GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #1017: PROOF THAT WE ARE NOT REPRESENTED IN CONGRESS

 Proof? What kind of proof could I possibly have? It's scientific, actually, so no one is going to listen to me, anyway. But there have been studies done, and because I've had a rough day (I'm going back to work on Monday), I'm going to let Cory Doctorow write my GF tonight.

Harken back to GF #1000 where I made the claim that We the People are no longer represented in Congress. Only our corporate overlords are. You'd think something like that would be hard to measure, but it's not. House or Senate, Democrat or Republican, if they're in Congress, they're doing their true master's bidding. I see these assholes at their townhall meetings, and I don't think it matters what they say at these things. While the voters still need to vote, it's the money that guarantees their positions.

And this article will explain the whole thing for you. There are a lot of links, and I know the last thing you want to do this late at night is to go down this rabbit hole, but think about the rabbit holes you've gone down previously. How many of them were actually worth it? How many did you have to stop and ask, "What the fuck am I doing?"

This rabbit hole is worth it. It will explain why our lives suck, which will help us find a way to do something about it.

If you want the direct study, here you go. Warning: it costs $30 unless you're with an authorized university.

Long story short, We the People want good things. We're the majority, so if the system works as advertised, we should have them. We do not. The system, therefore, does not work as advertised. Congress does not listen to any ol' voice. Just their master's.

Goodnight, fuckers.

GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #1016: GOODBYE TO TOM LEHRER

 I first heard of Tom Lehrer through the Dr. Demento cassette collection, the one that's delineated by the decade. It was "The Masochism Tango" that caught my eye (not literally in your left castanet, thank you), and it quickly became one of my favorite songs. On another cassette I found "Poisoning Pigeons in the Park," which quickly became a second favorite. But it never occurred to me that he might have made more songs. (I was a freshman in high school at the time, so I wasn't very bright.)

Around the same time I caught an episode of HBO's Real Sex that featured the song. I giggled, thinking, I know that one! And I also learned that Weird Al Yankovic, the only musician I'd seen in concert at the time (now it's one of two, the other being Alestorm when they were too young to drink at their own show) and someone I respected a great deal, revered Lehrer, which meant he'd made more songs than two.

(Incidentally, I didn't have a bedroom back then, so I didn't have an inner sanctum to escape to with the volume low. I slept on a cot in the living room, but we had a basement where we--meaning, me and my brothers mostly--watched a lot of stuff. I was 14, so I could watch PG-13 movies, but my brothers were still forbidden. So we watched Real Sex with the volume low enough, and if we heard someone on the stairs, they would certainly be someone who would disapprove, so we had the remote set to return us back to another channel just in case.)

Back then we didn't have the internet, so I went to the library to do more research, and lo! and behold! We had one of his live albums! It was Tom Lehrer Revisited, and I listened to that tape so much it practically became my Bible. Imagine my pleasure when I discovered more albums, which I quickly purchased from Borders (because they could order it, and Best Buy wouldn't).

(Another side note: when the library decided to get rid of their cassette collection, I saved this one from the garbage. I recently had to abandon my own cassette collection, but I saved a few, and this is one of them.)

Without Tom Lehrer, I don't know what my sense of humor would be like now. He's an essential part of my building blocks. For the longest time I had a quote of his paraphrased on my wall next to my dinosaur computer (back when it wasn't a dinosaur but top of the line!): "If after [reading] my [stories] just one human being is inspired to say something nasty to a friend or perhaps to strike a loved one, it will have all been worth the while." But there's an even better scenario that he described that works more toward my way of thinking.

I think he was interviewed by the New Yorker back when I was still working at the library (I found it while I was working the periodicals section in the haunted up-upstairs area), but the gist of it was this. He said he described his humor as thus, and I'm going off memory here, so don't be too harsh if it's not exact. He said, "You throw a baby up in the air and catch it, so the baby laughs. But I throw the baby up and don't catch it, so I laugh."

I know for a fact that I've written a GF about Lehrer before, maybe a few, but this is the first time I've done so since he died last week. He was well into his nineties when he passed. He'd left music to go back to his true love, teaching math (he worked at Los Alamos . . . as a spy), but he was always a violently funny musician to me.

Tom Lehrer is gone, and I'm going to miss him, but before he died he released his music into the public domain so anyone could use it. That was pretty nice of him. You can go here for all your Tom Lehrer needs. And if you don't think I'm a big enough fan of Lehrer's, please know that I once got in trouble at Conference Plus, my first big boy office job, for singing one of his songs on the floor. This one, in fact. It's the greatest love song ever written in my opinion.

If you've never heard his songs before, I encourage you to listen. If you think it's too old-timey for your likes (they were mostly written from the 'Fifties to the 'Seventies), just listen to the lyrics. Keep an eye out for the guy who took a knife and monogrammed his wife and dropped her in the pond and watched her drown, oh yes indeed the people there are just plain folks in my hometown!

Goodbye, Tom Lehrer.

PS: He also wrote the greatest end of the world song ever.

GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #1015: HAPPY BIRTHDAY, ROB TANNAHILL!

 

Right now my hetero lifemate, Rob Tannahill, is probably seething that I've forgotten his birthday. I have not. Surprise, ye bastard ye!

I've known him since I was 14 and he was 15. We briefly went to the same high school, and we met through our English teacher, Mr. Sibley, who was a former player for the Chicago Bulls, himself. We were in separate classes. Mr. Sibley knew we were both writers, so he had us swap stories and tell each other what we thought. Fast forward a few decades, and here we are.

Which reminds me, he's got a bunch of stuff out, including some music, but if you want to get to know him best, you should go for Prince Junkie, which details his life fairly well, or at least the early draft I read did. If you know him and would like to wish him a happy birthday, you should buy this. Or even if you don't know him, this is the easiest way to get into his work. He's also an artist, and if you want to see what he's capable of, check out GF #1000 for a piece I commissioned from him. Or, if you've got a twisted mind, you can check out The Cocaine! Bros., a webcomic by the both of us. Hunter and Tucker are evil and horrible bastards, kind of like what if MAGA assholes were Looney Tunes characters.

Happy birthday, Rob.

GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #1014: GOOD RIDDANCE TO THE CAGE

 

And hello to the cast.

I woke up at 3:30 am this morning to get the fucking cage removed from my bad foot. When I was in preop I was advised that I would have a cast on, but I'd be able to walk short distances. No more walker. However, when I woke up after the operation, they told me that I can't walk anywhere, and I can only put my foot down to balance myself. I still need the fucking walker.

That pisses me off to no end, but at least I'm no longer in agony anytime my bad foot so much as twitches. It's also good to know that if I start to fall over, I can put my bad foot down and not get sent to another galaxy with the shock of pain. And hey, look at that bandage on my toe! The surgeon removed a couple of giant scabs while she got rid of the cage. I got those scabs because . . .

OK, I lived in a friend's basement in Joliet for a while, but the floor down there was hardwood, and I had an air mattress. So I had to roll out of bed every day and climb up the walker, and I couldn't do that without fucking up my toes, which were sticking out of the cage. So yeah, those scabs had been there for quite some time. (I should also mention that once, after rolling out of the air mattress, I noticed that the floor had bent back my big toenail. Good thing I couldn't feel that. I must have done something similar this morning because the same toenail was bent back. I didn't notice until I got to the hospital.)

I'm in a much better mood today, but I'm still kinda fucked in regards to being able to move around. I have a bit more freedom now, but not much more. I was hoping I'd be able to unpack all these boxes and get my study ready for work. With these restrictions, though, it might be a long time before that becomes a reality. I'll do what I can, but that's not going to be much.

I was also hoping to get my microwave from storage. It's pretty far back, and I have to move a lot of stuff to get to it, so that might not happen for another month, either. Holy shit, I really need to get back to work to earn at least two weeks of wages, or I'm going to have some financial issues, too.

I think I'm going to have to go back to work with the walker. Fuck. I was hoping not to do that.

But last night's GF had the desired effect. I did not stop off at the place down the street for a bottle. At least the docs gave me some fentanyl as they rolled me into the recovery room. That was a nice little treat on my way out of surgery.

I haven't felt any pain yet, so I hope that part is over. Not having metal rods going through my leg has improved morale around here, but it's good to know that I still have my laudanum just in case.

It'll be good to sleep in tomorrow. Goodnight, fuckers.

GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #1013: MY CALENDAR IS STILL PACKED AWAY

 

Yesterday I found my motivational bottle of whiskey. There's maybe a quarter-inch of booze in there, and I'm guaranteed not to drink it because the original cork broke, and there are hundreds of pieces floating in the bottle. But I do like to take a sniff from the neck every once in a while. Sometimes it smells glorious, but most times it grosses me out, the desired effect.

It's been three years and a handful of days since my last drink. I don't know how many days because my calendar is still packed away. However, I made an ugly discovery this morning while refilling my bottle of liquid Vicodin from the cannister CVS gave me. I usually get a little red flask of the stuff, but for some reason I got the cannister this time. I read the label and found, much to my horror, that there is alcohol in this.

So technically I haven't had a drink since the last time I took my medicine.

I'm supposed to take 15 mL every four hours. That is the equivalent of a sip of decent beer at 6.7% ABV.

After some agonizing I decided that it doesn't count against my years and days. #1: I had no idea that there was alcohol in this. #2: It's not like I'm drinking this stuff to get wasted. Sure, the pain gets to be a bit much sometimes, so I'll take 30 mL, but it's not recreational. I'm using this as directed, as a painkiller.

Yes, I can hear myself. I used to drink to kill the pain of a terrible constant months-long headache, and that was how I became an alcoholic.

It gets worse. The temptation to drink in this new home is exceptionally strong. I've almost gotten myself convinced that I can just have a couple of drinks to unwind each night. Right now I have edibles to unwind. My new home is a nonsmoking place. You can't even smoke on the property. So I've stopped smoking weed, but the edibles aren't kicking in like they used to.

Yes, I can still hear myself. I'm looking for an excuse to get fucked up. I'm writing this to convince myself to *not* do that.

Because the rest of me is very much onboard with getting fucked up, but as I write this I can feel myself coming to my senses. Yet: "Hey, man, you don't have *any* days because you fucked up. You took the liquid Vicodin. So give up. Go get some bourbon. There's a place just down the street. It's a college town! There's a place just down *every* street! Let's go, dude!"

The other day I stopped in a Casey's to use the bathroom, and I had to crutch (I'm on a walker, not a crutch, but "walker" my way doesn't sound right) my way past the liquor section. I scowled at Evan Williams, but Larceny? Whoo-boy. I loved Larceny. If I wasn't in dire straits of a piss, I would have stopped and considered. Considering might have lead to something else.

The one thing that stops me flat is the cage on my leg. I can't tell you how many times I've almost fallen over on the walker dead sober. I have stopped myself from eating it each and every time. But if I was drunk . . .

It doesn't matter. The cage is coming off tomorrow. I won't have that to stop me soon. But I will still be in a cast. Maybe that will help.

Speaking of which, I've been advised that it's possible the cage *won't* come off tomorrow. My surgeon asked me to get a CT scan today (last minute) because she's afraid two of my bones haven't fused together. If they haven't, she said she won't take the cage off.

THE CAGE MUST COME OFF. I'm at the very end of my wits on this. I can't have this cage on me anymore. The longer it's on, the higher the risk of a bone infection and a subsequent amputation. But that's not what's eating me. I NEED TO WALK AGAIN. I can't keep crutching around on walkers and actual crutches (I use one for stairs). No matter how much of my liquid Vicodin I take, I'm still in pain, especially when I'm on stairs. I can't take it anymore. I literally can't.

Maybe I'll wake up tomorrow, and the surgeon will tell me that the CT scan showed the bones didn't fuse, so the cage isn't coming off. Or I'll go under, and when I wake up the cage will still be there. The cast is supposed to be a walking cast, so I've decided that if I can't walk around tomorrow on my feet, sans cage, I am going to get a bottle of Wild Turkey 101, and I'm going to drink myself into oblivion.

I know that sounds crazy, but have you ever spent approximately three months with a cage around one of your feet? One that keeps several metal rods going through your flesh and bone in place? So that you're in constant pain that whole time?

We're going to find out about a lot of things tomorrow. Things have been going my way lately. I can only assume this will go my way, too. So here's to hoping I walk out of the hospital on two feet tomorrow, and that I'm carrying my folded up walker under one arm. Wish me luck.

I really hope the cage comes off for many, many reasons, but one of the big ones for me is, I'll finally be able to change my boxers. I've been wearing the same pair since the cage was installed. The ones I'm wearing are pretty rank by this point. I spray them with air freshener every day. But hey! No pee stains or skidmarks! 

GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #1012: PULP FICTION

 I have a fairly decent collection of old pulp magazines, but I've been thinking about selling some of them. Not all of them. I have some pretty good issues, and I couldn't part with them. The covers are, uh, astounding. Here are some of the issues I'm keeping.

The perfect word for these covers is "lurid," I think. I have a bunch of other pulps that I'm going to keep, but they're all still packed up. I mention this because if you want to read pulp fiction for free, you should check this out. It's an archive of pulp magazines from way back when, free to read. You could probably read that site for years and still not reach the end of it. The internet *is* good for something!

GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #1011: THE LAST OUTPOST OF THE EMPIRE . . .

 . . . at least until Iowa.

I've lived in DeKalb for a few days, and it's been pretty nice, but it *is* in the middle of nowhere. I like the middle of nowhere. There's a lot of farmland and woods and prairie out here. You know how, if you're driving, the road signs tell you what the next major town is? When you get to DeKalb, the road signs advise you that Iowa is pretty much the next thing of interest on this road, and there's still about 90 miles of Illinois left.

I spent today trying to put things where they belong, or at least in the room they belong. Unpacking with this fucking cage on my foot is difficult, to say the least. Right now the dinosaur computer I write just about everything on is in my living room, and I'm trying to figure out how to get it all to my study, where I plan to do all my writing going forward. (Yes, I have a study. And yes, you may see it when it is ready.) I have two ideas: I can crawl on my hands and knees, pushing each component one at a time. Or I can put each component on a sheet that I can drag behind me as I make my way with the walker.

I supposedly go back to work next week. I'll bet the doc gives me another week of rest first. I'm taking a practice drive during rush hour tomorrow morning to see what the commute will be like. Better than I expect, I hope. But I'll have a better idea of how much time I'm going to have on work days soon. Which means I'll be deciding the fate of GF soon. I started writing these again because I had unexpected time. I might not have the time soon. I'll probably make that determination tomorrow. In the meantime, I'll keep writing these while I can.

I can't express to you how happy I am sleeping in my own bed every night. Not having to wake up twice (sometimes three times!) to refill the air mattress. It's like I've been given a respite in life.

I have to get up early tomorrow, so I'm heading to that bed right now. It will be glorious, just like you glorious fuckers. Goodnight.

GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #1010: THE AGREED UPON FACTS

 As much as I love history, there's an unfortunate side to the beast. It's plagued me since I discovered how interesting history really is, but it wasn't until Gore Vidal that I discovered the perfect phrase for the problem. History is the "agreed upon facts."

The nature of history is kind of dubious. We have all sorts of records, from newspaper articles to journals kept by historical figures. We have a treasure trove of this stuff. But the problem is, what if these primary and secondary sources lied? What if they had skin in the game and decided that history should remember this version of events over another version of the events. To say nothing of the problems of the relativity of perception . . .

I hate to do this, but Mark Twain is just such an instance. A lot of his stories were actually news articles. He just lied to sell more papers. And that really is how newspapers began, more as tabloids than anything else. Twain wasn't the only one playing fast and loose with truth, so how can we trust any of these documents in said treasure trove?

Thankfully there are corroborating sources, but more or less we have to figure out which of these things we can agree upon as facts. That bothers me a great deal. Memories of college return to me. Ghastly things creeping through my head. "What is truth?" it asks through a sewer of a mouth. "What is Truth?" it answers itself. The horror.

It also means a lot of history gets swept under the rug as unimportant to the big picture. So I'm going to put a few quotes here you most certainly never heard during your school years. I'm pretty sure any teacher who dared tell you about it would have been tarred and feathered and run out of town on a rail. Let's start with John Adams. If you'll recall I mentioned that a few of the Founding Fathers were Deists, a euphemism for atheists. John Adams was not one of them, but he had some interesting words in regards to religion. For those who believe this is a Christian Country(TM), you may want to avert your eyes.

“This would be the best of all possible worlds, if there were no religion in it.”
– John Adams

We discussed Benjamin Franklin a little bit in GF #1000, but here's a deeper look at his opinion of the Constitution that you never read in a textbook.

In these sentiments, Sir, I agree to this Constitution with all its faults, if they are such; because I think a general Government necessary for us, and there is no form of Government but what may be a blessing to the people if well administered, and believe farther that this is likely to be well administered for a course of years, and can only end in Despotism, as other forms have done before it, when the people shall become so corrupted as to need despotic Government, being incapable of any other. I doubt too whether any other Convention we can obtain may be able to make a better Constitution. For when you assemble a number of men to have the advantage of their joint wisdom, you inevitably assemble with those men, all their prejudices, their passions, their errors of opinion, their local interests, and their selfish views. From such an Assembly can a perfect production be expected? It therefore astonishes me, Sir, to find this system approaching so near to perfection as it does; and I think it will astonish our enemies, who are waiting with confidence to hear that our councils are confounded like those of the Builders of Babel; and that our States are on the point of separation, only to meet hereafter for the purpose of cutting one another's throats. Thus I consent, Sir, to this Constitution because I expect no better, and because I am not sure, that it is not the best.

How do I know that these men said these things? I don't. Not to a certainty. And a lot of people wish they hadn't said anything of the sort. But enough people agreed on these facts. I'm sure most would call it revisionist history (a phrase I dislike), but to be fair, a lot of people worked really hard to make sure we didn't encounter these quotes in the course of our regular lives.

The root of the problem is lying. I forget the movie's name, but there was a flick about a world where people were incapable of lying, not even little white lies like, "I'm fine," or "You look great," or etc. I don't advocate for that kind of world, but to quote Metallica, "When a man lies, he murders some part of the world." But, since you come here for class, I'll dig back further into the vaults. I'll leave you with a quote from Montaigne:

Lying is a hateful and accursed vice. We have no other tie upon one another, but our word. If we did but discover the horror and consequences of it, we should pursue it with fire and sword, and more justly than other crimes.

GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #1009: JOLIET

 

For the past few months I've lived in Joliet, IL, much to my amusement considering the shit that I've talked about this place over the years. I'll be moving to DeKalb soon, and I'm surprised to discover there are a few things I'll miss about Joliet.

It's kind of a nexus. I currently live in an area that makes it feel like the suburbs, almost like Elmhurst, where I'd lived most of my life. But when I'm on my way somewhere, when I turn out of the neighborhood, I find myself looking out across a gorgeous marsh. I'm going to miss that view most of all, especially in the morning when the sun has yet to burn off the mists of the night before.

But then I can make another turn and find myself in a rundown part of town, some of it pretty bad. This is the part of town that gets Joliet its reputation. Aided, of course, by the movie referenced in the image above.

Take yet another turn, and holy shit, you're in an industrial park, billowing smoke stacks and all. Here's where Joliet gets most of its smell.

And another turn will bring you out into farmland, where the crop stands tall already.

That's all within the city limits. What other city can you say that covers that much diverse territory? And yes, I've driven past the prison. It looks oddly . . . pleasant.

From what I understand, DeKalb is mostly a college town. Technically Elmhurst was a college town, but these two aren't quite the same thing. The college is the only thing in DeKalb. Otherwise we're surrounded by farmland. Technically it's in Central Illinois. I'm moving to a different region. Weird.

That commute is going to fucking blow. The gas. Oh Jesus fuck, the gas.

It will be worth it in other ways.

MAIL ORDER BRIDE excerpt

 

“Poor bastard.”

Jake Ellis looked up from the blanket he planned to buy. Brett Hartford, the shopkeeper, stood so stiff he could have been held up by a post like a scarecrow. Brett polished his spectacles with a handkerchief as his gray eyes peered through the front window.

When Jake didn’t reply, Brett turned to look at him. “Felton Reeves. Poor bastard’s got a new bride on the way.”

The blanket fell from Jake’s hands, forgotten. “How many does that make? Five?”

Brett shook his head and returned his attention to the window. “This one makes his seventh.”

Jake joined the shopkeeper in his vigil. “Hell, that can’t be. You think he killed the others?”

Brett recoiled. “Jesus, Jake! That’s a hell of a thing to say.”

“I don’t know. Seems unnatural.”

Both men stared through the sun-waved glass for a while in silence. Brett cleared his throat and speared his spectacles back onto his face. “Anyone else, you’d probably be right, but not that fella. He couldn’t even kill the proverbial fly.”

They watched Felton’s stationary form dawdle outside the stage office. He was a short, skinny rail of a man, and he wore a bowler hat too small for his head. A nest of hair stuck out at all angles from beneath the brim. His child-like blue eyes twinkled in the morning sun, but anyone looking casually would have missed them. His large, goofy button of a nose distracted from them too much, to say nothing of his .45-sized Adam’s apple. A slow, nervous smile twitched between these attention-grabbers, just as the rest of his body ticked and shuddered. It wouldn’t have been so noticeable if his Sunday’s best weren’t so starched and tight.

No, Jake thought Felton couldn’t have killed them. The simp didn’t even carry a gun. How in hell did he live out in the middle of nowhere without a gun?

-

Joe Ridgway couldn’t believe his eyes. At first he thought he’d made a mistake—that maybe he’d had a few too many after-hours shots with the customers—but Felton Reeves still stood there after Joe rubbed his eyes. Felton rested as tall as his five-seven frame allowed, and his smile twitched like a gut-shot man trying to stay conscious. A dozen flowers sprouted from his clenched fist, and Joe knew what the man had in mind.

He played it dumb, anyway. “Mornin, Fell. What’s got ye into town on a weekday? Who’s workin’ yer fields for ye?”

“Oh, hey Joe.” Felton’s voice was almost high enough to be a woman’s. “No, I took the day off. I’m here to pick up Tessa.”

“Tessa?”

Felton’s baby-face lit up like a lamp. “Yeah, Tessa! She’s my new wife.”

Joe nodded. “Well, damn. Glad to hear it, Fell. ‘Bout time ye moved on. It gets lonely out there.”

Felton pursed his lips. “Yeah, it does.”

“Tell ye what. The Lucky Lou’s gonna open up again in a hour. Ye want, bring the new Mrs. Reeves along, and I’ll give ye a few drinks. Onna house.”

“Thank you, Joe. I appreciate it, but I don’t drink. Neither does Tessa.”

“Aw hell. That’s right. Forgot. Well, stop by anyway. Ah’d like to meet her.”

“Sure.”

Right, Joe thought. Tessa would be another mail order deal, but knowing Fell, he wouldn’t bring her by. He’d think her too much of a lady.

He tipped his hat and went on his way. When he got a block from Felton, he looked back to see the poor bastard still standing at the stage office, waiting. Joe thought about Fell’s backyard with six gravestones poking out of the ground and hoped this one didn’t die on him.

-

The scarf across his mouth didn’t keep much of the dust out, but it did a decent job as a safeguard. Matt coughed the grit out of his throat, and he could feel it caking the inside of the rag.

There was only one passenger in the stagecoach. Normally Matt would gripe and moan. He didn’t even have any deliveries to make. But at least Tessa Reeves had great beauty, and he liked looking at her. She had a back-east figure, nothing like these western gals who tended to be built like bricks. No, you could tell this one was a lady, and a proper one at that.

Too bad she had to be wasted on Fell Reeves.

There he stood, straight as a streetlight in front of the stage office. If Matt knew him at all, the poor bastard had been standing there for at least an hour. The dust already settled on Fell’s suit and bowler hat.

“Whoa!” Matt pulled at the reins, and the horses reared back to a jittering halt. A murky cloud kicked up from under the coach, and Fell coughed. He waved his free hand in front of his face.

Matt tied the straps to the brake and reached for Mrs. Reeves’ luggage. He handed it down to Hank, the sweaty bald clerk. Subconsciously he kept up some small talk patter with Hank, but he only found interest in Fell. The skinny bastard cautiously approached the stagecoach as if he expected some kind of trap. Then it was like he was a match, and God had struck him aflame. Fell’s face exploded into a smile, and he opened the door for his new bride.

Matt wanted to wish him luck with this one. He didn’t have high hopes, though. Mrs. Reeves didn’t look like she had the fortitude to survive in this forsaken land.

__________________________________________________________

If you like what you've read so far, you can read the rest here.

GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #1008: THE SLIDING PAIN

 For the last week or so, I've been in worse pain than usual in my bad leg. It sucks because I have to put weight on it when going up or down stairs, so I can't exactly ignore it. But I had a suspicion as to why the pain is so pronounced there.

I have a skin infection. I was worried about a bone infection, because if that happened, I'd have to lose my leg from the knee down. But that's not what's causing the pain.

No, one of my pins is loose, and my leg, at about calf level, is sliding back and forth on that rod.

That's right, a rod that goes through my leg. Impaled. And the hole in my flesh keeps sliding back and forth whenever I stand or use the walker.

The podiatrist said it looks good, but then she said, "How would you feel about wearing this thing for another two months?"

Abso-fucking-lutely not. She said she figured, but she wasn't convinced that the bone she worked on previously had fused, so she wants me in a cast for a full month after this cage is removed. She added that the risk of bone infection did increase the longer this thing is on, so yeah, I don't want to wait any fucking longer for that. I do, after all, eventually have to return to work.

I'm just glad the tests came back negative for a bone infection. That would be just what I needed during this horrid fucking period of my life.

15 more days to go before this fucking thing comes off. I can't wait.

Also, the podiatrist said that this is when patients start to experience Cage Rage, where they scream to have the cage removed, and they keep kicking the cage against walls and such. I have not done any of this, no matter how eager I am to get this cage off my foot. Screaming about it won't help, anyway.

15 more days. Just 15. The countdown continues.

GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #1007: RELEASE IT

 [To give you a heads up, this one is about Epstein. I don't like to use the word "pedophile" because it sanitizes the person it describes, implying the problem is a sickness, and not pure evil. As such, I refer to these guys as CRs.* If that bothers you, maybe skip this one.]

Back in 2016 I was horrified by something. For the majority of my life the world has more or less agreed that Nazis were bad, and all of a sudden, very much like HYDRA reemerging in the MCU, Nazis were crawling out of the woodwork. American Nazis. And I know history. I know America had a healthy Nazi party going during WWII, so something like that shouldn't have surprised me.

But it did.

I'm currently being horrified by something else. I think a majority of us are, and I'm including a good portion of MAGA in that "us." Because I remember a time when we all agreed, more or less, that raping children was bad. And I know history. America used to be totally OK with an adult marrying a child (in particular south of the Mason-Dixon). The word "underage" has certainly been flexible over the years. Not that long ago the age of consent in Idaho was 14.

But, as with all things, it's only wrong if you don't have money. The rich, on the other hand, can do as they please.

Hold that thought.

One of the main reasons I love Printers Row are the weirdos we get. Yeah, yeah, I know. That's a relative term, as we advertise ourselves as weirdos. But there's always someone who rants at us for about 45 minutes about a conspiracy theory (the good kind, but something utterly brand new to me) before moving on to the next table. I love those rants, most times.

But one year we got this guy who claimed to have worked for Fox News. This guy told me all sorts of things, starting with the real footage of Waco. He said that the government was playing down the level of violence they'd been responsible for and flat out told me that he saw video of tanks firing into the Koresh compound. Since then I've watched a couple of documentaries about it, and I believe this guy was telling the truth.

So he was probably telling the truth about this billionaire child rapist with his own private island where he hosted the most powerful people in the world. More importantly, the guy told me that he had seen this motherfucker's client list. He rattled a lot of names off, names anyone would recognize. He mentioned Matt Groening, at which point I thought he was out of his mind. The guy who created The Simpsons went to a child rapist island for billionaires? Pull the other one. But he mentioned a lot of people. Rock stars and politicians. I smiled when he said that Bill Clinton and Donald Trump were on the list. Of course they were. This sort of thing sounds right up their alley.

I forgot about this guy for a while until the Epstein story broke. Holy shit, that crazy dude was maybe not that crazy. And I did find court transcripts. Groening did, per the files, visit the island, but per testimony only got a foot massage on the plane.

And then it all nearly went away when Jeffrey Epstein died with a rope around his neck in a jail cell (he said cagily). But it didn't go away, did it? He was arrested in 2019, so the FBI most certainly got its hands on his client list. If they didn't, how did my Fox News guy know about it? Which reminds me, who was in the Oval Office in 2019?

One would think that a list supposedly composed by Democrats to attack Trump would have been exposed then and there. 2020 was an election year, after all. But the client list suddenly became hard to pin down. Then Biden took office, and in standing with other Democrats, he sat on the list. Why? Bill Clinton's name comes to mind. So yes, I believe Biden suppressed the list. I don't think he's on it, but I think Clinton might not be the only pal mentioned. All the same, if Trump's name wasn't on that list, it would have surely been a slam dunk to release it and go after the people who *are* on it.

MAGA has been salivating over the list for ages because they fully expect their enemies to all be arrested and tried for raping children. (Remember Pizzagate?) Which, I might remind you now, is no longer such a taboo thing if the people in charge of our government are trying to cover it up. Mike Johnson is panicking so badly he threatened to shut down Congress until September if people don't shut their fucking mouths about Epstein.

But now I'm sure that we'll never see that list, and MAGA will fall back into line. Or if we do see the list, it will be severely altered. We should have pressed this shit immediately. We shouldn't have let so much time pass. It's a clusterfuck.

But lost in the clusterfuck is an even more unpleasant thought. The Fox News guy got one thing wrong. He told me that Epstein sank his island to destroy all the evidence. The island is still there. (Technically he had two islands, but the star of the show is Little St. James.) In fact, the US Virgin Islands sued Epstein's estate for $105M because Epstein allegedly used the government to hide his illicit activities. The DA was successful and went on to say, and this makes me wonder a little, "[Epstein was never] a respected member of the community. It was public knowledge that he was a registered sex offender." Hmmm. Not bad for "a terrific guy" according to his longtime friend, Donald J. Trump.

So who owns that island now?

Hoho. Who, indeed?

First, if you were in the market to buy an island, and you came upon Epstein's, which was listed for $125M, would you be interested? I know people who wouldn't move into a house if someone died there, so who would want to buy an island that is probably the child rape capital of the world?

Stephen Deckhoff, actually. Black Diamond Capital Management, a private equity firm. You mean to tell me that a private equity scumbag (and that's pretty oxymoronic, but I stand by the assessment) bought the most fucked up island in American history? Yes, and he got a deal for it. He also bought the island next door. He bundled his island purchase for a mere $60M.

So a billionaire assumed possession of the billionaire child rape island. He plans to turn it into a five-star resort, I'm assuming for fellow billionaires. I wonder what's on their room service menu.

Release the fucking list. Before we go through all this shit a second time.

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*CR stands for child rapist.

PS: I'm not seeing anyone else say it, so I guess I will. I don't think Virginia Giuffre committed suicide, either.