Why is there a diarrhea parasite outbreak in America?
Because Donald Trump and his Republican allies cut funding to disease prevention and control.
Why is measles back in America?
Because Donald Trump and his Republican allies, including RFK Jr, cut vaccine and measles prevention funding and programs.
Why is the New World Screwworm infecting cattle in Texas, when it had previously been eliminated from the area?
Because Donald Trump and his Republican allies, including Elon Musk, cut USAID funding, which in part worked to monitor and prevent screwworm outbreaks.
Why was there a flu outbreak in our armed forces?
Because Donald Trump and his Republican allies, including Pete Hegseth, cut vaccination requirements for our armed forces, putting all of them at risk alongside our military readiness.
What contributed to the Covid outbreak?
Donald Trump and his Republican allies cut funding to a pandemic prevention program in his first term because Barack Obama had created it.
“America first” sends its regards. Trump voters, please learn your lesson. And if you don’t, it’ll be taught to you again with yet another diarrhea outbreak.
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"Oh yeah, we have an outdoor Corgi, he just gets so bored cooped up inside all day. He knows to stay off the road. Don't worry, he's way too smart for coyotes and the neighbor's know to look out when they drive past."
"Us? Oh, of *course* our Dachshund sleeps inside- we just let him out in the morning and make sure he comes back for dinner. He just does his own thing, no worries."
"Um, you know it's not humane to keep a chihuahua confined to an apartment? They're dogs, they're natural predators. They need to experience hunting behaviors or they get depressed. No we don't leash ours, he absolutely hates it, we just let him come and go whenever."
Yall get how fucking stupid that sounds, right? So stop letting your goddamn cats get eaten and attacked and infected and hit by cars
A toddler would probably love full unattended access to the neighborhood too, but we don't do that either, do we
It's 2026, "keep your damn pet in a house or in your view" should not be controversial
when i was getting trained as a welder the guys started playing sneaky grabass with each other and with me. i almost hit a few people while holding dangerous tools in my hand because they wouldn’t stop grabbing me from behind, then laughing that i ‘almost’ hit them, so i finally had to go to the instructor and say, look, i’ve had years and years of self defense training due the fact i’m a very small weirdo who is in legitimate danger of getting hatecrimed and at some point one of these guys is going to goose me again and im going to bury a wrench in his eye. get them to stop grabbing me, because i don’t want to get kicked out for hitting people.
the next day i ended up punching someone in the face with a doughnut in my fist because she thought i was being a big fucking buzzkill who tattled to teacher about a harmless game, and, guess what, grabbed my butt. i got icing all over her hair. she complained to teacher...who let everyone know that this was why they weren’t supposed to be playing grabass in the fucking shop.
anyway don’t fucking sneak up on twitchy little queers with hypervigilance, it fucking sucks and you’re lucky if you get a doughnut to a face instead of a hammer.
I'll never forget the time one of the other camp counselors tried to scare a kid by waking him up while wearing a terrifying Halloween mask (they had a thing where they messed with each other constantly, it was fine) and got punched right in the face.
To be fair, the counselor came out not only rubbing his jaw but grinning ear to ear. "You gotta admire that, kid wakes up to see a monster in his face and immediately swings. Good for him."
A college roomie of mine decided to jump scare me by waiting in the dark and leaping at me when I came in the door to the apartment. Roomie got throat punched and never did that shit again. (No serious injury, just hard enough for some temporary coughing.)
It was a huge milestone of scientific and technological advancement. (Plus, at the time, politically significant). Humanity went to space! We set foot on a celestial body that was not earth for the first time in human history! That’s a big deal! I’ve never thought about it before but now that I have, it’s ridiculous to me that that’s not part of our everyday lives and the public consciousness anymore. Why don’t we have a public holiday and a family barbecue about it. Why have I never seen the original broadcast of the moon landing? It should be all over the news every year!
It’s July 20th. That’s the day of the moon landing. Next year is going to be the 54th anniversary. I’m ordering astronaut shaped cookie cutters on Etsy and I’m going to have a goddamn potluck. You’re all invited.
PITCH: We call it Moon Day, and then every 7 years when it falls on a Monday, that's an even BIGGER deal and we call that Moon Day Monday and go absolutely apeshit about it (the next Moon Day Monday is in 2026 so we have a couple trial runs first)
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The Fox News article about this is freaking hilarious. (No, I don't frequent Fox News, but it was the first result on a search and I accidentally clicked it so what the hell)
"While sane Americans were celebrating the MLB All-Star Game in Philadelphia" oh no! I had no idea this was even happening! Did I lose my claim on sanity?
"HBO gay hockey series that is supposedly a huge ratings success" oooh, sour much?
"At least one little girl can be seen covering her eyes" so like many children they may be going through a "eew kissing" phase? Grandpa promised this wouldn't be a kissing book!
"This isn't about two men kissing. This is about taking one of the final wholesome places left for families — the Pickles are holding a Fart Night this Friday night — and turning it into a LIB stunt factory where kids are subjected to the Alphabet Mafia's whims." Oh it obviously is about 2 men kissing, and how much of a twist that puts in your knickers, Joe Kinsey, writer for Fox loudly proclaiming your steadfast 0 on the scale you share a name with. Also, if you know the Pickles are a stunt team in it for the lulz, why would you ever expect seriousness? Hey, incidentally do you think it's a traumatic issue on par with the whims of the mafia when kids see the straights kiss?
Man, it must suck all the time to live in such a stuffy head of fear and disgust at everything in life. Poor Joe.
Next up someone is going to claim that the Narnia series isn't kids books.
Kids books is probably not the best way to word it, you can enjoy them at every age, including your childhood, as you get older you may find new truths in them, but they're still good for any age.
I want you to understand this. I NEED you to understand this. My mother read me the hobbit as bedtime story, and I started pushing myself to read before pre-school so I could in fact read the hobbit for myself instead of having to wait for bedtime.
I didn't do so right away but jesus wept I PUSHED myself to learn to read SPECIFICALLY so I could read The Hobbit! It is, in fact, a children's story! And children only see page count as 'there is a lot of this fun story to read!'
I read Steven King's It (1,138 pages) as a 10 year old 300 pages is NOTHING. I can't remember how old I was when I read The Hobbit, but I do know I went directly from it to the Fellowship of the Ring and the rest of the series, because I had all 4 books in a set.
The dismissal of kids needing/being able to read long books is leading directly to a decrease in ability of adults to read long works, including things like texts and articles for college courses. Kids should definitely be reading longer books, and page count doesn't rule any book in/out of "kids" category.
I always think of the description I saw years ago: Self-imposed deadlines don't help me, because I know the person who set them, and they're full of shit.
Setting the clock ahead works for me but only when it's my alarm clock, because I'm too groggy first thing up to remember I did it. Won't work for clocks I'm looking at once I'm functional. Which I think supports the point that it doesn't work for sim because they're too aware.
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The funny part is that this is a totally valid question when it comes to trying to pick apart what you actually think is immortal/unethical vs just icky or bad on a societal level for some reason.
But I can't for the life of me figure out what that means it's a gotcha for atheists.
"Nobody will know" - are you taking the roadkill home, or at least away from the road first? If so... yeah, gross, but not morally wrong. You could make an argument for morally wrong to do it on the side of the road where you are subjecting other people passing by to your sexual proclivities they want nothing to do with.
Do you consider self-harm morally wrong? (If so, why?) Because you could also argue that this activity puts the roadkill fucker at risk of injury (getting hit by car while out picking up roadkill, trying to pick up something dangerously large, broken bones are sharp, etc) or by illness (rapid bacterial growth in warm dead things, see again broken bones are sharp-may directly introduce that bacteria to sensitive areas). Is physically risky behavior inherently morally risky as well? At what hobbies/point do you draw that line, and when does it become intentional self-harm and therefore morally wrong if you do consider self-harm morally wrong?
At what point in my rambling did the hypothetical Christian trying to score gotcha points on me check out of this conversation with the strong urge to never speak to me again?
If they're still hanging in there, I'm gonna circle back to why is self harm morally wrong, and when does the severity of harm start to change that answer, is it because it impacts other people and where is it morally correct to draw boundary lines around someone you know is hurting themself and won't accept your help.
And if they're *still* debating at me, start making suggestions on safer places to acquire dead animals for this activity.
Yo, I'm curious for book recommendations on the basis of "the writing is really good." Even if the plot didn't thrill you or the book is not an all-time fave or whatever, what are your "this author knows how to write" book recs?
I continued reading Joe Hill's Nos4atu all the way through, and enjoyed it despite the blatant and recurring fact that the man clearly knows NOTHING about medical equipment and supplies, and he hinged major plot events around medical equipment doing things that it absolutely cannot/will not/was specifically designed not to do. I literally screamed "that is not how that works!" a couple times, but still was compelled to keep reading.
In like two weeks, give or take, I'll be finished with the fifth arc of my story. That means only about fifty chapters to go until the end.
I've been writing this thing for ages. It's already more than a million words long. So when it's finally done... do I just start a new story?
Do I do a totally different genre? Do I do one in the same world? Do I switch to short stories until I'm sure I have a longer plot properly nailed down?
I could poll my current readers, but I don't think that's guaranteed to get me the actual right answer. I think the main thing I want to avoid is just never starting another project, but close behind that concern is the idea that I might start a new story and then decide I hate it after a few dozen chapters.
Well, as always, I would live for a story about Mila's youthful adventures.
That said, I'll give pretty much anything you write a go, and would be nearly as stoked with a new Sci/Fi thing as a Mila thing, since that short-fic about the ambassador kicking ass was how I latched onto you in the first place.
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For those of you who aren't familiar, I live in an exceptionally flammable part of the United States, and despite the fact that every goddamn year multiple parts of my state catch fire, destroy homes and kill people, the local assholes insist on getting drunk and setting fire to a bunch of illegal explosives anyway.
In 2023, God granted me a Miracle that prevented my house from burning down.
Last year, I had to resort to Psychological and Chemical Warfare to keep the patriotic arsonists at bay.
This year is apparently An Important Birthday for the clusterfuck we have the nerve to call a nation, so despite the fact there is so much smoke in the air that the sun has literally been blood red for the last week, the pyrotechnic fetishists are out in force.
Last year, I hit upon the concept that if my neighbors were going to act like problem animals, it would make sense to use the management techniques on them that you might use on say, a Bear that was doing serious property damage. Thusly, I created The Stench, a nontoxic but FOUL smelling concoction that I could discretely spray around the flammable gatherings and render the area extremely uncomfortable to occupy for the rest of the night, forcing them to give up or move on.
If this seems harsh:
There is no story from 2024 because a grass fire was started by fireworks less than 12 miles from me and the high winds put me in the evacuation zone in under an hour.
Over fifty people lost their homes.
Errant fireworks burning my house down is a very real possibility, and I pay the price in anxiety and insurance premiums.
The Stench is noxious but harmless, and also very effective at building a buffer zone around my home. But sneaking up to parties on foot in this heat is both exhausting and nerve-wracking. There have to be more effective ways to do this
-And there is!
It involves Weeds and Business Cards :)
All of this spring, I've been battling Bindweed and my City Code Enforcement Officers.
The city code people have been professional, but the truth is that one of my neighbors is calling them on use because one of my housemates is transgender. It's extremely grating to get these notices, having to explain repeatedly that I *AM* working on the weed situation, I just have a heart condition and No Money. It's also deeply paranoia-inducing to know that the city is regularly coming by and photographing my house.
The Solution to the Bindweed is 1 gallon of high-concentration vinegar, half a cup of Borax, a quarter cup of salt, and a couple tablespoons of dish soap. Get one of those weed sprayers from a hardware store and mix it up in there. Spray it on your thistles, bindweed, kudzu, garlic mustard or whatever your local herbaceous invasive is on a day with bright sunlight, and in a few hours the entire part of the plant above the soil is Deceased. It's non-toxic to insects, pets and wildlife (just wait a few months before trying to plant anything in the area for the traces to wash out).
The only real downside to this stuff is that it smells HEINOUS.
Sure, The Stench is nauseating, but WeedFucker 5000 is genuinely painful to inhale. Again, it wont hurt people- even my asthmatic housemates can use the stuff- but boy howdy it sure smells toxic. I've got the ingredients for about 40 gallons of WeedFucker 5000 prepared and ready to go.
I've also got a disposable hazmat suit, rubber boots and gloves, respirator, goggles and a shitty little golf cart from the free section of craigslist to haul my shit around in.
I also have Business Cards!
See, the very nice officers from the City Code department left some Very Nice business cards so that I may contact them about "the fucking bindweed is gone, get off my back".
So I scanned the business card into my computer, fired up Clip Studio, and made my own business cards. I've turned my City's Abstract Triangle Logo into an Eye of Providence and the slogan of "E Pluribus Unum" to "E Plurbis Anus", Changed my city's name to a dumb pun, and stated the card originates from "The Department Of Public Nuisances".
Crucially, where the name and contact information of the real city employee has been replaced with the name and business email of the neighbor who has been bragging on facebook about calling the city code department on my home because he hates my housemate :)
It looks, at a glance, very much like the business cards of city employees. If you look at it for like 5 seconds though, there's no way it could be mistaken for the real thing.
I've printed out 500 of these bad boys and will have them on hand as I, a put-upon employee, am forced to work overtime on a national holiday doing weed mitigation, because my boss can't manage deadlines for shit.
You're mad about it? I've been out here since 5 AM! But if we don't finish by the deadline we lose the contract and I could get fired. You know what the economy is.
Here, this is my Boss's Business card- how about you send him an email about how this has ruined your barbecue?
It's golden hour now, so I'm Suiting Up and preparing to embark on some civil service in the form of Noxious Weed Eradication, and by coincidence, Fire Mitigation.
I'll report back later Tonight🫡
(If you'd like to support your local disabled storyteller in their Acts Of Public Service, please consider donating to my Ko-Fi or supporting me on Patreon)
So it's national Recreational Explosives, Hand Loss and Wildfire day, and unlike 2023, there is nary a drop of rain in sight.
Despite being slapped upside the head by God, my put technically inclined neighbor has acquired TWO pallets of fireworks this year.
The state is of no help: my city police department has made it pretty clear they don't intend to respond to any fireworks calls this weekend. I've sent the pictures I took to the county tipline and received and automated email reply saying that it will take several weeks to process my case. Perhaps he will get jail time later, but this does not actually you know. Stop him from setting the neighborhood ablaze. Going up to his door the week prior and very politely asking him to move- not cancel, just relocate - his celebrations was met with calling me a "nosy bitch" and "I'll set one off in your ass!".
Sometimes God needs us to make our own miracles.
My miracle comes with several layers, and plenty of opportunities to back down without losing face. We'll see how many are needed.
The first wave has already been deployed: a psyop directed at the Visiting Mother In Law of the miscreant.
I got up at 8:30 AM this morning to make sure I'd be in the front yard of my house, casually doing yardwork with Herschel. His participation was essential.
For those of you who are new here, Herschel is the world's most charming Cardigan Welsh Crime Tube, who thinks everyone in the world is his best friend and that people come to the house to see him specifically. So at 9:04 AM when the visiting mother-in-law appeared around the corner on her daily power-walk around the block, Herschel employed his natural Corgi instinct to make friends with everyone and cheerfully tossed himself on the sidewalk in front of her, belly up for expected tummy rubs.
"OH AREN'T YOU DARLING!!" My target coos, kneeling down to pat him while he makes him like snuffling noises of glee. She is at least 70. I think her bright pink leg warmers and terrycloth headband might be original from her jazzercise days.
"I'm so sorry! Herschel you're going to trip people doing that!" I apologize, going up to greet the woman. "I'm [REDACTED], I don't think we've met..?"
"No, I'm just visiting my daughter and her family- my name is Barbara. And who is this?" She asks Herschel, whose whole back end is waggling with glee.
"This is my service dog Herschel." I explain while he rolls around on the pavement. "I just wanted him to get some time outside before the pyrotechnics start."
"Oh. Yes." Barbra grumbles and I know I've got her. "My son-in-law is planning something extravagant." She says with such disdain it practically comes out of her nose. This is a woman who loves her daughter and dearly wishes she married someone, anyone else.
"Yeah, he got rained out and sick the last two years, so I think he's compensating." I agree.
"Oh he's definitely overcompensating!" Barbra spits, then shakes her whole body like a dog. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't complain. You said he's a service dog?"
I go for it.
"Yeah! I have... Neurological problems." I say and that is technically true. "I've um. Lost a lot of things, like a sense of time, or appetite, and his job is to remind me to eat or take my meds or alerts that I'm having an episode. My personal dog-tor!" I say, patting his adorable little head, and he leans on me, equally adoring.
"Oh, is that why-?" Barbra starts to ask, gesturing at the top of her head, but stops herself.
I hadn't planned this, but yesterday I'd shaved my head to deal with the heat and now only have a quarter inch of hair, which doesn't really hide the scars from when I got run over by a minivan. They're bright red with the heat and exertion of yard work.
I decide I'm okay with lying to a stranger to prevent my house from being set ablaze.
I sort of... Crumple to the ground and drop the rake I was holding, and Herschel immediately climbs into my lap to comfort me as I start to cry.
"Oh my God." Says Barbra.
"I'm sorry!" I gasp, tears streaming down my face. I've been stressed and this is honestly very cathartic. "I'm sorry to dump on you, I'm just so scared-!"
"Oh my God. It's bad." Barbra realizes.
"D- do you know what-" a pause as Herschel tries to manually clear my nostrils like a good service dog. "-oh, Herschel... It's - do you know what an astrocytoma* is?"
*An astrocytoma is a type of brain tumor.
Barbra turns white and sits down next to me. "I'm so sorry... I- one of my friends from church had one, it was agony but she's alright now!" She tries to reassure me.
"It hurts! Everything hurts all the time!" I sob. "And- and I'm scared, so he's scared and I feel bad for hi which just makes it worse and then there's the-" I gesture at the sky. "I have surgery in a month to remove as much of it as they can and do biopsies to see if I need radiation too but..."
"-but all that noise must be Hell on you and your doggy." Barbra nods.
"It'd be fine if he went down to the lake of something but, that house's driveway is like, a hundred feet from my bedroom, I can't sleep and it TERRIFIES Herschel..." I whimper pathetically.
"Well. I may be able to do something about that." Barbra decides.
"Oh no, I don't want to intrude!" I mock-protest.
"No, we're the ones intruding dear. I'll have words with him." She growls. I get the impression she's been waiting for an excuse To Have Words With Him.
"Th-thank you. Um. It's getting hot and I'm a mess, we should probably go inside..." I mutter and Barbra very kindly helps me and Herschel to the front door and tells me she'll be by later with watermelon as we wave goodbye.
From the porch, I watch her furiously power-walk back to her daughter's house, wrench open the front door, and issue a battle cry of "HEN-RY!!!" before it slams behind her.
Now I realize that this may not have been the most honest or ethical thing to do, but I figured it's more polite and ethical than the next step, which is chemical warfare, courtesy of Bath & Body Works :)
Well, they Psyop seems to have worked! That cul-de-sac, and indeed my entire block is perfectly quiet tonight!
Unfortunately I cannot say the same of the surrounding neighborhood, so it has been necessary to deploy The Stench.
The Stench is a mixture of Odoriferous chemicals meant to be discreetly poured over a surface (preferably something hot, like a sidewalk or fence in direct sunlight) to render an area temporarily uninhabitable, Similar to spraying coyote pee on your garden to discourage the rabbits. I can't give you a full recipe because I forgot to take notes, but elements include:
Spoiled beef broth, which is both rancid and unexpectedly sour (boiled to kill bacteria)
Expired milk, the most retch-inducing ingredient for me.
Several bottles of Liquid Ass
Ghost Pepper Hot Sauce
Concentrated Dog Urine
and FOUR bottles of Bath & Body Work's Cucumber Melon, which smells light and fruity when used as a light body spray, but in concentration smells like an entire fruit cart left to rot, possibly along with the carcass of the fruitseller.
The resulting solution smells like raw sewage, a fraternity dorm fridge when the power's been out for a week, and a roadkilled skunk. It's impressively vile. Herschel wanted to roll in it so bad.
I've spent the last few hours strolling the surrounding neighborhoods until I found the source of the mortars and flying explosives that are the real hazards, ingratiating myself into the parties, and discreetly dousing the lawns and fences nearby until someone goes "OH GOD!" and gags, and the party breaks up shortly thereafter. I returned home because I ran out of The Stench, despite hiding five 2L soda bottles of it in a backpack.
I will call it a success though, because while I can hear fireworks, they're all at least a mile away from me. In total:
Fire Hazard Parties derailed: 13
Screaming: 10
Crying: 13
Vomiting: 4
Fight blaming each other for causing The Stench: 5
Called the city to complain about The Stench, on the assumption it was a sewage issue, and then waited right next to their pile of illegal fireworks, for the fire department to show up: 2.
Guy who claimed to be enjoying the smell: 1
Party was partially derailed by The Stench, and partly by the fact they actually did start a fire: 1 (every human was alright, the pyro's roof, not as much)
Stray dogs caught and returned home: 2
So next year: MORE STENCH.
Until then, I have a corgi zooted on trazadone on my feet, and we bid you goodnight.
(If you would like to support a disabled storyteller and/or fund more stench research, you can donate to my Ko-fi or pre-order my Family Lore book on Patreon)
