"In a democracy (‘rule by mob’), those who refuse to learn from history will be the majority and will dictate that everyone else suffer for their ignorance."
. . .but I can’t find it where I thought I filed it.
Needed a refill on coffee. Turned to pick up my coffee mug from the coaster on the end table (where it belongs *heh*), and. . . nope. Went hunting for where I had put it down.
Oh.
Went back. There it was. Four inches from where it belonged.
A FarceBook acquaintance (longer acquaintance online–mostly blogging) suggested a method for dealing with “looping racing thoughts,” etc. Here’s a (still long for a FarceBook post) snippet:
If you have looping racing thoughts, or an escalating anxiety or depression cycle… or even if you have problems with attention regulation because of ADHD or emotional stress… try this…
Carry a pair of polyhedral dice in your pocket… it’s better if they’re two different types, both large… say a D12 and a d20. It has to be physical dice… You need to get out of your head and connect to the world.Any time you have a thought loop you need to disrupt, shake the dice and read them… on your hand, on a table, doesn’t matter.
Then multiply them.
Then divide the result by the total number of sides.
Then take that number and add it to the letters of your name, in a simple substitution, where A is 1, B is 2 etc…
Then alternately multiply, divide, add, and subtract the numbers.
Then start squaring them, or raising them to the exponent of each other.
At some point in this process your loop will disrupt. . . and you can insert your control thought that says something like:
“these emotions are not in control of me, they are simply an excess or deficit of emotional energy caused by too much of some neurotransmitters and not enough of some other neurotransmitters, and they are lying to me [about reality]. . . “
Very good technique(s). I have used visualizing musical scores, performing them or directing them, while either listening to a recorded performance or simply listening to them in my head. Taking [semi-quasi] “random” dictionary words or sentences from a book and using them to compose a fugue or another form via letter-number substitutions for both tones and rhythms, etc. Actually singing or playing one of these (or even just one line while “hearing” the rest in my head) has proved useful to me.
It’s more complex than that, but that’s the basic framework. Playing math games with minor (or maybe even not so minor would be more interesting?) linguistic twists seems likely to work as well.
Aside: From the FarceBook post,
“Recite a dice roll number of words or lines of a poem or song from memory. . . ”
*heh* very close to one of my methods for devising pass phrases (though I also choose one of several techniques to encode the phrases, usually from Renaissance at songs, though only in Italian, French or _maybe_ English).
Back when I was a lad, I used to have some seriously dangerous thoughts. For example, driving “into town,” as I thought of it, in my ’53 Chevy, there was a place in the road where the road curved to the left and ascended a wee bit. To the right, just over the curb and a wee bit of verge was an arroyo. Every now and then I wondered what it would be like to just keep going straight and launch myself off the roadway. Oh, these weren’t serious thoughts, and I was in no way (consciously) suicidal, but every now and then. . .
This morning, I had another such “dangerous thought” as I reached into the fridge to get the cream for our coffees. I almost picked up the buttermilk thinking, “I wonder what buttermilk in coffee would taste like?”
DANGER! DANGER!
*heh*
Because one should take a knife (or several) everywhere one goes, anyway. Now, using a knife at a gun fight is a good idea or not, may depend on the circumstances. I have been (I believe) reliably informed that at the right distance, and in the right circumstances, a knife can be more useful than a handgun.
It would take a willingness to be up close, personal, and very, very bloody, though. I imagine it would help to have gutted a few deer and pigs beforehand. I’ve only used rubber knives for simulating the former, but field dressing game is mainly just a bit messy.
Just another *cough* typical *cough* interaction with putative “law enforcement” in America’s Third World County™. . .
[Phone rings]
Me: Hello.
Caller: This is [some redneck] with the [Third World County™] Sheriff’s Department. What can I do for you?
Me: You called _me_. What do you want?
Caller: Dispatch gave me your name and number and told me you requested a call.
Me: What name?
Caller: Junior [Redacted].
Me: Junior [Redacted] lives two miles from me. What number did dispatch give you?
Caller: [recites my landline number]
Me: That’s not Junior [Redacted]’s number.
Caller: Sorry.
Me: *click*
I should have asked if dispatched was referring to Junior [Redacted] or Junior [Redacted] Junior, his son, although they live (lived? Is Junior [Redacted] still among the “quick”?) in “manufactured homes” catty-cornered from each other. . . (and Junior [Redacted] Junior now runs the family business).
Elsewhere on the Interwebs, an acquaintance quoted Sir Conan Doyle,
“There are many men in London, you know, who, some from shyness, some from misanthropy, have no wish for the company of their fellows. Yet they are not averse to comfortable chairs and the latest periodicals. It is for the convenience of these that the Diogenes Club was started, and it now contains the most unsociable and unclubable men in town. No member is permitted to take the least notice of any other one. Save in the Stranger’s Room, no talking is, under any circumstances, allowed. and three offences, if brought to the notice of the committee, render the talker liable to expulsion. My brother was one of the founders, and I have myself found it a very soothing atmosphere.” ~ Sherlock Holmes, “The Greek Interpreter”
A sort of 19th Century British “safe space.” *meh* My “safe place” is designed for the safety of others. I’m thoughtful that way.
I have my “Curmudgeon’s Corner” home office for that. Comfy chair. Semi-adequate research capabilities. TONS of books and periodicals. Fine music. Phones NOT allowed. And “Do NOT Disturb” is well-observed by the household. A “Misanthropists’ Club” would probably include some asthmatic wheezer or “irritable bowel gurgler” to harsh my curmudgeonly “mellow.” *heh* No thanks. 😉 (OK, I do allow the dog to share the space, sometimes, even though his presence tends to curdle my curmudgeonry into a genuinely peaceful attitude. Oh, well. The sacrifices I make for his adoration. . . 🙂 )
That something different is goin’ on here at America’s Third World County. . .
Yeh, the theme I’d used for years was broken by an incompatible WP upgrade, and I’m reduced to using an outa the box plain vanilla theme. Probably for the best. I may reinstall a few of the plugins I once had installed and re-list a (very trimmed down) set of blogs and other features. . . eventually.
Meanwhile, I think this will just serve as what it became six or seven years ago, after its first six or seven years as. . . something else, and just be the place where the voices in my head are free to utter. . . whatever opinions they have. (I’m always interested in what they have to say, whether anyone else is or not. 😉 )
All the manufactured sturm und drang of folks upset that “their” criminal candidate–surprisingly!–managed to lose a fixed election to a clown has driven more and more #NeverTrump -ers into reluctant defense of the Orange Clown, and reluctant Trumpery voters into firm support for a pres-elect no thinking person wanted.
Chill or lose even bigger down the road, dumbasses.
I see a lot of silly folks crowing about having a “Republican” in the WH along with “Republican control” (by the skin of their teeth) of Congress.
So? It means little to nothing, really, since any “conservatism” in the Republican Party is no different to the “conservatism” decried by R.L. Dabney in his day:
“Conservatism’s history has been that it demurs to each aggression of the progressive party, and aims to save its credit by a respectable amount of growling, but always acquiesces at last in the innovation. What was the resisted novelty of yesterday is today one of the accepted principles of conservatism; it is now conservative only in affecting to resist the next innovation, which will tomorrow be forced upon its timidity and will be succeeded by some third revolution, to be denounced and then adopted in its turn. American conservatism is merely the shadow that follows Radicalism as it moves forward to perdition. It remains behind it, but never retards it, and always advances near its leader. This pretended salt hath utterly lost its savor: wherewith shall it be salted? Its impotency is not hard to explain. It is worthless because it is the conservatism of expediency only, and not of sturdy principle. It tends to risk nothing serious for the sake of truth.”
But at least one good thing has come of The Trumpery’s win in the prexy race:
*Fear, Uncertainly, and Doubt
With the national election only days away, the FUD is strong in the Mass MEdia Podpeople Hivemind, social media, and just out and about “on the street.” I see/hear talk about nuclear war with Russia, a “feddle gummint” crackdown on dissenters–including fear that “they” will be “shooting us down in the street,” and so on.
Well, I’m glad to live where I do. Yeh, there’s some of that FUD floating around here in America’s Third World County™, but while “they” can try “shooting us down in the street,” it wouldn’t fly here, where firearms outnumber citizens by at least six to one, retired military are in very high ratio to the rest of the county population, we have very nearly Afganistan-like terrain (with even better cover most of the year, nearly as many cave systems/square mile, many of which are on no one’s maps or records–because PRIVATE, and excellent backwoods trails and waterways for transport), and the local National Guard unit would _definitely_ be on the side of the citizens. Heck, my neighbors and I could probably outgun the local LEOs, not that we’d need to if a “feddle gummint they” started trying to push in. Again: would side with citizens, like the local NatGuard unit.
“Red Dawn” was bush league by comparison to Third World County™ standards.
And then there’s the prevalent attitude: “Let them come.”
BTW, the county was almost precisely balanced between Repugnicant stalwarts and Ron Paulistas in the last prexy election, with nearly as many Paulista write-ins as votes for Romney. Neither Dhimmicrp vote counted for much at all.)
Oh, where is “America’s Third World County™”? Nowhere near my IP address. . . 🙂