Kakker

Wat is n Kakker?

Wie is n Kakker?

Is Kakker n ding?

Elon Musk might know, maybe Charlize Theron but the rest of the Afrikaans speaking demographic are clueless. Kakker surpasses the most monumental fuck up imagined. It's the planned ignorance of those determined to cock up and it's the unplanned foolhardy stubborn drive driving square pegs into round holes.

An ego cranking up to 11, hou my kak en check die dop. The modern age is closest to that world ending moment when, a Kakker, will doom us all. I'm leaving this final thought on a sign post at the fork in the road. Follow the Kakker or go your own way. You decide.

The Outbound Train:

Two things I advocate; A.I. will not be recognized as sentient and wifi is not a basic human right. As we close off another year of anarchy I realise I cannot teach common sense to adults, I cannot tolerate the current social mindset because I cannot comprehend or understand the blank space of the millennial brain and yet I see these things as a positive. Social media is the digital cesspool of human hatred feeding our addiction. I recently drowned to the wave of human waste. Then the unexpected occurred, one of those blank space of the millennial brain types facilitated my Facebook rehabilitation, unbeknownst to them their digital dependence took me offline. Away from wifi I sat down to breathe freely in the calm before the interruption of reality.

Fuck it, people equal shit and that's not changing. I could fight the world to my final breath or I could ignore them all and turn inward to find others dwelling in the darkness I am drawn to. I've been an asshole many times in my life. I treated people poorly without apology or remorse. I've made bad decisions many times, losing more than winning. I do not regret this, these were my actions, my decisions and for that I'm accountable.

I cannot go back to change any of it, I accept that. My overall outlook is be less of an asshole. I try to be better, do better. Mostly I fail better. No explanations, no apologies, no excuses, not now, not ever. Death fast approaching I'm done done chasing digital garbage like everyone else. Join me on a dark, weird, exciting and terrifying adventure. Grab your Ouija board, say a quick prayer to whatever you think protects you and get in the car. Driver picks the music and shotgun shuts their cake hole. 

Three Pans Full: 5

A few things to remember:
It starts with an innocent encounter, spirits reveal their reasons to the vulnerable and impressionable.
Activity gradually increases, expect it to get worse.
Do the research to determine what you're dealing with, you arrived afterward they did.
Do not invite them in.
Do not befriend them.
Do not challenge, provoke or threaten them.
Find peaceful resolve first, engage as necessary.
Be mindful, respectful and Steadfast.
Don't piss them off with holy water, amateur cleansing or DIY exorcism.
Get proper help before shit goes wrong.
Use common sense.

Howard Johnson 

Three Pans Full: 4

The last of the broken scaffolding collapsed. The tunnel went dark around them, in the quiet they waited. 'Jonathon?'

'Fuck you Max,' rumbling came through from a deeper part of the casm, polite and non threatening sounds in the aftermath. 'Maxwell?'

'Fuck you John,' each crunched rock under them to show signs of life as they did during role call taking with Ms Henderson. Her inconsistent squeaky bark of student's names could put anyone to death by teenage embarrassment, proper pronunciation of formal first names remains a scholastic staple, the boy underbreath response stirred the giggles of the other students.

'WOOO!' Echoed around them, 'what now smart guy?' Max didn't have contingency, they may well be screwed, John wasn't having any of his regular bullshit. 'The tunnel is this way,' flicking the flashlight beam into the far reaching corners of the dark. 'Will you put that stupid fucking thing away,' John started flinging clumps of dirt at his friend, 'there's nothing in there,' 'nothing in there what?' Max shot back, slapping the cover closed. The compact camera was their third wheel, traveling everywhere, Max recording and replaying his weird video.

'Lords of the underworld, darkness fills our hearts with pain.'

The corner of the bar was getting louder, the local biker gang celebrating, their chapter chant shouted with every round sent up the counter. Empty bottles tipping into the bin, glasses gathering nearby. Gandalf's remained a respectable pub, biker gangs in the area remained loyal patrons, never sharing their waterhole with other chapters. LotU were friendly, outlawed, getting drunk. Their fearless leader was absent, McGregor's hog wasn't outside. He'd been quiet, avoiding Gandalf's for nearly a week. That strange call, a couple of punk kids wanted to poke around the town archives but he settled them, sent them to the bottom of the hole. Punk kids playing YouTube out here in the boonies where our lady kept her secrets, the outlaw town dressed in a daily suit of tourist business made pretty by the quick search history of diamonds and demons. McGregor never believed any other that shit, the expectation his cursed family name advertises. None of that weekend cosplay wannabe after how many bodies he'd buried around town. He knew what lived in the dark; nothing. Spirits resided in the past where they passed, old mines were abandoned because they run dry, the nun. He held his breath at the thought of her, he knew her as she knew him, he also knew better.

Three Pans Full: 3

3.
'I don't believe in the supernatural yet I make my living hunting them, extermination for hire like any other job. Heading east from Hollywood I've taken them all done state by state, there isn't a haunted house, phantom hitchhiker, sasquatch or chuppacabra left on the continent. I then hopped the pond for jolly old England and did pretty much the same thing clearing castles, lakes, lochs and church buildings. Europe, the Middle East, Asia cleaned up their supernatural messes too. I'll admit South America was challenging, I could tell you but knowledge matters in the savage wilderness. I learned a few things about Africa, it's unpredictable. African Witchcraft is more psychological than magical when I drove the superstition off an entire continent. When you are this damn good business booms and hitting a few ghosts abroad offered a franchise opportunity I couldn't pass up. I upset a lot folk. More often than not the spelunking turned debunking and in Africa that means wealthy, crazy, unpredictable people will not like you. There were witch trials held the further south I went.'
'In short the weirdest encounter was the fallen angel from Columbus Ohio, called himself Joseph the, it didn't matter much the boy claimed retribution from the people who slain his beloved Ashley, the mortal reason he fell from grace. Joseph appeared unassuming, features of an athlete. He went down willingly but not without a fight. I respected that, gave him his vengeance first. He tore those hate mongering rednecks a new asshole, Ashley was their hate crime victim. Homophobic intolerance aside that was love powerful enough for an angel to rebel against heaven, Ashley was pretty enough to defy God for. I'm not one to judge, don't really think much of God anyhow but should I meet him let's just say that's one conversation the almighty Lord will not appreciate. Did I believe Joseph's story?
Wouldn't be much to my purpose going around hunting normal folk.'
Howard Johnson July 09844

Three Pans Full: 2

McGregor Museum remained silent, empty at night. Many believed the ghostly nun walked her rounds at night. Max, claiming to have seen her as he spun that yarn throughout his high school career. John remained skeptical. The two boys once dared each other to tour the museum after dark, neither boy did contrary to their brave boasts, they were afraid of her. But the nun knew, she heard them telling each other a fabricated account breaking into the museum. She'd seen both come through on a school tour, passing right in front of her. She knew the lie two childhood friends shared.

She knew the soldiers of several wars, caring for the young men scared to face death. She stayed by them, heard their confession, blessed each in the Lord's forgiveness, offered their final rites and lay them to rest. War was not the Lord's work, war was the evil of men unleashed. She remembered their fearful eyes staring beyond pain, beyond awareness, knowing life was ending and they were to leave this world untimely. She dared not cry with these young men, her tears could not reflect their fears. Let heroes pass in peace, let them. She knew the Rudd family, what scandal they buried somewhere inside the manor walls. Family portraits and old bullet holes. 'There are definitely spirits residing here, they seem friendly.' This old house was her house now and something threatened that.

Three Pans Full: Introduction

Two friends survive at the bottom of the Kimberly Hole following a free climb accident traps them. Lost in the darkness at the bottom of a giant hole something starts to haunt them. John, a paranormal investigator and novice climber reluctantly agreed to this free climb with his mate Max, a professional climber and amateur paranormal skeptic. Ghosts begin to emerge from history, haunting the pair, challenging their will to survive and their determination to live through the Northern Cape winter.

Uncancel Culture: Returned

Peck's Anchovette and Redro Paste have returned to retailers to help make South Africa great again. I still call for the return of Peanut Puff sweets and the original Chocolate Log  chocolate bars. These are the comfort foods the idiot millennial generation of South Africa laid the kibosh to. This was done by the gluten free, allergen riddled trans-vegan disassociate generation. I won't stand for that, cancel culture be damned take the warning labels off everything and let nature follow course. 

Halloween Horror Binge of 2023:

I haven't done one in a few years because Netflix ruined Blockbuster, fuck you Netflix. I'm a lover of b-grade horror flicks as inspired by the legendary Bob Wilkins, I still watch Creature Features on the YouTube. My DVD collection runneth over. The rules are simple; one flick a night until Halloween night when I indulge in a grindhouse double feature.

1. Night of the demons (1988)
2. Night Terror (1977)
3. Werewolf in the Girl's Dormitory (1961)
4. SCOOBY-DOO, there was a spooky marathon playing on YouTube.
5. Skip night, reality happened.
6. The Beckoning (2006)
7. Nightbreed (1990)
8. The Two Faces of Dr. Jekyll (1960)
9. Cosmic Monsters (1960)
10. Frozen Alive (1964)
11. Messiah of Evil (1973)
12. Hell in a Cell, Bad Blood, Shawn Micheals vs. The Undertaker (1997)
13. Scared to Death (1947)
14. And now the Screaming Starts (1973)
15. The Cat Creature (1973)
16. Bloodlust (1959)
17. Skip night, reality happened.
18. Crowhaven Farm
19. The Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy marathon playing on YouTube.
20. Another YouTube marathon, Saturday morning cartoons from the 80s and 90s in a Halloween theme.
21. Dawn of the Dead (1978)
22. The Bees (1978)
23. Skip night, reality happened.
24. Binge watching Halloween cartoons on YouTube.
25. Binge watching Halloween cartoons on YouTube.
26. Tales from the Crypt (marathon)
27. The Fifth Element (1995)
28. The Monster Club (1980)
29. Halloween with the Addams Family (1977)
30. A spooky dose of reality
31. Double Feature Presentation: Hell in a Cell, King of the Ring, Mankind vs. The Undertaker (1998) / The Paul Lynde Halloween Special (1976)

que todos celebren el día de muertos con amor, felicidad y familia

Stay spooky.

When results don't matter:

I stated for reasons of antagonism that public support counts for nothing when the team wins, at least in South Africa. Amidst the falsehood of social media everyone was leering and jeering the bokke on the road to their world cup victory. Honestly the win meant more to ex South Africans living abroad than it did to the entire country. Well done all the same. But let's talk about the theoretical public holiday promised to the nation should the Bokke win, eish what a wasted opportunity for the ANC to salvage their political career on Monday morning. Our fearless leader proceeded with damage control the moment the final whistle blew as the political atmosphere for the 2024 general elections don't look positive for the current leadership, I'll revisit this slow burn journey in the months to come but for now El Presidente needs the wins where he can get them and knowing our president to celebrate the Bokke world cup victory December 25th and 26th will be public holidays in South Africa. Maybe if we win the cricket world cup South Africa can have January 1st off too, we just lucky that way. I'm somewhat confused by the post match lack of celebration from the home based fandom, it looked like misery hungover because we lost to the B team fielded on the day. Single digit temperature, no sunshine, wind swept drizzle and dikbek work colleagues refusing to talk rugby; I thought I woke up in London this morning. 

A Game of Class:

I'm not a rugby fan, never have been and never will be. Never played the sport so my understanding of the game play is about as proficient as my understanding of molecular physics, I get the general idea but I cannot get into the nitty gritty of enjoyment. I'm a cricket fan, played the game, love the game, watch the game. I've learned the ins and outs of the game, I've cheered them on to victory, supported them in defeat and met some of the legends of the game. I've stood upon the hallowed grounds of The Wanderers and the MCG, witnessed the excitement of T20, ODI and day 5 of a test game. I claim not to comprehend Duckworth Lewis. As a sports fan my fandom is: Pro Wrestling, football and cricket. When it comes to football I shout for England, when it comes to cricket I shout for South Africa. Herein lies the entertainment value of all sporting codes; Fandom criticism. Social media explodes with post game commentary from every arm enthusiast weighing in their opinions. And in 2023, when I posted this, the Rugby World Cup and Cricket World Cup trended into a frenzy. Then something of a sporting minority crossed over with celebrity objection as an online slow burn topic. The gender debate again threw professional sport and modern literature communities into a quagmire over the line drawn on the sand. J.K. Rowling hammered out the why and when the swimming governing body determined the where and who, the British government declared what and I sat back pondering how?
When I comes to individual opinions you are whatever the fuck you are, fly your freak flag proudly, but when in competition Trans gender switches are cheating in my opinion.

The millennial age will be remembered as the dumb ages because none choose to learn. I'll be brief. The trans movement is counter productive in trying to achieve equality among everyone. The WWE in the late 90s revolutionized the sport with the in ring debut of Chyna. This athletic, beautiful, talented female wrestler dubbed the ninth wonder of the world was competing against and beating the male roster for a title reign. This wasn't a gimmick, it didn't cause offense or outrage, it didn't need a woke joke cancel movement commentary. We as fans, loved it. Chris Canyon too stood out for conscious change in the sport, struggling against his personal demons he was probably the first homosexual wrestler in the industry and we loved it. Canyon was talented and set with potential but he succumbed to his inner demons and we miss him but I draw the line there. What people do in an individual capacity is entirely their own business so let me be the antagonist asshole about it on a public platform by stating Trans gender shouldn't be competitive; stay out of sports, stay out of pageantry, stay out of pop culture. Drag queens aren't protesting to enter and win Miss World, blind people aren't canceling motorsports events because they aren't represented on the drivers roster, Harry Potter isn't due for a rewrite because Hogwarts wants to be LGBTQ compliant. Bowing to the pressure be damned, society tries to simplify tolerance like a devote Muslim resident in the Vatican. The rule of nature is we don't like each other yet we stubbornly defy logic by bashing square pegs into whatever hole it/he/she/they/them/placedickpichere really want to force a way into. My constant critique of the millennial generation Muppets I throw out this challenge to the trans movement. Get creative and go mutant; grow horns, blue skin, additional limbs, full on physical transformation into anything your tiny little minds dream up, I jokingly remarked my acceptance for trans when bi phallic surgery becomes viable because everyone wants a second fully functional penis but until then you weirdos are theoretical X-Men. As I continue to antagonize the status quo because it needs to be done. The trans movement insults the men and women who sacrifice for their succes, who shed blood sweat and tears to be acknowledged as champions and certainly don't demand everything through self entitlement. I'll reconsider things when the first trans gender captain lifts the Webb Ellis trophy in victory. Trannies aren't earning their place in the world the same way everyone else did before them.

Be All You Can Be:

I remember Physical Education class in school. It was interesting to me but agonizing to some. Our PE teacher was memorable, Mr Oesterhuizen wherever you may be today, Sir I tip my hat to you. I recall a particular period of PE in 1995 when for reasons unbeknown to me at the time our little troop of 7th graders were about to fall in for boot camp. "Line up," shouted our instructor, "space arm to shoulder to your right," he continued, "counting off jumping Jack's." First set of ten done, no problem. "Down, counting off push-ups." Ten push-ups for anyone takes effort, the troop started grumbling. "AGAIN!" Again what?
Now if I've learned anything from military films there is always a hard-ass in the group to challenge the old school instructor; The Dirty Dozen, Full Metal Jacket, Major Payne. We had David Bowe. "One for Sir," came from the end of the row, David was three boys down from me. Seven push-ups in, David still counting them off, when our grumbles turned to protest. "AGAIN!"
This was getting serious, like sweat beads on our faces serious as we started the third set of push-ups with the sun beating down on our backs. Reaching number 5, David still sounding off every count, the message was coming down the line, "shut the hell up David." Alas he didn't. This battle continued, push-ups became sit ups became short sprint drops became squats. Thirty minutes of healthy physical activity, a moment of silence in the heat and the sweat. The experience best understood in adulthood illustrated the dynamics of social standing the modern age can't comprehend. The cancel culture Nazis would tear this practice apart but it never put any of us to harm, we weren't oppressed or abused or persecuted, the none suffered injury, none suffered trauma. To your generation this was character building. Stark contrast between Gen X and the non binary joke. So what was the lesson learned?
Respect. A universal virtue given and received. This wasn't an exercise in opposition, teacher enforcing discipline upon students, hardly needed when there is mutual respect. In every instance of the scenario the hard-ass opposed to the true grit isn't the point, each see opportunity to show the other mutual respect. A lesson no millennial is learning. So I, a gen-x asshole and proud of it, will be paying this lesson forward to the millennial generation in my charge because their lack of common decency disturbs me and I hold full dominion over the wifi access at home. This weekend will be fun, push-ups optional. 

Paraskevidekatriaphobia, actually it's pronounced Friggatriskaidekaphobia:

Novelty passes, like when millennials get excited about watching Friday the 13th on Friday the 13th so they can brag to their idiot online buddies how the movies suck when compared to Twilight or the MCU. I, the purist aristocrat of the horror genre mock the foolish mortals who wait for Halloween to come and scare them once a year when they try kill its spirit with commercial vommit as they do. As far as I'm concerned every day is Halloween, the real world is more evil and original films are better than reboots, reboots suck forever.

But a reasonable discussion or healthy debate just won't cut it nowadays, how about a good old fashioned street fight?
A no holds barred, anything goes parking lot brawl with the winner drawing first blood. I mean everything online loves to talk shit about and hate on the hype  throwing their idiotic opinions around, it doesn't matter what your opinion is I'm  still going the lay the smackdown on your candy ass. It pains me to see what monumental cluster fuck the millennial generation is, what the fuck?
Somebody needs to put these fools in a hurt locker for their own damn good. I understand millennial society are post culture to the point they want to reboot all that came before them but that isn't necessary. What is necessary is combat, maybe Mortal Kombat but let's not push our luck. Combat is the absent component in a millennial generation existence, hardly if any knew what a sucker punch feels like, especially in the ear.

Reason, Silent no more:

Trolling the 99% stupid on social media might be therapeutic, alternative treatment I do not prescribe if you are not affiliated with the 1% because I'm not your guidance councilor, legal advice, financial guru or spiritual non binary carbon based life form. I am tired, stupid people are exhausting thus I choose to remain silent in the face of their annomosity simply because I choose to ignore stupidity, it doesn't mean stupid won. As previously posted I'd be happy with at least half the global population being X'd to Mars but I'm not entirely sure what the demographic ratio of the 99% is. There are good people out there, I know good people but the sheer volume of idiots is overwhelming. Wishing for establishing a elite community of 1% minds is cult instead of a lifestyle so that won't work. Patrony is the killer of good nature, being canceled is a compliment as it means you're calling the millennial muppets out on their shit. Woke culture, more like joke culture. How exactly is anyone supposed to take them seriously?

Opposition instead of assimilation, I openly mock their stupidity.

Damaged Democracy:

If someone asked me to explain Democracy in a single sentence I would reply; I did something nice, now vote for me. Knowing irony is lost on Africa I'll tell you a tale and believe me it's true. Rural roads traditionally are unserviced, stripped dirt surfaces renowned for keeping your vehicle dirty and enabling the stupidity of weekend off-road dirt bike muppets. In my tenure residence that road I use daily has been serviced by the municipal council twice. Once at my formal request to turn the inaccessible bicycle track into a two lane motorway and now recently with self motivation of the council as showmen work to garner favour ahead of the general elections. Great, sort of. The political strategy is fix the least critical fault with the most visual asthetic then hype the success of these acts to frenzy the voting public into voting for you, promising more to come which never does once the votes are in. Intelligent voters see through this ruse and demand immediate resolve for the most critical faults, in this instant the failing electrical substation in my community that despite the municipal council advising the assholes at Eskom not to force load shedding on this section of their grid as the node cannot handle frequent outrage without risking failure. Eskom heard "do it!" and I sit without power for 12 hours at the time of writing this post because the node failed. Thanks Eskom, you idiots. In a quagmire we sit; repaired roads are great but repaired electrical supply is better. This is a repeat incident, the power supply distribution, so all parties concerned are aware of the ongoing issues. Having registered to vote for the first time in South Africa I jokingly posted on social media at just how bad things must be in country when I decide to vote, me being an advocate for anarchy and chaos. I never felt inclined to vote because I was content with state of the nation but now; completely fucked doesn't begin to describe it. In the last few years the general attitude of people has changed to "I don't care, that's ignorant and I'll do what I want," but living according to anything goes and the rules don't matter exceeds anarchy and chaos to leave everyone on the downward spiral to inevitable zero. We can come back from that if attitudes change though secretly I'm hoping Elon Musk sends half of Earth's population to Mars. 

Kobayashi Maru:

The unwinnable scenario. Apart from Star Trek I wonder what else inspired SpaceX. I have my theories about Tesla, X (Twitter) and colonizing Mars but why spoil the surprise. Let's ship half of the human population on Earth to Mars, give them Teslas, all the Bitcoin and X. Let them drive around a barren planet in their hybrid cars producing breathable air while they chat bot on X and throw Bitcoin parties with each other. It's simple; everyone is eligible, anyone can go, none will return. Maybe Musk has a preferred method but I'm saying send the vegans first. The rest of that tribe will follow.

In something slightly unrelated. Some may recall my open letter of contempt I wrote to the criminal element of South Africa in which I unleashed with great vengeance and furious anger upon them. Sadly their stupidity remains beyond comprehension and my hand bares the scar. This time around my distain to projected toward an inanimate object. A broom. This rusted handle Frankenstein assembly absolutely ruined my good deed with another finger laceration and the end of a potential Quidich career. Me attempting to sweep a floor, rusted broom and snaps clean off to ninja slice across my battle tested little finger. No stitches this time around, there was blood and I cried like a little girl. This time around I had my retribution, that rust buster 9000 crashed and burned. I'm not suggesting my incident coincides with Dumbledore passing, all the same I raise my wand because the magic lives beyond the failings of reality. 

Artificial Ignorance

I'm not opposed to A.I. as I believe it's not on a functional level, at least at the time of writing this post. My idea of A.I. integration is R2d2, where's my Droid?

This opinion doesn't come from a want of understanding, I understand the system just fine but I don't think we need to pledge our undying allegiance to chatbotGBT. This stuff is artificial, always will be, it's imperfect and flawed and needs us; we don't need it, at least not to the same degree. Then why has the millennial generation turned cult following for it?

The culture crazed fundamental morons record their ignorance explicitly for future humans to study as the singularity when humanity completely fucked it all up. It's no fault of the technology, a tool misused is not evil when weaponised. That's correct future people, technology in the 21st century is a tool. It would be contemptuous of me to state I've forgotten more about information technology than the millennial age will ever learn, gen X represents...

In my continued persecution of millennial ignorance, not the same as artificial ignorance, I've uncovered the misunderstanding of the one and done philosophy. Raising pets is super hard when you forget to inform the responsible Gen X adult in advance, skipping over the part where this was my fault for forgetting to be reminded and my heartless cruelty is unwoke. 

So what do I feed my hungry pet?

Ask Google I say.

I like did and all the stuff Google says you need to go to the store and buy right now.

The store is sold out until the weekend, two days from this conversation, when I can get more food. Oh the damn thing is reptilian and can go for several weeks without food but in this case it's nearly starved after last eating a week ago, it won't die in two days.

What else did Google suggest? I ask.

Nothing, I like watched the first video and it validated what I know already.

Not much by my observation.

...

...

...

...

I'm doing a quick Google search 

...

...

...

...

...

Right, so Google just validated common sense, that's the stuff I have, and made several suggestions on what else carnivorous reptiles do eat.

But it won't.

How do you know, have you tried? I enquire.

No.

Place sarcastic meme here.

So are we A.I. ready?

Try again ten years from now.

Listen to the past:

When I was a young boy, my father took me to the city of Johannesburg for the first time. As an impressionable eight year old I was captivated by the giant machine operating around me. I remember what he told me about the changing world I saw around me. 'Everyone here is making a change, you are part of that change and you can make it good change or you can make it bad change.'

I haven't been to the city of Johannesburg for many years, it's not the city I remember. It's a fallen city, bad change claimed it over time. I don't remember when last I traveled to Johannesburg, I don't need to go there to know its ruin. That was the legacy of my father, the past. I've posted a lot about my legacy that I leave to my children, the sad reality is they will never experience Johannesburg as I did. I'm not sure what I'm building as my legacy, sad to think it won't include parts of my lineage history. I can best retell and record those stories. Beyond the documented failures of the current government, social agreements and gradual decline of a country into ruin the common goal remains greed. Describe South African priorities today; cock and booze, having unpacked the anatomy of this thing I've realized this is not part of my legacy. You cannot fix anything choosing to remain broken, not by acceptable standards. Conflict resolves. I'm moving on. What really grinds my gears is the general ignorance in the aftermath, things failed because we wanted it that way and now it's OK to start from zero because everyone wanted that. What the fuck kind of logic is that?

Woke logic, according to a millennial reality works like Minecraft, exactly like it. You just break it down and rebuild for like 100 days. Now I, the Gen X fossil am not one to argue with an idiot, I avoid them like covid. Instead I decided in a head to head challenge; they play Minecraft online while I play the OG real-time version of Minecraft many of us refer to as life. Life, the reality based MMORPG on open world platform starts on level HARD, oh yes you spawn in on day 1 an infant and only really get established twenty odd years later as you struggle to live before you die. So be fair we're playing a 100 day challenge to see who makes greater progress. Arguably this sounds closer to The Sims, but all the kids these days are Minecrafting...

Thus far I'm winning, my point being life experience trumps digital garbage. Yes it's hard labour, there is failure, you do not respawn, other people lie, cheat and steal after all this is real life and there is no app for it. 

I do see something of a digital legacy formed in memes, the vehicle for teaching history to the millennial muppets. Have I surrendered on my return to Johannesburg, perhaps. Perhaps the city I first experienced changed into the city pixelated online. History is old, old is not a concept for the millennial generation. 

The Magic Roundabout:

Since the dawn of man children have experienced the right of passage from a single mechanical device menacing and mesmerizing on playgrounds everywhere; the merry-go-round. This primitive machine skims the skin from knees of small children careening away from the elliptical path of travel centrifugal force can generate. Oh science thou art a heartless bitch. Too has the monstrous mechanism claimed the stomach content of older children ride the challenge to test their might and retain the lunch at the same time. Alas the cry of defeat, 'stop, stop, stop I'm gonna be sick.' While these carousels of controlled chaos were the work of scientific witchcraft your perception of its medieval design changes in your adult mind. My adult mind observes these childhood instruments of torture with practical repurpose, how exactly would I institute this automaton from the ancient time to infuriate their daily digital drudgery. A merry-go-round could turn a dynamo that slow charges the the wifi router. It amazes me nobody has thought of this sooner, millennial sized hampster wheels slowly turning round and round to the mindless shuffle of feet and the rapid ticking and clicking of fingers on touch screen.

But the thought squirrels are running rampant and there modern day practical applications for really old technology that within the twisted realm wherein resides my imagination I would observe; 15 minute parenting. The world is a fucking scary place for adults, especially necrotic parents when they partake in this weird childhood practice their children insist on, like spending time outside, in the sunshine, having fun. Kids know adults are definitely defective and need their help with nearly everything because you forget how to do stuff when you get really old. Back to super dad, our hero neurotic braving the wildness of a public park on a Saturday afternoon, he was super nervous of the big scary dogs chasing their ball around he quickly ushered his kids out the car then locked it from the inside. His daughter reassuringly illustrated the big scary dog wasn't going to rip everyone to shreds, 'hi doggy, can I pet you?' She did, and wasn't mauled by Cujo. A sigh of relief, dad tentatively exited the overcompensated SUV, gast their are swings and children are playing on them. Gently hand holding and soft words of reassurance, adults freak out about anything. Swings, slide, merry-go-round all declared safe but then dad caught sight of a new danger, other children. Dad, still hugging the treeline close to his beloved SUV attempting to execute order parental advisory. Turns out I was the "stranger danger" to his tiny universe, kids didn't think so yhe next fifteen minutes were tiktok worthy. When adults attempt to show children how to have fun it usually ends with someone uploading the hilarious failed clip to social media. As my 7 year old says, 'parks are for play, YouTube is for assholes.' as he attempts to conquer the infamous magic roundabout.

A want of understanding:

The service industry, nobody knows its exact definition anymore. That blue collar working class society looks down upon is best described by Tyler Durden : 'Look, the people you are after are the people you depend on. We cook your meals, we haul your trash, we connect your calls, we drive your ambulances. We guard you while you sleep. Do not... fuck with us.'
I being on of these people am regularly frustrated by the corporate muppets who, until recently were as important as the manual labour force. But can an algorithm replace middle management?
Could your fortune 500 company be automated at the board room level based on the inputs of the work force?
I say it can. Artificial intelligence is a decision making program, when tasked it processes accumulated data provided by an input source to postulate the best outcome. That describes every office based job from management to administration and, at the time of writing, those tasks are done by people sitting at home wasting hours each day attending online video sessions while chatbotgbt runs the business more effectively. Meaning every job appointment above the threshold of physical labour can be replaced by chatbots running algorithms, Siri, Alexa and Cortana sign the paychecks. I welcome the concept and forecast in less than a decade paper pushing employees will be phased out for a.i. replacement capable of, at minimum, reading. Audio books in my opinion are not books anymore than streaming movies to your smartphone is a full cinematic experience. Reading something engages you but having someone else read to you puts you to sleep. People tell stories, people are not always storytellers and I prefer the narrative voice in my mind over a voice actor. So why won't anyone read?
A want of understanding, or the absence thereof works in three parts. Based on simple observation and my experience 

What's in a name:

GPS services suck. I travel from here to there by a combination of turns between intermissions of robotic instructions. Ask for directions and you get a pin drop, why?
Have we lost all sense of direction?
I remember being asked for directions by a slight panic looking Asian man entered the train station in London many years ago. 'Excuse me, where is Putney Bridge?'
'You take the next train on the city line, count four stops. This is Southfields station.'
In my youth everyone knew their way around by landmarks. You want to get to the city library, turn left on Kruger Street by the Corner Lounge Cafe (Sadly the Cafe is no more), we'd walk home from school passed creepy heights stopping to buy cheap cigarettes from Johnny's Cafe; everyone knew Johnny was cool, it was the 90s, things were cooler back then. I've put a lot of miles in the clock since then, I reckon I've driven around the earth at least once or maybe a decent part of the way to the moon and things change all the time but most of the street names remain the same. From time to time I'll turn down a road to meander along memory lane feeling nostalgic because of the street names. Every town has a Church Street and 5th Ave but what about Somerset Ave, Van Der Stel Rd or Livingstone Drive?
Who are these people and why is there a street named after them?
I saddened and embarrassed to say I don't know enough of the history about these names and their streets, except for the history behind Prince George Rd in Brakpan, Google it like I did. Names change, mostly, when someone did something significant to warrant a street renaming of 3rd Avenue to Nelson Mandela Avenue. It's infuriating when some asshole bribes some bottom feeding government fool to erase history and stroke their tiny ego. Africa remembers nothing so it cannot learn anything. America remembers, Europe remembers, Asia remembers, Oceania remembers...

'Hello, the fairy of tranquility here. Popped in here to pause this post so everyone can breath out all that nasty negative energy and breath in all that yummy positive energy. Everyone is loved and appreciated, our opinion isn't agreeable with everyone and y'all are encouraged to do your own research, reach your own conclusions and continue to make the world a better place.'

AWR10:TTMO.

Everyone wants to blame the bad guy when things go wrong, every story has a villain and the more sensational the better. Let's meet Gerald, the bad guy in our vignette. Gerald is the villain of South Africa, he's exactly what you expect. Gerald is everything, everyone, all at once, always. Gerald has zero redeemable qualities to him, he's stolen from you, lied to you and about you, cheated you out of many things. But here's the real nuts and bolts of the matter, you trust Gerald. You admire him, exonerate his deeds, seek his council and console but you neither trust him nor respect him and when conditions are favorable you betray him for another Gerald. Africa has no memory, none can remember what happen the day after yesterday. History is mystery and life is an endless circle because nobody learns from the same mistakes being made. Gerald knows this, he knows how and when to use it. Gerald can turn friends into enemies, a crowd into a mob, good people indifferent. He conquers by division, dissention and desertion. He controls with chaos fueled by controversy, he feeds on the social disruption. I sniffed around social media for an honest state of the nation, well done. Every thread unraveling to opinionated mud slinging, to my frustration it's not worth the effort to post a comment. I quietly pursue my rebellion of one, immigration.

Bother:

Having never used Craigslist or ebay to sell my items of intrinsic value and seeing how the Pirate Bay and Silk Road are permanent on Santa's naughty list I tried the Market Place on Facebook. The online classifieds haven't changed all that much since my previous outing; post a picture, write a brief story and wait for the weirdos to come sniffing. I recently acquired a pair of analog credit card transaction machines, the slide and slide action that rubbed the raised imprint of your credit card details onto several layers of carbon copy transaction receipts that made you look super rich and irritated the bank tellers if the numbers are illegible. I'm examining these two antique machines when I notice the raised plate was missing, usually the plate was cut for the merchant operating it but my curiosity ran away and I dropped this little gem under the picture: analog plate printer, single print slider, print plates not included. The response was weird. Several DMs from a third world counterfeit syndicate and an official looking administration post flagging my suspicious activity. Those Interpol folk are mighty understanding, I'm not selling contraband material but if I were the selling of machines and key components together lands you in the Gulag but selling them separately, to different buyers is not illegal. My misinterpreted post was neither. My misleading the weirdos online is certainly trying the patience of  the digital police. Still I wonder if I could modify these two machines to reproduce a rudimentary reproduction of paper currency, anyone having a spare plate?
I would successfully construct my personal printing press to produce an unlimited supply of Monopoly money, everyone loves playing Monopoly. 

End.

répondez s'il vous plaît:

Racism exists because people refuse to let it go. Racists choose it. Racism doesn't bother me, it's human nature, I'm not expressing my opinins on race, politics, gender or religion as they are my personal expressions that are easily misinterpreted by idiots bur this bothers me;

Now, we must all fear evil men. But there is another kind of evil which we must fear most, and that is the indifference of good men. Social media goes viral when a racist becomes a bully pretending to be the victim while the gathered audience uploads their videos online. Defeating our goal for global unity, such behavior is despicable and stupid. 

I'm done nit-picking the modern age, free will bitches and I'm just better than y'all.

🖕🏻💩

Back into the online turd pool:

After a two and a half year absence from social media I was compelled to dip a virtual toe back into the Facebook turd pool. No surprise at my absence going unnoticed as my return went unnoticed too, the soulless algorithms remain artificial. Right, time to fuck with a.i.

I never recycle my Digital Garbage

Seeing another book store close its doors brings a tear to my eye. Does this mean the digital domain is greener?

I'm doubtful because I never recycle my digital garbage. The Cloud is vast and infinite, my document storage is minimal and small file sized but just how much landscape is all that social media crap occupying?

Let's do an experiment, traditionally user storage is limited to device space, so what's the Cloud limit?

I intend to upload all my digital garbage to the Cloud because I'm done sending it to my recycle bin. This might take some time, I'll keep you posted.

A creepy fact: you never die online. I've encountered profiles and scheduled reminders from recently deceased contacts of mine. You die in the real world but your Roblox profile doesn't?

Usually social media profiles are converted to memorials by the friends and family of the departed. Where's the Instagram cemetery?

Where do dead avatars go?

In the game world you respawn in the Graveyard but that's just silly. I think the virtual world isn't ready to embrace mortality because fiction cannot die, the virtual world doesn't have an understanding of reality. In reality finalizing a virtual estate is equivalent to finalizing a real world estate. The machine is absent of mortality. Because of that social media platforms need cemeteries where the virtually dead go. Let's not stop there, Roblox needs a real world beatdown. An economic crisis, mass unemployment, increasing poverty, avatars resorting to crime and maybe a virtual invasion. None escape reality. None of that unpredictability is there because virtual zombies express zero emotion, emotion we read on each other's faces. Desperation, concern and worry, seriousness and occasional excitement or joy. Feelings pixelated and replicated remain virtual, meaningless and irrelevant.

Back into the turd pool:

After a two and a half year absence from social media I was compelled to dip a virtual toe back into the Facebook turd pool. No surprise at my absence going unnoticed as my return went unnoticed, the soulless algorithms remain artificial.

Of war, we don't speak anymore:

Warfare is a declaration of intent. Protest is a declaration of intent. I protest. In opposition to my country's leadership, their allies and their interest in the Russia / Ukraine conflict. I defy the general opinion and attitude of my fellow countrymen, they fail to acknowledge the gravity of the situation. I am a disgruntled patriot encouraging 50+ million of my countrymen to protest and rebel.

Yo-ho, yo-ho a pirate's life for me:

Everyone wants to be a pirate, admittedly. Our collective understanding of pirate life varies yet ever since childhood I have wanted to be a real pirate. This strange desire for the outlaw lifestyle baffles many but I assure you my intentions, self serving  outlawful rather than unlawful. Spend time in Africa where anything goes and the rules don't matter. The entire continent was founded on greed and corruption, established on the fundamentals of injustice where nobody gives a shit about anyone other than themselves and the ultimate goal is pure exploitable profit. Piracy is the tax free alternative to living in country and it doesn't require me establishing a cult disguised as a religion for the tax exemption, pluses and minuses, my plan to start my own cult is another post for another time. A Google search shows modern piracy has changed much, adjusting for modernisation it's the same grim reality of plunder, pillage, drink rum, repeat of its pirate ancestry; Captain Jack Sparrow committed many evil deeds outside of overly commercialised cosplay attire in pop culture trendiness and Disney turned pure profits which kind of makes my point. However reality that unpredictable nasty thing happens beyond the confines of limited online worlds perfectly controlled for our digital distraction by artificial intelligence less intelligent than our avatars. You can't be a MMORPG pirate, digital piracy is real but who wants to stream a series about cyber piracy where the smartphone zombies steal Robux from each other. The online world is that small yellow spot floating on the surface of life's vast ocean. I openly mock you. Avast you hornswoggling yellow tea drinking sea cucumber stains, hand over your worldly possessions and I may spare your avatar death in the real world

Two moments of irony in two days:

I love the music of Alanis Morissette, Ironic is like an anthem for my pre millennium generation. Recently two moments occurred that left my saying, isn't it ironic.

An ambulance parked in front of a pharmacy. No body died waiting in line for the cashier to call the next customer but a little old lady required additional medical care when the nurse on duty treating her asthma noticed serious symptoms of restricted air flow to her lungs. Not so ironic when you read the back story. Moving on to the Russia / South Africa bait and switch. Listening in conversation I heard a Russian woman residing in South Africa warn us about the Putin threat. Skipping ahead to the irony of the tale, this woman left Russia when Putin took power fearing the evil he ultimately became. Her only living connection to Russia is a close friend from South Africa who left South Africa about the same time she left Russia citing the same reasoning. Ironic, both were bang on the money. So I'm thinking, hearing the distant sounds of gunfire on the African bushveld at dusk, of another popular song that has no relevance to my tale of irony but is a nice twist ending. Waka Waka...

Initially I misheard the lyrics and thought Shakira was singing "when you fuck it up oh oh, when you fuck it up eh eh'

Admittedly it's a play on the South African street culture, I'm local so I get the expression and I'm not inclined to try explaining it you. It's the hook to the song 'this time for Africa' that took a left turn as an expression of irony. Nobody really gives a crap about Africa, Unicef commercials aimlessly promote straving for change village folk with weird names nobody can pronounce correct. Admit if you're two dollars actually made a difference you'd at least know where Africa is on Google Earth. You don't,  that's cool, let's move on. The ultimate irony is Putin getting a foothold on the continent least desired where the locals are unpredictable, an every other un prefix imagined. The real estate isn't worth its dirt because what unclaimed resources remain within the former colonies have long been plundered by local greed. The is a step down into failure, unremarkable failure from which one may never return. Real irony is Africa has no memory, all occurs quickly then all is quickly forgotten. I'm enjoying the sunset while it lasts.

Currently Influencing Pop Culture Solicitation:

Lately I've been struggling to disconnect from the daily push. Keeping to anything has become a mental decathlon of times, dates, deadlines, names, places, addresses, faces that I sometimes forget. Just forget, a brief blank in my mind. I have to make a conscious effort to step away from the smart devices. Occasionally I tune into the infomercials in my head, good old fashioned channel surfing when I hit on Kevin Trudeau telling the world about Mega Memory, his system of memory training is a favourite of mine. The mind palace technique, my mind palace is somewhat disorganized. In an effort to reorganize my thoughts I've done, absolutely nothing. Then I watched some YouTube and there was a man claiming the advantages to walking backwards. So I tried it and it's rather enjoyable. As the organization of my mind progressed I fixated; can you walk backwards on a treadmill while browsing tiktok videos?
Yes, but you look like an idiot everyone is filming in case you faceplant which is worth 52.4m views. I'll reserve my reverse walking for outdoor spaces free of treadmills and tiktok. Curious thing about handheld smart devices, or the absence thereof, when you decide to reverse walk is your eye line is parallel with the horizon instead of your feet. As trending as your footwear might be it limits your point of view. I represent the broken part of life, my pessimistic outlook on reality is far more depressing than Neo waking up in the real world to then be told he's destined to die for a cause that inevitably changes nothing. The further I walk the simpler things seems, by things I mean human nature. Still advocating for the end of the pursuit of human singularity and a.i. because I want droids like r2d2 and c2p0 instead of whatever the millennial version of hal9000 or skynet or viki might be. Keep it simple. We don't need the additional complications, ahem, back in my day we Had LGB, SMS and cash because that's all we needed. Now we're tacking on letters for everything, using chat bots everywhere and starting up a virtual currency daily. The excess is making everyone miserable and unbearable. As I walk in reverse I speculate if rather than when we'll discover time travel and I doubt anyone in the past would want to deal with the modern era bullshit non associate binary forms trying to Karen about the validity of the crypto unicorn sparkles making their a-iPhone needs yum yum to picture take.

Simplicity is traditional and tradition is human. The king's coronation exercised tradition dating back 1200 years. Tradition connects humanity across our timeline. We continue the scroll on our smart devices to interact online without ever considering scrolling was the method of interacting with information recorded on rolls of papyrus. 

I once saw him kill three men in a bar... with a pencil, with a fucking pencil.

Britain thinks a weapons ban will stop violent stabbings, they passed idiotic legislation to prove this but they were wrong. Human nature opposes all, people will stab other people with anything so taking away the sharp pointy things won't stop this. People don't need restrictions, people need guidance. Guidance offers understanding and understanding offers choice. When offered a choice to either be right or be happy I choose to be right. I understand what that decision brings and I stand by it Steadfast. So I decided to write a short children's story called; Where does mum keep the kitchen knives?
You can illustrate it yourself:

Sam arrives home to a flat in Kent.
Mun and dad shout about paying rent.
Mum says 'you're drunk again before 10 am.' Dad says 'what, what, what?'
Sam passes by as quiet as he can, he didn't want to watch his parents fight again.
Dad is shouting 'you're a useless wife,' there's a struggle in the kitchen as he reaches for a knife.
Mum is scared, she tries to stop him.
Dad screams 'Sam where is the fucking chef knife?'
Mum pushes him aside, dad reaches the cupboard in one stride.
Mum sceams 'help!'
Dad, now angry at his useless wife reaches in the cupboard to grab his zombie knife. He turns to swing by bumps his head on the side of the fridge instead. The tiny kitchen has no space when two adults stand face to face. Dad tries again to stab his wife but no such luck with a large zombie knife. The machete blade is bulky and wide with awkward sharp edges at odd angles each side. He lifts the blade up trying to chop but the hard thud above him signals his stop. Sam watched dad's face turn bright red as the zombie knife was stuck in the ceiling above his head. Mum saw her chance, life-saving essential, poking out dad's shirt pocket was his only work pencil. Mum pushed him back with a shove and a grab. 'Die you bastard,' she shouted then stab, stab, stab. Sam was sad when police arrived, he'd never mum or dad again, dead alive. But Sam doesn't live in that flat on his own. He's happy with friends living in his new foster home. Sam kept that pencil, it served him through school. He wrote his docrate with that scribing tool. Some years later, in his adult life Sam addressed a letter to the Prime Minister.

Dear Minister
It is in your power to regulate the rule of law that keep the order of governance civilised and respectable. Many have critisised, questioned, opposed and ignored your decisions passed for various reasons. Such reasons I have learned are from a want of understanding. I too questioned a decision you made which affected me as an impressionable youth. Your decision that came into law had zero impact on my personal well being as the law intended, in fact it produced ruinous results. Results that changed my life for the better. A ban on a weapon design allowed me an opportunity to pursue education. When zombie knives were banned the law didn't spare my parents from the downward spiral their lives were on, it spared me through tragedy from coming the next tragedy. The act of a violent crime committed could never have been prevented with a weapon ban; perhaps the statistical evaluation should have shifted focus from the action onto the ignorance, I am not the person to pass judgment. Instead I implore you to consider the facts better, evaluate the data to find a comprehensive solution rather than a short term fix. I begrudge neither my parents for their destructive living nor the government for passing laws they believe will benefit everyone, I simply ask for an expansion of perspective. In closing I have inserted personal responsibility and effort to assist in the betterment of the community from whence I came, Kent needs our help. I thank you for your ongoing service to our country and taking time from your busy timetable to read my letter. Sincerely. Sam.

You Shall Not Pass:

Seismic activity is not common place in Africa because fault lines and tectonic plates are few and far between. My experience of the Earth moving under my has occurred three times while under African blue skies, each time barely stirring me from slumber. Some speculate the extensive mining infrastructure cross crossing the affected zone of the highveld. The endless shafts and tunnels peppering the Witwatersrand may have something to do with it. I have another theory. I considered Graboids but none of the seismoraphers around the cradle of humankind even blipped. What if we unearthed a Balrog?

My theory is the nearly three decades of illegal sub surface mining has compromised the structural integrity of the mknes and now we have tremors. As Gandalf put it they were to greedy and they dug too deep and something deep below was awoken. 

Reality

Never stop to think about it. I move between rows of ordinary people queued and waiting for the charity of reality. I do not sympathize with them, I do not feel empathy for them, I do not immediately judge any of them because once I was them and I can be them again at any moment. We all have choices in life, some we make bad ones. Seeing these desperate folk standing in line for the scraps discarded to them by an evil government, absolutely the South African government is evil. The spare change of a government grant is the life line they cling to in vain. I'm not stirred by this scene, I never am. It's the grim reality Unicef commercials aimlessly promote. I keep those thoughts in a folder I revisit frequently, studying the photographs, reading the recorded testimonials, staring at those pitiful faces. We're not supposed to give a flying fuck for the modern world of our own creation. Our instinct for the natural order drives us to care for other forms of life, the natural world in which we live and the driving force of our self aware consciousness. Philosophy that renders technology useless, money worthless and individualism meaningless. Why can't we consciously get over that hill?

Stupidity is man made, artificially manufactured and incorrectly guaged on an unnatural scale. That sounds rather depressing, in reality it is. It's like playing a MMORPG but real. I can rant on for eternity about millennial generation being the last generation of the human race but why should I?

Instead I'll share something I firmly believed the world needs right now. RAGE. On my travels a watched an unassuming man rage out his frustration in a public parking lot across from the local magistrate office, assuming the two are related I was inspired by this individual voicing whatever it was he needed to rage over. I don't care for the details, I care one man is giving Society the middle finger as he rants about the injustice currently afflicted upon him. I champion such oddities, these weirdos intermingled with the political correct douchebags of the world politely pass judgment on as they pass them by like the assholes in the Bible parable. Everyone has their story, most of them are best posted on social media for the haters to tear apart. I commend those who rage, be heard, you matter, fight the power. 

Buy The Kid a Damn Chocolate

Sometimes I revisit the ideas my beautiful mind offers to update things. Like standing in line at a shop waiting to pay when your attention is drawn to a kid and parent discussing the importance of wants versus needs in front of the toy or candy shelf inconveniently but strategically place at the cashier tills. We all know the story, it ends in tears of frustration and stares of indignation and a warmish smile of understanding on my face in witness to the discomfort these incidents cause to adults. Adults are assholes, we try rationalise everything. Children live for every moment. In my observation the adults take the same approach to everything, rational. Things escalate quickly. So why do we do it?

Are we more concerned with the positive appreciation of strangers in public than our own children?

Some people are, let's call this group assholes. I believe in all things being equal, what we do from there determines our judgment from others. Sometimes you need to be the villain and say no, explain your reason and ride out the storm. Who gives a flying fuck what other people think. Sometimes you need to be the hero and buy the kid a damn chocolate because who gives a flying fuck what people think. And then there's me, watching with enjoyment the pain of these incidents cause those condescending assholes standing by silently in misery. I care not for their back story for had I the means and consent of the parental figure I'd buy the kid a damn chocolate if only to ease the burden. Children don't understand reasons and adults always have reasons and shops always have delightful little trinkets of temptation for childhood wants that frustrate adulthood needs. Next time you encounter such incident take a moment to observe the situation and if warranted, with parental consent buy the kid a damn chocolate unless you're some creepy weirdo with real issues then nevermind and stand in line quietly being miserable with all the other assholes.

Some Days I'm Glad I Live in Africa, Where Anything Goes and the Rules Don't Matter:

Judging by the mad world scale Africa is wasteland nobody gives a continental shit about. I won't defend anymore than I criticize my present environment as a resident in Africa. I will point out some common sense. You can't rush change. You can't force change. You can't un-asshole yourself. Stupid people do stupid things, evident by the modern age excessive documentation of everything all the time but in Africa, for the most part accountability is ignored. But nobody gives a continental shit, let's move on. As an active member of a secret society I am here to observe, because me interacting means certain global genocide. Africa functions by Pavlovian culture, ask the dogs about it. Zero gain for the instant reward sums it up. I think often of the keen observation Pavlov had for his test group, watching for signs in any of the dogs for primitive self realization of let's defy that damn bell and revolt. He no doubtedly corrected his experiment, hopefully without having to shoot the dog. How these clever techniques have fooled the mind of modern society to believing the instant reward comes without gain everytime that device in your hand responds. YouTube brazenly advertises you ring that bell to receive notifications, ding-a-ling. Empty be this lonely planet. I mentioned the rules don't matter and anything goes, that's true as long as you're not seeking freedom. You can't please everyone all the time, there are going to be moments of conflict that sometimes continue on for an age. Honestly if the reward is worth the hassle I encourage you to go for it, you might turn into an asshole but everyone should reach for their dream. Be the rulebreaking rebellious oddity you want to be, but remember their is going to be sacrifice and you decide what price you'll pay. Ultimately a string of shitty choices don't matter much when you look back at them during your victory celebration, however lonely that feeling is I don't really know. I've stomped on a lot of toes, said a ton of crappy things, hurt a lot of feelings and ruined many relationships in my pursuit for success. The results have been minimal.

Camera rolling, Action:

I decided to turn my Friday afternoon into a movie pitch.
Working title - I'm having a three beer day. Deep breath, calm place, let's unfuck the human race.
Opening Narrative: 'Some People are Fucking Rude, for fuck sake. Here's what grinds my gears, assholes. The world is overpopulated with arrogant fucking assholes that I believe belong in global death camps as being an asshole cancels all protection offered by the human rights charter. The root of all evil in the world is the attitude of an asshole.'

Synopsis, as read by the epic voiceover guy: A service technician has three hours to close four service requests avoiding escalation and saving the SLA to keep all the clients satisfied.

Opening shot: me, sprinting across the screen like Tom Cruise in Mission Impossible, I reach the dispatch counter at the warehouse and in my frantic Arnold Schwarzenegger voice, 'come on, I need my parts, I have to get out of here.'
I grab the boxes, sign the paperwork, check my mobile device for updates then back to the Tom Cruise sprinting. I reach my car, time to drive it like every Fast and Furious film doing my best Vin Diesel pose. Burning rubber at high revs I race from one  parking lot to another. Dodging homeless people at the traffic lights and the annoying car guards I make it to the first site. Shit, the customer is unavailable, I scramble to call my escalation team, I'm not going to miss this SLA damnit, we're good to move on to the next call. More Tom Cruise sprints, Vin Diesel poses and annoying car guards dodged. I make it to the second site when bam, loadshedding strikes and the power goes out. Quick queue the A-Team music as I complete the call successfully despite Eskom. Half way there, my phone beeps and I check my messages, the dispatcher is near panic. "You're not going make it," but I'm on my game and I sprint into the next site, another one in the bag as the clock counts down but I'm not Jack Bauer and that last service call is waiting. Roll the countdown clock. Time slows, there's a montage wanting to play but I don't have time for it because the third act twist is coming. I get to site, I get the job done, I get the signature from the customer and I get gone but wait; the montage reel rolls and I'm thrown back into a highlight reel. I missed something, a crucial plot point but the movie reel shreds the film all grindhouse like and by the time the Foley grip gets the new film can back on we're rolling the credits in time for the cutaway scene. I stop, face the camera and say.
'I'm not good at what I do, I'm fucking exceptional. I beat the clock, job well done but that means nothing because at the end of the day I do what I for me. I don't need your praise, your accolades or your words of encouragement. Stick that up your pipe. Customer appreciation is enough for me.'
Cut to black, beep, beep, beep.

Time Travel Permits:

I received a new company identification card today, it expired several months ago. It got me thinking about expiry dates and what they could represent if we recycled them. An expiration date is a point in time where anytime before that date is good. So when time travel becomes a thing, if it isn't already then please future people the key is a Flux capacitor, all those expired documents and permits and photo ID cards will have use again. Take passports as an example, they're only good for X amount of years and not everyone gets to use them but what if through a overly complicated explanation for traversing the space / time continuum future you travels back to 2005 and realizing you don't have your passport at hand but you can locate the one issued in 2005, ba-da-bing ba-da-boom you are good to go without the hassles of stuff lost in time. My genius knows no bounds, and I keep all my passports past and current. Recycle time, hardly plausible just like recycling. Time travel, lightsabers and hover boards remain in virtual reality for our entertainment but let's prep for potential all the same, some wise person once quoted; rather have something and not need it than not have it when you need it. 

You're Fucked, Have a Nice Day:

I've rewritten this post a fuck load of times, I'm tired and agrevated and uncensored. Technology is going to kills everyone, why?

Social media has made us intolerant. E-commerce has turned us into poor consumers enslaved to a corrupt global economy. AI is making us stupid, bots, chats, algorithms, fuck off all of it. Smart devices have stripped us of humanity, do you think anything matters anymore? 

I'll post my opinion on TWITTER, banned because some fuckwit was offended. I'll share a post on Facebook and get canceled by the idiot police for not being politically correct. Streaming services are saturating the market with evil consumerism, algorithms tell us what to watch, where to shop, when to binge and how  cool this bullshit is. This constant flood of digital garbage lives in your pocket, all the time feeding an addiction like a silent predator feeding off human life. We protest, oppose and fight a common enemy shamelessly and fearlessly. I'm calling it all out, I'm easy to find motherfucker so come get a rightoleous beating. These are my opinions, tough shit if they hurt your feelings. Big corporates are evil, they want to control everything. Disney promotes fascism, Netflix are sore losers because DVD will always be better than streaming, Meta is controlled by the biggest douche in existence and there isn't a single thing on Amazon worth buying that I  couldn't find anywhere else. Wake up people.

Let it be clear this is a letter of intent. I declare to the government and the people of South Africa I can do a better job than they can. Post Apartheid South Africa has fallen on a gradual decline pioneered and executed by greedy and corrupt people who just don't give a shit. Anyone believing their vote can change things is incorrect, get up and do things yourself. Take back South Africa from corrupt ANC assholes selling us out to China and Russia from a handful of magic beans. The ANC protested aggressively against the Apartheid National Party because the people mattered more than the status did. Step aside ANC, you have fucked up enough, we're taking charge to fix it. Governance going forward should be open to anyone, for everyone and without encumbrance. You are South Africa, you matter, do something about it.

PSA

Punch a millennial in the face, keep the world strong.

May the Force be with you:

Recently I traveled around my hometown for a few days, my surreal grand tour through my youth. Things have changed over time, with indifferent feeling I meandered the town observing modern development and encroaching decay as I paid my respects to the OG buildings, businesses and hangouts no longer standing tall. It's a divide in time, that which I fondly remember and what there is now. I may return to the schools I attended, for loyalty and curiosity. I shall miss those restaurants, corner café, Irish pub and peculiar stores I frequented that are no more, they certainly will be missed. Many familiar faces are the ghostly reflections in passing. The familiar feeling remains, same sights, sounds and smells buried in accompany to my fondest memories. I often think my close circle of friends could podcast about our hometown reminisce, we'd laugh a lot and our listening audience would cancel us. With the themes of Middle Earth freshly resurfaced in mind I wonder why the comparison of art and life are indistinguishable. It comes with age, perhaps we only live four ages, perhaps I am hovering near the end my third age approaching the beginning of my fourth age. Who knows, there might podcast material when old friends meet over a pint to remember Tubthumping.

Once upon a time in a galaxy far, far away...

Finite Hours:

I like numbers, they are a foreign language to me but I like their representation rather than interpretation. Sometimes numbers get weird, we make them that way.
A New York minute, a million bucks, gone in sixty seconds. You have 80,000 hours in your career: 40 hours per week, 50 weeks per year, for 40 years. You can master any skill in 10000 hours: 10000 Hours is 416 Days and 16 Hours. Human lives generally last for 2 billion to 3 billion seconds; the universe is nearly 14 billion years old. But don't feel sad. Life is too short, vacations aren't as long as you remember and 1999 seemed like only yesterday. But you should feel sad. We spend six hours and 57 minutes per day online; On average that's nearly one third of each day. We spend one third of our lives sleeping, 6 - 8 hours each day, motorists in the city spend 136 hours (5.6 days) in rush hour per year. Office hours run 9 - 14 hours per day. Do some math and that's, on average 6 hours asleep, 6 hours online, 9 hours working, 2 hours sitting in traffic; adjusting for overlap 17 of 24 hours each day is wasted, two thirds of your life is dedicated to essential sleep and completing menial tasks with little to zero enjoyment. That being said here is my generic universal go for a walkabout pack filled with survivable stuff: A back pack, I have a CampMaster camper pack designed for day trips that serves my needs complete with high visibility rain cover, loads of straps and zippers and pockets and ultra comfy padding. A knife, rule #9 states don't go anywhere without a knife. The type of travel suggests the type of knife, sometimes I carry more than one of varying size. A good hack would be to carry a wetting stone should you need to sharpen the blade edge. A notebook of some kind, paper variety, with a pen. A length of rope, name one thing you're going to need you're stupid fucking rope for?
Your wallet, it's not the Apocalypse so keep your piss warm Bear Grylls stans you still need money. A cigarette lighter, it makes you look cool. A flashlight, I use a rechargeable model. This will get you around, and it doesn't matter where you go as long as you go. Explore the world around you without the need for gadgetry or technology to facilitate a virtual experience. I of the old guard fight the millennial age of cancel culture because I believe them, at least in attitude, to be wrong. The minds of the foolish are logged in, DM or chat botting right now. Advancement is a gradual embrace and eventual acceptance. We cannot rush through the immediate, that cancels enjoyment. The reality is nobody can cancel human nature, ever. Intolerance, racism, oppression and regular differences of opinion cannot be canceled. I disagree with religion but none of the gods have been canceled, I disagree with various opinions and practices of the people at Netflix, Facebook and Disney but I haven't started a crusade to cancel any on them. I learned tolerance, a lifelong skill. I voice my opinions that do offend people at times but I defend my opinions too. I have neither a Facebook profile, I did initially but changed my opinion on social media and closed my account. Nor do I have a Netflix or Disney+ account, for the same reason and I exercise no religion. The world still turns and everyone gets to enjoy their own piece of it. Go touch some grass.

Silence

An absence, removal, suspension or opposite. What remains when the noise passes, the sounds stop. Golden, awkward, uncomfortable and peaceful. We have canonized the quiet and exhausted our appreciation for it. We consider silence a universal force...

Silence can be exercised without the need for sound, unless you're reading aloud which changes any blog to podcast but that's another rabbit hole to stumble down another day. 

Silence of sleep

Silence of the grave

Silence of offline machines 

Silence of silence

Silence within silence 

Enjoy the sounds of silence. We don't appreciate silence enough. Here I sit, quietly, in another period of power outages courtesy of load shedding. The calm lets me listen to the surrounding environment while I wait for the computer to reload. I hear the background noises we ignore, they are interesting. My calming interrupted by the fuck awful text alert on a smart phone. The intrusions of junk technology. 

Do you know what it sounds like when technology dies?

Absolute silence.

Twist Ending Only Discovered in 2023

What if Covid-19 ended all life in 2020?

Who initiated the simulation?

When does it expire? (three years in at this point)

Where are the data transmissions going?

Ultimately, Why?

Ain’t Karma just a motherfucker: original post 04 06 2014

There is only one universal concept I believe to be true - universal balance. Call it what you will the concept remains this: the ideals of good and evil are kept in constant balance. We as people constantly shift this balance with action. Lets debunk a few things real quick: you cannot manipulate the universal balance for your own personal preference, there is no secret technique to do this so forget that shit. The balance does not conspire against you or anyone else, that’s just dumb. If religion is your thing then our personal beliefs are awkwardly structured around the universal law - let’s for all intents and purposes call it Karma. You, the cosmic being within the universe, can only do one thing and that is try keep the balance. Your life may be filled joy-joy feelings because you generally are a nice person but that does not make you exempt from bad shit happening to you so expect some somewhere. The severity of good and bad are in balance so try not to be super nice or super shitty because Karma is a bitch and levels us all from time to time. Now here’s how Karma does its thing: think Newton’s law of attraction where everything is equal and opposite. You are generally a nice person spreading nice with random acts of kindness, positive energy towards and thinking the world is bed of roses BUT you are being selective and as such trying to manipulate the system. Karma only gives you a certain amount of distance before the proverbial rug gets yanked. Bad things, as you see them, find their way into your happy little world and pleasantly pisses on your sunny day. Do you ever stop to think about it? 

Clearly the expression ‘bad things happen to good people’ is desperate words spoken because someone tried and failed at favourably shifting the balance. 

  

What in the world happened?

I had a normal day once, it was a Tuesday and it was horrible. Sometimes I stumble into the empty space between what came before and what is still to come. These tiny gaps nestle between the three universe of my being. My academic universe, my creative universe and my virtual universe. Each parallel and independent of the other, sometimes overlapping.
My academic universe is the daily struggle of reality we all fight to get by, being an adult sucks. This is where I spend most of my time.
My virtual universe is this conscript. The limited digital connection of my life to the digital world around me, a tool and nothing more. My means of connecting things and sharing them.
My creative universe. Beyond the limitations of the Multiverse. What you have seen of it I choose to reveal. The three are not in balance with each other, at odds for dominance and the reason for depression. We all want to play nice and get along but that's not how reality works. I would rather build magic blanket forts with my son and go on epic quests to eat pizza than waste what remains on my life working to pay bills and buy stuff because my knowledge base and skillset keeps the virtual world operating for thankless millennial muppets to watch tiktok videos and download apps. A modern age duality, it sucks. So, after some brief soul searching on YouTube I've discovered the pre millennium appreciation society. An informal community with a deep love of the analog era and a deep hate for the digital age in equals. To be fair my personal cut-off for when the millennial muppets took control is 2010, prior decades are fondly reminisced and while I cannot accurately point out patient zero ( as yet) the first decade of the millennium was a swan song to transition from analog to digital starting with selfies, hashtags, eating Tide pods and hating. The modern age is rotten with arrogance and stupidity that many are trying to abandon the lifestyle and return to analog years. My feelings are a simple hybrid. Technology is a tool not a basic  human right. Google and the wheel rank on the same level of usefulness. We don't need any social media, therein lies addiction and the fuel to rush everyone to impatiently accomplish nothing. Go out and experience life in the real world. Maybe there is potential to expand into hybrid living where communities can live a reduced technology lifestyle without the digital rubbish overwhelming us. Places where life is less balanced. I have imagined a hybrid living that is part modern in the use of  current technology and part the 1980s of my young; shared concept with others with whom I've discussed this concept, a technology current with a variety of decade mod preferences sounds ideal. Cosplay in each time where the community travels back in time for the most part but remains active in the modern age, it's still a fuzzy picture but you get the just of it. In my multiverse such things are possible, practical and preferable. 

Please remain calm, no need to panic the millennials

I wrote lyrics to a protest song to tune of Billy Joel's We didn't start the fire. Sadly the idiot technology on the "smartphone" I was using erased the content and failed to save. Fuck-fuckity-fuck-fuck-fuck.
I could have rewritten it but these failures of technology remind me to never settle. Millennial minds don't comprehend the nuts and bolts of the mechanics they hold in their hands. They know how to code it, know how to load it, know what app to run and which to download. The limited physical attributes of the device. Welcome to the dress rehearsal for the Apocalypse. I, at constant impasse with millennial everything am frequently drawn into the "back in my day" comparative narrative. It's true I was a brain dead teenager awkwardly navigating my way into the millennium but I top trump generation smartphone with a near perfect score. There is a slow burn horror film to behold when the power goes out, the wifi goes down and neither laptop nor mobile can retain battery charge. Millennials cannot survive. I recall such scenarios where all I needed to survive the pre social media age was a Nokia 5110. The unkillable phone with a battery that outlasted eternity, a screen practically bulletproof and no camera because we didn't need selfies. We were resilient, independent snot nose punks with attitude with no need for online activity, we prefer the real world. By the time I finished high school I held part time employment to pay for my spelunking. I bought my first shitty car, went binge drinking, began chain smoking, dabbled in recreational narcotics and mastered proper condom use. Unbelievable to many, I emerged shining like chrome forged from fire. I come from the age of trials and tribulations, learning through the hardship of experience. Nothing was easy but it was fun. Where is the virtual rebuttal?
Gollum.
Their meta ceases when the tech goes dark. Withdrawal is ugly when you offline; eventually wifi access will become a recognized human right. But I cannot change perception, I cannot influence free will, I definitely cannot change anyone's mind any more than those previous generations swore I had it easy and back in their day of hardship a degeneration punk like me couldn't cut it. Perhaps. Perhaps we were the past generation where the world made sense, perhaps the elders were correct about our inability to cut it. Perhaps we're the root cause of this millennial mess nobody wants to clean up. The world as we know it will inevitably end and what we need from it will cease. I don't think technology is the key to our survival. I think therefore I am. A.I. does not think and we trust it implicitly. I do not champion my work by campaigning for its popularity, let it stand the test of time is all I wish of it. While some comparisons may be drawn  between me and the millennial muppets I take solace in the definitive differences between. Remember this when next to change out a light bulb or repair a tyre puncture or simply clean out the lint filter in your washing machine; somewhere out there a millennial is watching a video on tiktok on how to do those exact same things. Try to remain calm, anxiety from digital withdrawal is streamline to a human rights charter amendment, maybe even a new age commandment no matter the adrenaline fueled frustration surging through every fibre of your being as those slumped forward shoulder precariously perch hands in pockets drive your frustration skyward to meet vacant glazed over eyes staring into nothing. Take a deep breath, recite the lyrics to be prepared from the Lion King and channel every bit of the force to refrain from smacking them upside the head their 4kUHD will resync to 8bit pixels black and white. I stand in opposition to the current millennial menacr, loyal to my opinions I'll continue to share, feelings need hurting - toughen the fuck up because nobody is going to slow walk you through your virtual existence.

Entrepreneurial Protest:

Protests remain an untapped market for aspiring entrepreneurs with an eye for violence and a sense for solid business returns. I've identified several areas within the protest model that offer profit potential and repeat sales in the current political atmosphere. Rocks and tyres at wholesale prices because every rioting mob needs a sufficient supply stones to pelt and tyres to ignite and barricade with. Let's go one level up; commerative merch, autographed posters and t shirt prints celebrating your rebellious event. Having discussed this matter it's good business to flog respective shirts of political motivation and an autographed poster of the event. Global franchise opportunities, conflict makes easy money, at the time of writing this post I witnessed a local protest outside the district magistrate courts, people protesting gender based violence demanding bail denied to the accused. They had posters, and t-shirts but no rocks or tyres. And while condoning or encouraging mob action is illegal I'd be comfortable providing at a profit the tools of a reasonable demonstration. Social unrest is not desirable and would be an unfortunate circumstance of malicious intent, my entrepreneurial enterprise disclaims to sell materials not intended for acts of violence or unrest; gardening rocks and refurbished tyres are legitimate if not coincidentally linked to scenes of unrest. I'm not supplying the fuel to burn the tyre barricades, that would be immoral and very illegal.

Another Universe

Somewhere in the Multiverse:
1. The MCU doesn't exist.
2. Elon Musk owns all social media, and it's awesome.
3. The WWE owns Disney, WrestleMania at Disneyland.
4. Cancel culture got canceled, common sense prevails.

It's a very, very, mad world:

We may not have commercial time travel or vacation destinations on planets beyond the stars but we have escapism because our reality is often terrible. When pushed for an answer to what is the most important invention gifted to humanity I say it's books. Each with immeasurable value and timeless importance. Literature style and language change may change over time and that passage of time remains documented between the pages of books. Our identity recorded for prosperity though lately it feels ignored, remember books save lives, so why are we not reading them?
Middle Earth may have the answer. I remain critical of film adaptations from literature because a great story will be stripped down to the key plot points and airbrushed with commercial sorcery to sell it to ignorant consumer markets. Filmmakers needn't buckle under the corporate pressure to push profits, I want to take an unexpected journey without corporate sponsorship or intentional product placement and despite the general limitations of the analog Era of film making current digital practices null the need for content redaction, quality storytelling in a cinema over DIY tiktok videos in my opinion. Let's shut it down, pack it in, go home to binge Netflix and gorge Uber eats where we can post temper tantrum rants online. Society boarded the express train to disaster and jammed the throttle full open, because like this is so like a video game tutorial I totally watched on tiktok with other users and we connected on a deep virtual level but not in the real world because that is so hard. Living in reality is hard?
Absolutely. It is downright brutal when you need responsibility to survive every damn day. Rising inflation, economic depreciation, long-term preparation all require your constant attention while the world around you runs squirrel mad in every direction. Shit breaks, gets sick, disappears and the unexpected all before you wipe the breakfast vommit deposit from your shoes courtesy of some random Muppet stumbling into you on the street. Reality is depressing but we continue chasing the madness of comfortable lifestyle in top billing consuming the planet resources like fat grubs waiting to pupate. I am grateful to have the 20/20 perspective of living in the third world and observing the first world. Everyone should spend time in third world shit hole countries trying to make them a better place. Impossible is democracy for dictatorship. I reside in an African country and can pity while passing judgment on those claiming global equality - you are idiots. Exploitation placed the device you're reading this from in the palm of your hand. People suffered the violation of their human rights so you can # things. Your like, share and subscribe means nothing to people suffering poverty, famine, warfare, oppression. I oppose needless technological progression, we simply don't need it. Science fiction illustrates we shall forever exploit, oppress, violate and fight against each other despite modern advancements. Peace is achieved when we come to our senses but peace remains fleeting. It remains in our nature to kill. So allow me to advocate: nothing matters. There is no rise for change, nobody wants to make the world better. Lie, cheat, steal, rape, murder, plunder and pillage our black weasely guts out. Accept the inalienable truth millennial society is utterly stupid and not worth saving. Continuing to fight the inevitable failure a small portion of the human race will keep shit together for as long as possible to steady the course of mankind without the techno crap dependence. Hopefully these posts remain for future historians to study and learn. Perhaps the third age of man has ended, perhaps we're destined for a dystopia future of Morloc and Eloy balance of life. Come what may we shall leave record telling of the events of a very, very mad world.

The forthcoming Apocalypse of South Africa:

Walking within my dream my father's father before him encountered me on my path. He spoke in revelation of the future.
"The rivers will flood the lands, engulf the earth, submerge the plants and drown the animals though you may never see these waters rise. Foolish leaders carelessly trade this land among foreign nations forcing the people to fight without uprising. Then comes the drought. Money will dry up and wither as  resources decline to exhaustion. Many go hunger as they cannot afford to buy food, many more perish in the bitter winters without electricity to light their homes or fuel to power the vehicles, appliances and generators. Famine turns to cannibalism, the people's hunger turns them on their foreign masters. The hunger will consume everyone. The people will not be prepared despite their preparation, the lies will blind their judgment and distract them."
He paused, looked at my sternly, "you are not to tell anyone of this future."

From the desk of the South African Ministry of Information:

Patient 42, Department X, Room 13. Standing in line, waiting on time, results might be worth it. This is the system anywhere in the world, rate the quality of service on the comfort of the chairs provided. A hard wooden bench creaking and groaning under the full weight of your butt suggests extended wait time. You can't rate the service, not as non existing as due process takes as long as it takes. Such institutions practice functional before efficient. Having spent many hours bench warming the afore mentioned practice needs a space on the wall between all the infographic charts filled with invaluable information so exclusive you cannot get it elsewhere, expect from the office of your local branch of the Ministry of Information. I sincerely hope such services are essential in the future as no experience captures the raw essence of being human among other humans without prejudice of titles, labels or definitions. Sitting on that furniture you meet other people, you discuss the present moment without the social media firewalls safeguarding your acronyms. At the time of writing this pop culture solicitation was professional therapy with online therapists pushing catch phrases. That isn't therapeutic, spend several hours waiting for assistance from a civil servant is a more productive session. The digital age fear reality, as it's not on your virtual profile. Reality is the even level where there's no exception, no special treatment and no one day rush. Immediately is not plausible, instantly is a word printed in the dictionary. Take a seat, wait to be seen to, file paperwork then return to waiting on those instruments of practical sitting. I'm grateful for the experience, I'm saddened it won't last, I'm glad the idiot millennial generation won't appreciate the value of the experience. The fake world versus real world stand-off of social consciousness consumes everything. Future dystopia without real interaction is bleak. A statement allegedly leaked from the department of internal affairs by an outgoing unnamed member. The department has submitted proposals for digital migration of all services stating, " people no longer need our help as they can help themselves using the Google."

In unrelated news select participants at a recent local municipal meeting were denied entry from the invitation only event cited by the organizers the event was at capacity. Factual evidence of this intentional deception was posted online illustrating capacity is a relative term as many more participants were observed entering the event after the capacity was reached. No members of the government have been available for comment as it's believed they're stuck in the venue at capacity. The presidency is considering a period of silent as recent statements during public address were paradoxically paradoxical oxymoron hyperbole. Silence is golden Mr President, get richer.