Still no time, dear reader.  Same deal as yesterday…iots going on.  Also, today I’m in a bad mood.  The seasonally inappropriate heat is not helping anything, mood-wise.  The heat and The Angst…always a dreadful combination.

N.P.: “The Race” – Yello

What’s happening, dear reader.  No time to talk tonight…lots going on.

N.P.: “I’m An Adult Now” – Pursuit of Happiness

Today’s depressing headline is: “More Humans Are Growing an Extra Artery in Our Arms, Showing We’re Still Evolving.”  The author of the article couples the increased artery growth with a relative decrease in wisdom teeth in newborns as yet even more evidence that (wait for it) “humans are still evolving.”  Gasp!
The story appeared in numerous publications, but the one I saw it in had “science” in its name.  That any entity professing to be “scientific” is treating the ongoing evolution of humans (or any other living thing, for that matter) as a newsworthy revelation is not only wrist-slittingly depressing but yet another example of the sort of scientifically impoverished and temporally provincial and myopic horseshit that seems to have taken over all academic discussions this century.  I see things like this, and my jaw drops…this got published in a science magazine?!  Then it gets worse as I realize that the reason it was published is that to the beard-curating Whiteclaw-swilling cretins that comprise this rag’s readership, it’s actually news.  They’re so egocentric as to think that they really are the apex of human evolution.  They’re also convinced that the world’s going to end during their lifetimes (it won’t), and that they are witnessing climate change far worse than anything that’s ever happened before (sorry Kevin, not even close).   It’s tempting to lampoon America’s embarrassing public school system here, but I don’t think it’s their fault…I don’t know.  Maybe.  I figured out continental drift the same year I learned how to tie my shoes.  The difference was someone had to show me how to tie my shoes.  There are some things that should just be rather obvious to anyone who’s spent more than a couple of years on this rotten planet, but I guess not.  Alas.

N.P.: “Gravel Road” – Clutch

I’ve got The Angst.

N.P.: “Hungry Like the Wolf” – The Rain Within

Good lord, dear reader…today was non-stop.  Last night was no picnic either.  But I got through it, got everything done.  Didn’t write shit.  No, wait…that’s not true…I wrote a couple hundred words in the car.  I got pissed off at politics and instituted a personal policy that if you text my fucking phone with political bullshit, I automatically vote against whatever it is you’re pushing.  Which is unfortunate, because there is one particular proposition that I was in favor of and was going to vote for, but I’ve now gotten two texts from people I don’t know, to whom I did not give my number, encouraging me to vote for this proposition.  But now?  Nope.  Fuck ’em.  I don’t have a dog in the fight, really, so I can easily throw my support behind the opposition.  And I don’t even like the opposition.  But the opposition hasn’t unsolicitedly texted me.  If they do, and both parties have overstepped, I won’t vote on it at all.  Uncivicly dickish, I know.  But there are boundaries, dammit.

N.P.: “Shot in the Dark” – AC/DC

Today was hectic, tomorrow will likely be more so.
Wheels tend to turn slowly, but they are turning.

N.P.: “Goin’ Out West” – Tom Waits

The Office of the Governor of California, perhaps the worst state in the U.S., issued the following statement:  “Going out to eat with members of your household this weekend?  Don’t forget to keep your mask on in between bites.  Do your part to  keep those around you healthy.”  Jesus.  You know, you spend a lot of time in childhood looking at the adult world and shaking your head and thinking to yourself, “Look at these idiots…they have absolutely no business being in charge of anything, but somehow, they’re in charge of everything.  Maybe I don’t want to grow up.  And then you grow up, and you realize that you were absolutely right as a child: The governor of a state larger than many countries is officially telling people to take a bite of food, then put on a mask, masticate, swallow, then remove the mask, take another bite, repeat.  Morons.

Speaking of morons, the various cowardly corporate entities who so blatantly displayed their willingness to absolutely sell out and abandon their own customers at the very threat of a hashtag campaign by an ignorant mob are suddenly slapping their corrupt corporate foreheads as they start to understand the damage they’ve done to their bottom line, which was, is, and always will be their only genuine concern.  If they think there is money in mouthing virtue-signaling platitudes, then that’s what they do.  And that’s what they thought, but then the ratings started coming in and, oddly enough, Americans don’t appreciate being falsely accused of racism by aggrieved parties who are enjoying multi-million dollar annual incomes for playing a game and bitching about being oppressed.  The NBA Commissioner and obsequious turd Adam Silver attempted to delicately deliver the news earlier this week, having suddenly noticed that the NBA’s viewership is in the toilet: the bullshit virtue-signaling social justice warrior bullshit will be left off the court and off the jerseys next season.  Mr. Silver and the NBA deserve every bit of grief they’re going to get from all sides about this.  It’s going to be fun to watch.

Meanwhile, over in Tulsa, the city government finally sacked up and removed a stupid and illegal BLM™ painting on one of its streets.  There were protests, natch, but nobody cared.

The first and best reality show in the history of television, “Cops,” resumed production recently.  Cancelled by the Paramount Network in a humiliating display of pusillanimity, the show has no intention of resuming that relationship.  Episodes being produced now are strictly for overseas markets.
The same bullshit happened to “LivePD” over at A&E, but Dan Abrams recently promised that the show is “coming back.”  I hope someplace other than A&E, because fuck them.  And Paramount too.  Cable’s dead anyway.

N.P.: “Put It in the Boogie” – Zach Deputy

Tonight we’re drinking to Uncle Eddie.  Thanks for teaching the rest of us how to play guitar.

N.P.: “Eruption” – Van Halen

I was invited to attend some online conference, which conference described itself as “a safe space” to talk about whatever bullshit the conference was about.  I immediately deleted the invitation.  Despite their invitation, they really don’t want me there.
Chief amongst my very few fears is ever being labeled a “victim.”  I have an active fear of someday being interviewed on TV because I was present at some catastrophic event and having the Chyron underneath my name say “Victim.”  I would sue the network.
I think a certain (embarrassingly large) segment of American society has it’s entire identity wrapped up in victimhood.  If you take away their identities as “victims,” there’s not much left.  And it people who have been taught and then bought into the notion of victimhood who need to be told by someone else that a certain space is “safe” in order to even consider going there.
Understand that I’m not talking about actual victims of actual trauma here…I’m talking about the delicate little entitled flowers who were raised playing scoreless sports and are now operating under the delusion that the world must bend around their delicate sensitivities so that they never ever be Offended (gasps…clutches pearls).  People whose most significant trauma to date has been the cancellation of SXSW this year.
More often than not, when some entity labels a space “safe,” that merely means you won’t be exposed to any opinions divergent from those of the organizers because differing opinions will not be tolerated.
I would think it would be extremely “empowering” (another term I loathe (because if you are “empowered,” what power you now have was given to you…it wasn’t yours in the first place, it had to be given to you by someone else, which is not real power at all, is it)), to know that whatever space you inhabit is a “safe space.”  You do this by knowing (not telling yourself, not listening to those idiots on The View, or The Talk or Oprah or whatever) it is safe because no matter what anybody says, you are unaffected.  Knowing that no matter what anybody says, you can defend yourself and your ideas and easily demonstrate why the opposition is wrong, embarrassing them in the process if you think that’s what the situation calls for.  And if you can’t do that, maybe it’s time to reexamine your ideas.

N.P.: “Saladin” – Hybrid

Made some headway putting the new studio together today.  Then things kind of got away from me and suddenly it’s nighttime.  Time does not behave the way it used to.

N.P.: “Don’t Stand So Close To Me” – The Police