Speak her name

 

A brief reminder that today, January 6th, is Ashli Babbitt Day.

May her soul rest in peace;  may her death be remembered;  and may the man responsible face impartial justice, sooner or later, for what he did.

Peter

Indeed

 

From Divemedic:

I don’t give a hairy rat’s ass if you never select a Speaker of the House, because until you do, the House won’t be able to do anything else. That’s fine by me, because the best that Americans can hope for at this point is gridlock.

He has a lot more to say about Republicans who've consistently and persistently betrayed the party's presumed "conservative" base.  I doubt many of my readers will disagree with him.

Peter

EDITED TO ADD:  From Sebastian Gorka on Twitter:

Under the knife today

 

You'll recall I mentioned the other day having developed a big blood-filled abscess on my leg.  I've been on some hyper-dosage of Bactrim to deal with the infection, and I don't mind telling you, it's whupped my butt!  There are two sizes of Bactrim pill, one 400/80mg and the other 800/160mg.  They've got me on four of the latter, double strength size every day, two morning and two evening.  My gut flora really, really don't like that!  I may ask today whether there's an alternative medication;  or, alternatively, ask for something to ease the impact on my body of the first medication.  *Sigh*

I go into the clinic this afternoon to get the abscess opened, drained and packed.  They're not wasting any time about it;  apparently large abscesses like this need fairly urgent treatment.  Unfortunately, it's also close to the major blood vessels in the inner thigh, so a big part of today's treatment will be for them to make very sure that they're not poking too close to the femoral artery or vein.  That would not be good.  If it looks too tricky, they'll run me over to the local hospital and finish the job under general anesthetic, with a vascular surgeon on hand.  However, they don't expect it to be that complicated.  I'll keep my fingers crossed!

Blog posts may be later than usual tomorrow morning, depending on how easy it is for me to move and work at the computer.  Please forgive any delay.

Peter

EDITED TO ADD:  My physician was horrified to learn I'd been put on so high a dose of Bactrim, and immediately told me to halve it.  She's also put me on probiotics, and prescribed something called Zofran that apparently makes heavy doses of antibiotics easier on the stomach.  She cut open the abscess and drained it, but says that its size and location make it unwise to pack it.  Instead, I have to wash it under the shower, very carefully, twice a day, and make sure the area stays as dry as possible.  (Let's hear it for cornstarch powder!  However, I must use it around, rather than on, the incision area, to prevent further granulation of the wound.)  I'll see her again late next week to follow up.

Thanks to everyone for their prayers and suggestions.

A summary of current conflicts

 

Strategy Page has just published its annual list of armed conflicts, wars, insurrections, rebellions, terrorism and other nasties.  They update it every year, so that those of us with an interest in the subject can find a potted summary of almost any fight and dig deeper from there.

This is our annual summary of current war zones and an overview of where it is all heading. After this overview there is the alphabetical list of the war zones and a quick summary of how the local mayhem has been proceeding. Since we have been covering this sort of thing for over twenty years now there are many war zones that have gone quiet, we left most of those in summary, with a note that those wars had gone dormant, and maybe extinct. History shows that dormant is more common than extinct. Forever wars, or at least multi-century ones, are an ancient tradition.

. . .

Aside from the Russian war in Ukraine, the rest of the world is a lot more peaceful than the headlines or Internet chatter would have you believe. Like most major trends, world peace just kind of sneaked up on everyone and a lot of people have not noticed. Thanks to modern tech, mainly ubiquitous access to cell phones and the Internet, any mayhem anywhere on the planet easily becomes another news item for a global audience. This gives the impression of more violence when it is nothing more than unprecedented general public access to news of violence that, until recently, was never broadcast worldwide and accompanied by video. That gives a false impression which has not been widely acknowledged. Historians, anthropologists and archeologists have found that centuries ago life was a lot more violent while we have long known that life spans then were much shorter. This is still the case with surviving tribal and Stone Age cultures as well as what we have come to call “failed states” like Somalia, Yemen and Afghanistan.

While there are still a few stone-age cultures left on the planet, there are also several more advanced ones that are cursed with a culture of medieval mayhem. These are the failed states and the most active ones, Yemen, Somalia and Afghanistan are often in the news. There are still a few imperial powers making headlines as they try to rebuild lost empires. Most empires disappeared over the last two centuries but several have survived and are trying to bring back the good old days, for the emperor and his cronies, of power and glory. Empires are dictatorships because democracy and imperial behavior do not mix. The troublesome empires currently in the news include China, Russia, Iran, Turkey and the Islamic Caliphate. Turkey, Russia and Iran are technically democracies but for the moment the imperial spirit is ascendant and the main cause of problems is aggression towards neighbors who were once part of their empire. The most active current example is Russia, which is actively seeking to reclaim Ukraine, Belarus, and the three Baltic States. All of these were part of the Soviet Union until the Soviet Union dissolved in 1991, with the loss of half its population and some of the most productive territories. None of these former Soviet territories have asked to rejoin the empire and many have joined NATO in an effort to keep the Russians out. All but Ukraine had joined NATO by 2021 and Ukraine's efforts to join was seen by Vladimir Putin as a threat to Russia.

Since the end of the Cold War in 1991, deaths from wars and large-scale civil disorder, which is often recorded as some kind of war, has led to a sharp drop in violence worldwide.

There's more at the link.  Conflict areas and war zones are listed in alphabetical order by country, so you can easily find those that interest you.  Useful and informative reading.

Peter

"Simply put, the global economy is like a Rube Goldberg machine"

 

That's the opinion of Bruce Wilds, who expands on his point at some length.  He also links to a spectacular video of a Rube Goldberg machine to make his point (embedded below).

Overall, the global financial system is not a well-designed efficient machine. Instead, it is a cobbled-together mess all glued together in a haphazard way to get the job done. To make matters worse, this system is greased by the greed of those who benefit from stealing a little from here and there. In the real world, things are usually not intentionally designed to be complicated but the reality is that they just are.

. . .

Simply put, the global economy is like a Rube Goldberg machine. These are "goal-oriented" contraptions built in a ridiculously complicated way to perform what would normally be a simple task. History shows we often have no idea what is driving events until long after they have transpired and even then the picture is blurred by interpretation. The lens by which we peer at events is firmly controlled by those with an agenda. These people control our government, big business, and mainstream media. When we look at the individuals leading these various factions we should feel little reason for faith or calm.

. . .

We have become very complacent and accepted the idea those in power will continue being creative enough to keep the economy moving forward. This includes thinking they can prolong current trends. Like a complicated Rube Goldberg machine with many moving parts, the failure of just one piece to perform as expected can alter the way events unfold.

There's more at the link.  It's worth reading in full.

Here's his exemplar of a Rube Goldberg machine.  Daft, yes, but entertaining!

Looking at our economy today, that's a pretty good comparison . . .

Peter

Remember the food crisis warnings?

 

Last year, everybody from the United Nations downwards was warning in strident tones about a food crisis, where not enough food would be produced to feed the world.  We spoke of it in these pages often enough.

Read the following report in that light.

Cofigeo, a group which owns several food companies in France, has shut down four of its eight factories over energy costs, amounting to 80 per cent of its total production.

. . .

“This decision aims to cope with the spectacular increase in its energy costs (gas and electricity necessary for cooking and sterilizing cooked dishes and recipes), which will be multiplied by 10 from the beginning of the year,” the group said in a statement this week.

The group warned that its energy costs were set to surge this year, with president Mathieu Thomazeau saying, “It will go overnight, from 4 million to 40 million euros.”

Cofigeo is the first major food producer to enact such radical measures to deal with the costs of energy but according to Le Figaro, other companies in the sector are also facing great difficulty adjusting to the rising prices of energy.

Last month, Perifem, a federation of French supermarket chains, warned that France could face major issues with food spoilage due to possible power outages and cuts, as many supermarkets would not have adequate time to prepare for outages.

. . .

Energy to cook and preserve food for canning or ready-meals is not the only place that energy security and food security intersect. As reported by Breitbart London in recent months, the sudden surge in energy prices has also impacted the production of fertiliser, which is an energy-intensive process requiring natural gas. Without ready access to modern fertilisers, the crop yields of European farms can be expected to collapse.

There's more at the link.

That's one firm, in one country.  Now multiply that by many firms in most European countries (including Britain, which may no longer be part of the European Union but still follows much the same policies).  Yes, the problem is that widespread.  There's lots of information out there about it, if you exercise due diligence and look for it.  Add to food companies those that produce fertilizer, and the raw materials for same (including German giant BASF, which is the biggest supplier in the world of nitrogen fertilizers, AFAIK).  They're in trouble, too.

When enough companies have such problems, there will come a tipping point.  Worse, once that capacity leaves the food growing, processing and distribution market, it can't come back overnight.  We're talking at least one growing season, if not two or three, to restore it.  That's between six months and two or three years.

Got your food reserves in order?  I used to reckon on a minimum of ten days to two weeks for everybody.  Now I'm thinking two to three months of food may be the new minimum, and a year's supply is no longer merely a prepper's way-out-there wet dream.  I've been surprised to hear from many readers that they're aiming for that much of a food reserve, as soon as they can save (and buy) enough.  If you can afford it, or build it up over time, and have space to store it, why not?

As for fertilizers, just ask your local farmers what they're having to pay to get deliveries for their 2023 crops.  In this part of the world, many are paying five to six times what they did last year.  Some are only paying three times as much, because they had the foresight to lock in multi-year contracts;  but even they have been told by their suppliers to pay higher prices, or do without.  They have no choice but to pay up - or quit farming.  Some have drastically altered their crop plans, choosing those that need less fertilizer.  We may have a glut of soybeans next year, but a real shortage of wheat and corn.

Food for thought, as well as the body.

Peter

National security, commercial insecurity

 

I was initially surprised to read about this incident.

Amid the growing threat of an invasion of Taiwan by Chinese forces, Taiwan's National Chung-Shan Institute of Science and Technology (NCSIST) has developed the Hsiung-Feng III anti-ship missile, which has been nicknamed the "Carrier Killer" due to its supersonic speed, range of up to 400 kilometers, and 225 kg warhead. However, Mirror Media on Wednesday (Jan. 4) cited sources as saying that the theodolites used to calibrate the missiles were sent by a Swiss company to China to make repairs due to malfunctions, potentially exposing sensitive data from missile tests and endangering Taiwan's national security.

According to the magazine, the theodolites used to make measurements on the Hsiung Feng III are made by the Swiss firm Leica Geosystems ... The NCSIST had recently discovered that the connector pins on two Leica theodolites had become loose. In early December of 2021 and late February 2022, a company distributor located in New Taipei City's Xindian District sent the products back to Switzerland for Leica Geosystems to carry out repairs. However, people familiar with the matter said that the repairs were very fast and after about three months, the two theodolites were sent back to NCSIST in February and May of 2022, respectively.

After the theodolites were repaired, their measurements of the Hsiung Feng missiles returned to normal. It was not until September of last year that NCSIST personnel checked the import declaration form and other materials returned by Leica Geosystems' maintenance center, and they noticed that something was amiss.

The documents revealed that the devices had actually been sent back to Taiwan from Qingdao in China's Shandong Province. This means the equipment was repaired in China or was sent to Taiwan via China, where secrets about the missiles or other parameters may have been seen by the Chinese military.

There's more at the link.

Thinking about it, it's the kind of security threat that must arise relatively easily in many countries.  In today's interconnected world, a precision instrument such as a theodolite, or a robot, or whatever, may be produced and sold by a firm in one country.  However, the components of that instrument may be assembled from many other countries.  Their origin isn't shown on product documentation;  all that says is that Company A in Country B produced the system.  Thus, when someone purchases that system, and later needs it checked or repaired, they have no problem sending it back to the manufacturer.  Unfortunately for them, they have no way of knowing where the manufacturer obtained all the parts;  and they can't control whether the manufacturer sends the parts back to the country of origin to have them repaired.  That's clearly what happened in this case.

I guess the USA has probably been caught in the same trap from time to time.  Remember last year's announcement that the F-35 contains metals from prohibited Chinese sources?  I bet the manufacturer (Lockheed Martin) subcontracted with another company to buy those parts, and the other company subcontracted with yet another to buy what it needed for them . . . and nobody put two and two together and came up with 3.14159.  I don't know whether it's possible to resolve this sort of conundrum without constant vigilance;  and if sophisticated technology originates in another country, where we can't exercise such vigilance, it's a permanent threat to security.

Food for thought.

Peter

Beautiful!

 

Courtesy of Koltuk's Honey on Gab, here's a picture he/she/they titled "Nature's frozen hummingbird".  Clickit to biggit.

Amazing to have the wind and rain and snow shape that icicle just right, and for the photographer to be in just the right spot at just the right time to capture it.

Peter

Medical stuff

 

I'm snarling at the world at present.  Over the weekend a small lump in my thigh blew up into a major blood-filled abscess, which is slowly draining.  This morning it took me 3 hours to see a PA for 5 minutes to confirm the diagnosis.  She's put me on an antibiotic to stop the infection, after which the abscess will have to be opened, packed and sutured to let it heal from the inside.  Meanwhile, I must help it drain with hot compresses and gentle squeezes.  Joy.

(The PA was annoyed with me because I said I could drain it every day with a needle and syringe.  "Don't DO that!  You'll make the infection worse!"  "Not if I disinfect everything first.  I did that in the military often enough."  "Well... just remember, I told you not to!"  She stomped off down the corridor muttering something about veterans.  It didn't sound polite.)

Anyway, prayers for healing will be appreciated, as always.  Please and thank you!

Peter

The list is painful even to read, much less experience!

 

I alternated between giggling and astonishment when reading Defector's article, "What Did We Get Stuck In Our Rectums Last Year?".  Here's an excerpt.

This is a tribute to American ingenuity, American perseverance, and above all else, American recklessness.

All reports are taken from the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission’s database of emergency room visits, all descriptions are verbatim, and always remember that a flared base is your best friend.

The lists may be found at the link.  I really can't reproduce them here, thanks to the family-friendly nature of this blog - but be prepared to be amazed!  The article covers every human orifice, not just rectums, so there's plenty of room for imaginative idiots to do what should never be done.

Peter

mRNA vaccines in pork products? YGTBSM!!!

 

A few days ago, I mentioned that mRNA technology was soon to appear in vaccines for other diseases besides COVID-19.

I'm very concerned to learn that the mRNA technology used in most COVID-19 vaccines is being further developed to produce many other types of vaccines against many other illnesses, including a universal flu vaccine and a malaria vaccine.  Given mRNA vaccines' track record so far, my wife and I won't be getting those, either - not until there's a whole lot more work done to ensure the safety of that technology, and it's been clearly demonstrated.

There's more at the link.

Now comes news that is, if possible, even more disturbing.

Genvax Technologies, a startup dedicated to bringing advances in self-amplifying mRNA (saRNA) vaccine production to animal health, has secured $6.5 million in series seed funding.

United Animal Health led the financing with participation from Johnsonville Ventures, Iowa Corn Growers Association, Summit Agricultural Group and Ag Startup Engine. This investor coalition represents animal health, nutrition, feed, meat packers and consumer products in the fight against existing and emerging threats to the food supply chain.

“The threat posed to producers and consumers by foreign animal diseases like African swine fever (ASF) and constantly mutating variants of swine influenza is extraordinary,” Joel Harris, CEO and co-founder of Genvax Technologies, said in a release. “The goal is to develop a vaccine that matches 100% to the specific strain when a disease outbreak occurs."

. . .

The company's proprietary saRNA platform allows for rapid development of herd-specific vaccines matched 100% to the variant strain circulating in an animal-production operation. By inserting a specific transgene or “gene of interest” (GOI) matched to the variant strain into the platform, the saRNA can generate an antibody response without requiring the whole pathogen, Genvax explained.

Again, more at the link.

Sounds exciting, doesn't it? . . . until one comes to the bit about "inserting a specific transgene or "gene of interest".  Wait a minute.  You're going to inject a new gene, distributed using the same mRNA technology that's blamed for many of the COVID-19 vaxx side-effects, into our food supply?

If this goes on, how can we trust pork and pork products to be safe to eat?  Oh, the technologists will doubtless scoff at such fears, and assure us that there's nothing to worry about - but they said that about the COVID-19 vaccines as well, didn't they?  Look how well that's worked out!

It's not just pork, either.  Other meat products may find themselves treated in the same way.  For that matter, scientists have already spoken of inserting mRNA vaccines into vegetables and fruit.  What if, over time, our entire food supply becomes a carrier of this stuff?

I may not be a scientist, and I lack their perspective on this:  but I can't help thinking that this may be one of the most dangerous, most potentially threatening technologies ever developed.  The further away we can keep it from our food supply, the better, as far as I'm concerned.  I foresee a bright future for farmers and smallholders who guarantee their produce to be mRNA-vaccine-free.  A lot of people like me will beat a path to their door, yelling "Take our money!  Please!"

Peter

Inflation watch, and reader feedback

 

On this, the first business day of 2023, we're reminded that our economy continues to be in serious trouble.  Inflation is still hitting hard, despite what the liberal pundits would have us believe, and it shows no sign of improvement (apart from wishful thinking, that is).

User Trucker Fren on Gab reported yesterday:

Almost $200 for a handful of groceries. I got barely anything. This has to be 50% higher than this time last year, it has to be

Agreeing with him, user Chadley Dudebro noted:

One of my colleagues found a grocery receipt from March 2019 in a kitchen drawer. He told his wife to buy exactly that list in December 2022. She had to sub a few items due to availability. But the moral of the story is, $93 worth of groceries in 2019 costs $209 in 2022.

If you have old grocery bills like that, it might be interesting to repeat the exercise yourself, and see how the numbers compare.

It's not just inflation - it's ongoing supply chain problems, too.  Many parts of the country are suffering shortages of many products.  Phil at Bustednuckles lives in the Vancouver, WA area.  He posted these images from his local Walmart (click 'em to biggem):

He writes:

We managed to get the last gallon of milk in the case.

That egg case is directly across the aisle from the milk case. Normally you would have to thread the needle between a floor full of goods and displays to get between them. Yesterday there was nothing but empty floor from one end of those two sections to the other.

The very fist thing we saw when we came in the door was a massive section of empty floor space that was probably 40 feet by fifty feet wide.

I will be 63 years old at the end of next month and never in all those years have I ever seen anything like this.

There's more at the link, as well as many comments from his readers about what they're seeing and experiencing in their own parts of the country.  Recommended reading.

Fortunately, here in North Texas we don't have many supply chain problems right now, but that can change quickly if problems arise.  I recall, back in 2021, the nearby city of Wichita Falls ran very low on all sorts of consumer needs.  Desperate shoppers from there promptly invaded nearby towns and tried to buy everything they had, only to be met with stiff resistance from locals who didn't want their shelves left bare.  The manager of our branch of Lowe's Market became something of a hero when he ordered that anyone whom he or the staff did not recognize had to produce their driver's license.  If it showed their home address to be outside our town, he refused to sell them anything, saying that his was a small store and had to satisfy local customers first.  We entirely approved, needless to say - although many visitors didn't!  My wife and I have patronized that store more often ever since then, as a "Thank You" for his loyalty to his regular customers.

How are you finding prices and availability of the things you need, readers?  Please let us know in Comments.

Peter

EDITED TO ADD:  Armstrong Economics calculates that the actual rate of real inflation in 2022 was a mind-boggling 32%.  That squares pretty well with my own calculation, which takes the official inflation rate and multiplies it by 3.5 to arrive at the real rate and get around bureaucratic obfuscation.  (I should add that when I wrote that article in May 2021, I figured the real inflation rate to be around 14.7%.  I'm not surprised to learn that it's more than doubled since then.  I expect it to keep going up for the foreseeable future, because our politicians and central bankers flatly refuse to learn from their mistakes.  If that happens, I may have to revise upward my 3.5x multiplier . . .)

Tradecraft - NOT!!!

 

Found on MeWe (sorry, can't provide a direct link - their software doesn't allow it).  Clickit to biggit.

Given the several former Intel weenies whom I know read this blog regularly, I expect feedback from them as to whether such tactics were, indeed, used in the Cold War.  It would explain a few things!

Peter

Memes that made me laugh 140

 

Gathered from around the Internet over the past week.  Click any image for a larger view.

Sunday morning music

 

Welcome to 2023!  Our first Sunday Morning Music post is for progressive rock group Polyphia, who turn out to be not so much "rock" as "anything goes" in their musical approach.  They're certainly innovative, with a style I'm growing to enjoy as I listen to more of their work.  A number of legendary musicians have performed with the group in recent releases, to add to the enjoyment.

Let's begin with the group's 2016 track "Crush", from their album "Renaissance".

Next, here are two tracks from their 2022 album "Remember That You Will Die".  First, here's "Playing God".

And this is "Ego Death".  The group is joined by master guitarist Steve Vai.

Eclectic, interesting music.  I hope you enjoyed these samples.  Look on YouTube for more of their tracks.

Peter

Saturday Snippet: Cats and gods

 

My friend, fellow writer and blogger Cedar Sanderson writes quirky, entertaining fiction that my wife and I both enjoy.  I'm sure many of you may have read her name in these pages, but not any of her books:  so I thought I'd provide the opening to her first young adult novel, "Vulcan's Kittens", published in 2013, to give you an idea of her style.

She's improved since then, as we all do with experience, but this book (and her second, "Pixie For Hire") have remained among my favorites, thanks to their chatty, simple, folksy style and easy reading.  Also, Cedar grew up and lived for many years in homesteading environments in New Hampshire and Alaska, so she speaks with the voice of experience about many of the settings in which she writes.

This book (and its sequel, "The God's Wolfling") tell the story of Linnea Vulkane, whom we meet as a teenager getting used to an adult world - and the more-than-merely-adult beings that run in her family.

Linnea looked out the tiny window of the tiny plane and marveled at the mountains below it. They had flown out of the Boise airport just a half hour before, but already she could see few signs of civilization below them. Her trip had started out that morning, in the Seattle Airport. She leaned her head against the cool window glass and re-lived the earlier scene with her mother.

“Mom, I’ll be fine. I want you to do this.” She’d insisted.

Her mother had hugged her, and Linnaea had leaned into her comfortable bulk, smelling the scent of lilacs and roses her mother always wore. Theta Vulkane was a renowned photographer, and traveled the world taking pictures of volcanoes and forest fires. But for the last two years she had stayed home with her only daughter. When this assignment had come in Linnaea could see how much her mother wanted to go.

“Dad and I, we had a lot of fun when you were gone. He always wanted you to go. Just because he’s not here...” Linnaea tried to keep her lip from wobbling. She took a deep breath and went on. “I’m sure Grampa Heff can keep me out of trouble.”

“Oh, I know he can. He always kept me from getting into too much. He’s just, well, since your grandmother left, he is sad and a bit cranky.”

“Mom, it’s not like I don’t have your phone number. And a new phone - thank you so much!”

Reminded of that in the present, Linn sat up and pulled it out of her jacket pocket. Her mom had always resisted her getting a phone - no amount of teasing and begging had moved her for the last two years, since she had gone into sixth grade and most of her friends had gotten one. But in the whirlwind of packing and preparation her mother had bought her the latest smart phone and loaded it with games and ebooks. Linn suspected the gift was partly to atone for the abandonment.

She didn’t care though. It was cool. She texted her mother now, making sure she didn’t use text speak. Mom would explode if she did, so she wrote, “Almost there. Flying over Nez Perce Mountains.”

She played a game, and then, bored, switched to her ebooks. Her mom had loaded the Diaries of Lewis and Clark onto it, no doubt hoping that she would get interested in the history of the area her grandfather lived in. Linn decided she would read that later and opened the latest fantasy novel instead. It was really cool, about how the gods of myth and folklore were living among humans and hiding their abilities. She read happily until they were on final approach to the Pierce Airport.

Grampa Heff was waiting for her in the little terminal, which was barely the two rooms needed for TSA regulations. He was leaning on his cane, she noticed. She ran to him and hugged him fiercely, which made him snort and lean into her. He smelled of smoke and apple tobacco, which made her sneeze.

He grinned at her when she finally let go. “Ready for a summer with an old coot?”

“Yep. I’m planning to be bored and whiny already.”

“Oh, I remember your mother at this age. Whew. Her moods could change on a dime.” Linn grimaced. She did that too. Frustrating. She’d talked to Mom about it, and although she understood that partly it was her body and hormones and all that, it was still annoying to start crying for no reason at all. Or yelling at her mother.

“I’ll try to be good, Grampa.”

Despite the cane, her grandfather was as strong as the steel that was his trade. He pitched her bags into the back of the truck and climbed into the cab beside her.

“Want to tool around town before we head up to the farm. Need to pick up some groceries. I also remember how much your mom ate at your age.”

Linn sighed. Her mom wouldn’t let her diet, either. Women in her family were supposed to be all ‘generous curves’ according to her, and no, Linn wasn’t fat at all. No matter what her friends said. She had a pretty good idea of what her grandfather would say if she asked for diet food. She helped shop at the grocery store, a very small place, nothing like the massive city supermarkets she was used to. Her grandfather bought a lot of stuff in bulk.

“We’ll have a garden for veggies,” he explained. “And I have a freezer full of meat, so this is mostly staples for the next month. Your Mom said you like to cook and bake?”

“We aren’t coming back to town for a month?”

“Well, maybe. I don’t come to town much.”

Linn blinked up at him, speechless for a moment. Yes, Pierce was a one-horse town, but the idea of not going anywhere for a month had surprised her. Where she lived in Seattle she could walk to the library, or to meet her friends.

“OK.” She finally said, realizing there wasn’t much to do in Pierce anyway. No wonder her mom had bought the phone for her. And no point in arguing with Grandpa Heff. His stubbornness was legendary.

The ride up to his farm was quiet. Linn spent most of it looking out the window admiring the scenery as they climbed up into the mountains. At one point her grandfather pulled over onto the side of the road and she got out and stared in awe at the perfect meadow of wildflowers in front of her. Her grandfather cleared his throat. “The blue ones are Camas. Kinda gets you, don’t it?”

“Wow, Grampa, it’s so beautiful.”

The field reached out endlessly, it seemed. The flowers were as blue as the sky above them, and for a moment she felt like she was floating between sky and sky. The scattered reds and yellows among the river of blue were like rays of sunlight coming through cracks. The scent of the flowers filled her up and she closed her eyes, savoring the warmth on her face. She looked back, realizing that she’d walked a little way out into the field. Her grandfather just leaned against the truck, his arms crossed and a small smile on his face.

Linn took a couple of pictures and climbed back in the truck. “Thanks, Grampa.”

“Thank you, young lady. Helps me see it fresh again through your eyes.” Without taking his eyes off the road, he reached over and ruffled her hair.

When they pulled into the farmyard the chickens scattered from the truck and then gathered again as soon as the engine was off. Linn hopped out and reached in for her bags, but her grandfather waved her off.

“Got a surprise for you in the barn. See if you can find it.”

Linn started for his small barn. Grampa didn’t keep any large livestock, so the barn was just big enough for a couple goats and their hay. As she got to the sliding doors, she saw the cat sitting on the stump beside them. Sitting upright, tail curled around her toes, she was a very elegant tawny cat.

“Hello, pretty lady.” Linn held out her hand to be sniffed. The cat surveyed her for a moment, and then leaped off the stump to wait at the doors. Linn was surprised at the size of her, fully as tall as her knee. The softly weaving tail, tip hooked like a shepherd’s crook at the moment, reached up to her waist. Linn slid the door open and the cat walked into the dimness of the barn. Linn could smell the sweet hay in the loft. The cat turned back and said firmly “Mew.”

Linn chuckled. “I am coming, Cat.”

The cat ascended to the loft in two swift bounds, one to the top of the stall door and the other to the floor of the loft, easily ten feet above them. Linn was impressed, but stopped to rub the noses of Grandpa’s two Alpine does as they stood in the stall. Then the cat miaowed again, and Linn obediently climbed the ladder to the loft. The cat sat on a bale of hay looking down into a little cavity surrounded by four bales on the floor. Linn looked into it.

“Kittens! Oh, how precious!”

She knelt on the floor and reached over the bale toward them, then hesitated. “May I?” she asked the mother cat. This was a very dignified beast, and very different from the house cats Linn knew at home. The cat curled her paws under her chest and began to purr, eyes half lidded. Linn took this to mean yes, and stroked the top of the nearest kitten’s head.

“You are so soft.” She murmured, not wanting to disturb the sleepy kittens. There were four of them. One black, one calico, and two silvery gray with black spots. They bobbed blind little heads at her and opened little pink mouths in soundless mews, but Linn could see they would be even bigger than their mother, as they were already the size of her two fists put together, and they couldn’t be more than two weeks old.

Linn stroked each of the kittens for a few minutes, marveling at the soft fur and cute round tummies. She stopped when their mother flowed into the nest and wrapped herself around them. The kittens immediately nosed into her teats. Even blind they knew exactly where to go. Linn sighed. This was a very nice surprise.

“Linn? Dinnertime.” Her grandfather sounded like he was calling from the porch.

“Coming, Grampa.” She called back, no longer worried about waking the kittens.

She climbed down the ladder and washed up at the pump between the house and the smithy. Her grandfather had designed the pump and basin to overflow into a koi pond, and she trailed her fingers in it to feel the eager mouths nibble at her.

Dinner was a venison stew and rustic bread. Her grandfather was a good cook. She sighed a little, looking down at her half empty bowl. Her father had been a good cook, too.

After dinner her grandfather pointed to the loft. “Up you go! These old knees can’t do the ladder, but you’ll be sleeping up there this summer, unless you decide to sleep in the barn.”

“Could I?” Linn asked, picturing the kittens.

“Not tonight, but yes. Now bed.”

Linn fell asleep quickly, worn out with her long day of traveling. In the middle of the night, she woke up with the familiar feeling of a crampy stomach. Her period had started. Yuck. She rolled over to get out of bed and then realized that there was someone in the cabin talking to Grampa Heff.

“You do realize you cannot stay out of this forever.” A heavy male voice, dripping with anger and a strange accent.

“We choose to treat Hephaestus as a refuge.” A sibilant and melodious female voice. Linn thought she had a speech impediment.

Linn crawled out of bed, her belly cramps forgotten and slid to the edge of the loft where she could see into the sitting area below. Four figures stood down there in the dimly lit room. The two closest to the door were very big. If they walked under the loft they would have to duck. The one on the couch appeared to be huddled under Grampa’s afghan. Grampa Heff himself was straddling a kitchen chair he had turned backwards and was leaning his crossed arms on the back of it.

“Vulcan - ah, Haephestus, as you prefer. You choose to live unnaturally. We would rather not force you to return with us.”

“I chose to make myself happy, not your lot. And do you recall what happened last time I was forced?”

Linn could see a grimace pass over the man’s face. In the firelight his skin was unusually red, as was his hair. She wondered why Grampa hadn’t lit a lamp.

“I cannot and will not leave here.” The woman on the couch declared, sitting up suddenly. Linn startled as she realized that the woman was a cat... This was her grandfather’s barn cat, talking and sitting on the couch.

The big man stepped toward her, casting his face into shadow. Linn could still hear the sneer in his voice. “Bastet’s Daughter, you are the least of our concerns. Vulcan may take on strays and broken... beings, but we do not.”

“I would not go with you, even without my obligations here.” Grampa interjected.

“Oh, the child.” The man’s dismissive tone made Linn’s blood boil.

“Not just a child. Blood of my blood.”

“Which I’m sure she knows nothing about. To her, you are just a broken-down old smith.”

“Her mother has told her what we are, I am certain.”

“She could not even see me if she were able to wake from the spell I cast over her.”

Linn blinked in surprise. Not only was she wide awake, riveted to the conversation below, but she could see the red man, the cat woman, and the bulk of something else (she was no longer sure it was a man) near the door in the shadows. And as for ‘what she was’... she was a human being. Wasn’t she? Linn remembered her mother once telling her that not all myths and fairy tales were made up. Many of the old tales had a grain of truth in them.

“There are very powerful things in this world of ours, things that most people cannot see or accept if they do see them.” Theta’s voice had gone dreamy, and Linn saw that her eyes were focused somewhere far away. “My family is a powerful one, and you have a little of that power, my sweet. If you see strange things, or feel like you did something you cannot explain, then I will tell you more.”

Linn dragged her attention back to the scene below. Her mother wasn’t there to explain, but she knew who she was going to talk to as soon as their visitors left.

“I think the child will surprise you, Mars.” Grampa Heff’s voice was mild. Linn suddenly caught the connection of names. Mars and Vulcan were gods. Bastet was the cat god of Egypt. Who were these people? Who was her grandfather? Linn felt dizzy even lying flat on the floor.

“In any case,” Her grandfather stood up and Linn could see the fire shimmering through his halo of white hair. She suddenly wondered what color it had been when he was young. “You will leave now. I have no intention of abandoning my work.”

“You will come to Olympus.”

“You can’t make me.”

“Oh, I have ways...” Mars backed out of the door. His unseen bodyguard had already gone out.

Grampa Heff sighed and ran his hands through his hair, making it stand even more on end. He looked up toward Linn. “Come on down, child.”

Lid slid down the ladder. “How did you know?”

He chuckled and hugged her. “I could hear you breathing, little one. How much did you hear?”

Linn realized he was asking her how much she had really understood. “Not much... why did he call you Vulcan? Where did he want you to go? Was he really red?”

Her grandfather laughed. “Vulcan is one of my names, the gods are meeting to arrange the fate of the world and he is indeed, red.”

“The fate of the world? Gods? What?” Her dizzy feeling came back.

“Sit, child.” Bastet’s Daughter, forgotten behind her, reached out a soft and very large paw to pull her down onto the couch. Linn sank down next to the warm bulk of the cat, who was now closer to tiger-sized.

“You grew.” Linn muttered.

The cat laughed.

Grampa Heff smiled. “I think we need to explain, but first, hot cocoa.”

There's your introduction to Linnea's world.  This book and its sequel are free to read via Kindle Unlimited, so if you have a KU subscription, click over to Amazon via the links provided and read the whole thing.  You'll enjoy it.

Peter

I'd be embarrassed to place an order like this

 

Courtesy of an e-mail from a regular reader, we come across this coffee order at Starbucks (click the image for a larger view):

Pretentious?  Check.  Twee?  Check.  Ridiculous?  Check.

I'd be embarrassed to place an order like that, making almost impossible demands on the barista and demonstrating my own sense of entitlement above all else.  What happened to ordering a simple cup of coffee, for heaven's sake?

I suppose it's a worthwhile check for sanity.  If you want to hire someone for your business, take them to a coffee shop and listen to what they order.  If it's anything like the above, drop them like a hot potato!

Peter

Why Gab is vitally important in the social media sphere

 

I've mentioned on several occasions that I'm a member of Gab, the social media network that emphasizes personal responsibility and free speech.  Gab does not censor its users, apart from violations of the laws and constitution of the USA.  It expects its members to clean up their own online environment by blocking or muting voices they don't want to hear.  I do that on a daily basis, whenever I come across anti-Semitic or Nazi sympathizers and/or propaganda.  Their ideas are invalid in the most fundamental sense, and are alien to any Christian worthy of the name:  so I block every one of them that I find, and even some of the borderline cases.  It's up to me to keep my timeline free of their nonsense.  It's not Gab's responsibility, or anyone else's.  That respects free speech and online freedom at one and the same time.

Gab is open and honest about not censoring its members when it comes to lawful speech.  It rejects demands from elsewhere to shut down users who have committed no crime under US law.  Yesterday it did so again.

Gab is going to begin publishing the purely censorship-based inbound requests that we receive from governments. These are the cases where for the most part European bodies like the Met and Europol send us transparently political takedown requests with no law enforcement purpose. Essentially they’re trying to silence a person that they’ve already thrown in prison or are about to. If they don’t want us to talk about these frivolous requests, they can stop sending them to us.

Welcome to the Gab Files.

Today we received one such request from the UK government.

They cited Public Order Act 1986 which says the following:

(1) A person who publishes or distributes written material which is threatening, abusive or insulting is guilty of an offence if—(a) he intends thereby to stir up racial hatred (b) having regard to all the circumstances racial hatred is likely to be stirred up thereby

They didn’t tell us who the person is who allegedly broke this dystopian nonsense law, they didn’t tell us whether the content which they convicted him of was found on our site, and they didn’t specify which posts, if any, actually violated UK law.

They simply told us that they imprisoned someone for expressing wrongthink online, that person had a Gab account and the UK government expected us to unperson this person from the Internet at their behest when no violation of our TOS was found.

Gab is an American company which operates its business in accordance with U.S. law. Gab has no business or operations in the United Kingdom of any kind, nor does it inquire as to, or log, the residence or criminal records of its users or readers.

Gab’s policy is to not remove material unless it violates Gab’s terms of service which was drafted in accordance with US law, in particular the First Amendment.

“Hate speech” or “offensive speech” as such is not illegal here and in fact benefits from unambiguous constitutional protection backed by a half-century of precedent.

Our response to the UK is the same as it is to Germany, France, China, and every other country who tries to remove lawful content from the American Internet: get bent.

Let's hear it for Gab!  That's precisely what their response should be.  No violation of US law?  Then no interference with free speech.  I wish other social media companies followed the same policy.

Peter

Doofus Of The Day #1,099

 

Today's award goes to a doctor's surgery in Doncaster, England.  The BBC reports:

A GP surgery accidentally told patients they had aggressive lung cancer instead of wishing them a merry Christmas.

Askern Medical Practice sent the text message to people registered with the surgery in Doncaster on 23 December.

There's more at the link.

Understandably, the patients who received the wrong message are not happy about it.  One observed:  "If it's one of their admins that's sent out a mass text, I wouldn't be trusting them to empty the bins."  It's hard to argue with that sentiment.

After that, I daresay a Merry Christmas was not had by all concerned!

Peter

Ask, and you shall receive...

 

... and therefore, you should be careful what you ask for.

A California sheriff’s office released body camera footage showing a deputy-involved shooting of a man who was riding a bike before wielding a cleaver and claiming to be the Antichrist.

. . .

"Don't touch your weapon. Keep your hands out of your pockets," the deputy is heard telling Wallis.

"Shoot me then, motherf-----. …. Call your f---ing office, because I’m the Antichrist," Wallis responded. 

Wallis attempted to get back onto his bike and ride away, but the deputy pushed him. 

"Alright motherf-----. What's up, G," Wallis asked the deputy, before pulling a cleaver from his backpack. 

The deputy is seen pulling out a baton and his firearm and then shoots Wallis. 

Authorities said the deputy provided medical aid to Wallis until paramedics arrived, but Wallis was ultimately declared dead at the scene. The sheriff’s office recovered a six-inch meat cleaver from the scene.

There's more at the link.

Quite literally, he asked for it!  In particular, if the late Mr. Wallis was, indeed, the Antichrist (something I beg leave to doubt), he should surely have known better than to ignore the promise made by Christ himself.  That promise certainly worked for him - but it's too late now for him to complain...

Peter