On the Inauguration Day afternoon links, it was remarked that it seemed like there weren’t as many leftie meltdowns this time as there were in 2017. Au contraire, there are, but they’re segregated onto Bluesky. If you’re a normal person who loves their life, you have no reason to be on Bluesky, so you won’t be seeing this. But I hate my life, and since I’m an author who runs in mainstream/traditional publishing circles, and since publishing moved to Bluesky in November for 🤔 some reason 🤔, I am on Bluesky. Also known as my personal hell.
Now, in an attempt to make Bluesky endurable for myself, I have installed over 300 content filters to block out any keywords that are likely to be found in derpy posts. But since the inauguration (in fact, since the day of the TikTok ban, really), they’ve found new and inventive ways to get around my filters. On Inauguration Day itself, around three dozen posts made it through. So just from those alone, I am able to bring you an undercover report from the derp mines.
Note that this is an incomplete record. Beyond the filters preventing me from seeing some things that were probably truly delicious, I am also not going to include posts that were just “reeee reeee whyyy” or “I’m going to not give the 🍊 Menace my time or mental energy today” and posting about that is definitely not using your time or mental entergy. (Note: That one got through because filters can’t block emoji; I suppose you think you’re very clever, leftie poaster.) But here are some of the trends I picked up on.
The Conspiracy Theorists
This one’s been going around for a while but it’s really picked up steam over the last week: BlueAnon types insisting that any action any Republican takes is not in the interest of advancing conservative causes, but rather is specifically done to demoralize and psychologically terrorize leftists. The theory seems to rely on the premise that anything lefties think is “batshit” is something the right ALSO thinks is “batshit,” and that the right knows it’s “batshit,” but is doing it anyway to torment the left and make them too emotionally weak to #Resist. They trust in “the plan,” and “the plan” is that the right means to weaken and break the left by emotionally DDOSing them with an overwhelming amount of torment, so they can then do… whatever it is they’re apparently planning on doing… without any resistance.
It’s such a stupid conspiracy and it’s also so typical of the narcissistic leftie millennial, they think the world revolves around them. Conservative policies don’t exist to advance conservative causes, they apparently only exist to psychologically torture lefties because they’re the Good Guys™ and the right is the Bad Guys™ whose only purpose is to be the enemy of the Good Guys™.
Bonus content: Before we close this section, one more conspiracy that’s been going around that made me lol
It’s Different When Democrats Do It
Did you know that executive orders aren’t laws? It’s true, Andrew Losowsky told me.
He’s only doing the executive orders, you see, not because he’s rescinding all the executive orders that were TOTALLY LAWS AND TOTALLY LEGAL when Biden did it, but because he’s trying to break the left psychologically. The conspiracies work hand-in-hand!
Something else that’s different when Democrats do it: pardons. These ones are particularly hilarious because, chronologically on the timeline, they’re interspersed with each other. Posts about pardon being heroic coming in after posts about pardon being villainous coming in after posts about pardon being heroic. It will truly give you whiplash.
Yes, that’s why they did it. The rule of law. No other reason.
The Library is the Temple and the Librarians are the Priests
Now, maybe it’s because of the fact that I run in publishing circles, but the last several years I’ve been seeing an absolutely egregious amount of blue-haired librarian ladydick sucking. Librarians are saints who care about nothing but selflessly serving their communities at their own personal expense for pennies on the dollar. Librarians are sweet cinnamon rolls who must be protected at all costs. Librarians are too good for this world. Maybe it’s because the librarians in my town are elitist self-righteous cunts, but this narrative has always made me a little sick to my stomach and it’s gotten to nauseating levels over the last week. It’s become clear that to followers of the statist religion, libraries are the temple and librarians are the priests, which means that they are of course now being threatened by the 🍊 Menace. But don’t worry, the #Resistance will protect them to their dying breath.
“THEY,” lmao
“Nobel”
And in case the fact that these are socialist temples was not overt enough, they’re just coming out and saying it.
Self-Care Tips for #Resisting
Finally, we conclude today with the reminder that lefties are suffering right now. Remember, they’re being subjected to a targeted psychological harassment campaign now. But never fear, social media street medics are on the case with some handy tips for self-care while #Resisting.
And most importantly:
Additional note: I wrote this post the day after Inauguration Day. In the following week, they spent 5 days absolutely LOSING THEIR MINDS over Elon’s autistic flailing, two of my friends I actually am concerned may be suicidal, and the last straw was when the library cultists zeroed in on my hometown library and started #Resisting there. I couldn’t handle it anymore and deleted Bluesky off my phone.
You have enormous strength for lasting that long. I am alternately amazed by what I learn on X and repelled by what I learn on X. I still have it but my use is trending down.
I had a Twitter account for a about a month maybe ten years ago.
Otherwise, I have no use for it except when you lot link to it.
I got an account just last month so I could read comments and look at cat memes. I try to keep it to a minimum, the whole idea is to just have a never ending roll of brain distracting nonsense.
Distinction without a difference.
Yeah, I’m not seeing the problem.
“You don’t owe anyone your last spoon tomorrow.”
What does that mean?
“You are spoon feeding spoons!”
It is a reference to what is called Spoonerism. As in you only have so many scoops you can take with your spoon, so don’t waste them on… whatever is freaking them out.
Cultural appropriashun!!!
Makes about as much sense as the most convoluted Spoonerism in the traditional sense of the term.
I was expecting someone to make a Tick reference.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=rcm-J7lQT3w
Connected to this, but also, I don’t 100% understand what they meant because, as a chronically ill person, it’s not like I have an actual quantifiable amount of energy that I can go “here you go, my last serving of energy, now leave me as my body disintegrated and I turn into a Force ghost.” It’s usually “oh shit I didn’t realize recapping this episode of MLJ was going to make me feel so sick afterwards, oops”
Yeah, that’s the one that made me go, “Huh??”
The rest just made me go 🙄.
You’re a strong woman, MLW!
There was a blogpost maybe 15 years ago from a Lupus patient who described what it was like to be sick. Spoons were basically energy currency, limited and variable based on the day, and each task (taking a shower, getting dressed, making a snack) consumed one.
She picked spoons since she was at a restaurant during her explanation.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GV85tQhKHMc
Dishwalla – Counting Blue Cars – 7/31/2017 – Paste Studios, New York, NY
I always liked this song. Nice unplugged version.
Sorry for off topic early
I know the song but could never have named the track or band. Nice.
I don’t remember anyone in Trump’s circle talking about book banning. I did read about state schools removing books based on not being age appropriate.
I’m aware of past attempts at book banning, but those were from the 1960’s or earlier.
6-YEAR-OLDS NEED TO KNOW HOW TO GIVE BLOW JOBS, BIGOT
I was going to say something, but I’d probably end up on a list and I don’t need to be on anymore lists. Particularly that kind of list.
It really does seem to boil down to that.
They *really* hate when you try to claim that some material is inappropriate for kids.
See also: the scare quotes around “parental rights” above.
I think there are local efforts (especially by school boards) that may or may not be appropriate. But, for most progressives I know, the right is a vast, organized, organism intent on destroying ordinary Americans. A vast, right-wing conspiracy if you will.
Nice piece here (TW: CNN): https://www.cnn.com/2021/09/17/opinions/york-pennsylvania-school-district-book-ban-parini/index.html
I had literally zero interest in “politics” and “identity” at that age.
I would even beg to differ and posit that home is where politics and identity are really shaped.
@Rhywun. Yeah, I didn’t agree with that, but his point about bans coming from both sides was well made.
“I think there are local efforts (especially by school boards) that may or may not be appropriate”
Apparently the local effort to prevent kids from learning has been highly successful.
It’s all happening at the state or local level. But because Orange Man Bad, it’s all his fault.
Tangentially, what with the left freaking out about Dobbs, I think this works in their favor. Instead of having all of their eggs in one basket, which could have been taken away when there was a Republican trifecta like we have now, they get to make sure that it is available somewhere no matter what.
See, to your point, it is good that things here are so diffused.
I remember the proggies trying to ban Huck Finn and To Kill a Mockingbird because they used the N-word.
That is beyond the pale I guess, while teaching elementary kids how to suck cock is just common sense.
I suppose it hasn’t occurred to them that the “overwhelming amount of torment” is necessary to counteract the overwhelming amount of damage their Team has done to the country particularly since The One ascended lo some years ago.
Trump’s pen and phone are well known sources of DDOSing. Ow! My eyes rolled so far back I saw my brain.
The first conspiracy bit is somewhat accurate. The strategy of issuing so many EOs right off the bat is, indeed, intended to keep them off balance and make it hard to respond. Trump and co are inside their decision loop, before they can get fully outraged about the latest thing, there’s a new thing to be outraged about it. It splinters their ability to align their factured coalition. It’s really quite clever.
Thank you for your service on the front lines of derp
I came to say this. I get MythicalLibertarianWoman’s point, though. That’s a tactic, but the end goal is still actually policy.
Right, and they’re also not processing it as a means of cramming through policy with less opposition, they think it’s a deliberate demoralizing tactic to leave them personally feeling depressed and anxious so they won’t #Resist
Hey if we don’t drain their energy how are we supposed to force them to have babies?
I think it is having that impact of demoralizing them. The leftards I know are all in a state. They feel hopeless, they aren’t fighting. And while that may not be a /goal/ of the tactic, and the purpose may be to get policy done, if you can achieve your objective while also demoralizing your enemy so they resist less effectively, that’s a positive thing. It’s not a conspiracy though. It’s right out in the open.
I’m ok with EO’s that are used as a method of execution of existing laws based on a legislatively approved budget.
Anything outside of the above needs to follow the legislative process.
Changing a previous president’s EO if following the above is no different than a new CEO changing how a company is run.
Agreed. I think that’s why his EO on birthright citizenship will have a short life.
That birthright thing will grow legs and provide distractions for at least a year.
If anything, it may get the courts to finally clarify it. Which shouldn’t take long given all the contemporary discussion supporting OMB’s position.
I am certainly a-hangin’. I’m in Carmel, Indiana and currently looking for new work. Four gigs in 2024, the last two were in phlebotomy. My needlework was good, but other causes pushed that out of reality. (I *am* fairly bold with new choices.)
Gotta learn to lay off the easy-lookin’ fastballs, with proper wit to handle the curves, yeah?
Hey, stranger!
How do, Spudalicious?
Life continues in a positive direction. Are you still in Oregon?
‘Tis indeed great to see you ’round again! Hope things are going well where…all the things are goin’.
I am, yes. Still in the place in wine country. Life’s going where it is going. Not perfect, but it often be that way. You hanging in there Evan?
I’m hangin’ in just, fine, though I am on the job hunt again. My phlebotomy adventure was a bold one, and I’m proud I tried, but it didn’t work out. My needlework was shockingly good, thankfully. The meat grinder of plasma centers was not pleasant, though I really did enjoy the work and loved the donors I met.
So it goes, and onward again.
I think Milei of Argentina may have given Trump the inspiration, with his innumerable EO’s reducing the size of government etc.. Also the constant lawfare and other shit that’s was thrown out when the Bidenistas were in charge. Kept people playing whack-a-mole. Now that the shoe’s on the other foot, they are getting a taste of what they did to others, out of righteousness, and they ain’t liking it one bit either.
I doubt it’s just in your town.
16 Personalities at the Library:
https://youtu.be/lIstuQWQaqo?si=TUNqGToGWfWt8jHT
When I hear a content creator talk about how toxic Twitter has become because there’s some semblance of free speech now and say they’ve moved to Bluesky, I know what they really mean.
It sucks that some guy you watch for something completely unrelated to politics feels the need to signal like that.
Twitter is toxic because it now lets the deplorables voice their opinions.
The icky people should not be allowed to speak. They should not be allowed to exist because their opinions are deplorable and wrong and evil. I swear, they’d line us all up against a wall and kill us without hesitation if it meant they didn’t have to be traumatized by the existence of people who think Bad Things.
No tolerance for intolerance. Duh.
@Lack, EXACTLY!!! They REALLY mean that!
When I was a kid I spent a LOT of time at the public library, being a nerd. Borrowing nerd books and shit. Not even socialisming.
Now I live next door to my town’s central library and I haven’t been in there because I have a much better option sitting right in front of me on my desk and I don’t have to smell reeking bums to access it.
I thought being subjected to the stench of the unhoused was part of the charm of living in a city.
To be fair, I just made that up. I just expect reeking bums in libraries because that’s how it was where I used to live. I don’t see much of that around here now – our bums have a camp of their own on the other side of town.
Rhywun: my local cunty library is FULL of bums. When I was finishing my last book, I went to work there. They’d renovated and got rid of all the desks with the walls on the sides of them so you can have privacy, they were all like sitting areas for people to socialize. So I went down to the basement and it was all quiet, and I was delighted… until I realized that it opens up to “Peace Plaza,” some faggoty plaza between the library and city hall, and it was FULL of bums. They kept coming in and talking to me and I was like “I AM TRYING TO WORK, NOT LISTEN TO YOUR SCHIZOPHRENIC HALLUCINATIONS”
Shit, not even they want to listen to their schizoid thoughts.
lol
Maybe my town is just too small but there are literally only a couple bums that I recognize on sight and they tend to move around a lot. Despite being the home of a gigantic university and zillions of hard left libs.
I’ve been to large public libraries doing research. Many have become homeless daycares. I have to tune out the mumbles and off-key singing to themselves. Fortunately more and more of my research can be done on-line.
That was before they curated all the non-socialist books out so they could use the shelves to preserve all the important books us fascists want to ban.
Being old, that’s all we had. The musty book smell of the old stone library is a childhood memory.
My last career was working for a large used bookstore company. Some customers would ask if we were a library. I always said, “Better, here you can keep the books, you don’t have to return them”
Seriously. When I discovered “money” a few decades ago I pretty much never borrowed a book again.
Since my local library started lending e-books you could download from their website – when the borrowing period ends, you just can’t open the file anymore – I rarely set foot in the bricks & mortar libraries, though both the downtown library and the branch close to my house are both new and very nice.
Unfortunately, the big problem at the local library buildings right now isn’t bums (we’re used to that – an old guy nicknamed “Rags” was a local legend back in the ’70s) but teens fighting. I loved going to the library as a kid, and it infuriates me to think that the current version of Young GT may not be able to go there because it isn’t safe. 😠
That’s crazy. In my hometown, somewhat larger, the central library was perfectly safe when I was a kid.
In fact, I don’t recall seeing any teens or younger at all there – ever. I guess that is why it was perfectly safe.
At ten, I rode the bus downtown for ten cents to go to the library, or go to a movie.
I think I was still hitting the local branch at that age. By 12 or so I was riding my bike downtown to hit the motherlode.
I have fond memories of my library, a perfect 15-min bike ride away. Much, much farther away is Eville’s legitimately beautiful library. The Willard, which is known for a haunting:
“The first sighting of the gray lady was reported in the basement of the library in 1937 by a library custodian, who quit shortly after the encounter. People who have encountered the grey lady say 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐲 𝐬𝐦𝐞𝐥𝐥𝐞𝐝 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐬𝐜𝐞𝐧𝐭 𝐨𝐟 𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐟𝐮𝐦𝐞 and heard strange noises. The library started putting up webcams in 1999 and currently has 6 of them.”
We should call those free of sugar.
whoops, here’s that beautiful Willard Library, 1877. (The Grey Lady is they name its ghost.)
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/5b/Willard_Library_from_southwest.jpg/1200px-Willard_Library_from_southwest.jpg
What a lovely building!
Nice. Mine was not so exuberant.
Wow! Kinda imposing! My ’50s-’60s-era neighborhood library (now apparently a daycare center since three branches were consolidated a few years ago) was on a much smaller scale.
I just remembered that tucked into my baby book or in the box of memorabilia in which it’s stored are several of the little construction paper nametags I got at the neighborhood library’s story hour – cutouts of the characters from the stories like Clifford the Big Red Dog. We got along very nicely without drag queens, thankyouverymuch.
@GT
That’s the downtown library.
My local branch looked a lot like yours.
*digs*
lol Almost identical.
I loved going to the local library when I was a kid. It was an old skool Carnegie library.
Since I was a kid, they have almost doubled the size of it by adding on behind it. They did a very good job blending the new and the old.
Discuss: Was Andrew Carnegie the Elon Musk of his time?
Getting 2500 libraries built for the public seems like Musk buying Twitter. Putting a lot of your own money where your mouth is.
My local library is four stories high and has books on one-half of one floor. The other half is DVDs.
One floor is all “community meeting rooms.” You can guess which groups meet there and which don’t. One floor is offices, one is internet.
So what you’re saying is the building can be sold and the collection move into 1/8th the space?
Sexy Wiccans?
If you delve too deeply into the Derp Mines, you unleash a Balrog.
I was thinking of Tirgglypuff.
That’s a good choice too.
Yikes!
😬
I’m afraid to find out but… what’s written on her?
I’m guessing something about the male gaze. Unfortunately my gaze has limits.
Well, it sure wont be the male glaze.
Thanks, I’m having trouble unseeing that.
The only things I see from Bluesky are what gets screenshotted and posted to Tweeters. Those people are…yeah. Jen Rubin and her hypochondria are a favorite.
Just about all the D&D personalities have moved to Blue Sky.
I’m surprised the place hasn’t been cancelled for racism.
The first “talkie” was The Jazz Singer and in the talking part of the movie,Al Jolson sings “Blue Skies”.
Then, he does a black face routine.
Anybody who uses Blue Sky Twitter is secretly supporting racism.
https://youtu.be/Djd1XfwDAQs?si=uoyTlTFFuZEJe8d1
Didn’t that game go out of business in the early 2000s?
Speaking of wypipo.
Kind of a bummer, but it’s probably healthy to remind oneself – most ‘personalities’ in the TTRPG community are gigantic assholes.
The only group I follow regularly is 3d6, Down the Line.
They are starting their last delve in “The Halls of Arden Vul”. It has been going for more than two years.
Before that, they did a “Dolmenwood” campaign, and before that, “Blades in the Dark”, which was more Steampunk/SciFi than fantasy.
I don’t get the appeal.
Some games are just not spectator sports.
I don’t watch sports.
The only sport I find genuinely entertaining is bull riding
Ehh, I listen to D&D* podcasts in the car. Mostly to get ideas for my own games. 3d6 Down the Line sounds interesting.
* – I use the term ‘D&D’ to mean ‘whatever TTRPG system you’re playing these days.’
It’s five guys who have been playing together for a while, so the camaraderie is there.
They also play the game instead of trying to ply act a story, so if you are interested in how game rules work, you would probably like them.
Also, Arden Vul is a setting that is spread over five volumes, so there is a lot of material there.
The premise is that Fantasy Roman Empire conquered a region, pulled its legions during a civil war, then sent the legions back to the region afterward.
They use a house-ruled version of “Old School Essentials”, which is a clone of the Basic/Expert sets edited by Tom Moldvay and Cook/Marsh.
There is a lot of faction play that starts in earnest with a group of Halflings that charge an entry fee to get into the dungeon. The players got to really hate those Halflings.
Wait, it’s not an ELO reference?
Mark Hamill is such a scrunt. They shoulda left him on Tatooine.
With Stephen King.
Fuck off, Wesley!
I’m guessing whoever posted that got attacked because “OMG I can’t imagine being so privileged that I could preserve my precious mental energy while trans people and immigrants are LITERALLY DYING!!!!”
One of my friends whom I’m actually genuinely concerned may be suicidal actually did say that.
Oops, that should have been a closed blockquote, not a second layer blockquote 😅
Local news* is bursting with concern over the hate that trans kids are facing now. 🙄
*My cable box suddenly decided to tune to the local news channel every time it turns on. I need to correct this.
It’s a shame it’s not anatomically possible for them to break their arms by patting themselves on the back. That would at least make it harder for them to type for a while.
Perhaps they should ponder their good fortune to live in a country where people carry libraries in their pockets and it’s perfectly legal to openly criticize the government.
After spending almost 10 days with my lefty brothers in close proximity, I’m still unable to articulate the gaslighting. Not that they’re trying to gaslight ME. No. They’ve been gaslit and they’re trying to pass it on like a virus. They’re very smart people. Why is this possible?
Maybe I don’t know how to explain how I’m being gaslit, but I know someone’s TRYING to gaslight me, and it just stuns me into silence because how do you fight this?
1. Generally, my views are evil. (Except I’m not an evil person and they love me, so they’re visibly confused while they’re trying to parse this out.)
2. My stance on trans (particularly transwomen) is DEEPLY misogynistic. Clearly. (Because obviously not wanting a dude in a dress in the bathroom is…woman hating? I think?)
3. It is not possible for me to have my views on trans and ALSO be nice to them. It’s performative and insincere and therefore not possible. (Does your soul not allow you to hold two thoughts/feelings in yourself at once?)
4. I said the quiet part out loud, which was unexpected. (If you’re going to go live your best life, divorce your wife FIRST. Also, I was concerned about your intractable depression and all its treatments, and that if going out to live your best life cleared that up, well, then okay. [This confused him. Because apparently, being able to hold two thoughts/feelings in yourself at once is incomprehensible.])
5. Because my views are evil, I am not allowed to express them. I must listen to their opinions because they are right and true and good. (I just had to suck this one up because it was just so out there in Totalitarianville there was no hope.)
I will admit I fucked up at the beginning of this conflagration because I made a Matthew Shepard joke. I apologized for that.
I was fucking DIZZY after two days of their wailing and flailing, lecturing, yelling, and earnest conviction that their opinions are The True And Good Opinions™. Bro1 was trying to be the mediator, but he’s the one with the transkids (3/4, maybe 4/4), so he was also mad but could at least hold a reasonable conversation even though he was really trying to get me to see the error of my evil ways. I didn’t apologize for anything else, but I did tell him to back off on the trans issue because you can’t just come at me and expect me to change my opinion in a 10-minute conversion attempt. He acceded that that was true.
The OTHER thing I said that gave him pause was that I said, “Look. If someone says something hurtful to me, it might hurt, but if it’s TRUE, I’m not going to get mad.” Since I did, in fact, demonstrate that that’s how I deal with getting yelled at or whatever, it confused him. “It might hurt, but okay. I own that whatever it is. I’m not going to change, not going to apologize, and I accept that that’s how people see me and there’s nothing to get mad about.”
That confused the shit out of him, so we let it drop there.
The utter disconnect from reality is an amazing thing to behold. My mouth dropped open and pretty much stayed that way for about 3 days. I could muster NO cogent comment, no soundbite, no snark, no wit, no riposte, no argument (that would be listened to), and pretty much wasn’t allowed to speak at all. Under normal circumstances, I wouldn’t have stood being lectured at like a naughty little girl, but we had a crisis to tend and they were bent on it and they weren’t going to listen to anything I said. I couldn’t walk away. Couldn’t say, “Fuck you.” Couldn’t get them to let me get a word in edgewise or at least let me finish a sentence before interrupting or storming out.
Absolute children. Toddlers, both of them. 48- and 51-year-old toddlers throwing a tantrum because they a) can’t hold two opposing thoughts in their minds at the same time, b) have ZERO empathy that someone MIGHT have a different opinion from them, c) cannot CONCEIVE that a different opinion might NOT be evil, and d) REFUSE to listen to the differing opinion much less think about it.
I’ve written this screed and I still can’t succinctly parse what all was going on in those conversations, but that’s the nature of gaslighting, isn’t it?
I don’t know if they’re true believers, if they’re clinging to a belief system that conforms with their desires, if they’re just dupes, or if all of it’s a coping mechanism to deal with their lives that they know are just OFF for various reasons (I think there’s A LOT of this).
Broken culture bereft of traditional morality that provides support and guidance. It’s like children walking through the ruins of 1945 Berlin trying to make sense of the world.
It’s definitely the place of men to tell a woman when she’s being misogynistic.
THAT stuck in my craw.
BOTH of them dismissed me when I said I am a woman and I’m addressing a woman’s concerns. It was one of THE most misogynistic things I have witnessed in my lifetime (or at least, directed at me).
I guess I’m not a woman. Just their sister. And I am wrong. So that makes my womanhood irrelevant. Or something.
To be fair, smug arrogant certainty is a defining characteristic of libs.
Did you beat them with the “mansplaining” club?
Moj, were your brothers like this growing up? Sounds terrible but I’m guessing you don’t see them too often and now you have been forced into the situation.
We’re all here to vent on, any time. It’s “Dial a Vent” as necessary. Are they soon to return back to where they usually live and just be a memory?
No, but they’re so much younger than I am (one’s 6 years younger and the other’s 8 years younger), I never really got to know them as people until they were adults and they didn’t seem to have much opinion on things one way or another.
One lives in Seattle. One lives in Orlando.
Funny thing is, they think what I believe is evil (if they knew what that was, because they didn’t let me say much), but they ABSOLUTELY trust me to do what’s right and fair. I think they’re misguided, but I absolutely trust them to do what’s right and fair. We don’t have to even THINK about it. It just IS. It hasn’t occurred to them to try to square their opinion of my beliefs with their absolute certainty that I will do what’s right and fair. With regard to my mom, we’re all on the same page without even having to think about it. We present a united front. We know who our enemy is and we don’t let our infighting get in the way of protecting our mom or her assets.
We had a moment of real peace when I decided to take Mom home with me. Mom didn’t want that. My husband didn’t want that. My brothers didn’t want that. My sister-in-law didn’t want that. Why? Because they all knew I would burn out. I said, “I KNOW I’m going to burn out. THAT’S OKAY. When I do, I’ll cry uncle and we’ll do something about it then. We MUST stretch the money we do have until the property is disposed of.”
But. Bro2 came to me later and said, “I would NEVER have asked you to do this, but I’m very grateful you did.”
I ALSO told them that my husband and I owed Mom $X and she had forgiven it, but as executor, I had always intended to deduct that from my portion and split it between them and they absolutely REFUSED to listen to that business. “No. What Mom did with her money is her business. Not ours.”
So. There’s a whole lot of weird going on.
I don’t know how they can think I’m evil AND trust me implicitly without thinking about it.
One possibility: they’ve decided to trust you (even though you’re evil) because if they didn’t, they’d have to take on more of the responsibility for taking care of your mom?/jaded & cynical
It’s good that your family is united when it comes to your Mom’s health. Good that you stepped up, at some emotional cost, it ain’t easy.
Fortunately we never had to face those problems (any of them) as a family. Now I hope not to put my own kids in that quandary. They are
now just beginning to get reacquainted and become friends instead of siblings.
@GT, it doesn’t feel like that. It feels like … that’s just the way it is in our family without question. Comfortable.
We have ALL fucked up. Bro1 went all FloridaMan. Bro2 “left”* his wife and kids to go be flamboyant. I write smut, which is probably as disappointing to my mom as my brothers.
But we still are there, are functioning as a unit, all the gears working, with me being the face of it all. It’s very comfortable.
*Now, this is where my thinking has changed just a couple of days ago. He once said his wife was his bestie, so, yeah, so what, my husband’s my bestie. But he said he was trying to explain the whole situation to his wife and kids and he couldn’t get a good handle on the timeline because it was all so rollercoastery or whatever. My whole opinion of his doing this is because I felt bad for his wife. Again, I am looking at this as a woman with a woman’s concerns in mind. But then I realized, people have ARRANGEMENTS. Maybe it’s presumptive of me to assume that the wife is hurt at all. I mean, that really is their business.
Mojeaux: They think you’re honorably evil. Yeah, cognitive dissonance.
I mean, well … I guess? Gangsters and dictators love their kids and dogs, too, so …
In my experience 90% of what people believe/say/do is entirely a post hoc rationalization of what they feel or their prior assumptions. I don’t think I am above this but I do try to be aware of the tendency.
That sucks my Mom (Low-grade TDS), and my Aunt (a pretty dogmatic conservative) reached a truce some time ago, they just don’t talk about it. Turns out that two septuagenarian sisters have a lot to talk about that isn’t the man who is orange and bad. I don’t bring it up either, my mom knows where I stand and values me more than politics. My dad will drop in a few passive-aggressive comments about the coming pogrom but it isn’t worth engaging. Mostly the same with my brother, he had pictures of him and his wife standing on a curb holding a ‘no human is illegal ‘-flavored sign up on Facederp circa 2017. We have a, ‘see each other once every 2-3 years and nothing else’ relationship, which kinda sucks but it is minimum impact.
My dad and uncle are planning a reunion of some sort this summer in WV, it looks like a good time. I am planning on doing my best to not let politics interfere.
🙁
I know it’s been commented on before but I do think the 3 or 4 transkids thing is… supernaturally improbable and that’s if you even believe in transkids which I don’t and therefore more a sign that yeah something is off.
Crowd following and FOMO have been a thing since we could walk on two legs.
Kid 1 MtF is 23, lives at home, no job. He followed Kid3 and Kid2. My bet is boredom + anime futanari porn/autogynephilia.
Kid 2 FtM is 21, lives at home, no job. Younger sis went trans, so… why not? I don’t know.
Kid 3 FtM is 19, lives at home, no job. “He” KNEW he was a boy when he was 16 or whatever.
Kid 4 F to maybe M, dunno, is still in high school. No job.
I asked, “Um, you’re calling Kid4 ‘XYZ’ sometimes and ‘ABC’ sometimes. Which is it?” He looked surprised. “Well, not sure yet. We’re still getting used to it, too. Thank you for asking.” I said (with some exasperation), “Look. I don’t care that much. I don’t have a problem calling people what they want to be called or using their preferred pronouns.” After everything that had gone on before, that just did not compute to him. Well, fuck, Bro1, if you let me talk, you’d’a known that.
That is at least three kids that need kicking out.
I was no paragon of self-sufficiency at that age but even I moved out after HS.
At the LEAST, get a job.
Fair enough. In my case it was a no-brainer since college was in another town.
But yeah, I WANTED to leave home. I can’t understand not wanting that.
Your siblings mirror mine. So maybe…we are wrong?
Seriously, are you sure we aren’t siblings? I know, logically, it doesn’t match up but same with my two elder siblings. Pretentious Harvard bro and SoCal sis are exactly this.
For a trite answer, I’ll blame prosperity and boredom and the search for some kind of meaning.
I heard it said recently that what we call “traditions” are the solutions to problems we forgot we once had. We’ll get back to those problems and then we’ll reinvent the wheel.
My kids are years older than your siblings, OBE, and they are finally beginning to like each other. Maybe a little exaggerated, they worry about my wife and me, but maybe from sort of Mojeaux’s point of view.
Libraries? Do you mean those hobo masturbation facilities?
Wait, you can freely masturbate there?
/not a hobo!
Nope. $20 same as downtown
Christ, they are so pathetic and overwrought. Shows how shallow they are. Here’s my SiL’s, best friend’s status:
“Raise your hand if you’ve sat in bed and cried this week about Nazis.
You are not overreacting.
You are not overreacting.
You are not overreacting.
You are not overreacting.
You are not overreacting.”
Ya know, openly stating you’re terrified is rarely a good strategy. (I know this is the world she grew up in, but damn.) I’d love to be a fly in her mind to hear what frightens her so. I know it wouldn’t be productive, as much ‘thought’ is occurring vis a vis… that.
SiL and her have matching ink and feminist, anti-patriarchal coffee mugs. My SiL, on the other hand, is hot. Curious, that.
A broken, quivering population is easy to manipulate and control.
“If you’ve lost faith in humanity clap your hands…”
“If you’ve lost faith in humanity and have slipped into insanity…”
😁👍
“If you’ve lost faith in humanity and have slipped into reality…”
Clap your hands
The only library I have is the one I purchased. I’m outside the city/school district/library district boundaries so no card for me. Shit dripping bums doing drugs and surfing porn & jacking are welcome and valued users of said libraries.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Island_Trees_School_District_v._Pico is as big of a mistake as Roe. School libraries* are not independent creatures, they’re subordinate to school boards and given the finite nature of space and budgets, they absolutely have ultimate control over books placed in their school libraries. It’s an upside down world where they wouldn’t.
*that goes for every public library. City, county, library district.. whatever is in charge gets to make decisions about the content. Don’t like it? Vote the assholes out. Or buy your own damned smut and feed it to your own kids. But it’s never been about that. It’s about forcing those that disagree with you to be humiliated and subjugated to your wishes.
Okay, I did not hear this part of the “Colombia Story” until just now:
Trump’s new Secretary of State Marco Rubio explained, “Colombian President Petro had authorized the flights and provided all needed authorizations, and then canceled his authorization when the planes were in the air.”
https://open.substack.com/pub/coffeeandcovid/p/adios-amigos-monday-january-27-2025?r=d0r3d&utm_medium=ios
The guy was trying to play cute.
Push the migrants out the back while over the presidential palace.
I like that.
That is new information to me as well. That kind of cements my analysis that his stunning and braveness was entirely performative. I don’t know too much about the internal politics of Columbia but I suspect that he had to appear to be resisting OMB to appease his domestic power base and maybe to gain street cred with the other socialist leaders in Latin America.
This is where actual transparency will win the day. If this is all true, we win. Hands down. We had authorization and clearance and once the birds were near, he tried to rescind the deal? Nah…we don’t play that way.
And if this had happened six months ago, State would falling over themselves to appease Columbia so they could “work together” in the future and Blinken and others would be afraid of making a public spectacle because they’d appear weak.
Or play macho.
I guess I know a different category of lefty, as those I deal with are primarily fretting over the potential impact of tariffs, and somewhat bummed at not getting the student loan forgiveness.
Absolutely no one I interact with in the physical world has even raised a negative word regarding gender, DEI, pardons, etc, etc. They either don’t care, or silently support the actions because the cultural climate isn’t the kind that would keep them quiet if their opinions aligned with the bluesky shriekers.
Seeing the lefties suddenly transform into Milton Freidman vis-à-vis tariffs has been an interesting development.
And they all discovered inflation and migrant kids this week, too. It’s amazing.
Now to get Trump to tweet about how he supports socialism and high taxes…
Winston’s Mom rejoices:
https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2025/01/evil-vs-even-more-evil.php
“So, Paul (Krugman), rage on at Substack! You have no editor, no filter, you can give free rein to your unquenchable inner rage. But no one will read it.”
Somebody will…
I don’t buy for one second that the NYT wasted brain cells on “toning down” Krugnuts.
I have to go see myself. Later. Not right now.
This is cognitive dissonance in action. They just can’t believe they could be wrong, so the only other option is to believe that the 80% of the country who want deportations are genocidal Nazis.
Also, they have spent the last 20 odd years convincing themselves that a. they are morally right and b. that there is no need to talk to anyone outside their bubble. They don’t have the language to disagree anymore, and, due to twitter/Tictok/facebook they only think in small bites, and cannot process longer thought steams.
TwitterNo more of Elon’s Nazi site!
Great article from last week I just read last night. Good stuff about Marine aviators – right up Ozy’s alley.
https://www.twz.com/air/we-went-to-mock-war-with-marine-f-35bs-on-a-pacific-island
My current hometown (in Minnesoda) built a fancy new library in 2010. It is actually a very nice building. I’m not sure book-wise it is any better than the old library. Most of the new space ended up going to PC work stations for the public and CD/DVD’s.
Oh, I almost forgot the county requirement that any library project over $1M needs to spend at least 1% of the total cost on “public art”. My friend was a county commissioner at the time that my local library opened. The county was facing a tight budget and he tried to postpone the purchase of $2.9M of art for the library. His suggestion was roundly criticized and he was officially a bad person.
This is what we got for our tax money: A big mobile, some kid pictures and the usual random blob of metal crap.
How do you feel about the public sector in general?
For most of my life I thought of government as merely inefficient: we bascally the roads more or less we would get if the private sector owned them sort of thinking. Maybe we overpay 20% and public works underperform 20%, but most of the same folk are doing the same thing kinda the same way, so I never thought of it as evil. Bear in mind that I’m cusp of Boomer/X, so I grew up in a wonderful, rural world where teachers and postmen and the DMV and even the brothers of the URW actually did their jobs.
But now the game has changed: the public sector is too large, so controlling it and managing scope and access are political footballs. I never believed government was the best way, but now it seems inevitably corrupt, everything falling down everywhere so why even pretend.
So I don’t believe the government is the correct vector for hardly anything, and I don’t really engage on management efficacy anymore: there is no correct way to do public sector things in this inevitably toxic culture we have (that is to say, this culture where, somehow, the 80% reasonable people somehow get bullied into insanity by the other 20%).
I care. I regret. But I don’t engage anymore. I just shrug and know that a private anything is a better anything. The mob does not agree; the mob lays siege, taxes, destroys. My hemlock cannot be far away…..Hold then my sword and turn away thy face While I do run upon it. Wilt thou, Strato?
“I just shrug and know that a private anything is a better anything. “
Prisons?
Good morning all.
Still somewhat despondent watching the tides and storms in this ocean of lunacy. All of the lefty outrage upon their losing power and the rise of Trump is just as much performative virtue signaling as anything they have done. Bluesky is their digital ‘safe space’ echo chamber with security blankets, cookies and coloring books.
The best response is to ignore it. Where is my hermit’s cabin in the woods?
Oh, that’s right, I am in it.
*stokes fire, pours coffee*
Good morning, Suthen, Stinky, DeM, Sean, Ted’S., and U, and good…evening(?) Your Holiness!
Yep. Getting close to bedtime. Waiting to see if a rain system will blow through in time for a walk
Hey Glibs! It’s not totally fucking freezing out. Yay.
☕🌄😏
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ET3-t1jFmo0
🎶🎶
Something Mojeaux touched on is the sense of entitlement of the Bluesky type. Of course they can bring their politics into spaces where it was previously a taboo. You disagreeing with it, or offering a wrongthinkful opinion, however, is beyond the pale.
Biden being obviously senile during the debate was one of the first times where the visible consensus changed to something the Bluesky types didn’t agree with.
I think the things I think because I’m a good person; I’m a good person because of the things I think; You don’t agree with those things therefore you have some fundamental flaw. It’s a mindset that consumes the leftist way of thinking (along with raging narcissism) but, to be fair, it’s seen on the right too but to a much smaller degree. Getting too worked up about it is a fool’s errand though because they aren’t going to change.
I read something the other day about Bluesky (probably linked from here) and how they think of themselves as “smol beans” – tiny and precious and they couldn’t be in the wrong – they’re too delicate for that and their obvious feelings on the matter make them self-evidently correct.
I.e., narcissistic children (which may be a redundancy)
But things do change, maybe not in the direction we like or not fast enough or we aren’t able to see them clearly.
Our (my)(your) thinking is probably different from our parents, our kids are different from us. The advances in technology
are unbelievable. The problems are some (of us)(them) are still clinging to yesterday. This is especially true the older we become.
I’ve tried to recreate “The Old Days” for myself but with indoor plumbing and central heat. It tends to isolate a person but
so much the better for some of us.
https://www.wfmz.com/news/area/lehighvalley/lehigh-county/western-lehigh-county/out-of-the-norm-for-the-neighborhood-neighbors-speak-out-after-couple-charged-with-forcing/article_82ebe2bc-dd0f-11ef-83b8-475825c51756.html
Don’t click that.
OK. I won’t.
Took out some boxes of boxes, the space looks less cluttered already.
😃👍
[Disclaimer: I am, as you may have guessed, a notorious box hoarder. I mean…that one could be useful! And this one…]
Save the boxes for the cats.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=PVagSTNMbN4&pp=ygUNY2F0cyBpbiBib3hlcw%3D%3D
I order too much crap online. It all comes in boxes…
When I think back on all the crap I ordered online, it’s a wonder I can think at all.
it doesn’t appear that those two are related issues.
Awwww! Imagine them tearing you limb from limb just like those boxes.
Mrs. Suthenboy is ecstatic about Trump’s election and the things he is doing. For me what is most striking is the contrast between what he is doing now, sensible solutions to obvious problems, and what the left has been up to. The extent of the evil and incompetence that people have tolerated before turning around is breathtaking.
The tranny thing? Exposing children to pedophiles and perverts in public, on the public dime? Letting violent felons transfer to women’s prisons? Boys in women’s sports? Opening the borders and flooding the country with not only people with cultural values that directly conflict with ours, but the worst individuals from those countries because even their home cultures dont want them? Completely trashing meritocracy…filling the ranks of every institution with incompetents? Openly burning cities, persecuting people who protest not only with mob violence but with the CJ system? DA’s releasing criminals and fostering crime as much as they can while prosecuting anyone who resists?
When I consider the scale and brazenness of the evil it really is stunning. Had Trump not come along, had we not had a legal means to put the brakes on, I think we might likely have collapsed into a violent over-reaction.
Even more stunning is how many people supported Biden. All the BlueSky people believe the evil Biden did was good. It is a significant portion of the nation, as we saw during COVID. As Milei pointed out, we can never stop fighting even for a moment.
The only way that makes sense is their brains are broken, beaten down by decades of wicked propaganda.
I just like to point out to the lefties that by opposing Trump they are opposing democracy.
A memo issued by acting director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Matthew Vaeth directs federal agencies to temporarily pause “all activities related to obligation or disbursement of all Federal financial assistance.”
……………
Trump and his nominee to lead OMB, Russ Vought, have signaled they may seek to expand presidential authority over the agency. Trump has also talked about challenging the Impoundment Control Act by using presidential authority to hold back certain funding appropriated by Congress.
https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/5109943-trump-administration-directs-widespread-pause-federal-loans-grants/
“We truly do apologize,” she told NJ Advance Media in an occasionally emotional phone interview. “It was a bad decision. It was stupidity. It was ignorance. But we do not support hatred or Nazism or any of that.”
The Proud Boys Burger was put on Aqua Blu’s menu on Thursday. A description of the burger — made of “white American cheese, onion ring layers of truth, resilience pickles, freedom fries, cancel culture coleslaw, and liberty sauce” — was posted by a customer to social media, where it quickly gained traction and fueled outrage.
The Proud Boys are a far-right extremist organization designated as a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center.
https://www.nj.com/ocean/2025/01/nj-restaurant-hammered-for-proud-boys-burger-it-was-an-ignorant-mistake-owner-says.html
Can I have a side of craven apology fries with that?
*facepalm*
The SPLC grifters designate anyone to the right of Mao as a far-right extremist hate group. Why anyone would pay attention to them, much less cave is a mystery to me.
How the SPLC retains any relevancy is amazing
Lawfare grifting, not relevance.
Really, they should lose in court more, being slander merchants, but they pick on little guys.
Not really. The left throws money at them (and probably your tax dollars too) in order to prop up the left.
One might as well ask why teachers unions are relevant.
He would make more money if he left it on the menu. The leftists would forget about him in two news cycles.
Ayup.
The only bad thing about the healthiest meal is that I will probably not eat it, so it’s supposed benefits will not apply to me.
https://archive.is/fpq1r
I would eat that. I can’t cook fish right now due to apartment living though.