks, but this one is my least favorite. But it has come to this, dear reader. The smoke is so bad in Fecal Creek, yrs. truly is having to mask up. Seriously, it looks like Beirut on a bad day out there. Californians are asked to please refrain from breathing for the next 48 – 72 hours.
N.P.: “Rebel Yell” – Billy Idol
Holy shit, dear reader, I am frustrated. By pretty much everything. Surely this must be the apex of my frustration. The zenith. Or would nadir be more appropriate? I don’t know. Whatever the fuck. I’m just frustrated.
Made a bit of headway on the book this weekend. I should get back to it. Just wanted to say hey.
Hey.
N.P.: “That’s the Way (I Like It) – Pig and Sasha Grey
Well, shit, California. You voted to make moronic Daylight Saving Time permanent, and now the whole goddamn state is on fire. Which fire, by the way, dear reader, is not threatening me directly. I do appreciate the inquiries about my health a well being. California is a huge state, so to quell any further concern, I have a little place above a liquor store at the corner of Bedlam and Squalor here in Fecal Creek,, which is a perverted suburb just a few minutes south of Anhedonia, CA. We’re pretty impervious to fire around here: all structures are built with asbestos and petrified wood. The smoke, however, is dreadful. Orders have been issued regarding outdoor respiration and visibility whilst driving. The trees look forlorn. Lugubrious. Maybe it’s not because of the smoke, though. Maybe the trees are upset as I am about the passage of Proposition 7. Permanent Daylight Saving Time. Shit. The only hope now is the federal government, which are not words anyone ever wants to have to say.
Anyway, friends to the north and south, stay safe and pray for rain.
N.P.: “Squealer” – Genitorturers
The whole “I voted” thing with the stickers and all that strikes me as silly and childish and an example of the grotesquely misplaced priorities endemic to today’s culture. I guess it’s that by so loudly declaring that you have voted via garish stickers and social media posts, you are also declaring that this is either a rarity, a first, or some kind of actual accomplishment that you are proud of. Maybe it’s just another unavoidable empty gesture demanded by a desperate culture of inclusion that insists that everybody gets an award or at least a certificate of participation because we don’t want anybody to feel like some pathetically marginalized failure.
If you vote in every election, voting is not a big deal.
Look, you’re supposed to vote. There are innumerable things that, as an adult, you are supposed to do whether you want to or not: you’re supposed to file a tax return every year. If you’re in a certain age bracket, you’re supposed to register with the selective service. You’re supposed to pay a fee to register your car every year. You’re supposed to spend several hours at the DMV with the unwashed masses to renew your driver’s license. You’re supposed to show up when summoned for jury duty. And you’re supposed to vote in every election. You’re not supposed to want to do any of these things. And you don’t have to do any of them, but bad things happen if you don’t. They are each just another droll civic hassle that’s part of adult life. Every one of them is a pain in the ass. And you do them. But you don’t then run around putting bullshitty frames around your profile pic extolling to fact that you filed your tax return or paid your registration, and then, not suggesting as much as rhetorically bludgeoning your friends to register their cars too. Why not? Because everybody else did the exact same thing already, and they didn’t need your dumb ass to encourage them to do it.
Stickers are for brave five-year-olds who don’t cry during the routine cleaning at the dentist’s office.
N.P.: “Hau Ruck (Spezial K Mix) – KMFDM
Just taking a gander at the news. Some rapper’s cause of death was today officially listed as a “mixed drug toxicity” caused by an “accidental overdose of fentanyl, cocaine, and alcohol.” How “accidental” could that have really been? If it had been any one of those ingredients, sure…especially fentanyl, which is apparently popping up labeled as Vicodin. Dude goes to take his new prescription of Vicodin and accidentally ingests a fatal amount of something else, that is an accident. But fentanyl and cocaine and booze? That’s like saying the someone who died after being shot three times by three different guns fired by three different shooters was killed by an accidental shooting.
We could probably take a lesson from the Brits here. They would have labeled it “Death by Misadventure” which, if you must have a cause of death, is about as good as it gets.
Speaking of death, absolutely fuck Louis Farrakhan. The day he dies (which will be soon) is a day I smile and drink. More than usual. Another one off the list.
I should probably quit reading the news.
N.P.: “Lightning Man” – Nitzer Ebb
The villagers are having some sort of superstitious ruckus outside, so I’m sheltering in place. Laying low until they pass out or fuck off.
You know what else needs to fuck off? This stupid aloe plant. I was sitting right here the other night, scribbling away, and out of the corner of my eye, one of the stalks of this thing just collapses in half and starts oozing pure skincare/burn treatment goodness onto my desk. I thought about chucking the whole thing right then, but there are still two stalks left which, despite some bullshit going on down at the base, seem to be at least potentially more robust than this stupid broken dead thing just dangling over the edge of the pot.
I am presently so unpleasantly behind on the book that I can’t bear to think about it. Okay, it’s not that bad. I don’t know how behind I am. I may not be behind at all. It’s impossible to say. It’s like trying to figure out how much longer your drive is if you have no accurate idea of where your destination is.
N.P.: “Red Tape” – Agent Provocateur
Dearest and most intelligent reader…what’s crackin’? I was just reading about some idiots in the news, and the following paragraph appeared:
“Their thrill-seeking social media posts foreshadow the couple’s link to the growing problem of selfie deaths.”
Is it really a problem? Or is it just Darwin taking out the trash? I’m inclined to think the latter. After all, we, as a species, have gotten so damn good at surviving: our wars no longer kill off enough people to affect anything, and though health experts constantly warn about the potential for a herd-thinning pandemic, we so effectively control disease that it doesn’t rid us of anywhere near the numbers of the past. Even Ebola seems not only containable but treatable. So it’s rather poetic but also unavoidable that the rising causes of death will be manmade/self-inflicted.
The article continues:
“A study published this month in the Journal of Family Medicine and Primary Care said 259 people had died taking selfies between October 2011 and November 2017.”
A good start, but I think we can get those numbers up.
N.P.: “Somewhat Damaged” – Nine Inch Nails
All the usual apologies and excuses, dear reader…the road has been a bit rough on this end. Nothing I can’t handle, of course, but just enough little annoyances and inconveniences to keep me from certain non-survival oriented tasks, like, you know, posting here.
For most of the last couple weeks I’ve felt as if I’m on the verge of some kind of break, either a breakthrough or a breakdown. Which hasn’t been exactly comfortable, and it’s rather frustrating when neither breakdown nor breakthrough is forthcoming.
Another thing that is stressing me out is this goddamn plant. Yeah, I violated personal policy and bought a plant the other day, and the thing is being absolutely dickish. Obstinately refusing to thrive. I should have known better.
Here’s the deal: things don’t survive very well wherever I live. When I move in to a house, not only does the lawn die, but the lawns of the neighbors on the houses on either side of the house die as well. Household pets contract rare tropical disease or go on hellbent hunger strikes. Even non-living things are not safe: the most reliable appliances suffer catastrophic failure if attempt to use them for the simplest of purposes. Hell, I had a full-sized plastic tree in my apartment in Seattle, and after about two weeks, its plastic leaves turned brown and fell off and it just looked completely derelict and weird. It’s bad. So after decades of the same result, I implemented a personal policy which stipulates no living things in my domicile. No harm, no foul. And it’s worked out fine. So long as I’ve adhered to it. Which I have. Until last week, when I bought a plant at the grocery store for no good reason whatsoever. I’m sure there were reasons, but they certainly weren’t good ones. That I was grocery shopping whilst drunk likely had something to do with it.
Anyway, I bought this goddamn plant, and as soon as I got it in the door, this thing had started the death spiral. I googled a picture of the thing, and was told subsequently that this is an aloe plant. Low maintenance…the thing is supposed to love desert life, Rather impossible to kill…the only thing it absolutely cannot tolerate is standing water. And me, apparently, because this thing has done nothing but die for a week. I’ve given it water, withheld water, given it light, kept it in the shade. Whatever. Fuck plants.
N.P.: “Tougher Than Leather” – Run-D.M.C.
The days of frustration continue, dearest reader.
Wrote a couple songs yesterday. One’s an instrumental called “Nekid Pictures (of Your Mother).” It is a dreadful song and shall never be played in public. The other one is a children’s sing-along called “The Sun is Fucking Disgusting.” I’m doubting it will see the light of day (kind of punny) ever either.
Which is keeping with the theme of this last week: I also started working on a screenplay for an absurd slasher movie, just for the hell of it. Kind of a way to blow off steam, take a break from the other writing I’m doing, and as a bit of catharsis. It is likely no fit for public consumption, so of course it is just sailing along. if I was to focus exclusively on this little side show of a project, I could probably finish it in 3 days. Of course;: work on something never meant to be read and it just hums right along…work on “the book I was meant to write” and the words trickle out one, then later another. It’s crazy. And frustrating. And hopefully not pointless.
A reminder to California voters to vote Fuck No on Proposition 7. It is evil and the triumph of sun-loving extroverts.
If it passes, fear not, dear reader: as stated the other day, Agenda Item #1 on the day after I assume power after the revolution is abolishing Daylight Saving Time. Number 2 will void all driver’s licenses issued by the State of Oregon and ban all Oregonians from driving on any public thoroughfare. Wanna know what # 3 is? Hold on…I better have a belt of desk whiskey first.
Okay…the third thing I will do after assuming office the day after the revolution is to ban the use of an gasoline-powered yard maintenance equipment, including and especially lawn mowers, leaf blowers, chain saws, and wood chippers in all urban and suburban communities. Farmers, ranchers, and cult leaders on their compounds out in the hinterlands can do whatever the hell they want. But if you fire up one of those fucking leaf blowers within the city limits, you will be shot in the balls and then beaten with your own leaf blower.
An adviser has suggested that the beating might be a bit much, that being shot in the balls should be a sufficient deterrent, which is a perspective I’ve taken under consideration. Whatever. We’ll figure that out later. For now, just vote Fuck No on 7.
N.P.: “Angel” – Massive Attack
Ugh, dear reader. The world is too much with me, as Uncle Bill used to say. Far too much time spent on the road lately. Very uninspiring. That and I’ve got The Angst, big time. Angst with a side of fantods. And it sucks.
In addition to that, there’s this: you know how I don’t really get involved in politics at all? Maybe you don’t. The transient politics of humans hold little interest to me (so you can imagine how unceasingly bored I’ve been with pretty much everything for the last two years). But I suddenly started hearing about a proposition allegedly on the mid-term ballot that would repeal Daylight Savings Time. The significance of this may require a bit of additional explanation. It is difficult for me to find words that truly express the utter contempt I have for Daylight Saving Time. It is a bit of an embarrassment to me to be part of a society that engages in such a silly and pointless practice. Try keeping a straight face while attempting to explain it to someone from another country. I don’t think it can be done. And if you do manage to pull it off, I can guarantee that the person you’re telling will be at least smirking unkindly. Hell, our own Native Americans have described Daylight Saving Time as being “like cutting a foot off the bottom of a blanket, then sewing it back on to the top of the same blanket, and then claiming that you have a longer blanket. Which sums it up pretty damn accurately, I think. I have long said that after The Revolution, once I assume power, the first order of business will be not just to repeal but to in fact ban Daylight Saving Time forever as one of the few truly foolish and stupid ideas to ever come out of this country. Fuck Daylight Saving Time.
So I’m hearing all this stuff about Proposition 7 , and I’ve been responding with caution: if this thing actually repeals DST, then vote for it as many times as you can.
Dear Reader, that is not what California’s Proposition 7 does at all. It actually does the exact opposite: basically, it gives the legislature the power to enact PERMANENT DAYLIGHT SAVING TIME. This would be a nightmare.
I doubt you remember 1974, when Nixon declared emergency year-round DST for 16 months in response to the rather dire energy crisis we were having. It lasted 10 months, and then the riots began. People went nuts. They started lighting each other on fire in broad daylight, and eating the neighborhood children. It was a terrifying time, and I was lucky to make it out alive myself, and I’m not no hurry to return to those dark days.
Jesus, speaking of darkness, let me quickly put to rest any flat-earthers who also think that DST is a good or even necessary idea: it isn’t. The notion that farmers, ranchers, or any other agrarian sort needs DST to function is absurd. They get up whenever the hell they need to get up, which is usually about 2 hours before the sun comes up, regardless of what time you want to call it.
The notion that non-agrarian folks need DST for any reason whatsoever is ludicrous: electric light has been standard in American homes and businesses for about 70 years now, and the energy-efficient and mega-effective bulbs readily available to all consumers and businesses, the amount of sunlight in our sky has no real effect on what we are able to do or how we conduct ourselves. Rather than cause societal trauma twice a year, with an exponential increase in heart attacks and hundreds of millions of dollars in lost productivity, I offer this simple and perfectly reasonable solution: if the gets dark outside but you are not quite ready to go to bed, turn on the lights. If the sun is not yet up when you get to work in the morning, turn on the lights. If you need more daylight in your day, wake up earlier. But don’t throw the rest of us into temporal turmoil twice a year because turning on the lights or setting an alarm clock are just too much for you to handle.
The two idiots behind this turd of a proposition are Kansen Chu and Lorera Gonzalez. I feel a strongly worded letter coming on.
Damn, that reminds me…I already have a strongly-worded letter I need to write to Mr. P.F. Chang regarding the sudden absence of tempura green beans from the menus of their Bay Area locations (I haven’t checked the rest of the country yet, but I’m almost afraid to).
Also, the second thing I’m going to do when I assume power after The Revolution is to void all Oregon state issued driver’s licenses and ban Oregonians from all public roads. Look…we given it a fair chance, but those people are just not meant to drive.
N.P.: “Tainted Love” – Marilyn Manson