I love Venn diagrams. Those three circles, right? I love Venn diagrams. Always ask, ‘Is there a Venn diagram for this?’ I’m telling you, it’s fascinating when you do.  ~ Kamala Harris

Alright, dear reader…Day 3 of the carnivore diet and I am cranky!  Badass that I am, I’m able to conceal my crankiness from all but the most familiar and astute observer.  But I am pretty cranky.  This is the longest I’ve gone without either sugar or caffeine as an adult, and I’ve gotta say: I thought it would be a lot worse than a little bit of crankiness.  I’ve heard of people getting “sicker than they’ve ever gotten” from cold-turkey sugar withdrawals.  Nightmarish headaches and chills/light seizures.  But so far, not bad.

The sugar cravings are the most noticeable.  After each meal (of which there are only now two: lunch and dinner, with lunch usually being the bigger of the two), I am completely full, but I still have strong cravings for anything sugary.   If I wasn’t paying attention, it would register as simple hunger, like “I ate my dinner, but I’m still hungry.”  But it’s not hunger…it’s my sugar addiction dying a death of privation.

N.P.: “Free – Black Noise Remix” – Vast, Chris Vrenna

The significance of the passage of time, right? The significance of the passage of time. So when you think about it, there is great significance to the passage of time.  ~ Kamala Harris

I decided to start the Carnivore Diet yesterday.   I’ve always had a pretty meat-centric diet, but I’ve tried to Go All The Way with it until now.  It is basically this: eat as much grass-fed steak as you want, seasoned only with butter and salt, and only drink water.  Also allowable are shrimp, salmon, chicken, and bacon.  If I ate eggs, those would be fine too, but eggs give me the fantods.  According to some of the black belts I train with (who talked me into this in the first place), you’re supposed to eat a liver a month to get all the vitamins that other cuts of meat may be low in (especially vitamin C), but liver is right next to eggs on my fantods-induction meter, so hard pass.

Even with all those options of meats, it’s a pretty spartan plan.  Most noticeable for this lifelong hardcore sugar addict is the complete dearth of sugar and carbohydrates.   I’ve heard some pretty nightmarish stories about quitting sugar cold turkey, so this is the only part that concerns me.  Also no booze.  Should be interesting.  Right now the plan is to try it for a week or two, and see what happens.

Yesterday was two center-cut filets for lunch and dinner, respectively.  Today I’m cooking a massive tri-tip.  Pretty sure this is the longest I’ve been without sugar.  Ever.

N.P.: “I Have No Name” – Andrew Duck MacDonald, Bryan New

I think it’s very important for us at every moment in time and certainly this one, to see the moment in time in which we exist and are present, and to be able to contextualize it, to understand where we exist in the history and in the moment as it relates not only to the past but the future.  ~ Kamala Harris

The puppy has this simultaneously annoying yet endearing habit of bringing weird shit into the house.  Unfortunately, sometimes that weird shit is alive.  Such was the case the other night, I believe, when, as I was just about to shut off the lights in the kitchen, I saw this ghastly fucking bug sort of undulating unpleasantly in the middle of the floor.  This malignant-looking mutation has the face of a nightmare, a weird yellow thorax (I don’t know what the parts of insects are called…I’m not an ickyologist) with horrible yellow legs, all lugging along this weird, swollen, bulbous ass.  [It just occurred to be that the previous sentence could be used to accurately describe any of the Kardashian girls, but this thing is even more monstrous and grotesque than they are.] It is wretched, foul, and ghastly and I hate that it exists.

I’m told by people who know, that when I see any kind of insect in the house, but especially spiders and anything I can’t easily identify, and also anything big enough that it looks like it might fight back (fortunately there aren’t too many of those in Northern California),  this is what they hear: “Oh hell no!  Fuck off!” which is then followed by a loud bang when whatever I am using to smash the creature hits whatever hard surface the creature is standing on, absolutely flattening the bastard, or a series of bangs interspersed with me yelling “motherfucker,” indicating that I’m dealing with a bug that moves quickly and/or knows how to hide.

Which is exactly what happened with this atrocity I found writhing on the kitchen floor.  Except normally, the time between me seeing an insect and the time that insect ceases to be is a second or two.  But this thing was so weird that I took a couple of seconds before murdering it to try to figure out exactly what the hell it was.  I only allowed myself to get so close out of fear of the thing jumping onto my face and doing horrible and perverse things.  But I couldn’t identify the thing, so I annihilated it where it writhed.  The insect was large enough that there was some light clean up involved, but the real problem had been solved: this mutant menace had been eliminated.

But things got really weird the next day, when I saw not one but two separate posts of the same meme by some local friends that featured this picture:

Yep, it was that same big bitch bug I had killed the night before.  But the caption on the meme was imploring those who see this bug in their gardens to not only not kill it, but to leave it completely alone.  “Benefits to your garden…” and such.  Everything under the picture was written in the anthropomorphized first person: “Please don’t kill me!  Even though I look scary, I am just a potato bug, or Jerusalem Cricket.”  Et cetera.  I shuddered to think of the limp-wristed, Disneyesque mind that came up with this garbage.

Despite all the counter-intuitive advice to not kill these things on site, it did give me a name to work with. Jerusalem Cricket.  You are my new enemy.  Your kind now join all spiders targeted by my Arachnojihad, which I’ve been waging for at least 40 years now.

It’s this sort of thing that kept me from being a Buddhist: the karma I must be racking up for all these bugs I unrepentantly kill is, I’m sure, staggering.  They would always try to lay that nonsense about one’s mother being reincarnated as any living thing, therefore you must never kill any living thing because it could be your reincarnated mother.  But, from my perspective, I’d be doing anyone I cared about a massive existential favor by ending their incarnation as some miserable insect as quickly as possible.

N.P.: “Ready or Not” – Manbreak

What do we know about 18 to 24-year-olds? They are really stupid. They make really bad decisions.  ~ Kamala Harris

It may be time for a new treadmill, dear reader.  The old one has served me well as I’ve put…let’s see…7305 miles on it.  Not bad.  I went through two (2) pairs of Under Armor running shoes racking up enough miles to run from Canada to Mexico and back multiple times.  So I can’t complain too much about its performance.
Until this week.
This week, the goddamn thing attacked me.
This week, due to what I assume is a faulty fuse, the treadmill just suddenly quits at some seemingly random point in my five-mile run.  If the treadmill behaved normally (and civilly), it would do the slow and gentle slowing from 10mph to zero over the course of several seconds, as it does when you press the “Stop” button.  But that’s not what happens.  This thing just instantly comes to a dead stop.  Which sudden stop sends me careening into the control panel  of the treadmill and sometimes into the wall just beyond, at exactly 10 mph.  Neither the control panel nor the wall, are particularly made to be crashed into at 10mph, and the result of the impacts thus far have been unusual bruising and an almost broken nose.
I’m going to change the fuse tonight and see if that takes care of it.  If not, I may start a GoFundMe to cover medical bills and the cost of a new, perhaps more padded treadmill.

N.P.: “Raise the Red Flag” – Marilyn Manson

I think it’s very important for us at every moment in time and certainly this one, to see the moment in time in which we exist and are present, and to be able to contextualize it, to understand where we exist in the history and in the moment as it relates not only to the past but the future. ~ Kamala Harris

Me: This is bullshit.  I’m not signing an NDA…not for these clowns.
Mgmt: I figured that would be your position.  That’s not the worst of it.
Me: Oh God…what else?
Mgmt: They want everybody on their team to…
Me: I’m not on their shitty team.
Mgmt: …and anyone working with their team, including influencers and freelancers, to be fully vaxed and boosted.
Me: It’s 2024.  We knew the “vax” didn’t work two years ago.  They probably want everybody to wear slave masks too.
Mgmt: And I quote: “Harris for President requires all employees to be up to date on COVID-19 vaccination status as prescribed by the CDC as a condition of employment, unless prohibited by applicable law.  If you seek reasonable accommodation in relation to the campaign’s COVID-19 policy, you should speak to the HR Department prior to reporting to an office location.”
Me: The Supreme Court said vax status can’t be a condition of employment.
Mgmt: The administration has a habit ignoring the Supreme Court.
Me: Pathetic.  The Biden-Harris White House announced an end to the bullshit vax mandates for Federal employees back in May 2023.  What gives?
Mgmt: The Dems love COVID.  Kinda like a security blanket.
Me: Well, it doesn’t matter…I’m not going to be an “employee.”
Mgmt: That’s not how they see it.  In fact, if you want to get paid,  there’s an application you need to fill out.  Here…I’m sending it to you now.

Me:  Holy shit.  These people are seriously fucked.
Mgmt: Indeed. Then, I didn’t even bother to send it to you, there is an “optional diversity survey.”
Me: Yeah, you send that shit to me, you’re fired.  My pronouns are “go/fuck/yourself.”
Mgmt: You could check the “custom” box and let them know.
Me:  Look, they already owe me over $3000 for what I’ve done for them already, and I’m assuming you’re not going to be of any help collecting.
Mgmt:  That assumption is correct.
Me: Pussy.
Mgmt: Hey man…they’ve got the Secret Service and FBI on their side.  I’m not touching them.
Me: Like I said: pussy.
Mgmt:  Hey, you’re welcome to try to collect $3,000 from them however you’d like.
Me: Nah…I don’t have time.  But I’m probably going to open up the guns on their campaign.  Linguistically, I mean.
Mgmt: Do what thou wilt.

N.P.: “The Man” – Small Town Titans

We must together, work together, to see where we are, where we are headed, but also see it as a moment, yes, to together, address the challenges and to work on the opportunities.
~ Kamala Harris

Does anybody else feel gross and vaguely queasy about the amount of gaslighting going on in the United States these days?  It’s probably just me.

N.P.: “Whole Lotta Sabbath (Wax Audio Lance Herbstrong Edit)” – Lance Herbstrong

“You’re out of your fucking tree” was the exact wording of my response to this absurd request.  At first I thought the call was just one of my friends pranking me.  But then I remembered that I don’t have any friends.  And these people seemed legit…but I couldn’t really believe that they’d ever approach me for such an assignment.  So I asked.

“Why me?” I asked.

I can’t see the person I’m speaking with over the phone, but they sound as if they are trying not to sound panicked and desperate.  It’s not working.

“The Harris Campaign has been going exceedingly well these first two weeks…”

“Oh, fer sure,” I interrupted.  “You managed to pull off the most successful palace coup since the Glorious Revolution of 1688 without a single democratic voter seeming to care.  Or even notice, really.  Most impressive.”

“Well, to be fair, our target demographic is…how shall I put this?”

“Dangerously gullible?”

“We prefer ‘pleasantly suggestable.'”

“They’re suckers.”

“That’s pretty aggressive.”

“I’m a pretty aggressive guy…I mean as opposed to pathetically suggestable.  Which is why I’m still wondering why you’re calling me.”

“Well, as great as it’s been going these three weeks, we have some…rather…significant challenges we need to overcome, sooner than later, but also sooner and later, if that makes sense.”

“It doesn’t.  What the fuck are you talking about?”

“It’ll be a lot easier to explain in person.  Where are you right now?”

“I’m nowhere near ready to share my whereabouts with you.  Why, where are you?”

“Where we are depends greatly on when we are.”

“I don’t think we’re going to get along very well at all.  Don’t be abstruse.”

“All I mean to say is that where we are now is almost irrelevant to anything pertaining to the making of plans since it is unlikely to the point of impossibility that we will be where we are much longer at all, let alone still be here whenever the plans are made for.  I guess it’s better to ask where we will be as opposed to where we are.”

“You’re giving me a headache.  And I don’t give a fuck about any of this.  Your people contacted my people and wanted me to do this.  You said 20k to go to the convention and do one post…I’m still weighing whether that will be worth it.  I would likely need combat pay to get anywhere near that catastrophe.  What about the non-convention deal?”

“We’ll give you $1200 per positive post about Kamala, and $1800 per negative Trump post.”

“And I don’t even need to leave my house to do this?”

“That is correct…in fact it’s probably better if you don’t.”

“Sounds good to me.”

“There is one thing.”

“What’s that?”

“You can’t talk about…not even mention…what or how she eats.”

“Wait…what?  Why?”

“That’s just the rules.”

“Weird.  Anything else off limits as far as questions or interviews?”

“Actually, both questions and interviews are off limits.”

“Waaaaait a minute…this idiot is suddenly running for president, and you’re telling me she’s not doing any interviews or answering any questions?  From me specifically, or at all, in general?”

“At all.  No questions.”

“Then what are we supposed to base our posts on?”

“The money that we’re paying you, that the other side isn’t.”

“The other side doesn’t have to pay anybody.  They do interviews and ask questions for free.  Your strategy is incredibly weird and will not work.”

“Sure it will…it’s been working like a charm so far: 21 days without any real interviews or press conferences.  Remember, she’s the Democratic nominee, and Dem voters don’t give a shit about anything she says…she just has to be not Trump.  That’s how Biden won.”

“Yeah, and look what you guys did to that poor old bastard.”

“We’re not talking about that either.  Can we count on you for the posts?”

“Yeah.  Sure.  God yes.  I’ll start immediately.”

N.P.: “Let Me Live / Let Me Die” – Des Rocs

One social media post?  I find your terms acceptable.

N.P.: “Nessun Dorma” – Jeff Beck

The democrats aren’t even pretending anymore.  Saviors of democracy my ass.  Over the weekend, in what can only be described as a palace coup, the party elites (3-4 people) decided to literally depose the democratic nominee (according to the primary vote), nullify 15 million democratic votes, and just give his nomination and campaign funds to someone else “who can win.”

While this is egregious and outrageous enough, what is truly unbelievable has been the democrats reaction to this: they don’t give a shit.  Which is just bizarre.  Apparently they’re fine with this blatant revelation that their political party is run by a small group of “elites” who are apparently totally comfortable overwriting the will of their own people, and why shouldn’t they be…their own people won’t say a word.

You almost have to feel bad for Old Joe.  He was so insistent…he was going to do a string of comeback appearances last week, including a multi-date trip to Las Vegas.  Every night, after Matlock but before bed, Joe and his comms team we putting out fiery and defiant messages declaring with papal ex cathedra that by Christ  Joe was the nominee and that he was staying in the race.  Then suddenly, in the middle of his Vegas stint, Joe Biden, who has been vaxed and boosted 113 times, got COVID.  For the third time.  The public got a glimpse of him trudging up his big boy stairs to Air Force One and that was it…he was off to deepest, darkest Delaware to “recover” from COVID.

Then Joe woke up last Sunday to find someone had forged a letter on his personal stationary and posted it to his X account saying that he was dropping out of the race.  Then whomever posted the first X published another, more hastily written X saying, “Oh yeah…we also endorse Scamala as replacement candidate.”  And democrat voters just fell in line immediately.

Well, most of them did.  Even the shameless, race-baiting grifters over at BLM know this whole thing stinks to high hell of corruption and shady shit. To wit:

It’s a start.  Wait ’til they find out the Democratic Party defended slavery, started the Civil War because of it, opposed Reconstruction, founded the Ku Klux Klan, imposed segregation, perpetrated lynchings, and fought against the civil rights acts of the ’50s and ’60s.  But “a party of hypocrites” is a start.  Baby steps.

N.P.: “Black Betty – Fuzzy” – Spiderbait

Well, dearest reader, as you know, I’ve watched every season of The United States since Nixon was president, and I can tell you absolutely and objectively that this season’s finale continues to be far and away the most fascinating, intriguing, riveting season finale ever.

The  Democrats’ Collapse Into Chaos is now complete:  a letter on Joe Biden’s personal stationary (not that of the White House) appeared on Biden’s X account weirdly announcing he’s ending his reelection bid.

I don’t buy it.  I mean, I’m sure he’s dropping out, but I’ve seen nothing at all to indicate that this is his decision.  Quite the opposite…everything points to the contrary.  This senile old ball-bag made recorded statements from the Oval Office recently, first when his DOJ prosecuted Trump on a bunch of bullshit…apparently that was important enough to warrant addressing the nation.  He did it again after the attempted assassination of the same former President.  Apparently that was important enough to warrant addressing the nation.  But becoming the first incumbent President not to seek reelection since LBJ, and to do so after actively running in the primaries and getting 50 million+ democrat votes in the process, and then “deciding” not to run for reelection…that doesn’t warrant addressing the nation.  That doesn’t warrant a prepared statement from the Oval Office.  Apparently that doesn’t warrant even a carefully edited video clip.  No audio…nothing at all to indicate that Old Joe is even aware these statements are being made.  Sending out a letter, on X…weird as hell.

As of Friday night, the Biden campaign was still defiant as fuck, stating unequivocally that Joe was the democratic nominee, and that message did not change over the weekend.  Biden’s White House aides as well as aides to the Biden campaign are now publicly saying that they all found out about Old Joe dropping out when the statement was released on X along with the rest of the world.  “We’re all finding out by tweet,” said one such insider, “None of us understand what’s happening.”  A reporter for the beshitted New York Times

X’d: “To give a sense of how much Biden’s decision took his campaign by surprise…Campaign staff were still calling delegates 30 minutes before the announcement, pushing them to declare their support for Biden in the rollcall & on social media, according to one delegate.”  He then X’d that “the delegate who received the call 30 mins before the announcement says…they refused to commit and commented, “It’s absolutely bonkers.”

So even two hours after the supposed announcement, there still has been no indication whatsoever that Joe Biden, anyone in the Biden family, or anyone working in the White House or on the Biden campaign had even a hint that this was happening.

Then, significantly after the initial letter was posted, another message appeared on Biden’s X account endorsing Scamala Harris.  Like it was an afterthought.

No…this is way too weird…I don’t think we’ll know what actually happened for some time…if ever.  But know that there is presently (and has been for over three years) someone who is apparently admitting that he doesn’t have the mental or physical ability required to run a successful campaign, but simultaneously continues to insist is perfectly fine to run the United States and effectively the entire world.

Seven months is a dangerously long time.

N.P.: “You Missed” – Tom MacDonald