Crunching the Numbers

'Mile Magnificent' by Molly OfGeography (released 2019).

An apartment when it's empty echoes lovely, bright and clean

Sing odes to green-blue water that we stole so it comes free

All things end, it's part of living; forest fires feed the trees

Lift your glasses full of sunshine, sing a toast to gasoline

Track #4 on 'Myths'.

Fun fact: Molly refers to this song as 'The Song My Producer Said I Was Not Allowed To Name “CHICAGO IS BETTER THAN NEW YORK”'.* Honestly, her descriptions for so of the songs on this album are hilarious:

'1) The Song That Made My Producer Go, “Wait, What Was That Bit About Worms?”

2) The Song My Producer Said I Had To Append A Parenthetical To So That People Would Be Able To Find It Because The Lyrics Never Mention The Title Once But I Was Raised On Fanfiction So Joke’s On You, Pal! I Love A Long Title With A Parenthetical In It!!!

3) The Song That Is Sad'

Pretty dang accurate, honestly. Also, I think she has a Tumblr!!! *Gasp.* What if I...tag her???

@ofgeography Hiiii and thank you, your music is amazing.

I did it bees and knees (yes, this is my hip modern way of including every kind of person, fight me or provide more hilarious options; I'm content with either option).

I have had a fun time perusing this flavourful dose of humanity's wild website and I think my fun fact today should be her story where she becomes a donut god:

You're welcome, singular entity that reads this blog (that entity being my sister and/or the rogue bots, doesn't matter, we're all friends here).

Personal blurb: Alright, full disclosure time: I discovered this artist because of the 'Good Omens' fandom. Someone said we were missing out on feelings and shared this song, and when I tell you I felt those feelings, I certainly don't mean that I danced to this on repeat for several months (and her 'Hanahaki (Bloom)'), often at 3 in the morning in the bathroom. Of course not.

Pro tip: dancing with your toothbrush in your mouth is a choking hazard, but in the spirit of Alanis Morissette, I recommend doing it anyway:

One of my favourite books in the world is 'The Overstory' by Richard Powers. In it, one of the themes that arises often is the concept of pyrophitic serotinous plants (it's okay, I won't remember it either). They are plants that need fire to open. (There are actually different types of pyrophitic plants, from passive to fire-activated but I probably shouldn't start talking about that because you'll need to pull out the duct tape.)

(Technically, 'serotinous' plants are a category in which plants release seeds over a longer period of time, and it doesn't matter how they are released, but the seeds that open by fire fit into this category.) The eucalyptus tree, the lodgehole pine, and other trees encase their seeds in resin that can only be melted by fire (thereby releasing the seeds).

The thing that I love about this concept is this: we need to burn to grow. I recently read this book called 'Life in Oil' about the Cofàn tribe in Ecuador who were drastically impacted by oil companies. And the thing was: Yes. They were impacted horribly (physically, psychologically, environmentally, the works). They also survived. They figured out, through tumult and trial and falling apart, how to keep going.

This song screams to me of that same instinct. I mean, look at us. This is what we do, isn't it? We fight, we fall, we continue. We're just like every other aspect of nature in that we are born, and in our fight to continue, we impact everything around us. We're just a part of the cycle and eventually we will decay back to where we belong and serve as soil for our children. And all we'll be? A story. And after a while, not even that. Just a whisper of what was.

In a way? I find that freeing. We might as well live the life we want to live; how little it will matter. (This isn't absolution, please don't go murdering people.) I just mean that I don't have to put so much weight into every little thing. Not everything has to be joyful or depressing (and if we really think about it, everything is always a balance of both). It can just be what it is.

We are as we are. And we don't have to love ourselves for it, but we don't have to hate ourselves either.

I love the lyrics to this song. For a long time, I misheard 'We're animals of love/ the city never makes us beg' as 'the city never makes us pay' and I don't know why? But I kind of like that image.

We are animals of love. And that's okay.

We are the cogs in a continuous cycle and we always will be.

I think often of this monologue (content warning for the video, it's gory, but you don't need to watch it, you can just listen) from 'Midnight Mass' so often, in regards to this:

It must also be noted that rubbed penis quickly grow to their peak size.

My dads coworker is at the front and this man comes Up and hands him a document.

The coworker took a Look at the document and while he couldn't read the things written by Hand, because he wasn't wearing his glases, he did notice the Logo of a different Bank so he's like:

"Oh, sorry sir you can't do that here! You have to go to the other Bank for this :)"

The man, visibly confused leaves, but dosen't take the document with him.

The coworker, now just as confused as the Guy actually Takes Out his glases and reads the hand written part:

So our branch had had a big takeover robbery as well as a note one. We also had a teller that had transferred to our branch after having been through a robbery. She was sweet as apple pie, hair up to the ceiling, southern lady who had just been through multiple robberies.

A guy comes in and hands her a folded note. Her immediate thought was “this guy needs to learn you don’t hand bank tellers notes. I am just not going to read that.” So how the conversation goes:

Her: how can I help you today?

Him: I’m here to get money

Her: great *hands him a withdrawal slip*

Him: all the information is on the paper

Her: to process the transaction I need you to put it on my piece of paper

SO HE FILLS OUT A WITHDRAWAL SLIP. Meanwhile another coworker is looking at her latest robbery notification email thinking the guy at the window looks a lot like him but the teller is calm and seems to be following standard transaction.

Back at the window the teller notices his name on the withdrawal slip doesn’t match the name on the account so she asks for his ID. He once again tells her all the relevant info is on the folded note but also gives her his ID and says it is his dad’s account. She tells him he will need a check from his dad to get cash. He grabs the note and leaves.

ONE HOUR LATER

Two new robbery notifications hit our emails, both branches within a mile. It is our guy. Teller goes over to the manager and sheepishly informs them he was here and the time. Security department is notified as are local police and the FBI. The FBI comes over believing that these poor tellers had been robbed for the 3rd time in a month and take her statement. She is completely embarrassed telling them how everything went down and he kept signaling to the note and telling her to read it but she was just done.

To which this FBI agent of 40 years who has been to the scene of many bank robberies (several at this branch in recent weeks) says: Ok. Let me see if I got this right, he came in fully intending to rob you. He gave you the note and you just…refused to read it? So he left and went to the bank literally across the street, handed them the exact same note, and they just handed him five grand? Do I have that correct?”

Her: I am so embarrassed

FBI: this is best thing I have ever heard. He even handed you his ID! Holy-

Her: I feel so dumb!

He was working at a 7-11 that got robbed a lot, working nights. And he was bored and read though his entire contract and learned if you're shot at work you get $200,000. Also, he hated his boss and the job.

So when a guy came in to rob him at gunpoint he got excited and was able to hatch the plan he had been pondering while dealing with a Shitty Boring Job.

"Dude. Shoot me in the leg. Right here- it'll go through and not hit anything vital and I'll be able to quit this fucking job. I'll give you fifty fucking grand to shoot me in the leg then you can take everything in the register."

One day, this guy came in and announced he was there to rob the place. This man was smoking a cigar with one hand and had a gun in the other.

My uncle pointed at the "No Smoking" sign and told him in no uncertain terms, "Put that cigar out, or finish it outside first."

This guy, bless his heart, went back outside to finish his cigar.

And I was put in the seat instantly, of course. I said, “your honor, I can’t be a juror on a two week trial, I have opera rehearsal.” And she said, “opera huh, well, sing something for us.”

And I did. In a federal court of law, in front of the judge, 75 jurors, the lawyers and the fucking DEFENDANT, I sang o mio babbino caro.

I heard the Hess Truck commercial on the radio this morning.

imagine watching Star Wars in theaters in 1977 and pointing at Darth Vader boarding a ship with Stormtroopers and then choking some guy, and exclaiming THAT'S CLEARLY JESUS CHRIST, THAT'S WHY I'M INTO THIS

i am here at your house, to take away your guns.

i am wearing a uniform that could be nebulously FBI-adjacent, maybe an off-shoot of the NSA, maybe i bought it at a halloween costume store, you don’t know. you can’t tell. my badge has an agency listed on it but it’s blurred, slightly, so you can’t read what the letters are. but there are five of me, all identical, all scowling in that way that says I’ve Seen It All, Kid, And Your Posturing Doesn’t Mean Shit To Me. Your Tears Mean Dick To Me, Just So You Know.

it occurs to you that i might be a team of weirdly identical strippers, here to celebrate–whatever the most recent holiday of yours was. did your friends hire me, as a weird joke gift? are you on candid camera?

no. i am not here to party with you and drink the artisenal beer that you keep at your house to make up for the fact that you have no personality except what you are mimicking from the people around you. i am here to take away your guns.

“but they’re my guns,” you say, confused, as i and the five other me’s enter your house without a warrant. “i have a right to them. the constitution says so.”

“that’s interesting,” i tell you. “once upon a time, we could have had a really nuanced, rational conversation about that, and maybe come up with some kind of legislative solution that at once acknowledges the deeply-rooted american fear of its own government and our extremely strong sense of self-reliance and wild-west-machismo while parsing out the difference between what the writers of the constitution understood as ‘bearing arms’ and how your right to a gun doesn’t supersede the public’s right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. but that time is done now. that time is in the past. now i’m here to take away your guns.”

i and my five clones begin to take your guns from their various resting places, slowly, leisurely, not breaking eye contact with you the whole time. this should be impossible, given that we are moving about your house, but throughout the entire process you can feel our eyes somehow, through the walls.

there is a half-made sandwich on your kitchen island, which you were clearly preparing for yourself when we interrupted you with a ring at your door. i pick up the sandwich and start to eat it.

“that’s mine,” you say. you want to grab a gun and menace me with it, but you can’t, because i and my five clones have taken them all.

“it sure was,” i say. “but now here i am, taking all your guns. so i think it’s probably mine now, don’t you?”

“guns don’t kill people,” you say. “people kill people.”

“people are gonna have to get a whole lot more creative i guess,” i answer, my mouth full of sandwich. it’s not even a good sandwich. you can’t even make a sandwich right. you expect me to have sympathy for you wanting to keep your hunting rifle when you clearly can’t be trusted to make a decent meal out of whatever you manage to sneak up on and catch? you don’t deserve to hunt a deer because you don’t deserve to eat venison. enjoy your soggy tomato and lettuce and mayonnaise sandwiches for the rest of your stupid life.

there is only one gun left. it is a family heirloom. your grandfather used that gun during the civil war to defend his family from nearby militias. “please,” you say. “it barely even shoots anymore. it’s my heritage. it’s my history.”

i pry the gun from your hands. you try to shoot me with it but you can’t, because your body feels paralyzed. i stare you straight in the eyes as i pull your Super Special Family Heirloom Hunting God-Given Right Snowflake Bullet Machine Signed By The Real Wyatt Earp out of your hands and make you watch as i take it apart, piece by piece, all out of order, breaking the delicate parts and discarding them carelessly around your house. i make you watch me eat the bullets, that’s right, EAT THE BULLETS, PHYSICALLY, WITH MY MOUTH, me and my five clones, all of us surrounding you chomping on the ammunition that your great-great-whoever-the-fuck relative hand-carved from metal they mined out of a quarry they had to steal from whoever was there first.

“it didn’t have to be this way,” i tell you, bits falling out of my mouth while i talk, somehow growing immeasurably taller, all six of us, while you are paralyzed and frozen and have no guns left because we have taken them, all across the country my clones are going into every house and taking them from everybody, the NRA tried to stop us but somehow everyone with a membership evaporated overnight, turning into finely ground dust like the gunpowder now being ground into my molars: “it didn’t have to be this way, but now it is, because you couldn’t be rational, you couldn’t have one single shred of human empathy, you couldn’t see past your own extremely oily nose, and because you couldn’t, you don’t get to have a voice in this policy anymore. you just have to stand there and watch as i take away this thing that you love so much, that gives you so much comfort, that lets you pretend to believe that in a high-stress situation you’d be john wick and not just some asshole who shoots a child because that child scared you. i was willing to respect it and work with you for a solution, but you wouldn’t do that, so now you don’t get anything that you want.

you don’t get anything that you want.

you don’t get anything that you want.