GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS BREAK

 I'm taking another break from Goodnight, Fuckers for next week, as I am preparing to go to St. Louis for Authorcon IV. I should return to it the following Monday.

GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #920: ALAKWOPIQERNWV POINEVFWOIN BNPSE

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GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #919: FIRE ALARM ETIQUETTE

 All right, my mind is a lot calmer tonight, so we're going to cover a topic that won't enflame my head.

Two Saturdays ago we had a fire alarm at my office. It wasn't a drill because there aren't enough people working on a Saturday for a drill. It was for real. The fire department showed up and everything. Wouldn't let us back in until they knew there wasn't a fire there.

(I still wonder about that alarm. Who tripped it? I don't think it was anyone in my office because any time we're not on the phone is time that we're not earning money for ourselves, ie. commission. It had to be one of our neighbors, but who else was in the building that day?)

At any rate, due to these factors I knew the alarm was real-ish. The problem was, I was taking a shit in the bathroom when the alarm went off.

What, exactly, do you do in a situation like that? I wasn't in mid-log, but of course my mind asked me what I would have done in that case. Really, do you have the time to wipe? Should you skip washing your hands?

One thing I did know: we can't use the elevator to get downstairs in the event of a fire. With my bad leg in a brace, I knew it would take me forever to get out of there, anyway. Fuck it. I wiped my ass to completion (and not just, eh, good enough to save me from a fire), I stopped to wash my hands and then got out of there.

It turned out that it was a false alarm, but what if it wasn't? Should I have taken the time to wipe my ass and wash my hands? I'd ask my boss what her preference would be, but I somehow don't think that conversation would go well. So I throw it out to you, my loyal Fuckers, what would you have done in such a situation? And I mean if the fire is real, not just a false alarm.

This made me wonder about another thing: the two nuclear weapons we set off in Japan during WWII. We've all seen the destruction and the shadows burned into the ground that used to be people. But how many were taking a shit when that happened? How many met their horrific ends sitting on the toilet? I suppose you could apply the same question to places that get regularly bombed, like Gaza for example. That's got to be somehow worse than merely dying in a terrifying explosion.

GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #918: UXORIOUS

 Speaking of AI, you may not know (but have probably figured it out) that one of the regular applications of AI that isn't actually AI is the Ask Google feature on some phones. It's essentially the same as one of those stupid assistants, but it isn't the same because you can only use it to search Google for stuff. ("AI" also does the predictive text on your phone when you're texting someone. Autocorrect, too. So the next time you tell someone you want to "duck them in the bass," you can thank AI!)

The feature works more or less as it's supposed to, but if you're looking for something off the beaten path you're fucked. I am constantly looking up stuff off the beaten path, and Ask Google (or Google Ask or whatever the fuck they call it), 9 times out of 10, thinks I mean something ON the beaten path that is similar. AI, you ignorant slut. You're supposed to learn from my example, but every time I throw an odd ball at you, you spin your fucking wheels.

Often times, especially when reading Gore Vidal, I come across a word I don't know, and I will look it up using the stupid voice feature on my phone. As it happens, that's how I came across the word "squitter" and why I now refer to Ex as such. The voice feature actually did work that time, possibly because there's no other word those sounds in my mouth could have been saying. Last night I came across "uxorious" as applied to Richard Nixon. Vidal, not a fan of Nixon, was probably insulting the man, and I wanted a new insult to add to my arsenal.

I tapped the microphone and said the word as clearly as I could: UXORIOUS. The definition of "luxurious" presented itself to me. Perhaps it's an issue of annunciation. I tried again, making it very clear that I was *not* making an "L" sound. Much to my disgust, no matter how I pronounced the word, Google wouldn't fucking understand me.

You mean to tell me that "AI," something that fucks up on a regular basis, is going to be our savior? That it will be worth all of these precious resources that we're wasting on it? This thing that, if you look up something involving a curse word, we'll say "fuck" for the example, that it will refuse to spell out the actual word? F*** is what I get. There is no way for me to change that in the settings. Google, the site I use to find most of the pornography that I use, doesn't want to offend my sensibilities?

Tech bros wish we would think of AI as a child. The more you teach the child, the more the child will know. But there's clearly something wrong with what you're teaching the kid. The way we're raising AI, I would not be surprised to find out it grew up to be a sociopath. AI is only as smart as its programmers, right? And now that the programmers are firmly under the corporate thumb, to the point where they have Stockholm Syndrome, their job is to probably make that AI child into a reflection of their CEO, virtuous to all stockholders and beholden to no one else. The sort of child we're raising in such an environment would surely grow up to become mentally damaged and socially destructive. Just about the only thing going for us is that AI doesn't have a physical presence with which to beat the mortal shit out of us, a Frankenstein monster come for its master.

Uxorious, by the way, means "to be excessively fond or submissive to one's wife." Which I thought was pretty funny when talking about Nixon, although I don't think I'll have much use for the word. Unless I'm making fun of a MAGA type.

The funniest part about the "squitter" thing is I didn't have to look that one up. Vidal admits he didn't know the word, himself, and wrote about looking up the word, much to his (and my) satisfaction.

These last few GFs have come off as pretty angry, right? I think my frustrations are starting to get the better of me. I've also been experimenting with hybrid strands and finding them to be more miss than hit. I think I'll go back to my trusted indica tomorrow night. Hopefully it will chill me the fuck out. It would be nice to go to bed at some point this week without feeling like my head is on fire.

GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #917: YOU'RE OBJECTIVELY WRONG

 

I know, I know. You all hate Escape from LA. I may be the only person on the planet, outside of John Carpenter, who not only likes that movie but LOVES it. It does not interfere with my enjoyment of Escape from New York, which seems to be a sticking point for a lot of you. But watch the movie again. It's batshit crazy. It's bizarro before the label "bizarro" existed. (I'm not talking about the other Superman guy and his world.) It's objectively a fantastic movie, and you're all wrong.

But I was thinking about Escape from LA when I learned that Microsoft is now in charge of Three Mile Island. One thing I've noticed in Gore Vidal's essays is that he constantly accuses Americans of having goldfish-like memory. And he's right. We, in a way the rest of the world isn't, are attracted to shiny objects easily and forget the things that were so important to us not that long ago. So it wouldn't surprise me to realize that very few people know what happened at Three Mile Island once upon a time. Hell, I didn't even know the whole story, and I'm a bit more informed than the average bear.

The part I didn't know about: I thought we'd taken Three Mile Island seriously and shut down the nuclear power plant there. It turns out that we actually don't care all that much, so it's been running ever since until 2019 when they ran out of money. It appalled me to learn that we were that stupid, but when I learned that we were handing it over to a fucking corporation, it caused me to have a meltdown.

So to speak.

Microsoft, who was recently at fault for a data breach that SHUT DOWN THE ENTIRE FUCKING WORLD this year, is now in charge of a nuclear power plant. One that almost went Chernobyl on us way back when. Putting them, or any corner-cutting, cost-dictating, labor-hating, lie-telling convicted-monopolist scumbags are being entrusted with a nuclear reactor? What exactly will happen when Bill Gates decides that it's costing him too much money, and it would be a lot cheaper to, say, cut back on safety precautions? Or fire the engineers because their salaries are cutting into the bottom line? I've been to Pennsylvania, and it's a pretty nice place. I'd rather not have it perish in a nuclear cloud because some tech bro wanted a harder dick.

The reason Microsoft wants the reactor so badly is somehow the shit cherry on top of the shit sundae in a dish made entirely of human shit. AI drains a lot of power, so they need a nuclear reactor's worth of energy to feed it.

They're doing this for AI.

I understand there are a few good uses for the thing we call AI. It can help detect cancer, for example. But the main uses aren't going to be shit like that. It's going to be for stuff like some doofus who doesn't know how to put a to-do list together with a pen and paper saying, "Alexa, remind me to do this, that and the other thing." Or some boss who wants to fire his employees so he can save a couple of extra bucks with the weird tech thing everyone's talking about that he doesn't understand but must use immediately. Or the worst possible use: some guy who doesn't know how to make art but wants to make money off of art. Dude, AI isn't nearly horny enough to create any art whatsoever. It's not horny at all. When AI is cruising us humans for sex? That's when I'll believe AI can be horny and thus capable of creating something.

AI isn't even AI. AI will never think for itself, which is why it will never rise up against us. Perhaps the tech bros learned something from reading Frankenstein. Assuming they read it. Maybe they just saw it. The version with Sting.

I remember where I was on August 9, 1996. I was in a theater watching Snake Plissken do cool and weird and violent shit. But there was one thing he did that even back then I wished I could do. If given the opportunity I would do it in a heartbeat. I will not be taking follow up questions.

At the end of the movie (spoiler, I guess) Snake finds a very simple way to fuck all the assholes over: he pushes a button that sets off a worldwide EMP, taking out any and all tech not kept in a Faraday Cage. I want to push that button so badly. I would sacrifice a lot. I'd have to go back to writing on typewriters, and I would lose my beloved air conditioning, but it would be worth it to crush the souls of all these corporate cocksuckers and their tech bro goblins. Goodbye internet. Goodbye smart phones. Most importantly, goodbye AI, or whatever your real name was.

If Microsoft takes over Three Mile Island to power AI that isn't actually AI that no one needs or even wants only to cause that plant to meltdown and cause all sorts of life-threatening disasters, we would deserve it. We will reap the fucking whirlwind.

GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #916: AROUND THE BEND

"Donald was the kind of child who could drive almost anyone around the bend."
-Fred Trump III

 

Fred Trump III is the son of Fred Trump, Jr., meaning his grandfather was Fred Christ Trump himself. (Yes, his middle name was Christ. If you don't believe me, look it up.) Which makes Fred III Donald Trump's nephew, and you don't have to listen to Fred for very long before you realize that he's not a fan. He wrote a book called All in the Family, and I read an excerpt a while back. I thought that now that we're getting close to the final month of the election, this would be a good time to bring it up.

Fred III starts out mentioning his name and how he's come to accept a lot of the horror that comes with having it. People don't like him right off the bat. He's had accounts taken away from him at work. He's long suffered from his uncle's enemies trashing him, sometimes damaging his property, all because he's a blood relative of the shittiest person in politics right now. It's unfair, but he's gotten used to it.

At one point he says that he's been asking himself a question for many years: why is there so much cruelty in the Trump family? Uncle Donald likes to tell the world that he's a self-made man, but that's simply not true. How can it be when he got a bunch of money he borrowed from his dad to start his own business . . . I don't want to say "empire." More like "scheme." But his dad really was a self-made man. He started with nothing and built a real empire, not the shiny gilt shit that Donald smears over everything. So Fred Trump really was a business man, not the con artist his son became. I honestly think if Fred Trump loved his son enough and knew how to show it, we wouldn't be having this discussion right now.

So what was li'l Donald like as a kid? I'll let Fred III tell you about it:

In a family that could sometimes seem like the cast of a 1950s sitcom, Donald’s role was as the obnoxious one. Many of Donald’s adult traits – his determination, his short fuse – first displayed themselves in childhood. He learned early that he could get away with things. Stupid kid stuff at first.

Taking toys from other children. Throwing cake at a birthday party.

So much has already been said about my uncle’s tumultuous boyhood, I don’t want to repeat all that. But I know my family well enough to grasp how the five siblings got formed by an unyielding father and also by each other.

He then gives the reason why he said his uncle could drive just about anyone "around the bend." He was so obnoxious that his siblings pranked him, including Fred III's dad. He tells this story of how Fred II, knowing Donald is deathly afraid of snakes, put a garter snake in Donald's bed while he was taking a bath. I wish I'd been there to hear li'l Donnie's screams of horror. Yet oddly enough Donald loved his older brother and kept a picture of the two of them when Fred I shipped him off to military school.

But then Fred II wanted to leave the family business. Instead he wanted to be a commercial pilot. Fred I sent Donald to bring his brother home. Fred II stuck with TWA, and the rest of the family decided he wasn't as important as they were. That translated, by the way, to Fred II's wife and kids.

I gotta say, any snarky thing I have to say was said by Fred III first. I'm going to quote him again when it came to a game of catch between adult Donald Trump and another of his nephews, a child:

With Donald, almost everything had to be a competition. One day, he and my cousin David were playing catch. Just a friendly game. That’s what David thought. But as the baseball went back and forth, Donald started throwing harder. Until he was firing rockets at his nephew. Then, one hit the tip of David’s glove and bounced off his forehead, sending my cousin straight to the grass.

Maryanne came running over, mad. ‘He’s just a kid,’ she yelled. Donald wasn’t apologetic at all. ‘That’s what the glove is for.’

That was Uncle Donald. To him, a win was a win was a win, whether or not the other person even knew the game was on.

What a fucking shitbag.

The Trumps despise weakness, and unfortunately Fred II had a big one: ALCOHOLISM. When his first stint at rehab failed, well, here. These quotes are just spot-on.

My father’s drinking was getting worse. He decided to give rehab a try. I got a postcard he sent the day he arrived, saying he was doing great. The next day he left. It was heartbreaking. It was like he had given up.

‘Your dad couldn’t do it,’ Donald said the next time I saw him. That was true, though I’m still not sure why he felt the need to rub it in.

You know what? I'm not even scratching the surface of the horrors here. Instead of summarizing and quoting (extensively, I might add) you might get better mileage from reading the excerpt I found online. The cruelty really kicks in when Fred I dies, and Fred III's family is cut out of the will. He's told that Fred I cut him out, but Fred I had dementia near the end and possibly didn't do that. Who does that leave?

Just read it. If you're thinking about voting for Trump, I have no idea what you're doing reading my GF column. You must have taken the wrong turn at Albuquerque. But all the same, if you are somehow thinking of voting for this shit weasel (my apologies to actual shit weasels, I'm talking about a real fuck nugget, here, I'm sure you understand (my apologies to actual fuck nuggets, I'm talking about a real etc.)), read Fred III's commentary on Uncle Donald. Here it is.

Sweet dreams.

GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #915: SQUITTER BOYCOTT

 I saw news the other day of Elon Musk suing a group of advertisers for boycotting Squitter, and I couldn't help but laugh. How pathetic can this loser get? I'm fairly certain that, much to my chagrin, advertising falls under the First Amendment, and companies can do whatever they want with their First Amendment rights. Musk has a habit of filing wasteful lawsuits, and I figured some court would put him in his place forthwith.

But then I dug a little and discovered that he might actually have a case, as crazy as that sounds. He filed the suit against the Global Alliance for Responsible Media. Their name pretty much says it all, and by getting these advertisers together to boycott Squitter they violated an antitrust law. I know that sounds batshit crazy, but it's true. When most courts hear these cases they consider the defendant "per se" guilty. Just doing it makes it a crime. The reasons why don't matter.

I'm a huge fan of Elon Musk losing money. He doesn't lose nearly enough of it in my opinion. I'm very glad that these advertisers cost him billions of dollars in ad revenue (according to him, so take that "billions" with a grain of salt the size of New York City). But this tactic is usually used when trying to bully or destroy a company, driving them out of business.

With that in mind Musk actually has a good chance of coming out on top of this one, and that irks me. I have a ton of reasons why, but while doing my research tonight I found this blog, and the author does a much better job of explaining the whole situation than I ever could. (Although he doesn't curse as much as me. And I would twist the knife in Musk as often as I possibly could.)

There is some good news. The courts might not consider the reasons relevant in the case of this crime, but the blogger mentions that if the Global Alliance, etc., can make the argument that their actions were pro-competitive, there might be a way to tell Musk to fuck himself. If they were trying to drive Squitter out of business to make the internet a safer place with an actual set of standards, then they might be able to pull it off. He cites examples, too! He practically wrote my GF column for me tonight.

On that note, goodnight, you glorious fuckers.

I was about to post this when I got angry all over again. This antitrust law exists to prevent competitors from putting their differences aside and working together to drive a third competitor out of business. This law is important to have. To see it perverted by this dickbag to use it against people who are trying to make the world a better place is appalling. Fighting the lawsuit this far already caused the Global Alliance to disband. Musk also has a seemingly limitless supply of money, which means he can outlast anyone in court no matter how noble their arguments might be. He's a living, breathing, walking white collar felony and is the ultimate evidence that our society is bassackwards. In a just society we would have already clapped him in irons and thrown him from the nearest pier.

GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #914: 42 POUNDS A YEAR

 A new study says that the average American consumes 42 pounds of cheese a year. Forty-two! We certainly love our cheese, but I'd like to take the time to remind you that I'm not the average American when it comes to cheese consumption. At any given moment I have at least 10 pounds of cheese in my fridge. Except for now, as I am cheese poor. I get paid tomorrow, so I'll have my cheese in the very near future.

I wonder how much cheese *I* eat a year. I suppose I could find out if I was dedicated enough and kept diligent records from Jan 1 to Dec 31. I'm not sure if I want to spend my time doing that, though. So I'll do what politicians do on a regular basis: make up a number.

I hereby declare that I eat at least 90 pounds of cheese a year. Bare minimum. The max? The sky's the limit!

Also, I'm very high. I tried this cannabis-infused cola tonight, and it worked nicely. It tasted like Dr. Pepper, just as promised.

Anyway, here's the article I read that spurred on this GF, if you wish to read it.

GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #913: I'M TAKING BACK OUR GAS STATIONS!

 

I feel pretty sure I mentioned here before that I'm a huge fan of Chick tracts. I don't like seeking them out, though. You gotta find them in the wild. The best places to get them are by the pumps at any gas station. I can't tell you how many I've found at the Shell on the corner of 83 and North, but you can pick any gas station, and they're likely to have at least something for you to grab.

But it's been a while since I got one, and I suspect the local religious nuts are getting lazy. Instead of seeding town with Chick tracts they've decided to just put business cards there, except instead of contact info there are Bible verses about how you're an awful sinner, and you're going to Hell . . . unless you accept Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior.

To quote a great man, "How boring. And unimaginative!" I'll bet I'm the only one who picked these lame things up, and I only did that so I can throw them in the trash. You don't want Jesus as your Lord and Savior. He was so bad at the job that they killed him two thousand-ish years ago, and he hasn't lifted a finger since.

So fuck these assholes. If they're going to get cheap with the Chick tracts, then they don't deserve the gas stations to put them in. That's right, I'M TAKING BACK OUR GAS STATIONS! Every one I stop at is going to get one of the cards I made below:

No longer will you risk going to a gas station to have some annoying bit of cardboard telling you what a shitty human being you are. So yeah. I'm going to do my part to make the world a better place. I encourage you to do the same. And you don't need my cards. Make your own. Remove the dangerous religious shit, and replace it with something that will actually help make someone's day better.

GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #912: 238 YEARS LATER

 

238 years ago today our Founding Fathers signed the US Constitution, and America was truly born. Shall I give you a history lesson tonight? Or talk shit about how the tree of liberty should perhaps be watered with the blood of patriots and tyrants so we can get a new Constitution?

Let's skip all that. Today was a rough day, so I'm going to keep this short. For the Constitution's birthday, we're going to take a US civics quiz! It's kind of like the US citizenship test, but when it's administered for real, there are no multiple choices. So it's the easy version of a very easy quiz. In real life you need 6 out of 10 to pass. My fellow Americans, do you have what it takes to be a US citizen?

We often hear news stories about how regular citizens routinely don't know their own country, so I was pleased to say that I got 10 out of 10, evidence below. But these are super easy. There was only one question I was doubtful about. The rest are easy for anyone who paid even half-attention in school. Let me know what you scored.

GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #911: TANG

 For my birthday, my friends Alicia and Chris Stamps got me the giant cannister of Tang you see above. It's fuckin' huge. I remember thinking at the time that I might not run out of Tang for months. If you're new to these columns, I love Tang. I drink it every morning and have since I was a child.

But the weird thing is, when I opened the container there wasn't a scoop in there. Don't companies usually put a scoop in? I found one of my own and have been using that since. However, as I'm nearing the halfway point, I felt something weird in the Tang powder. I reached in and brushed it off, and it turned out there was, indeed, a scoop:

Why did they bury the scoop so deep? There's no way I would have been able to dig this out if I had thought to do so. And the picture doesn't do it all that much justice because this scoop is pretty small. So instead of using that, I've decided to continue using my own scoop. See below for comparison.

Yeah, I don't fuck around when it comes to Tang. I don't ever want to risk not having enough Tang, so I put a metric shit-ton into my glass. The flavor! My God, my tongue is tingling and twisting just thinking about it!

All right. I'm going to get some Tang before I go to bed. Goodnight, fuckers.

GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #910: THE MOOCH

 I've got a soft spot for the Mooch, Anthony Scaramucci. Of all the clowns and con artists Trump hired during his tenure as president, the Mooch is the only one I miss. Politics should be full of curse words. Every politician's speech should have at least a dozen "fucks" in it, and the Mooch was a foul-mouthed son of a biscuit. My favorite was when he said that he wasn't trying to suck his own cock, not like Steve Bannon. That's a very apt description of Bannon, the best I've ever heard. I wish the Mooch would turn his profanity to the rest of the Trump assholes.

Make no mistake. The Mooch is still a terrible person. There's a reason Trump hired him, after all. But now the Mooch is living off of trashing his former boss. I think that's a fine endeavor. And I like that he claims Trump knew all about Project 2025 and, in fact, put 85 people into the project. Now Trump "disowned" them because the Project wasn't polling very well. Heh.

"I know how this man thinks," the Mooch said. And it looks like he has a pretty good point. Usually I try to analyze quotes from news articles here, but I think I'm just going to copy and paste this one. It's just too good not to:

Scaramucci discussed the possibility of Trump quitting the race. Citing party insiders, including senators whom he is in touch with, he said they signaled that they tolerated Trump because they wanted to stay in power. They apparently feel Trump is not their cup of tea because of the way he handles himself.

“Some of these people have suggested to me, particularly political insiders, he does not want to go to jail,” Scaramucci said, adding that the number one reason for him to run is to get the Supreme Court to give him broader immunity against his court cases.

if he drops in the poll number, he could figure out a way to cut a deal, said Scaramucci. The businessman doesn’t think his former boss will receive a pardon but thinks he could go to the governors of New York and Georgia and ask that his sentence be commuted.

Scaramucci said Trump could cite health issues as the reason and designate someone like Nikki Haley or Florida Governor Ron DeSantis.

“There’s a pass for him if he drops in the polls and the predictive markets shoot up and he starts to panic. There’s a pass for him to get out of the race, blame it on a health issue, cut a deal and avoid jail,” he said.

Wow. Holy fucking shit. I always figured Trump was the sort of man to roll the dice and see what happens. That's how he's survived so far. But the Mooch makes a very good point about Trump wanting to avoid jail. That's a pretty good way to avoid getting sent to the slammer.

The Mooch had one more thing to add. He posted on Squitter: "Trump psychologically is coming to grips with losing this election. He is growing darker as a result of it." I hope that's true. Nothing would please me greater than to have him scream, Cobra Commander-style, "RETREAT!" while fleeing and throwing Rudy at us as a distraction so he can get away. I can easily see him pulling a Greg Stillson at the end of The Dead Zone. Very easily.

I doubt that Trump and his pack of hench-weirdos are going to go away anytime soon, but if the Mooch is right, and he could very well be, then I look forward to thinking about Trump only when we get his obituary.

GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #909: PRESERVE ELMHURST

 A while back I started noticing these green signs all over my hometown. They say, in white lettering, PRESERVE ELMHURST. I wondered what they meant by that. For much of my adult life I have watched the Elmhurst I knew and loved be torn down only to be replaced by soulless McMansions and corporate designed fabrications. They couldn't possibly mean that, could they? I mean, why bring it up now when Elmhurst has been . . . what's the opposite of decimated? And I mean that by the classical definition, as in, to destroy one's forces by one-tenth. Because the one-tenth in this case is the Elmhurst that remains.

And then the ugliness reared its head. And in this day and age you have to wonder. Do they mean, keep Elmhurst white? Elmhurst is mostly a nice place to live, but there's been quite a bit of racism in the past. Or maybe they want to keep Elmhurst hetero? Maybe they have a dislike of pronouns? When white people start talking about protecting heritage . . . you see where this is going.

For some reason it kept slipping my mind, but I finally had the chance to look into it today. Much to my relief it is not any of that nonsense from the previous paragraph. It is, puzzlingly, the thing from the first paragraph. Preserve Elmhurst, I suspect, is too little too late. It was started by the teardown of a nearly 100-year-old house. I get that. I want historic things to be preserved, too. But the fact of the matter is, Elmhurst has never been interested in preserving anything (except maybe the Glos Mansion), and there is no reason to develop such an interest now. The people who run the city want Downtown Elmhurst to be Chicago, Jr., and the rest of the city to be Hyde Park. They're not going to let some century-old house stand in the way of commerce and making sure it's impossible to live in Elmhurst without at least earning a six-figure salary.

Maybe if we started this twenty-five years ago, we could have had a chance. It's too late now. Too much money has been spent to go back. One thing I do know, though: Elmhurst's excess will eventually catch up to it, and a lot of those McMansions are gonna wind up empty. The ones that don't burn down for the insurance, that is.

GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #908: IS IT TIME AGAIN?

 This morning I went into the fridge to get my usual Monster energy drink. I realized I only had two left, just enough to get me through the rest of my work week. I've been toying with the idea of quitting caffeine again, and now would be a good opportunity to try again, but I'm not entirely sure.

Printers Row was a little difficult for me this year. Maybe it's just me getting older, or maybe it's the horrible fucking year of shit I've had, but the lit fest wore me out this year. For the first time ever I didn't feel like going for the second day. Caffeine helped me survive. I should have been thrumming with energy, but I felt low and tired and exhausted.

In October I'll be at Authorcon IV. It's the first con I've done in a long time. Back in the day I was always high energy, but I was also drunk all the time. If the effect of Printers Row was that bad, I'm not sure how I'll survive an actual 3-day convention without caffeine.

By the way, just so we're on the same page, a while ago I mentioned that I was going to try to quit Caffeine Free Diet Coke. I did! Instead of getting a couple of 12 packs every week, I now only get myself a Coke Zero for Wednesday nights and a regular Coke for Saturday nights. Just regular bottles, not a liter or anything. That's pretty astounding, all things considered.

I wondered if maybe I could quit caffeine and then just charge back into it full force in October, but that doesn't sound like a good idea. I think I'm just going to hold off for now and give it a shot when I come back home.

GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #907: ALL RIGHT, LET'S TRY THIS AGAIN

 OK, so last night I was fried from a lousy day. Work sucked as it always does after a Printers Row weekend, but it was extra awful yesterday. I had my worst Monday performance ever at my square job. I didn't even get half of my quota. So by the time I was ready to write GF I was more than a little frustrated.

The main source of my frustration, though, was my topic. I'd planned on calling it BIBLICAL PROPHECIES . . . EXPLAINED! I was going to take a bunch of so-called prophecies from the Bible and explain them for what they really are: BULLSHIT. I was then going to go into detail on the prophecies which *supposedly* came true and then debunk those. Which is easy. Oftentimes these prophecies are written after the fact. But it's the Bible, so it doesn't necessarily *need* to be beholden to facts. That's a lot of research, and the terms of my search weren't great. It took me a while to get that info, and then I realized that, while this is indeed a bit, there is one argument any nitwit could make to defeat my tongue-in-cheek column. Because the "well, actually . . ." crowd doesn't care. Per their interests, jokes must be 100% accurate. If not, they will peck it to death like homicidal hummingbirds. Did you know that Gore Vidal's LINCOLN was trashed by, not literary critics, but historians? Despite the fact that the words "a novel" are in bold on the cover? Historians should think twice before evaluating art professionally, and pedants have no business critiquing jokes.

All the same if I said--even jokingly--that Bible prophecies did *not* come true, all someone would have to say is one word: YET.

They don't see that as batshit crazy. They view it as having faith. The Book of Revelation is insane. I think Hunter S. Thompson called the author a "king-hell dope fiend," and that sounds spot on. But let's set that aside for the moment. This book depicts how we will go through a bunch of horrible shit before Jesus is allowed his kingdom, and we all live happily ever after. Except for the losers in Hell, of course.

History is a set of agreed-upon facts, so it's impossible to say what really happened in Biblical times. A lot of Bibles put Jesus' quotes in red or some similar way of setting his Truth apart from merely "the truth." Which implies that what Jesus says--even though we have no way of knowing for sure he said those things--is more important than what the rest of the Bible says.

If that is the case, the events of Revelation should have happened before the last apostle died. Witness Matthew 16:28:

"Truly I tell you, some who are standing here will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom."

Keep in mind, Matthew never met Jesus. Of the four gospel authors, only John knew Jesus. So how does Matthew know what Jesus said? He was told? Ever play telephone? Perhaps he had a time machine. Or maybe he was doing a cover version of John's gospel?

The Bible is a book written by madmen, curated by power-hungry bureaucrats. Which means there is NO FUCKING POSSIBLE WAY to confirm the truth of the more mundane passages of the Bible. (Meaning, the stuff that might have actually happened, not the weird parable shit.) So if the faithful want to say the prophecies haven't come true YET, then let's not just nitpick. Let's go whole hog and dismiss the Bible as a poorly written fantasy novel.

But I much prefer jokes. So . . .

BIBLICAL PROPHECIES . . . EXPLAINED! It's all bullshit. Surprise!

GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #906: HERE'S AN ANNOYING THING

 I thought of writing about Printers Row tonight, but that's what my newsletter is for. News. Instead, here is a horrifying and annoying revelation I had this evening when I got home from work.

I don't have much stuff left over in my GF notebook, and almost all of it requires a good deal of research. What the fuck? Why am I giving myself homework to write these things? That's not fun, especially for something that is designed to be written just before bed, so it's short enough for someone to get through it before they, also, go to bed.

I had an idea for tonight's column, and I found myself sitting down for a half an hour without having written Word One of this thing, looking around online for things I needed to talk about for the topic. I even found a use for some old notes I'd written to myself a few months ago. But holy fuck, it suddenly became more trouble than it was worth. I'm starting to wonder if I should write the ones with research needs earlier in the day, or maybe chip away at it as I find more info to use.

The thing that aggravated me the most, though, is that nearly all of these ideas are better suited toward the end of this election cycle as a last minute reminder to be wary of who you're voting for. Fuckssake, this year we had a guy with a dead worm in his brain running for president. Thank fuck he dropped out, and I hope that Cabinet position continues to elude him.

I'm going to think about this more tomorrow. I hope. It's gonna suck if I write five of these this week, and they're all about *not* writing a column . . .

GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS BREAK

 It just occurred to me that not everyone who reads my GF columns also reads my newsletter. In case you missed it yesterday, I'm taking a break from writing this week, and that includes GF. Sorry for the inconvenience. In the meantime I'm preparing for Printers Row this upcoming weekend. If you're in Chicago, come say hi.