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Hamburger dream

Since I have nothing much to say today, I'm going to share three of my dreams from last night, courtesy of mugwort pillow. Feel free to diagnose any obvious mental illness you notice.

CRANKY
OLD FART

#259

leftovers
& links

 
Tuesday,
Jan. 5, 2023

① I'm at a Nirvana reunion concert, with Courtney Love sitting in for Kurt Cobain. That could never happen, of course. The drummer is in a snit, maybe about Courtney being there, maybe about something else, and he refuses to go on stage. I don't care, I'm just the janitor, holding a broom backstage, but someone grabs me and makes me play the drums.

I'm not even a big Nirvana fan, and I barely knew who Cobain was until a decade after his death. I sure as heck wouldn't go to a Nirvana concert, or any concert, but damn if I wasn't pretty good on the drums.

② My girlfriend is moving away with me in a few days. Where are we moving? I don't know, but before we go, her friends have told us they're robbing a bank. Me & my girl have lunch at a cafe a few blocks from the bank, then walk past and see cops all around, blue lights flashing. "I hope they're just asking questions, like cops do," says my girlfriend. She walks to the fence to get a closer view, and I wake up.

I don't even know who the girlfriend was. She didn't look at all familiar.

③ I'm the only employee working at a Burger King during a blizzard. It's late at night, nobody's out on the dangerous streets, so there are no customers. I'm pretty sure my boss would understand if I locked ip the place and went home, but as a point of pride I want to keep the restaurant open. Also, I want to make myself a Whopper, so I get a patty cooking, but I can't find any of the buns.

I think this is my subconscious protesting that since I'm eating healthy and all, it's been weeks since I've had a hamburger.

News you need,
whether you know it or not

Stanford scientists warn that civilization as we know it will end in "next few decades" 

Power companies caught paying local news outlets for glowing coverage 

Climate change could cause 'disaster' in the world's oceans, say scientists 

FDA allows abortion pills to be sold at retail pharmacies, say two drugmakers 

In first act in power, Republicans remove metal detectors from House chamber 

Seems stupid to me, but it sure shows the Republicans' priorities. 

A newspaper vanished from the internet. Did someone pay to kill it? 

Jeez, someone with lots of money really wants old rape allegations against Curtis N. Ofori, co-director of Greenhall Capital Partners, removed from the web.

New York cops escort Proud Boys, help them evade subway fares 

A single, moderate dose of psilocybin reduces depressive symptoms for at least two weeks, controlled study finds 

California Dem to be sworn in on first Superman comic book 

Google researcher, long out of math, cracks devilish problem about sets 

Mystery links
Like life itself, there's no
knowing where you're going

click 

click 

click 

Clicks ahoy

Has the United States ever been a democracy? 

Treat my body like vegetable peelings 

A record year of death:
Who were the victims of police violence in the US in 2022?
 

Despite the grim, nearly daily occurrence of murders and homicides by the police, cops continued to kill with impunity, almost never facing criminal charges or significant disciplinary action. Police officers were criminally charged in just ten cases last year, less than 1 percent. 

US military budget remains insane, only more so.

In 2015, the United States spent $585 billion on its military, more than the next 11 countries combined. Since then, the United States withdrew from Afghanistan, ending its longest-running war.

And yet, eight years later, President Biden approved $858 billion in military spending — an increase of about $273 billion. Had military spending kept pace with inflation since 2015, military spending would be below $700 billion. Instead, the military budget is barrelling toward $1 trillion annually.

Microplastics are in your fruits and vegetables.

Keeping track of how corporations screw over their customers 

Despite a rebrand, Charles Koch won’t stop until U.S. democracy is dead.

Remembering the Catholic Church's role in the immolation of Vietnam 

Dude catches baseball, gets rich, complains about it 

• The spooky quest to build a Google Maps for graveyards 

The scientist who discovered sperm was so grossed out he hoped his findings would be repressed.

Star Trek on terrorism and unified Ireland — banned in the UK 

♫♬  Mix tape of my mind  ♫

A Better Place to Be — Harry Chapin 

Darlin' Be Home Soon — The Lovin' Spoonful 

I am the Doctor — Murray Gold 

Money Changes Everything — Cyndi Lauper 

Shenandoah — Kansas 

Wide Open Spaces — The Chicks 

Eventually, everyone
leaves the building

Walter Cunningham 

Lou Mougin 

Edith Pearlman

1/5/2023   

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 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.
 
Special thanks to Becky Jo, Name Withheld, Dave S, Wynn Bruce, and always extra special thanks to my lovely late Stephanie, who gave me 21 years and proved that the world isn't always shitty.

11 comments:

  1. In ingested psilocybin 50 years ago and have rarely been depressed since. Yeah, I know clinical depression is a disorder... I make joke.

    John

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. This is my 17th try, in three different browsers, to post a brief reply to John. Each time, it's auto-deleted by Google.

      This time I'll leave my comment entirely out of my comment, as I suspect it's some mathematical combination of the bits behind the words and letters that's causing Google to shoot me dead.

      Delete
    2. That was weirdly fun, trying and trying to post a comment, and watching Google eat it every time, over the last 45 minutes. I have no resolution, but at least I now know what the problem is. Hooray!

      And now, at long last, here's the comment Google will never allow me to post.

      Delete
  2. The bastards deleted my rather lengthy reply. Fuck them. I mean in the ass. Only those who don't enjoy it.

    John

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Really? Two in a row, on the same thread -- that's aggressive, even for the Google Monster.

      If you send it to me by email, I'll post it as a picture like I did mine. But also I'll understand if you just want to say fuck it.

      Delete
  3. I haven't het read the post, but my dream last night was a new variation on my standard stress dream. Most commonly, I have a test, but can't find the classroom. Or an appointment, but the street geography is wrong and I can't get there.

    Last night was different. As you (Doug) know, my dad is having health issues. In the dream, I got a phone call from my mom. In a very faint voice, I thought she said "Dad is dead," then the call cut out. I try to call over and over, but I can't. The phone dies, or I dial the first 9 numbers right but mis-dial the last number, or I forget how a phone works.

    Shitty dream.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. You know I'm pulling for your pop, so I'll say no more here about that. But jeez, man. Shitty dream, yeah, but one hell of a nightmare.

      Delete
  4. I'm going to test. First : M**ic M***rooms

    ReplyDelete
  5. I dunno, I thought maybe it was a drug reference>

    ReplyDelete
  6. I wish it was something so simple.

    It's been happening, rarely but once in a while, ever since the site launched. It's not triggered by any single word or phrase, but by some irregular combination of text, like my two paragraphs of nonsense yesterday. Google just says, screw it, you can't add that comment.

    You can try posting the same comment under a different byline, in a different browser, from a different internet connection, and it doesn't matter (except once, when it did).

    The only thing that works reliably is to junk the entire comment, and rewrite it from scratch. You can say the same thing, but it has ti be in different words, and that'll be OK with the gods of Google.

    They know about the issue, but don't seem to care. Actually, after farting around with it yesterday, I'll bet I know more about the problem than Google does. But not how to fix it.

    ReplyDelete

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