24 Posts in 24 Hours, a Retrospective

Well, I set out to do it, and when I hit "Publish Post", it will be a fait accompli (C'est la fait, Jacques!)... 88 Lines About 44 Women 24 posts in 24 hours. This little project of mine has been a microcosm of my blogging experience- a little stargazing, a little crystal gazing, a little gazing into the Abyss, and a lot of navel gazing (well, at least there's been no shoegazing on my part). The best thing about completing this "24 Posts in 24 Hours" project is that I never have to do this again. Once again, I want to thank my beloved readers for being with me every step of the way- if I'm not mistaken, the valiant Thunder has posted a comment on every entry!

Well, I may not have done a NABLOPOMO, but I can say without hesitation that I have joined the ranks of the 24 Hour People:

24 Posts in 24 Hours

So, in a comment on Jennifer's (and not the one you are thinking of) "blogging efficiency" post, I toyed with the idea of doing 24 posts in 24 hours. While I have never seriously taken on the 30 posts in 30 days challenge, I think it's time to try this project.

I'll be working a 16 hour day, and will try to put up short posts during lulls in the action.

The Anniversary of My Madness

It was a year ago today that I wrote 24 posts in 24 hours, a feat which I have never felt the need to duplicate. The idea came to me in a comment thread at Jennifer's blog. By the end of the day, I was having a blast reading the various comments- Thunder posted a comment on every blog post.

The best thing about pulling off a stunt like "24 Posts in 24 Hours" is that I have no reason to ever do it again. I am happy that I did it, I had a blast while doing it, and I was able to cross it off of the "to do" list. In a comment on Jennifer's post, Brando suggested: How about 60 posts in 60 minutes?

Interesting idea, but I just can't type that quickly, and setting all those posts up beforehand would seem like cheating.

Ten Years and One Week of Bastardy

If a guy forgot his tenth anniversary, you'd probably mutter. "What a bastard..." Well, that's exactly what I did- my tenth anniversary was last Sunday. The blog started on 12/1/2009, when I posted a silly riff on the introduction to Robert E. Howard's original 'Conan' story, The Phoenix on the Sword, which inspired the opening of the Conan the Barbarian movie (perhaps the greatest barbarian movie of all time). It was a silly post, but the important thing was that it got the ball rolling... an old co-worker of mine, one Johnny Alvarado, had a motto: "There's nothing to it, but to do it." That post was the initial 'doing it'. The two big inspirations behind the blog were the exhortations of my great and good friend Francesco Rulli, and the example set by the storied snark blog Sadly, No! The bulk of my early blogroll was composed of Sadly, No! regulars. Over the years of blogging, I wrote for Rumproast as well, and some of my co-bloggers there are also on the blogroll.

As of this writing, I've had 1,761,105 hits in my ten years, with my by-far most popular post (with a whopping 302,942 hits, most of them spambots) being my 2013 post about eating a kousa dogwood fruit before I knew for sure that it was edible. My top five countries are the United States, France, Russia, Germany, and the United Kingdom.

I've long thought that my most important posts are the Secret Science Club post-lecture recaps. ee, When I started them, they were very rudimentary descriptions of the lectures, but I quickly came to the realization that I owed Margaret and Dorian and the lecturers more, and got serious about the recaps, taking extensive, barely legible (hey, you juggle a beer, pen, and notepad in a dark nightclub) notes and spending hours on each post, verifying information and hunting down links. These posts are the ones which most challenge me, each one is like a mini term paper, with you good people being my graders. They are a lot more difficult than just posting some political snark or a cute cat pic. My one most outré blogging experience was my 2011 24 Posts in 24 Hours stunt, which led to the spinoff Objectivist Morrissey project, which would be more funny if Morrissey hadn't turned into a real right-wing nutter.

Throughout my ten years of blogging, life has been pretty stable- I have had the same job all along, though when I started, it was a part-time position to ensure a steady trickle of money while I was working as a contractor (n.b.: clients never want to pay on time), but I was hired full-time and promoted to head the department within two years, all because I was the one office software proficient guy. I'm coy about posting too much information about my job, but I work in beautiful surroundings and enjoy myself perhaps too much (work shouldn't feel like a kick in the balls). In the course of my job, I have blogged about three of my feline co-workers- the dear, departed Moses and Fred, and the lively, lovely Ginger. Right now, while there's talk about getting a second (and maybe a third) mouser for the site, we're in the midst of a major construction project involving one of the buildings requiring mousing, and Ginger is such a dominant force that we're reluctant to force a younger cat to share quarters with her until they become acclimated. Of course, there are also the wild critters that I share my stomping grounds with... both enemies and friends. In the decade, I have inhabited two apartments, six blocks from each other, in the same neighborhood, the 'tavern district' of Yonkers. While I do enjoy a spot of novelty, life has been pretty stable for me throughout my blogging career. I realize that I am extremely lucky in this regard.

I want to thank you all for your support over the years. M. Bouffant and Tengrain in particular have been most generous in linking to my blog at Crooks and Liars. Driftglass and Blue Gal have also been very generous with their links and their support. Without you readers, though, the whole endeavor would be for naught. You're the reason I keep doing this thing. It's been a hell of a decade, and you have been a hell of an audience. Much love, much gratitude!

Five Years of Bastardy

Five years ago, I started this blog with a somewhat unauspicious post, figuring that the hardest part of blogging was starting the whole endeavor. Ultimately, the inspiration for this blog was the Sadly, No! community, both headliners and commentariat. The immediate inspiration for the blog came from Thunder, zrm, Substance McGravitas, M. Bouffant and the antipodean genii at "Riddled"- I needed a Blogger profile to post comments at their blogs, and their blogs were so entertaining that I just had to join in on the fun.

Regarding the 'nym... I've always considered it a tongue-in-cheek jab at "machismo", which I consider a "toxic cult of failed masculinity". That being said, the "Big Bad Bald Bastard" is a character that mild-mannered Mr _________ of the City of Y______ can readily slip into when it is to his advantage- I admit that I can be somewhat fierce on those rare occasions on which fierceness is called for. I chalk a lot of the "Bastard" character's traits, and my traits which I exaggerate when I have to be the Bastard, to the tutelage of this departed gentleman. Regarding the "Bad", I've always meant that in the non-pejorative slang sense... I am a generally law-abiding, responsible individual. For the record, my parents were married when my four siblings and I were born, so the "Bastard" is a self-deprecating bit of slang. Also, I'm a sucker for alliteration, being a fan of Old Norse Poetry.

Early on, most of my posts were short, pithy bits of snark, written to amuse me on the cold nights after the jobsite had closed to the public for the winter months. I had a lot of quiet solitude on the job to crank out short posts that were mainly personal observations of little consequence.

Soon after starting the blog, I put up my first short "political" piece, but I really didn't realize the potential of blogging until I put up my first (woefully skimpy- I've since taken to bringing a memo pad to lectures) recap of a Secret Science Club lecture. The lecture recaps quickly became a regular feature of my blog and the recaps actually became kinda good sometime in 2010. Besides the SSC recaps, I also had the privilege of writing up a recap of a lecture by Ned.

Speaking of Ned, I had the pleasure of meeting him in person back in ought-nine and we get together every so often, but not often enough. I have also had the honor of hanging out with Substance McGravitas, Actor212, Major Kong (who I took to my workplace on one occasion), and Thunder (who let me hang out on his famous deck).

In 2011, I finally realized that the second biggest reason for the internet is posting cat pictures, so I got smart and started regularly featuring my co-workers Fred and Ginger, who I met shortly before starting this blog. I also posted about our dear, departed Moses, but I didn't post more about him because he had a higher profile than Fred and Ginger, and I'm leery about revealing too much about the job.

Perhaps my single most unusual blogging achievement was my 24 Posts in 24 Hours stint, which took place on Sunday, June 19, 2011, when I was working a split double shift (midnight to 8AM, 4PM to midnight). This day also saw the birth of Objectivist Morrissey, who desparately needs a revival. Thunder, being a trouper, commented on each and every one of those posts. Maybe my single greatest blogging achievement was my recap of the post-Sandy Secret Science Club lecture- that lecture had scientific, political, and social pertinence. Another big achievement, in 2012, was being invited to join the snarky geniuses at Rumproast (I'm overdue for a post there). Also in 2012, I began to get some serious linky love from all-around great and good guy Tengrain, who recently put up a post similar to this one.

If I were asked about any regrets I might have had in the course of my blogging career, I'd have to say that my only big regret is not starting this blog in time to cover the entire run of Secret Science Club lectures. One minor regret is neglecting to label any of my posts, but that's a minor thing.

Over the course of my five years of blogging, my blogroll has expanded to seventy-seven blogs owned by diverse people from all over the planet. I am very proud of everyone in the "bloggerhood" and I love you all. Thanks for all of the support you've given me over my five years of bastardy. Writing this blog has always been a great pleasure, in large part because of you. I am looking forward to the next five years with you. Thank you for everything!

500th Post

Wow, it's post number five hundred for me. I was pretty much running neck and neck with Von, but I pulled ahead using such perfidious Albion ploys as 24 posts in 24 hours. I suggested to Von that she do a "what did we learn?" post for 500. I figured that my 500th post would be a reintroduction of myself, and an iteration of my reasons for blogging.

I would say that my two defining characteristics are smartassery and nerdliness. I am an unrepentent wisenheimer, and have been for years. While still in high school, my boss told me, "You're a real smartass!", to which I replied, "Better a smartass than a dumbass." I've tried to live by that credo ever since that day. I'm also a nerd- I was the sort of kid who usually had his nose in a book, who loved to turn over rocks to see what kind of cool critters lived underneath- I'm still basically a demented, precocious 8-year-old. I am into science fiction, math and chess- I'm not that into pop science fiction movies though (gots no T.V. machine), I'm more of a reader, and especially love the works of Jack Vance and Gene Wolfe. I'm also a sucker for classic "weird" pulps, even though I am oftimes appalled by the racialist content that often taints the stories.

Politically, I am unabashedly liberal, not the strawman "librul" of right-wing hacks. I believe in equal rights for women and minorities (so-called), and pretty much sussed out that the assumption that "white straight male" was some sort of "default setting" was nonsense pretty early. My family background is "multicultural"- Italian, Irish, Swiss and French, so I developed an interest in other cultures early on. I'm one of five children, so the house was always occupied by all sorts of friends. Mom pretty much had an "open door" policy- nobody was turned away due to race (which, to my anthropologically-oriented mind, is a social construct), creed, or sexual preference. I am interested in biology, and enjoy hiking and biking, so I'm an environmentalist by default. I believe in fair trade- I don't like to taste the blood of peasants in my coffee, and would rather own something made with pride by free laborers than made with poison by wage-slaves or prisoners. I also detest bullies and deplore idiots, so American Conservatism is pretty much a non-starter with me.

I'll cop to being an eccentric, and a bit of a cheapskate- I love foraging, and I have no desire to keep up with the hypothetical Joneses. I live in a working-and-middle-class neighborhood in a sizable city in the shadow of one of the greatest cities in the world... I'd call it a "most urban suburb". I have no desire to live in a community in which I'd catch grief for hanging a clothesline. For a year and a half, I was driving a car which cost half what my bicycle did.

While I can sometimes come across as angry, I'm generally even-keeled. I tend to get angry at the misfortunes of others, and laugh at my own setbacks (I have a friend who put it, "You're not happy unless you're getting your ass kicked!"). I tend to keep my temper very well- when you've spent quality time being pounded to the consistency of mincemeat by this guy, having some guy call you a "dickweed" is pretty tame by comparison. Once, while interviewing an insurance claimant, an attorney tried to rattle my cage by telling me that I "didn't know what I was doing, and was ignorant of the law". When I didn't get rattled after a good five minutes of this line of bullshit, he said, "You don't want to show it, but you're steamed!" I smiled at him and said, "I'm not mad, I'm billing this time... you can go on for as long as you want." Since he would receive a portion of any settlement, he shut up pretty quickly. Maintain an imperturbable mien- if you lose your temper, you lose control of the situation.

Why do I blog? Well, I enjoy writing... I have strong opinions, and I am happy to be able to express them. I also like the camaraderie- I enjoy the correspondence with my blogroll and my commentariat. I certainly hope I have entertained my readers... do I amuse you? Another thing I love about writing this blog is that I find that people from all over are reading my bloviations. If someone had told me a year ago that I have readers from Latvia, Iran, and the Philippines reading this blog, I wouldn't have believed it. It's really heartening.

I don't forsee ending this anytime soon. I love doing this, and I hope to do another little recap when I hit one thousand posts. Of course, I've been very, very lazy when it comes to labeling my posts- I may have to go back over my body of work and get cracking with the labels.

Thanks to all of my readers, you really are a wonderful bunch. I love the back-and-forth in the comments, and the insights I get from different viewpoints from really smart people. Without you, I'd just be yelling at clouds. Now, time for Von to catch up.

Post Scheduling and the Laptop Situation

The last couple of posts, and this one, were composed in the wee hours of Sunday morning so I could "work around" my laptop situation. Hopefully, my laptop should be back from the shop (and/or the power cord I ordered for my antiquated Compaq laptop will have arrived in the mail) by today, so I can put up some more substantial, more topical posts.

Although these posts have been spread out over the course of a few days, the fact that I wrote them in the course of a few hours reminds me of my 24 posts in 24 hours effort... though I seem to be less inspired then I was then.

Been at it Two Years

Today marks the two year mark of this blog... I have to thank everybody in the bloggerhood for making this a very fun, very enlightening endeavor. I kinda see this blog as my personal "magazine", an e-publication in which I have complete editorial control. I'm the reporter, the bloviator, the humor columnist, the gossip columnist- I even brew the coffee and clean the pissoir. The one thing for which I'm not responsible is the "Letters to the Editor" section, so thanks a million for your comments, everybody. I'm really grateful for your friendship and your support... without you wonderful folks, I'd just be some guy yelling at a cloud.

It's funny... the whole concept of the Big Bad Bald Bastard really started as a bit of a joke- while the Bastard is recognizably moi, he's a tongue-in-cheek version of me. He's a spoof of the manly-man stereotype, rendered by a guy who's really a supergeek at heart. I hope it's a spoof of gender stereotypes done right. That being said, I'd be lying if I said it wasn't useful to play the Bastard at times (a couple of times, I've had belligerents back off by telling them, "Uh, I'm not as wimpy as I look!"). As an aside, fighting's like fucking, it really should only be done with people you like, who know what they're doing, and have your best interests at heart (this sentence, which has been kicking around my big bald noggin for quite some time now, deserves its own post)

Anyway, that's a bit of Bastard backstory... now onto a quick review of the year. I think my greatest blogging achievement of the past year (indeed, of my whole career) was my 24 posts in 24 hours slog. I had to work that cruelest of workdays, the graveyard shift/evening shift (worst slashfic EVER!!!) split, so I decided to amuse myself with a series of largely stream-of-consciousness posts. It was on that fateful day when Objectivist Morrissey, first conceived of in a Sadly, No! comment, shuffled out of the gulch, so to speak.

This year also marked the glorious occasion when I became the internet's number one unapologetic ass man (although I originally applied that moniker to Frank Frazetta (to this day, that post remains, by far, my most popular, with the search terms "voluptuous women" and "Frazetta women" being my two most popular search criteria- I hereby offer a sincere apology to all the hapless horndogs who came looking for Dejah Thoris' ass and found my face).

The blogroll has grown quite a bit, and I'm happy to have had Laura and Dusty join the cast of regulars who have been so supportive all along. I love how the neighborhood keeps expanding, and I'll continually keep an eye toward expanding it.

I'd be remiss if I didn't mention that I got to meet the celebrated Substance McGravitas in person. I'd met fellow Noo Yawkehs actor and Ned previously, but meeting a guy from a mysterious northern land who flew all the way across the continent was pretty mind-blowing.

Let me mention that, if any of you plan on visiting the New York metro area, don't hesitate to drop me a line (MEMO TO MYSELF: do the dumb things I've got to do- touch the puppet head post your e-mail on the blog)- I'd love to meet you for a spleen sandwich, a beer in a baby biergarten or a foot fetish party. Until then, I have to be content having you drop by my place, my place in cyberspace. I'll probably do a couple of more additions to the blogroll soon.

Thanks, everybody, it's been another fun year of blogging, and it wouldn't have been possible without you. I love hearing from you, I love reading your stuff, and I love the genuine feeling of community I get from you. I look forward to our next year together.

Gonna Knock Off for a Couple of Hours

I'm three-quarters of the way through this project- I am in a good position to pull off this "24 Posts in 24 Hours" trick. Of course, I'll be going on a hiatus of a few hours so I can rest up for another eight-hour shift this afternoon.

Posting at this rate has been interesting- at the rate I've been going, I feel as prolific as the redoubtable M. Bouffant. By the time I return to posting, he will most likely have outstripped me in the amount of today's posts.

Objectivist Morrissey Didn't Go Galt

Back when I did my bizarre 24 posts in 24 hours postapalooza, I debuted the "character" of Objectivist Morrissey, a Bizarro World Morrissey who was a huge fan of Ayn Rand. Objectivist Morrissey appealed to me so much that I thought he merited his own blog. It's been a while since I've revisited the guy, mainly because real-world Morrissey can be just as horrible as his parallel universe doppelgänger. I can't stay mad forever, especially if it gets in the way of a good joke, so here's Dagny, Take a Hike, the latest from Objectivist Morrissey:


Is it wrong to want to keep what you've got?
Ayn Rand would tell you, “Surely not!”
How can this world be just
When lice aren't shot?

Dagny, take a- Dagny, take a hike.
Stop the wheels of the world in their tracks, dear.
And don't produce tonight,
Go Galt and find the one that you love and who loves you.
The one that you love and who loves you


Is it wrong to hate your lessers, my dear?
No it's not wrong, so have no fear.
Leave them all in your dust,
Your way is clear!


Dagny, take a- Dagny, take a hike.
Stop the wheels of the world in their tracks, dear.
And don't produce tonight,
Go Galt and find the one that you love and who loves you.
The one that you love and who loves you.

Find my gulch and disappear.
La la la la la la la la.
Throw your blueprints onto the fire.
Come out and find the one that you love!


I have an an additional verse, but it would throw off the flow of the song:


Is it wrong to scorn the weak and the poor?
Ayn Rand would tell you "No!", I'm sure.
How could you be so rich, if you aren't pure?


For those of you unfamiliar with The Smiths, this song is a spoof of Sheila, Take a Bow:





I divided this post into two smaller posts, cross posted (where else?) at Objectivist Morrissey.

Gonna Cool My Heels for a Few Days

I'm going to be heading to Maine for a few days, to revel in glorious rusticity- no electricity, rudimentary plumbing, a night sky in which stars can bee seen. Seeing that, the last time this happened, my blog was Zardozed in most brutal fashion, I am going to try to bang out a few posts and use the "Post Scheduling" option that I didn't use in my "24 posts in 24 hours" effort.

Realizing I'm Not Getting a Nablopomo This Year

Checking over this month's posts, I realized that I didn't put up a post on the 5th, so I won't be eligible for a NABLOPOMO like I was in 2011... so close. It's no biggie, though, I did once write 24 posts in 24 hours in the course of a long, bizarre day on the job during which I worked a 12-8, 4-12 split-double shift. Ah, those were the days- thanks to Jennifer for putting that idea into my head.

At any rate, I don't have to put up a blog post tonight just to get a NABLOPOMO in this year.

The Return of Objectivist Morrissey

In the course of my 24 posts in 24 hours push, I wrote a post speculating about how The Smiths would have sounded had Morrissey been a hardline Objectivist. This notion has been bouncing around my head for the past couple of weeks (chalk it up to being in a locale with no electricity). Put succinctly, I've had an earworm which was a song which had never been written, so I had to go ahead and finish the damn song:


Mooching parasites, and a tax rate burdensome,
The average working stiff is a bum
But in this hidden gulch, this Randian man.

Why be a slave to guilt and dread,
When the superman's path is the one that you tread?

I would go Galt tonight, but I haven't got a hidden lair.
Ayn Rand said, "It's gruesome, that such a producer should care."

A titan simply shrugs,
and drops the wicked world,
Leaves moochers to their fate,
'Cos greed is such a noble trait.
'Cos greed is such a noble trait.

I would go Galt tonight, but I haven't got a hidden lair.
Ayn Rand said, "It's gruesome, that such a producer should care."

This Randian man

A titan simply shrugs,
and drops the wicked world,
Leaves moochers to their fate,
'Cos greed is such a noble trait.
'Cos greed is such a noble trait.


Of course, for those unfamiliar with Monsieur Morrissey and The Smiths (get with the program, hippie! or get offa mah lawn! whatever the case may be), here's the tune that I dragged kicking and screaming into a dry gulch inhabited by sociopaths:





I ordinarily don't "bleg", but if anyone could "Photoshop" Morrissey's pompadour onto the dour visage of Ayn Rand, I'd totally have their babies.

UPDATE: I figured Objectivist Morrissey deserved his own blog- I'll cross post any entries here as well. I... uh... have more than just a couple of parodies in the pipeline.

Twelve Years of Bastardy

Twelve years ago, I started this blog with a post which spoofed the opening of Robert E. Howard's The Phoenix on the Sword, the first of his 'Conan' stories.  The opening of the Arnold Conan movie was modified from this introduction.  I've striven to post just about every day since then, with some measure of success.  One one bizarre occasion, I even wrote 24 posts in 24 hours, but feel no need to repeat that feat.

As far as goals and inspirations go, I pretty much can't describe them better than I did in my five year blogiversary post.  Needless to say, it's also nice to have a running chronology of contemporary events and my thoughts and moods regarding them.  I've gotten more political in the intervening years, because politics have gotten more fraught.  When I started, it was a pretty even mix of navel gazing, star gazing, and gazing into the abyss, but the abyss has gotten deeper in the past five, and particularly last two, years.

My one big blogging regret is that I didn't start earlier, primarily because I missed out on two years and three months of Secret Science Club lecture recaps.  Currently, I plan to keep on blogging as long as Google doesn't mess with the Blogger platform too egregiously.  Thanks for reading, you make it all worthwhile.

Back, As They Say, With a Vengeance

I got home from work around 9AM this morning, crawled into bed by 9:30, and was up by 2PM to prepare myself for a return to work. After the customary three hours or so of running around, I have a lull in which I can resume my "24 Posts in 24 Hours" push.

Blogroll Amnesty Day 2016

Tengrain, the patron saint of small bloggers, reminds us that today is Blogroll Amnesty Day, the day for promoting other blogs according to three rules:


1. You are not allowed to complain or mention your blog’s low traffic until you have been posting daily for a year.

2.If you’re little, link other blogs that are new or still growing their audience, and encourage them to practice their craft daily.

3. Then, show them how.


Regarding the first rule, I have to wonder if one can complain if one has put up 24 posts in 24 hours... I can't complain about low traffic at any rate, I passed the one million hit mark last November, thanks to your readership and your linkage. I can't express my gratitude enough, you've always been the best.

As far as the blogs I'm going to link to, here goes nothing...

Buddy McCue's place showcases the man's art, which deserves a good look. The man is a true gentleman with a keen wit, please check him out.

Paleotectonics mixes righteous rage and side-splitting humor, with copious doses of nerdery and traditional Midwestern values. He's exactly what the Heartland should be- a take no shit attitude, walleye fishing, and Dr Who references aplenty.

Also in the Heartland, zombie rotten mcdonald is another righteously angry Wisconsinite whose eclectic musical tastes take a backseat to no one's... ZRM and Paleo represent the original Heartland values, not the 'I got mine, screw you' values promulgated by the Scott Walkers and Rick Snyders dicking up 'flyover country' and making it into a place that people really want to fly over, or flee from.

Aunt Snow's blog is the perfect cure for Beauty Deficit Disorder- she was a great chronicler of the sheer gorgeousness of the greater L.A. area, now she's doing the same for the NO LA area. Aunt Snow lives beautifully, and she shares the beauty of her existence with her lucky readers.

Nasreen Iqbal's blog is the newest blog on my blogroll, a wonderful mix of the personal and the political. Nasreen is another individual whose musical taste I find interesting. One of these days, I'm going to hang out with Nasreen and ZRM and we're going to geek out for hours on music.

I'd be remiss if I didn't thank Tengrain for his unfailing support throughout my blogging endeavor. Also, I don't know if I would have gotten this thing off the ground if it hadn't of been for the early support from Thunder, mikey, Kiwi and Smut, Johnny Pez, and M. Bouffant. If there's such a thing as 'Blog Amnesty', these are the bloggers who showed it to me when I was just beginning.

Paul Ryan Leaves, Objectivist Morrissey Returns

There really isn't a lot I need to say about Paul Ryan leaving the House of Representatives. I think the guy is awful, by which I mean offal- he's the classic case of the guy who wants to pull the ladder up behind him- he received Social Security survivor benefits after the death of his father yet claimed to dream of cutting government benefits since he was a frathole at keggers. Yeah, I'd come to bury Ryan in snark, not to praise him, but I think he's pretty much done- the House is lost to his party, which is lost to Trump.

Back in 2011, I went through a manic phase while working a split-shift at work, a graveyard shift followed by an afternoon/evening shift. In these heady conditions, I wrote 24 blog posts in 24 hours, one of which imagined singer/songwriter Morrissey as a hardcore Objectivist. This led to a spate of writing Objectivist parodies of songs by Morrissey's old band, the Smiths, and even its own short-lived blog which ran its course because there aren't a lot of Smiths songs to parody and, well, Morrissey became a far-right loon so imagining him as a hardcore Randian became unnecessary and not-so-fun.

There is a bit of unfinished business, though, back in the 2012 election season, my older brother, Sweetums, suggested that I write an Objectivist Morrissey parody about Paul Ryan. I had a half-finished piece rattling around my head, but the election season wasn't fun until B. Hussein Obummer won, and I left the piece unfinished, unposted. Now, with Paul Ryan seemingly leaving the public eye for good, I figured I'd post the parody, though it is now woefully dated:


We're cryin', Mister Ryan, at this sickening mess,
And this Kenyan Usurper who'd penalize success.
You must stand fast, and athwart history
And you must reclaim GOP mastery.

Greed, greed glorious greed,
It despises the people in need.
But I'd rather be greedy
Than righteous or holy
Any day, any day, any day.

But frankly, I am more inclined
To be lobbyist courted and wined.
I want to cut and I want to slash.
I want to do something that others may deem rash.

We're cryin', Mister Ryan, at this sickening mess,
And this Kenyan Usurper who'd penalize success.
Oh, I didn't realise that you wrote policy.
I didn't realise you wrote such poor despising policy, Mister Ryan.

Frankly Mister Ryan since you cut
You are a pain in a socialist's butt.
I do not mean to fluff you so,
But I can't be lying, Mister Ryan.

Don't give them your money!


This bit is a parody of the bouncy Frankly, Mister Shankly:





Cross-posted at, where else?

Cabal Canal

The world is a bizarre place, with weird occurrences happening all the time.  It's a human tendency to look for causation, to seek connections when coincidences pop up, and conspiracy theorists go out of their way to fit these bizarre occasions into their narratives.  With this in mind, I present to you the conspiracy theories concerning a container ship blocking the Suez Canal.  As luck would have it, the ship's call sign is H3RC, so let the fun and games begin:

QAnon is abuzz with the Suez Canal story.

Given the Ever Given ship's call sign is H3RC, and Hillary Clinton's initials are HRC, and the ship is operated by Evergreen Marine, and Hillary's secret service code is Evergreen, the ship is tarfficking kids on behalf of the Clintons. pic.twitter.com/4iI42QS5Ca

— Shayan Sardarizadeh (@Shayan86) March 24, 2021

Yes, the QCumbers believe that this ship is transporting trafficked children at the behest of the Clintons. It's basically last year's Wayfair child trafficking conspiracy writ large:

From one of @Shayan86' screenshots, I just want to pause and marvel at this incredible sentence using language that builds the fictional reality Q believers live in, transforming a baseless internet accusation that went nowhere into a "fact."

"Wayfair was caught" pic.twitter.com/3z2esbTr5j

— Feminist Proper Gander (@dappergander) March 24, 2021

The amount of creativity that goes into forging connections between the vague content of the 'Q drops' and news headlines actually makes me somewhat envious, though I pity anyone who is fooled into thinking these narratives are true:

MelQ swinging for the fences with another decode that requires Q to have a time machine and used it to predict that the Suez container ship thing would happen in Drop 1279, written three years ago. pic.twitter.com/OpjJ5i1LtO

— Feminist Proper Gander (@dappergander) March 24, 2021

There's an undeniable power to the QAnon conspiracy complex- the posts, while proving to be trash when scrutinized by a critical thinker, are just suggestive enough to make for an intriguing game. A bored individual, looking for order in a chaotic world, knowing that something just isn't right in the world, can while away hours trying to find connections in the cryptic posts, can play the role of an insider privy to recondite knowledge, can cast himself or herself as a hero in a Good vs Evil narrative. It's heady stuff for thousands of Walter Mittys... I mean, who doesn't want to be a hero, especially if it doesn't even entail leaving the house?