What will I be hunting, you ask? Easy….. bureaucrats, politicians, preachers, or rednecks, whichever pops up in the scope first. Any one of those four groups, as I define them, would furnish me with an ample number of targets, any of whom deserve to die…. They actually deserve slow, agonizing deaths, but I’ll settle for blasting them into oblivion quickly, if it means I get to watch, and to pull the trigger…. The emotional release will be ecstatic, and so will the knowledge that the world is a safer place for the good ffolkes who are not party to, but are subjected to, their vicious games of manipulation and power-grabbing….

I know, you’re probably wondering why I’m so pissed off this morning…. I’m not sure, exactly, but it may have something to do with having to officially decide yesterday to give up on Christmas, again, for the third straight year. It’s not that my kids will care, they’re adults now, and will understand, but it is truly a hard thing, emotionally, to accept not being able to even think about buying gifts for others, merely because I have to keep the money available to buy food to eat in the last week of the month. All because the assholes who run the system have set it up to harass and annoy people rather than help them….

Now I’ve torn it….. I’m now just about as angry and upset as I can possibly be, and it is a very good thing that I don’t already own a gun, or I’d be out using it now. Every time I turn around, I’m bumping up against another piece of poverty, and am reminded that my situation is one that only time can fix, that I’m trapped into waiting for the bureaucrats to act. In fact, I’m so ripped right now, I’m going to have to take a short break, to pull it together enough to be able to type….. I’ll be back, as Arnie said to such good effect (maybe his only good line, ever….)….

“Humor is the best antidote to reality.” — Smart Bee

Okay, the homicidal urges have passed, for now…. Damn this emotionalism, anyway! Frigging PTSD is really a pain at times…. think about the past… pain and joy in turn, break into tears. Think about the future…. fun, but unproductive, break into tears. Think about the present, same-same. My tear ducts are getting raw and wrinkled from passing so much salty water, and I’m quite sure I can do without the assault of fluids on my sinuses every time my subconscious decides it wants to grieve again. Ah well, I’m now going to apply the most severe form of distraction I can, and then try to write about something else…. I’ll let you know if it works…. Shall we Pearl?…..
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So, my brain is being uncooperative today, so much so that it has caused me to pick pearls that fade on me…. that is, after a single paragraph, I’m stuck for anything more to say about the subject, at least anything in my usual vein of sardonicism and humorous approbation and examination. (What does that MEAN?….) Any who, I’m going to use some mental judo, and use its own weight against it… so here are two very short pearls, to make one decent sized pearl to start this now staggeringly disorganized process….

“Don’t Panic.” — The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy

I’m not really sure why I chose to use this today. It is, of course, very good advice, applicable to virtually every situation of which one can conceive in a rational state of mind. Or, I suppose, in an irrational state…. Panic, while useful as a motivational factor, or perhaps more accurately, as fuel for the energy to act, most often dims our bulb. That is to say, it drastically reduces our overall ability to think, channeling the mind into those patterns of thought that can lead to precipitous actions, of the type which can be highly dangerous to our health and welfare, as they so often act without attention to details, such as a tall cliff directly in the path we choose to run from a wild animal…. So, while it may be useful in increasing one’s speed and strength for short periods, one must not fall prey to its effect on the mind, which is generally counter-productive in achieving the ultimate goal, of survival….
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“If a lawyer and an IRS agent were both drowning, and you could only save one of them, would you go to lunch or read the paper?” — Smart Alec Bee

I’m not sure if it was obvious, or not, but the above is an attempt to regain some control over this process today; it got away from me quite early, and I’m not certain what is going to work to get it back on track…. I hope this doesn’t mean I’ll have to drag a poem out of my head; it HURTS! Ah well, if I must, I must…. but let us first trust to Smart Bee to furnish me with at least one good pearl to turn into something worthwhile, and I’ll be happy…. or at least content….. Onward……

“Each man can interpret another’s experience only by his own.” — Thoreau
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The Tale of Custard The Dragon

Belinda lived in a little white house,
With a little black kitten and a little gray mouse,
And a little yellow dog and a little red wagon,
And a realio, trulio, little pet dragon.

Now the name of the little black kitten was Ink,
And the little gray mouse, she called her Blink,
And the little yellow dog was sharp as Mustard,
But the dragon was a coward, and she called him Custard.

Custard the dragon had big sharp teeth,
And spikes on top of him and scales underneath,
Mouth like a fireplace, chimney for a nose,
And realio, trulio, daggers on his toes.

Belinda was as brave as a barrel full of bears,
And Ink and Blink chased lions down the stairs,
Mustard was as brave as a tiger in a rage,
But Custard cried for a nice safe cage.

Belinda tickled him, she tickled him unmerciful,
Ink, Blink and Mustard, they rudely called him Percival,
They all sat laughing in the little red wagon
At the realio, trulio, cowardly dragon.

Belinda giggled till she shook the house,
And Blink said Week!, which is giggling for a mouse,
Ink and Mustard rudely asked his age,
When Custard cried for a nice safe cage.

Suddenly, suddenly they heard a nasty sound,
And Mustard growled, and they all looked around.
Meowch! cried Ink, and Ooh! cried Belinda,
For there was a pirate, climbing in the winda.

Pistol in his left hand, pistol in his right,
And he held in his teeth a cutlass bright,
His beard was black, one leg was wood;
It was clear that the pirate meant no good.

Belinda paled, and she cried, Help! Help!
But Mustard fled with a terrified yelp,
Ink trickled down to the bottom of the household,
And little mouse Blink strategically mouseholed.

But up jumped Custard, snorting like an engine,
Clashed his tail like irons in a dungeon,
With a clatter and a clank and a jangling squirm
He went at the pirate like a robin at a worm.

The pirate gaped at Belinda’s dragon,
And gulped some grog from his pocket flagon,
He fired two bullets but they didn’t hit,
And Custard gobbled him, every bit.

Belinda embraced him, Mustard licked him,
No one mourned for his pirate victim
Ink and Blink in glee did gyrate
Around the dragon that ate the pyrate.

Belinda still lives in her little white house,
With her little black kitten and her little gray mouse,
And her little yellow dog and her little red wagon,
And her realio, trulio, little pet dragon.

Belinda is as brave as a barrel full of bears,
And Ink and Blink chase lions down the stairs,
Mustard is as brave as a tiger in a rage,
But Custard keeps crying for a nice safe cage.

Ogden Nash
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“The need to be right is the sign of a vulgar mind.” — Albert Camus

Albert is right, but is obviously a proponent of saying what he has to say, then stopping. In this case, stopping does not give enough clarity to this idea, which is a central one to a complete and balanced outlook, or, if you will, a balanced mind. It is indeed vulgar, as well as ultimately unproductive, to NEED to be right. What should be more important is to KNOW, or be able to learn to know, what is right…. Only then can a rational decision be made as to the correct action, or non-action to pursue. I think in this particular case, Mr. Camus was telling us something we should all know; he was not telling us all that he knew….

I find this to be true of much of his philosophy, in that it only goes so far before dumping the reader back into a place where they must use their own resources to figure out his exact meaning. I’m not sure if this is deliberate, a method to force people to think, or if it is just his own sense of independence and curmudgeonry that causes him to only share part of what he really understands. I suppose, in its way, it is a very effective technique to encourage others to think, an activity of which I wholeheartedly approve, and is also, I suppose, one of the reasons I’ve always liked his published statements, and use them fairly frequently in pearls, or rather, as pearls….

In my world, the search for Truth is pretty much the backbone of all that I do. Even the mundane activities I perform are in some way in support of that search, or, at least, I’d like to think they are…. because the Truth is very important to me, and how I feel about the world. The use of it for manipulation, or its suppression for the same purpose, infuriates me, and makes me want to carve out of any human I see doing so, that part of their soul that makes them misuse the Truth for their own purposes, or allows them to believe that they have any right to do so…. To me, it is the simplest interpretation of the Golden Rule…. If I expect myself to honor the Truth, then I would expect others to do the same….

Sadly, that is MY belief, and very few of the people in the world who are in positions of power over others have any investment at all in promoting Truth, as it doesn’t suit their self-interest…. The statement that started this discussion is, in fact, one of the best ways to identify those in society who tend to act in their own interests before those of others. The need to BE right implies that one need not necessarily be IN the right; in fact, it is often to their advantage to be wrong, and lie about what is right, twisting facts and circumstance to suit their purpose. If someone insists on being right, you can usually bet they are not being entirely truthful….

“If what the philosophers say be true,–that all men’s actions proceed from one source; that as they assent from a persuasion that a thing is so, and dissent from a persuasion that it is not, and suspend their judgment from a persuasion that it is uncertain,–so likewise they seek a thing from a persuasion that it is for their advantage.” — Epictetus (c. 60 AD) — Discourses, Book i, Chap. xviii

I wish I COULD offer some simple explanation for why people can be such assholes….. but, I can’t. I guess we’ll all just have to deal with them the best we can, each in our own way….. and hope for the best……

“I feel like I’m in a Toilet Bowl with a thumbtack in my forehead!!” — Zippy the Pinhead
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