Be Nice
MAGA?
How about doing this instead of hocking your goddamn red hats during a natural disaster?
Build new infrastructure to ameliorate the effects of huge storms and repair the rest of the existing, crumbling national infrastructure (transport, water, power), invest enormously in renewable energies and local power, move quickly beyond the targets set in the Paris accord, reduce military spending, institute a single-payer healthcare system, perhaps a move to universal basic income, provide 5 weeks annual paid leave as mandatory, provide free universal antenatal care and contraceptive advice for all women, provide cheap public transport, paid maternal and paternal leave…just a few ideas to help MAGA. Easily affordable—just up the taxes on the mega rich a bit, close a few loopholes, introduce the 0.01% financial transaction tax and regulate the fucking banking industry. There you are, fixed it and actually made America great again.
Sigh. A boy can dream—and take some solace in knowing these things are probably already happening in a parallel universe somewhere…
Quote of the Day
That man is so stupid if he threw himself on the ground he would miss." ~ Helen, on the idiot occupying the Oval Office
Memories of San Francisco
Hogg & Mythen Architects, Part Three
REBUILDING
We found a new home for the office about a half mile southeast of our old location. It wasn't the one of the several we looked at South of Market that I liked the best, but then, it wasn't my firm. It was another older building—albeit one that passed its earthquake inspection, was entirely wood frame, and for the rent offered an incredible amount of space (we occupied the entire upper floor). It was kind of a lofty space, although not really a loft as strictly defined, even though the entire rear half the office had a structurally-exposed two story ceiling. We eventually added a bunch of color to the space—as well as painting the front door a bright canary yellow on which we overlaid the company logo in black. We also put up track lights (it was the 90s, after all) and bolted the shelving units to the wall. Lesson learned.
Our workload swelled—and then crashed—as the years passed following the move. After the infamous Black Wednesday of 1992, things got so bad Nick and Jack were forced with either laying us all off or asking that we voluntarily go to four day weeks. Since they had done so much for both Neill and I over the years and neither one of us particularly wanted to look for work in that kind of economy, the decision was a no-brainer. When everything snapped back, not only did our workload necessitate the hiring of two more drafters, but it also resulted in raises and bonuses, the likes of which we hadn't ever seen. Neill and I even convinced the bosses that in addition to the already paid vacation and holidays, to stay competitive they also needed to provide health insurance. Done and done.
To say that we were like a family was an understatement. When the owners exchanged words, Neill and I would retreat to the kitchen, whispering to each other that it was like when our biological parents fought.
CELEBRATIONS
We always did something special for the holidays. The first year I worked for H&M, it was a ferry ride across the bay to Sausalito for lunch. The second year was much more exciting, and not necessarily in a good way. Nick decided that we needed to go fishing on the bay. He contacted a longtime friend with a boat and off we went—during some of the worst weather we'd ever seen in December.
As I wrote in those infamous Journals (and amended some time later):
Today we went out on San Pablo Bay to go fishing in lieu of having a regular Christmas Lunch. It was interesting, but not something I think I'd jump at again. I'm still very uncomfortable on small boats, and even though the water is supposedly only about thirty feet deep where we were, it was murky enough to make me uneasy.
The weather today was awful. It was bitterly cold, windy and raining. The bay calmed down for about an hour, but heading back to the marina (in Richmond), it was very choppy. Neill caught a 40 lb. sturgeon and we all ended up with sturgeon steaks. I threw mine out upon returning home (I wasn't going to eat anything that came out of that bay), and after seeing Nick bludgeon the poor thing to death on the dock, it caused Neil to become a vegetarian.
Subsequent holiday lunches were either spent in The City or down the coast, anywhere from Pacifica to Santa Cruz. One memorable lunch was had at The Shore Bird in Half Moon Bay—where I had the most delicious halibut I have ever eaten. Sadly, the restaurant has long since closed. Another year we drove down to Capitola for dinner at a Shadowbrook, a restaurant that you entered via a small tramway. (Nick got very drunk that night and while I was designated driver and responsible for driving us back to The City, it was Nick's minivan and we had to listen to the soundtrack from Twin Peaks on endless repeat all the way home.)
(to be continued)
Memories of San Francisco
Hogg & Mythen Architects, Part Two
WILD WEST COMPUTING
About six months into my employment at H&M, one morning I arrived at work to find a brand new IBM XT PC sitting on that fold-out conference room desk. Okay, it wasn't a real IBM; it was a no-name locally-grown clone, but still…it was 1987 and this was a personal computer! It sat there for several days until I asked, "Is anyone going to do anything with that?"
Nick replied, "We were hoping you'd ask. It's all yours."
And so began my descent into the madness that would lead me to my current career.
Bernie (my ex, with whom I was sharing that flat with) was working as a legal secretary/assistant/word processor and had more experience with personal computers than I had. (To this point my only exposure had been with a Commodore VIC-20 about five years earlier.) I told him what had been loaded on the machine: DOS 3.1, Wordstar and some database program whose name eludes me. I'd started teaching myself Wordstar when Bernie said, "Fuck that. You need WordPerfect, and promptly supplied me with a set of 4.2 installation disks.
He was right. WordPerfect was much more intuitive and allowed me the opportunity to start creating fifteen years of obsessive, self-absorbed Journals that are at this point cringe-worthy reading.
Prior to moving to San Francisco, I had worked for a firm in Tucson that was on the verge of converting to AutoCAD. They brought Autodesk in to demo their product, and even then in the prehistoric days of 8088 processors and CGA displays, I knew this was the direction architecture was headed. Unfortunately converting the entire office was so cost-prohibitive (not to mention the initial loss of productivity that was expected) the project was shelved. But that spark of "the future" had taken hold in my imagination, and when the opportunity to obtain a copy of the program presented itself to me in San Francisco, I jumped on it.
Two roadblocks stood in the way of converting H&M to this new way of doing things: (1) I had to gain enough expertise with the program that my productivity wouldn't be measurably impacted and (2) sell the whole concept to the bosses.
By this time I'd gotten my own PC at home, so teaching myself AutoCAD consumed me. Prior to this you would find me at the beach most every weekend (weather permitting) and sometimes even after work. That—and my meticulously curated tan flew out the window thereafter.
(As an aside, one of the things I most loved about this firm was on the first sunny day after a long, wet winter, Nick would often just close the office and say, "Go to the beach! Enjoy the weather!")
All that came crashing down once I welcomed the electronic demon into my home. I was literally moving objects in my dreams by calling out cartesian coordinates—that's how thoroughly and completely AutoCAD had consumed my consciousness.
But it paid off. After I felt comfortable enough putting my own set of architectural floor plans together, I suggested to Nick that on our next project we try it live. If it works, great. If not, then we continue drafting the old fashioned way.
He went for it—and many more instances of pushing the envelope—allowing me a degree of freedom to learn and explore that has been unmatched in any position I've held since.
The office's original XT class computer had only a monochrome "Hercules" display. It was unbelievably crisp, but differentiating layers in AutoCAD was difficult and time consuming. I convinced them to buy a color monitor to make life a bit easier and offset the amount of money we were wasting on plots that didn't come out looking the way they should because items weren't on the correct layers. It wasn't a high-res setup, but the colors at least cut down on the errors.
As time passed, the four of us settled into certain roles. Jack was the one who brought in the work, Nick managed the projects, the office, and the accounting. Neill became the de facto firm designer (he avoided doing CAD for years), and I was the guy who created all the production drawings. Life was good.
As the years went by, my knowledge and expertise increased. DOS gave way to Windows. AutoCAD and Wordperfect were purchased and regularly upgraded. We finally gave up on WordPerfect altogether after their initial foray into Windows crashed and burned spectacularly, forcing our hand to MS Word. I also somehow managed to teach myself Excel during this transition, something that's paid off many times over the years. After spending hundreds of dollars to have our drawings printed at the local blueprint shop, we bought our own plotter. The original XT-class PC was replaced by a 286, then a 386, and by the time I left in 1995, a 486 machine. It was augmented by three others, eventually being crudely networked thanks to Windows for Workgroups.
EARTHQUAKE
On 17 October 1989 I left work about fifteen minutes early. I don't remember why; only that I did. I was about three blocks from home, walking down 12th Street, when I rubbed one of my eyes and the contact lens rode up onto the top of my eyeball. As I was struggling to get it repositioned, the ground started shaking. "That's odd," I thought. And then I realized what was happening.
As my contact lens finally made it down to where it was supposed to be, the shaking continued, and I looked up to see the cantilevered billboard at the corner of 12th & South Van Ness wobbling vertically. I heard glass breaking and people screaming. The shaking stopped. A few errant car alarms could be heard wailing.
I arrived home to find my then-roommate Frank, mopping up water from the fish tank that had sloshed onto the floor. That—and the fact we were without power for several days afterward—was the extent of the damage we suffered.
The same could not be said for the H&M office at 2nd & Mission, however. Nick (who was the only one in the office at the time) related that when the shaking started, the shelves (which had not been secured to the wall) began to fall and he sprinted for the exit.
The building was red-flagged.
If I'd left work at my usual time, I would've been on the underground when it hit.
Like a lot of places in the aftermath of Loma Prieta, the office was closed for an extended period as the Bay Area dug itself out. But Jack and Nick—being the type of folks they were—continued to pay us as the search for new office space began.
(to be continued)
Memories of San Francisco
An old coworker/friend from my days in San Francisco whom I haven't heard from in ages in popped into a dream this morning. Seeing Neill again after all these years left me with such a wonderfully warm feeling—as if to remind me that the world hasn't always been the shit storm we currently find ourselves in—that I decided it was way past time to start jotting down memories of my time in The City before they slip away completely.
(Even now I must publish this caveat: they may or may not be a hundred percent accurate; such is the nature of the human mind and while I can go back and read my journals from the period, I only started writing them in 1987 and I didn't record everything.)
Hogg & Mythen Architects, Part One
When I first moved to San Francisco thirty one years ago this month, employment was not immediately forthcoming. I didn't expect to just walk into a job, but I had a desirable skill set, and knew it would just be a matter of time before I got settled.
After about a month, a landed a job working as an architectural drafter in a small firm in Japantown. The only downside to this was that I was working as an independent contractor, i.e. paying all my own taxes and had no benefits whatsoever. It didn't take me long to realize the office was filled with "independent contractors," all of whom had the classification but none of the perks of actually being independent. We were expected to work in the office with fixed hours and all the tools we needed to perform our tasks were supplied by the owner of the firm. And did I mention there wasn't ever any sort of contract for services signed by either party?
The owner was in the midst of renovating a three unit Victorian about two blocks from the office and my second partner and I (we'd moved to SF together after splitting up, go figure) ended up renting the bottom unit. That is another story for a different post.
Anyhow, as the months dragged on, I was becoming increasingly disenchanted with this employment arrangement, especially how I saw how we were all being taken advantage of. I brought up my concerns with the grizzled old bitch of an accountant who came into the office periodically (another "independent" contractor, no doubt), and I was told in no uncertain terms, "Everything we are doing is perfectly legal."
By the time January rolled around, I'd had enough. I sent out resumes to every San Francisco architectural firm listed in the phone book. A few days later I received a call asking me to come in for an interview.
Hogg & Mythen Architects was located on the third floor of a building on the southeast corner of Mission & 2nd Street downtown that had obviously seen better days. As I entered the rickety elevator and reached the third floor, greeted by a locked gate that cordoned off the lobby from the offices, I seriously thought about just turning around and leaving.
But I didn't.
I rang the bell, and was greeted by Nick, one of the owners. He showed me into the long, narrow office space and told me to take a seat at the fold-up conference table nestled up against a wall of bookshelves containing product catalogs and reference materials. A few moments later, Jack—the other owner—joined us and we started talking. The interview went on for over an hour. I showed the examples of my work, went over my background, and asked about the type of work they specialized in and what they were willing to pay. Despite the rather dank environment, everything sounded great and I liked these guys. It was an easy commute via a single bus line and as I left I really hoped I'd get a call from them.
By the time I'd arrived back home, there was already a message waiting on the answering machine. "We like you and would like for you to come work for us."
And so what was to become an almost decade-long relationship began.
I started work at H&M the following Monday, giving my current employer next-to-no notice (after all, I was an independent contractor) and shortly thereafter turned the bastard into the IRS. They nailed him to the wall. He ended up having to pay back taxes on all his "contractors" and I didn't owe a penny that year.
I was not H&M's only employee. They had one other drafter, a guy named Neill who had been on vacation when I'd interviewed with them. We met about a week into my employment. He was a tall, lanky ginger lad who had dual US/UK citizenship and had recently graduated from UC Berkeley. We hit it off immediately, but we really didn't bond until one day we were out measuring a building and he said something about cocksuckers. Without missing a beat, I replied, "Hey, some of my best friends are cocksuckers!" and he replied, "So are some of mine!" And that was the moment I came out to him.
Neill wasn't gay, but being a resident of San Francisco, he was still a staunch ally. While we butted heads on several occasions, to this day I still have nothing but affection for Neill and my only regret is that over the years we've lost touch with each other. He successfully got his architectural license the last year we worked together, and as I understand it has long since moved to the UK, gotten married, and now has kids of his own.
(to be continued)
Monday
At least it's pay week…
Fun Animal Observations from a Zoo Docent
1. There are several ways to classify the large cats, one of the more useful ones is into the roaring cats (tigers, lions) and the purring cats (bobcats, lynxes). The puma (also known as the mountain lion) is the largest cat that purrs. I've heard it up close, it's amazing. A cheetah's purr sounds like an idling motorcycle engine.
2. Kangaroos cannot move their legs independently of each other, they have to move them in sync – when they're on land. When they're swimming, they can move them separately. Hopping is their most efficient way to move – a walking kangaroo is awkward as hell. They swing both legs forward using their tail as a third leg to prop up while their legs swing.
3. People often think that flamingoes' knees bend the wrong way. They don't – the joint you're seeing in the middle of their leg isn't their knee, it's their ankle. Their knee is up by their body, and it bends the same way ours does.
4. Giraffes only sleep 1-2 hours a day.
5. Bald eagles' vocalizations are not what you expect. When you see a flying bald eagle in the movies and hear that majestic caw sound? That isn't an eagle, it's been dubbed over with another bird, usually a red-tailed hawk. Bald eagles actually sound…not majestic. Kind of like if a kitten could be a bird.
6. Elephants are one of only a handful of animals that can pass the mirror test – in other words, they can recognize their own reflection (and not think it's another animal, as dogs and cats usually do). They tested this by placing a chalk mark on an elephant's forehead and then showing it a mirror. The elephant investigated the mark on its own forehead, indicating it knew that it was looking at itself. The only animals that pass this test are the higher primates, the higher cetaceans (orcas, dolphines), elephants, and weirdly, magpies.
7. One-fifth of all the known mammal species are bats.
8. A kangaroo mother can have three joeys simultaneously at different stages of development: an embryo in her womb (kangaroos can do what's called embryonic diapause which means sort of putting the development on pause until she's ready for it to develop further), a joey in her pouch attached to one nipple, and a joey out of the pouch on the ground who nurses from the other one. The amazing thing? Each of her nipples make different formulations of milk for each joey's different nutritional needs.
9. Bonobos, our closest genetic relative (they are more closely related to us than they are to either chimps or gorillas) are almost entirely non-aggressive, matriarchal, and use sex to solve all their problems. They engage in both same and opposite sex interactions, non-penetrative sex (oral, rubbing, manual) and with any age. That's an interesting area to work in, lemme tell you.
10. Tortoises have super loud sex. Like, really loud.
11. All grizzlies are brown bears, but not all brown bears are grizzlies (grizzlies are a sub-categorization of the brown bear).
12. Reindeer are the only deer species where both males and females grow antlers. The males shed theirs the beginning of December, the females shed theirs in the spring. So all of Santa's reindeer are girls, heh. I love telling little kids that.
13. If a rhinoceros knocks off its horn, it grows back faster than you'd expect. One of ours, Rosie, has knocked hers off twice.
14. Gorillas get crushes on each other. And on the humans that take care of them. Male gorillas also masturbate. I don't know if the females do, I've never seen it. Sometimes it's like a soap opera up in there.
15. Langur monkeys are silvery-gray in color – their babies are bright orange. Like Cheeto orange, I do not exaggerate.
16. Polar bear fur is not white, it's transparent, like fiber optics. Also, their skin is black.
A Certain Aesthetic
UNF! (NSFW)
Friday
Dreaming of Snow
The other night I dreamt it started snowing and it was wonderful. I know, strange statement coming from a guy who had come to detest the white stuff by the time we left Denver. But this dream was…different. I wasn't in Denver; I was in Phoenix. Now, snow in Phoenix isn't unheard of, but it's extremely rare and seldom lasts more than a few hours after dusting the ground. It's so rare in fact, that I had a very hard time finding any decent photos to illustrate it.
In this dream I was coming out of a Trader Joe's…or a Sprouts…or a Whole Foods…or some other hipster-addled grocery store where people buy ready-to-eat artisanal, cruelty-free organically-grown, non-GMO gluten-free potstickers and during the time I'd been in the store (picking the last of the good orange cherry tomatoes individually out of a bin), the skies had clouded over and temperature had dropped precipitously. It felt like snow weather. The clouds were hanging—to quote a line from Rocky Horror—dark and pendulous. The ground was already turning white as the flakes began falling.
I wasn't concerned. I knew it wouldn't be like a Denver storm where I might have trouble getting home, and the sheer joy I felt at the cold temperature made me realize on some level I actually missed that kind of weather.
We're now in our third summer back in Phoenix; a milestone that I've always marked as being fully acclimated to a climate—especially one as brutal as Phoenix. It's marks the point that you can relax and take solace in knowing the ridiculously hot days won't last forever; that in just a few short months cold water will actually start coming out of the cold water tap again and you might even have to wear a hoodie when you go out.
Come to think of it, the whole thing might just have been fever-induced as I was coming down sick—something akin to a (reverse) plot line from that old Twilight Zone episode The Midnight Sun…
Not Everything Is Lost
Via Wil Wheaton:
After learning my flight was detained 4 hours,
I heard the announcement:
If anyone in the vicinity of gate 4-A understands any Arabic,
Please come to the gate immediately.
Well—one pauses these days. Gate 4-A was my own gate. I went there.
An older woman in full traditional Palestinian dress,
Just like my grandma wore, was crumpled to the floor, wailing loudly.
Help, said the flight service person. Talk to her. What is her
Problem? we told her the flight was going to be four hours late and she
Did this.
I put my arm around her and spoke to her haltingly.
Shu dow-a, shu- biduck habibti, stani stani schway, min fadlick,
Sho bit se-wee?
The minute she heard any words she knew—however poorly used—
She stopped crying.
She thought our flight had been canceled entirely.
She needed to be in El Paso for some major medical treatment the
Following day. I said no, no, we're fine, you'll get there, just late,
Who is picking you up? Let's call him and tell him.
We called her son and I spoke with him in English.
I told him I would stay with his mother till we got on the plane and
Would ride next to her—Southwest.
She talked to him. Then we called her other sons just for the fun of it.
Then we called my dad and he and she spoke for a while in Arabic and
Found out of course they had ten shared friends.
Then I thought just for the heck of it why not call some Palestinian
Poets I know and let them chat with her. This all took up about 2 hours.
She was laughing a lot by then. Telling about her life. Answering
Questions.
She had pulled a sack of homemade mamool cookies—little powdered
Sugar crumbly mounds stuffed with dates and nuts—out of her bag—
And was offering them to all the women at the gate.
To my amazement, not a single woman declined one. It was like a
Sacrament. The traveler from Argentina, the traveler from California,
The lovely woman from Laredo—we were all covered with the same
Powdered sugar. And smiling. There are no better cookies.
And then the airline broke out the free beverages from huge coolers—
Non-alcoholic—and the two little girls for our flight, one African
American, one Mexican American—ran around serving us all apple juice
And lemonade and they were covered with powdered sugar too.
And I noticed my new best friend—by now we were holding hands—
Had a potted plant poking out of her bag, some medicinal thing,
With green furry leaves. Such an old country traveling tradition. Always
Carry a plant. Always stay rooted to somewhere.
And I looked around that gate of late and weary ones and thought,
This is the world I want to live in. The shared world.
Not a single person in this gate—once the crying of confusion stopped
—has seemed apprehensive about any other person.
They took the cookies. I wanted to hug all those other women too.
This can still happen anywhere.
Not everything is lost.
~Naomi Shihab Nye (b. 1952), "Wandering Around an Albuquerque Airport Terminal."
Shower Thoughts
Sometimes I think the greatest benefit of Freedom of Speech is that it gives us all an opportunity to see who's an asshole.
Gratuitous Ex Mr. Lady Gaga
The Test
Shower Thoughts
Maybe the reason cell phones were made possible and became so popular was because The Machines wanted to get rid of pay-phones to make it harder to exit the Matrix.
Westworld in Six Minutes
This is awesome.
The Disruption of Orange Caligula
Despite the fact that he has failed at pretty much every endeavor he's set his tiny hands to, the current illegitimate occupant of the White House has succeeded spectacularly at one thing: absolutely monopolizing the entire "fake news" cycle—that he so loathes—24/7.
Even yesterday, as nature was putting on one of the most awe-inspiring spectacles imaginable, the shitgibbon still managed—through his own blatantly willful stupidity (as I predicted), made it all about him.
I mean seriously. If someone in a lab coat told the idiot not to touch a hot stove, I'm sure he'd think, "No one can tell me what to do…especially some scientist."
And we saw that yesterday.
And now he's flying into Phoenix to hold a "rally." I guess widdle Donny's ego needs to be stroked after the last couple weeks. Oh hell, after the last eight months. Is it possible that it's finally pushing through his thick, malignantly narcissistic skull that except for his knuckle-dragging, basement-dwelling base, everyone is coming to hate him?
All I know is that this Phoenix trip is going to be a shit show. Both sides are planning on infiltrating the other to cause trouble. Supposedly the anti-Trumpers are buying up tickets and will be staging a mass walk-out the moment the tiny-fisted ferret-wearing shitgibbon starts blathering incoherently. In other words, the moment he starts speaking.
Meanwhile, the Trumpanzees are openly advertising for actors (preferably of color) to pose as anti-Trump protestors (at $10/hour) to cause trouble so Dear Leader can claim with his trademark smirk, "See, both sides are violent!"
My employer has taken note of this gathering tsunami of stupid about to descent upon the city. I work about two blocks from the state capitol building, and yesterday we received a call and email from our supervisor:
As a follow-up to this morning's Deputy Director's meeting, here is guidance regarding tomorrow for our employees specifically in the Capitol Complex/Campus, and Phoenix Metro areas. For employee safety, we are making the following options available for Division Directors to use based on your discretion and individual business needs:
If employees are non-essential (as deemed per individual Division Directors) and have the ability to telecommute, the recommendation is to have them do so. Employees are not required to physically come to the Capitol Complex/Campus/Phoenix Metro if they are not needed. However, if they do, then we'd like them to leave the area no later than 1 p.m. as there are reports of large protests, not to mention traffic congestion in preparation for the arrival and event.
Additionally, all facilities in the area locked down at 1 p.m. to preclude any general public entry and for the safety of our employees.
Only the senior tech at my facility will be on site; myself and my other colleague were requested to telecommute. One of the perks of being a contract employee, however, is that I'm not trusted with the keys to the remote access kingdom. Asked what to do about this, my supervisor replied, "Put down 8 hours on your time sheet and enjoy your day off."
This actually works out well, because I was already planning on calling out today anyway. Two weeks into the new school year, Ben has already brought home—and shared—the first incident of the upper respiratory creeping crud. He started exhibiting symptoms last Friday, and I knew I'd be feeling it within 48 hours. Sure enough, it started to hit shortly after I got finished putting the new bed frame together (another story for another time) on Sunday. By the time I left work yesterday my throat was on fire, and this morning—after a horrible night's sleep—I can tell it's already moving down into my chest. I'm hoping to ward off full-blown bronchitis by hitting it hard with Mucinex to keep the sludge flowing, but I know how this typically goes, and I will undoubtedly be making an appointment with my Primary Care doctor by week's end.
And now I'm going back to bed.
Shower Thoughts
My adult years have made me question why anyone would go big when they could go home.
Monday
Shower Thoughts
Washing machines should have a reservoir tank where I can pour in a whole jug of detergent and have it automatically dispense the correct amount for every load—and then automatically flush the whole system of old detergent if it's below a certain level in the tank when it does a self-clean cycle.
Inappropriate Office Behavior (NSFW)
More True Than Not
"I don't understand any of it. I never did."
In my mind, that is probably the most memorable quote from the 1970 film, Boys in the Band. It was spoken by the character Michael as he was relating his dying father's last words.
I first saw the film during my senior year in high school. I went with my then-"girlfriend," Jean. Not really having any media representations of gay life at the time, Boys in the Band—as bleak and depressing as it was—did offer a glimpse into at least some aspect of the life I was taking my first, tentative steps into—if only as a warning of what not to become. (I returned for a second screening on my own a week later, and Jean's response was, "Why?!")
But I digress.
As I've grown older, those words have rung more true with each passing year.
When I was in my 20s and 30s, I thought had it all figured out. I knew how life worked—even if it didn't always work out the way I intended. The cracks started appearing in that belief as I entered my 40s, and when cancer came out of nowhere and hit me up the side of the head mid-decade, I realized I didn't know shit.
When you're twenty-one, life is a roadmap. It's only when you get to be twenty-five or so that you begin to suspect you've been looking at the map upside down, and not until you're forty are you entirely sure. By the time you're sixty, take it from me, you're…lost." ~ Stephen King
Guess I'm not the only one…
#Truth
White dudes: I don't know who's worse: Hillary or Trump.
LGBTQ people: Trump is.
Black people: Trump is.
Undocumented immigrants: Trump.
Muslims: It's Trump.
Women: Trump, duh!
White dudes: (shoving their heads deeper into their asses) I just…don't…know…
Because 'murika!
A large portion of the population is about to have permanent eye damage.
If the last two years have taught me anything, it's that a huge portion of the United States population is dumber than a box of rocks, and will do something contrary to what they're told, especially if the person telling them is actually someone who knows what they're talking about.