Old Friends For Sale

Finally, a good eight years after my divorce, when I threw all my DVDs into four large moving boxes, I've just this month gotten around to converting them to image files...that is, after teaching myself the ins and outs of converting them, as I lamented last month about DVDs no longer being a "thing".

 

Made some really good progress, burned an entire moving box down in the past two weeks. Still have three to go, but overall - not a bad chunk to start.

 

Not everything going as smoothly as I hoped.

 

A few DVDs in my collection came with proprietary viewing software I either couldn't get around, or didn't feel like fighting for it. The Tron 20th Anniversary set was one, came with something called "Inter Active Player", and you had to accept the software loaded on your computer to watch the damn thing. Turns out, this was a brief fad companies flirted with back in the day, when digital media was still in its infancy. Pffftt - NEXT.

 

"The Descent" and the bonus disc for "Herbert West, Re-Animator" both gave me a weird vibe; they seemed to convert just fine, but refused to play. The Herbert West one was particularly strange, because the movie DVD itself ripped and played no hiccups. The bonus/extras disc is fighting me tooth and nail. The same error comes up for The Descent as well, I might just rip them both to straight-up MP4 files and be done with it.

 

The emotional aspect is a different matter entirely.

 

Like my book collection, these DVDs were old friends of mine. John Carpenter's "The Thing" was simply converted from Laserdisc to DVD, and it really shows in the menu formatting of the time. That was the first DVD I ever bought. I remember, before Anchor Bay studios released George Romero's Dawn of the Dead five disc ultimate edition, there was a guy who had ripped a fuzzy VHS copy to DVD in the late 90's, and was hawking it on Ebay for $500 apiece. 

 

He got some takers, too. I was *almost* one of them.

 

My Mystery Science Theater collection got me through a lot of my spinal trauma, as did Monty Python. All my eclectic horror/sci-fi stuff, David Cronenberg's "Rabid", Dark Night of the Scarecrow, Boris Karloff's Thriller series, Ray Bradbury Theater collection, The Abominable Dr. Phibes, The Bowery at Midnight...and let us not forget the King of Monsters. I came close to real tears when I ripped my Godzilla collection to digital. 

 

Getting rid of the physical DVDs almost feels like being divorced all over again, every time I throw another one on the pile. I amassed this collection during my marriage, and each one brings back memories of where we were in our relationship at the time I got them. I feel like, for 20 years of marriage, I should have something more to show for it than my prized Hammer Horror box set.

 

Then again, it could also be that I'm just a rank sentimentalist who puts too much emotional investment in things, and should really move the hell on, like the rest of the world has.

 

I haven't ruled that out.

Brittney Griner's Return

 Welcome Home, Hero

So...the "charge" that Brittney Griner was "smuggling narcotics into Russia" has some interesting aspects that recently came to light.

Russian officials "allegedly" found less than a gram of cannabis oil in her luggage. We'll start there.

 

Right-wing talking points are all over this, that we traded a convicted arms dealer known as "The Merchant of Death,” for a Black lesbian drug smuggler.

 

"Less than a gram". They didn't, you'll note, specify HOW MUCH LESS they found, or what the total amount actually was. Griner was actually a card-carrying recipient of medical Marijuana, not a needle-to-the-vein heroin addict she's portrayed as in Right-wing media. The circumstances for which she had LESS THAN A GRAM could be anything; residue from a bag that once carried it, a loose leaf from a plant (which, it should be noted, does NOT contain THC, the active ingredient in Cannabis), or simply a forgotten leftover roach in a zipper compartment mixed in with her tampons. 

 

"Less than a gram", to me, says she wasn't attempting to smuggle ANYTHING in, because less than a gram wouldn't get a fly high.

That the arrest came just a week before Russia invaded Ukraine shouldn't be overlooked.

 

Then there's what I'm calling "The Paul Whelan Syndrome".

Paul Whelan is being touted as some kind of war hero, unfairly detained in Russia as a spy, working for the Pentagon.

 

Nah, son.

 

Whelan was a dishonorably discharged Marine, who never served overseas. The circumstances of his arrest, like Griner's, appear sketchy - he was given a hard drive at a friend's wedding in Russia, whom he assumed contained wedding photos. Apparently (according to Whelan), he was set up in a sting operation, and the drive contained state secrets. Maybe true, maybe not, again - one must consider the source.

 

Russia contends that a spy isn't on the table, and that's why only Griner was released. President Biden had been attempting to secure the release of both Griner and Whelan in one move, and Russian authorities REFUSED to include Whelan in any trade. 

 

We must also take into account that Russian operatives work to sow division in the U.S., and permitting Biden to win the freedom of a Black married lesbian while keeping a white former Marine in prison is the sort of ploy that could turn the repatriation of an American into a cultural flashpoint. I've seen this tactic up close the past year, during the Ukraine war. Several people I know are posting "Don't believe the anti-Russian rhetoric!" rants, willing to completely ignore Russians raping Ukrainian citizens and posting it on Tik Tok, or that Russia STARTED the fucking thing in the first place. 

 

The Russian propaganda machine has its hooks in American culture, and we're swallowing it without gagging for an instant.

 

In an impressive display of intelligence and unity, both the Griner and Whelan families avoided that trap and kept a united front.

 

Former president Trump...

 

You just KNOW what I'm going to say here, don't you? Really, we all do, for it is the only thing he EVER says, and it's always the same, sad song.

 

Here we go;

 

Trump immediately posted rants about “a ‘stupid’ and unpatriotic embarrassment for the USA!!!” that had secured the release of “a basketball player who openly hates our Country” (Griner kneeled at some games, always a flashpoint for Right-wingers and their canned patriotism), instead of “former Marine Paul Whelan,” who “would have been let out for the asking.” 

 

I said it in an earlier post, and I'll say it now: If Trump could have gotten Whelan out - and let us remember, Whelan was arrested ON TRUMP'S WATCH - why didn't he?

 

After all...he DID manage to release 5,000 Taliban soldiers. Just, you know, in case anyone's counting.

 

In typical MAGA/Republican fashion, the Right-wingnuts (I'm going to start calling them that from now on - the shoe fits) are all enraged that a Black lesbian was freed, and a White, straight male is still in prison, facts be damned.

 

Personally, I'm looking forward to seeing Brittney step off that plane and embrace her wife. I hope they televise it worldwide.

 

This isn't a win for Russia.

 

This is a win for everyone who has ever been unjustly accused, tried and convicted without any hope of humanity or compassion. 

 

This one is for everybody in America, not just the White people.

The Last Days of the Hurricane Cafe

Let me tell you about the twilight of Old Seattle.

 

 

Over the past 25 years, Downtown Seattle has been slowly undergoing a sneaky gentrification, millionaire construction companies and billionaire tax evaders buying up every available parking lot within spitting distance of Pike Place Market to make the city their personal playground. 

 

Dozens of new condominiums popped up within 10 years, and Jeff Bezos, the once-proud son of Seattle who rose from dot-com obscurity to mega billionaire and sodomizer of the Seattle working class, yanked most of Denny square out from under the bohemian mom-and-pops' joints that stood against the ever-growing tide of late-night tourists, drunk college kids, snotty epicurians and the underground music scene.

 

And the Hurricane Cafe was both at and in the heart of it all.

 

The Hurricane was one of Seattle's original greasy spoons, open 24 hours, non-franchised, and unapologetic of its reputation being either a dive bar that served good food in Godzilla-sized portions, or a Denny's wannabe that served alcohol with a 20 egg omelette. The prices were about dollar more than places like Denny's or Shari's, but the portions were twice as big, and while the food was a caloric and cholesterol nightmare, it was always fast, delicious, and in your fat fucking face. Most breakfast dishes came with bottomless hash browns, something every barfly and fraternity boozer thanked God for more than a few times at 2:30 am on a Saturday.

 

The Restaurant itself was something out of an 80's trucker movie, booths with questionable stains on the walls, stabs on the upholstery that duct tape barely held together, a creepy line of Mr. Potato Heads along an overhead shelf, passing judgement on your meal selections with impassive stares, pinball machines, weird decor, and the occasional time traveler in a dark corner booth, drinking it all in with a mysterious smile.

 

I always wondered what that bastard knew that I didn't. 

 

The Hurricane had a following, more than that, it had a loyalty. It had PARKING, that golden commodity more valued than diamonds in downtown Seattle.

 

I ate here many, many a night, and I say that with the pride of someone awaiting a long-overdue heart attack - no regrets. During the day, The Hurricane truly was a tourist spot for lunch, safe for kids and family, a great place to fill up without going broke in downtown, while hemorrhaging your savings at every knick-knack shop in Pike Place Market. Most of the more colorful crowd didn't start oozing in until 9pm, and you could grab an afternoon bite or some take out for the drive home after work in under 10 minutes, no worries.

 

But when the sun went down...

 

As the song goes - the freaks come out at night.

 

Between working all-nighters at whatever graphics and print shop I was currently pretending to work at while siphoning a paycheck from computer illiterate bosses, late-night Kung Fu classes or just roaming the streets with the other Vampires and nightwalkers, The Hurricane was always the spot to end the night on. Denny Park hookers between tricks, some bikers at the bar that looked like they hadn't seen water or soap in a month, an overworked Amazon employee typing furiously on a laptop between shoveling ketchup-soaked fries in his gob, me and some of my hooligans looking for a fight, a pimply-faced kid on a nervous date, trying not to let his girlfriend catch him glancing at the Denny Park hooker's ass.

 

Once, four of us tried to take on an 18 egg omelette with bottomless hash browns - we suffered a humiliating defeat, our heads hung in shame, farting uncontrollably in a corner booth. "This will be the death of us", said Tokie, the stoner of the group. "YOU'RE the one who demanded the omelette", I replied, trying my damnedest to stifle another rectal announcement, demanding passage through my already tortured sphincter, "next time, leave me to my fucking chicken tenders in peace."

 

The others simply groaned to themselves, praying for the sweet release of death, wondering which end of us would explode first.

 

Good times, good times.

 

Around 2003, places like the Hurricane started disappearing. You didn't notice it at first, Seattle is always evolving, and one place you liked to eat/shop/hang at would be gone, another would pop up to take its place just around the corner.

 

Except, this time, instead of a cool new club or a hot spot for sneakers...it was a cold, soulless condominium. And then another. 

 

And another.

 

By 2013, every construction crane in the Pacific Northwest was in downtown Seattle, at once. They were demolishing, paving and building faster than even the locals could keep up with, and driving through downtown itself was worse than a rat navigating an endless maze with no cheese. Never-ending traffic jams, detour after detour, construction crews monopolizing every fast food joint and coffee house for blocks on end, and the acrid smell of "progress" filling your nostrils every time you took a damn breath.

 

The Hurricane Cafe finally breathed its last in late 2014, and they started tearing it apart in the Spring of 2015. I took this photo from the top of one of the newly constructed condos, at which I was the concierge, and I admit to a few tears being shed watching it happen.

 

A lot of places like The Hurricane simply disappeared with the coming of the dot com children. Casa You Betcha seemed to vanish overnight, B&O Espresso was gone faster than a bowl of Percocet at a tweaker party, almost nothing of the alternative culture that was Broadway remains. 

 

There's a few relics of Old Seattle still standing; The Crocodile is still around, although even they had to move to another spot. The 13 Coins is still standing strong. Shorty's Pinball in Belltown, The Five Points Cafe', and their sister act, the Sit-N-Spin are still holding it down. Dick's Drive-In, holding fast.

 

But there's really nothing left of what made Seattle so great in the 90's. The old style has given way to the new, and the great Pacific Northwest melting pot has become a soggy, bland, vegan casserole.

 

...no fries.

It Isn't Over

 Every morning, I wake up and I say; "Why did I have to be born in the stupid country...?"

This is the problem, this bit, right here; "I'll never forget what the DEMOCRATS did".

When people ask me why I've become so militant, why won't I "reach across the aisle", why won't I sit at the table, I point to this: these people exist, in large groups, propagating their insanity. You can;t reason with someone who didn't use reason to arrive at their conclusions in the first place.

This whiny, temper-tantrum bleating about suffering the consequences of a virus the Right decided, from the very beginning, to ignore, deny, and then ridicule and abuse everyone who took it seriously.

People died on hospital waiting room floors because Republicans screamed that their rights were being trampled. Children died waiting for ventilators that never came, because rich assholes like Herman Cain usurped them, in their final moments. Thousands of hospital staff worldwide collapsed from exhaustion, while begging relatives of those infected to please, please, use some goddamned common sense.

And still, they didn't listen. They WOULDN'T listen.

I personally lost more than a dozen friends to Covid, and many, many more were infected, lived, and are now suffering from Long Covid.

And because the conspiracy cult that is the Republican party today demanded that they be allowed to cough on anyone they pleased, people lost their jobs. Schools closed, businesses closed, many never to reopen again.

This forced a new paradigm on America, that only a select few of us truly understood: our old way of life is gone, and we must now learn to live in this new age of the death microbe.

But still, to this day (and presumably, for decades into the future - Republicans are nothing, if not consistent in stupidity) they not only deny it really exists (plandemic) , but that it's the Democrats fault for the aftermath.

The Fuck Around group has begun to Find the Fuck Out - and the taste isn't to their liking.

After the incalculable loss to not only America, but the entire world, I can only say this:

Cry me a river, you sons of bitches.

Cry me a fucking ocean, for all of me.

The pandemic isn't over, not by a long shot - and for the first time since the inception, Whites are now exceeding the infection rate of all other ethnic groups. So the predominately White Conservative party (excluding a few Uncle Toms still trying to carry water for the White hierarchy), are beginning to feel the hammer they thought only the other nails would get.

I've been criticized, chastised, scorned and excluded for pointing this out to the more "idealist" of my fellows, and to them, I can only say this: It isn't over. And what's coming next will be an experiment in death-by-stupidity.

Because if there's one thing I've discovered, it's that the more the Right suffers from shooting itself in the dick, the louder they cry that it's the Left's fault.

And while we're doing everything we can just to stay afloat in this sea of Right-wing bullshit, they'll do their level best to take us down with them. Just watch and see if they don't.

It isn't over.

Uptown Girl

 "Look! A Black guy!"

Kelly Loeffler is a good example of what happens when you take the King's shilling, and probably sets the record for one of the shortest terms ever served (one year) that didn't end in assassination.

...not that Trump probably didn't throw that on the table, at some point.

When it came down to her and Reverend Raphael Warnock in the home stretch, Loeffler showed serious feet of clay when Trump grabbed her by the pussy and demanded she join him in challenging the Georgia election results - her recently released emails show she tried to walk a line between reality and Trump’s supporters.

Reality eventually lost...and so did she. (I've been waiting a year to make that joke.)

When Ted "Making a Run to Cancun" Cruz pressured Loeffler to sign a letter challenging Biden’s victory and calling for election audits, Loeffler’s aide warned her, “you can’t afford not to be on it.”

'Ya gotta wonder what school these "aides" are coming from, with advice like that.

She didn’t sign it, but when Trump threatened to abandon her, she publicly supported challenging the election results in exchange for his appearance at a rally. She actually asked aides to make sure Trump retweeted her statement “so I don’t get booed off the stage!”

And she lost anyways.

This is one of dozens of examples coming to light, of how easily people who, already loyal Nazis, can get sucked into the vortex of absolute crazy to win the vox populi. Sometimes, you're just so happy someone asked you to the prom, you don't stop to think whose hands are gonna be digging around in your pants when the lights go out.

Right now, Loeffler is sitting in her million dollar gazebo, getting railed from behind by Juan, the Mexican poolboy she adopted after deporting his family, wondering what the hell just happened - and how did that Black guy from public housing beat her all-American White girl image..

And she probably regrets that presidential blowjob more than Monica Lewinsky.

Tai Tai no Sen

 Musashi v The Supreme Court

 

I don't have a terribly deep reserve for humanity at the moment, but for everyone so comfortable on that fence, because; "At least it's not ME in the barrel" - listen up.

 

IT WILL NOT STOP HERE.

 

In the martial arts, this is what we call "Attack Momentum", once the attacker has gained forward momentum, and has you stepping backwards, your chances of recovery dwindle exponentially by the second.

 

Because, at that point, you're no longer a combatant.

 

You're a pedestrian.

 

But there's one moment, right at the start, called "Tai Tai no Sen", from Miyamoto Musashi's Book of Five Rings: 

 

Taking the initiative at the initiative. Circumventing an ambush or sudden attack from the enemy by taking the initiative and attacking in full force, as they have begun to move. In simplistic terms; "They begin to move, you have already finished".

 

This strategy is the most difficult to achieve, because it requires immediate, unwavering commitment to fight, without hesitation or uncertainty. They move to attack, you've already finished before they get even halfway there.

 

So, those with the wisdom to hear - understand this.

 

This is the onset of the attack, and it will not stop here.

 

They will come after Griswold (the right to birth control), absolutely, and probably Obergefell after that (if not right along with it), and allow states to deny queer people the right to marry. 

 

Then Lawrence, so they can imprison the queer people for allegedly having queer sex with each other.

 

They will uphold a state right to deny trans people the same hormones and puberty blockers that cis people need and use. 

 

The state will decide what medicine you can take.

 

When Lawrence is overturned and gay sex is illegal? They'll have a neat little list of queers to go after, right there in the marriage license records. Queers with no legal defense.

 

Because once you dehumanize a group, killing them isn't a moral outrage - it's pest control. 

 

Maybe you've heard of Lawrence v. Texas, the 2003 Supreme Court case that declared anti-sodomy laws unconstitutional? 

 

What a lot of you people fail to realize is that the Texas penal code STILL defines oral and anal sex as "deviate sexual intercourse". They just need an outlet to get the party started. And remember, this is the same state that has proposed bounties on the heads of women seeking or having gotten an abortion, doctors who perform them, and anyone who aids them along the way.

 

And all the children Gay couples have adopted, that Conservatives claim to be oh-so concerned about, will get shipped off to the nearest religious kiddie fuck-farm, currently labeled as "Children's Homes".

 

And once they get that far forward, it won't be long. You think "Whites Only" signs are alarmist, they'll never go THAT far.

 

They've already declared that to be their intention. 

 

They will indeed "go that far". They've blatantly stated as much. Interracial marriage? They threw that on the table three weeks ago. 

 

They'll gut environmental protections and try to defang any governmental regulation that some corporation might object to.

 

And then, we won't have a livable planet much longer. Not that it's in great shape anyway, if you've been paying attention the past several years, or tried to go boating in Lake Mead recently. 

 

I'm not interested in the "Hillary tried to warn us" mantra - we dropped the ball, and let them walk all over the carpet with dogshit on their shoes. Finger pointing right now is only a distraction.

 

The best time to fix all this was in the past. 

 

The next best time is now.

 

Right Fucking Now.

 

We don't avoid those things by refusing to fight. They're still going to try to make all that happen. Republicans have already tilted the electoral maps, voter suppression policies, legal challenges and whatever coup plans they have, and they're going to use them anyway even if the Democrats did absolutely nothing.

 

But just like in 2016 and 2020, the more we turn out, the more we mitigate their evil. But it has to be now, at the single initiative. If they get the next step, it will be twice as hard for us to fight back.

 

The midterms are Tuesday, Nov. 8, 2022. All 435 U.S. House seats and 34 of the 100 Senate seats are on the ballot.

 

It's not theirs yet. 

 

But we have to do it together.

 

If you think Rome wasn't built in a day, ask a historian when it fell.

 

*********************************************

 

“The body of a rock is the state of an unmoving mind. When you have mastered this way of strategy you can suddenly make your body like a rock, and ten thousand things cannot touch you.

 

You will not be moved."

 

Miyamoto Musashi, 

 

The Book of Five Rings

The Embers of Hate

 

I don't miss it at all.

The rage tweets.

The calls for violence against any and every one within finger-pointing distance. The overwhelming racism and "othering" of any ethnicity, for daring to want to be treated equally as Whites.

The dick-in-hand Nazis, wearing their red hats they got in exchange for a sheet hood, carrying their swastikas and tiki torches, armed like they're defending Stalingrad against the final push, with the sly winks and silent support of the police.

The unchecked corruption and pillage of American resources, funneled into private offshore accounts, the open door policy for any Russian despot to pilfer the country's secrets.

The pants-shitting level of anxiety and national paranoia, escalated every day, sometimes every hour, to new heights of insanity.

And the "centrists" (so-called), sitting comfortably by, offering color commentary from their conservative strongholds, while their Black/Asian/Latino neighbor cowers behind locked doors, for fear of being black-bagged and deported to a country they weren't born in, while their children are raped and sold off to White families, simply for "looking that way".

I lost so many people I thought of as friends, because of this. Many of them revealed as aspect of themselves that dumbfounded me, even today.

The hatred. The willful ignorance, the joyous embrace of a man they believed to be the second coming of the Christ. And when that man fell, as all men do, they screamed and rent their garments, they fell to their knees and cried out; "O Lord, why hast thou forsaken us, your chosen race?"

Even today, these same people skulk and mutter to themselves, casting side glances at people like me, expecting the retaliation they surely would have dealt, if the jackboot was on the other foot. The disbelief on their faces etched like granite, the hollow stare of an apostle discovering he's been following a lemming all this time, and they've just gone over the cliff.

They hate me for the future I represent. They hate themselves for what they now know they'll never be.

I don't miss it at all.