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Out of work

I've been unemployed almost a week now, and everything seems wicked weird. 

Cranky Old Man #94

It's the weekend, but whatever I'm doing at home doesn't need to be done before Monday.

Tomorrow morning, I won't need to be awake and at my desk by 6AM.

I can go grocery shopping or take a walk in the snow any damned time I please, even at 9 or noon or 3 on a weekday.

No meetings. No deadlines. No urgent messages to ignore.

There's no need to do anything or be anywhere by any when. Time doesn't quite mean nothing, but almost. And I never never never want to go back to work.

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The lovely illustration atop this page is by the illustrious Jeff Meyer.

A few lifetimes ago, Jeff's art often graced the covers of Pathetic Life and Zine World, and I am delighted to have him back.

You'll soon see a few more of his works hanging on the walls and classing up this dump.

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In 2020 I made the mistake of donating to ActBlue. Before giving, I asked in an email, if I clicked the pertinent "do not sell, rent, or share" box, would they indeed never sell, rent, or share my email address? They promised me they never would.

Two years later the political spam keeps coming, from everywhere. I live in Wisconsin, but regularly get solicitation spam from political candidates and causes in California, Mississippi, West Virginia, etc, and it's difficult to envision ever making another donation to any political candidate.

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Eccentric billionaire Mark Cuban has launched a company offering a wide swathe of prescription medicines, all at 15% markup. Routinely, many/most US pharmacies have much, much higher markups than that. On some of the sample listings at the Cost Plus Drugs website, the savings add up to thousands of dollars for a single prescription.

This could be a great help for people like me — with no health insurance, yet hoping to stay alive.

I first heard of this last week, but couldn't find news coverage of it, so I didn't mention it, and assumed it was likely a hoax. It's not a hoax. I haven't signed up yet, but my prescriptions will run out soon, and I'll likely be buying drugs from Mark Cuban.

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Hundreds of truckers are still protesting COVID rules in Ottawa.

Trucks are expensive, and truck drivers don't make nearly the money they made a few decades ago. Yet hundreds of trucks and truckers have been in Ottawa, protesting and honking and acting generally obnoxious, for a week now. It costs a lot of money to drive a truck to Ottawa, and then keep it idling there, instead of, you know, trucking.

You gotta suspect someone's covering their expenses.

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Athletes ‘dropping dead’ is the latest mutation of COVID vaccine misinformation 

On the radio, I listened as QAnon wingnut Senator Ron Johnson talked about this — on a live microphone — to actual reporters — as if it's a thing. One simple Google search told me, it's not a thing. At all. Athletes are not dropping dead after getting COVID vaccines.

Johnson is a Senator. He's my Senator, actually. And he's just pulling crap out of his ass, saying nonsense like this all the time. And he's not the only one, not even the worst of them.

To hell with all these elected idiots who just make shit up and repeat nonsensical rumors, to scare people. And to hell with the idiots stupid enough to vote for these idiots — which means, to hell with about 47% of America.

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Good think-piece on Brian Flores's lawsuit over NFL racism. 

The next step is seeing who in the NFL is done dancing and will stand with him and finally air out the racism in the building. Flores comes from the New England Patriots coaching tree. Will Belichick and the rest of his protégés hold a press conference in support of Flores and his character? Will the NFL’s so-called “social justice committee” stand with Flores? Will players who spoke out against racism outside the NFL point their finger inside the tent? This is a moment when silences will speak volumes.

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This will probably mean nothing to you if you're under 40, but for old folks it's fabulous: Dial-up rock'n'roll. 

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That’s how it works when you’re a woman on the internet 

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Former zoo for sale. $3.6-million. No animals included. 

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What happened to Chinese tennis star Peng Shuai — and to the man she accused? 

Nobody knows, but the answer can't be good.

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Year of the Tiger 

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Rogen says his repeated use of n-word on his show was repeatedly taken out of context 

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How student debt is sabotaging America 

It's a long and dense read, but I think you can handle it.

Every other developed country in the world knows this, too: student debt is a rare or even nonexistent thing in most western democracies. Not only is college free or close to free around much of the world; many countries even offer a stipend for monthly expenses like our GI Bill did back in the day.  

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"I worked in live TV for over 20 years, walked away to talk about what Trump did behind the scenes on Celebrity Apprentice (like using N-word, & snorting Adderall) didn’t get a single mainstream media request. Rudy Giuliani tried to overthrow democracy and got a spot on The Masked Singer."
        Noel Casler

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Johnson & Johnson tried to get federal judge to block publication of Reuters story 

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One-word newscast:
cops
cops
elections
QAnon

Dead:
Todd Gitlin
Arnie Kantrowitz
John C Koss
Bob Planthold 

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 Mystery links  — Like life itself, there’s no knowing where you’re going:

—①—
     —②—
          —③— 

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♫♬  Sing along with Doug
2/6/2022 
 
Cranky Old Man is annoyed and complains and very occasionally offers a kindness, along with anything off the internet that's made me smile or snarl. All opinions fresh from my ass. Top illustration by Jeff Meyer. Click any image to enlarge. Comments & conversations invited. 
 
Tip 'o the hat to All Hat No Cattle, Linden Arden, BoingBoing, Breakfast at Ralf's, Captain Hampockets, CaptCreate's Log, Follow Me Here, John the Basket, LiarTownUSA, National Zero, Please Do Not Publish My Name, Ran Prieur, Voenix Rising, and anyone else I've stolen from but forgot to say thanks. 
 
Extra special thanks to Becky Jo, Name Withheld, Dave S., and always Stephanie...

22 comments:

  1. Mark Cuban to the rescue. I am not a fan of the man but the idea sounds like good business. Its sickening that we rely have to on the benevelance of billionaires.

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    1. Yeah, I skipped the part where he's a sickening capitalist swine who ought to be taxed at 98% and treated like a pariah in polite society. He's rich, so all that sorta goes without saying, doesn't it?

      Delete
    2. Thanks for saying it tho. I fucking hate Cuban even more than the average billionaire.

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    3. Yeah? I probably like him more, because me and the mrs used to watch Shark Tank, and he sometimes comes across as human on that show.

      Delete
  2. I didn't know Canada had Qanon and what's going on in Ottawa? They required COVID vaccinations and in response truck drivers swarm the capital and act like assholes?

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    1. That's what I see from here but why it's happening makes no sense to me. What's to protest?

      Delete
  3. Your comments are acting up again. Won't let me comment as Hamockets. Pretty sure this one will work, glad I copy-pasted...

    >The lovely illustration atop this page is by the illustrious Jeff Meyer.

    Before I got to this line, I had aready come down to the comments and typed "Is that a NEW Jeff Meyer drawing?" He does good stuff, I remember his PL and ZW covers very well.

    ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

    Unrelated, but I noticed zero comments on the last few Pathetic updates. I read 'em all, and I hope most people do too. Just not a lot of commentary needed on almost three-decade-old diary entries. But still good stuff.

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    >I never never never want to go back to work.

    Amen. I came back to PA from your swingin' bachelor pad in Wisconsin JUST in time for Covid to hit. That meant that we had to put ALL our energy into online sales of Virginia's pottery. So I had an almost full-time job, running the Etsy shop. Fantastic. My own hours, more-or-less, working from my nest in the corner, and I got to fuck the boss, in the good way. All for 20% of the take. I am unsure I can ever, ever enter the conventional work force again. 8 hours a day, five days a week? Fuck that, deep and on a slant.

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    1. Nobody does it better than Mr Jeff.

      Not sure the PL reruns offer much to people who weren't there, but I'm glad you were there.

      A surprise advantage of retyping all that stuff is that the entries where I left my job but somehow still survived in 1995 were reassuring when I lost my job in 2022.

      Working from home beats working anywhere else except not working at all. Wish I could find a way to make the not working pay.

      Delete
    2. > Not sure the PL reruns offer much to people who weren't there, but I'm glad you were there.

      Sadly, I wasn't "there" with you, but I spent some time in San Francisco in the 90s, and near as I can tell you did a terrific job in capturing time and place. I was there on "business" but actually there to see if I could meet and shake hands with Lawrence Ferlinghetti at City Lights. I made more than several visits over several decades but I never got to shake his hand. The man was a hero and top notch poet. Where the hell did the heroes go? They all flew away with the Traveling Show.

      John

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    3. When I look at these pictures I'm almost certain I talked to him in the store, but I barely knew who he was. He was just Mr F.

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    4. "A Coney Island of the Mind" changed everything just a little bit for me -- two or three degrees of separation, and the world looked different, chaotic, and made more sense. I'm pretty sure I still have the paperback copy I bought in the mid-60s. I assumed it was a secret between this poet who sometimes wore a funny hat and me, but it became one of the best-selling books of poetry in history. A good poetry book sells ten thousand copies, then gets reprinted for academia. ACIOTM has sold a million copies. But in the desperation of teenage, and now old man nights, Ferlinghetti is still there, quietly singing those old sweet songs.

      John

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    5. I watched this after his death, Peter Coyote's remembrance. "Fix your attention on something, be constant, follow through with it." I absolutely don't speak spirituality and the Buddha, but it still gets me.

      The book is on the way.

      Delete
    6. Thanks Doug, I had not seen that piece. Articulate and resonant.

      John

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  4. I've seen no comments re: your apology at the bottom of the right column. As someone who lives near what's left of tribal land, that apology seems entirely appropriate. The casinos are God's idea of recycling, although the wealthy bastards whose families stole the land in the first place are generally smart enough to stay clear.

    If you wish another signature, feel free, but not obligated, to add mine.

    jtb

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    1. You're the first to notice, and thanks. I read the history, just the briefest recap and it sickened me. It's a gesture, but it's sincere.

      I did some slight research prepping the list; it's every tribe known to have inhabited the turf everywhere I've lived for any length of time, so your list would be different.

      Delete
    2. I noticed, and ALMOST mentioned this, but didn't, because it's unrelated to anyone else : Virginia (the person, not the place) does a Buddhist meditation on Zoom every day. When they introduce themselves, some people, including her, say their name, and instead of their currently-named location, the natively-named territory. She says "This is Vee, I live on occupied Susquehannock territory."

      Delete
    3. I salute that! Reckon some would say it's nuts, but I wanna never not be nuts.

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    4. I dont know how i never noticed but your apology, its beautiful.

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  5. It's nice to hear Mary Lou tinkle the ivories, but it's hard to beat the song of the same title Willie Nelson wrote and sold for $150 or $50 -- Willie doesn't exactly remember. "Night Life" was an expensive payment on Willie's dues.

    And I assume it goes without saying that the Outlaws get the "Country Music Exception".

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=69w7A8qb-SU

    jtb

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    1. A beautiful rendition of a fine song. Of course, Willie plays an amplified acoustic rather than an electric guitar, so it sounds a lot different, and with Willie the notes he forgets to play are part of the song, but BB was the master of the blues instrument, and he found Willie's song on it which is harder than it looks.

      I hadn't heard that version, so thanks.

      John

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    2. Thanks you, man. You rattle my head every day and I love it.

      Delete

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