Category Archives: Day-to-Day

Day-to-Day, Frustration & Complaint, Meaning of Life

Smoking Angry

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Smoking Angry

Smoking Angry – The Lot Of Us

Lately, I think a lot people, everywhere, are smoking angry. There doesn’t seem to be a limit to it, wherever you look. I am not just talking about the putz of a POTUS, but just about anything you can think of.

White nationalists, a.k.a. Nazi-sympathizing fascists, North Korean insanity, international trade disputes, Scaramucci, Kenyan post-election violence,  Venezuela’s descent into an even worse dictatorship (is that possible?), the continued use of tofu in cooking. The list is endless.

And this can’t be good for the general health of the globe. Why, all this stress, all this violence, all this vitriol and bitterness – I’m afraid it will lead to more people taking up smoking.

Now if you’re the type to ask “smoke what?”, well, then I will let you, dear reader, decide if that is to be a legal cigarette, a pipe, a bong, a raft of Cuban cigars, a funny cigarette (for a little while longer), a brisket, a pork shoulder, some bacon, a freshly caught Pacific salmon, or even a caper or two.

Yet, the best course of action may not be to take up smoking in its various forms. Some would suggest exercise to combat the smoking anger. They’re idiots. Others suggest yoga and meditation. Colossal idiots. Retreating into tequila and massive chocolate and/or cinnamon danish consumption? Ok, now we’re getting somewhere.

The Ass That Launched A Thousand Shits

Perhaps getting to the source of the problem is what we need to do to alleviate all this hatred, this anger, this smoking cauldron of negativity. Mostly that would mean getting the POTUS impeached and then thrown into a vat of angry lesbians. But that isn’t going to happen any time soon.

We’re left with an ass in charge of the body politic. And I can assure you every time that ass fires off an alternative fact-based tweet, a misguided missive, a cantankerous comment, there are a thousand people in Washington who utter the word “shit!” He’s gone and done it again, he’s angered up the blood real good.

Retreat, Fight or Nap?

Left with another 3+ years in office and lots of hate-filled, environmentally-destructive and freedom-of-speech-depriving legislation to pass, the options left to the inhabitants of those sort of United States are threefold: retreat, fight or nap.

If you’re the scaredy-cat type, you retreat, try and flee to Canada (hey, it’s cold, people, and Prime Minister Sissy Pants still hasn’t legalized weed yet). If you’re smoking angry, you fight. Well sort of. There’s this #resistance thing going around, but let’s face it, President small-hands was actually duly elected in a democracy (with a lot of fake news, it seems). That leaves you with one option that I am quite fond of: Naps.

Will it bring about change? Nope. Will it fill the airwaves with inspiration and action? Not a chance. Will it lead to less smoking anger and potentially some ruffled sheets? Highly probable.

The Moral

What’s the moral of this story? If you can find one, you’re on more mood-altering medication than me, and you really should take a nap after eating some delicious chocolate babka that will put you into a coma once the sugar-high wears off.

Pontificatingly parochial,

Mozi The Mooch Maldonado-Druker

Day-to-Day, Frustration & Complaint, Meaning of Life

Go Into the Weeds! Rid Us of the Ants!

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Into the Weeds with Stanko & Tibor

Emerging Insurgents in the Weeds

Having returned home from work, I passed the tiny, patchy patch of grass and other weeds that co-habitate in front of my place of residence like filthy hippies after a bong hit. Laying about, intertwined and generally useless.  And what was circulating among those invasive weeds? Even filthier six-legged insurgents keen on crawling into my house to search for food that I, or more likely, my filth-generating children, undoubtedly left behind in various nooks and crannies. Ants. Big, small, black, dark brown, far too numerous to count and some were so large they even made a squishy noise when I crushed them.

No matter what I try to keep the garden free of ants, those semi-sentient drones keep coming back and always find ways into our house to eat the scraps of food we have dropped all over the kitchen since we foolishly agreed to host for my many greedy,  usurpatious relatives. That I love, of course.

Dumb But Multitudinous

I cannot understand how, over the eons and millennia of evolution,  that neither the ants nor the weeds have gotten any smarter. You crush them, rip them out, spray them, poison them, curse them while shaking your fist — they don’t learn their lesson. Actually, it’s probably a good thing that the ants haven’t really become any smarter because I think they would have found a way to take their revenge on me for having smooshed so many of their kind over my life. I could well imagine some A-student and Mensa society ants huddling together in a hive, with ant-sized smart boards, notebooks and a PowerPoint presentation having devised a plan to drop a bowling ball on my head. But I digress.

Weeds, conversely, I haven’t killed enough of. You rip them out by the roots, you spray them with illudium phosdex or gasoline, you curse them with a shaman’s fervour, and still, they don’t listen. They come back every week in spring and summer, every year. You’d think one of them would have spread the word to the others by now, but no. Stubborn and relentless.

POTUS Fabric

Neither ants nor weeds are wanted. Anywhere by anyone. They are invaders and despoil beauty. Just like the current POTUS, yet they (and he) still persist, in every garden, every city, every country, continent and country.

Yet accept them we must. We have no choice as they are part of the fabric of life. As we all know the fabric of life isn’t smooth cashmere with a satin liner and Merino wool. It’s more like an itchy, discount wool blend with a polyester weave, surrounded by a lovely layer of wet burlap. Furthermore, this fabric has not been well tailored, there are loose ends, it’s a hideous pastel color, probably mauve and green, and is ill-fitting and creates tremendous lint balls.

But it’s all the fabric we have, so bad parts are there as well as good parts.  Like ants and weeds, we can’t only have the good parts, we have to accept the bad.

Conversely, the ants and weeds that support the current leader of the free world and a bunch of hotels is something everyone has to learn to live with. There is no presidential pest removal service. Well there is, but you have to wait four years to replace him legally or find incriminating photos of him with a Russian prostitute.

Relentless Patience

To remove weeds and ants, one must have patience, perseverance, a large sum of money, a diet high in fibre and chocolate danish, and the ability to take defeat gracefully and with dignity. But stomping and cursing, foaming at the mouth and unspecified acts rage confined to your bathroom only are also helpful in dealing with this intractable problem.

So be sure to accept the situation, do not fly off the handle, unless you know you can win, deal with the unpleasantness as best as you can, and please, for me, destroy some weeds and ants.

Chronically imbalanced and low on sugar,

Facundo Thiago Salvador da Costa Gonclaves Schmidt

Day-to-Day, Meaning of Life

Weedy Reality – It Sucks

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Stanko & Tibor - Weedy Reality

Weeding Out Reality

[Warning: I took a lot of hey fever medicine and followed it with too much chocolate ice cream and not enough sleep. Happy reading.]

Having spent some time thinking about what to rant about, I spent time weeding out my more abstruse thoughts, like why can’t people who are smoking cigarettes during my daily strolls be encased in a giant, flexible plastic bubble so the carcinogenic fumes are trapped with their owners, while I stride by inhaling air, largely tainted by diesel fumes and people wearing far too much perfume and aftershave?

Another brilliant idea I wedded out is why hasn’t someone invented a mini crutch for under my chin that would rest on my collar bones or sternum so I could nap in in appropriate places like funeral homes and other places of worship? An indispensable napping device. Alas, reality strikes again and my wishes and wants remain unfulfilled and I am left with practical thoughts. Like how do I handle the imperfections of spring?

Today was a perfect example of what warm weather and sunshine bring out — beauty-spoiling, grass-molesting, flower-strangling weeds. Sure, while spring has finally arrived with some warmer weather, and the flowers are rising and the lilacs are blossoming, you still have to deal with the rebellious scum of nature: the weeds.

I spent 1 full hour, or 60 minutes to those of you who are more granular and anal in their timekeeping, using a metal weeding tool designed by Finns, no less, and ripping out weeds from the small patch if grass that is at the front of our house. It made me feel good to rid the space of those unruly horticultural whores who will pop up anywhere and everywhere. Made me feel like a man. With gardening equipment. I had the power of weed life and weed death for a brief shining moment. And yet, I still wasn’t totally satisfied.

Weed Remover

Like the unfortunate election of who some people are calling the Cheeto Mussolini, some things don’t work out the way we want them to. He’s an ego-ridden schmuck, but he is the duly elected POTUS (with some help from Russia). People wanted a change, an outsider, someone who would shake things up! And instead they elected a loud-mouthed, pathological weed who should be sprayed with some kind of industrial paint remover, and maybe cat urine. But some voters got what they wanted. Sort of.

We don’t always get what we want, even when we get what we want. I want free chocolate and danish as part of a healthy and nutritious breakfast, but the powers that be say it’s not healthy, and therefore I am thwarted. Instead I am forced to pay for, and eat cinnamon buns and almond croissants. It’s morally wrong, I tell you.

But with this ever-returning metaphorical and literal weed garden, we receive the gift of fodder for discussion. The stuff of comics and talkshows. That which keeps my father livid and his blood pressure elevated. It keeps me in comic heaven and gives me mental sustenance that can’t be provided by simple daily occurrences like work, the kids and giving the government vats of tax money.

Steady

Weedy reality will always be there. The steady hand of chaos and messiness that keeps me awake at night, dreaming of free danish and forever low glucose readings when I am getting my checkup.

Quizzically dizzy and sleepily silly,
Johann of the Suburbs

Day-to-Day, Frustration & Complaint, Meaning of Life

Name Calling and Other Policies

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Stanko & Tibor - Name Calling

Name Calling – Because It Works

A simple yet universally true observation of human behavior: Whenever you are walking anywhere, any place, and there are others afoot around you, you say to yourself “what’s with this moron who is walking too slowly and blocking my  progress?!! Idiot.” Conversely, the person who flies past you at a much greater pace, on his or her way to somewhere important like the toilet or the casino, is inevitably met with the thought “why is that jerk face in such a rush?? What a bipedal asshat he is.” You resort to name calling.

It’s such a natural human behaviour to apply a derogative label to someone you don’t agree with or think is somehow making your life worse. It also applies to people who don’t agree with your view on life, or politics, or any other facet of existence. You call them names because we cannot all just get along. But why do we do it, when we as a species really ought to be trying to chill out and not be so aggressive?

Name calling is so liberating and energizing! Don’t like someone’s religion? They are zealots. They are atheist? They are dirty heretics. Don’t like a country’s leader? Call him (it’s almost always a ‘him’ except for Eva Perón and my 9th grade math teacher) a filthy fascist! Or a dirty communist. Or an inbreed. Or a buck-toothed, cross-eyed yokel. (Note: yokels per se aren’t usually blessed with good access to dental care plans , so that’s not really a fair name calling strategy.)

Whether it be political, financial, sexual or religious orientation, humans have come up with some kind of nasty name to call the other person. And man, does it feel good!

Name Calling – Creativity for All

Name calling is not just convenient for letting off mental steam, and not just because it lets anyone feel superior to anyone else by demeaning the other person. Name calling isn’t just for the short-temepered, uneducated boobs among us. It’s a wonderful form of creative expression open to all (except probably the deaf & mute contingent). As proof, there’s a fantastic Shakespeare Insult Kit you can peruse online. It’s WAY more useful than working at your day job. I’ve heard. Dare I say, it’s a form of abusive art. Kind of like this comic. But I digress.

When have you ever not felt elated and all tingly about calling someone a nasty name? Never, that’s when. It’s such a great outlet. And less costly, most of the time, than shooting a gun. So it could be said that shooting off your mouth is less damaging than shooting off your gun. But I’d have to do some in-depth research involving a gallon of whiskey, some cheap ammunition and profanity-laced episode of Archer to be sure.

Some of the most creative, hurtful, demeaning descriptors I have ever heard were uttered by my father, usually while in traffic. In fact, I seem to recall most name calling and epithet hurling occurred where there were many humans in a crowded space. My goodness – if name calling is a result of high human density, that would explain why genuine New Yorkers are such jerks. I can barely imagine the name calling that goes on iat Costco on a Saturday… such a commercial use of words.

Words Matter. Mostly.

And words do matter, people. Concepts we verbalize or print have tremendous power. If you’re branded “a fat bag of gaseous impotent rage” (a.k.a. Prezeedent Donnie Trump), you’re not going to like it.  Call Vladimir Putin “a soulless, conniving killer who’d murder his own  grandmother if she looked at him crooked” then you’d merely be stating a fact, which is not so much name calling.

I would argue strenuously (as long as it wasn’t too strenuous and made me sweat) that humans cannot live without name calling. Many studies have shown that when you try to convince people of your point of view – with facts, no less, the opposite turns out to be the case. They dig in their metaphorical heels and refuse to believe you even more, no mater how much evidence you give them.

So why spend all that effort gathering fake news or real facts to get someone to agree with you? Way too much effort. Stick with name calling and be done with it.

Name Calling Is Genetic

I would argue based on scant research that name calling is genetically built in to humans. Look at the letters of the genetic code: A, U, G and C. And also sometimes T. If you rearrange them, you get “UGAC” – which derives from Bugac, which is a village in Bács-Kiskun county, in the Southern Great Plain region of southern Hungary. [Editor’s Note: He’s not lying, I fact-checked this and he didn’t make this up.] Anyone who knows anything about Bugacian Hungarians know they are the biggest name callers on the planet and must have been the originators of epithet hurling when they were cavemen. See? It’s in our genetic code!! [Editor’s Note: Now he’s lying big-time.]

I’ll bet you that even the sweetest Buddhist monk, the kindest most peace-loving Bahai, the laziest, most rational atheist couldn’t go half an hour without calling someone, somewhere a nasty name.

The Takeaway

So what is the take-away from this scientifically unfounded rant? Is it that the pleasures of a properly uttered series of insulting words is necessary for the human being to psychologically cope with the mass of genetic stupidity that is the human race (at least when there are no firearms present)? Could it be that there is a primordial need to feel better about ourselves by denigrating others with hurtful descriptors? Or have we reached an age in societal development that now forces us to resort to name calling so as to deal with the tsunami of horrible news that floods our airwaves and media? Or are we just all idiots?

Frankly, you’re all a bunch of half-wit morons for reading this swill.

Lovingly short of sleep and full of sinus issues,

Bugac Druker

I call people nasty names because...

Day-to-Day, Meaning of Life

It’s Getting A Little Absurd Out There

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Absurdity - It's The New Normal

Absurdity, Thy Wellspring Is POTUS

You know what he highlight of my day is? Is it being thankful that I didn’t pass away in my sleep? A fresh cup of coffee perking me up as the day starts ? A tranquil ride to work where no one has thrown themselves in front of the metro car yet again? Seeing the shining faces of my family and friends? Wrong.

It’s going to bathroom at work and knowing that I’m the first person to use the toilet. No one else has been near the seat since it was last cleaned. (I know you’re wondering “but how does he know?” Perhaps best if you don’t ask.) Absurd, isn’t it, that an unmolested toilet seat is the highlight of my day. No doubt about it.

But since the election of Emperor Trump, and the installment of Steve “Goebbels” Bannon, absurdity is the New Normal. That someone made a fish tribute to President Trump is just the start of the immense weirdness about to befall the globe.

[Note to reader: This particular blog rant is not absurd in and of itself. It merely serves to point out that absurd is now par for the course. Or this blog rant is proof, and is perhaps yet another reason to have me committed to an institution with darkened windows, staffed by thick-fingered, lightly moustachioed, hulking Eastern European nurses who chiefly rely on ECT as a method to “socially readjust undesirable behaviour”. But I digress.]

It will be four years of mind-bending, constitution-challenging, Dali-eque representations of alternative facts, all emanating from the uncontrolled, unmuzzled mouth of the POTUS, and the mind of the of his righthand man.

Almost makes you wish you Bush-Cheney was back in the Whitehouse, doesn’t it?

Unsettlingly imbalanced,

Enzo di Tutti Capi Druker

Day-to-Day, Frustration & Complaint, Meaning of Life

How To Replace Democracy – Choose Your Price

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Stanko & Tibor - The Price of Democracy

How To Replace Democracy – Choose Your Price

There was a report recently stating that if automobile makers want to reduce the weight of their vehicles, they will have to use more plastic parts because they are lighter. What is a key ingredient used to make plastic? Petroleum, the main ingredient in gasoline. So to reduce the amount of fuel vehicles use, they need to use parts made from the stuff needed to make gasoline. There is a price to pay for progress. Ironic. Or is that coincidental? I don’t know. English isn’t my mother tongue.

The same irony is valid when applied to democracy. To make it more useful, relevant and effective, you need more people to come out and vote. But participation rates in democracies have been going down for lots of reasons that I won’t speculate on here, largely, because I will employ far more profanity than usual, and after all, profanity should be reserved for use in the home, classrooms and inside your motor vehicle, where it’s best applied.

Furthermore, of those who come out to vote, most probably aren’t informed on all the issues and vote with their hearts and not their heads. Or they vote against someone or something rather than voting for someone or some idea. We can identify what and who we dislike more easily that what or who we like. Yet, if they knew the price of not voting, or voting with their hearts, maybe they’d reconsider. Or maybe not.

Solution: Price Democracy

Let’s apply some speculative and questionable pricing theory. Democracy needs to be priced properly for it to have relevance and value. You see, when you put a price on something suddenly you give it value you can calculate. Can you put a price on free speech or freedom? Well, it’s hard, but I’d say it’s worth at least $100, before taxes. Maybe a little more if I can print profanity-laced t-shirts and hand them out randomly. But I digress.

Conversely democracy could be priced in an inverse sense — meaning, if you don’t go out and vote, it’ll cost you some real cash. Like $20. OK, maybe that’s too low. Make it $30. But negative incentives tend not to work. Even if you got a tax break for voting in municipal, state or national elections, most people would skip it anyway because the outcome would suck anyway.

Bundling Democracy at the Right Price

What if democracy and voting came in a packaged bundle?  Much like mobile phones and cable TV subscriptions, if you could sign up for the democracy bundle that meets your budget and needs, you maybe be encouraged to vote.

Sure, right now, I get the right to free speech, and other services like health care, fire and police protection and sanitation. But what if I could get a free movie every month along with my right to vote? Or if I pay more, I could get 5 or more votes for any given election.

I bet if voting was tied to having your Internet connection cut or maintained, people would come out in droves to vote. Vote or we’ll cut off your Internet. That would scare the piss out everyone. On the other hand, if you could get increased upload/download speeds on your Internet connection if you went out an voted, that might be a good incentive. Or free dope.

Discount Democracy

Or better yet, you get a discount on your cable/TV/internet/mobile phone bill for each vote you make AND you get to kick someone at the cable/TV/internet/mobile company where you’re subscribed right in the privates for the crappy customer service and time wasted on hold when you need help with your erroneous and unjustly exorbitant bill.

What about loyalty voting points if you vote for one party every election? You’d get a loyalty card that could trade for privileges like a plane ticket to a warm vacation resort, or your street gets paved before the others in your neighbourhood. That happens now anyway  in a lot of places, but you have to be intimately linked to organized crime, and that means having to fill in my calendar with even more appointments at brothels and cheap motels than usual, and I’m too busy for that.

And if all else fails, we move to a democracy pricing model based on the single model that has shown itself to be more reliable and accurate than any other since academics and computational models became all the rage: We guesstimate the price like on the The Price Is Right.

Insincerely friendly,
Jean-Baptiste Colbert Druker of NDG

How would you improve democracy?

Day-to-Day, Frustration & Complaint, Meaning of Life

Good Riddance 2016 – Happy 2017

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Good Riddance and Welcome

Well the people who follow the Gregorian calendar can now officially say ‘good riddance to 2016’ — especially given that death has been  a big theme this past year. (If you follow the Chinese, Zoroastrian, Muslim, Jewish, Japanese Imperial or Mayan calendars, it was still a pretty shockingly crappy year from some perspectives.)

And I am not counting the long list of celebrities who shuffled off their moral coil, and there were many. Influential too, in all manner of subjects and areas of expertise.

However, we should not forget those who weren’t famous or successful who were killed, murdered or just plain suffered to death in just about every part of the world. Don’t forget, they are just as much a part of life as those n Hollywood or elsewhere. I know, the media doesn’t want us to focus on that so much, because it doesn’t get ratings. But try not to forget.

I wonder if there is a death counter to tally up all the people who willfully or less than willfully said good riddance to this mortal life. That would be a tough job for any computer, or even the best accountant, no matter how good the software. Do humans do a global death census? Maybe we should, but counting the dead is hard because they tend not speak up when asked.

2017 Has To be Better, Right?

2017 —  Will it get better? That is the question on so many peoples’ lips. If you are an optimist –gullible, on medication or otherwise — it can only get better. After Donald Trump‘s election, and countless other terrorist attacks in the name of some ‘benevolent’ god, life can only move toward the positive, depending on your point of view, of course.

For the bitter pessimists among us, we have to suffer through four years of Donald Trump and the inevitable talk shows that will tear him to shreds. We’re all losers here. There is still Putin, terrorists, and worst of all, Mariah Carey is making a comeback. Some in the media are asking, if she’s making a comeback, why can’t a benevolent god from ANY religion give her tongue gout?

Good Riddance Again?

The human memory is conditioned to blot out bad experiences (like murder, torture, losing money at gambling, or an overdone steak). We tend to remember the things that gave us joy and euphoria. Obviously that’s different for different people. But if we just learned to remember the awful stuff a little more often, maybe we wouldn’t fall into the same bad habits like betting on democracy, or your favorite sports team, or the mafia to get you out of a sticky situation.

My recommendation for the future is simple: Eat what you like, spend time with those who make you happy, quit your job if you hate it, and watch plenty of animated TV – way better than reality.

Faithfully without faith,

Nostradamned Ignorantus Biggus Druker

Day-to-Day, Meaning of Life

How To Replace Democracy – TwitFace

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Stanko & Tibor - How To Replace Democracy TwitFace

Date: December, snowy, and bathed in the glow of a computer monitor. Still trying to find a replacement for democracy that doesn't involve fascists. Or social media.

Democracy: It’s Easier Than Flossing

For some time there was a theory that flossing regularly could somehow help deter heart attacks. That theory has been disproven and rightfully so. Anything having to do with flossing is inherently evil, largely because no one I know, except dentists, the children of dentists, oral hygienists and psycho-killers, has ever been for a dental checkup and heard from said oral care specialist “your flossing habits are excellent!” We always get the drill of guilt for not having flossed either sufficiently or at all. And then a weather front of shame rolls in.

How does flossing in any, way, shape or form relate to my valiant search for something to replace democracy yet does not involve secret police, fascism, communism, or a form thereof? It’s a stretch, I admit, but I had a lot of coffee and sugar this morning so I think I can make this work.

Practice Makes Imperfect

Like so many things in life, the more you do something, usually the easier it gets. For example, kissing, thieving, knitting a wool hat, or hammering a nail. Same goes for flossing.

Your first attempt usually involves a valiant and often violent struggle with the roll of dental floss, or if you use one of those new fangled flossing implements, repeatedly stabbing your inner cheek walls or upper palette to the point where the pain-induced tear that runs down your eye winds up in your mouth, mere seconds after you’ve rattled off a series of profanities best suited for a confession box. (See National Lampoon’s That’s Not Funny, That’s Sick)

But after a while, you get it, you know how to do it, and it becomes almost second nature if you practice a bit. Sure, you might not be perfect, but you know what to do come floss-time. Same goes — or should go — for democracy.

Show Up, Choose, Leave

The democratic process is pretty simple, and depending on where you live and under what conditions, you usually have to practice the skill (and art) of choosing a candidate (or defacing the ballot) maybe every couple of years. So you do get some practice.

Not unlike the flossing described above, you do have to suffer a bit before you get to vote. There are course the interminable election campaigns, which are not unlike the fear one experiences prior to going to the dentist’s, or better yet, these campaigns may be more akin to actually being in the dentist’s chair just before the gum-wrecking, tooth-extracting, needle-inserting, pain-enhancing physician and assistant enter the room to tell you several thousand dollars of expensive and painful fixes are required, and to take out a loan to cover the costs.

Election campaigns are horrendous, wasteful, vainglorious affairs but, like flossing, they are part of the procedure and you can become numb to them with enough exposure. That could be bad if you experience blood loss living through either the flossing or the election campaign. But at the same time, its not all that hard to do your democratic duty. It takes 3 simple steps: Show up, choose, and then leave.

But Am I Qualified?

This begs the question — if, in a democracy, anyone eligible can vote, are they really qualified to vote? Many have suggested the same holds true for making and rearing a child. Too many are eligible and too few are qualified, yet we let that happen all the time (until that kind Mr. Trump spikes our drinking water with birth control pills). But I digress.

We test people who want to drive a car to see if they are competent — and again, too many are eligible and too few are qualified, even if they didn’t sleep with and/or bribe the driving instructor. Yet, 22-chromosed morons and idiots show up to take their driver’s test, choose some answers, spin around a parking lot and leave with a permit for motorized mayhem in their sweaty, greasy, unwashed, little hands.

Should we have means testing to determine who is qualified to vote? Who would decide this? (Answer: me, and me alone) How would this even be enforced? (Answer: lots of robots and a ton of domestic spying). If we tested for intelligence, would it be based on math? science? or a canonical knowledge of Star Wars and Bugs Bunny? (Answer: I’m leaning towards Bugs Bunny)

So much to contemplate, yet it’s so perilously close to dinner. And food wins every time over deep, rational thought.

With a warm heart and a glaring bald spot,

Mephistopheles “Bringer Noxious Emissions” Druker

Day-to-Day, Frustration & Complaint, Meaning of Life

How To Replace Democracy

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Stanko & Tibor - Gapplesoft & Democracy

Dateline: Early December. Wet weather lurks outside my door, while inside, it's getting mighty steamy. I left the shower running and the door open. I am trying to wash off the residue of democracy.

How To Replace Democracy

Does it sound like this post is anti-democratic? Do you think it will spiral into a rant about the failings of our democracy, where your fellow citizens, rich and poor, smart and dumb, well educated and not well educated (note to reader: being educated doesn’t mean you’re smart – look at that interracial-loving, open-minded, all-inclusive Bannon fellow), smelly and perfumed, hairy and non-hairy, are given the freedom and privilege to choose their leaders, no matter how well or poorly they are informed (I’m looking at you Facebook)?

It’s kind of ironic that some of the people who don’t like freedom of speech an despise the press, and are skilled at starting race wars, somehow got elected to powerful positions in the US of A. Especially that tanned, manicured and coiffed hairball, Mr. President Elect. He’d sue you nine ways from Sunday for calling him a short-fingered vulgarian (great blog). And his staff would have you water-boarded, electrocuted and deported just for saying he’s a nut bar. But that is the irony, or better yet, the sick coincidence of democracy.

So, What Are Our Options?

Having just reviewed Ancient Greek social and power structures and the democratic process they applied (I was helping my kid with her homework), it seemed like a pretty good idea at the time, but the Greeks kind of had segregated democracy.

If you were a natural citizen, male over the age of 18 and had done your military service, you could vote. Not the women, though. That would have been too progressive for a warrior-based society that was probably hairier and smellier than an Albanian metal worker’s armpit at the end of his shift. There were also other citizens who had to buy their way into voting. And of course there were the slaves and they had no right to vote ever.

Seems like a good idea, but not everyone is happy with it.

So what are the options for replacing democracy?

Pick From 5 Hardships

  • Dictatorship/Fascism – Not as good as the marketing department makes it sound. Sure, the rallies are fun, but there are silly uniforms, secret police and usually some form of ostracization by the world community, which makes it hard to get Tom Jones to come to your country to sing at your leader’s wedding.
  • Communism – Usually results in bad haircuts, crappy clothing options, terrible shopping hours, and you’re made fun of by the rest of the global community, including the Chinese, for drab clothing.
  • Anarchy – Seems appealing at first, especially where inflexible work hours are concerned, but it makes getting an Uber really difficult because the driver is probably going to robbed or crashed into by some post-apocalyptic vehicle driven by a person with (see a trend here) a bad haircut. And good luck try booking an appointment to get a driver’s licence.
  • Monarchy/Oligarchy – See “Dictatorship”, subtract the global ostracization and add high fashion, probably some inbreeding and a lot of castles and oodles of snobbery based solely on being part of the “lucky sperm club.” Usually good for some tourism if it’s a monarchy (see England), and great for commercial thuggery if it’s an oligarchy (see Eastern Europe).
  • Domination by aliens – If they don’t do anal probes, enslave us or eat us for breakfast, this may be the most acceptable alternative to democracy. Would certainly spare us having to deal with the humans who call at all hours from call centers asking us if we’d like to pay more for cable and phone service.

So as we can see, all of the above suck just as badly as democracy, except with the current form of democracy in practice in some parts of the globe, chances are you can buy your way into power more easily, and your vote might count if it’s limited to your house.

With that in mind, I will expound at length in my next post about how and why warm sheep’s cheese is superior to most elected and appointed officials, and way better than a kick in the private parts with a steel boot.

Philosophically spent, and morally bent,

Aristotle “The Arachnid” Druker

How should we govern ourselves?(required)

Day-to-Day, Meaning of Life

New & Improved: Environmentally Friendly Torture Items!

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Stanko & Tibor - Environmentally Sound Torture

Dateline: Fall, the season's a-changing', the leaves are a-fallin', the basement is chilly but cozy. However, I ate too much garlic. Many will be olfactorily assaulted. Many will suffer.

Torture Takes Its Cue From Nature

In color theory, there is something called the color wheel. In it you can see all the colors of the spectrum, and see which color is another’s opposite. So if you want to know, the opposite of green is red. Which is fitting for what lies outside my door. Streets full of trees all turning from green to red. Nature is telling us “get ready for the torture of winter.”

And torture takes many forms. Not just plummeting temperatures, icy roads and lazy, corrupt, shiftless city workers and oceans of rust-inducing salt. Sometimes it takes the form of an interminable US election between the female twin of The Joker and humanity’s version of a hairy ass pimple with a perma-tan. I’ll take The Joker any day of the week, because the ass pimple is a huge discomfort, is laden with pus and hangs around far longer than you want.

Sure, it’s close to being over, this “rigged” election, but it can’t come soon enough. I have reverted to watching even more animated shows and subjecting myself to self-torture through the regular ingestion of baked goods that probably have greater petroleum content than flour or sugar. Those are my favorite.

Regardless of how this election turns out, we can all agree on one thing: And that’s nothing. Which makes for lots of fodder for more comics to come your way when I have had insufficient sleep and a wholly imbalanced diet, low of fruit and high in hot dogs and fries.

Either way, it’s time for bed, for dreams of things greater, for days of sun and just enough snow for me to flee to the ski hills.

Sheepishly sleepless,

Master of Martial Arts, Field Marshal Marshall McLuhan Druker