TWGB: Everything Looks Worse in Black and White

 

The image I went with for today's TrumpWorld Grab-Bag is a black and white rendition of the one-fingered salute his faithful crowd gave him his past Saturday as he gave more of his "American carnage" type of doom-saying with the obvious punchline of how only he could fix it. He's been dipping a little deeper into Qanon signifying lately, and I can only surmise it has a lot to do with their being a goddamn cult that worships him, that they will believe anything, and they are primed as hell for violence. If you are a legally-jeopardized twice-impeached one-term wonder with multiple indictments potentially coming your way and a very limited defense, and are also Donald Trump, insurrectionist, sure, what the hell: 

Threaten mass violence in case of indictments. 

But is it fascism? Oh hell. It isn't history repeating, but it's been rhyming for a while now, ok? If you are looking for exact parallels, hey, maybe that isn't the metric we want to be looking at. I will say that Qanon is obviously a derivative of Nazi (and earlier) anti-Semitic blood-libel though. And that actual demonization of the other creates a permission slip for doing any amount of horror to one's political enemies. Look at this:

Pastor Mark Burns, at Eric Trump and Michael Flynn’s event in Idaho: “I’m coming here to declare war on every demonic, demon-possessed Democrat that comes from the gates of Hell!” pic.twitter.com/URUcHo11V8

— Ron Filipkowski 🇺🇦 (@RonFilipkowski) September 16, 2022

Trump has been using religion as a way to prove legitimacy and religionists (Christian Nationalists) have been using Trump to try and make their religious POV into law.  There are a number of evangelical "prophets" who insist God told them Trump never lost the 2020 election or is definitely coming into power again.   And you know who would have really hated this kind of thing--our founding fathers. This religious enthusiasm is too much. This dictating from the pulpit. This non-separation of church and state. 

The Joy of Fucking Off and Eating Pizza

 

I haven't had a proper review of just fucking off time since the early days of my blog, so I hope I will be indulged for a moment in talking about the weird thing when I was for somewhat over an hour not plugged into Twitter and ate about an entire pizza and also cider (Ploughman's--they make a very dry cider without adding yeast, just natural fermentation--it is low-calorie and really good if you like dry, more wine-y ciders I will have to figure out what distributors have them) and beer. 

I took a day off work to go and get lunch at one of the local haunts in Bristol. 

I spend so much time with wrath and drunkenness that I hardly know what to do when I have great gluttony opportunities. I usually get the carbonara pizza which boasts eggs and bacon and I add mushrooms, so I am basically having a classic breakfast on a pizza. There was also a special with mortadella and ricotta drizzled with balsamic, which was amazing. I am now considering whether balsamic-drizzled ricotta is just something I regularly need in my life, anyway.  For my general well-being. It seems like such a natural dip for breadsticks, apples, crudites (more so than salsa, anyway).  It is a thing for which, at the moment, I am entirely about. 

I tried, during my unplugged from all media moment, to think about TrumpWorld and whether I wanted to talk about his special master, the example it sets, and whether it seems likely that Trump is already in the midst of being about to perjure himself over the documents that are still missing, and I decided--

Yeah, fuck that. I went to a nearby vintage store, and I bought a strand of fake black pearls, a set of onyx dangles with marcasite that fit with a necklace I already have that I absolutely love b/c so gothic, a $4 set of gold-tone clip-on earrings that are amazingly 50's housewife realness, some also cheap gold-tone with fake orange coral dangle earrings, and a dyed howlite faux turquoise set that is a stunning green that deeply pleases me. It made for the kind of grab-bag different from the ones I write about. Instead of dwelling on things I find ugly, I used a little mad money (under $100) to invest in dress-up. 

Look, I don't know if this qualifies as self-care, because my obsessions are still here. I trimmed my bangs and ends this week, got a Vitamin-C facial and started to watch the latest Cobra Kai.  I harvested my self-grown decorative gourds and deposited them on my front steps and am ready for fall. Sometimes I rage against the machine, sometimes I eat pizza and plan wardrobes with amazing costume jewelry. 

I contain multitudes. I actually still feel like I contain a lot of pizza. But it was absolutely delicious.