Monday, August 8th 2022
Very late start today. I guess this is the usual Monday I don’t give a fuck. Forgive all of this excessive nasty language. I feel I am entitled. I can do whatever I want. I can be as selfish as I like and I can pollute the world with nasty words as much as I want to. I walk like a god upon the planet. Everyone must worship me and be jealous of my life. Look at me! I am beautiful. Fuck you and you and you and you and you may all observe my middle finger raised high and proudly. I am a modern earthlink. I don’t give a fuck.
That’s a pretty cool first paragraph. It kind of goes contrary to all of this square extra virgin shit that I usually spew. I usually figure that speaking straight is the thing that goes. It isn’t that I go out of my way to catch other people in their lives but I have found that if you talk straight, you can easily see those who don’t. When you run into someone who is a little screwy, that’s probably not the correct colloquial usage, you know. And then it’s up to you how much you wish to engage with screwy people. I’m using the term screwy as in not straight. I guess it could also mean something like something that will embed itself into you and be difficult to get out. That’s the thing about screws, you have to unscrew them first to get rid of them.
So the world is full of screwy people and this is the basic problem. We actually have mentality for hammer and nail but everybody likes to be screws. You know what happens when you hit a screw with a hammer? You break shit. You know the other thing about a screw that’s interesting? You need all kinds of power tools for it or you have to be willing to sit there and twist and twist and twist to make it work. Sure, screws have their place in building things. If you have the proper tools, they are technically more reusable than nails and hold things together tighter. But, you have to understand what it is.
I kind of feel like I am surrounded by nothing but screwy people now. They attempt to embed themselves into your life and then you find it very hard to get rid of them. And, like all curses, screwy people believe that everyone else is screwy. They don’t even have a mentality to understand that non-screwy people exist. Or, if you want to put me under a microscope and say that I must have screwed somewhere in my life, they automatically dismiss any attempts on my life not to be screwy. I am absolutely sure this is all part of screwy Christian mentality. Or maybe it’s Christian screwy mentality. Or maybe Christian mentality is just screwy.
No! Christ was affixed To The Cross by nails! Ah, yes! Too true. But if they had had the correct power tools, would they have bothered? I mean, were those nails actually reusable? Could they just take down the cross and reuse the parts for other people who needed public humiliation, torture and slow painful agonizing death? If you want to make a religious symbol that people will remember, I say we go for the deepest darkest pain. No reason to believe that love or light or community should be a decent symbol. We want pain. That’s what people understand.
Why am I going off like this? Probably because it’s Monday. I don’t have to go to work. Everyone else has to go to work. My ex partner has to go to work. The chicken people have to go to work. My other neighbor has to go to work. Her daughter doesn’t and her mother doesn’t. I’m not sure if they are still with us or not. I don’t care either way. Welcome to Monday. It’s 8:30 and I’m just thinking about the possibility of getting going.
Maybe it was the fresh chilies. You know? Maybe it was the fresh chilies. I have fresh chilies again. I am so happy. Chili peppers are amongst my favorite foods in the entire world. They add life to your life. Dry chili is okay. Spices are okay. I’ve got super hot peppers still from years ago and they work and they add intensity to your meals. And when you’re coveding, super hots go straight through that loss of taste buds. But fresh chilies? Ah, fresh chilies are life!
Do I like fresh chilies because I admire the pain of jesus? Fuck no! I like the spice. I like the heat. I like the excitement in my mouth. I like the excitement of that flavor.
I also had some wonderful fruit and fresh zucchini. Have I ever mentioned how much I actually like zucchini? I really like zucchini. And Lena last night brought over a bunch. Lana brought over some fruit, more pickles that I have to salt today, some zucchini and my ex partner brought me some chili peppers. I am so happy. My mother believed or at least lived the life of someone who believes that food is a replacement for love. In my case, food was brought along with Love by love for me and therefore I feel loved. Hence the stupid language.
I am also getting a little weird because this drought has basically and logically ended hopes for any deep bullshit with the garden this year. I am not going to have an abundant amount of harvest work to do. Not that I’m really interested in doing much gardening right now. I am still in my personal hospital watching my foot heel at a snail’s pace. There is not much else for me to do but keep my sugar balanced and try to stay off my feet as much as possible. Does this combination drive a person crazy? Woohoo! Let’s go crazy. Let’s get nuts!
I’ll be honest with you though, I don’t really mind the lack of hard labor. This year has been a weird combination of my desire to be a little physical with the world, perhaps a last hurrah, and with the world attempting to kill me. Politics denying me medical care or forcing me into unbelievably painful situations. Unreasonably so. It’s just a hateful, hateful place run by hateful, hateful people. And the really interesting thing about hateful people, especially hateful people who don’t know what war actually feels like, is that they get off on believing that they’re hatefulness ingratiates them somehow to the hateful people above them. They are a part of a team, it may be a hateful team but this allows them their sense of community. We hate therefore we are.
I remember reading quite a bit of thought concerning the Nazis. I’m talking about the German Nazi party of the second world war, not our current crop of fascist Nazis. And no, I’m not talking about the ukrainians, I’m talking about the people waging an incredibly stupid War against ukrainians. The thought about the Nazis that was interesting is that they gave relevance to incredibly perverse people. When we play this game of rising and falling ideologies, sometimes the true sickos get to do the surfing. My feeling is that because human suffering is profitable, we give the perversities way, way more leeway than they should have.
And this brings us back to the idea of exactly how perverse we are supposed to be. How many drugs do we actually need? Me? I get shit on because I like marijuana. I do by the way. I really like it very much because it makes me happy. The unfortunate thing is, it’s just a plant. It just grows and in fact it’s kind of perennial if we just leave it alone. It’s just a plant and it doesn’t cost anything and you can have a whole ton of it. And because you can have a whole ton of a plant that makes you happy, it’s illegal. There is no other reason for it. Human suffering makes money. A naturally occurring plant that makes suffering go away is bad business.
So you take away something like that and then you take away something like community and then what do you have? Well, money. That the monetary system can be played with and that there are those who play much, much more easily with money create slavery. Slavery is by definition human misery and exploitation. But, human misery makes money so that’s a good thing.
It also creates the necessity to make use of the oil business. This isn’t just about these personal internal combustion engine machines that we all need to jet around from place to place in our nervousness and our quest for money. Do you need food? Go to the supermarket, buy something that came from a million miles away, make sure you bring it home in a single-use plastic bag and that everything you buy is covered by plastic so that you do your very best to choke the land out of its ability to function in a way that allows for life and you have created as much misery as possible. Good for you! Good Christian, good christian. Let me Pat you on your head.
I’m not going crazy. I’m a little bored. I have Monday morning energy even though I don’t need it. I have a lot of unbelievably good food at my disposal. My work for this year is coming to a close and everything is going to start getting slower and slower as the summer gets up and goes away. I just don’t have very much responsibility right now nor will I for quite some time. And so how about just a burst of creativity just for the love of being creative.
Well, I need to do some human activity right now. I guess I have a little cleaning up to do. I have some chores that need to get done and I need to get my life and the house at least a little organized. I don’t have a lot to do and I’m not going to be walking around very much at all, as little as humanly possible. But I do need to get up and get going because this is the life I live. I can’t just stay here and do nothing. Human activity without the use of gasoline. Human activity without the use of a car. Human activity without causing anyone any misery. Human activity simply because I exist and have no choice but to do it.
I had zucchini with Chili’s for dinner last night and some unbelievably delicious fresh fruit for dessert. I slept very well and woke up well rested. And now I’m babbling like an idiot because it’s Monday morning in a dying World and I can’t do a damn thing about it.
***
This is a pretty interesting clip from the president of Ukraine. He mentions that Ukraine is still capable of exporting something like 60 million tons of corn to several European markets. This is a positive and he also mentions that European grain harvests have been small due to global warming. Interesting of people to start noticing the exact same problems that I am having this year. I was wondering if it was ever going to get through to people.
But then at the latter part, it seems that the Russians have fired rockets at a nuclear power plant. Would someone like to explain to me the thinking behind something like that. I mean, I understand it’s a time of war and war is terrorism and death and suffering and misery and this is what people who start wars really, really want. But is a potential nuclear disaster what is genuinely wanted? This is definitely something to think about.
Okay, perhaps it’s a propaganda point. Let’s ask.
Did Russia shoot missiles at a nuclear power plant?
The Russians have been firing from the cover of the Zaporizhzhia station since mid-July, Ukrainian military and civilian officials said, sending rockets over the river at Nikopol and other targets. It is, in effect, a free shot.
Okay, according to the reports, either they were firing missiles over the power plant or at the fire plant depending on how you look at it. However, if you ask me, I would say that missiles and nuclear power plants do not mix very well. One misfire and we have a cataclysm on our hands. Again, is this the point of the exercise? Or better said, exactly how insane are the Russians right now?
One answer to this question might be from Ryan McClain, the former soldier who now has a YouTube channel talking about tactics and understanding what is probably true as opposed to what is empty propaganda according to his expert analysis of raw data. In this youtube video, he asks a very good question: why do the Russians suck so badly at this war?
In a world where economics is more important than anything. I’m not going to bother saying ecology here for fear of sounding redundant. But if money is everything and we are talking about a country that does not derive its income generally from things like taxes, you can see why poor decision making, cheap instruments and shoddy choice selection might amount to basically throwing disposable people into a meat grinder.
Personally, I think the story is inevitably sad. Sad for everybody on both sides. I still to this day do not understand the point of this exercise. I understand they are doing it for money but I don’t understand why this was the only possible thing they could have done. Generally shameful.
Along with this of course, I am not the only one who thinks this way. Apparently, Russian soldiers who want to switch sides get much better pay and possibly feel like they are ending up on the right side of History.
***
It is about 6:00 and I’m sitting on my front step. I’ve just finished deseeding about half of our kitty harvest. There is not a lot. It was a few hours of work for a very little bit. I would do this again though. I would not bother with lentils anymore but I would grow chickpeas.
The effort is really similar to harvesting beans. True, they are smaller but they are not the size of lentils and when you actually separate the seed from the husk, there is some sense of volume here. I probably have three dishes from this, more if I’m just adding it to soups or something like that. It wasn’t so much work to harvest this and there’s a definite benefit. I’m not opposed.
I asked Lena what the local decision is on dealing with wasps and she told me to call the fire department. That job went over to my ex partner but she told me that the process required taking apart my roof, cleaning out the nest and then leaving me to put my roof back together. That did not sound like something I wanted to do so we passed on the help. The next step is to simply get some diclofoss, this is the local insect poisoner and just shoot the eaves with an entire can as a matter of discouraging the wasps. I am all for being Mr natural but I don’t really know if I need a friendly relationship with wasps directly over my front door.
The big decision these days however is what to do about the remaining Garden boxes. I quit watering the potatoes last week because they were about ready to go and it’s actually recommended to leave them alone to pass away and dry out before harvesting. But I am going to have to make some choices about what to keep and what to let go
Our pickle Garden did not really produce as we wanted it to. We definitely got some pickles and they were very tasty. But we’ve had a little problem with ants and unfortunately, this box does not really retain water well enough. Perhaps we should have mulched better. Always a good idea and next year, everything everywhere will be well mulched. But my ex partner seems to think we can just let the pickles go. I currently have four jars of pickles saved for whatever that’s worth. I don’t really drink vodka but I guess it’s nice to have pickles lying around.
As for the cabbages, I am currently taking everything that looks even a little sketchy regardless of the size. Almost all the Napa cabbages have been taken and everything that looks like it’s been enjoyed even a little bit is tagged to go this week. It’s only logical to try to get what we can out of it. I’m not taking everything and we still have quite a few cabbage growing, some carrots and onions and garlic and quite a few things that are doing reasonable. I just don’t have more than about 3 days of water and if I just let certain things go, I might be able to stretch it to four and maybe that’s enough to get me to next week. Next week they promise rain. I don’t necessarily believe it but this is what the promise is.
I’m not completely thrilled with this decision making process I’m stuck with. It also leads to a lot of decisions that need to be made about next year. This is both what we intend to grow and what sort of additions I need to make in order to grow things. Making good use of what water resources I have is of vital importance. Obviously, I’m going to have to bolster my water retention ability. I have some ideas.
On the other side of this, I can’t get away from this truth that I’m fighting an uphill battle that doesn’t need to be fought. I like growing my own food and there are certain things that I would be very happy to be able to walk out into my yard and take home with me. It’s just that we need to be a bit more calculating than we were this year and much, much more prudent. The thinking that went into this year’s sewing was not well discussed. A lot of it came from whimsical ideas taken from nostalgia from a time that simply doesn’t exist anymore. New choices have to be made with much more severe reservations.
All that said, I’m not one bit sorry for having come out here. I’m not one bit sorry for having built my garden boxes or invested in the water retention deal. I’m not sorry for having done anything I’ve done here. I didn’t do It for the stunt, I did it to have a house I both enjoy having and a house I can use and that has definite function for me.
I had an interesting conversation with my California friend. He is definitely conservative and sometimes honestly it’s work to keep the friendship going. I’m sure he thinks the same way. I asked him about how California was getting along this year and he said it’s very dry, there are agricultural problems and people are getting cranky in the fall. But he said it’s not so hot at the moment and the fires this year have not been as catastrophic as last year.
But then he got a little angry at me. He said something about not being responsible for other people and said words to the effect that he does what he can to be gentle on the environment. It is not true. He does not go out of his way to suffer. This is not saying he’s a bad person. He’s a wage slave just like everyone else and in a lot of ways, he’s very used to being admired for being someone who works hard and does his job.
But that’s the whole thing really. It is that he has never been presented with any alternative way to live or any opportunity to have what people consider a reasonable life without doing the things he does. I doubt he would ever have considered riding a bicycle to work even though the weather would permit it every day of the year where he lives. Even for the purposes of his own health, he would never have thought to do that or to only buy his food from local growers. He is also the last person in the world who would even consider giving up meat.
The truth is, when you talk to people about ecology, they get very angry. They have the same reaction that a drug addict would have if you tried to tell them that they were not able to take their drugs. And people have thrown that exact argument in my face. Why should they give up their cars and their access to exotic foods? They should deprive me of something I like and see if I can get along without it. This is exactly what happened by the way and though I don’t think it’s the same argument, I don’t think not having access to an extremely cheap plant is the same thing as finding a way to get through your day without destroying the atmosphere. But this is the argument people make when you take away their drugs.
It is a shame that this is the world we live in. It is a shame that nobody allows for any other option but the one that causes the most damage. It is a terrible shame that nobody is given a choice or practical education or available options that might go lighter on the world. I tried to set up several businesses that would do exactly this but, people didn’t like that either. People don’t like upsetting the status quo, people don’t like upsetting Russia, people don’t like being bothered or asked to work harder and people don’t like change.
So, this is what we have. I’m not going to say this Garden was a failure. I’ve been eating off my own food for quite some time now. I’ve gotten more mileage from the wild food then the human food but that’s just part of the thinking for next year as well.
I mean, there is never only one way. There are always many alternatives. I just think we need to start choosing those alternatives that cause a bit less damage. I just think we need to start thinking more practically.
***
8:15 p.m. and I’m still in the office. It’s not like I’m doing anything important but I’m still here. One of the nuances of living here in the summer is that you have to close up the windows before dusk. I have one mosquito screen in one room and truthfully, I’m not sure if I like it or not. It was a gift from my ex partner but I think it keeps as many bugs in as it keeps out. I was okay with just closing the windows before dusk. You can get used to almost anything.
It’s also part of the wake up ritual to open all the windows. I know I have this wasp thing going on over my entrance way and I’m going to get that fixed within the next day or two. I don’t feel the least bit bad about ruining that nest. But this house is absolutely magnificent with all of the windows open. It is cool and easy even on the warmest day and the cross breeze coming from all directions is just lovely. Right exactly where I’m sitting right now on the couch is something I called Cleopatra’s throne one time. It is just the sweetest place to be.
We have some flowers growing nearby. There are some carnations and hibiscus. In the springtime there are poppies. My ex partner put in a few rose plants and of course we have plenty of lavender here at the front of the house. It was another day of non rain but the sweetness of the air coming through the open Windows is almost intoxicating. It’s amazing when suddenly you just enjoy breathing. I know that sounds foolish but it’s really true. You can breathe in as deeply as you want here. Sometimes it is really that sweet.
But. That’s right, there is a butt. I have these neighbors who have these cars and they are as rancid to the air as they are to the ear. As absolutely peaceful as this moment is, pure sweetness, cool easy temperatures and not one single solitary thing to offend, the knowledge exists that these chicken people will just ramble on to their Penny hunting in a cloud of accurate poisonous smoke.
I’ve told the story a thousand times about them calling the police on me simply for suggesting that they change how they Park their car. If they were to back in when they arrive and pull straight out, it would alleviate the problem. They would rather destroy my sensitivity than adjust ecologically in any way.
I had yet a new thought about this problem. It’s the first new thought about this situation I’ve had in a long time but for some reason, I had some creativity come today. I have a new solution to this problem and to be honest, if they were even moderately reasonable people they would probably agree to do it. The solution to the problem this time is simply to move their driveway from next door to my property to the other side of their property. What is interesting about that move is their cars would not be near any neighbors or their own house. If they were even moderately aware of spreading poisons, this would be the smartest thing they could possibly do.
I’ve thought about them many times. I can’t not because they are notorious for spoiling contemplative moments. If I truly get into something I’m doing out in the yard, they will find a way to make some ridiculous noise. She will scream at her husband or cackle like a chicken after her grandchild. And of course there are the constant gasoline powered instruments that destroy the peace for everyone and everything. Why they do this is beyond me. Who they think they are impressing is pure insanity. I don’t care what they consider normal, in a time of 13-year drought and visibly and understandably the end of all life on Earth, you’d think they would find a new way to live on their land.
I wonder if the thought would ever come to them to have their blood tested. A taxi driver once said something pretty telling to me. He talked about how many more cars are now in the country now that we have so agreeably become an economic colony of Russia. He told me that at one point you could tell who the miners were because they had black lung disease. Now, you can’t tell the difference between a minor and a civilian because everybody has black lung disease.
My big journalistic moment or perhaps My eco-warrior moment came when we got a local journalist to write a story about a friend of mine ending up with a ridiculously high lead count in his blood. We had the doctor’s report. This led to some articles, the KGB coming in and eventually, quite a bit of government involvement. The owner, unfortunately I guess a previous friend of mine, he doesn’t like me very much anymore, even went to jail over this. Eventually they found a way to pay him off kind of. Friends of the president bought his planned battery factory in Brest. This basically ended all of the protests or at least news about them. Probably the protesters were allowed to be there just to devalue the company so they could get it cheap.
I learned a lot about those blood tests from the industrial areas. I learned a lot about the hiring and firing techniques so as to make sure we were within ecological regulations. My thinking is that people are far more poisoned than they think they are. In fact, just the lead poisoning alone would be an explanation for a lot of things.
What are symptoms of lead poisoning?
Lead exposure can cause high blood pressure and brain, kidney and reproductive health issues in adults. Symptoms of lead poisoning include headaches, stomach cramps, constipation, muscle/joint pain, trouble sleeping, fatigue, irritability, and loss of sex drive. Most adults with lead poisoning don’t look or feel sick.
Exposure to high levels of lead may cause anemia, weakness, and kidney and brain damage. Very high lead exposure can cause death. Lead can cross the placental barrier, which means pregnant women who are exposed to lead also expose their unborn child. Lead can damage a developing baby’s nervous system.
I’ve often felt that the child has a developmental disability. The parents have their own mental problems and all of these things here seem to make a great deal of sense. They are constantly irritated and restless. The word hysterical fits better but it all fits the profile pretty good. They spend a lot of time in industrial areas and their own home gets sprayed with auto emissions every time they come and go.
If for some reason they would agree simply to move their driveway to the other side of their property, they would be causing themselves a lot less damage. They would certainly make my life a lot better and it would probably be the healthiest thing they could do for their family as a whole.
Of course we’re talking about a domino effect here. If they were to even consider something like being responsible about the ecological damage that they cause, they might actually start rethinking a lot of things in their life. This is kind of what happened to me. Like I say, once you see things, you can’t unsee them. You can’t unknow things once they become clear.
I wonder if it would be the end of their relationship. I wonder if he might suddenly decide that he doesn’t like being hen-packed. I can only use my own experience as a reference but there was a time when I came back to town that I simply discovered that I wasn’t enjoying my social life. I was doing things and going places and spending money on meals and coffee that weren’t making me feel very good. It was a very unsatisfying time and suddenly I realized that I couldn’t figure out a single reason why I should continue doing it. It was quite a moment of Revelation.
These days I’m kind of hospitalizing myself here at home, taking care of my leg, but I noticed that everything seems to be Saturday right now. On saturday, I absolutely don’t work. This is a decision that I make religiously if you will. But these days I move as little as possible and only when I seriously have to. I’m more interested in keeping weight off my leg than moving around with it.
The effect though is that I am really relaxed these days. I don’t really think I’m screwing up as far as taking care of my garden. Global warming has given me an excellent reason to take my foot off the gas so to speak. For sure, this has been a learning year. I got a chance to test out some theories and see what works and what doesn’t. I also got to find out the severity of the situation that I’m living in. I also got to find out the severity of global warming in the region. A bit shocking that it’s much, much more than anybody is telling anybody. All it took was a little measurement and to look around.
What I’m getting at is that it is possible to change. It is possible to change your life. It’s very possible to do new things, break old habits and perhaps set yourself on a course that you might actually like. You can say horrible things about me about not hanging out in cafes anymore but I like myself and my life a lot better now. I respect myself more now. This is both in how I treat my body and when I have a moment of self-reflection and ask if I am the sort of person that should be respected.
Yeah, it’s an amazingly beautiful Tuesday evening. The air is exceptionally sweet right now. The temperature is as perfect as perfect can be. It’s getting towards dusk and time to close up the windows but here on the couch I get a few more moments of peace and tranquility. I made the correct choice in choosing this house. I made the correct choice in harvesting rainwater. I could have done better with some planting choices but I’ve been eating off my own land for several months now. All positives.
It’s a shame the chicken people will never have this moment of Revelation. It is a shame that they will never accept anything I have to say as being relevant. They have all the reasons in the world never to listen to me. They believe it is the correct and even popular choice to scapegoat me instead. Too bad. Lead poisoning is probably a bitch.
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