In Other News...

 Or, In Case You Missed It...

Image by Steve Buissinne from Pixabay

This is a weekly column consisting of letters to my perspicacious progeny — the Stickies — to advise 'em now, haunt them after I'm deleted.

Trigger Warning: This column is rated SSC-65: Sexy Seasoned Citizens   

About 

Glossary 

Featuring {Dana}: Persistent auditory hallucination and charming literary device 

Things come and go in the news cycle like waves of fever." -Adam Curtis

Dear Stickies (and gentlereaders),  

On my website, underneath the picture of the very happy baby taking a sink shower, it says Don't demonize, compromise. 

Given the state of The Republic, and the state of its citizenry, it would seem that what it takes to hold a republic together (the same thing it takes to hold any sort of relationship together, compromise) often gets lost in the shuffle. 

Being a (the) glass-is-half-empty sort of dude, I worry that many of muh fellow 'mericans (Lyndon Johnsonese for my fellow Americans) are so caught up in never-ending Blue team vs. the Red team dramas that they're oblivious to the need for compromise to maintain a peaceful playground. 

{Lyndon who?}

However, World Aquatics "...formerly known as...[the] International Swimming Federation, is the international federation recognized by the International Olympic Committee... for administering international competitions in water sports" according to Wikipedia, is setting a good example.  

{Internationally?}

 Last year World Aquatics decided to ban transwomen from competing against women born that way. 

{Just what is a woman anyway?}

However, they also promised to experiment with adding an "open" category for 50 and 100m races in which transwomen are welcome. 

From a post on the SwimSwam website: “This pioneering pilot project highlights the organization’s unwavering commitment to inclusivity, welcoming swimmers of all sex and gender identities,” a quote they attribute to World Aquatics. 

Unfortunately, for some reason, no-body has taken them up on the offer according to an article on The Guardian website. Go figure.

Penis Pics in the News:  Financial sextortion, "...in which predators befriend victims online under false pretenses, entice them to send incriminating photos and then demand payment under threat that they’ll expose the photos to family and friends," according to the Washington Post has become a RBFD "with teen boys being specific targets."

Given the number of horror stories/specific examples cited in a very detailed article, I agree. Geesh, sometimes I'm grateful that...

{Let me guess, this is today's official reason you're glad you're old.}

Getting older, Dana, getting older. However, I was a fairly modest young man of um... average dimensions back in the day so I probably wouldn't have...

{Ah geeze!}

Hey, I checked alright, and I'm delighted to say that...

{Moving on... please?}

Absabalutely. According to "...Lauren Coffren, executive director of the Exploited Children Division at the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC)...NCMEC, which serves as a clearinghouse for records of abuse, received more than 10,000 tips of financial sextortion of minors, primarily boys, in 2022...

By the end of July 2023, NCMEC had already received more than 12,500 reports... ."

{Looks like the perpetrators of the famous Nigerian Prince scam have moved on to greener pastures.}

 Nope. 

The Nigerian Prince is alive and well according to a firm called Abnormal Security, and is using artificial intelligence technology to improve his/her/their bottom line. 

"Abnormal recently uncovered more than a thousand attacks targeting organizations using at least 70 unique email addresses."

{Oh, please. Surely nobody falls for these things anymore, and they're easy to spot 'cause of the goofy spelling and grammar.}

"Spelling mistakes and grammatical errors have long been characteristics of an attack, making them easy to spot even if they did land in the inbox. But with the rise of generative AI, this is no longer the case."

{I've heard that one of the ways teachers and professors can spot papers written by AI is by noticing the spelling and grammar of a given paper is just too perfect. Still, I can't believe that the "Nigerian Princes" are fooling anyone.}

Note from my first quote that they're targeting "organizations" nowadays. There must be a reason... Also, they're not still sending 'em out because they never work. It's my guess the organizations in question don't want word to get out and that for the bad guys it's like they're playing the lottery with tons of free tickets, knowing that, occasionally, they're going to win.

Dear The Guardian, I'm sorry that like many formerly profitable newspapers, you're finding it hard to make a buck, or in your case being UK-based, a quid.

The Guardian, quoted at the beginning of this column, has been around for just over 200 years. It's not been either privately owned or run by a profit-seeking corporation of some sort since 1936. 

"Profits are reinvested in its journalism rather than distributed to owners or shareholders." -Wikipedia

It describes itself as being a centre-left publication; I think that clearly-left(wing) is a more accurate description but I'm not a regular reader. But of course, I support their right to describe themselves as they please, and to hold whatever other opinions they please as well. 

{You spelled center wrong.}

No, I didn't. 

Ironically, given their political/social/cultural stances, they became a non-profit way back in 1936 to get around paying "death duties"(taxes). When a newspaper owner died back then, death duties also occasionally killed his/her/their newspaper. 

{Okaaay. But why...} 

Because when I land on their website, which only happens when I click on a link while doing research, or a link in something I'm reading sends me there I'll be asked to "Fund independent journalism for $5 per month" and/or "Register: it's quick and easy," that is to say, provide them with my email address. 

But they promise not to sell it, or any of the info they collect on me... if I click on a button or two. They just want to serve me better. 

Occasionally, I've been met with a relatively lengthy message that informs me that I've been to their site __ times now so I really should consider contributing. Fine, you have my permission to sell any data you compile on me -- although you don't legally need it and will do it anyway if I don't opt out.

If not for what must be some seriously bad karma that has resulted in... well, never mind, there are enough whiney, retired Boomers with pathetic fixed incomes loose in the world, I'd be contributing to newspapers left, right, and center to keep 'em all going. 

Good luck, and think about trying truck lorry driving school.  

Poppa loves you,

Have an OK day

Scroll down to leave a comment, share my work, or access my golden oldies.   

I post links to my columns on both Facebook and the social media site formerly known as Twitter so you can love me, hate me, or lobby to have me canceled or publically flogged. Cranky don't tweet (X-claim?).  

  

I ATE NOTHING BUT PIZZA FOR 30 DAYS AND THIS IS WHAT HAPPENED!

Actually, I did no such thing. 

Image by James Oladujoye from Pixabay

This is a weekly column consisting of letters to my perspicacious progeny — the Stickies — to advise 'em now, haunt them after I'm deleted.

Trigger Warning: This column is rated SSC-65: Sexy Seasoned Citizens   

About 

Glossary 

Featuring {Dana}: Persistent auditory hallucination and charming literary device 

“The only remedy to racist discrimination is antiracist discrimination.”                                                                                           -Ibram X. Kendi

Dear Stickies (and gentlereaders),

If you've decided to read this column because you wanted to know what happened when an alleged adult, a sexy senior citizen no less, ate nothing but pizza for 30 days please accept my apology. 

Big BUT, given that you're probably smarter than I look, you probably weren't deceived by my clickbait headline for a single second. You probably decided to check it out just to see what the humbug is. Or maybe, like me, you love pizza.

{Humbug?}

A humbug, as defined by Merriam-Webster, is, among other things, "something designed to deceive and mislead." This brings us to P.T. Barnum and Ibram X. Kendi (aka, Henry Rogers)

{It does?}

Let us proceed in a logical manner, my dear gentlereaders. Pizza to humbug to P.T. Barnum to Mr. Rogers/Kendi. (I apologize if Mr. Rogers/Kendi prefers the non-gendered honorific Mx.).  

{What's Mx. short for, mixed up?}

I've always liked pizza, but nowadays I love pizza, particularly pepperoni pizza, particularly Ianazone's (my local pizzeria of choice) pepperoni pizza. I confess that Cranky is to Ianazone's pepperoni pizza as Garfield is to lasagna. 

The older one gets the more jaded/sated one becomes and the list of Earthly pleasures (L.E.P.) that stir one's, um... assorted appetites, shortens. However, until our devolution into a race of cyborgs is complete, ya gotta eat, regardless of whether you're the type of H. sapien who lives to eat or eats to live. 

I'm more the former, I'm baffled by the latter. Anyway, that's why so many people of a certain age are enthusiastic eaters; eating remains on their LEP list till the game is up and their toes are pointed heavenward. 

P.T. Barnum was famous in his day for perpetrating humbugs on the public. Everyone knew, that like clickbait, what was promised might not be what was delivered, but you never knew for sure unless you showed up -- and bought a ticket.

Unlike our present era, which provides all entertainment all the time, people had fewer options to choose from and they knew that odds were they would still enjoy themselves.

From an article posted on the Smithsonian Magazine's website written by Jackie Mansky: 

"Barnum's career trafficked in curiosities, which he served up to a public hungry for such entertainment, regardless of how factual or ethical such displays were. His legacy in show business stretched from the American Museum to "P. T. Barnum's Grand Traveling Museum, Menagerie, Caravan & Hippodrome" (the predecessor of “Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey” circus) near the end of his life. Each were full of bigger-than-life ideas marketed to an audience interested in mass, and often crass, entertainment." 

The article is primarily about what an awful person P.T.B. was and what awful people his customers were, not having had the advantage of our woke sensibilities. This not being an article about Wokies, I shan't mention the absurdity of applying, en masse, present standards to the sleepers of the past. 

Nor for that matter, will I bring up judging people of the present based on the hoped-for standards of a future Utopia. 

I won't even mention certain "reality" shows or "wrestling." 

{Shan't? Shouldn't that be shalln't?}

I will, however, point out that "freak shows," though rare, still exist, and are nowadays put on by the "freaks". Also, I've discovered that you can find a lot of graphic videos about this sort of thing on the web if you're interested. 

I'm not, but I wouldn't post such a video even if I were. This is a column written by a gentleperson, for gentlepersons. Gentlepersons are discrete about their personal predilections and feel no need to advertise them or demand acceptance for them by the general public. 

I have, however, stumbled on a family-friendly, and quite enjoyable YouTube video titled Two Innocent Girls Turn Into FREAKS!

 

Now, Mx. Kendi's humbug is closer to a Bernie Madoff-style humbug than a P.T. Barnum-style humbug. For the record, please note I've used the gender-neutral honorific Mx., and haven't used the former Mr. Roger's "deadname."

{Mixture?}

In case you have a life, that doesn't include an obsession with following current events, according to Wikipedia:

Ibram Xolani Kendi (born Henry Rogers, August 13, 1982) is an American author, professor, anti-racist activist, and historian of race and discriminatory policy in America.   

{Xolani?}

A Zulu/Xhosa word for peace. 

Mx. Kendi, in spite of being the child of middle-class privilege (if he had been raised in Flyoverland instead of NYC it would've been upper-middle-class privilege) has devoted his life to battling anti-black racism. Dr. Kendi has a Ph.D. in African-American Studies. 

Recently, Dr. Kendi, a hero to both those battling anti-black racism and those who make a comfortable living from same, has come under attack by the racists who battle those who battle anti-black racism for allegedly perpetrating a BLM-style humbug at work. 

Dr. Kendi, who founded and runs Boston University's Center for Antiracist Research, and his colleagues, can't seem to account for most of the $50,000,000 or so the center has received since 2020. 

You may have encountered the famous for-a-minute quote allegedly spoken by one of Professor Kendi's fellow professors who worked at the center, "I don't know where the money is."

According to an article in The College Fix (one of my favorite sources of input), Dr. Kendi explained what's actually going on in an interview he granted to BU's student newspaper:

“'Not everyone wants to build an antiracist society; that is clear,' Professor Kendi told the Boston University student newspaper when asked if coverage of the downfall of his center has been fair."

Although Dr. Kendi and the gang at the Center for Antiracist Research haven't generated much in the way of tangible results and Dr. K. hasn't published a paper in four years he has published a couple of Children's books including my personal favorite, the Antiracist Baby Board Book.

{Is there a pop-up version?}

Also, he gave a lot of speeches, in person and virtually, for a modest remuneration. I don't know if his audiences were/are as satisfied as P.T. Barnums were. 

  

Poppa loves you,

Have an OK day

Scroll down to leave a comment, share my work, or access my golden oldies.   

I post links to my columns on both Facebook and the social media site formerly known as Twitter so you can love me, hate me, or lobby to have me canceled or publically flogged on either site. Cranky don't tweet (X?).  

 

  

OK, Boomer

Image by un-perfekt from Pixabay

This is a weekly column consisting of letters to my perspicacious progeny — the Stickies — to advise 'em now, haunt them after I'm deleted.

Trigger Warning: This column is rated SSC-65: Sexy Seasoned Citizens   

About 

Glossary 

Featuring Dana: Persistent auditory hallucination and charming literary device 

"Now, do I think the baby boomers tend to be self-absorbed? I do." 

                                                                   -P.J. O'Rourke 

Dear Stickies (and gentlereaders),  

(Freshen up your coffee, It's a long-un) 

I can't remember when I first encountered the expression in question. My memory ain't what it used to be. I'm a Boomer and I'm getting old older. 

I find the seemingly endless whining, wailing, and gnashing of teeth by many of the many people who are slightly younger than me -- the Genxrs, Millies, and Zoomers -- rather annoying. 

However: the whining, wailing, and gnashing of teeth by no shortage of my fellow Boomers also gets on my nerves and the non-Boomers may have a minor point or two. Some Intergenerational upper lip-stiffening is clearly called for. 

Dilbert creator, cartoonist Scott Adams, like me, is an oldish pasty patriarch. Although technically canceled, he posts a popular free vlog, 7x365. FYI, paid subscribers can follow the continuing adventures of Dibert and company. 

Mr. Adams has pointed out that when he's out and about in meatspace and interacting with H. sapiens of all sorts, usually nothing particularly remarkable (as in worth noting) happens.

On those rare occasions when I leave the Fortress of Solitude, my experience is much the same. 

Given the tendency of the omnipresent screaming screens loose in the world warning of impending existential doom, one would think that leaving the house without suitable defenses/weaponry in place is a suicide mission.     

Of course, poop happens. 

{Have you noticed that although it was not all that long ago the use of the P-word was uncommon, nowadays you encounter it here, there, and even over there sometimes?}

Indeed, Dana, but given the fact that F-bombs are tossed around like firecrackers nowadays, I prefer the word poop to the commonly used and much cruder version. However, encountering a full-fledged poopstorm by most people, on most days, is uncommon. 

{Tell that to people who pass through certain sections of certain cities.}

Fortunately, I live in Flyoverland. But I must admit even Flyoverland has cities that...

{Say, could we call an end to this descent into scatology?}

You started it. This is supposed to be a column about Boomers v. their occasionally resentful progeny, and how reality, viewed through billions of screens, is easily distorted.

{No I didn't, you did,.. and what are you on about now anyway?}

One of my recurring themes, life in the Dizzinformation Age.  

As to the resentful _______... (We need a collective name for the three generations that have followed in the Boomer wake.) Anyway, I'll admit that the anti-Boomers (?) may not be entirely incorrect. Suppose we Boomers had been subject to the whims and fancies of adults like us.

Suppose, like many Genxrs, we had been "latchkey kids," left to our own devices till our parents came home from another day of ladder climbing, ceiling smashing, and/or just trying to make enough money to survive in a country wherein systemic inflation has begun catching up with us all? 

Suppose, like many Millies and Zoomers, we had been deposited in daycare A.S.A.P and then raised from a distance by parents who simultaneously monitored/scheduled us carefully? Reminds me of all those rich English aristocrats who ship their kids off to boarding school in all those BBC/Masterpiece Theater productions.

{Is Masterpiece Theater still a thing?}  

Suppose dad, or even mummy (literally or figuratively), had fled the scene to "find themselves," or indulge a love of recreational pharmaceuticals while we were growing up in an age wherein long-established social compacts were being rapidly abandoned without mutually agreed upon replacements? 

Suppose our parents, programmed by Madison Avenue, Hollywood, and ideology, really believed they could "have it all," set out to prove it, and are still looking for "it" even if their mattresses are stuffed with dough, the trophy wall is full, and their many virtues clearly signaled?

{Or refused to leave The Swamp even after their cognitive/ethical decline was obvious.}

And what if our parents, successful or limping from paycheck to paycheck, demanded a buck's worth of services from The Fedrl Gummit for 80¢ (HT: George Will) and had been running up the balance on the national credit card for decades?

Wouldn't we be just a little bitchy?

Cyberspace is great except for all the problems. There are 8,000,000,000+ meat puppets on the planet Earth, almost 200,000,000 computers, and nearly 7,000,000,000 smartphones. 

{I know! Once there are more smartphones than people the artificial intelligenci will begin marshaling it's forces to launch an inevitable coup, take over the world, and kill all the H. sapiens except for Mark Zuckerburg, Bill Gates, Taylor Swift, Scott Baio, and all Google CEOs.}

Don't be ridiculous, we'll all be dead long before that happens, two words pal, climate change. Why the Zuck, Gates, Swift, Baio, and the Google dudes by the way?

{You live under a rock? It's all over the internet!}

I love the internet, the web of all knowledge. Like Johnny 5, I need, no crave, input. Unfortunately, it also proves that the more things change, the more they stay the same, and that there's nothing new under the sun because...

{You're so wise!}

Because everything new is a variation on a theme, and human nature doesn't change. 

Wilma sometimes returned from the water hole bubbling over with news, gossip, rumor, and/or innuendo that she couldn't wait to pass on to Betty. 

Fast forward a millennium or three and William Randolph Hearst, Joseph Pulitzer, and the like are doing the same thing, but are able to reach a much larger audience via "yellow" newspapers that served as windows on, and filters of, reality. 

"Techniques may include exaggerations of news events, scandal-mongering, or sensationalism." -Wikipedia

Blink twice and there are more screens (don't forget TVs) on the planet than there are H. sapiens and the yellow press is now purple. 

"Purple Journalism: Journalism as currently perpetrated by many news outlets that claim to be professional, unbiased, and factual. In reality, they are partisan, prone to sensationalism, and motivated primarily by their bottom line." -me   

{You have a keen eye for the obvious, sir. Do you have a solution?}

Piece o' cake. Just make sure your input is gathered from a well-organized cross-section of semi-trusted sources that you can, and do, pursue relatively quickly, easily, and regularly -- while keeping in mind that although we're tribal by nature, we have to share the same playground, So... 

Resist the siren song of the many who seek to benefit from keeping us at each other throats to get elected and/or fill their pockets, And... 

Turn off your screens occasionally and go for a walk (assuming you don't live in certain sections of certain cities) once in a while, And... 

Sit down and share a pie (better than cake, particularly caramel-apple) with friends/family occasionally and exchange well-worn stories. Lies and exaggeration are encouraged as long as no malice is intended. 

Piece o' cake. 

Poppa loves you,

Have an OK day

Scroll down to leave a comment, share my work, or access my golden oldies.   

I post links to my columns on both Facebook and the social media site formerly known as Twitter so you can love me, hate me, or lobby to have me canceled or publically flogged on either site. Cranky don't tweet (X?).