Honey Boo Boo

A Day Without Scatological References is a Day Without Sunshine, and Selected Sophomoric Observations

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assholeinground

As long as we have this clear.

There is a classic scene from one of my favorite, and timeless movies, The Jerk, where Navin Johnson’s Dad explains to him the difference between shit and Shinola.  For those who may not be aware, Shinola was a waxy shoe polish that was popular in the beginning of the 20th century.   I know that sometimes I have a sophomoric obsession with things scatological, but it seems that many people in this world are having a hard time telling the difference.

I can go on and on about entropy and devolution- especially after perusing the illegitimate president’s mostly plagiarized speech (lots of tidbits lifted from the State of the Union address given by President G.W. Bush, 2007) and realizing that this despot is hell-bent on ruling by executive fiat, but there isn’t much I can do about that.  Obama is pretty much beyond rationality, and the only course for rational people is to do what they can to mitigate his nonsense and attempt to block his unconstitutional actions for the next three years.   Nothing productive or positive will get done in government as long as the Imperial BO is still squatting in the Oval Office, but hopefully by the grace of God (and a gridlocked Congress) some of the potential damage can be thwarted.

king obama

Let’s just say I wasn’t surprised by the last blast of hot air to come from Washington.  Obama makes me want to puke.

Sometimes I think that if there is such a thing as parallel universes and/or if there is a universe for every possible combination of actions and decisions, that I got dropped in one of the more insane sets of possibilities. There are physicists who say that everything boils down to one big long complex equation.  It probably does.  Just don’t ask me to explain it.

Standard_Model_Equation

I was doing good to pass high school algebra.

The really scary thing that I’ve come to realize is that the “powers that be” who have all sorts of high faluting expensive pieces of paper from supposedly prestigious institutions of learning, are proving themselves to be rank imbeciles.  Maybe I’m just cynical, (and largely self-educated,) but I think these supposedly prestigious institutions care about two things: the money, and where the money’s coming from.

Maybe I’m being negative and fatalistic, but I am beginning to believe that higher education has been hijacked, and that the “powers that be” are presiding over a continual dumbing down of the populace.  Sadly, such a theory makes sense.  If you want to remain in power, and acquire more power, it might be in your best interests to keep your subjects stupid.  That was the mindset behind the Romans’ free bread and circuses.  Keep the people fat and sassy and uninformed, and they won’t care if you strip them of their rights.

bread and circuses

Americans don’t even need the Olympics to be distracted.  The Kardashians and Honey Boo Boo are enough.

honey-boo-boo-

See what I mean?

There isn’t much that I can do.  I can try to find the humor in popular culture, but even that is a sort of bittersweet adventure.  Some things are funny and some things are just plain sad.  Why do the media care about people who dress up little girls to look like street walkers- and why do they follow around adult women who already look like street walkers who have nothing better to do than spend money on stupid things and cavort around with gangsta rappers? Are we obsessed with such bizarre families and weird behavior because the circus freak shows of days gone by have become politically incorrect?  Instead of “Let’s go to the carnival to see the bearded lady, ” it’s “Let’s watch Mama June?”

Plus ςa change, plus c’est la même chose.

I enjoy perusing ads for Victorian patent medicines and other nostrums that were popular in the mid-to late 19th century.  You just want to believe they would work even though most of the “medicines” were comprised of heroin, alcohol or a healthy combination of both.

parkers tonic

You might not be “cured,” but you’ll be too stoned to care.

I also find humor in some of the 19th century euphemisms for ED (which is itself, a euphemism, but it’s just not nice to say “he has a limp dick.”)

self abuse

Certain parts of the body enlarged…hmm?  And exactly what is a tansy?

Now if I could get my hands on this and if it actually worked, I would be a most delighted old bitty.

save the drunkard

I thought that was what that “Anabuse” pill was for – to make you puke every time you take a drink.

I Don’t Seek Approval, Party Like It’s 1899, and Things that Don’t Suck

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2013I usually don’t succumb to the lure of corny party kitsch, but the light up necklace was cute.

I’ve said before I don’t deal much in the currency of optimism, so I don’t see this year being much of an improvement over last.  In fact, I started today out rather depressed.  Today’s been one of those days where I’m actually trolling for things to cheer me up a bit.  I’m actively fighting against the urge to just concede to the Dark Funk and give up.  I guess the fact that I’m fighting the temptation to just give into hopelessness is either a good sign, or it’s just an unwillingness to face the reality that my life is pretty much hopeless.

The best way to give myself a reality check, I’ve discovered is to make three lists- Things that Suck that I Can’t Change, Things that Suck that I Can Change, and Things that Don’t Suck.

Things that Suck that I Can’t Change:

Obama.  ‘Nuff said.

Personal poverty/ not being financially independent

Being stuck in Ohio, especially in the winter

Health issues* (can mitigate but not eliminate- bad heredity and effects from past diseases/injuries suck)

Jerry – especially when he gets into his “bitch about everything and blame everything on me” mode

Things that Suck that I Can (*theoretically anyway) Change

My own reaction to things that suck

My neglect of friends that I should make an effort to see and communicate with more often

I already turn off the “mainstream” TV news (can’t handle the constant Obama worship) and I already avoid following garbage on TV such as anything Honey Boo Boo or the Kardashians are doing.  Admittedly I probably get into true crime shows (TruTV, Discovery ID, etc.) and the Military Channel way too much.  I should probably cut down on “World’s Dumbest” and “1000 Ways to Die” and get back into reading a lot more than I do now (although I read a lot by any standard) and maybe get into something a bit more uplifting than unsolved murders, people earning their Darwin Awards, and 20th century history.  I mean, how much is left unturned regarding WWII and Adolf Hitler?

Things that Don’t Suck

God

The dogs and cats

The vacuum cleaner when it gets clogged up with Tipsy McNumbNuts’ cigarette pack cellophanes (the irony of which is that it sucks when the vacuum cleaner doesn’t…)

vacuumThere is no vacuum cleaner made that I don’t have to unclog, tear apart and otherwise rework every time I use the damned thing.

2013 pic

Somehow the deer in the headlights look is a little too typical for me.

Now that I’ve determined that God and the dogs and cats don’t suck, then it should probably follow that I should spend my time in the company of Entities that Don’t Suck as much as I can.

not dead yetSince for now I do appear to be vertical and sucking up valuable oxygen, let’s be creative and try to enjoy it!

I rather enjoy Victorian ephemera- especially patent medicines and other creepy stuff from that era.  I’m surprised anyone survived being treated with the stuff they used as medicine back then, since most of it included either alcohol or opium or various poisons like arsenic, but even today there’s some pretty questionable stuff being used as medicine.

pain killer axe woundImagine the same scenario today, only the rednecks have chainsaws, and the little girl has a bottle of moonshine.

Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose.

That’s actually one of the few French phrases I remember from high school French class (Why in the hell did I take French?  Did I think I was going to be deported to Quebec?) and it means, “The more things change, the more they stay the same.”  Yes, they do, and not always in a good way.

Mugwump VDI didn’t think Harry Potter had to worry about VD.  Or was that “mugworts?” That sounds like VD anyway.  Something like that.

I’m thinking “Bad Hump” would be a better name for a VD cure-all.  “Take this stuff for last week’s bad hump.”  Or you could just leave it to Dr. Butts:

butts_dispensaryI want to be cured via the US Postal Service.   By Dr. Butts. Yeah.

It’s really kind of scary considering that there really were no cures for VD in Victorian times, and if you got the syph or the clap it could kill you.   Sort of like AIDS today, and heaven only knows whatever other deadly STDs are lurking out there that nobody knows about yet.  Forced chastity might bite in a lot of ways, but I’m old enough to know that 1.) no man is worth a deadly disease, and 2.) there are such things as “meat substitutes” if you get my drift.  The advantage of the “meat substitute” is you don’t have to fix it dinner or unclog its cigarette pack cellophanes from the vacuum cleaner.   I only wish I’d figured that out 20 years ago. Just don’t run out of batteries.

piles-cure01va

Piles: Old time word for “hemorrhoid” – just an FYI

Why is it that back in the day being German cast some sort of legitimacy upon medical quackery?  And I find it hard to believe that a medical doctor would spend most of his life on a hemorrhoid cure, but then everyone needs a purpose.  I’ve still not figured out exactly why I’m still sucking up valuable oxygen, so I’m the last one to talk.

valium_bigThe 20th century wasn’t much better, but at least you could get a good night’s rest, forget about your hemorrhoids AND forget about your pathetic lack of self-esteem!

Stop Misanglody, Jezebel’s First Road Trip, and Lilo’s Butt Funk

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equal rightsBack in the late 1800’s and early 1900’s there were a lot of Americans who weren’t terribly fond of the Irish.

Misanglody (N): 1.)The condition of loathing all things white, Anglo-Saxon and/or Protestant.  2.) A rather pervasive and pernicious form of racism prevalent in the United States, generally ignored when directed against traditional white conservatives. 3.) Cracka-hating.

Granted, a lot of the fear generated in the late 19th and early 20th centuries regarding immigration to the U.S. had more to do with religion than country of origin.  Many people in this country were afraid of Catholics (because of their belief in the primacy of the pope and the fact that the Mass was said in Latin rather than in English) and were afraid the Catholics would take over.   This sounds sort of crazy today but before Vatican II, Catholics referred to other Christians (i.e. Protestants and Orthodox) as “heathens.”  Today Catholics have a more beneficent term for Protestants and Orthodox: “separated brethren.”

That’s a little nicer, but as someone who was raised in Catholicism, I will tell you that the Catholics still teach that their goal on this earth is to convert others (including Protestants and Orthodox) to Catholicism.  If you’re a Protestant or Orthodox, according to Catholics, you might be Christian, but you don’t have the Faith in its completeness.  Catholic theology is an interesting study- and as a confessional Lutheran I am not too far removed from it, but I don’t subscribe to it 100% either.  I got lost on the pope thing as well I got lost on the prayers to dead people thing.  To each his or her own, and I know a lot of Catholics that live good Christian lives, but I can’t consider myself to be a Catholic because I don’t subscribe to Catholicism 100%. That’s one of the Catholic Rules, that you agree 100% with their rules.  Which makes me a Protestant by definition. Just sayin’.

indulgencesThis was some of the same stuff Martin Luther had problems with 500 years ago.  I’m not saying all Catholics are party to the corruption, or that Protestants are scandal-free, but it’s still there.  Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose.

Today most Americans aren’t particularly wicky about either Irish people (though I know a few people who aren’t really fond of Bono) or Catholics, which is a good thing.  I don’t have a problem with Catholics other than I don’t entirely agree with them, and as far as Irish people go I can’t say much, because a good number of my ancestors are English and Scots- just different parts of the same island.

cracker

Anyway, the point is that racism (as well as the myth that freedom of religion means freedom from religion) in this country should be a thing of the past.  It’s not, and it shouldn’t be, acceptable to use the “n” word or other racially derisive terms in public discourse.  But it seems to be perfectly OK to lampoon the “Cracka Nation” with impunity, and when white people say anything about it they get responses such as,

“White people don’t understand racism,”  or worse, “You can’t be racist against whites.”  Really?

I beg to differ, and hence, I bring to light the phenomenon of misanglody.

The popular culture is full of examples of the bumbling, inept WASP male and/or the ditzy WalMart queen WASP female.  Even in advertising, take notice how often the fall guy is a white guy.  To someone who only sees American culture from what they watch on TV, they might leave with the misconception that all white guys are Larry the Cable Guy (no offense to Larry the Cable Guy, but not all white men cut the sleeves off their shirts) and all white women are just like Honey Boo Boo’s mother.

not accurateI have body hair issues but even I don’t have five o’clock shadow like that.  Nor do I have three chins.

I do admit there are aspects of white culture that deserve the derision they get.  One is British cuisine.  Haggis and kidney pie do NOT sound appetizing in any remote fashion.  My ancestors may be Scots, but I can’t bring myself to eat mutton in any form.  The dogs eat mutton because that’s what’s in their dog food, but dogs lick their own butts and eat cat shit any time they get the opportunity to do so.  Just because the dogs eat something doesn’t mean it’s edible for humans.   I really don’t get the idea behind eating kidneys either.  I do eat sushi, (on the rare occasion I can afford good sushi) which might not make too much sense, but I just can’t get beyond the gross factor on haggis or kidneys.  Head cheese is another one I can’t get.  The fun fact about head cheese is that it is not cheese at all.

Haggis-001Do you eat the stomach “casing” too? Ewwwwwww!

So called “white supremacists” deserve the derision they get as well.  Hitler is not a role model.  Obama is not white, but he also is not a role model for the same reason.  Both Hitler and Obama are racists, just against different groups.  Anyone who goes around spouting hate against other races and nationalities- as opposed to pointing out faulty ideology or bad public policy- deserves to be called out for it.  I don’t believe white people are any better than anyone else, but I don’t believe we’re any worse either, unless you are taking into account that most of us can’t dance.

alcoholI couldn’t dance even when I could drink.

On another note, Miss Jezebel went on her first road trip yesterday.  I decided since I had to take Lilo to the vet yesterday to get meds for her re-occuring butt funk (seborrhagic dermatitis) that I would take Jezebel as well because she’s had a slight but lingering bit of the eye crusties and some sneezing.  So Miss Jezebel rode up to the vet’s tucked into my hoodie.  At least I have a closer estimate on her age (12-14 weeks) and have verified her gender.  Jezebel is definitely a girl.  She didn’t seem to mind the road trip at all, and was most compliant even getting eye ointment (most cats loathe this) and taking liquid Amoxicillin.  Usually I really hate giving cats either eye drops or liquids by mouth, because they normally hate it and it’s a good way to get scratched and/or bitten.  She has gotten through two doses of each without much fuss.  Let’s hope it’s that easy for the rest of the 10 days.

366So far, I can even give her meds without resorting to welding gloves again.

Lilo is the easiest creature on the planet to medicate.  She will even take Keflex without protest (getting it down Clara was an adventure, and yes, it does taste nasty) as long as it’s included in a bite of cottage cheese.  The combo of Keflex and Prednisone will clear up her butt funk, but I feel for her.  She does great with oral meds but isn’t so cool with the bath part of the treatment.  Baths were not suggested for Jezebel, which is quite fine with me.

liloallhangoutMost of the time Lilo is mellow.  Except when her butt itches.