“And if I did do it … you deserved it”

For someone to completely uproot their life, separate from most of their family, their friends and their upbringing takes guts. I’ve moved within my own country a few times and it was jarring enough.

People who are willing to such should be celebrated. I personally appreciate the culture, entertainment and food that they bring with them.

That said, I worked at UConn for a few months for a project, and I was taken aback by how many students were of Asian descent compared to how many were white or black. It made me reflect just how much more populous that part of the world is.

And while I do celebrate culture, and am even a proponent of open borders generally, I do think culture needs to be preserved. I live in the US and not China for a reason. The people who move from China, for more than a short term visit, should expect to follow American laws and social norms. That is to say, come freely to add onto our patchwork quilt here, but be ready to add to it, rather than replacing an existing patch with your own.

As for what people think here. I live in a small college town. We have folks from other cultures here already. I think they would be welcomed in town generally, but the outlying county folks would have more reservations - they’d be more accepting for those that talked or acted like them, hunting, fishing, 4-wheeling, big trucks and all of that.

There was this one time a few years back that I had to go to the dump to dispose of some various large material. Our dump is more of a transfer station with a big warehouse where everything is disposed of, compacted by giant bulldozers and then loaded onto other trucks to take to a nearby landfill in a separate county.

This particular visit it had been rainy for a few days, and I guess I must’ve gotten there right after the transfer trucks picked up all the refuse. Except for the floor, it was covered in a slippery stink-filled film. I carefully threw my truckload in, making sure that I didn’t fall, though I did slip a bit. It took some time to do so, so I came up with this little ditty. “Trash juice, trash juice, oh bring back my trash juice to me, to me!”

I did my work, shuffled my shoes and got into the car. Next stop was the grocery store. I’m fumbling around in the cheese aisle, and I guess I was still singing my song at a quiet mumble. Well, this old blue haired lady must’ve heard me. She turned around and recoiled “what are you singing!” In that way where it seemed like her whole life was built around cleanliness and my recitation was an affront to everything that she stood for.

Well, I got a good laugh out of that reaction, still do. Moral of the story is that singing to yourself does not necessarily negate other people thinking you’re a crazy person.

It’s all projection. When you know you’re capable of doing it, you think everyone else would be too.

It’s not the Severus Snape we wanted, but it is the one we all…ah hell I can’t go through with it. This guy is Bellatrix incarnate.

We are broken because society is broken.

1000s of years from now, whatever proceeds us will be judging us for our microplastics use, just as we judge the Romans for their lead use.

Someone produced a puff piece about the line and how it’s transformed Saudi Arabia. It’s biased (so keep that in mind) but it’s also well produced and answers some questions retroactively on why the Line was so important to SA even if it failed to become reality. It’s worth a watch:

https://youtu.be/bOG4qCx0peA

Dude’s moral compass is the NYSE.

Buy land from the lunar embassy. Guaranteed to go to the moon!

It’s his same old song. Tear down what already exists, then huck a new version of it out for the very low price of $19.84.

I’m surprised he hasn’t added his name to the title of it yet.

Why not just work with Denmark to add some defense bases there if it’s so important? Oh that’s right, we already do.

You’d think we as a society would have figured this out by now.

And yea, if I knew I was secretly corrupt AF and assumed everyone else was like me, then I’d probably want rules against it too.

Huh, gets me thinking, maybe we should treat extreme views like a mental illness. Then again, maybe not because it’s probably get abused quick like it did last time.

I agree. I was an early adopter. It’s a compelling idea to have a public ledger, but so far it’s been terrible execution, and what a disaster for the environment.

And they still host performances there!

If you had told me this pic was from the USS Alabama that I toured a few years back, I wouldn’t have disagreed with you, even down to the color of the floor.

A lot of these ammunition bays were deep within the hull of the ship. I’m assuming to protect them from all the other chaos that would be going on around them. Makes you realize just how dangerous a sub with one well aimed torpedo could be.

Another remarkable thing I saw was that the Alabama had a massive ice cream freezer on it. Was to improve morale on those long voyages. Anything like that on the North Carolina?

It’s only a select few who are looking for that from the diameter axis.

“She had hips that would put the main gun of a 1940s era battleship to shame. And her name was Helga, because of the hell she bore unto the Germans. I wouldn’t have touched her, but that’s because few men could.”

Good. Let the ones who can, survive. Not be swarmed by zombies.

The more well off ones usually have a connected airport and “fuck-you-money” level security. As someone else mentioned, helicopters are an option, or perhaps boat if they’re by a waterway.

So congratulations, you’ve trapped the community doctors and lawyers, maybe a very well off Grammy or two with limited faculties, but you’ve set off the alarm bells to the true predators of society, who’ve now made it to Madagascar and shut down the ports.

I’m supposed to have a flight next week. It was already right on the bubble of whether I should fly or just drive. I’m not going to stand in some long ass line and get berated by unpaid TSA officers and then risk my life with unpaid air traffic controllers.

Maybe I’ll make a trip of it and even go see some friends 2 hours away from the destination.

Man, I really wish this country had trains.

One of the wittier guys in the trailer park I grew up in did that trick where it looks like you can pull one of your fingers off from one hand. As an 8 year old, that was fucking cool. Perhaps you could even augment it with some fake blood.

Another time he did the quarter behind your ear trick and then gave us the quarter.

To this day, I still remember him more than any shucker of a Milky Way or Babe Ruth candy bar. So yeah, go for it, make an impression.