"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."
During my childhood and youth, the family dictionary was a two-volume set of 8”×10”×3.5” small print books absolutely full of fascinating reading.
And so I read them voraciously. I still read dictionaries for fun, although some of my collection of dictionaries may be closer to encyclopedias (like my 20-volume set of Groves).
And yet. . . I sometimes find myself lacking the words to describe the depth and breadth of stupidity I see. . . everywhere. . . including, at times, in the mirror.
I injured my left hand ~10 months ago. Recovery is slow (and may never be complete *shrugs*). Still only have ~80% grip strength – on a good day – and fingers still swollen (wedding ring still does not comfortably fit ring finger), but. . . after massaging some salicylic acid solution and DMSO into hand, better pain relief and a wee tad less swelling. Maybe the pain relief is just in my head, though. Placebo effect can be strong, I suppose.
Still keeping the hand exercises up and wearing the compression glove, but this seems to have effected more progress than all the other nine months’ measures have. We;ll see.
Note that when I use the term “zombie” I am referring to auto-lobotomized “mass-man,” the kind of person for whom the DummieBowl, celebrity shenanigans, and “news” from the Mass MEdia Podpeople Hivemind are MUCH more important than. . . reality.
So, how to survive?
Embrace the “prepper” lifestyle.
Condition Yellow: constant.
OODA Loop your daily life, and aim to stay inside “the enemy’s” OODA Loop.
And most importantly, learn how to really pray. (The catch is committing to being on GOD’S side, not trying to manipulate Him into being on your side.)
The way things are going, it’s the way to bet.
There are two kinds of people in the world: those who think they count, and those who can do the math. . . and thereby know that those who think they count, don’t.
Putting a tall fence around one’s house gives potential intruders a way to hide from third party observers, but it also gives you a way to hide your “capsaicin claymores” from potential intruders, so. . . Command or sensor detonation is the obvious decision tree. Switchable by remote?
Also working on a way to make a capsaicin fogger from my fog machine, and way to sensor trigger it (including safing it for yard use, & other controls). BTW, “capsaicin claymores”? #3 food can, CO2 cartridge, tripwire, Ghost Pepper powder, etc. When combined with things like Osage Orange as an ornamental face for a fence/wall, blinding strobes, etc., yeh, can have a tall fence/wall and be relatively safe from home intruders. Relatively. (A moat with gators would be nice, though.)
OTOH, Can live in a hardened bunker and not be safe from militarized law enFARCEment thugs.
I’m told that the reason phishing “attacks” work is that the phishing email/phone call seems to come from a “trusted source” like a CC company, insurance company (that one does business with), or government office/agency. Really? I mean seriously, to begin with, who trusts ANY of those sources, even when they are determined to be genuine? That alone, quite apart from all the other reasons to hang up/report SPAM, report to authorities, etc., anyone who trusts ANY call/email contact, formulated as a typical phishing contact or not, without AT LEAST verifying the source simply deserves to get what they have comin’ to ’em. *smh*
“Ducktail beard.” How a subliterate grup who is also culturally illiterate regarding anything more than 15 minutes old describes a particularly poorly-trimmed Van Dyke.
In addition to drinking from the skulls of one’s enemies and listening to the lamentations of their women (Paul need not fear Nancy lamenting his hammerfest, of course), a nifty “bomber jacket” made of their skin would be quite the fashion statement, eh?
(The above, of course, is just a thought experiment to pass off to a Hollywood Writer Guy acquaintance whose career has majored in the bizarre. Hey! If he bites and can sell the idea as part of a project, maybe I can get a bit part. As the jacket.)
Disclaimer: I am no genius, and nor am I someone with an encyclopedic knowledge of darned near everything, but. . . I am an Odd, and my education is even Odd-er.
That may not explain to my readers why, when I read something written by a typical 20-something or older “grup” writer, I often just shake my head and compare their vocabulary, spelling, grammar, and knowledge base to an eleven or twelve-year-old. . . me.
Yeh, when I read a writer who has groped blindly for a suitable word and instead grasped an execrably UNsuitable word to use, I compare that writer’s vocabulary to my sixth grade self, partly because, while recovering from a second surgery, I discovered a set of vocabulary quizzes in a two-volume dictionary set (each volume at least four inches thick in large, oversized formats). Yes, I went through the college-level vocabulary test, NOT because I was “smarter” than the average sixth grader, just because I had read more, even before becoming temporarily restricted physically, but VORACIOUSLY more so during that restricted period.
And that, combined with my fundamentally Odd way of looking at reality, probably defined as much of the next sixty years of my life, as much as simply being an Odd has in general. And so, people with a Stupid Level Vocabulary™ (and often even stupider level grasp of syntax, orthography, and basic arithmetic, physical mechanics, and life in general) probably tend to irk me more than is useful.
Glitter is often so horribly misused that, at times, it seems to have been spawned from hell, but any reasonable person would prefer a “whoop” of preschoolers tweaked on a sugar high and given unlimited bags of glitter at a funeral to a drag queen show in kindergarten.
That’s all I’m sayin’ about that.