I did.
I can’t past the nifty results code here, though. Nope. Not and have it work.
This has been fun.
I’m thinking I’ll migrate the posts back to the old digs. The old digs pissed me off from time to time, but I could paste code there.
Functionality… I’m totally NOT the sort who fusses over functionality. I’m not. It shall not be me that whines over the lack of bells and whistles and the latest new thingamabob. I’m not like that.
But sometimes shit doesn’t work.
But… yeah. I did.
So I’m at the bakery and I’m doing things to dough. I’m not baking, because I’m not at all a baker. Bakers bake and I don’t do that. I do things to dough. There is a baker… he bakes the dough after I’ve done things to it. Whatever.
And Boopsie comes rolling through. He does that. It’s odd that he should do that — come rolling through the bakery — but it’s part of his charm.
“Oh… just kill me now, Somebody.”
Seems Boopsie is not having a good day.
“What ails you, Boopsie?” says I.
I say this because it is pretty much required. Not so much that it’s socially expected (and it is) but because Boopsie really will piss and moan until his complaints reach an intolerable crescendo that obliges someone to make just such an inquiry. Boopsie is like that (as are a shockingly large number of people) and I find it’s best to just avoid the unpleasantness and ask.
I don’t do it because I’m nice. That’s a vicious calumny. I’m not at all nice. I fake it fairly well, however.
“I hate men,” declares Boopsie.
Ah.
Men.
Being one of those, I can quite safely vouch for our less than enjoyable aspects. We have them. Saying “I hate men” isn’t entirely daft… it’s just overly petulant.
Really.
As a man, I can also vouch for our over-all cuddlyness and general charm. We can be sweet. We’re like dogs that way: cuddly, charming, can be sweet. You wouldn’t really want to be without us but we really will pee on the couch or chew up the slippers or otherwise provoke you into screaming “I hate men.”
Whatever.
Boopsie, you may recall, “needs” a boyfriend. He does. He said so just two weeks ago or so. Scroll down past the pretty pink orchid and see if I’m wrong. (I’m just not, you know.)
Boopsie, you may recall, satisfied this “need” for a boyfriend. He did. He did so by deciding that breathing and male were the only two pertinent qualifications for being a boyfriend.
Yeah.
And now Boopsie has had the occasion to “hate” men.
I’m going to say it now: Boopsie is quite mad. He’s nutty, bonkers, not right in the head. Tetched, loonie, quite possibly psycho also come to mind. Boopsie is in good company, I fear. Some days it seems to me that everyone is quite insane.
That does not at all auger well for me. No. But then I quite like men. They’re cuddly, charming, are really good at scratching certain itches… all around handy things. They also don’t puke as much as dogs do… as a general rule with copious exceptions.
“Boopsie,” says I. “This boyfriend of yours… is he still breathing, is he still male?”
“I should have specified that he not be an asshole,” Boopsie says.
“Well, decide where men who aren’t assholes are likely to be found and then go there,” says I.
“Just like that?”
“Just like that,” says I. “But really, Boopsie… consider adding literate to the job description. Consider adding a great many things you really do find to be required. You can’t just decide that a breathing male is adequate and then complain about how breathing males are inadequate. It’s cruel.”
“I’m cruel? Me?” shrieks Boopsie.
Oh yes.
Did you think you were going to escape having orchid pictures inflicted upon you?
No?
Well… that was clever of you.
In other news, my friend (one of them, anyway) came bouncing into the bakery recently. He did.
“Guess what, Feral. Guess, guess guess.”
“I couldn’t possibly,” says I. Nope. I really couldn’t, either.
Then the other shoe falls. Ker-thump.
“I got a boyfriend!”
Oh what fresh gay hell is this, now? That’s what I’m thinking. It’s not at all what I said (not that I’m not prone to yelling just that at the top of my lungs because I am) but it is what I thought. “How special,” says I.
“It is, you know,” the friend says in all seriousness.
Now… this would be the self-same friend who ejaculated that he needed a boyfriend not that long ago… the one who seemed oblivious to the notion that one might (just might) have to actually do something to make that happen.
“Usually boyfriend shopping takes somewhat longer,” says I. “All serious shopping takes somewhat longer. Deciding on a pair of shoes takes longer, fer fuck’s sake.”
“I just did what you said to do,” says he. “It worked, too.”
“Oh… I know it works. My not-at-all-patented formula for boyfriend hunting most assuredly works. I’m just wondering… that part about Step 1… the part where you decide with some specificity what it is you want… you didn’t by any chance stop at ‘breathing,’ did you?”
He cocks his head. “And male. Breathing and male.”
So… on Thursday, the day after Groundhog Day… if you by any chance heard a monumental sigh… that was me. I might be wrong on this point (I very often am), but I do suspect that sigh went ’round the globe twice.
Yeah.
Note to the masses: “breathing” just isn’t a sufficient resume for a boyfriend. Certainly it helps… not-breathing is very counterproductive. It’s just not enough, though. It’s just not. It will lead to all manner of difficulties down the road. This “anyone will do” thing… that requires monumental effort to make it work.
Monuments… they tend to be large. Really large. Hence, “monumental.”
Yeah.
I’m not from here. I get that. I’m not especially “from” anywhere. That would be an experience I lack… something that sets me apart, ever so trivially, from others. Of course, while trivial, it also leads people to conclude that I’m sociopathic — something which I’m pretty sure is just not true.
It’s not so much the “not being from here” that irks people; it’s the “not being from anywhere.” Or perhaps it’s really my own puzzlement at the whole “being from somewhere” thing. I mean… for me… it’s just not normal, natural, or even especially desirable to “be from somewhere.” I don’t have a hometown and I don’t understand people who do have one… but whatever.
There is ice. Not so much ice. I’d be more comfortable describing the ice in terms of millimeters rather than in fractions of an inch. We’ll call it “two” … not that I’ve measured. Suffice it to say that it’s just not impressive ice. I’d not have expected any local response to the ice. I certainly had no response… other than to photograph it.
When you photograph the ice here about it has the tendency to look the same as every other time you’ve photographed it. I did that, you know. It’s true: root around in the archives and you’ll find a sparkly orange be-dazzlement of light flashing off of ice. Yup. On the very same tree. That ice was substantially thicker than this. This ice… it’s more of a glaze than a coating.
It’s gone now, by the way. I took that photo many hours ago, back when it was still dark. Not that it’s not dark now, because it is. The photo just wasn’t taken during this particular fit of darkness and couldn’t be taken now… not and have any ice in the trees.
You’d think, however, that this transient glazing of ice was mentioned explicitly in some sacred text as a harbinger of the end of the word.
Oh yeah… folks went a trifle nuts.
They’re bread and milk freaks here. I just don’t get that. I toddled off to the local marketeria to get some coffee on account of I was unacceptably low on coffee and (being quite addicted to coffee) this just cannot stand. It had nothing whatsoever to do with the ice. The ice was entirely coincidental (and substantially not in evidence as I traipsed off to the marketeria).
Note that “marketeria” just isn’t a real word. It’s one of my more annoying affectations. You’ll live through it, I trust.
There wasn’t any bread at the marketeria. Lots of empty bread shelves, but no bread. Ditto with the milk cooler: it had been divested of anything resembling contamination by milk or milk products.
Yes, Sweeties: the local freaks bought up the cream as well as the milk.
I have jokingly speculated that there is some sort of secret ritual involving the consumption of mass quantities of french toast. Otherwise, what the fuck are they doing with all that bread and milk? Surely they have bread and milk locked away in their kitchens left over from the recent snow. I mean… it’s totally not like they didn’t descend on all places bready like locusts because they did.
I just don’t get it. I’ve lived here for over twenty years and I just can’t get used to the phenomenon of the vanishing bread and milk. Nor can I get over the locals’ very peculiar relationship to all things frozen.
They carry on here. They do. They carry on as if they were residents of Fiji and all this freakish ice came out of nowhere to… well… end life as they know it. They carry on as if this sort of thing didn’t happen last year, or the year before, or the year before that.
This sort of thing has, after all, been going on for the full three centuries of this quaint little burg’s existence. It has. I’m not kidding there.
And it’s not like this region has recently experienced some massive influx of immigrants from someplace tropical. Oh no. These people grew up with annual deposits of frozen matter just as their parents and grandparents did.
I asked, I did, of one of the older residents about the milk. I was wondering if the psychotic bread and milk thing happened back before there were cars. Did Grandpa have to hitch up the horse to the old buggy to hoard bread and milk at the first hint of impending snow?
Grandpa did not, as it happens, hitch up the horse. Grandpa walked to get the bread and milk.
Huh.
Anyway… Wee Orchid is unimpressed by the ice. Of course, it’s far more likely that Wee Orchid is unaware of the ice.
The Selaginella is doing nicely, as well. I’m quite surprised by that. My own response to such weather is to closet myself away with orchids and Selaginellas (and towering bananas) and ignore the whole thing. Certainly I have to minimize my interaction with the bread and milk locusts. They can’t drive their automobiles in snow or ice either.
That’s not quite the view from the Tree House. It’s not… not quite. The Tree House is a bit higher than that. OK… it’s more than a bit higher. I should not at all like to climb the distance between what you see here and what I see out my window.
Or would see out my window if looking out the window was more practical.
I would not have thought the wee orchid would be blooming this time of year. I’d have thought it would be… oh, I don’t know… somewhat later in the year. Still, there you have it.
The other window in the Tree House isn’t all that much more of a tenable situation. It’s just not.
Of course, having to peer around a banana really is my idea of looking at snow.
Not that that kept me from scurrying outside to take that first picture.
How do you interview someone on homosexuality?
By asking them questions.
Which questions would depend on just what it is you want to know. That’s how it works, you see: you want to know the answer to a question so you ask it.
Now, there really is a trick to this. There is. See… Gay folks have been asked the same freaking stupid questions over and over and over for decades now. Those questions tend to be annoying in the extreme… partly because of the repetition but mostly because of the shear stupidity of many of these questions. Some of them are shockingly offensive. Whatever. I did, however, say there was a trick to it. There is one: don’t bother.
So far as I can see, the only rational reason why people would ask the same stupid questions over and over and over again for decades is they aren’t listening to the answers. If you don’t plan on listening to the answer to a question, there’s little point in asking it. So don’t. That would be how you interview someone on homosexuality… leave them in peace and quiet.
Now, were you to plan on actually listening to the answers, then just go ahead and ask the questions.
How can you be gay and republican?
It’s fairly easy. There’s this peculiar myth flouncing about that the Democrats are some sort of Gift To The Gay People. It’s just not true. I know more viciously homophobic Democrats than I do Republicans. That may well be due to some insane sampling error so don’t take that to heart. Still, I know more Republicans than I know Democrats (Republicans are quite common hereabout) and yet I know more viciously homophobic Democrats than I do Republicans.
The problem here seems to be something I call “Europe-envy.” It seems to me that Democrats wish the US were something resembling a European state. Thing of it is, the US was founded in explicit contradiction to the concept of the European state as it existed at the time and remains so to this day. The US is not a state; it is 50 of them. “State” does not mean “province.” The Democrats seem to me to be of the view that the two words are synonyms… which does not at all reflect well on them because the two words aren’t at all synonymous. Some people care a very great deal about the distinction there. Don’t worry about it too dreadfully much: wars have been fought over far more trivial issues.
Why are there so many gays in (Place X)?
Chances are, there aren’t so many Gays… chances are you’re just a nasty homophobe and any Gays at all counts as “so many.”
In the redacted place in question, the number of Gays is one tenth of a percent above the national average. I mean… really… that’s not so awful many. This one-tenth of a percent bump almost certainly represents a very casual migration from the rural hinterland of said place. The countryside does not lend itself to gaiety. Many quite urban areas also fail to lend themselves to gaiety and so these areas also suffer from emigration to other places.
The Williams Institute crunched all those numbers some years ago.
I suppose things may have changed since then, though I doubt it. Generally speaking, an absence of Gays correlates to overall unpleasantness. If Place X really does have more than 4.1% Gays, Lesbians, and Bisexuals, then it’s probably a pleasant place to live. That’s been studied (though I feel no interest in looking up the citation). When I say “pleasant place to live” I do not mean “lends itself to gaiety.” I don’t. I mean it’s a pleasant place… for just everyone. Now, such places do lend themselves to gaiety. They do. You’ve heard that peculiar rumor, right? The one that alleges that Gays have demanding standards and exquisite taste? Sure. Whatever.
Now, the creepy question one should be asking is “Why aren’t there any Gays in (Place X)? Oh yeah. Places without Gays are quite dreadful hell-holes. That would be why the presumptively natural incidence of 4.1% has eroded: what with all those demanding standards and exquisite taste, Gay folks tend to pack their bags and head for somewhat more glittery, rainbow-enhanced places. Yup… no Gays is like not being able to hear birds. Have you ever been somewhere where there were no birds?
Creepy.
Yeah. First up is the teenager.
“How do I keep my teenager (a boy) from going through socks so quickly? He’s awfully hard on socks.”
Ouch.
Mind you, this is known: teen-aged boys have what might be termed “stink-foot.” It’s true so don’t bother denying it.
“Oh… not my teenager.” I hear that shit quite often. I do. Sure. And then I generally get around to fielding some variant on the stockings issue. Though… it’s not usually so grisly.
Keep them from going through socks?
Seriously?
Deep breath. (It’s just Feral going not-so-quietly-crazy over here.)
I went to the grocery store the other day. I do that. That’s because that’s where we keep the food and… I’m prone to eating from time to time. Silly habit, I know, but it keeps me alive. Whatever. They sell socks there. While that might seem odd (I mean… food… socks… they don’t seem all that natural a conjunction) I’d expect to be able to buy socks at a grocery store. Funny thing… I can. Imagine.
They cost $5.96. I suppose in the Philippines that’s a large sum. I’m told it’s almost a day’s wages. That’s another issue altogether. The teenager with his stink-foot who goes through socks lives here. The $5.96… that gets you six pairs, not just one. Nope.
At that price, you can pretty much call the socks disposable. Let the kid wear a pair, then throw that nasty thing away the next day. Use tongs… I’d not advise touching them because I have no idea why the used socks of stink-foot teenagers can be leaned against a wall. I’ve seen it: that is totally not one of my flights of hyperbole. Nope. Teenagers do evil things to socks… things that belong in a science-fiction horror movie like “Aliens.”
Cue the inevitable quotations:
“Looks like some kind of secreted resin.”
“Nobody touch nothin’!”
Yeah.
I mean… there is no need whatsoever to worry about something that costs one dollar. Really. Teenagers are expensive but their socks aren’t part of that equation. Use tongs if you must, but launder the socks with some regularity. From time to time, remind yourself that you really can afford to just buy brand new ones each day… they’re at the grocery store.
If you’re fussing over something so trivial, you shouldn’t have kids. Fixations on such trivialities lead me to believe just vile and uncharitable thoughts. Perhaps you see your child as some sort of intolerable burden.
Yeah. Knock that shit right the fuck of and buy some freaking socks.
Be advised that I’m pretty sure that grocery stores are not the most economical source of socks. Nope. I suspect the socks at grocery stores may just be a tad over-priced. I suspect you can get far more than six pairs of socks for $5.96 if you shop around.
“I need a boyfriend.”
Really? That’s not good. I mean… it strikes me as a symptom of something. See a doctor, preferably a psychiatrist. They may have a pill for that.
I’m more than half serious here. Boyfriends are the cause of all manner of drama and some small amount of tribulation. Boyfriends are not at all the solution to any problem I can conjure a mental image of. Really.
Now, that may be due to a lack of imagination on my part. I doubt that, but it’s remotely possible. So let’s just discard that bit of advice (no one takes it anyway) and move forward.
“Where have you been looking?” ask I.
“Looking?” parrots my woeful interlocutor. “What do you mean, looking?”
I think we’ve found the problem.
Boyfriends do not spontaneously materialize. They just don’t. My friend has not been looking at all… not anywhere. Yet, he thinks he “needs” a boyfriend.
So I rattle through Feral’s not-at-all-patented four-step process:
All four steps are equally important, though I find people do the most slouching with Step 1 and Step 3. I’ve yet to meet anyone who even tried to do a fair effort at Step 4, but that’s a bit of a double-bind. I mean… if you are inherently a dishonest and manipulative cretin, who am I to argue about all the false behaviors people immediately trot out when they’re boyfriend hunting? Yeah… whatever.
Nope… you really do have to go looking for one. You really do have to look in a reasonable place. You just plain have to know what it is you’re looking for in the first place.
As for that last bit… if you can’t just be yourself then I don’t know what help there is for you.
Of course, the bit of psychiatry I recommend right of the bat still applies. I mean… “need” is a foul word. You need?
Just ouch.
That’s a favorite around the tree house… it is. Especially poor Basil. Of course, Susan has her fans, but being assaulted by bears… that’s just tops. All the nieces have this in book form. Indeed, all the wee critters of my acquaintance have it.
Huh.
Do I have to say that I am NOT responsible for this state of affairs?
Fine.
I’m totally not responsible for this state of affairs. It just happens that, entirely by coincidence (really), all of my sibs and minions share my taste in children’s literature.
Titus flying into bits is a huge hit amongst the wee ones. They have no taste. Basil… totes.
Anyway… ’round about now I’m supposed to be wishing everyone a happy new year. Imagine. I’ll not be doing so. (Surprised?) Here’s the thing (read this ever so carefully): Wishes don’t make things happen.
Got that?
I mean… you folks do realize that if my wishes were of any material significance whatsoever that a really very large, metallic asteroid would have struck the planet years ago. It would… had wishing been able to make it so. Then there’s all the really quite dismal plagues and other devastations.
Nope… I think I’ve pretty much demonstrated that wishing is somewhat less effective than a tinker’s damn… not that there are all that many tinkers about, or that they’ve been damning anyone lately… whatever.
If you’ll strain your brain, you may recall that I had mentioned (more than just in passing) that I had purchased some swords. Yeah. I did. Now, that was Thing Five of a great many Things in the Omnibus Post of Doom: one of my more word-intensive rants. Whatever. I totally get that more than a few people completely phase me out when I go on a tear. That’s fine.
But… I did say.
Some people, I am told, do not care for swords. Huh. There are, they say, people with no fondness whatsoever for sharpened bits of cutlery of any sort. “The hell,” you say. Yup. I’ve been told this is so. Incomprehensible, I know (to be sure), but these creatures not only exist, I’m told they’re quite common.
Well.
Should you be one of these creatures, do run off and play with whatever it is that could possibly be more entertaining than a sword. Don’t trouble yourself further.
So then… the swords. This escapade was not without some trifling bit of drama. No. As dramatics go, it wasn’t all that. Still, it seems untoward to say the escapade merely induced a little anxiety because… no, Sweeties… it was full-fledged drama, just not fledged with outlandish plumage. Nope: it was drab, sparrow-like drama, but drama nonetheless.
I am an old-fashioned sort. I like the Internet just fine… I do. I just don’t let it play with my money. I prefer my money to be played with by what are now considered antiquated institutions. The Internet is, I find, a most excellent shopping aid. Oh yes. Most excellent. It advertises, but in reverse. I quite dislike (yea… even hate and loathe) advertisements of the usual sort: some beastly and synthetic imitation of a somebody extolling the virtues of this, that, or some other thing that I couldn’t possibly want (not even a little bit). The reverse sort, where I root around and find merchants perfectly willing to indulge one of my flights of fancy in exchange for currency, that I like. I mean… it’s not like I don’t want stuff. I do want stuff. I’m what some people call a tad psychotic about wanting stuff on occasion. Finding it, then getting it is what I call a good day.
But we’re going to be communicating by mail, this merchant and I. Yah. “Snail mail,” I think they call it these days. Rumor has it that communications via Internet are covered under wire fraud laws. Huh. I don’t know anything about that. The mail fraud laws, on the other hand… those are old, and there are institutions set up to prosecute those who use the US postal system for fraud. Seriously… show me a merchant who will not use the US Postal service and I’ll show you a merchant that I immediately suspect of engaging in fraud. I really, especially dislike being defrauded.
We’re also going to be using the banking institution of my choice, more often than not, this merchant and I. It works like this: I write out a cheque, the merchant deposits the cheque, our respective bankers fuss over the details. Then I get my stuff. I surely would not expect to get my stuff before the merchant gets his money. It’d be nice if the exchange could be simultaneous, but I haven’t come upon a way to do that yet. Don’t take cheques? Some merchants don’t take cheques. That troubles me… it does. It reflects a fundamental distrust in the very foundation of modern commerce. Not that I’d not understand because I would understand. Oh yes… I know lots of folks who have a well-founded distrust of all kinds of underpinnings of civilization as we know it. I can do money orders. First choice would be Postal money orders and second choice would be Western Union. Why not? That particular institution might even be considered medieval. What’s not to like? But I just don’t do business with merchants who only take credit cards.
I mean… seriously… Henry VIII might be borrowing money from bankers to buy swords (I think he may have done more than occasionally) but that’s just not a reason to borrow money in my book. Not going to do it. Period. Money is illusory enough, and bank cheques are pushing the illusion a bit far but not so far that I can’t grasp it. Credit cards: those are as evil as coupons and for the same reason: it’s unregulated counterfeit money. It’s bad for the economy. I stick with “real” money… not that money is “real” at all. Whatever.
In addition to sharply limiting my shopping options (though avoiding people I believe to be fraudsters and scam artists at best is hardly an unwelcome limitation), my admittedly quirky approach to shopping is also uncomfortably slow. I get that.
It took a hair under a week for my mailed missive to reach my merchant. I expected that: the USPS was mediocre prior to 2001 and quite promptly after 11 September became nearly intolerable in that way that some drunken, dotty old uncle is nearly intolerable at family gatherings: this is to say completely intolerable, but technically minimally tolerable because you’ve gone and tolerated the intolerable because you’re fond of the old coot. Whatever.
It took my merchant a full week to decide I had, in fact, sent him the equivalent of US currency and not some piece of paper that resembled such a thing. Fine: it took my own bank one day longer to notice the same thing.
So that’s two weeks. I can live with that. Normally, UPS takes 3 or 4 days (with the grave caveat that Saturday and Sunday are not, by any stretch of the imagination, to be considered “days”). Yeah. Normally.
They didn’t. No. They took eight. Now… that’s way beyond my endurance. Four days is fine, but eight is not fine. No.
I had, in fact, spent a most surly day at the bake-shop mentally composing the really very stern (edited down repeatedly through the stages of threatening, obscene, hostile, and harsh) missive I was going to send my chosen merchant regarding this escapade.
However… upon my arrival home to scurry off to do just that, I could not help but lay eyes on my much expected package propped up where I could not possibly miss it. The spousal-unit did that. He’s sweet that way. It was still freezing cold from sitting for… oh… eight freaking days… in one or another conveyance of UPS.
I mean… eight days is reasonable if the package comes from California and has to cross an entire continent and two mountain ranges… not to mention a more than slightly impressive river that, last I heard, was missing one or possibly more slightly vital bridges. (We’re ignoring the fact that UPS owns airplanes because… oh yes, Sweeties… airplanes can circle the freaking planet in eight days so surely it was trucked.)
I had ordered something from South Carolina, after all… not California. I’m still more than half boycotting California. South Carolina… that’s totally just three days… maybe only two. Seriously.
Then I look at the package: It came, in fact, from California. Whatever. Eight days is not satisfactory but it will do, since my package did travel much, much further than I had anticipated. After all… I have my package. Not, mind you, that I did not promptly scour the Internet for evidence that this unexpected third party had, to even a trivial degree, supported California’s Proposition 8. I’d have sent the package back, in that case, swords or no swords. The verdict came back “not guilty” so all is well and I have swords and am well pleased.
That would be this sword on the top and this other one on the bottom. For their price, they aren’t bad at all. Nope.
The wakizashi, at least, does differ from the manufacturer’s description in one respect: it most assuredly does not have two pegs, one bamboo and the other brass. It has but one peg, a brass one. That’s fine. I think the two-peg thing is silly.
The hamon (which is what I was properly buying) is right nice. This is the shorter sword. The katana has a nicer hamon, but… the Kaze Katana has been reviewed more than occasionally on the Internet… and excessively harshly. There just aren’t that many pictures of the Kaze wakizashi out there, though.
I’ll grant, the ito does bear a striking resemblance to shoelace. It may even be shoelace. The problem isn’t so much that it’s not silk… it’s the weave. I can live with that, though. I can. I’m even going to get to handle these swords with what might just pass for wild abandon without fussing over whether I’m going to get the ito dirty or not. Besides… I get to spend many months, maybe even years, plotting on just what I’m going to re-wrap them with. The options for shopping are… just dazzling.
While others have found less than pleasant scuffs and scratches on their new blades, I have not. The polish… well, let’s just say that a proper polish on a katana costs $800 (it does) and I totally did not spend that much on the pair of them. I’d not have expected more. I am, however, quite likely to improve matters. The hamon will be much better for it.
The only real issues are the tsuba on the katana is loose and both the tsuba and the fuchi are loose on the wakizashi. That can be dealt with, however.
But there’s this word: yokote. In theory, that would be a transverse line on the blade just short of the tip, the angle where the plane of the tip meets the plane of the blade. I say “in theory” because these blades have no such angle. Nope. That’s just scratchiness on the tip… scratchiness that just cries out for polishing out. That being done, there won’t be a line there at all. That would be because these blades don’t have yokote, they’ve just been made up to look like they do. And we’re not talking drag queen make up here. No. Maybe Halloween costume make up. Sure. Folks have called this a “fake” yokote and that’s just way too charitable by far. This isn’t fake… it’s an imitation of fake. Fakery suggests a counterfeit, a more than passable attempt to approximate the real thing. This is… those steel-brushed stenciled hamon-like designs they used to (and, regrettably, still do) put on nasty-ass stainless steel thingies.
I can understand not having a yokote. A sword is allowed to not have one. Soon enough, these swords will look like they don’t have one rather than looking….
They just look scratched up this way. This is misplaced effort. They should stop doing that.
Not, mind you, that I don’t like my swords. Oh no. I’ve been far too busy cooing over them for that. I mean… I got them on Wednesday afternoon and here it is Sunday morning.
There remains, however, this issue of drop-shipping. I do not approve. When a merchant says “I have this thing,” I quite expect that to be literally true. This is not at all the same thing as saying “I expect to be able to procure this thing.” No. I don’t need mysterious third parties in my meager business relationships. I can just go to the third party and give him my money directly. If I’m going to pay a middleman (and I surely do not begrudge middlemen their pay), I quite expect that he will have actually done something. Phoning my snail mail order in to California does not count as “something” in my book. No. I mean… $50 for a phone call? Seriously? I’ll not be paying that again.
So then… as a reward for your patience, have a picture of a fat kitty.
Look… no swords of any sort. Just an 11 kilogram kitty.
I trip over bizarre interview requests quite often. They’re bizarre because they just don’t have any questions in them. That’s… well it’s a funny way to run an interview. This one had questions. Imagine that.
And here I pretty much habitually answer questions. Isn’t that convenient? Whatever.
1. When did you turn gay?
I did not ‘turn’ Gay.
2. Were you born gay?
Why, yes. Yes I was.
3. Should gay people be accepted?
The short answer is ‘yes.’ The real question is ‘can gay people be accepted?’ You can’t have an answer from me on that one. You need to go ask some straight folks about that. For what it’s worth, in the aggregate, I just don’t see too much evidence that the answer to the real question is ‘yes.’ There are some bits of primatological evidence worthy of inspiring a bit of hope. There are. But Sweetie… if you need to delve into primatology for what ought to be a sociological question, you have a very, very big problem.
4. Were you abused as a child?
It depends on how you define ‘abuse.’ Really. Sexually abused? No. Physically abused? I happen to share that distinction with approximately 33% of my male peers and 26% of all my peers. Physical abuse is disgustingly common. Dead serious: look at a male, any male, in the US: one in three chance he was physically abused as a minor. Not. Kidding. Emotionally abused? Well, yeah. I don’t want to even think about the statistics on that one. I witness serious emotional abuse of minors every single day, and that’s just in walking around.
5. Why are parents always the last people to know their kid is gay?
Are they? I don’t find that they are. I find that “I always knew” is the more common response. Now, if you’re fishing around for why they seem to be the last a Gay kid comes out to… kids seem to save the things they care about most for last. They also seem to save the things that frighten them the most for last. But no… if a parent or two are the last people to know their kid is Gay, they’re probably more than a little on the stupid side, more than a little self-indulgent and prone to substituting their own fantasy life for reality, and more than a little bit assholes. But that’s just my opinion (rooted firmly in experience). It’s nothing to take seriously.
6. Do you think you’ll ever regret being gay?
Regret it? Oh… never. Never ever. Seriously. If I had a choice in the matter, I’d choose Gay. I don’t, so I’ll settle for never regretting it.
7. Were you ever attracted to the opposite sex?
Nope. Does that surprise you? I’m Gay. I’m male. That means I’m attracted to males generally. Now… think about that just for one minute, Sweetie. Males. Show me a female who looks like a male and I might think her cute. This has happened twice. I’m what I consider to be old, so that’s not at all saying something for the cuteness of baby-dykes with cute haircuts. I find that members of the opposite sex have unsightly bulges in places there ought not be bulges (and when I say unsightly I mean shaved-dog’s-ass ugly). I also find they’re distressingly squishy. Squishy is not attractive. Nope. My immunity to the imagined charms of females ought not trouble anyone. I’m told (and I’m convinced it’s true) that many not-Gay people find the opposite sex to be just enchanting.
8. Maybe you haven’t found the “right person” of the opposite sex yet?
No… I’m quite convinced this imaginary “right person” just doesn’t exist. Besides… I found the right person of the same sex. The spousal-unit would be seriously put out by this entire line of questioning. Theoretically, however… were you to find some woman that had broad shoulders, pecs of doom, a washboard stomach, a monstrous penis, and thighs bigger than I am… a stature of 6’2” would be handy… I’d give that a whirl. Thing is… I’m pretty fucking sure I just described something more than a little on the male side (and something in the heavyweight class of college wrestling, to boot). I don’t think there really are all that many women with monstrous penises and pecs of doom. Call it a theory.
9. How do you know you’re gay if you haven’t had sex with anyone? (have you?!)
Here’s the thing: having sex is not at all the same thing as wanting sex. It’s just not. Knowing whether or not you are Gay is a simple matter of introspection. I suppose it’s possible you aren’t capable of introspection. There may be disorders that preclude introspection. Or not. I know plenty of really miserably virginal Gays. They’ve not had sex with anyone at all. They’re not at all happy with that state of affairs. They want to… does ‘hide the salami’ ring a bell? Yeah. Whatever. They want. It’s not a question of doing. It’s a question of wanting.
10. What’s it like to be gay?
Like a handbag full of rainbows, Sweetie.
Should that answer seem too flippant for you, then I’m afraid you’ll have to answer the question “What’s it like to be straight?” first.
