Does Kristi Noem’s bizarre hatred of everybody not white maybe stem from her being banned from every Native American reservation while she was South Dakota governor? It must be a bit provoking not to be allowed to set foot on 12% of the state you supposedly run, on threat of being charged with trespassing.
* * * *
As I’ve said many times, I see population control as the major long-range necessity to save the world from annihilation. (No comment here on whether saving the world from annihilation is a good or bad thing.) But I’m delighted to see that RFK Jr. is doing his best to help with population control. Once the U.S. federal government, under his thoughtful care, has dropped all vaccines and stopped all health research, we should see a rapid increase in childhood death, directly and indirectly leading to a decrease in our population.
The main loophole is that this will directly affect only the U.S. population, rather than assure a worldwide solution. I also think there may be more effective approaches to population control, such as cutting birth rates through family planning, so that kids born only to be eliminated later don’t get born in the first place. Might even be a tad kinder to families, should anyone be concerned with that.
* * * *
The marching on of waste:
1. We recently received from Amazon a 9×14 in. non-recyclable plastic mailer which held a 2×3 in. item we ordered. This comes to roughly 1.7 sq. ft. of excess waste plastic, if you consider both sides of the envelope.
2. I recently bought a new iMac, with a 24 in. screen. The sheer amount of cardboard in the internal packing was bad enough, but the way it was wangled together beggared belief.
There were 8 or 10 individual miniature “boxes” constructed of interlocking parts that made no rational sense. Time and money was spent putting low-level designers to work to assemble the most complicated possible ways to intertwine elements of cardboarded forms that would defy Escher. It seemed pretty clear that stuffing folded paper between the computer’s parts would achieve the same thing with less weight, design cost, and bulk to dispose of.
Or maybe they hired the 7 dwarfs: Skanky, Bumwad, Dingle, Limpdick, Nosewipe, Dimbulb and Rumpledforeskin.
3. And just in time – right in the middle of writing that last sentence – Linda returned with the mail, which included a free drink holder from Recover Red, a red-light therapy outfit be bought from. It was a “customer appreciation” item we neither ordered or wanted. It’s stainless steel, weighs over 12 ounces, holds 30 fl. ounces of “coffee tea water” (beer, not being considered a Good Thing, is not also recommended).
It’s 9 1/2 inches tall, comes with a 10 1/2 inch straw, and is slightly larger around than is comfortable to hold. The top features a bizarrely complicated opening mechanism that we have yet to figure out. From the included note, printed on a small plastic sheet, it seems to have been sent to help ensure a 5-star rating of the company’s product.
Feh!
* * * *
Time travel is not possible because time is not a thing to be traversed, it is a record, an unfolding. It cannot be viewed in its extension, like the 3 dimensions of space. Time does not cause, it is a fixed record that cannot be gone back to or changed.
Einstein and others did us a disservice by melding “spacetime” as a term that makes 4 dimensions sound all equal in type and extent.
Nowadays, string theorists posit 10 or 11 dimensions, the extras curled up in little balls like pill bugs. Watch it when you’re out in the garden that you don’t step on a dimension and fuck up the universe.
* * * *
Daughter Cait, at her Twin Wolves Healing Arts center, is promoting “natural oral health,” which sounds like a really excellent idea. Unfortunately, it reminds me of my personal, peculiar response to almost anything having to do with my mouth – total revulsion.
From the first time I held a toothbrush, I hated brushing my teeth. Toothpaste made me feel that I was brushing with pure spit. That feeling has never changed. I haven’t used toothpaste in at least 3 decades. I don’t floss either, because the mere sight of floss makes me gag (even unused, but used, it hits me like an assault).
There are minor exceptions: As a kid, I almost liked tooth powder, which may be a worthwhile substance today, but back then had mint-flavored abrasive inclusions like ground lava, which can’t be all that good for you. I only used it at my grandmother’s, we never had it at home.
I pay the price today. I’ve lost at least half my teeth, though I chew relatively well thanks to the occasional crown or replacement. I do have a tendency to bite myself 3 or 4 times per meal, which just makes me more pissed at my mouth.
I’m sure I’ll be hit with the psych certainty that this results from some horrendous childhood trauma. Believe it, it doesn’t. It’s innate. And I can’t think of a more disgusting job than being a dental tech.
* * * *
One of the chemicals that Linda uses in her glaze-making is gerstley borate. It is, she says, a “melter,” which sounds… unsettling. So my next character will be:
Gerstley Borate, Deadly Man of Intrigue.
* * * *
Now, if for some ungodly reason you’ve read this far, I have a question for you.
I’ve deliberately shied from starting a blog, perhaps because the word sounds like a form of nasal impaction, but I’m wondering – should I move my ruminations online, to an outfit like Substack or Patreon?
I do currently post them to Linda’s and my website, where we have exactly 6 followers. If I did transfer to online, all of you would still enjoy them [snicker, rattle, GUFFAW] delivered to your email, but I might be able to pick up another 6 followers who tripped over me while searching for John Derrick, the Scottish hangman. And I wouldn’t be looking for money; you could still read it for free, and I don’t need what pittance might otherwise roll in.
If you think this is an even minimally good idea, would you choose Patreon or Substack as the more worthwhile?
lickhaven 