2/8/2024 america the load-o'bull
Adam recently posted to his website about how he pays attention to even the most minute details of events occurring around him and then related a short encounter with a man who seemed eager to talk to him and that he, Adam, decided to avoid the encounter. I try to do the same: pay attention to minute details and take my life's course into my own hands because I have been a long time coming to realize that one way or another, pretty much everyone is lying, if not about one thing, then another. As the Po character in ConAir says, "Sorry boss, but there's only two men I trust. One of them's me. The other's not you."
Last week, I went out to pick up some supplies. Because the eSIM I recently downloaded from a new-to-me network provider is not connecting to the network, I cannot make calls, except emergency calls, send or receive texts, or use the internet on my phone. As a side note: when my mom and I called the service provider on a 3-way call to try and get it worked out, the man, Jack, on the other end said that my phone does not have eSIM capabilities which is patently untrue. My phone indeed has an eSIM slot. In fact, it has 2. I assume if it didn't have eSIM capabilities, there would have been an error, and it would not have downloaded the eSIM via the QR code that the provider sent. Anyway, I decided to, this time, use public wifi while I was in town so that I could clip some digital coupons. I also browsed the ad for the grocery store in the town nearer to our camp to see if they had on sale any of the items I was planning to pick up. It turned out they did. I finished my errands in the farther and larger of the two towns and headed back home, making a quick stop at the smaller town's grocery store on the way. When I arrived at the store, there was a moderately older man busking immediately adjacent to the only door. He was using an electric guitar and a small amplifier to which he had also hooked up some preset background music. I'm not fully familiar with how this type of thing works, so it could be that the preset music was stored in the amplifier. At any rate, the music this man and the machine were playing was very similar to what can be heard here in this video, from the sound of the guitar right down to the reverb and the supporting instruments. Adam and I had been listening to this song quite a bit in the days leading up to this particular trip in to town. We like it. I suspect the setup is exactly the same. The man in front of the store was just playing different tunes.
Anyway, I did my shopping and when I came out and started to pack up my bike, he started in on a tune that was vaguely familiar that, as he progressed, became exceedingly familiar. It was that song about David playing Hallelujah for god. Rewind a few decades, and you see that this is not only a song that affected me as an adolescent when I saw a dance performed to it, but also one that I heard over and over (and over and over) another decade after that, when Adam and I lived with one of his former co-workers. The co-worker, an alcoholic who had given up, would play this song relentlessly both on the piano and a recorded version of it.
Back in front of the grocery store, as I'm about finished packing up, I pass in front of the store's entrance and in front of the guitar player to replace the shopping cart. As I'm passing in front of the guitar player, he suddenly but smoothly switches his tune to that of "america the stolen" better known as "america the beautiful." I give an audible disapproving chortle at this piece of obvious nationalist propaganda. As I cross in front of the man for the second time to return to my bike, the man says, "I saw you on your bike on my way here," in that cheerful tone that I know all to well that suggests that they want me postpone the rest of my life to start telling them all about where I ride my bike and why. Personally, I don't have time for rapists, so I just say, equally cheerfully, "okay!" and proceeded to my bike. I get all my bits and bobs tucked in and take off, telling him to "Have a good one!" as I roll away. He smiled, and hollered, still cheerful, "yeah, you too!" And I went home. Fast forward to the next day in the morning, and I'm noodling around with some color placement on my phone for a crochet blanket I'm making. Earlier, the tune of "america the stolen" had slinked its way into the forefront of my mind, and I'd hummed about 7 syllables of it when I noticed what was happening and said, "no, we're not doin' that." So I popped on Tenacious D's "Beelzeboss (The Final Showdown)". I listened to that 5 or 6 times (I do so enjoy the song) before deciding to change it up. I switched over to the version of The Gael (the song from the film The Last of the Mohicans) which I shared above. Suddenly, having nothing to do with the colors I was fiddling with, it all congealed. Something Adam wrote in his Vae Victis post popped into my head almost simultaneously with the memory of the man that I encountered in front of the store. Adam had written: "Before you hit the internet to find that your search results for Vae Victis all say it means America is great and free thinkers are evil, it's actually a latin phrase meaning "woe to the vanquished." america the beautiful, huh?
After I posted my last post, Adam and I had a conversation in which he offered up his opinion on what I wrote. I welcomed his critique with gratitude, and as it turns out, I happen to agree with his opinion and analysis of why I wrote it the way I did.
He felt that in it, it seems like I'm trying to say something without actually saying it because I'm afraid of what people will think of me if I actually said it. In looking back and doing an honest search of my feelings, I can confirm that this is true. In that post, I left out a great many details which, when shared, reveal the truth about the experience. He, having heard these details and knowing me well, understood what I was trying to say, but he thought that from an outsider's perspective, it wouldn't make a whole lot of sense. He offered this up free of any implication that I should change it. Through the conversation, I decided that I wanted to write another post about the same experience that relates the whole truth, directly, in black and white. I will leave that post in its place since I think it has value as a learning tool of what the difference is between sharing the whole truth and bending it. I've made a comment on that post that contains this post's introduction and a link to this post. The two posts may then easily be compared side by side. Wednesday, 24 January 2024, I visited a local food pantry, and on my way in to town, I opted to use the sidewalk for a portion of the trip. Even when bike lanes are available, a sidewalk is generally preferable for the bit of extra buffer it provides from drivers doing who knows what while they're driving, or perhaps worse: Tesla vehicles in self-driving mode. It's not uncommon to encounter people walking dogs on the sidewalk, obviously, and whenever I approach someone from behind on a sidewalk (dog or no), I slow to approximately their speed of travel, ring my bell gently to alert them to my presence, and pass them. As you can imagine, the reactions from the people walking range from jumping off the sidewalk clearing the entire way, a calm veer to one side, and irritated comments to downright rage and refusal to move. On this particular day, I encountered the latter in a couple, a man and woman, each walking a dog. First, the man turned his head halfway around and grunted, "Bike lane, lady," in what I imagine was the most flat and hateful tone he could muster. The woman, though she shared his demeanor and opinion, opted to move over to walk behind the man, and as I approached, scathed, "There's a bike lane down there for you, yehnn yehhng yehhng yehngyehh yehhn yenn." I didn't hear the second half, but what I have printed here is the best way I can think of to reproduce what it sounded like. Some traffic was passing at the time, making it difficult to distinguish. At this point, I had been slowly biking behind them ever since ringing my bell and was now passing them, and I politely stated, "Well, it's also pretty dangerous down there." Down there, of course meaning the bike lane. A retort was uttered, but I did not hear it as they were now behind me, nor did I care to stop for an argument about my right to use the sidewalk. Needless to say, this encounter was an unpleasant one. It soured my mood for about 3 minutes, at which time I realized, "they're probably just agents" which made it a lot easier to digest. I've posted about it here before that as a result of Adam's outspokenness of, well, the truth, he and I have been the targets of organized operations to kill him for over a decade now, hence the "agents" line of thought. I know how that sounds to the vast majority of people which is why I don't really readily speak about it so blatantly. Whether or not you want to believe that is...whatever I guess, but I think that it is still important to realize how people can be misleading and out-and-out lie in order to get you to submit to their will, and the following encounter, combined with the dog walkers, illustrates just how that can be done and is done.
The point of the dog walkers becomes clear later on. I tried to set aside the emotions that arose as a result of this encounter so that I could continue to enjoy my morning, but if truth be told, I was more than ready for some sympathy. When I arrived at the pantry, the emotions faded to the background once the activity of selecting foods came to the forefront.
Upon exiting the pantry, I found myself passing a table set up under a tent with boxes of protein-rich meal bars, a plastic tub containing various types of jerky, and a couple boxes of socks. There was also a sign that said, "Point in Time Survey: PIT" with a graphic that I couldn't tell what it was supposed to be. There were two women sitting at the table, one of whom is alternatingly hostile and friendly toward me whenever I encounter her. She volunteers at two pantries in town, both of which I occasionally visit, and at one of them, she makes fun of me, tries to make me look stupid in front of other people, and at the other (the one at which this encounter took place), she is as friendly and warm as you might expect from a stranger who is in a good mood and enjoying what they're doing. She's downright pleasant. The other woman was said to be "from The City," presumably a city employee. They were apparently taking surveys of the homeless, or "people without permanent housing," as they euphemistically put it. All my defensive pricklies were immediately activated because of my awareness that though not everyone I encounter is an agent, anyone could be. This situation didn't seem necessarily out of the ordinary but raised a red flag nevertheless. I hesitantly agreed to take their survey saying, "As long as you don't mind if I pack my food up while you ask your questions." It didn't occur to me until maybe 45% of the way through the survey that if I hadn't said that, they might have just handed me the clipboard with the survey, and I might have filled out the information myself. We'll never know. When I said it, I was thinking, "well, how can I make this take up as little of my time as possible?" I knew I'd be organizing the food into my various bags anyway, so I thought I might as well do that while they were asking the questions.
So I organized my food selections into my pannier and tote bags while the city woman asked me the questions. First question: your name? Second question: last initial? Right here, we can see that they are establishing that this survey is intended to give the impression that it is anonymous. They only want my last initial. Adam brought up the point during our discussion that a name isn't even relevant to the food pantry or to the government on a survey of homeless people that the pantry serves. Further, pretty much all the questions are irrelevant. We've both volunteered at food pantries before, and the only thing they need to really know is how many people they're serving so that they know up for how many people they need to divide the food. The only reason a food pantry takes down names, and we know this from experience as volunteers, is because the government forces them to.
Third question: your birthday? I told her the month and day. Fourth question: year? Red flag number two. A survey that doesn't require your full last name but requires your date of birth? So the truth begins to unfold that they explicitly want to identify me personally. More unfolding to come. I actually thought to ask, "Is that really necessary?" but instead told her the year. Even though I was uncomfortable giving her this information, I gave it to her anyway. I guess my best explanation is a lack of self-confidence and the irrational and unwarranted fear that I wouldn't be allowed to take any of the meal bars with around 15 grams of protein each if I didn't answer their stupid little questions. At this point in my pantry-going experience, to anyone observing, it is clear that I opt for protein bars and powders, as many as possible, whenever possible, so the bait was effective. Now may be a good time to explain the relevance of the encounter with the dog walkers earlier that morning. While their cutting remarks and hateful attitudes are easily sloughed off and recovered from given enough time, Adam explained that they induce a temporary lowering of self-esteem that results in a need for validation. I was being greased up. Looking back, I can see exactly how (and that) the tactic worked. Bingo, bango, whaddya know: two women speaking in saccharin tones at the pantry need people to take a survey so they "can prove, basically to the federal government, that they do actually help..." Here was an opportunity where I could "be of assistance" to these people, thereby boosting my ego and lifting the self-esteem that was just lowered not more than 90 minutes earlier. I could feel important again. Of note here is that when they were explaining to me why they were taking the surveys, the explanation was simply, "so that we can prove that we do actually help..." but the sentence sort of drifted off without a definite sounding conclusion. It was while I was being surveyed that another woman "without permanent housing" came out and was being surveyed that the little "federal government" detail was included when they explained it to her which I just happened to overhear. In thinking about it, if you are from the government and want someone who is opposed to the notion of government to take your survey, you would probably bend the truth to omit the part about how you're reporting your results to the federal government.
There were of course, several easy-to-consider questions like how long you've been homeless; do you live in a tent or in a vehicle; do you stay in the forest, by a river or lake, on BLM land; how long have you been in this county; do you have a job; how do you receive income (families/friends help, job, panhandling, etc.) and so on. Here is another red flag: a way to identify me. So we've got my first name, last initial, full date of birth, and the fact that I receive money from "families/friends help."
Then came the section that is the most troubling to me. Have you ever experienced domestic violence. As it turns out, Adam and I have both experienced domestic abuse. When we lived with his mother and brother, his mother constantly berated us both verbally and often abused me physically. Adam, of course, was always swift to intervene, pull her off of me, and calm her down. So after answering, "actually, yeah" to the question, she marked it down on her sheet, and I immediately offered "but not from my boyfriend. His mom tried to push me down some stairs once." No one said anything or wrote down the context. Next question.
So you can see here, without any of the details included and out of context, on paper, I'm in a relationship with Adam and have experienced domestic violence. The vast majority of people will automatically construe this information against Adam, and this is what made me feel compelled to write a blog post about the whole experience in the first place.
He wrote about our experiences on this subject in a musing on his website titled, "Don't Stay with Family" on 02 September 300,023. Seen here (search "Don't Stay with Family" to skip to it): https://www.inventati.org/1337gallery/musings.html I bring it up here to show that this information was publicly available well before both the survey and the blog post that you are currently viewing. The troubling survey continued. It was a "check all that apply" question asking: How did you become homeless (religious/cultural differences with others in your previous living arrangement, family made you become homeless, could not pay rent, escaping domestic abuse, other, etc). When I related this part of the survey to Adam, he pointed out that no one's citing religious or cultural differences as their reasons for being homeless and that this question on the survey further serves to identify me personally. Religious differences generally result in arguments, rifts in familial or other personal ties, but not homelessness. I answered, "definitely the first one" for this and said, "and I guess the second one sort of" indicating "family made you become homeless" because of when, toward the end of the lease on the apartment we all inhabited, Adam's mother said, "when we move, you're not coming with us." This was the first of a few steps that led to Adam and me sharing my tiny childhood-bedroom at my father's house. Over the course of the two years that we spent there, my father continually criticized Adam and constantly tried to force me to convert to what I would call his religion. I don't think anyone else besides me or Adam would word it this way. My father, along with all the other members of the congregation, worships his government. His worship involves giving up his time in exchange for a pittance so small that he can barely afford to maintain status quo. Apparently, there is honor in this. After he is done selling his time, he has so little time or energy left that anything he wanted to do with his time falls to the wayside. Under threat of death, he is only ever doing the bidding of his god, his government, and never following his own will. Every now and then, he would send me pictures of "now hiring" signs posted in front of various businesses. Once, he printed out the entire application and tenant's handbook to the apartment complex where he and my mother first lived together. The thing was a stack of 8.5" x 11" papers an inch and a half thick. As he was leaving the house, without saying a word, he dropped the thing onto the hardwood floor outside my bedroom door where it resonated with a loud cracking boom. Eventually, knowing that we did not have the money and that we had no interest in converting to his religion, he demanded either $500 for each month that we would continue to use the cramped bedroom in his mildewy house or that we leave. Convert or die. So, rather than converting to his religion and assimilate into his culture, we chose to leave. This survey question was very obviously intended to identify me personally.
To the city-woman, I also mentioned that it was kind of complicated, that there was a bit of choice involved. I also said that leaving on my bike was the best decision I've made in my life so far, and I stand by that. The non-city woman said, "I've heard a lot of people say that today." I'm not sure if city-woman made a note of that or not. I'd bet you dollars to donuts that I was the only person who indicated religious/cultural differences on that question though, so now we have: first name, last initial, full date of birth, "families/friends help" with income, has experienced domestic violence with no context given, and religious/cultural differences as the cause of homelessness.
More questions. Do you experience any of the following (addiction to drugs or alcohol, debilitating pain, post-traumatic stress, domestic violence, etc.). I said, "I guess a little PTS" but did not explain that it is because of the anxiety I experience when I encounter people other than Adam as a result of being hurt and punished by people, one way or another, my entire life, for being myself. (It's not just me, it's you too). I did not indicate that I currently experience domestic abuse--because I don't. What I experience domestically is better categorized as bliss. But: first name, last initial, full date of birth, "families/friends help" with income, has experienced domestic violence with no context given, religious/cultural differences as cause of homelessness, and has post-traumatic stress. Somewhere in there, I noticed that "traumatic event" was one of the options for one of the "check all that apply" questions. I don't remember what the question was asking, but I remember thinking that it might be considered odd that I claim to experience "post-traumatic stress" without indicating that I experienced a traumatic event. I guess they'll do with that one whatever they want. Finally came some more "easy" questions regarding personal details: do you live with other people? What is their relationship to you? (boyfriend, "we actually celebrated 18 years together just a few weeks ago." "oh, wow! congratulations!" of course there was no box to check for "oh wow, congratulations"). Do you identify as male or female? Do they identify as male or female? What is your age group? (of the options, 35-44 was the appropriate one), so: first name, last initial, full date of birth, "families/friends help" with income, has experienced domestic violence with no context given, religious/cultural differences as the cause of homelessness, and female 35-44 in a relationship with male 35-44. By the end, I was what the hep cats might describe as "so done" with it, and it felt like a lot of focus on domestic violence, about 35-40% of the questions--lots of opportunities for me to make a claim about domestic violence, shoving it in my face. I was very uncomfortable the whole time, not necessarily because of the domestic violence but because I knew pretty much exactly what was going on but did not posess the fortitude to metaphorically kick those slugs off and bust outta that puke hole. While I don't usually mind sharing information about my experiences, I don't trust these people to not use this information against me--against Adam. Obviously it occurred to me that the whole setup may well have been a data-mining operation, specifically targeted to glean information about Adam and myself under the guise of collecting information about the homeless. In fact, this is what I thought from the start, but, like I said, I wanted those protein bars, and they knew it. I probably could have refused the survey and still taken the food though.
During our conversation, Adam spoke about how most homeless people he sees, and this has been my experience as well, are men. The point to be made here is that men will probably just deny any experience of domestic violence because no one would believe them anyway.
At one point, the city woman said, "this is soooo helpful to us," and I didn't say it aloud, but I thought in a sardonic tone, "I bet it is..." Next time I see a bitch with a clipboard, I ain't stoppin'. 1/25/2024 Never Stop for a Bitch with a Clipboard
Link to new post.
Yesterday, 24 January 2024, I visited a local food pantry, and upon exiting, found myself passing a table set up under a tent with more foods and a couple boxes of socks. There were two women sitting at the table, one of whom is alternatingly hostile and friendly toward me whenever I encounter her. She volunteers at two pantries in town, both of which I occasionally visit, and at one of them, she makes fun of me, tries to make me look stupid in front of other people, and at the other, she is as friendly and warm as you might expect from a stranger who is in a good mood and enjoying what they're doing. She's downright pleasant. The other woman was said to be "from The City," presumably a city employee. They were apparently taking surveys of the homeless, or "people without permanent housing," as they euphemistically put it. All my defensive pricklies were immediately activated, and I hesitantly agreed to take their survey. The city woman asked me the questions. First question: your name? Second question: last initial? Third question: your birthday? I told her the month and day. Fourth question: year? I hesitated again, but apparently I just said, "fuck it." because even though I was uncomfortable giving her this information, I gave it to her anyway. I guess my best explanation is a lack of self-confidence and fear of authority. I actually thought to say, "is that really necessary?" but instead told her the year. I was very uncomfortable the whole time. While I don't usually mind sharing information about my experiences, I don't trust these people to not use this information against me--against Adam. It occurred to me that the whole setup may well have been a data-mining operation, specifically targeted to glean information about Adam and myself under the guise of collecting information about the homeless "so that we can prove that we actually do help"... that sentence sort of drifted off, and I didn't ask for specifics. At the time, I figured that anything I have to say, they already know. What occurred to me while knitting is that this information could and would be construed against Adam.
There were of course, several easy-to-consider questions like how long you've been homeless; do you live in a tent or in a vehicle; do you stay in the forest, by a river or lake, on BLM land; how long have you been in this county; do you have a job; how do you receive income (families/friends help, job, panhandling, etc.) and so on. Then came the section that is the most troubling. Have you ever experienced domestic violence. How did you become homeless (religious/cultural differences with others in your previous living arrangement, family made you become homeless, could not pay rent, escaping domestic abuse, etc). Do you experience any of the following (addiction to drugs or alcohol, debilitating pain, post-traumatic stress, domestic violence, etc.).
It felt like a lot of focus on domestic violence, and I was puzzled by this. Hours later, at home, knitting, it suddenly occurred to me exactly how the information might be used. As it turns out, Adam and I have both experienced domestic abuse. When we lived with his mother and brother, his mother constantly berated us both verbally and often abused me physically. Slaps to the face, once while holding her keys, pulling my hair, locking me out of the house. Once, when she was so enraged upon coming home to find me vacuuming the stairs, she tried to push me down those stairs. Adam, of course, was always swift to intervene, pull her off of me, and calm her down. I told this to the city woman asking me the questions. Immediately after saying, "actually, yeah" to the domestic violence yes or no question, I said, "but not from my boyfriend. His mom tried to push me down some stairs once." No one said anything or wrote anything down. Next question. So you can see here, without any of the details included and out of context, on paper, I'm in a relationship with Adam and have experienced domestic violence. What occurred to me while knitting is that this information could and would be construed against Adam, even though the only information of his on the form is that I, a female of a certain age range, live with a male of a certain age range. To most people, it doesn't really matter what the truth is, they hear domestic violence, and boom: automatically the image of a man beating a woman enters their mind. Reality depicts a far different image. People don't seem to think women capable of abuse. Sure, when confronted, they'll say, "no, women can abuse men too." But they only say that because they know they have to. They don't admit it because admitting it would mean that they wouldn't be able to abuse their husbands anymore. Husband-beating at the hands of a wife is typically more psychological in nature and is, for some reason, widely accepted as necessary. The consensus seems to be that men are heathens and wouldn't be able to function without women. Reality is that women just want slaves and invent this whole narrative about how men need women to tell them what to do. Adam wrote about our experiences on this subject in a post titled, "Don't Stay with Family" on 02 September 300,023. Seen here (search "Don't Stay with Family" to skip to it):https://www.inventati.org/1337gallery/musings.html At one point, the city woman said, "this is soooo helpful to us," and I didn't say it aloud, but I thought in a sardonic tone, "I bet it is..." Next time I see a bitch with a clipboard, I ain't stoppin'. 10/28/2023 There Was a Farmer Ha(lloween)d a Dog...
In October 302,020, I began what I thought would be a fun little game when Adam and I were watching horror and Halloween themed films during the month of October that year. I revisited it each October since then, and it took us a few years to fill out all 25 squares, but we finally did it. This year, in 302,023, I decided to digitize the little scrap of paper on which I originally drew the bingo board. The little scrap of paper was folded, softened, worn around the edges and torn from three years of traveling in a backpack and being taken out and handled for a month every year. I thought, "well, it'll last longer as a digital file," and so I set to work in the image manipulation program GIMP.
You'll notice on the horror film board the addition of two antiquated racist tropes: that of the "magical negro," and the "indian burial ground." The idea for the "mystical negro" square came about when we noticed a commonality of supporting characters with mystical powers who both happened to be black. The title was inspired by the Key & Peele sketch "Dueling Magical Negros" (which may not be its official title and whose show we still enjoy on a regular basis) in which they critique the "magical negro" trope. As for the "indian burial ground" trope, it came up as a result of being in a handful of the films we watch during October. At first, I had "mystical negro" and "It was built on indian burial ground" as squares on the main board, but I felt uncomfortable publishing it partly because I am white and as such it is not generally acceptable for me to use the word "negro," and partly because I thought it could be construed as racist--and me along with it. I decided to look up Key and Peele's "magical negro" sketch so as to learn more about it. Down a rabbit-hole from there, I learned what the magical negro trope is and that it is common and widespread, and I decided that it has no place on my bingo board as a square to check off as if it is a necessary part of the game or necessary to the horror genre. I then realized, "if magical negro is racist, then so is indian burial ground." So I decided to remove that from the main board as well. Afterwards, I looked up "indian burial ground" and learned that, of course, the trope is well removed from any basis in reality. North American indigenous cultures have a variety of beliefs regarding the afterlife. Certainly, it is disrespectful to desecrate the land that others hold sacred, and the xenophobic European belief that the living descendants would raise evil spirits as some sort of retribution for disturbing the remains of their ancestors is completely fabricated. I have decided to keep the two racist squares adjacent to the main bingo board as an educational acknowledgement of their existence and of how their use has been a detriment to their respective cultures. I highly urge anyone reading this to research "magical negro," and "indian burial ground" as an antidote to ignorance as to how these cultures have been exploited and falsified as cheap plot tools in horror films and literature. As I was working on the horror film board, Adam had the idea that it would be fun to do the same thing but for Halloween candy. I immediately created a new layer for the candy board, and that one took about 10 minutes to fill out as we both starting naming candies. You'll also notice that at the center of both the horror and candy boards is not the free space, but a comically common horror-film occurrence or candy that is a given in any film or halloween candy tour, respectively. I thought it was funny. Further, I thought it would be funny to also add a free space just to accentuate the fact.
I have also included blank boards for candy and horror so that people may fill in the squares as they please, and there is also a blank "halloween film" board for the less horror-leaning fans among us or perhaps for the kiddies who haven't yet discovered a love of horror fiction. Perhaps over the coming years, I will make a filled in version of that board which caters more to the non-horror halloween movies. To obtain one of these boards for yourself, simply right-click (Apple+click, I think, on a MAC; or long click on a mobile device) the desired image and choose "download image" or "save image" from the options that appear as the case may be. When the download is complete, the image should then be available in your "Downloads" folder or perhaps somewhere in your "Pictures" folder, and you can move it to wherever you please and use it however you like to accompany any Halloween festivities in which you choose to participate.
Enjoy!! Explanation of the less obvious "horror" squares: -- "I shot him 6 times" is a line from Halloween 2. In Halloween, SPOILER ALERT: the killer's psychiatrist ends up shooting him 6 times, the killer falls out a window and is seen lying on the ground below. The shot cuts away and a few more lines are spoken at which point the shot cuts back to the ground where the killer had fallen, only he isn't there anymore. END OF SPOILER. So the square "I shot him 6 times" can be fulfilled anytime there is a villain who doesn't seem to die after experiencing something inflicted upon them that certainly, you would think, should have killed them. -- "WARNING" is a reference to when a warning is issued by (usually) a supporting character to (usually) a main character about certain dangers which just so happen to be central to the plot. The warning inevitably goes unheeded. Initially I thought of putting "unheeded warning," but then agreed with Adam that the fact that the warning goes unheeded is a given. -- "seems to be scared of cameraman" is a funny one Adam came up with and is my favorite one on the board. It's a photographic style in which a character is frantically fleeing directly from the camera which continues to directly follow them. The camera is supposedly the point of view of the menace or killer. Naturally, women are camera operators as well but have been lumped in under the term "cameraman" with no disrespect implied. I just thought the rhythm of the word, "cameraman" was funniest when considering various options. -- "it has >6 sequels" just to be clear, it must have 6 or more sequels, for a total of 7 or more films in the series. It's up to you whether reboots count for this square ;-) -- "the animals know" may be an obvious one to horror fans, but examples include the dog barking at the basement door in Paranormal Activity 2 or the cat yowling and hissing at the lamp in Amityville Horror 4. The animals can sense the evil: "the animals know."
Welcome to the first in what I hope to develop into a series of horror stories from my real life. Halloween is one of my favorite celebration/event/festival things--probably a psychological conditioning of receiving massive amounts of candy on a particular night of the year for the first 15 years of my life (some of the most impressionistic years)! I don't really care for the origin stories of trick-or-treating: how people would terrorize each other and threaten vandalism or physical harm if their demands weren't met, but in these, my adult years, I don't mind other people enjoying the creating or purchasing and wearing of costumes, coming to the door with the expectation of candy. I had a lot of fun doing it as a kid, and i gotta say: there's little else, for me, that tops the cuteness factor of 3-foot tall humans wailing, "trick-or-treeeeet!!" at you and holding out a bag. I love kids. So much. Actually, in the past several years, I have designed a handful of crocheted (and one or two knitted) trinkets with Halloween themes that I have handed out either in addition to or in lieu of candy. (Choose the "Patterns" category at the bottom of the page to find them). I made a miniature knitted Michael Myers doll and attached it to a barrette that I wear in my hair as often as I remember to during October.
Anyway, to spread my enthusiasm for the enjoyment of horror stories and non-scary Halloween fun during the month of October, I've decided to start sharing Horror Stories from Real Life. I got the idea after making my last post when I said that I had plenty of horror stories from volunteering at food pantries. Without further ado, I give you the first Horror Stories from Real Life: Who's Debbie?? In my previous post, I talked about how I volunteer at food pantries and the primary reason being so that I can self-curate our groceries. It is true, though, that I very much enjoy the tasks of helping to run a food bank...organizing and sorting, cleaning, and talking to people. One summer, we spent our time outside of a very small town (population 300 or so), and thankfully there was a weekly food pantry, a monthly food pantry, and a dollar store. Between these three, we ate pretty well all summer. As you might be able to imagine, in a town of this size, it is hard to blend in as a loaded cyclist, so the folks who ran both pantries became well familiar with me, or at least, what I allowed them to know about me and whatever else they assumed beyond that. Frequently, one or another person from the weekly pantry would saunter over to me as I packed and loaded my bike with the bounty. This annoyed me a little bit because most of the time, I just wanted to get home to Adam where I was safe from prying and judgemental eyes. On the other hand, I do enjoy conversation and being able to talk about my ideals, but frankly, a lot of times, the conversant would ignore my cues of being ready to roll and force me to linger beyond what I would have wanted. It didn't bother me, but it would have been more enjoyable if I felt my contributions to the conversation were actually being heard. Alas, that's the world we currently live in: those with less money are stupid and insufficient as humans and need to be eradicated or reformed. Anyway, I got to know these people little by little, and I mostly enjoyed the conversations that I came to accept as inevitable. However, that particular summer, I decided (for the most part) to not offer my time and able body as a volunteer. This was mainly because people in a town that small, having not much to distract them, tend to spend a lot of time getting to know one another and, eventually, because of the way 21st century humans are, exerting, or at least attempting to exert, their will over one another. I just didn't feel like constantly explaining why I don't want a job or to "build greenhouses at your ranch." ...the reaction they sustained was not one of care and worry but one of manipulation and attention-seeking.
As a result of not donating my time to these charities, I had more time to dedicate to working on my fiber arts designs, and as such, I nailed out a pattern for a knitted stuffed heart that is knit in one piece without breaking the yarn. If you don't know knitting-things, that's somewhat of a feat. By the end of it, I had somewhere around 20 samples from having tested the instructions so many times combined with wanting to use up some yarn stash. As autumn set in, I decided that before we departed, I would give the hearts to the pantry volunteers (of both pantries) as a small but heartfelt token of my gratitude.
Naturally, they were well received, and when I handed them out on my final visit to the weekly pantry, there was much enthusiasm and gratitude from both sides of the table, and, not wanting to make a big deal out of saying goodbye to the people who tried to manipulate me into abandoning my good sense, moral ideals, and beliefs over the summer, I allowed the hearts to act as a farewell. The connection was not made, however. Despite having given them Adam's web address and thereby, a way to contact me, they did not know what happened to me and, apparently, worried to varying degrees about my well-being. If it was just that, I would not be writing this blog post. The plot thickens. When I bumped into a handful of the weekly-pantry volunteers several months later at a larger food bank 30 miles away that supplies several smaller pantries (including the one from the aforementioned small town) as well as performing its own distribution services, I was greeted with a hug and smiles and "It's great to see you! We were so worried about you! We didn't know what happened to you!" There was also "(Name redacted) was so worried about you! Don't do that again!" With genuine scold in the voice behind a thin veil of smile and gladness. Mind you, they know explicitly from our lengthy conversations over the summer that I am nomadic and move as the seasons change. In our conversations, they struck me as people intelligent enough to make the connection between the changing of a season and someone's absence who has stated that they move when the seasons change. So I am forced to any of a number of conclusions, not the least of which is that the reaction they sustained was not one of care and worry but one of manipulation and attention-seeking. A few more months pass. I see (name redacted) at the big food bank. She is standing facing me with her back to the open garage door. The contrast of the dimness inside and the brightness outside obscures her face into darkness. "Jenny." she says in an ominous tone that perfectly matches the lighting. Taking just a moment to process where I know the voice from, because I can't see the face too well, I say cheerfully, "ohhh! (Name redacted)! How are you??" My attempts at a normal, "how-are-things-haven't-seen-ya-in-awhile" conversation were rebuffed. She came with a loaded gun, aimed, and fired. In the same grave tone with which she originally addressed me, she informed me of that which I was already aware: that she was, and now I paraphrase, sick with worry over what happened to me. My stock response from the previous interaction with the others was that I didn't want to make a big deal about saying goodbye. She proceeded to explain that she has a hard time with goodbyes too which, by the way, is not what I meant by "not wanting to make a big deal out of saying goodbye." What I meant was more like, "I didn't want to give you assholes the opportunity to try and suck the life out of me and attempt to 'welcome' me into your homes under the guise of protecting me from winter's threats only to spin back 4 days after we move in and attempt to enslave us. It's just annoying, and I don't have time for that shit. I'd really just rather take my chances biking down a dark 2-lane country road with little to no shoulder on a fully loaded bicycle so that I can just fend off skunks at night, sleep in when I want to, and eat what I want, listen to music when I want, and space-out when I want, for however long I want than continuously explain to you why I won't do your ranch chores and clean your house while you berate me for not contributing enough to society; or worse: do the chores anyway, at your beck and call, against my will and develop heartburn, and weak joints from the stress until I just fall over dead in the middle of your field from an embolism." See how just not saying goodbye might be a little easier for us both? She came with a loaded gun, aimed, and fired.
I didn't say any of that, of course, but now that you've read it, you can see how "I just didn't want to make a big deal out of saying goodbye" sorta captures it as far as brief sentences go. She went on to try and hold me responsible for how she chooses to use (or not use) her mind: "Worrying about you occupied so much of my brain space." ...with some exaggerated phrase like, "it made me so sick." As if it was me who was controlling her brain space. If you ask me, she's the one who owes me an apology for continually trying to suck me into her lifestyle. Over that summer there were constant invitations for me to come over to so and so's house to teach them how to spin yarn or "we'd really like to get to know you better, so we thought we could all meet up at such and such diner sometime." I politely avoided committing every time an invitation was extended because I've been around the block enough times to know that "getting to know you" means "acting interested in your point of view while subtly trying to get you to do things our way for us." If you want to get to know someone, you just get to know them.
I would have thought that my constant replies like, "well, I don't like to disclose my location," or "no, I'd rather ride my bike home myself, but thank you for the offer," and more directly, "well I associate having a job with slavery--helping the rich get richer while the poor stay poor" or even "well, I tend not to socialize with people because I have found that in many cases, people tend to have their own agenda that doesn't generally include genuine interest in your well being" would have been glaringly obvious clues that I wanted nothing to do with them or their lifestyles, that I'll come to your little food pantry where I am simply one of perhaps 70 people who comes for food, and I'll participate in your stupid little conversations where you're not listening to anything I have to say and using flattery to try and gain my favor, but I'm not giving up my principles to live in your hell. I guess people really are just that stupid. And I don't mean stupid derogatorily. I mean stupid as in when you purposely ignore a great many obvious social cues of refusal in order to pursue your agenda of trying to convert someone who is genuinely happy with their lifestyle. The problem for them, see, is that my lifestyle shines a great big bright light on how awful and unfulfilling their lifestyle is, and they can't stand it, so they try to pull me into their darkness and extinguish my light. And I'm not saying I'm special or anything. It's happening to you to. You maybe just don't realize it, accept it, ignore it, have become complacent to it...whatever. But it's all around us in advertising and social status: conform and outperform to be worthy, and I just don't see it that way. It's more like: conform and outperform to be unhappy and die sooner. So that's our first horror story of real-life: I visited a weekly pantry one summer where I was constantly bombarded with manipulation to try and get me to abandon my freedom, I gave them my handmade and personally designed tokens of appreciation, and my thanks in return was a scolding about how I should have behaved in a way that was acceptable to them and catered to their insecurities. Sound familiar to anyone? 9/27/2023 crystal
I just want to make one thing perfectly clear to anyone who comes into contact with me: the only reason I volunteer at the food pantries, the ONLY REASON, is so that I can pick out my own food. It's not "to give back," "to do good," "to be social," "for the law of reciprocity," (whatever the fuck that means) or any other reason. It's so that I can choose what we eat. All math.
Not to mention, and more than that anymore: I don't trust any of you schmuck volunteers or staff to not put something poisoned in my bag because some asshole trained in psy-ops gave you 30 bucks to do it. Doesn't matter if you knew why or not. I don't trust you. Having said that, now I will say this: you are schmucks. Food pantry volunteers and organizers are some of the most vile walking talking feces I have ever encountered. One man who I was guiding through the pantry in Indianapolis had a broken back. Asshole doesn't even begin to describe the pinky toe of the head volunteer guy on the board of directors. Let's call him Bill--since that is his name. Bill always wanted to keep things moving quickly. He was always walking around rushing the clients and hassling the volunteers about spending too much time engaging in conversation with the clients, each other, whatever. If we had enough volunteers, one would be dedicated to the task of helping clients who desired it to carry the food on a cart up the elevator with the client and out to their car. One time Speaks with Thunder was gone for some 10 or 15 minutes when he walked a guy all the way back to the dude's apartment. For reference, in Bill's little fantasy world, that's enough time to take 3 pantry guests through. Anyway, on this particular day--when I had guided the very pleasantly tempered man with a broken back through the pantry, I'm carrying the full bag of food, opening my mouth with a cheerful expression to let Bill know that this man has a broken back so I'll walk him up to his car with the food, but before I even finish drawing the breath to say it, Bill swipes the bag out of my arms, violently shoves it into the arms of the man whose back is broken, and says brusquely, "wedon'thavetimetowalkpeopleuptotheircars." Maybe those weren't the exact words, but the exact words aren't really that important. Myself, I was stunned. And speechless. I looked at the guy helplessly and apologetically, for I too was broken--of spirit. I really wish I could go back and grasp the bag, holding it fast when I sensed Bill was clawing it from my arms. I wish I could have stood up against Bill for the guy, but I guess it's no use crying over spilled milk and best to use the experience as a learning opportunity. A chance to fortify myself, steeling myself against the will of assholes. 'Cuz dey everywhere. I've got lots more pantry stories. How horrifically I have been treated as a client, as a monetarily non-wealthy volunteer, the racism and classism I have seen committed by staff and volunteers both to the faces and behind the backs of clients and volunteers. These people--they'll call you nigger and in the same breath tell you they're not racist. As it just so happens, I do love sorting and organizing, so the tasks requested by food pantries of volunteers are basically right up my alley, but I can sort and organize whatever I want, whenever the fuck I want to, I don't need to go wade through a swamp of bloody gnashing idiots to do it. I don't need you. You need me. 8/13/2023 the facts are in
Recently, a knitting designer whose work I've got my eye on posted a few calls for testing the patterns of some fresh designs she's come up with. I don't test other designers' works anymore, mainly because I don't want to aid someone who actively works against me, but also because it just takes a great deal of my brain-power and time away from my own design-work. Still, I like to see peoples' fresh designs, and I suppose I won't say, "I'll never test for another designer again," but I don't see it happening in the foreseeable future. These new designs though, I was somewhat tempted by one of them. Actually, it was more like, "ooh, that's nice. If I wanted to do a test, I'd do this one!" I played through in my mind how it might have gone if I had offered to test, and I didn't even get past "Well, I know it calls for aran weight yarn, but I've only got enough on hand of sport weight." Sometimes a designer doesn't mind if you use a different yarn weight, but again, I didn't even really want to test anyway, even though the design was really interesting and nice-looking. Oddly enough, it is the only of the three tests that hasn't garnered any interest, but it is the only one I would have wanted to do...if I was into that type of thing.
I have a few of the designers patterns that I acquired through the use of coupon codes when she occasionally offers up a free pattern using a code. She's got nice designs. So to pass the time while I was lying there, I started to peruse the rest of her catalogue. The patterns were presented by "Best Match," so I'm not sure how one named Algonquin came up as the best match when the search parameters are simply "all patterns by Joan Forgione," but there you have it. Now--I have a natural curiosity, and if I do say so, skepticism, when it comes to titles. I know someone personally who has a photography side-hustle, and the name of that hustle is "Person's Name Studios." I know for a fact that this person does not have a studio--not in the sense that there's a dark-room where film is developed--ignoring the fact that this person uses a digital camera. The arrangement may have changed, but when I lived with the person, it was their PC in their bedroom. That was the studio. So if you broaden the sense of the word "studio," then yes, I would say they have "studios." I do it all the time, in fact. I have a tarp rigged up with some ropes where our panniers and other belongings stay when we're not using them, and I call it the garage. It's not an aluminum building with a large door that raises and lowers, but it's still "a garage." So I'm not knocking the "Person's Name Studios" idea. What I am saying, however, is that I don't think that "Person" wants you to realize it's just the PC in the bedroom while they're half-clothed smoking a cigarette. "Person" would probably much prefer it if you thought it was some nice, well-lit room in an office-park somewhere, or maybe a cottage in a wooded area of town. The food industry is especially guilty of misrepresentation. How is it that from the top-shelf to the well-brands, they all use "the best ingredients." Someone's lying, and I think it might actually be all of them. So when I came across "Algonquin" by a person whose profile picture is of a white lady and whose profile says she's often got "knitting needles in [her] hand, coffee in [her] cup, and a spreadsheet open on [her] Mac," I didn't get the sense that she had any great connection to the Algonquin people after whom she named the pattern. This is not to say that a person of Algonquin descent would not have knitting, coffee, and a Mac, but between that and the profile picture which, to the best of my knowledge, is a real picture of the lady, I got the sense that it was another case of a privileged euro-descendant using an indigenous name to present a sense of higher-knowing, intelligence, sensitivity, and general goodness that is utterly and completely lacking on all counts. This judgement wasn't personal. I see it everywhere I go, but only while my eyes are open. Name your patterns however you please, hold them for whatever ransom you desire. The phrase, "sell them for whatever price you like," is the more socially acceptable one, I know, but just doesn't quite say it, in my opinion.
So I wondered aloud in a comment. From the response, I glean that it is the name of a group of people who the designer says she respects, goes about her life in the same region as, and knows a lot about. Other than all that, there is no relation. Yet I cannot ignore and would like to point out the irony that she expects her friends--those Algonquin--to fork over 8 bucks if they (or anyone else) want to knit the shirt so she can actually pay her own protection racket which is itself a continuation of the same racket that brought her friends down in the first place.
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February 2024
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