Last week I was waiting for Chelsea to get out of work so we could head to the cat cafe (again), so I'm heading down to Georgetown. Y'all know Georgetown. It's the bougiest place on Earth. I have not even remotely the money to buy some of the clothes I like in the the designer shops there and it hits me, "the fuck?! How does Georgetown not have a record store, or one that I know of?" Google search, boom. Hill & Dale Records. I don't get my hopes up. What are the chances it's indie in this neighborhood?

End up finding it in this little hidden back alley I'd never noticed that opens into a gorgeous courtyard. Place looks so tiny but they have an incredible, absurdly eclectic mix, and the owner, Rob, one of the coolest guys I've talked to, is cranking from the most expensive, beautiful setup Technics deck I've ever seen. A $4k table with a $4k needle at least. So I'm happy to be browsing jazz with the punk with the indie with the local with the world and just loving it. And what do I finally find, the thing I've been checking every local shop for since October?

Fuckin' Sunn O))) + Scott Walker - Soused. Never have I been so excited to drop that much on a record. I find a great shop owner, a great location, a great collection, a record I've been searching high and low for, and I got to support it all. It's such a unique feeling, having all that come together perfectly, on on whim of "fuck I'm bored let's wander". It's not just a 'support your local record store and musicians, kiddo because capitalism is a cold bitch and then we die", it's just the whole process is so... Human and global. Musicians put their heart out there, a guy opens a shop that won't ever make him rich because he's passionate, and same dude has his life brightened because it came together, passionate about all of it. It's how everything should work in life.

Before I left, he puts on the most entrancing thing. Something just so familiar I couldn't place. The Blade Runner soundtrack. I couldn't get it out of my mind after leaving, so of course I had to go back the next day and pick that up. I'll gladly empty my wallet for any of that.

That's a major part of my point. The culture of the site isn't immediately clear to new users, as it isn't with most sites immediately. But no one ever listened to the time-wisened knowledge of "lurk moar." Since we're so small, a ton of redditors will come in at the same time, believe we're a reddit clone, and will treat it like a reddit clone, none the wiser that what they're doing is contrary to what we are trying to do here. It's not their fault, it's just that since they came in with a bunch of redditors, their experience here is.... a bunch of redditors.

It's hard to try to quantify and lay out to people the difference too. Saying "we care about personal relationships with other users" and "your network of people, ideas, sites, and connections is a vital component here" and "the experience is truly more in line with a coffee shop, or a pub, or any sort of local hub with people you love than an internet community". These are abstract ideas, and ones that other sites will use, and ignore, and they think it close enough to reddit that people will start to get angry at central components of the site, telling the people who have been here for years that they're wrong for wanting it one way or being resistant to change. And don't get me wrong, we value new ideas, but the angry vitriol people come in isn't new. You know how many times we've had to fight users about the mute function? It's tiring. I understand not wanting to put up with another month of assholes coming in and ruining something you love. I understand having a socialist, feminist safe space cut out for you on the site, only to have it shit on by assholes who don't get it over and over and over as new people come in.

The important thing is the people like you who come here, don't want to step on toes, do want to understand, and do contribute a very large amounts of good quality. But that's such a minority on the internet. That's why we're small anyway. People will come in, self-centered, see a platform to preach their stale language from, and will be angry when they're not given voice. Reddit serves that masturbatory sense of ego, where here, if there are people who want to listen, they will. If people don't want to, they won't, just like in real life. If you have the self-awareness of "I've made bad habits", and "I want to learn", and "I would hate to step on the culture". you're a hubskier that we want here. That's what we strive for. If it's the people saying "I want to shape this place for my voice", get the fuck out of my coffee shop.

Hi there!

Kevin was ten of my closest friends best friend, and I work for his alma mater!

Go fuck yourself you vile, racist piece of shit!

There was a debate when I was in high school over whether students should avoid reading that word when reading Huck Finn. Someone even released editions sanitized of it. Our school, thankfully, had a massive push back against that. Removing that part of history, and removing the struggle of black men in the story, and removing Mark Twain's harsh criticism of racism and that word not only completely misses the point, it's racist itself. It's harmful. I consider it akin to trying to hide the atrocities we committed against the Native Americans.

Yes, it's horrific. Yes, it's a heavy word that should not be used without purpose, but it's still unfortunately a word. It's a word deeply intertwined with our nation's horrible history.

The terrible thing is this polemic I'm writing is exactly the kind of thing that gets warped by internet white boys as a justification for using the word, and that we shouldn't have any restrictions on what we say in the form of judgement or consequences of choices of words, and they'll go on to say that judging them or calling their usage out as problematic is an offense on free speech. Which is not at all what I'm saying. Call out culture is extremely useful in educating, and is an active strategy in deconstructing the issues in our culture and society, many of which are unseen by the ruling class many times, and especially ending the silence on these things. And it doesn't have to be from a place of anger! Here's how this should go, first in the context of using the word in historical context like Huck Finn, and then in the larger:

"Reading Huck Finn includes many passages of hatred of people based on their skin color, including a vile word used to dehumanize and demean POC for centuries now. This is a very important word in our country, and should not be used lightly, but in respect for the people who went through these atrocities, we have to respect that it was there, it happened, and requires acknowledgement. Erasing the blood erases the conflict and the people who suffered."

Now in a casual setting with a friend:

"Hey sorry, you just used the word 'gypsy'. I know that's the term you've probably learned, but it's unfortunately a slur that's been used for a long time, including in genocides against Roma people. Generally the preferred term in Roma or Romani." and that can be more detailed or less. It can be as simple as "oh gypsy is a slur, by the way.", and you can continue education from there if they like. The problems arise when you say, "oh hey that's a slur" and they return with "what? No it's not. I've always used it. I'm not racist. What the fuck is wrong with you?" or "i don't give a fuck, that's the term I'm going to continue to use." and it becomes understandable why they things become escalated. Of course it's an issue when the starting point is "fuck you, you're a racist, I'm calling for your head" because our country is woefully terrible at teaching about the struggles of minority peoples the world over, but even of our own country. Education when you have it is great, and calling things out directly to people is a fantastic way of letting them know.

But it seems there's a rabid section of people completely opposed to the idea of confronting that they've been wrong, taught wrong, or know something wrong. Saying something racist unknowingly doesn't make you a racist, it just makes you ignorant of the history of a word. Knowing that it's wrong and being able to correct yourself is how you become a better person. We're going to say racist, or sexist, or transphobic things until we die because so much of it is ingrained in our society. Actively attempting to remove these things from your own vocabulary is important. Saying "I don't want them calling me out" or "I'm going to continue saying these things because free speech" is like saying "I know I'm saying the wrong thing, and I don't care that it's used for dehumanization", and that is a fucking problem.

...

"We are assembled here today to pay final respects to our honored dead. And yet it should be noted, in the midst of our sorrow, this death takes place in the shadow of new life, the sunrise of a new world; a world that our beloved comrade gave his life to protect and nourish. He did not feel this sacrifice a vain or empty one, and we will not debate his profound wisdom at these proceedings. Of my friend, I can only say this: Of all the souls I have encountered in my travels, his was the most... human."

EDIT: I was holding up until I came across that quote and then choked up. But I lost it after seeing his last tweet. I can't comprehend that level of acceptance of mortality, and in the moments leading up to your death, having the clarity and ability to put something valuable out there.

Boil or nearly boil water

Fill a mug to the brim with whiskey

throw out the water.

Done.

They is also generally accepted as a gender-neutral singular, and is generally the preferred pronoun of many gender non-binary people.

I have actually been taking it upon myself in the last few months to substitute they wherever possible when a gendered pronoun occurs, because I would like to break down the usage of assumption of gender or placing a gender on someone that may be incorrect.

Fun story time:

I moved to DC a few years ago. When I did so, I had no house and no job. I was absolutely, insanely lucky to get both within three days. Even more incredibly, the housing situation I got was... free.

The deal I got from her daughter-- who was running this whole operation-- was that I live in the English basement of a very nice, very expensive house of a woman that came from old, old Pullman money. She was 82 and her mental health was failing, and she recently crashed her car because of her lack of mental faculties. My job was to help her out for 15 hours a week, mostly by driving her whenever she needed. I worked nearby, so if she ever needed me to come back to drive her, it wouldn't be a problem. Of course, this became insanely frustrating because she was determined to be independent and drive herself. I ended up having to play a coy game with her daughter of intentionally "losing" the key so she wouldn't drive, deal with her resentment for it, and do more and more basic things for her as her health declined. At a certain point, I was making or driving her to nearly every meal she had because she simply could not cook anymore. She'd leave the stove running for hours, or, more often, would try to eat raw meat because she forget that you have to cook things, and then would argue that's she's been doing it for decades and I'm trying to take away her freedom.

My point is, it was stressful. It became almost a much more time consuming ordeal, and I was keeping logs of everything I was doing for her daughter as well as keeping tabs of her disease's progression (a mix of things, really, but Alzheimer's early stages with rapidly progressing dementia were among them. Other things I'm not sure of, but the Alzheimer's clearly wasn't the primary issue at the time I was there.)

After some time, she started taking longer vacations to her farm up in Vermont. Getting out of the city was good, and the DC weather was becoming more unbearable for her. When this happened, her daughter decided I was would need to continue to 'earn my rent' somehow, and I was asked to do some physical labor around the house. I had no problem with that at first, but it eventually became a "please do all the yardwork that hasn't been done in a year or more around the sides and back of the house." This was a problem for two reasons for me:

1.) It was the dead of DC summer, so really fucking hot, and really fucking humid.

2.) The yards were formed entirely of ivy, kudzu, and bamboo. If you don't know what those three plants are like, they grow fast. The bamboo at this point was near 20 feet fall and the kudzu hid an entire alcove I didn't even know existed. The ivy covered paths and went halfway up the side of the house.

Regardless, I still felt I should do it because, hey, free rent. However, the daughter (or at least her husband), felt I wasn't do it fast enough. One week after asking me to do all of this, while I'm still working full time at two jobs on campus, they emailed me that I wasn't earning my keep. I apologized, worked harder on it (about three hours an evening or more at this point), and completed everything else they added to my list.

As I was cutting out the last of the bamboo and kudzu and whatever else was in there in a particularly productive feeling evening, I went back in, showered, and sat down to realize I had spent seven straight hours clearing everything away. I had 36 mosquito bites, 12 open cuts on my arms, and my muscles were killing me, but it felt great to complete it. Even better knowing that I had completed three days before, finally, after three years of fighting with terribly ruin bureaucracies at universities, I'd be taking classes for real, with good financial aid, and making just enough to be able to pay the remainder off.

I then checked my phone to see an email from the daughter saying that, with her mother traveling so much more lately, and they're trips to see her, they would need to start charging me $1500 a month because it was just very expensive to not do so. They knew full well I couldn't afford it, they knew full well that I was finally starting school, and worse, they framed it as a benefit for her mother, that they would be getting her a nurse (which, I happened to know was a lie, and here, years later, speaking to her neighbor I still know who is close with the mother, know was a lie because they have another student paying them and no nurse has ever visited), and claiming the cost was an insult to me personally as every single person in that family was making a half million a year, not to mention the amounts of money the woman had in the first place.

I had 30 days to find a new place, move out, move into the new place, while starting school, and a full time job, and having no vehicle to speak of. They burned me bad. The worst I've ever been burned.

I'm still reeling from the financial consequences of the entire ordeal because I ended up four miles from work, school, and home from any point. This was around the time I was having my massive, literally paralyzing headaches I was telling some people about at the hubski meetup, and I had to be biking everywhere. This stopped when I had to eventually go to the emergency room for the headaches, and drop out of my classes because I could not physically make it anymore, and pay way more money than I had between transportation, money owed to the university (which ended up being double the original amount monthly because-- surprise! clerical errors), and my insane fucking rent for a tyrant, bourgeois landlord, and the sky high utilities. No food. I didn't have money to buy food. My bosses, the saints that they are, bought all my food, outside my occasional things simply to remain sane.

So anyway, rambling aside, fuck bourgeois shits. Fuck kicking people out of the place they live to make more money. Fuck capitalism.

Ugh.

I've still been away for a while, but this topic irks me so much for some reason that I have to jump into the fold again.

I eat meat. I enjoy meat a lot. I've been a hunter for a decade now as well, but very rarely get out. Guns and ammo are expensive, yo. nowaypablo mentioned getting a wild pig. I can tell you nothing is more exhilarating and terrifying than boar hunting. And really, Pablo, we should do that some time.

So that's one level of things to tackle. People want to make that mention of 'more ethical meat'. So let's lay out the levels of arguments on meat.

-The one I already mentioned, those that don't oppose meat eating when you're hunting for it, or at a stricter level, those are hunt meat to survive. These are the vegetarians that are able to take a step back from their First World privilege where they have the ability to not eat meat and recognize that other places in the world have no choice. Okay. Cool.

-The types of people that have no problems with meat being eaten by others, but don't personally want to. I don't see an issue with this. These are people that are usually conflicted in some way about taking a life or find animals adorable or have the ability to not eat meat without much issue. They recognize that they have their choices, and other people have theirs, and stepping into others' lives claiming 'ethics' is a breach of boundaries and common decency, despite whether they believe animals have freedom of choice or consciousness.

-The vegetarian, usually vegan as well, that opposes the entire entire of meat or animal products, that they are morally superior for not using these products in any way at all, and it is their god-given duty (and I mean God-given, as this more closely resembles Christian religious evangelism than anything else) to tell every last person on Earth about it. These are the people who don't take a step back from their position of privilege to understand there are other circumstances, and who will spout that even 'free range animals would prefer to be free than eaten :)' when, no, in reality, they'll still be eaten, just not by humans, and I don't think you understand that wolves don't have consideration for ethical killing, nor do they really care about the quality of life of creatures living in the wild vs. living in a range managed by humans. I think this is the most fantasy world that's most disconnecting humans and animals, despite their claims of "one in the same!" because they have some idea of an equation where "animals - humans = peaceful harmony where everything lives forever and is cute and happier."

-Lastly, the people who don't oppose meat, but oppose factory farms. I feel like factory farms are what lead most people to be vegetarians in the first place. I subscribe to this pretty well, for a lot of reasons. Nothing should have to have a miserable life, whether it has consciousness or not. A chicken doesn't care if its life purpose is to be eaten, but it does care if it never moves. Animals should have a high standard of living that meets or exceeds what it would in the wild (i.e. space, regular feeding, medication, safety). Beyond this, at a capitalist level, removing corporations and strong-arming small and family farms is absolutely fucking vital to every country. Allowing corporations to wholesale owning agriculture and food is one of the most dangerous things possible in the long term, and it isn't addressed enough.

Of course I have conflicted feelings on eating meat. There's always the chance of it turning out that every animal on Earth is exactly as conscious and aware of everything as humans are. But I don't see where that leads to making eating meat morally wrong. Everything dies at some point. Everything. Death is the absolute most important part of the life cycle. Why it shouldn't serve a purpose of sustenance of other creatures and enjoyment of others is beyond me. To discuss moral questions, one of the things that rustles my feathers most is Western human funeral procedures. We die, fill our bodies with toxic chemicals, seal them in boxes, and bury them, where they cannot become a part of the life cycle, and don't feed other creatures. How is that not wrong? We should provide animals freedom to die, or be eaten by other animals, but when you factor humans into the creatures that eat them, it becomes different because we're aware of what we're doing, or planning it agriculturally somehow it inverts it? And at the same time, we don't believe in the Earth completing its cycles naturally in our deaths, and well, fucking billions of other ways as well.

But sure. I can't actually come up with a reason why one should eat meat, in a wealthy, first world country with other options. Because there are other options, and you are taking a life from eating meat. If you find that makes you uncomfortable, that's your own right. There's nothing wrong with not eating meat. I simply don't find anything particularly wrong with eating it either. That's my stance, at least. I enjoy it. I don't find qualms with myself enjoying it. It's going to get eaten completely regardless, by other animals or 'eaten' by the soil when it dies. 'Life' is such weird, vague, ethereal concept to the human mind as it is, limiting it to the discussion of whether we should eat something is bewildering.

Personal anecdote on hunting: I have always found that hunting-- and most other hunters seem to think this way too, across the whole gamut of people who hunt-- is an activity that is completely a commune with nature and evokes an enormous respect for the world around you. I can't express what it's like to be tracking a deer for three days in the woods. You have every kind of life around you, and the majority of your time is spent is silence, and hopefully reverence. You try to understand the patterns of everything around you and the animal you're hunting. The kill isn't really the focal point at all, it's usually just a rote part of the cycle. You kill the animal to clean the animal, the use the parts of the animal for a world of necessary things, and you have the meat and energy provided by the animal to sustain yourself and others. It's a wonderful thing. And that hippy-dippy "one with nature" bullshit isn't possible without something like that. You can't separate yourself from animals and believe that you're respecting it when you simply close your eyes and cover your ears as to how the systems of nature work. It's belittling to believe you love the animals and respect them just because you don't eat them.

This reads more spiritual than I meant for it to be. Perhaps that's good, because most of the arguments against meat seem to read spiritually as well.

FINAL UPDATE OF THE EVENING

Truly astounding work. +!

I've been following all this since the story broke. This is going to have big repercussions. Maker fired half their company almost, it's suspicious that the author was "super not fired" after having a "miscommunication", the devs banded together in a way that is already leading to RebelJam, the women have all released their own statements that have gone gangbusters everywhere across the web, and the entire world is watching and every corporation is learning hard and fast that the way they've been treating the gaming development community just went up in flames in a single day. Maker and Polaris are reeling and any and all things considered standard in the development and marketing houses are going to be questioned and will come under fire, heavily from outside, without a doubt, and enough to make changes, but the banding of the devs is the real story here. That's going to continue to grow, and knowing how terribly they're treated, revolt will happen.

It's a really exciting time to be a gamer.

Whoa whoa whoa, no one said that. Maps, stripes, music, ads, clovers. This is clearly all an elaborate game to finding DB Cooper's treasure!

Ads - D.B. became a cultural phenomenon. Between "Cooper Day" in Ariel Washington, souvenirs sold of him, and all the books written about him, there are ads about him everywhere.

Maps - lil said it's of the Canadian North, but no, really it's the Pacific Northwest, with topography removed to obfuscate the area being shown.

Stripes - Longitude and latitude lines, of course, showing a zoomed in view of the precise spot where the money is buried, with topography removed again.

Music - Oh my there is quite a bit

Clovers - This one is the coup d'etat of the whole riddle. It seems so simple at first: it's Washington State, there are clovers everywhere, but it's better than that, O my brothers. No, you see, originally it was thought that Cooper landed near the base of Mt. St. Helen's, near Ariel, Washington, but later they discovered that due to manual flying based on Cooper's demands, they were south-southeast of that, near the Washougal River. Now this is full forest here, where someone can easily disappear, even if someone's looking for them. If someone were to know what they were doing, they could navigate through Gifford Pinchot and Mt. Rainier parks, worth their way towards Puget Sound. Of course, if they were carrying $200,000 in cash, there would be no way someone could make it through the Sound and past Seattle uncaught, so they would have to hide it for a while, while things cooled off enough to come back for it. And what's just south of the sound, just North of the National Parks and only around four hour's drive from the Washougal River? Clover Creek.. Cooper probably wasn't expecting the fact that he was so close to McChord AFB either. Look at this map, see how close he was, how he had to go around it, after trekking through land just outside the search range. He had to make his way around it though to get to the Sound. No way that any plan he had at this point to carry the money with him will go through, no matter what his plan was already through that area. So he had to ditch it there. Bury it in a memorable spot near the Creek and go until he could come back for it when things cooled off.

What happened to Cooper that he wasn't able to retrieve it? Who knows. Maybe _refugee_ knows. Maybe she's the only child of DB Cooper. Maybe she is DB Cooper and this is the elaborate way for the person most cunning, most willing to go search for it to find it, so DB can finally rest. A true riddle indeed.

I'm fairly into football. I try not to talk about it around people too often, but it's an invaluable tool for making connections with higher ups at work, and as well as a nice little thing to get excited over for no reason, and a proxy for war or battle in some ways. Anyway.

This has actually been a pretty quickly growing topic of conversation among fans: we simply can't afford it. I have never been to a football game, and I never will, because I cannot afford, nor can I justify, spending a minimum of a hundred dollars to see a game, and more realistically closer to 500. That's exorbitant to a point we know money is the purpose here. Add to that the expensive packages to watch games that aren't local on TV, and it feels worse. Add to that the fact that if the NFL does not sell literally all of their overpriced seats, they refuse to show it on TV, and you feel even worse. (Note: I'm aware it was for protecting TV originally, but it certainly is not anymore.)

On top of all these, this year there was the revelation that the NFL had been usually significant amounts of money to suppress studies showing the effects of head injuries to protect themselves, and being in a country where there's already such a huge wealth divide, in a sport where the majority of fans are well below the wealthy line, it becomes hard to ignore how bourgeois the whole spectacle is, and that's the death knell for a lot of us. We look to the sport as an escape for that shit, where you can throw yourself entirely behind a team, make it a proxy for a country, or an ideology, or a cause, where if you win, great, you feel good, if you lose, it's all meaningless anyway.. When it becomes consumed by wealth the way it is, you can't get your mind off it, and win or lose, you're still losing as a fan, so you feel nothing but anger.

This season was big for me, because I went into it extremely excited. I followed everything from the draft, I had high hopes for my teams, and hoped well on some others, and mediocrity for the ones I hate, but I just stopped being happy about any of it halfway through the season, despite it being historic in a lot of ways. I barely watched anymore games. I don't get the rush I used to because they've become a symptom of the problem instead of entertainment. I don't know that I'll come back at all next year outside of following scores.

Posted this in another thread, but thought it appropriate to share here as well:

I was yet to be born, but my father had the best story which was handed down to me rather fittingly. He was in a screening of the Yellow Submarine that night. It was a packed theater and he went alone, but when he came out, he got in his car, turned on the radio... and they were telling of the assassination. He said the entire parking lot stood still. No one moved their cars, they all just sat and silently listened. The first thing he did was he went out and grabbed the local newspaper when they printed it with the story. He brought it home and read the pages and pages they had on his life and the Beatles while he listened to this collection of their love songs he had. He slipped the newspaper in their for one reason or another. In 2008, I removed myself from his life. He's not a good man, but while I was moving out, he was also about to sell his house. He once cared greatly for music, but since he took up with his girlfriend, he pushed aside all rock music as garbage, and said I could take his record collection. I did so happily as a collector myself. After going through everything for a few months I found the gatefold of love songs. I didn't even notice the newspaper until I have halfway through side two of the first LP, but when I did I read every bit of the paper. It was the closest to living that night and knowing the importance he held to everyone in the two decades that proceeded his assassination. It was a truly poignant experience. I asked my mother about it one day because they were already a couple at that point. She had a glimmer of recognition and remembrance. I haven't seen that before or since, her reliving or telling of her youth in any way. It was even more astounding seeing his face when I showed him the paper. For a minute or two while he told me the story it was actually like seeing him from when he still had passions and humanity, back when the Beatles really were a massive influence on his life and beliefs before drugs, alcohol, and deceit became him. It was probably the most information I'll ever get about them or their lives together, and it was mostly a look in their faces. All because of a newspaper reminding them of a single night.