I don't know what to tell you.

  The last day of July. Two of my cousins and a passel of their collected young'uns came by today to visit. They were mightily impressed with Momma's basement set-up and it's always fun to see them. I don't see them as much as I should and they're all so grown up. Even the ones that are still teenagers are huge. I don't know what makes me feel older, seeing these kids get old enough to go off to college or knowing that my baby cousin is pushing 40.

  Let's get the News in. Spent a lot of time in Washington, D.C., this week, but it does scan. Between Trump's ongoing legal problems, the Great American Temper Tantrum hearings, and the Infrastructure Bill, it's been a pretty heavy weekend on the Potomac. I've been avoiding too much COVID-19 news because I figure that's going to dominate the Fall. I hope I'm wrong on that one.

 I'm going to get this out of my system. I don't care if you don't get the vaccine. I think you should and you're a moron if you don't, but I care about as much as I care about you demanding to exercise your right to lie down on a busy highway. I don't care about you, but it's a shame about the people you're going to hurt out of your arrogance. And for that matter, I don't give a damn about your kids you're subjecting to possible infection. If you cared more about them than yourself, it wouldn't be an issue.

 My man Ashton Pittman wrote a sharp piece on some of the shenanigans going on at Ole Miss that definitely should be read. I wrote about Arbee Stidham and the joy of finding old music in your preferred genre you didn't know existed over at the Tumblr site. I wouldn't call it a must-read, but it was fun to write, and it's a pretty good tune.

 For those interested, Steam is hosting a free weekend for Square Enix's Marvel's Avengers game. It's a big-ass download and will put your computer through the paces, so be forewarned. I played some of it and... it's okay. It's very pretty and plays well, you're definitely getting a good MCU Avengers vibe. It does deviate some, best I can tell, from cannon but people who get bent out of shape about different platforms telling different stories especially when it comes to comic books are gigantic losers. Look, y'all, multiple universes are built into it.

 I'm not sure how much more time I'll put into it and I doubt I'll worry about purchasing it anytime soon. It's got a good discount that lasts until August 11, if that does anything for you. It's definitely a Triple-A game with all the bloat that entails. It's been somewhat contemptuously compared to Destiny, which I don't think I ever played. They may work for some, but it's all too much for me. Skyrim, Dragon Age: Inquisition, and Assassin's Creed IV are about too much for me. I may go back and mess with the Hawkeye bit some, though.

 Something else I want to get off my chest. My four favorite Marvel heroes have all been represented by the MCU. I should say five, but I've never seen the Iron Fist show. Anyhow, I'm shooting 50%. I like how they've handled Spider-Man and Ant-Man (both Scott Lang and Hank Pym, and that whole mess). Unfortunately, they're using the Ultimate versions of Hawkeye and Falcon rather than the original 616 versions.

 I must confess, I don't like super-spy Hawkeye and special forces Falcon. I like Hawkeye who's just a circus kid who worked his ass off to run with mythological beings and a Falcon who's more interested in helping his Harlem neighborhood - impressing the shit out of the Sentinel of Liberty along the way - rather than a soldier who had access to neat toys. I mean, I understand that it actually makes more sense, but I'm old school, I guess. Guys who give a shit top soldiers any day of the week.

 Is there anything else? I can't think of anything. My damn knee is killing me and I don't think I can put off going to the doctor about it much longer. Enjoy the rest of your weekend.

I can't think of anything.

  I just woke up from a dream where I was writing. My set-up was truly something and the initial paragraph was actually pretty good. It's a shame reality pales in comparison in so many ways. I read somewhere that copious marijuana use retarded dreaming or, at least, remembering dreams. That sort of tracks, as I really didn't remember the dreams I'd had when I was smoking more weed than Willie Nelson.

 That may be what I miss most about not being able to get (or stay, let's be honest) stoned. I remember my dreams these days and it's always disappointing. It's either a work dream and everyone hates me because I suck or it's got something to do with school where I'm late for a class I can't find and everyone hates me. Lots of dreams where everyone hates me, and I'm sure that says something but I don't care to know what. I have no illusions about my self-esteem. so all I'm getting from that is I really loathe myself more than I will admit. That's unsettling.

 The dumbest one I've had lately is I dreamt I was late for work at Whole Foods because I'd gone to a mall across town for a McDonald's hamburger. Or maybe it was a sausage-and-biscuit for breakfast. In any event, it was someplace I wouldn't go for something I don't like making me stress out over a job I hated. Imagine trying to be in a good mood after that.

 There are also the... I wouldn't call them "sex dreams" because there's no actual sex. They're definitely fantasy because they involve a woman I'm incredibly attracted to who desperately wants to be with me. To my shame, I've never had a heavy lust for any woman who was actively interested in having sex with me. Granted, the sexiest thing a woman can do is be physically interested in me so I've usually managed to get over that. It does generally come out in the end, though.

 That's a lie. Twice have I lusted after women who wanted in my pants, but neither woman wanted to stay around after the loving was through. I'm not sure I should count them, but again, that's all pretty telling, I think. Anyhow, the not-sex dreams are probably the most disheartening. Again, I don't mind that living my life as I wish has led me to become single in my mid-40s but it's still no fun when my subconscious rubs it in my face.

 Anyhow. So much for all of that. I'm depressed and miserable and probably desperately lonely and undoubtedly in denial about how deep all that is, but it's neither interesting nor all that revealing. This is the sixth day in a row that I've gone to sleep just before the sun came up and slept well into noon. I've decided to give into it for as long as it lasts. Might as well, it's been as hot as a bastard while the sun was up.

 It's been ridiculously hot here at Enon Holler World Headquarters. We've had heat indexes in the 110s all week, and we're not supposed to get relief any time soon. Apparently, the country's under a "heat dome," which is when the atmosphere holds heat in from hot ocean air. It's linked to climate change, so there you go. Between that and the spike in Delta cases - and particularly the conservative zealotry against vaccinations and the ilk - humanity is not looking good.

 I watched a YouTube video the other day saying how one would probably survive a Romero-style zombie outbreak. I used to think so myself, if for no other reason that eventually dead bodies break down. It takes a year or so for a human body to completely melt away, but give it a couple of days and your tendons would be so dry they'd snap, no worries.

 I'm not as certain now. Night after night of Tucker Carlson claiming zombie bites caused death and resurrection into a flesh-eating monster was merely a Democrat hoax to make Trump look bad would have a deleterious effect. Multiple Facebook groups where ding-dongs convince each other that there are no actual zombies and only people who live in fear would mind being bitten would have a deleterious effect.

 We would be at Day of the Dead within six weeks, man.

Yeah, just post the damn thing.

  This is the fourth day, hand running, that I've stayed in bed until well into the afternoon. I'm not staying up too late nor am I sleeping the whole time. Indeed, I'm getting a good bit of reading done. I just don't want to get out of bed and face another day. It's fucking tedious, man.

 Every time I talk to the Psych Doc or Therapist, they ask me if I have suicidal thoughts, and I don't, not really. I just don't want to be here and I'm not sure that's the same thing. I'm in a dark place right now, though, and I don't see a way out of it. I avoid Twitter because there will come a point where I tell someone they should've been drowned at birth. This is why I don't argue with people there or anywhere else. It's rarely worth it.

 Simone Bailes bowed out of the team gymnastics event during the Olympics and conservative white dudes (and wanna-be conservative white dudes) are losing their shit over it. We're told she's doing it for her mental health and they're all pissed off that she's "not tough enough," but I'm convinced they're all pissed off they're losing the opportunity to gloat if she doesn't get gold. In any event, if anyone should be ignored about anything, it's conservative white dudes.

 I really haven't been paying attention to the Olympics this time around. Partly because they're in Japan and there's a 10-hour time difference, but mostly because I don't have cable nor do I have a girlfriend who wants to watch it. That's how it worked out the last time I paid attention, which I guess was the 2012 Olympics. We watched a good bit of it and, pretty much like every sport, it's not my thing but I can appreciate excellence wherever it's found. I've seen Bailes do her thing and if she feels she needs to step aside for her own health and the good of her team, who am I to judge. Not a white dude conservative critic, that's for damn sure.

 Anyhow. I don't know I really have anything else. I've been reading a couple short story collections that are based on Lovecraftian themes. One collection's stories are new-ish while the other collection pulls in some classics by folks like Robert Howard and Robert Bloch. They're both about equal, so far, and I'm switching between the two. Most of the time I can't tell the difference, but they're both fun.

 It's tying in with the fascination with pre-historical societies or the possibility thereof. The Appalachian Mountains are almost 500 million years old and pre-date the formation of the Atlantic Ocean. That's pretty stunning to think about, but it sort of puts a new spin on some of the "ancient evils" in Lovecraft's New England and could totally bypass any weird connotation with Native Americans. I never have been that into Conan or Middle-Earth stuff, so I wish I could come across some fiction that uses this. I could write my own, of course, but that doesn't seem to work and I don't know how to make it so.

 I am tired of being depressed and miserable. I don't see a good way out, life is just going to get tougher and more painful. Oh, well. Maybe tomorrow will be different. It won't, but what other choice is there?

That picker there's in trouble, boy, ain't nothin' but another side of you.

  I suppose we should get on this. I've got nothing and, for the most part, I don't care. I've been shut down most of the day and still buried alive in the blues. It's too damn hot, my knee's killing me, and I'm just too burnt out to deal with it, man.

 Okay, but the News. Pretty good week, mainly because the House Select Committee drama has kept things entertaining. I'll say it again, I did not see the particular rope-a-dope Nancy Pelosi pulled with her denial of Jims Jordan and Banks. Again, it should go on record that I'm not one of these folks who thinks old-timers like Pelosi are being shucked by the GOP. At worst, they're playing by rules the Republicans no longer feel the need to even acknowledge, but given the media landscape and the basic gullibility of the American public, they haven't much choice.

 That's one thing I really don't think people get about American politics, the effect public opinion has on the parties' boundaries. People instantly assume, for example, the GOP is financially thrifty when every time in the past fifty years that the debt has run out of control has been under a Republican administration. People think Democrats are soft on national defense, i.e. bombing the shit out of countries that can't really fight back, and that's just not true, either. And so on and so forth.

 People have a hard time accepting the Republican Party's total acceptance and capitulation to Donald Trump because he's, well, a celebrity with the morals of a guttersnipe. He's replaced Reagan as their god, and the only reason he got as far as he did in politics is because of his Hollywood connections. And to be honest, every Republican president back to at least Ike has been a pig, with the possible exception of George W. Bush. As odd as that might sound, it's true enough.

 Anyhow. Enough of that for now. That's News and I'll save it for the News. I'll need something to write about tomorrow night, anyway. I don't know what else to write about tonight, though. Best I can tell, it's been two weeks since I've played video game one and most of my reading has been different cosmic horror stories based on Lovecraftian lore. I've been blowin' my harps, sure, but that's just a part of breathing these days.

 My brother's coming to visit next month and if I can come up with a subtle way of asking him to get me some of the good smoke, I will. I don't want to put him on the spot, given how shit the mail is these days and that I'm basically asking him to commit a felony.

 Now that I think about it, I watched Dagon last night. It's a Spanish horror film based on the Lovecraft story The Shadow Over Innsmouth, which to be frank, is one of the Lovecraft go-to stories I never have cared for. It stinks way, way too much of Henry Phillip's issues with people who aren't proper white folks breeding with each other. I don't understand why it's so popular as opposed to something like The Statement of Randolph Carter, but there you go.

 I think that's good enough for now.

Hell, I don't know.

  I'm not going to dick around with this today.

 A little insight on My Day. I usually get up sometime between 7 a.m. and 9 a.m. if I haven't stayed up all night. First breakfast, and then any last looks that Actual Paying Work might need. If there's none of that, it's a news bath until right around noon. Then I take a nap until 2 or 3 p.m., whereupon I go to the gym for an hour. Upon coming home, me and Otis spend some time outside walking the property until it's time for supper. Interspersed there's another news bath, and either I'll play some games or watch some movies or read until I fall asleep, usually around 2 a.m. There's also a good possibility of at least one more nap thrown into all that because I like naps.

 I said all that to say all this. I've been letting the Gibberish slide too much lately. Well, I've been letting everything slide too much, but this especially. I'll think to myself, "I'll have something to write about later this evening," only to forget and not think of it until 5 a.m.

 So, here we are filling up space during the post-walk, pre-supper news bath. And for the record, a "news bath" is a concept taken from Frank Zappa. He'd spend his afternoons clicking between various television news programs. I don't watch television news if I can help it, so my news bath is internet sources. I'm sure Frank would understand.

 Anyhow. While I don't get as much feedback as I'd like, I do get some. Mostly clicks and the occasional like, and that's fine. Once in a while, I'll get an email or a comment. Nothing heavy, just some variation of "I agree" or "I didn't know that, thanks." The latter is what I'm going for, but it's all nice.

 However, and this always comes from Tumblr, I get some utter nonsense. The News posts automatically to Tumblr and once in a while I get some dopey comment from someone who obviously didn't read past the opening paragraph that's repeated on Tumblr, and they decide to get cute. Now, I'm not going to try to figure out why Tumblr is like it is, but I do want to note that I've gotten complete silly shit from gun worshippers, reasonable liberals, and soi-disant socialists, but they all have one thing in common.

 They didn't read the whole piece. Y'all, read the whole piece or at least read the whole section because I do sometimes break it up. But read the whole piece, I beg you. Just because I criticize mass shooters doesn't mean I'm anti-gun. Just because I question what Nancy Pelosi's trying to do doesn't mean I think she's the font of all political evil. Just because I wonder about leftists' actions having any effect doesn't mean I'm hippie punching. And so on. Read the whole piece, kids, or leave me alone.

 And so much for all that. I caught an entertaining flick last night on Tubi called The Night Watchmen. In short, a group of titular night watchmen and a reporter have to survive a night in a newspaper office filled with vampires which are led by a popular television clown. It's a horror-comedy with a Shaun of the Dead sort of thing going. It's pretty witty, isn't too gory, there aren't too many cringe-inducing moments, and it's fairly well-made all together. Check it out.

Stand right up and yell.

  I completely forgot to do this yesterday evening. I thought about it earlier in the day, but I went to sleep pretty early due to a large meal and didn't think about it until the 5 a.m. pee break. I thought about letting it ride since there's a good chunk of Actual Paying Work I can get done this week, but I know better to write checks my ass won't bother to cash.

 So, I'll doodle around until I get inclined to take a nap. I will get to the News tonight; I'm still finding that much easier to do for whatever reason. I would've never thought I'd appreciate a regular, set deadline, but there you go.

 The blue funk I've been in hasn't gone away, obviously. It hasn't gotten any worse, though, so that's something, I guess. "Disassociated" was the word I was looking for the other day. I feel disconnected and unattached from the rest of the world. One reason - and this is a really good reason, I think - is because the rest of the world isn't worth being a part of. Which is cynical and probably a bit elitist, I'm sure - it's not like I have much to offer anyway - but it's gotten pretty goddamn stupid out there.

 The Delta variant is going to be nasty. I don't have any hard science to base that one on, but the hard 180 the GOP leadership has taken on vaccination speaks volumes. Steve Scalise said yesterday he's going to get the jab, and that evil bastard is a pretty good canary-in-the-coalmine for the party as a whole. And yes, I'm counting Sean Hannity and the Fox News crew as part of the GOP leadership. Let's not bullshit ourselves here.

 I never could figure out the end game for allowing the anti-vax wing of conservatism to take over, but the shift is pretty easy to grok. Apparently, the Stock Market went into freefall yesterday and that's probably got them jumping. It does no good to point out the hypocrisy of Mitch McConnell calling for vaccinations, but there you go. It is laughable, however, the suggestion that Joe Biden should ask Trump to come out in favor. Whether or not it's good politics on Biden's part is irrelevant; Trump would just spend the opportunity to complain about losing again.

 This hasn't trickled down to the Base, of course, as they're full-on in favor of the idea that the Illuminati is trying to do gene therapy and make them mindless consumers. Them not knowing what HIPAA laws cover is making a resurgence, and that foul beast Marjorie Greene actually laughed when asked about how the Delta variant.

 And that's the rub. Congressional Republicans who got their vaccinations as soon as they became available can beg and plead all they want. The pack of mad vandals and whiny honkies they've nursed and encouraged for the past 30 years, just to be dumped for the first celebrity to come along, will most certainly let their kids die to own the libs. It's foolish to think otherwise, and all we're going to be able to do is hopefully pick up the pieces afterward.

 Okay, then. That's word count. I could do more but I don't want to.

No kidding, I'm ready to fight.

 I'm not going to go into detail about this week's News. I'm just going to link to them. It was a decent week's worth of work, though. I'm feeling very squirrelly, so I want to lash something together, take a shower, and hell, I don't know.

 I'm so stressed out I can feel my blood pressure be high. That tooth that was working itself loose over the past month popped free yesterday. One of the back molars on my left side, it didn't look like what I figured. I guess this is the start of that bit of fun, but it upset Momma something off. "You're too young," she said. I don't know. My sciatic nerve has yet to cool down and I'm tired of being in pain. And I swear, I think my eyesight is getting worse. I'm wearing my glasses as I'm writing this.

 Not a happy bunny, nope. I've figured out why I've been so stressed and generally miserable lately. Everyone around me is stressed. The brother is stressed because of the new house and his wife is stressed because of her mom, which makes him more stressed. Momma's stressed because my uncle's heart is giving out on him and it's driving his wife, Momma's sister, even squirrelly than she is normal. My cousins are stressed, so talking to them is a landmine field.

 I shouldn't have any stress, but for whatever reason, this is making me a little nuts or, at the very least, exacerbating the already gloomy funk I've been in all summer. And pointing out I don't have anything to take the edge off is boring even me. Seriously, I would beat your momma's ass for a joint. Even some reggie, your grandmama would get a beating.

 It's getting weirder out there, y'all. The wingnut outrage machine has cranked up over claims that the COVID vaccination represents some sort of government control, like the entire world is in on this, all to make Trump look bad. I really don't get the endgame. We have actual U.S. Representatives arguing that getting a shot is equal to giving in to the communist hordes. The most-watched television talking head is claiming the shots are losing effectiveness. And the hoi polloi is more than willing to slit your throat if you disagree with them.

 I'll say it again, beloved, but I don't think it's a bad idea to learn how to defend yourself. It's getting to the point where they'll feel whatever they do is justified to "save the country" or "save the children" or "save religion." Nothing penetrates their field or shakes them from their faith. The goofy shit in Arizona is coming up snake eyes and they're convinced Trump will be put in the White House come August.

 The next two election cycles are going to be off the chain. Again, if you decide to buy a firearm, make sure you learn how to properly use and care for it, and the proper way to store it when not in use. Guns are toys. They're tools and their only purpose is to kill people. That may be how you have to defend yourself. You shoot to kill, shooting to wound only happens in movies. Keep that in mind and never fool yourself otherwise.

 Okay. On that cheery note, before we wrap things up, something that's been running through my mind the last day or so. This is a fiction conceit, so don't flip. Specifically, pre-historical civilizations, like in Robert Howard's Conan stores or Tolkien's Middle-Earth. Human beings as we recognize them have been around for 200,000 years but our recorded history only goes back at the most 10,000 years. That's a big whack of time unaccounted for, especially when you consider how much humanity has changed just in the past 1,000 years.

 We still have hunter-gatherer groups, what we've considered "primitive" societies for so long. There are islands in Asia and tribes in the Amazon that are protected from modern contact. We also know societies have changed from those types of societies to something we'd recognize as cities just to go back to the old ways because of this, that, or the other. Like the Mayans, they just... dispersed. Hell, even most of Europe changed greatly between the fall of the Western Roman Empire and the rise of nation-states.

 For all we know, for all we can say with any degree of certainty, what we recognize as "civilization" didn't happen until 6,000-10,000 years ago in Egypt, Sumer, and Crete, along with a handful of other places. Far as we know, for all we can say, that 290,000 years was spent with us being hunter-gatherers that really didn't move around a lot. We know the climate went through massive changes more than once and we know we almost died off as a species, willowed down to a little over 10,000 people. Or so some folks think.

 But I've been finding it diverting to think of pre-historical civilizations lately. People overestimate the durability of mankind's efforts. The pyramids survived because they're fucking huge. A large, vibrant civilization existed in North America well before 1619 but fell to European-born diseases caught by brief contact with Viking explorers, leaving almost nothing behind. Of course, by the time we got around to looking, we'd decided that only the white man could do "civilization" and were prepared to be a dick about it.

 So, what if there was a thriving civilization we'd recognize as such that's disappeared. What if there was more than one. It's not a new thought, of course. It's used a great deal in Lovecraftian fiction as well as Marvel Comics. Hell, half of Marvel's background is based on Conan stories.

 And those civilizations don't have to stop at a sword-&-sorcery level. I mean, it only took us at most 10,000 years to make it to the Moon. I've never come across any, but I'm sure there's fiction out there that touches on advanced civilizations that rise and fall before Gilgamesh. All sorts of stuff we haven't even thought of could've been developed. Hell, we could've achieved faster-than-light travel and left the planet, perhaps under the threat of devastating climate change.

 Just throwing it out there. My ideas are always great but my execution is crap. I've tried to sell them but never had any takers. I guess that tells me all I need to know.

Hey, I got it done, don't expect too much out of me.

  I'm not going to screw around tonight. I got nothing, in particular, I feel like writing about, but what the hell. Never stopped me before.

 Kicking things off, here's a good piece on the young Black activists who led the charge to change the state flag last year. Our good friends Ashton Pittman and Nick Judin at the excellent Mississippi Free Press. Do check them out. Mainstream media is dying a slow death but, surprisingly, Mississippi's got several quality online news magazines. It's like the surfeit of colleges in this state. Never have been able to figure that out.

 I'll just reiterate, but the kids who're written up in this story are what keeps me sane. They've got no choice but to make the state something better than just a place where folks are from. Mississippi catches a lot of shit from the rest of the country, and much of it we deserve. But people, actual people, live here and try to thrive. It's harder than most people think. We're still dealing with the 1890 state constitution that goes out of its way to disenfranchise Black people. What's crazy is it does the same for poor White folks, which doesn't bother the Powers That Be, of course. Racism is a helluva thing.

 So this has slammed to a serious halt. I got a Golden Melody, another Hohner harp. However, I'm still not up for the compare-and-contrast. It's a good harmonica, though. Nice, bright sound, easy feel, just a good instrument all around.

 It's been a good twenty minutes since I wrote the above. I think I'll watch a crappy movie. For whatever reason, I've got a hankering for the Asylum version of John Carter, Princess of Mars. That's the actual title of the book Edgar Rice Burroughs wrote. I saw John Carter staying in a hotel during my Big Trip. It wasn't bad, really, but one understands just why it tanked.

 I need to get around to watching Horn From The Heart but I don't think tonight's the night. That has to be a night where I can pay attention, and that isn't happening tonight. I don't know why I feel so whipped but I do. Some good brain fluff might be the ticket, though.

 A couple hours later...

 Well, I'm watching Princess of Mars and it's... definitely an Asylum movie. It's only dusting over the source material, but that sort of goes without saying. Guy's supposed to be a Marine in Afghanistan rather than a Civil War vet. It's not bad - for an Asylum film, granted - but it is taking a while to get moving. The guy playing John Carter has all the charisma of a bowl of grits, though. And bless her heart, Traci Lords isn't much better.

UPDATE: John Carter is played by Antonio Sabato, Jr. That explains a whole lot about his acting skills.

 Man, I'll be glad when this sciatic nerve settles down. I don't like moving much, sure, but it sucks that much more when it hurts as bad as this does. Something to look forward to in my old age, I suppose. I bet that's when I regret my monkish ways the most.

 Anyway, I've got word count so I might as well pinch this off. I'm going to leave it open, though, in case something comes to me. I know I keep saying that, but you never know.

Ain't nothin' hurt me but my back and side.

  Well, this is just fine. Not only did I let this one slip past me, but I also forgot to actually post it after writing it. It's early Wednesday morning as I speak, but you really didn't miss anything.

 I finally finished that goddamn Network of Time book. All of those pop science books that deal with general relativity, quantum mechanics, or both spend the bulk of the book rehashing all of that. Which is fair, frankly, because that is heavy stuff that changes ever-so-slightly every four or five years, completely changing the paradigm. Anyhow, by the time you get to the meat of the book, it's hard to give a good goddamn. Since whatever's the meat of the book generally hinges on that ever-so-slight change, you really can't skip it.

 Anyhow, time is a result of a network made of collapsed but intertwined quantum effects. Or something like that. To be honest, the damn thing blipped out because near the end of the book the author said, essentially, since we'll never really know the book was a waste of time. That's a problem with e-books; you lose the satisfaction of tossing a book across the room when it pisses you off.

 Don't get me wrong, I liked the book, more or less, and frankly find the idea that reality is sorta-kinda made up of a bunch of interconnected decohered states that, to my mind, make up sort of a lattice or netting. That's one of the reasons I read these books, is that it helps me come up with new versions of reality. Granted, I'll probably never do anything with it - and trust me, no one wants to hear me ramble on about it - but it's fun to think about nevertheless.

 I'm not going to bore anyone by wallowing in tired misery about being unable to gear up any fiction or, for that matter, any writing of substance beyond The News and an occasionally bright idea that finds its way here. That is a well-tread path that I'm sure no one has any interest in going back over. I will say, however, that... I don't know what I was going to say, however. Oh well. Must've not been that important.

 Changing tracks, I sometimes wonder what's behind the zeitgeist. Now I'm not one to think the vox populi is being controlled by the media or manipulated by old men with cigars behind the scenes, but it'd be foolish to think there wasn't something going on, even if indirectly. For example, I'm convinced that a good bulk of the initial animus the conservative mainstream has for Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is based on someone in the media who tried and failed to get into her pants. That she refuses to shut up is the rest of it.

 That being said, I can't help but wonder what is behind the conservative movement against the COVID vaccine. I'll save it for tomorrow's (today's) News, but Tennessee has called a half to all vaccination outreach programs for school children. Not just COVID, but everything. Measles, chickenpox, everything. They still offer them, they just can't say anything about them.

 That state's in a weird place, man. The state government recently fire the doctor who was heading up its COVID program for telling people about COVID, particularly the dangers of the Delta variant. Or, in other words, they fired her for doing her job. I wonder how long it'll be before Dr. Thomas Hobbs pisses off the wrong person in Jackson and he finds himself up against it. He's not been silent about how the Delta variant is affecting kids, mainly because adults are refusing to get vaccinated.

 Okay, I understand "parental choice," sure. But they're acting like this isn't what saved millions of lives during the 20th century, within living memory. But that's the hoi polloi. I don't understand the government's goal behind this, particularly Republicans. Again, I'm not one given to flights of fancy thinking there's some sort of sinister motive behind this apart from greed and hubris. Most of the time, that's plenty.

 But still. It's weird, man, just weird.

100 years of the blues.

  I tell you what, I am sick and tired of being in such a bad mood all the time. It's getting harder and harder to put up with anything and everything either gets on my nerves or depresses the hell out of me. My damn sciatic nerve is acting up, too, just to make things that much more pleasant.

 Otis wants to go outside. What he does is go around to the other side of the garage, look around for a bit, and want to come back in. We've done that like four times this evening. If I don't take him out when he wants to go out, he looks for something to rip up, either the carpet or just whatever he can get his mouth around. And then has the audacity of looking like I'm whipping him when I pull him away. He doesn't even need me, that's the real pisser. It's tiresome because if he's awake that's all he wants to do, walk around the garage and then come back inside. One of the reasons I stay up all night is both he and Momma are asleep so I can get some peace and quiet. 

 Ah well. That's life and it'll all end soon enough, I suppose. Okay, then, the News. Pretty decent week, if nothing special. We kept up with Elsa, the Delta Variant, and the condo collapse in Miami. It's been kind of a depressing week, what with the Pacific Northwest burning up and New York City being flooded. I did some writing about music at the Tumblr place, too, so check it out.

 I don't know what else beyond I just don't have it in me to do this tonight. I'm tempted to go ahead and shut it down, maybe come back to it after a nap. I never get enough sleep and I'm drowsy all the time. In any event, it's going to sit here for a while until I come up with something.

LATER: Nope, napping didn't help a thing. Still pissed off and still dull in the brain. There's plenty going on. There's that teacher in Tennessee who got fired for teaching what some people think Critical Race Theory is. There's booger-eating white supremacist Nick Fuentes booting from Twitter and subsequent clown show at CPAC. There's CPAC, which just gets nuttier and nuttier each year. There's flatlander fraud J.D. Vance shit-talking New York City like anyone believes a thing he says. He's going to get stomped into a mudhole in the primary. You'd almost feel bad for him if he weren't such a transparent douchebag.

 But I don't feel like writing about that shit. Maybe I'll be more inclined to face the foul realities of life in these United States tomorrow. I've done pretty well this week with previous Gibberish. Jumping thoughts, I'm currently - as in, as I write this - watching Lucio Fulci's The Beyond. It takes place in Louisiana and features a haunted hotel's basement. If you don't know why that's funny, I can't help you. For what it's worth, it's very much a "style over substance" movie with not much plot to get in the way of the story.

 I guess that's plenty. I'm up for another hour, at least, so maybe something interesting will pop out. Of course, we know how that goes.

Tears wickedness and self-conceit that is the deign of man.

  Dad-blame it. I let it slip by again. It's now 1:20 a.m. Friday morning. I did have something I was going to muddle around with but I'm not as irritated about it now.

 I probably got close to Word Count last night at the Tumblr site. I wrote about blues harmonica players Big Walter Thorton and Good Rockin' Charles Edwards and how they cross paths concerning Jimmy Rogers's "Walking By Myself." I've been writing a little more about music lately, for whatever reason. Here's something on Kid Thomas Watts. Anyway, it's obviously got something to do with my obsession with harmonica music. I've always liked the instrument, but as I've said, I get wild about a genre or musician from time to time and just wallow it. I think this might be the first instrument.

 Anyhow, I was going to write about how silly and potentially dangerous the panic about Critical Race Theory has become. It really has become, well, stupid and hard to take seriously. People are actually claiming it's based on Nazi thought. These are the same people who think Dr. Martin Luther King starts and stops with the "I Have A Dream" speech, so, it's not really surprising they're not putting all that much effort into it.

 And while it hasn't filtered up to the actual government, some wingnuts are pounding the table to put cameras in classrooms so teachers can't sneak in CRT into their little darlings' multiplication tables. Actual politicians who actually make actual laws have compared vaccination efforts to Nazi doings, though. It's getting harder and harder to take these people seriously and harder and harder to do anything but tell "godspeed, you mad fuckers."

 I'm sure I've stated my feeling that debating with conservatives online is a waste of time, but if not, let me say it again. Debating with conservatives online is a waste of time. They're either misunderstanding what they're so mad about or they're lying about it, and it generally depends on how high up on the pecking order they are. Either way, they take the absolute worst position on whatever the "problem" is. 

 Reckon how long this current outrage lasts? I'm not sure what the endgame is beyond stirring up the rubes, like banning trans kids from high school sports or previous efforts to ban gay marriage. I have no doubt that, for the most part, most politicians and media figures know exactly what they're doing and why. Probably not, say, Louie Gohmert and Tomi Lahren, but Tucker Carlson and Ted Cruz? Sure, they're hip. I mean, you really don't hear those guys raising hell about gay marriage anymore, do you?

 It's just me, but it's becoming more difficult to even engage these jackasses. You don't want to get vaccinated even though COVID-19 has apparently mutated into two nastier strains? That's on you, hoss, just keep your nasty ass away from Momma. You want to put cameras into your kid's classroom because you're worried the fragile little dears might learn that white people have been awful in the past? Okay by me. There'll be enough non-idiots to keep the lights on until after I shuffle off this mortal coil.

 That's the wrong way to approach things, of course, but it's almost keeping me sane since I can't get stoned. Just drop out, man, since I can't turn on. Y'all want to let the planet become unlivable? Be my guest, I've just to be here maybe another thirty years. I'm leaving nothing behind when I go, so why should I care?

 Yeah, that's not the best way to approach things, I know, but it's getting me down, man. In any event, there's enough in Mississippi that's screwed up to keep me occupied for the duration

Not even going to bother.

  On a whim, I bought a collection of short stories based around the Carl Kolchak character from the old television movie and show. It's by a bunch of different science fiction/horror/fantasy/what have you authors, some I'm heard of and some I haven't. So far it's okay. Not terribly but definitely better than the other Kolchak-based fiction I read, C.J. Henderson's A Black And Evil Truth.

 Which in itself wasn't bad. It just didn't feel like a Kolchak story. Everybody liked Carl. Vincenzo was praising him. The local law wanted to work with him. Hell, he even got the hot babe who was also intelligent and charming. That's not Kolchak. One of the things that makes the character so intriguing is that he's on his own. His editors think he's more trouble than he's worth, the fuzz thinks he's a bug that should be stepped on, and he rarely has luck with the ladies.

 The other thing about modern takes on Kolchak is they have him in the 21st century with access to all the technology we have. Or at least the first decade, so maybe not smartphones with a television-grade camera. Still, it never sets well with me.

 Kolchak is a creature of the '70s and just doesn't work in any other time. For one, the media landscape today is totally different, and the new stories acknowledge things like multiple 24-hour news channels and web-based magazines. One thing that doesn't exist and hasn't for years is even big cities having multiple newspapers that can afford to send a reporter across the country.

 I watched some of the Kolchak revival from a couple of years ago. It was terrible. One of the reasons is it gave Kolchak motivation beyond getting a byline. It made him all dark and tortured by the past instead of wanting to get a better gig at a higher-rated newspaper. Everyone was too pretty in that early part of the 21st century way, too. Kolchak is a ruffled, middle-aged shlump with a stupid hat and one suit. He's also cowardly, just like all of us would be if faced with an Aztec demon or a vampire.

 What do you call this sort of fiction? It's not really fan fiction but it sort of is in spirit. It's as often as not a part of a brand. Back in the '90s, LucasFilm gave the world the Star Wars Expanded Universe that started out okay but lost me fairly quickly. The time between the end of the series and the TV movie gave the world a bunch of Doctor Who books, both with the Seventh Doctor and Past Doctor Adventures. Virgin Books had the license at first but after the movie, BBC got it back. It was... spotty. A lot of the early Seventh Doctor books were based on the so-called "Cartmel Masterplan" which saw a darker turn, more "sophisticated and mature," which meant more sex scenes.

 I liked the Big Finish Audios better, anyway. It's not quite the same thing as Scarlett or Poodle Springs or suchlike. There has been a metric ton of Sherlock Holmes fiction that's post-Conan Doyle and it's really not worth the effort. The Robert Downey movie was fun but it still made the mistake of making Irene Adler a love interest.

 Some of the post-Stoker Dracula fiction is woeful, especially the stuff written by his ancestor. Everyone assumes, one, Jonathan Harker was disgusted by Mina after she'd been attacked and, two, the focus of Dracula's desire was Mina. It was Jonathan, and he said if she turned to a vampire, let him be turned as well and then destroy both of them. I get worked up over this, I admit.

 To give credit where credit is due, I have thoroughly enjoyed William Meikle's revival of the Carnacki: The Ghost Finder. They're well-written and fairly true to the originals. William Hope Hodgson had only written nine of the short stories before his death in World War I, so there's a lot of room to expand. They do get a bit repetitive but Meike's managed to find different scenarios for the plots, so if you space them out, you're good.

 Well, I should wrap this up, I guess. If nothing else, I've spent most of the day watching Kolchak: The Night Stalker reruns on NBC's streaming service. It cuts out every now and then regardless of which browser I use. The wonders of modern technology at work, I reckon.

I got your drinkin' money, tune up your Dobro.

 It's the weekend of the Fourth of July, so if you're going to do something celebrate, have a good time and be safe. I would say avoid big crowds so as to not give the COVID-19 Delta variety a fertile field to grow, but we are way past that, son. But let's move on and get started.

 Good week for the news. We touched on the discussion on medical marijuana in the state senate, the collapse of the condo in Florida, the vagrancies of the law concerning celebrities, and the massive amount of shit Black women have been catching from the Olympic folks. Lots of good stuff there, so go check it out.

 Before I get too deep into it, I just have to get something off my chest. I don't get Nick Cage. I think he's a so-so actor, as far as I can judge those things, when he's being serious (like, say, The Rock) and just irritating when he's being Wacky Nick Cage, like in everything else he does. I'm not crazy about anything he's done, even the iconic roles like in Raising Arizona. If you dig him, fine but I ain't on board. Seriously, Ghost Rider is terrible. Everyone involved should be embarrassed.

 Okay, then. Today's Twitter star is the Intellectual Dark Web darling and editor of the phrenology enthusiasts' publication Quillete Claire Lehmann decided that Sha'Carri Richardson wasn't actually popped for weed but for steroids. Her reasoning? Only steroids could account for Richardson's big hair and long fingernails. No, really. She double-downed on it by claiming Florence Joyner, the late icon, died due to drug abuse. For the record, FloJo died due to an epileptic fit and no one seriously thinks she was juicing, particularly not the coroners who examined her corpse.

But of course, neither she nor her reply guys are backing down on this even in the face of not only having no evidence but all evidence available to the contrary. The only answer is illegal performance-enhancing substances, and nothing else fits, especially for someone like her. You know, "those people" really can't succeed without cheating.

Let's get this out of the way. Yes, I think this is a prime example of pure, uncut racism. If you don't believe so, I do not care. You're probably racist, as well, but don't feel bad. Racism is woven far deeper into American society and it's something most of us have a difficult time recognizing, like a fish explaining what water is. This goes double for anti-Black strains of racism. We don't want to admit it, - see the hoo-hah concerning "Critical Race Theory" - but that is American culture's Original Sin along with genocide and betrayal of the indigenous population.

Again, if you disagree with this perception, I really don't care one way or another. I'm tired of arguing with you assholes and there is plenty of resources available to learn for yourself. There are better people than I who'll spend time trying to save you, but as far as I'm concerned, you can all go skip rope.

One thing that gets me about these discussions is how a lot of people seem to think if there isn't a bonafide slur involved, it can't be an example of racism. I think that's why the "dirtbag left"-slash-IDW-slash-"identity politics" crowd likes things like Quillete so much. It gives them not only an air of legitimacy but isn't as crude as, say, Stormfront. The '90s saw the rise of the Conservative Citizens Council, which rode the same horses as the Klan - white supremacy with a neo-Confederate edge - but wore nice suits and drove expensive cars. A better face on the same old shit, and that's what Quillette is. Plus, it's poorly written, but that's just how things are.

Okay, that's plenty. This has gone on all day and I'm bored with it. Again, if you think I'm being unfair or close-minded concerning Lehmann or the publication, I really don't care and don't waste my time with your jibber-jabber. Keep that in mind if you're experiencing a case of the red ass here. I've been giving Kingdom Come: Deliverance a shot, and goddamn, that's tough. Almost as bad as Outward. It's amazing how much one relies on normal CRPG devices like quest markers and on-screen maps.

But hey. Stay safe, y'all.

I got nothing for this. Sometimes it works like this.

  I let this ride too long today. It's 11 p.m. and I desperately need a shower. I get started on this, I'll be dicking around until god knows when. So I'll just get something down and come back to it. I'll have to sit up until my hair dries, anyway. Hold tight.

 Okay, that's done. I'm starting to let more time pass between showers and that's not a good thing. I was supposed to have a video chat with the Psych Doc today but I slept through the damn call. No kidding, was asleep a whole 45 minutes and woke up one minute past the point of no return for a callback. I've got it rescheduled for tomorrow, though, so that's... something.

 Be honest, I wonder if I didn't subconsciously do it on purpose because I'm not looking forward to the talk anyway. Along with the Therapist, he's basically the only human interaction I have all month with anyone I'm not related to, but I am not really inclined to discuss the shitty mood I've been in for the past month. Cranky? Yes. Irritable? Yes. Depressed? Yes. Fatalistic? Yes. Separated? Yes.

 Have a clue what could be behind it beyond just my bad head wiring? Hell, no. I couldn't tell you, don't even have an inkling. Part of it is just being stir crazy, sure, but let's face it. Even when I travel, I don't seek out companionship or company. Even when I'm visiting Athens or New Orleans, the best times are when my hosts and/friends leave me to my own devices.

 But I've always been like that. I remember one of my first visits to Athens, I stayed with the then-guitarist of The Drive-By Truckers and his then-wife. It was a spur-of-the-moment thing and knowing what I know now about their relationship (y'all, never hook up with a musician until they've gone through three or four serious relationships) she was barely consulted. For as long as I knew her - we've since lost touch, but I hope she's well - she'd tell people I was the perfect guest because she didn't have to do a thing while I was under her roof.

 It's a double-edged sword, walking this path. But hey, no one cares about that. Don't ask me what they do care about because I don't know and I really don't care.

 The Northwest is getting baked right now. The other day, Portland, Oregon, was the second hottest place on the planet. And those people don't have air conditioners. Years ago when I visited Chicago, I stayed with a friend of a friend who didn't have A/C and it just happened to be the hottest Fourth of July to date on record. Let me tell you if you don't know, being in a city when it's that goddamn hot is miserable. Even worse than here or New Orleans, I think, because we're at least used to it and planned for it. 

 I feel sorry for you poor bastards with kids or, more specifically, those kids. We have fucked up the planet. Or to be more precise, we've fucked it up to where it may not sustain us anymore. George Carlin has a bit that explores this that I'm sure everyone has seen, and there's something to that. Whatever killed off the dinosaurs also killed off something like 90 percent of multicellular life on land. Life finds a way to survive, but we're not needed for that to be.

 And on that cheery note, it's time to pinch this off. Nobody cares. It doesn't matter. I think I'm just going to go to bed.