Is that all it takes tomake myself an ass?

You know I love movies, especially weird movies, but I'm finished with modern-day horror movies. I saw one a few days ago (review written but not yet published), and it sickened me again, like almost all modern-day horror movies sicken me, so that'll be the last one for me.

Movies should have more sex, less violence, I say.

There's not much that's more dramatic than death, so if it helps a movie's story, movies should kill as many people as they need to kill. Kill them all. It's only fiction.

If you need to kill someone in a movie, though, do it. Get it over with.

Nothing's gained, dramatically, by killing someone in an imaginative, leisurely, or torturous fashion. Gouge his eyeballs out, crack his skull like an acorn, grab a handful of his brains and chew on them, then spit 'em out? He's just as dead as if you'd shot him through the heart, so for dramatic purposes, all that extra work is not naught.

Some moviemakers enjoy staging such vividly-detailed killings, and some audiences enjoy watching them, and by golly, make some Jiffy-Pop and have a marvelous time.

For me, though, that's not entertainment, so I'm going to skip all the ordinary modern-day horror movies, unless I can quickly spot some redeeming social value soaking in the blood and guts.

Is it terribly rude to clip your nails while riding the bus? That's all I was doing, minding my own fingernails clip clip clip, when I noticed that the driver was scowling at me in the rear-view, like she thought I was disgusting.

Everybody has to clip their nails somewhere. Might as well do it someplace where I don't have to sweep up afterwards. That's what I was thinking, like me and the driver were having an argument, but neither of us said anything.

She turned her eyes to the road and I resumed clipping, but at the next traffic light she seemed to be glaring at me again, and her eyes said I was an ass.

Is that all it takes to make myself an ass? Clipping my damned nails?

Look, there was nobody sitting in the seats in front of me, so my clippings weren't popping into anyone's hairdo or groceries. And unlike about a third of the passengers on any bus, I'd paid my fare. I wasn't drunk or high. Pretty sure I didn't stink as much as the guy across the aisle.

Clip, clip.

A friend sent a link to this article from a few years ago, by Gloria Diaz. She wrote a zine I liked, called Angry Young Woman, and in the article she writes about how she got into zines and why, and what it was like. Not just the bright, sunny parts, but the dark bits too — she was inspired to zining by Jim Goad, who later turned himself into a monster, but that's another story.

(If you click the link above, scroll down; the article is below the PDF links.)

Most of the zines I read in the 1990s are a blur to me, but Angry Young Woman is one I remember, because it was a living thing. It was the essence of Gloria, I think — smart, fun to read, and funny.

Too many of the few zinesters from back then no longer write, or if they're writing I don't know where. Gloria has a fine blog, Edge of Gloria, but it's been dormant so long it was listed as emeritus, at the bottom of my sidebar.

Reading her article made me click her blog again and, happy surprise, she's posted something recently. That's the best news of the week. She's alive and presumably well, and writing, so I am delighted to move her link from 'emeritus' to 'blogs and zines'.

And now, the news you need, whether you know it or not…

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Biden mistakenly asks if deceased congresswoman is in audience

Well, Rep Jackie Walorski was a MAGA monstrosity who tried to decertify Biden's 2020 election. I like to think Biden was trolling her corpse.

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The CIA wants to bring back the woolly mammoth

I guess some of us didn't learn anything from Jurassic Park.

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Red states sue to block Biden student loan forgiveness plan

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1,000 deaths in custody went unreported last year because US Justice system doesn’t care about the people it jails

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Company asked employees to bring family, pets to office to work through Hurricane Ian

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Drag performer sues far-right blogger for defamation over edited video

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Campaign ad targets Republican's insane fundamentalist Christian beliefs

I can't recall ever seeing an ad that bluntly called out a gubernatorial candidate for faith-based sexism and homophobia, evolution denial and promotion of Creationism, and David Barton-esque historical revisionism.

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Ray Bradbury asks:

"What would you do if you knew this was the last night of the world?"

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What can't the internet handle in 2022? Apostrophes.

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Just Enough Room Island

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Crash at Crush, Texas

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One-word newscast, because it's the same news every time...

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