The Idea That Voters Should Select Candidates In Primary Elections Seems to Be Growing

A few months ago I wrote about how I thought it was obnoxious that the county party where I live endorsed candidates in the primary ahead of the election.  It was a blatant attempt by party bosses to favor certain candidates over others.  It looks like some others have now also objected to this practice as Our Revolution has launched some activism along these lines.  Presumably, this is because their candidates tend to be of the progressive and grassroots type who gets usually victimized by this process.  I'm not sure how common this practice is, but it definitely needs to be discarded.  Once again, voters should be picking the candidates for the general election, not party bosses.  If enough people object to this practice, it will go away.  Unfortunately, most people don't seem to care about much these days, so it will definitely be an uphill battle.  It is one of many sensible election reforms that should be made.  It's not quite to the ridiculousness of having a partisan referee an election, but it's pretty close.  By the way, the Ohio Democratic Party never did get back to me about why they were endorsing candidates ahead of a primary election.  Sigh . . . I guess they were too busy preparing to lose another general election.  Just saying, maybe they wouldn't have such a horrible losing streak if they just let voters decide the primaries.

Our "democracy" is pretty laughable these days, but that's also pretty depressing.  If you want an all around more pleasant humorous experience, then please read my latest novel.

The Print Version Of Edna's Employment Agency

I finally got a copy of the print version of Edna's Employment Agency.  Amazon did a nice job!  The novel was designed as an ebook, so the print version is a bit of an afterthought (nothing against print, which I like just fine).  It looks great though!  They basically print the pdf version of the book with a few formatting modifications.  The oddest one is that they take pages of the pdf that aren't full pages and center them instead of keeping them at the top of the page.  That's a bit strange, but I found it didn't bother me once I started reading.  And I enjoyed reading the book as well.  In fact, it made me laugh out loud numerous times.  It was pleasant to read it as a reader and not as a writer revising it or whatnot.  It's a very funny book.  It's definitely the best book I've read this year (though of course, I haven't read all the other hundred thousand books that have come out, and I might be a bit biased having written the thing as well).  But I write the kind of books that I want to read.  I like to laugh and I like thoughtprovoking works, and this novel fits those descriptions.  I am very happy with it.  It is nice to have a print version this handsome as well rather than just a printout of the pdf paperclipped together.  It's mainly there though for those who prefer to read in print (and they are of course welcome to just print out the pdf if that's cheaper/easier).  It is nice to have it available, however.  

drinkdrankdrunk: "Peel" by Mark Justice

Jim sat around, eating an orange.  He thought softly of an oil lamp burning, the thin smoke discoloring some greasy wood mantle while slowly licking his fingers, his short, sticky fingers.  That sour sensation of the taste of skin and orange delighted him, and he continued licking until his tongue was numb.  The numbness was good, and while Jim thought of spice and tea and rum somewhere warm and wet, he sucked his index finger to a red throb.

The throb on his tongue gave him the taste for another orange.  He rolled back from his cross-legged way and felt for the net of oranges.  Deftly, he grabbed a rather large one and rolled back to his sitting.  That was good, to be sitting, he thought, and with his finger still throbbing, cut into the orange. 

Jim slowly peeled a small section back, and was caught in a rapture of the smell and juicy mist.  He grabbed some salt, sprinkled some on the peel, and ate it.  The bitter and salt crashed in his mouth until he moaned.  He began to cut again with his white plastic serrated-edged knife, with a quick draw, there was a clean cut, and a sharp jab of pain in the throbbing finger.

 
Excited by the sensation, Jim quickly pulled the orange peel.  The mist spurted, with a tinge of blood, onto his face.  Jim smeared the sticky red all over his face then licked his fingers, carefully sucking the cut index.  His mouth leaped in excitement at the taste, a flash of cold to his stomach, heart quicken in his chest, the taste, the salt taste!

 
Jim dropped the orange and licked at his finger.  The open wound, drawn vertically, was slowly pouring the great taste away.  He began to play with the wound, fascinated at this mouth on his finger, mimicking words to music in his head, a song that had just been played by the instrument on the floor.
 

There was a pain, real sharp and stingy, the more Jim pulled the flaps of skin open.  What a sensation!  This wasn’t tea or sand or oil lamps; this was orange!
 

There was a sudden tear in the skin, down his finger to the second knuckle.  The blood began to wash down his hand and arm and collect between his legs. 

Jim gleefully smiled, brought the knife up to his finger and dug down along the cut, drawing it into his palm.  Slowly he rolled back the edges of his skin-peel, the gap widening each time his tongue caressed it.  The hot salt and juicy flesh bubbled in Jim’s brain. 

He couldn’t stop at the hand, good night, no!  There was so much more to unravel.  The knife slowly dug its way down his arm, stopping at the soft inbend just opposite the elbow.

 
The glorious red blood flowed evenly down both halves of Jim’s split skin.  He began dragging his finger along the flap, in galloping triplets.  It began to curl into itself and roll back.  That pain was unbearable, and Jim managed a smile.  He worked the gallop all along the freshly cut furrow until one side was rolled.  With a yellow smile, he began to pull. 

The tearing sounds of the separating flesh were pleasing, and the squirting of the blood all so delightfully for Jim.  He continued tugging, and stopped as he held in his left hand the skin of his right, which was a glittering red, and Jim sucked air for the intensity.  Looking at the still dripping skin, he picked up the knife, and contemplated his left arm…

Jim sat, happily, as he looked at the pile of hide at his knee. His red arms glistened, but not as bright as his legs, or his stomach, or his chest. 

The breath in his chest was slow and deliberate, so he could observe the new blood flows with every inhale. What sharp, piercing ecstasy! 

Jim thought for just a moment, and while looking at his flesh, picked up the salt. 

 

Mark Justice is the author of Gauge Black:  Hell's Revenge.  Check it out for more pulpy goodness!  That one's a Western.  Obviously, this Website does not recommend self-cannibalism, but it does recommend reading more Mark Justice.  I am pleased to run on his work on drinkdrankdrunk!

Facemask Follies

So it seems the politicians, public health officials, and even the general public just will not let the COVID-19 panic pass.  The latest hysteria is the mandatory wearing of facemasks among the entire population (at least, most people have learned that lockdowns don't work; they do not stop the virus; they just create more problems--for a nice overview on the stupidity of lockdowns, please check out Heather Mac Donald's "Four Months Of Unprecedented Malfeasance").  Unfortunately, mandatory facemasking is just as dumb as the lockdowns.  Those of you who think facemasks are the solution, please have an open mind and keep reading.

First of all, facemasks apparently do not stop the spread of the virus.  I know this goes contrary to the heavy propaganda push about wearing them from politicians, public health officials, and the general public, but it appears to be true.   Let's start with the World Health Organization.  Their most recent publication about facemasks is "Advice on the use of masks in the context of COVID-19" updated on 5 June 2020, which is an interesting overview on masks in a variety of settings.  For health care workers treating COVID-19 patients, WHO clearly recommends the wearing of facemasks.  However, given how many healthcare workers wore masks and still died from the disease, one does wonder if they are as effective as WHO hopes.

Moving on to the issue at hand, it gets worse.  Even WHO admits that there is no evidence suggesting that masking an entire population will be helpful:  "At present, there is no direct evidence (from studies on COVID-19 and in healthy people in the community) on the effectiveness of universal masking of healthy people in the community to prevent infection with respiratory viruses, including COVID-19."

Of course, the absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.  Universal masking could work; we just don't know yet.  However, such a pronounced change in social behavior needs some evidence before it's adopted.  The politicians such as the governor of Ohio USA who have mandated facemasks did so without evidence (mine, in the picture above, says "Resign DeWine" if you're curious--he can compel me to wear one, but he can't compel me to like it).

Even a politician with some horsesense (DeWine also was dumb enough to push for the Iraq War because of the weapons of mass destruction lies, so one expects him to make idiotic decisions; the only ones dumber than him are the Ohio voters who keep electing the moron so he can continue to make more dumb decisions to make their lives worse) such as Bernie Sanders is pushing universal facemasking.  Despite giving up on his presidential run, Sanders continues to send out fundraising emails (Why?  I have no idea.  You will have to ask him.  Maybe he's hoping the Democrats will figure out Joe Biden is senile and turn back to him at the last minute).  In a recent one, he wrote, "The science is clear: Wearing a mask is the best way to protect ourselves from the coronavirus and save lives, and the widespread use of masks will get Americans back to work sooner and reunite families who have stayed apart."  Since the research I was finding while researching mandatory facemasking was suggesting quite the opposite, I emailed Sanders asking if he could point me to that "clear science".

He did not reply, but he did send me four more fundraising emails.

I unsubscribed.  

Well, maybe he didn't get back to me because there is no clear science.  While I did find the occasional study that suggested facemasks might be good for sick people to wear, I found more often stuff that stated that facemasks were more or less useless overall such as this:  ("A cloth mask or face covering does very little to prevent the emission or inhalation of small particles.").

And this: ("In pooled analysis, we found no significant reduction in influenza transmission with the use of face masks").

And this:  ("Viruses, including the coronavirus that scientists believe may be the cause of SARS, are so tiny that they can easily pass through such barriers.").

And this:  ("[B]oth surgical and cotton masks seem to be ineffective in preventing the dissemination of SARS–CoV-2 from the coughs of patients with COVID-19 to the environment and external mask surface").

That last link raises another interesting issue.  If you click on it, you don't go to the actual study; instead, you go to an article about the study.

This is because the study has disappeared.  It was retracted by the authors.  Parsing the retraction carefully, it looks as if the authors wanted to correct whatever mistake they made, but the editors said no.

Maybe their mistake was simply going against the groupthink tide.  One bizarre sideline of researching this issue was how much of the research tended to disappear.  A study by a retired dentist from 2016 about how facemasks don't work in dentistry?

Poof!  Gone!  You can find it mentioned by Peter Hitchens in this article, but if you go to where it was posted, you find this:  "“Why Face Masks Don’t Work: A Revealing Review” by John Hardie, BDS, MSc, PhD, FRCDC, it has been removed. The content was published in 2016 and is no longer relevant in our current climate."  However, you can still find it if you know where to look.  Take that URL from the link and go to one of the links in my link section that takes you to websites from the past.  I can't tell you more because I don't want it to disappear even more so, but you can find it if you want to.  Fortunately, the retired dentist has kept writing.  You can see what he thinks about COVID-19 here (while you're there, you might as well read "Should You Wear A Mask?  What Does The Science Say?").

I even experienced some of the Orwellian memory hole censorship personally on NextDoor.Com.  Some well-meaning moron had slapped up a quick post called "Wear A Mask!" and the thread exploded like no thread that I had ever seen on there.  Most folks were pro-mask and not just for themselves; they wanted you to wear a mask as well.  In fact, if you didn't, they thought you were a horrible person who was trying to kill them.

The fear that the politicians and public health officials have whipped up about the virus goes beyond even the considerable fear whipped up by the politicians during the War On Terror.  Back then, we were supposed to be afraid of terrorists; now, apparently, we're supposed to be afraid of one another.  For those of us old-fashioned Americans who believe along with FDR that "the only thing we have to fear is fear itself—nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance", this is particularly annoying.

These folks couldn't be reasoned with.  I would cite the WHO report, and they would tell me I was citing "junk science".  One poster claimed that New York USA had mandatory facemasking and that's why they were doing better than we were in Ohio USA.  But when I looked up the per capita death rate on the CDC website, New York was so bad they had it divided into the city and the state, and they both were in the top ten in the USA with the City being #1 by itself (Ohio was 27th or something at the time, with something like 1/10th of the per capita deaths of NY overall).  When I pointed this out, they carried on as if they lived in some alternate reality where Ohio had the larger death rate.  It was like people thought they had a right to their own facts, not just their own opinions.

The people on my "side" per se and resistant to mandatory facemasking were an interesting bunch as well.  Most seemed to believe in various conspiracy theories about the virus.  I get the conspiracy theory appeal.  Even when they're daft, they still reassure people that someone somewhere, even if they're evil, knows what they are doing, and life is not as chaotic as it seems.

There is a comfort in that because otherwise the truth appears to be that we are just led by morons who have no idea what they are doing.

Eventually, NextDoor.Com just deleted the whole thread.  Maybe someone complained, or maybe they didn't want to offend the State Of Ohio, who was one of their main advertisers (reminding us all to "Wear A Mask!" among other things).  I tried contacting them to find out, but there seemed no way to reach them.  Since I wasn't down with censorship, I just deleted my account.

The censorship and groupthink is definitely creepy.  To add more creepiness on top, my home county made headlines for establishing a snitch line where people could inform on those not wearing masks.  I am sure this is in a fine tradition of fascism.  Maybe the Nazis had such a snitch line in Amsterdam and that's how poor Anne Frank got caught.  Either way, it's annoying to pay taxes to these people and they won't even provide basic services because they're terrified of the virus (for example, closing most of the county buildings to the public), but they'll waste tax money on a snitch line about something that does nothing to help the situation.

My county is corruptly run by Dems while Ohio is corruptly run by Repubs, but when it comes to mandatory facemasking, they're in agreement.  They love citizens being muzzled.  Not only is it a nice symbol of a voiceless public, but it makes the politicians able to pretend that their failed lockdown policies weren't to blame for failing to stop the virus and then creating an economic disaster (a gift that may keep on giving), it was the public not wearing masks that is to blame.

In truth, the virus isn't going to be stopped.  It's going to run its course.  All the politicians and public health officials on power trips and the population that supports the nonsense they slop out can do is make more problems on top of the annoying virus.  Some countries such as The Netherlands and Sweden have somewhat recognized this.

Sadly, if you watch the network news and read a lot of the panic porn articles online, you probably are too terrified to critically think enough to recognize that the true way forward is to return to normality as quickly as possible (indeed, we never should have panicked in the first place).  Strangely enough, the voices of reason currently seem to be all coming from right wing nutjobs, which makes things even more terrifying.  I suppose, like a stopped clock, they are right once in a while (in the stopped clock's case, twice a day; in the right-wingers' case maybe only on this issue).  So, if you need an alternate to the mainstream media hysteria, check out Justin Hart and Alex Berenson for some counterweights.  Just like Trump, when liberals and progressives push nonsense, it just makes them harder to believe the next time, even if they're right.  So, please, people who are otherwise semi-reasonable, stop pushing for mandatory facemasking and other strategies that will do little or nothing to stop the virus.  Start pushing for a return to normalcy and away from hysteria over a nasty variation of the common cold.  There are almost 8 billion human beings, more than ever in history; this virus is not going to make a dent in that number overall.  Politicians and public health officials cannot conquer death; they can make a mess of life though. 

In 1984, Orwell wrote "If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face — forever."  Even old George couldn't imagine that we would be so dumb that the face would be wearing a facemask.

1984's a better book overall, but it isn't as funny as Edna's Employment Agency, and, let's face it, if you made it through that post about how crazy Americans have gotten panicking over a virus, then you need a laugh.

drinkdrankdrunk: "Miss Texas" by The Midnight Rider

while we’re on the subject of outlaw students, I guess I should break down the life/times of my all-time favorite advisee…..veronica was born in texas, is long/lean and weighs roughly 99 lbs…..she looks like a heroin chick and for all I know, she is one…..she looks like the kind of girl that a biker couldn’t keep satisfied for long (if you smell what the rock is cooking)…..that’s not to say veronica isn’t sexy-as-fuck, but i don’t think my stubby/little turtle could do the job….for most of the time that I’ve known veronica, she’s had a long-haired, survivalist boyfriend that looks like a professional wrestler….the dude is actually prettier than professional wrestler, edge, but I think that’s what I’m gonna call him……veronica’s edge is 6’4” with rippling muscles and tattoos covering roughly 75% of his body…..edge is something of a gun nut/aficionado and I’ve never seen him when he wasn’t packing heat (including my office and inside the local walmart)…..is he a drug dealer?----well, yeah……are there 100 plus guns in his house including assault rifles?-----I would guess over 200, but I’ve only seen 10-12 pistols plus hand grenades and an ak-47 (and that was at a cookout at his parents’ house)….and I don’t know much about the edge’s politics, but let’s just say that he’s not a fan of the government…..i don’t necessarily have one specific story for veronica, but I’ll try to do a random sketch….veronica graduated with a 4.0 and should have been the valedictorian, but the cashpoint powers-that-be didn’t want to present her with the award at graduation because she had gotten a d.u.i the week before…..she also got felony possession of a firearm because she was driving her boyfriend’s truck and there was a pistol in the glove compartment (he was too drunk to drive and having a gun in your vehicle when you’re drunk is a felony in illinois)….the shitty thing is that some member of the liberal arts faculty (my money is on swede hansen) sent a poison pen letter to the vice president arguing that “a felon doesn’t represents the values of cashpoint university” (and half of our students are felons from chicago who pay their tuition using government grants)……since I was veronica’s adviser, my boss called me into his office and asked if I thought she deserved the award-----I responded that she had the highest g.p.a. and dean bell ultimately decided to put it to a vote of the graduation committee…..veronica won and the committee decided (perhaps sarcastically) that I should present the award to her at graduation----and right before I went onstage to give the speech, the fucking lesbian nun took me aside and whispered in my ear to “act normal”……the second veronica story that I wanted to tell has to do with a halloween party/bonfire that her boyfriend’s parents have thrown every october for the last 27 years……the first time I went, I slept in my car in the front lawn----and when I woke up, there was a dude passed out in a tent to my left and a dude passed out on the grass to my right….the party served as a drug/arms dealer convention as fun-loving criminals from 3 states made their way to goose lake……when I first arrived I asked the edge if he thought the police might show and he responded: “no dude, the police around here are scared of us because they know we’ll fucking shoot them if they come on our property”…..the compound itself was divided into three sections; 1) the small/main house, 2) the old people’s barn and 3) the young people’s barn…..i don’t really know what the main house was like because I was never allowed inside (I think that honor was reserved for the family and their giant/guard dogs)…..i was prolly 45-years-old at the time, so I generally split my time between the 2 barns……the old people’s barn was full of fat/crazy uncles hitting one-hitters and talking about other people’s wives’ titties…..the edge’s obese mother held court in the center of the space----pouring white russians and loudly proclaiming that she’d rather eat food than give her husband blow jobs (note: this wasn’t just at the first party I attended----it was at every party that I attended)….in between the 2 barns, there was a firepit…..there was a band the first year, fire dancers the second and fireworks the third (it seemed the family had blown a good portion of their savings on court dates that year)…..to make up for the fact that there were only fireworks that year, several partygoers went to their trucks and returned with an assortment of firearms (including an assault weapon) which they would fire indiscriminately into the air…..my favorite moment at the firepit occurred when a random dude sobered up after passing out on the ground only to discover that people were laughing at him for pissing his pants…..after screaming at us and challenging everyone within earshot to a fight, the dude dragged a couch out of one of the barns and proceeded to drag it into the middle of the bonfire…..then, as the flames licked at his bare feet, the dude jumped on top of the couch and again challenged everyone at the party to a fight…..i honestly believe 90% of the people at that party could have beaten his ass (on top of the raging bonfire), but the crowd seemed to view him as comic relief and ultimately just let him scream it out…….i don’t really know how to describe the young peoples’ barn other than to say that IT WAS THE KIND OF PLACE WHERE OFF-DUTY STRIPPERS WENT TO UNWIND AFTER THEIR SHIFT…..it was halloween too, so sluts in fishnet stockings were doing lines off of every available flat surface…..99-lb veronica was dressed as a saloon girl and wearing a corset that was so tight that it made her tits appear larger than her head……as soon as the edge saw me, he put me in a bear hug and within 30 seconds, I was doing lines of adderol off a table next to a dead cow’s skull (that was being used as a decoration)……the walls of the barn were painted black and were covered with dayglow graffiti featured demons/devils/faceless cowboys fucking big-breasted barbie dolls----it was like the space had been decorated by hank 3……veronica introduced me to one of her friends (a stripper from davenport) as her professor and for the rest of the evening, the chick (whose name I don’t remember) followed me from barn-to-barn rubbing up against me and sitting in my lap…..she was 19/blonde/covered with piercings and I knew after the first 30 seconds that she would have fucked me…..at the ending of the evening she asked where I lived (i.e. she wanted a “ride” home), but I made up an excuse…..and you might ask why a fat/lonely/45-year-old professor (who hadn’t been laid in 3 years) would turn down an 19-year-old stripper?-----well, ultimately I think it was the picture of her 4-year-old son……that and the fact that I got the feeling that if she knew where I lived, she’d come back over christmas break with her boyfriend and steal everything that wasn’t nailed down…..i guess I could have fucked her in my car, but I think part of the fun for the stripper is fantasizing about the john’s life/house/money…..i still have a picture of her sitting in my lap and sometimes I beat my meat on the toilet seat thinking about what it would have been like…..i heard the edge fucked her a few weeks later and that led to veronica fucking the edge’s best friend in the edge’s bed to get revenge…..as the night progressed, I would eavesdrop as partygoers in the young peoples’ barn discussed their brushes with the law----most had spent a night or two in jail for minor drug offenses, but there others who had done hard time----I was obviously intrigued, but also couldn’t run the risk of appearing to be too much of a groupie…..one dude had defended his girlfriend’s honor by caving another dude’s head in with a tire iron (and it turns out the first guy’s girlfriend had been cheating on him and the victim had been telling the truth)…..one dude had broken into a walmart at night to steal electronics and another had run out of a pharmacy with a handful of oxycodone…..there was a redneck girl who had broken another girl’s nose in a fist fight and a hillbilly who had spent 2 nights in jail for (repeatedly) hunting squirrels out of season in some rural wisconsin county…..if there were 42 people in that barn on that particular night, I would guesstimate that all 42 (both male and female) had spent at least one night in jail as part of their criminal careers……perhaps you’d like to know what happened to veronica after she graduated in the fall of 2014…..i don’t know the particulars, but she eventually broke up with the edge….there was a major car accident in which the edge was under-the-influence----the car was totaled and when the edge finally woke up from his medically-induced coma, the police were there to arrest him…..veronica went to trial for her earlier drunk driving/weapons charge and the judge sentenced her to drunk driving school (among other punishments)……while at drunk driving school, veronica met the owner of a construction company (who, as luck would have it, received his d.u.i. on the same night)…..they hit it off and before the weekend was over, the dude offered veronica a job as his administrative assistant in iowa city…..did he want to fuck her?----I’m sure he did……do all the construction workers at that job site want to fuck her?---I’m sure they do…..i’ll conclude with a snippet from the letter of recommendation that I wrote for veronica after her graduation: “In our personal conversations, Veronica has shown herself to be a kind and generous individual. She is a person of utmost integrity, one who is self-reflective, hardworking and modest. I believe Veronica is a wonderful representative of the ideals that [Cashpoint] represents and I would certainly give her my highest recommendation.”

The Midnight Rider prefers to remain mysterious.  You could visit his website, but he won't say where it is.  You could read his books, but he won't say what they are.  You could email him, but I'm pretty sure spam@gofuckyourself.gov is not a real email address.  In a world where everyone is repping their Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, sex tapes, line of clothing, new microbrew, and overall brand, I find that refreshing.  I am happy to have the Rider ride on drinkdrankdrunk.

Lawn Letter

I wrote a letter recently thanking a local newspaper writer for pointing out the dangers of lawn chemicals.  The newspaper published it, which was nice of them.  Once again, please don't poison yourselves and the rest of us just because you have a fetish for a certain way your yard can look.  Please learn instead to enjoy clover, dandelions, and the rest of stuff that grows in a yard beyond grass.

OK, you can tear out Canadian thistles.  I hate them also.  But do it manually.

To be fair, they have some benefits, as does poison ivy (birds like the berries), but they can both grow somewhere else other than my yard.

drinkdrankdrunk: "Write About What You Know" by Victor Schwartzman

Sidney wrote poetry, short stories, novels and screenplays.  He decided to write something original, and started with the basics by writing a list of fundamental plots:

--Man achieves goal

--Woman in danger rescued (old)/Woman in danger rescues herself (new)

--Two people achieve romance despite obstacles

Sidney was surprised the list was so short.

But for the past three thousand years, the stories of all literature, plays and films boiled down to those three plots.  Everything else was a twist.

Sidney realized that if he could create a new plot, his fame and success would be unimaginable.  Two weeks later, the notebook screen remained blank.   He could not come up with a new fourth plot.  Worse, every twist he thought of had already been done.

Then it took an ugly turn when his friends suggested he follow the writer’s Golden Rule:  write about what you know.  To write original, start with what is original about you.

His deliberations eventually grew quite uncomfortable as he tried to think of what was original about his work, his thoughts, himself.  Days flowed by.  Ultimately, Sidney concluded there was nothing original about him.

He was not religious but prayed to God for an answer.  To Sidney’s surprise, God replied.

“I understand your concerns, my child.  Rest assured, it is not you that is not original.  It is your entire world.

“Millennia ago, I created the Earth.  Then, I created a copy.  Your planet is the copy.  I knew copies never turn out as well as the original, but I had hopes.

“The original Earth is fine.  Never been a war and there are colonies on Mars.  Your Earth, I’ve thought more than once of shutting it down.”

“Why haven’t you?”

“Still curious, my child.”

“Can you help me?”

“It would ruin the experiment.  Oh, one more thing.  When you die here, there is no Heaven or Hell.  You’re just dead.”

Then God left.

It was very quiet.

Sidney now understood his entire world, his whole life, was God‘s disappointing experiment. 

Sidney looked at the blank monitor.

Write about what you know.

With the knowledge life was meaningless, Sidney wrote a self-help book.

It was quickly published and sold millions.

When he sat down to write the sequel, Sidney wondered:  How can I make this original?

Victor Schwartzman is a Canadian writer with whom I used to be in the Underground Literary Alliance.  I am quite happy that he is still writing and willing to share some of his work on drinkdrankdrunk!

New Song!: "The Whistleblower Takes Up Harmonica"

wredfright · The Whistleblower Takes Up Harmonica

Woo-boy!  It's a tough time politically right now.  I may be the only one who feels like this (and maybe not), but it seems like everyone else has gone nuts.  The Left seem to think we can all survive hiding in our houses for months on end from a virus (um, that will just bring even more problems when the economy and other things collapse as a result) while the Right think the Left are all killers because they don't join them in gargling bleach or whatever else Trump goes on about.  What's been so disappointing is to see so many supposed freethinkers fall in line and stop thinking critically and just follow the party line of their tribe.  For example, if you think Andrew Cuomo's declaration that his COVID-19 orders would all be worth it if they saved even one life is inspiring, then you need to think a bit about what he would do if anyone ever approached him about preventing auto accident deaths (the answer is he would shut down the roads--does that make sense to you?  Do you think we could survive very long as a society that way?).  Meanwhile, people like me, seemingly rare, just try to carry on, don't panic, and still have a bit of fun (note:  we're all going to die anyway; have a good time before you go).  At this point, it's gotten so confusing that matters of right and wrong and heroism are all garbled.  Years ago, Michael Jordan was a hero for playing a game while sick.  Now he'd be viewed as a creep endangering others (it apparently was food poisoning so facemaskers can still cheer him).  Good grief!  Well, now he joins Edward Snowden in the grey no person's land.  Snowden and other whistleblowers actually take human rights seriously, yet we live in a country where he's still wanted for treason, so he has to be sheltered in what's basically a dictatorship.  It's so depressing that I can imagine many people just say forget it when it comes to do the right thing and just fall into line with whatever other people are doing, pretending to themselves that it is the right thing (and 9 out of 10 times, it still ain't hard to figure out what the real right thing is).  If you think walking around the supermarket looking like you are about to perform surgery is a-ok, then go on with your bad self, but don't try to convince me that it's doing anything much beyond making you feel better about a situation that you have little control over (and if you don't believe me, then maybe you'll believe the World Health Organization, who wrote, "Many countries have recommended the use of fabric masks/face coverings for the general public. At the present time, the widespread use of masks by healthy people in the community setting is not yet supported by high quality or direct scientific evidence and there are potential benefits and harms to consider (see below).").  This song is for anyone who does the right thing anyway even when everyone else is headed in the wrong direction ("It's totally safe to go back in that burning building.  Get back to work!").  Your anti-social behavior may save yourself or even us all.  Authority figures and the masses are not always wrong, but they are definitely not always right.  Think for yourself.  The lyrics are below.  It's the same deal as always.  If you like a song, then feel free to cover it if you're in a band or whatnot.  I love to hear covers of my songs, so please let me know about your version.  If you start making money, then send me a check/we can work out a deal.  Similarly, if you want to use a song for your Youtube video or whatnot, then just let me know.  It's usually fine by me unless it's a commercial product or whatnot (and then it's likely fine as well--I just want my cut).  Find out first though.  Write me at wredfright ATATAT yahoo DOTT com.

The supermarket is awash in fear
And I'm just trying to buy some groceries
Everybody's wearing a mask
Looks like they're going to be robbing the place
But they're looking at me like I'm the criminal
Because I don't have anything on my face
Joseph Goebbels would be amazed
At how quickly people today fall into line
All an authority figure needs to do is scare them a little
And they never even bother to use their minds

The whistleblower is taking up harmonica
Because there's nobody to blow a whistle to
Still plenty of people to blow a whistle on though
What's a poor whistleblower to do?
Do the right thing, and you're the one they'll send to jail
Say everything you said was just fake news
Meanwhile nobody else really gives a shit
It's enough to give a whistleblower the blues

My Bilderberg invitation must have gotten lost in the mail
That's OK; I never wanted to rule the world
I just wish people would stop taking of pictures of themselves
Long enough to realize that freedom is more than just a flag unfurled
Underneath all the corporate and government propaganda
It's hard to know what's true
But my bullshit detector is still working
And I got it pointed at you 

Written June 2020
Recorded June 2020

Want more Wred Fright music?  Order the Yeast? 7" here!