The August Dog Days

As most of you can tell by now, those of who are cooking with us under the “warm California sun”, now realize, that between  3pm and 7pm as the sun sets in the west, it beats down on our building and our apartment, turning it into an oven.

As record temperatures reach around 100 to 105, the effect of perpetual sun light on our home can be estimated at 110+. It is during those 4 hours of baking does the human body begin to slow down to the point of heat stroke (the process of your brains cooking within your skull as it swells and blocks blood from reaching it’s critical destinations.).

While the La Tuna Fire caused dozens evacuations near Burbank and concerns for our friends who live there, the dark cloud of smoke blocked out the sun on Saturday morning. As the hours of 3pm to 7 pm passed the smoky haze from the brush fire brought us relief from the unforgiving sun.

Its strange though. As sweat pours from my body, I’m motivated to continue working to bail my family out of “The August Dog Days”. I even found the time and energy to write my blog and report to whomever may be reading.

As the heat takes it toll on us and everyone around us, I realize it is tougher to handle as the body ages. Add to the fact that I am recovering from a 2.5 week sinus infection. I’ve deduced the diabetes has “complicated” my immunity from this yearly sickness I endure this time of year. It cost me 2.5 weeks of production.

And of course, our sweet little dog, Rex whose back legs stopped working. We took him to the vet and found nothing wrong with him, but we all suspect that one of his launching to or from the bed, perhaps misaligned one of his spinal discs. He’s not in pain and he can pee okay, but he can’t walk. We are trying various therapies, but we will will keep and love our Rex forever.  In any case, the visit cost $800.00, eating up our business money.

We also had a bed bug infestation that we had to prepare for and  ditch our Hollywood Bowl and Sunset Strip tickets. That was about $250.00 in entertainment cancellations.

Nuclear Holocaust or The Ultimate Reality Show into Oblivion

Ok. This is it. The perfect scenario:

On their respective thrones sits two (2) spoiled, rotten, entitled, rich kids who got everything they ever wanted since birth. Anyone who has said “no” to them has been either “eliminated”, bribed, paid-off, or “disappeared”.

This is generally known as “Royalty”, whereas leaders are “awarded” leadership roles based on their bloodline. This is what their nation homes have “allowed”  causing this potential nuclear night befalling us all. This is what “inheritance” has reciprocated back to the world as…birthright.

This week, the theory of “Royalty” and “Birthright” will be put to the test as these two borderline morons bluff their way into the everlasting…with us along for the ride.

In any case, we are watching two (2) megalomaniacs who have stumbled upon concrete reflections of them selves. Two (2) children are throwing temper tantrums holding biological, nuclear and chemical weapons in their tiny hands and nobody can the nukes out of their hands. Why? “It’s…just because. See? Now do what your ordered and die for your “anointed” leader as you should.

“So this is what happens when an unstoppable force meets an unmovable object.” Said the Joker in The Dark Night. The problem here is both are jokers and they hold the lives of the world in their  paranoid hands.

Now as the reality of this mess sinks in, we can check our options like we did in the military, “Bend over, grab your ankles and kiss your ass goodbye.” Surprisingly, in this twenty-first century, there are those who insist to survive a  full-blown nuclear catastrophe. I salute their spirit, but their corpses will long purtify during those two to three-hundred years of radioactive wonderland swirling the globe’s “water”, “air” and “land” and I use those terms quite loosely since none of those are guaranteed to be in their original states of existence.

What’s that you say? A “limited nuclear war”? “Surviving a nuclear war”? Hmm. That sounds interesting. Let’s explore that delusion, shall we?

I may be wrong and I hope I am, but let’s say it happens and half the United States (the western part of course) and the entire Korean Peninsula are obliterated into radioactive ASH and it stops there…maybe.

“But I have prepared a 2 mile deep bomb shelter for just this purpose with 20 to 30 years supply of food and water. We got this!”

Good point, however moot, unless you can outlast the endless, lingering fallout in the air, water, land and no animals or vegetation, and reboot a planet void of life or the possibility thereof…also know as FUBAR.

If the deadly radiation dares to cross borders, say…all of them, the planet will,  as Wikipedia puts it…
“Besides the obvious direct destruction of cities by nuclear blasts, the potential aftermath of a nuclear war could involve firestorms, a nuclear winter, widespread radiation sickness from fallout, and/or the temporary loss of much modern technology due to electromagnetic pulses. Some scientists, such as Alan Robock, have speculated that a thermonuclear war could result in the end of modern civilization on Earth, in part due to a long-lasting nuclear winter. In one model, temperatures following a full thermonuclear war fall for several years by 7 to 8 degrees Celsius on average.^[1] ” See, “Likelihood of human extinction.”

According to the The Nuclear Threat Initiative, “The United States will spend at least $179 billion over the nine fiscal years of 2010-2018 on its nuclear arsenal, averaging $20 billion per year, with costs increasing from $16 billion to $25 billion per year over that time frame. ”

That sure is a lot of money to delete the human race, isn’t it? Looks like it may not matter how many times we destroy the world. We’ll long be carbon shadows before the next dozen of missiles hit the same targets over and over again, until, they too are eradicated by the last functioning nuclear launch base or the last base standing, probably one from the diagram on the left.

Imagine! You and your crew of about five or six people, in underground silos, (sealed?) have just launched all your missiles at various targets, killing millions of people around the globe, your missions complete and most of the Continent is ablaze with radiation storms and no communications, since nearly every has been killed within minutes….including their families and homes. What now? The obvious answer is they would eventually starve and dehydrate after a matter of weeks and that would be it.

So they moral of the story is…After spending TRILLIONS on this world-ending shit, we FINALLY get to use it! But don’t despair, because if it does happen, regardless of which idiot rich kid holds the nuke codes…you won’t feel a thing.

Seriously. You would either vaporize instantly from the intense 3000 degree plus of incineration OR your would become a carbon shadow on the one, like the one shown here on the left from Hiroshima.

OR you’ll experience terminal radiation sickness, the likes of which the world has seen in Hiroshima and Nagasaki such as the example pictured below left.

In any case, there is a silver lining and I keep telling my fiends and they look at me funny when I assure them, that first, we FINALLY get to spend all that Nuke Tech Investment we were forced to buy and most importantly, we don’t have to go to work or pay bills. Think about it. Slaves no more. Its all gone.

Those of you who can meditate close to the point of death or non-existence will understand the feeling of eternal bliss. To some it may hard to let go of all…this mess and war and anger and, etc. To others like me, the sooner the better. To be affiliated with a species who’s only commodities are those of self destruction is quite embarrassing to be sure. Alien beings, somewhere out there, will probably wait out the thousand years after we go “poof” and until the radiation storms are cleared.

Sure the can wait a thousand years. They have Universal Health Coverage. 🙂

Do you have a plan?

Wow! I must say that things are picking up. Freelance work is really taking off and work is non stop. For those who know me, I’ve been uncharacteristically silent on the current political situation in this country. That’s because I’m too focused on 2 things that make my life complete: Family and Work, in that order.

After reaching 50 (an age I’d never dreamed I’d reach), you begin to think about legacy and the memories you will leave behind. When that day comes when they either throw my ashes into the pacific or lower my stiff, embalmed and purifying carcass into the cold ground, I’d like to have given the funeral audience a nice little slide show of digital work. So then, afterwords, when they go get drunk (or whatever), they can kick back and watch some entertaining images and say, “CJ did a good job. Maybe I’ll buy a few of his DVD’s for his folks.”

And so they family element is the final reason for the legacy. As the political situation grown more turbulent and more unstable, financial and future considerations are taken more seriously.

“Where do we want to be in 10 years?” – HAVE A PLAN!

This is what I asked my wife, Karin. We have different answers, however resulting in the same answer: Healthcare. As our bodies turn to shit, Healthcare becomes an incredibly vital issue. Knowing that the GOP will unravel our entire healthcare system sometime in the future, we have know choice then to save up and move to a country that actually cares about it’s citizens and not just uses them as their own personal ATMs.

Of course that does not include the upcoming global financial meltdown sure occur as Wall Street regulations are scaled back to repeat the same catastrophe we barely lived through during the Bush Recession of 2008.

It baffles the imagination how the American could actually vote back the same criminals (GOP) who destroyed the national and world economies. But we all know they have cultivated a highly cultivated, subculture of uneducated and misinformed sheep who will believe anything as long as it involves guns and selling more Bibles to countries they want to plunder, destroy and “rebuild” with no-bid contracts to themselves and contractor buddies. (Iraq).

“But we must consider the votes and values of the sparse and scattered, illiterate and sometimes inbred folks of the boonies who essentially just sit around hating OTWs (other than white).” Nurtured on a daily diet of lies, misinformation, manipulation and brutal mind-fucking, this small sample of America has been systematically “uneducated” for years, using religion, fear and an integrated xenophobia to guarantee an expected an overwhelming GOP victory in nearly every election.

How do I know? I grew up with them in the Midwest. I went to medium city High School of Missouri and witness many country boys (and some girls) deliberately drop out of schools to become farmers. And they went on to become great farmers and horrible business people. As the cut-throat business of agriculture became another corporate strong-hold, their simple uneducated minds could not handle the onslaught and so created a new “welfare recipient”, the farmer class.

When the founding fathers created the Electoral College, that tricky little mechanism to over-ride the distrustful people, they did not account for Fox News feeding the honest rural folks a daily diet of lies, misinformation, propaganda and brutal mind-fucking. Based on these facts, there are many people who would like to abolish the Electoral College and put the power into the hands of the American People. But that won’t happen anytime and the millions of educated people in the cites will bow down to the drunken, hateful and sometimes methed-out ‘values” of rural folks and be satisfied with their “illusion of democracy” as my non-genetic father, George Carlin taught me.

The Political Page

Most of you who know me have noticed I haven’t said much about the current situation.

Unless you are following the show’s Facebook Page,  I really haven’t said much about the current political situation plaguing the country. For what it’s worth, the only change that will come is in the form of what I call, “Time Machine Laws”. These are the laws that keep a small minority of rich, old white males in power, similar to the apartheid laws in South Africa before they evolved. It appears we have been pushed into a time machine, where black folks sat on the bus, old folks had no retirement and children went hungry every day of the year and nobody cared or had the power to stop it.

Indeed, we can sum up the 2016 election as just another installation like in 2000. The people’s voices were ignored and the devastating results eight years later were global economic collapse with a double dose of endless war and DEBT!

But of course we already know what will happen since we will get more of the same only worse. What’s that saying nobody pays attention to? Oh yes…”Those who fail to remember history are doomed to repeat it.”  Frankly, I don’t have time. Seriously. I blew a lot of time and energy seventeen years ago telling people that when an idiot rich kids sits in the whitehouse, he will destroy the country as he and his family business(es) pockets billions from our treasury.

 

Reason Vs. The Irrational Mind

A Psychological Approach to Climate Change. By CJ Davidson

And so it begins…again.

Another “debate” ensues to challenge common sense and reality. After watching the tiniest and poorest islands disappear into the Pacific Ocean, after watching the Atlantic Ocean put New York, New Jersey, New Orleans and Wales underwater you’d think the Climate change debate would be settled. But that conclusion would take both sides using rational thought, concrete instances and solid scientific data using scholastic, empirical studies on both sides.

What’s that? You haven’t heard much about those tragedies? Go figure.

Without debating the obvious “slant” of mainstream media that cowers to the whims of the purveyors of filthy fossil fuels, there simmers an obvious question to ask…

“How much of the planet is the Oil/Gas industry willing to destroy before reality kicks in…If ever?”

If never, we would most certainly conclude this suicidal/murderous and therefore, we must ask the next question…

“Is suicide and mass murder within the psychology of the Oil industry?”

I’ll try to illustrate a simple psychological profile of the Oil Industry, giving itself “personhood” for our purposes here. Using a few common media instances and not so cerebral and boring, we can profile this beast into a simple, single-celled organism with 2 words…Blind Greed.

Although greed has been used a motivating factor in the financial sector, those on the other end of the greed barrel would not reckon it favorable at all.

At the height of the cold war, I recall an old college days song by Sting, “Do the Russians love their children too?” suggesting if we launch thermal nuclear strikes against each other, triggering nuclear war around the world, they and their children, their bloodlines, money, favorite vodka would all be gone. Nothingness.

This seemed to eventually sink in (after 74 years) when the Soviet state crashed in 1991. With 80% of its gross national product going for nukes and weapons, the economy and government crumbled like week-old dog shit in the wind. It appeared common sense and self-preservation prevailed and we all didn’t have to die…for now.

Capitalism Wins…For now

Reaching deeper into TV Land, we recall an old Star Trek episode (I’m not a Trekie, so I can’t name the episode. My brother could) where a Starfleet Captain was relieved of duty based on an obvious suicidal-murderous decision that would kill him and every member of his crew. “Under Article OU812, Section 5150, if a Starfleet Commander is deemed mentally incapacitated, emotionally or psychological UNFIT for command based on IRRATIONAL ACTIONS, ORDERS or PERFORMANCE, he can and will be relieved of his command, placing the second in command in control.”

The suicidal commander was over-ruled by RATIONAL RULES. These rules were non-negotiable and concrete. The insane have no place calling the shots in a “civilized” society. End of discussion.

As a child I was naïve enough to consider this a general rule in life. When the irrational mind goes haywire, the rational mind(s) step in and corrects the human “deficiency” (mental illness). This logic was undisputed in my world and still is.

But there is a problem. There are no rules for our homeboy, Oil. That “person”, Oil, who lives among us on what’s left of the planet, is not applicable to the same rules we all follow. Oil Dude operates unfettered to do as he wishes. Again, without debating corruption, we’ll stick to the psychological profile.

As a child of wealthy parents Oil has known no repercussions for it’s actions. Whether it’s purchasing the government for oil, overthrowing governments for oil or force-feeding a nation oil for one-hundred years, hoarding/sabotaging energy alternatives, manipulating energy markets….there are no consequences for its actions. Period.

Without RULES & REGULATIONS, “punishment” or “penalties” to influence decisions, the thinking of a human being becomes omnipotent and delusional. Everything our buddy Oil does will never be challenged and therefore must be the right decision. “The market must like us because we have owned it for over 100 years.” Without opposition, the ego of this person grows exponentially to dangerous levels of sociopathic schizophrenia behavior.

And now on to the boring premises…

Quoting “Delusion of Grandeur” by John M. Grohl, PSYD

“A delusion of grandeur is the fixed, false belief that one possesses superior qualities such as genius, fame, omnipotence, or wealth. It is most often a symptom of schizophrenia, but can also be a symptom found in psychotic or bipolar disorders, as well as dementia (such as Alzheimer’s).

People with a delusion of grandeur often have the conviction of having some great but unrecognized talent or insight. They may also believe they have made some important discovery that others don’t understand or appreciate. ”

Wikipedia describes Megalomania as, “a psycho-pathological disorder characterized by delusional fantasies of power, relevance, or omnipotence. “Megalomania is characterized by an inflated sense of self-esteem and overestimation by persons of their powers and beliefs.”[1] Historically it was used as an old name for narcissistic personality disorder prior to the latter’s first use by Heinz Kohut in 1968, and is used these days as a non-clinical equivalent.[2][3] It is not mentioned in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM)[4] or the International Statistical Classification of Diseases (ICD).

Having done our quick, unprofessional analysis of our newly personified fossil fuels fellow, (or any corporate giant) can we determine that the captain of our ship, our lives and our planet is in sane, capable hands? If the answer is no, we MUST ask the following question: “Is suicide and mass murder within the psychology of the Oil industry?”

Without anyone to challenge this self-destructive behavior, it is most likely this irrational course of climate change denial will dominate the media and the actions of our bribed governments indefinitely. In the end, we will be forced to suffer the inevitable climate disasters on a global scale and most of us have accepted this already without question.

The UK & New York floods this year MAY have opened the eyes of the irrational minds of all, but it is doubtful since they have essentially painted themselves into a corner. After all the denial propaganda, The Oil Industry would not only have to reverse its course on oil/gas drilling but it would have to eat crow and admit the obvious impending Armageddon looming.

The IMMENSE cost of admitting Climate Change would most likely cause a feeding frenzy of litigation that would, ultimately break all five (5) oil conglomerates to the size of a Mom & Pop Snack Shop. After learning what they have done to us and themselves, we can understand their frustration, desperation and failure they have wrought upon us and them. We all accept the consequences of nature we are all eventually facing in the grand scheme of things. There’s no gong back.

Indeed, most of us take comfort in knowing that as the planet goes so does the oil industry…we all die. Of course, this answers the earlier question, “Do the oil industry executives love their children or grand children too?” Obviously not. Can we call that

irrational? Possibly.

Most CREDIBLE scientists predict the entire planet underwater within 100 years from now. As the oceans have swallowed Europe, high atop their Swiss chalets, we can picture the grand kids of current oil executives, atop the roof of their under-water, clinging desperately to their billion-dollar homes, shouting to their oil exec neighbors stranded atop their chalet helipads…“It’s all YOUR FAULT!”

Life in KoreaTown

Well, it’s been a helluva week with our building flooded here in KoreaTown. We didn’t know what was going on when we heard people dashing through the halls at 2 am, knocking on doors and yelling unintelligible things. The dogs barked a bit and we went back to sleep.

As I left to work on Thursday morning around 7 am, I noticed a “gaggle” of fire trucks, EMVs and  an abundance of emergency personnel converging on our building. I also noticed the Channel 9 news van and a couple media groups setting up for broadcast. I couldn’t imagine anything that could bring  them here…other than me, of course.

By 10 am or so, Karin texted me a photo of a trash can floating into our laundry room from the basement hallway. I did a double take and realized the basement was flooded. At lunch, Karin called and explained a pipe broke under the building, flooding the basement, the garage and the laundry room. A couple cars were trapped, but the were retrieved without incident. I watched my neighbors’ interviews on the news. They seemed upbeat.

Goodbye to our friend, Gilbert 🙁

What saddened me the most was the property lost by our manager and protectorate, Gilbert Tang. He lost everything he stored in the basement including personal documents.  Karin and I were nearly as devastated as he. Gilbert is a great guy who takes care of the tenants, the building and is always there for us.

Unfortunately, Gilbert became sick while cleaning the mold from the water damage. He sounded and looked awful. This, apparently was the last straw as he has since taken medical leave from the building.

It has been a week since Gilbert left and I miss him a great deal. Sometimes when we walked the dogs, he would throw treats from the window. I always look up to his window in case he has come back and expect “treats from heaven” as Karin and I call them.
But of course, he is not back and I don’t blame him if he never comes back. His job overworked him and his body was breaking into pieces. He worked with us when we were late with rent and was always there when someone had an emergency. He was like a father figure to the young ladies in the building, watching over us all from his third story apartment, chatting with cops, chasing away bums and sinister Jehovah’s Witnesses.

I went to court with him and other tenants when the building company was being sued by a psychotic tenant  named “Mr. Vermin”. This guy would smoke meth, invite guys to his apartment and have hot, kinky sex. Things got out of hand, of course and neighbors were “affected” by the destructive behavior, complained and Mr. Vermin and his sex show of speed were evicted. Vermin sued and I gladly agreed to show up for Gilbert and the building company who worked with us during those dark times.

Gilbert was an honored US Army service member and police officer. The man deserved better. He had such a kind heart that his job kept him prisoner until he could no longer physically do the job…and it cost him all his personal belongings.

Thank you, Gilbert for your kindness in a cruel city. We will never forget you and you are always welcomed in our home and will always be in our hearts. Be safe, my brother.

Here’s an awesome interview of our neighbors, Lois and Nicholas.

Electricity was the first utility to come back. After a few hours, the toilet started to smell from the use and kept praying for the water to flush. Eventually it did and only had minor inconvenienced.

The car owners and Gilbert suffered the most. After living with these great people for so long, I hurt when they hurt. It was not fair. But these disasters bring people together. They give us a cohesiveness and bonding. We here in this building we can count on each other.

Afterwords, we had a “Disaster Party”. Karin couldn’t make it, as she was exhausted from climbing the stairs after the elevator went down. Experiences like these bring us together. We had many friends before the flooding. We had many more afterwords.

The Solution: Planning

We live in a capitalist nation. Having said that, we follow the maxim, “Don’t fix it until it breaks. “But the building is 90 years old.” is the usual reply.
“Exactly.” I replied back. “Ten or even 5 years ago would have been an ideal time to replace the pipe, saving on upcoming lawsuits…and they had to replace the pipe anyway.”

The computer I type this on is going on 7 years old. Despite the splendid craftsmanship of the PC (like the building and it’s plumbing) I know from experience that I must plan on REPLACING this computer…or 90 year old water main.