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Talk talk, chop chop, sizzle sizzle

#152
Sunday,
June 5, 2022

I'm at a coffee shop where a girl who can't be ten years old just came in, alone, ordered a double latte, sat down with her device, and started playing video games.

Everything in the world has changed since I was that kid's age, and not much has been a change for the better. Things are getting worse at a frightful pace, the end of civilization isn't just science fiction any more, and my own death seems less and less frightening. I'm in no hurry for it, but watching this world sometimes the thought of death is a relief.

If that girl lives to be my age, I don't want even a glimpse of the world she'll be living in.

I've moved to Seattle and settled in the city's most boring neighborhood — block after block of houses and nothing but. A bus rolls through twice an hour. The neighbors don't have loud parties or arguments. Nobody screams in Spanish in the night. In two months, I haven't seen a cop car within walking distance of home. Sometimes a horn honks, but other than that it's quiet here.

Some people would love it. I hate it. It's too damned quiet — outside, at least.

Inside it's quiet, too, unless my flatmate Dean is talking at me, but he talks at me whenever he sees me — coming and going from the bathroom, when I check the fridge, when I check the mail, when I leave to go anywhere, and when I come back. He's told me six times about unsalted butter, despite me telling him twice that he's already told me.

A few times he's even knocked on my door, to tell me news I don't care about — another rat caught in another trap, someone left the front door unlocked, can I borrow some of your celery for a stew? After his third knocking interruption, I told him, "Help yourself to my celery any time, but when this door is closed, don't bother me," and he hasn't knocked since. He still talks at me whenever he sees me, though.

Dean loves cooking almost as much as he loves talking, so he's in our kitchen for a few hours every day, chop chop, sizzle sizzle. All his kitchen sounds come through my closed bedroom door like it's open — every sliced carrot and diced onion, every pot stirred, every oven or fridge door opened and closed, every song he hums or sings, every conversation he has with Robert, or sometimes with the cat. (The above list is not all-inclusive.)

His kitchen noises through the door might be pleasant background noise, if it wasn't for his talking at me whenever the door is open. Instead it's a reminder that he's out there. He's always out there, even when he's not out there.

There are two refrigerators in the kitchen, and Dean and I share one of them. This gives him an excellent view of my grocery shopping habits, and he comments on what I've bought: "You really shouldn't buy the pre-bagged cucumbers. You get better quality if you choose them yourselves from the next bin."

"Good to know, man," I said, "but don't be second-guessing my shopping," and he hasn't said anything like that again. See, Dean is not an ass, and not the worst flatmate ever. He's an extreme extrovert, that's all, and I'm the opposite.

He gets on my nerves, but I've lived with far more annoying people than Dean, when I was far younger. Now I'm far older, my patience for people is far shorter, and it's not 'home' if it's shared with someone who's always on my nerves.

I've been thinking about it for a month, and now I've started low-key looking for a better place — a room in a quieter house, in a louder neighborhood. Either that or I'll need to find a way to dispose of Dean's body.


For my birthday, I brought lunch to my Mom at her house. Not mere sandwiches, but genuine Subway® sandwiches, at her insistence. They were more expensive than sandwiches from a non-chain shop, and as usual Subway® got the order wrong. This time it was jalapenos on both our sandwiches, when I'd said no. 

Any time I splurge on fancy sandwiches, I need corn chips on the side, so I stopped at a grocery store for soda and chips, and here's another irritation: All the Fritos® at the store had special Memorial Day packaging. Every bag screamed, "Fritos brand salutes our nation's heroes."

I wanted corn chips, not propaganda. Even if you think all soldiers are heroes, which I absolutely don't, what the hell does it have to do with a sack of corn chips? It's only marketing and advertising, and thus bullshit.

Couldn't find any generic or fake-patriotism-free corn chips, so I bought store-brand cheesy-popcorn instead. It was a dollar less for a bigger bag, just as tasty, and not an insult to my intelligence.


I've recommended the burgers at Smokey's Char-Broiled, and they're still the best burgers in town, but Smokey's cheapest hamburger is $4.50. Mrs Rigby's Diner offers only one simple hamburger, but it's very good, fresh and juicy on a toasted bun, with lettuce, raw onions, pickles, whatever, and it's $3.75.

My first burger at Mrs Rigby's, I ordered it with a plate of egg-fried rice, which was marvelous.

The second time I ordered the same thing, and it was going to become my new standard lunch, but the waitress mis-heard me — she delivered a burger and fries. I'm kinda weary of fries, but not a complainer, so I ate 'em, and squirt me with ketchup, they were the finest french fries ever eaten by this fat man.

For my third lunch at Mrs Rigby's I ordered the burger and fries, and again the burger was very good and the fries were just as spectacular on purpose as they'd been on accident.

Burger, fries, and a bottomless cup of coffee at a diner, for $11.40. That is a 1990s price, thirty years later.

 

And now, the news you need, whether or not you know you need it… 

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Under Merrick Garland, DoJ says subpoenas can be ignored 

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Supreme Court leak investigation heats up as clerks are asked for phone records in unprecedented move 

Calling a reporter and/or sharing internal documents from the Court might be against the Court's employee handbook, but it's not a crime. Investigating it like this, demanding phone records, sounds wildly intrusive of of individual rights, which is exactly what you'd expect from the current troglodyte Supreme Court.

I'm curious what would (will?) happen when one of the employees sues (maybe the leaker, or anyone else who works there — they're all victims of the Court in this) and the ruling eventually reaches the Supreme Court.

Several members of the USSC are well-known for politically-based decisions, and for not recusing themselves when the case hits very close to home. So the decent members of the Court would recuse themselves, and Alito, Roberts, Thomas, Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, and Coney Barrett would rule in favor of the Supreme Court, 6-0.

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Call me cynical. I'm cynical. I laughed out loud when I heard this over the radio, masquerading as news that might matter somehow.  

Biden plans primetime address on gun violence following mass shootings 

That was Thursday, and today's Sunday, so the speech has been delivered. I didn't watch it, didn't listen, didn't read anything about it, because it doesn't matter. Pretending that it matters is delusional.

Correct me if I'm wrong — what's that, you say? It was a brilliant speech, and Biden has convinced the country and the Congress to pass sensible gun-control legislation? Lick my nipples.

Even when homogenized whitebread Democrats like Biden are allegedly "in charge," Republicans own the United States of America, so there will be no meaningful curtailing of the Second Amendment's sacred right to mass murder.

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The original Lincoln memorial stands forgotten in D.C.’s Judiciary Square 

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Uvalde police stop cooperating with investigation into them; footage proves teacher did not leave door open 

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One-word newscast, because it's the same news every time...
copscopscopscopscopscopscopscopscopscopscopscopscopscops
RepublicansRepublicansRepublicansRepublicansRepublicans

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The End
Andrew Fletcher
Ronnie Hawkins
Joe Pignatano

6/5/2022 
 
Cranky Old Fart 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, ye olde AVA, BoingBoing, Breakfast at Ralf's, Captain Hampockets, CaptCreate's Log, John the Basket, LiarTownUSA, Meme City, National Zero, Ran Prieur, Voenix Rising, and anyone else whose work I've stolen without saying thanks.
 
Extra special thanks to Becky Jo, Name Withheld, Dave S, Wynn Bruce, and always Stephanie...


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