You know how it goes: every once in a while someone will ask: knowing what you know now, if you could, would you go back in time to assassinate Hitler? Or something to that effect.
To be honest, I’m a lover not a fighter so I would probably defer the time travel assassin role to someone a bit more inspired than I. But I’m pretty sure if I could go back in time I woud take a mulligan and redo high school and not be as lazy and unmotivated as I was the first go around. Such lost potential there, that’s for sure.
Anyway, why we’re on the subject of maniacal dictators, I can’t help wondering more and more if some time in the future we won’t be asking the same, unsatisfying time travel question about Trump.
I hope not. I pray not. I hope and pray that an act of God takes out the Hitler wannabe before there is even the chance he’s “voted” back into office. I mean, how many Big Macs does one have to eat before the plumbing finally clogs up for good?
And if those hopes and prayers aren’t answered, as a back up I hope and pray that as a nation we are smart enough, and motivated enough (although at this point in time I don’t have much confidence in either), to not vote for him in such numbers that even as big a liar and a cheat as he is that he feels so demoralized that he doesn’t even try to claim the election was rigged.
Yeah, I know, I know… wishful thinking.
Speaking of wishful thinking… now while of course I do not condone assassination or murder of any sort, except through due process of the law obviously, but I can’t help also wondering, as hated as The Donald is by so many people around the world, and as extreme and unpredictable as we humans have become, if there isn’t someone out there right now planning on taking the self-loving, disadvantaged-people loathing wannabe dictator out so as to not allow another Hitler to terrorize the planet.
Do you think?
Just wondering…
Not condoning…
Or hoping or praying or wishing…
And I promise I wasn’t crossing my fingers either when I typed that…
Or my toes.
Anyway…
Regardless of all the hopes and prayers and wishful thinking, there will indeed come a day when we live in a post-Donald world (assuming he vacates an oxygen-breathing state before one of the narcissistic billionaires discover a “cure” for aging and death like they are trying so hard to do), I can’t help but wondering yet again if there is anyone out there megalomaniacal enough to curry enough favor with all the whacky cultists to assume The Donald’s role as King of the MAGAtes.
It seems like his daughter has evolved into a semi-state of sanity and is no longer interested in throwing her diamond-studded tiara into the despotic ring.
How about Junior, the Cocaine Kid, does he have what it takes to be as world-destroying as his father? I’m guessing not, despite any sincere effort he may make.
EriK? LOL, am I right!
Or maybe it is that The Donald is just a one-off? And that when he goes, so goes the threat to the world’s oldest democracy…
The deceased author William Gay, that is, not the former professional football cornerback William Gay.
Well, William Gay the cornerback may also be a literary genius, I’m just not aware of it.
But I am aware that Nic Pizzolatto is too a genius, at least of the screenwriting variation, as is evidenced by his hugely popular HBO series True Detective.
I watched season one of True Detective as soon as it was released, what… nearly ten years ago now.
I liked it. Maybe not as much as many seemed to have at the time, and certainly not as much as I like season two (I know, I know… I’m woefully in the minority on this one – I have never been much of a fan of Woody Harrelson’s acting, and I thought Matthew McConaughey’s character was a bit over the top), but I liked it enough to dig into the particulars of its development.
Which is when I discovered Nic Pizzolatto.
And which is when shortly thereafter I discovered Thomas Ligotti…
As this highly misanthropic madman (both literally and literarily) genius author was a huge influence on NP and his creation and development of MM’s forlorn and highly misanthropic character Detective Rustin “Rust” Cohle.
Come to find out there is an actual philosophical movement, however slight (hopefully), that actual believes that, for the sake of humanity, I guess, humanity needs to be disappeared.
Apparently, NP was so influenced by Tl that some/many believed he plagiarized the immensely pessimistically nihilistic author for much of MM/Cohle’s dialogue.
I can understand why (while imitation might be the sincerest form of flattery, I do not condone plagiarism of any stripe), TL’s short stories are some of the most awesomely horrific stories I have ever read/listened to, and I truly appreciate NP for turning me on to the human depressant…
Although, to date, I have not yet been able to make it all the way through his anti-humanity book. It’s too depressing, simple as that.
Incidentally, during Joe Rogan’s last interview with Elon Musk recently, I was surprised to discover, seeing how well informed they both always seem to be, that neither of them seemed to be aware of TL or of his influence on NP or of the whole down with humanity philosophy as they first heard about the Voluntary Human Extinction Movement in a less than recent New York Times article entitled Earth Now Has 8 Billion Humans. This Man Wishes There Were None.
Rogan probably has heard of it before but as much dope as he smokes and as old as he’s getting to be, he probably burned out the brain cells responsible for recalling that information.
Anyway, long story short…
Or have I missed that bus already?
Anyway, for some reason I forget, a few weeks ago I mentioned to my son that I enjoy season two of TD much more than season one.
(Season three isn’t even in the discussion as it is immensely forgettable. And from what I’ve seen of the upcoming season four, it looks equally immensely forgettable.)
My son was shocked at my (poor) taste and went on to pan season two and praise season one, as do most.
So, I figured, since I’ve already watched season two three times, I might as well give season one another shot, seeing that it’s been nearly ten years since I last watched it.
And I recently finished rewatching it.
And I still enjoyed it, probably more because this time around I was familiar with TL and his work and the insight from it was appreciated.
And though I still prefer season two, I still liked season one enough once again to once again look up ol’ NP to see if he has been up to anything new.
Didn’t really discover anything new by NP that interested me, but I did discover this old Buzzfeed article that interested me greatly, as it lists all the literary influences of NP’s that went into the development of season one.
And it was from this article that I discovered William Gay.
The author, not the cornerback.
And I cannot believe I have never heard of this good ol’ boy literary genius before.
And by good ol’ boy, I mean that was one dude whose neck was severely reddened. Crispy, if you know what I mean*.
Never had I read/listened to a collection of short stories where ever single story is as completely fantastic as these are. Especially in a collection written by just one author.
Because my eyes are shot because of the side effects from my bone marrow transplant of so long ago, I listen to books now more than I read them.
Consequently, I have a pretty good ear for great narrators. Great as defined by me anyway.
Tom Stescschulte has been a longtime favorite of mine and this to me is the best work he has ever done.
So, yeah, once again I must thank NP for turning me on to yet another amazing author.
And I hope I’m wrong about season four. I’m a fan of Jodie Foster so I hope she pulls it off.
So, that’s the short story long of it.
Oh yeah!
Since I’ve already missed the short bus, let bring up one last thing…
I’ll make it fast – punctuation be damned.
If you are a fan of audiobooks like I am but are not a fan of Audible’s expensive subscription like I am – the only reason I started my subscription back up recently is because I was offered and I accepted a one-month free promo (which they are betting I will forget to cancel but which I marked my calendar so to hell with them I won’t fall into that expensive trap) – then you must be estatic like I am that Spotify is now offering audiobooks for those who are subscribed with a premium membership like I am and all the books I have on my audible wish list are available on spotify as are many many more and my TBLT (to be listened to) list is so long now I probably won’t finish it until I’m in my eighties, which, sadly, is almost as close as my forties are far away…
Yeah…
*Apologies for the stereotype but, dagburnit that dude is one countrified dude. Not that it’s a bad thing, it’s just, well, you know how the stereotype goes…
My Johns Hopkins oncologist once told me that if he had twenty patients with lung GVHD, aka bronchiolitis obliterans syndrome, as bad as mine, he would have 20 dead patients within the year. Of course, he didn’t tell me this until many years after my initial diagnosis when it was certain I was not going to abide by those fatal odds, odds which were significantly more fatal than what my NIH doc told me.
He also told me that if I ever got pneumonia, it would be game over for me.
Well, I got bacterial pneumonia a year or so ago and, well, here I am.
Only the good die young and all that, you know how it goes.
Well, after I was cleared to re-enter the game of life at full speed and contact, my doc clarified his game over remarks.
He meant to say, or, according to him he did say and I just don’t remember, that if I ever get fungal pneumonia, then it is game over.
Well, well, well…
That has upped the game’s stakes quite significantly.
And now I wished I had never watched that damned terrifying show that was adapted from that damned terrifying video game.
Of course it wasn’t nearly as terrifying until put into the context of my doc’s prediction.
And which is why my heart ever so slightly skips a beat whenever I see one of the evermore present fungal superbug spreading headlines.
In October, there were 57 new clinical cases of the drug-resistant, potentially lethal fungus that can invade a person’s bloodstream, brain, heart or other organs, according to Nevada Division of Behavioral Health data. In the same month, 123 cases of colonization were reported in which individuals typically have the fungus in the folds of their skin, invisible to the eye, yet are not sick. Those people can still transmit the pathogen.
The fungus can spread from person to person and also from contaminated surfaces and equipment with transmission occurring most often in healthcare settings. Patients who have been hospitalized for a long time, or have a central venous catheter or other lines or tubes entering their body, are at highest risk for infection, public health authorities say. Healthy people usually don’t develop an invasive infection.
Fortunately, I do not live in Nevada…
But, the way things are going, I doubt it will soon matter where one lives.
The only bright side to all this for me is, like I’ve already said…
I am alone - me
alone, I exist
alone, I consume the crowd
and the crowd becomes me
without me there is no crowd
without me - nothing
no thing
without me the thing, any thing
is absent
was never there
had never existed
I, alone, am
and, alone, I exist
I don’t know if you’ve heard or not, but there is some mysterious illness affecting dogs that is spreading fast throughout the U.S….
A mysterious and potentially fatal respiratory illness in dogs has been reported in several states across the country, as veterinarians continue to search for what may be causing the condition that has killed some dogs.
The illness starts out as a cough that can last for several weeks, but it may not respond to typical treatment, such as antibiotics, which can leave the dog struggling to breathe and with severe pneumonia.
But “Old Blue” was a favorite of my children’s, and mine, when they were growing up. There are many versions of it, The Byrds’, Joan Baez’, and Willie Nelson’s just to name a few, but Disney’s version is my favorite since it has so many happy memories attached to it.
