Tag: weird ideas

What Fresh Hell Will August Bring



by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

August is the worst month of the year, in large part because all the “powerful people” are out to lunch on vacation. So, as fate has it nearly every year, some huge breaking news happens while they’re sipping margaritas somewhere remote and secluded that forces them to pay attention again.

Slate has an article they re-publish every year about this very thing. They propose abolishing the month altogether it’s so bad.

Anyway, let’s think up some bonkers scenarios for August.

War
While Trump is obviously going to ultimately steal the election in an extremely brazen fashion, he’s such an insecure idiot — and self-own artist — that it would be very easy to see him go way out of his way to provoke a war with either the DPRK or Iran. The conventional wisdom is that as long as a war with the DPRK didn’t go nuclear, the whole thing could be wrapped up in about three months — which would place us at just about when Election Day happens. People would be humming Lee Greenwood’s “God Bless The USA” on their way to the polls and Trump breezes towards an easy (legitimate) victory. Iran is a lot trickier and less likely to be wrapped up in time. The DPRK is so crazy, of course, that they could very well engage in a limited nuclear exchange with the US which Trump might be blamed for and, well, that might help his re-election chances. There is the long shot chance that the United States and China might go at it, but that’s a pretty scary proposition.

World War III
In this scenario, it’s not just the United States and the DPRK or Iran who have at it, it’s the entire world. One way this might happen is the Russians, fearing Trump might somehow magically lose despite their best efforts to help him steal the election, decide to grab as much of Ukraine as they can while the going’s good. This destabilizes the world in general and some major hotspots flair up all at the same time. Several regional wars happening at the same time would be marketed as WWIII by the press. This is a very unlikely scenario — I mean, the Russians know they’re going to be successful hacking our election — so, lulz. But you never know. It is interesting, of course, to speculate on what the reaction among Americans would be to a general war between the Russians and the Ukrainians — would people even notice?

The Durham Investigation
Republicans have absolute bloodlust when it comes to the Durham Investigation into the origins of the TrumpRussia probe. They get all excited just thinking about it. What they want, of course, is a repeat of 2016 when there was an air of criminality surrounding Hillary Clinton for various reasons. While Durham is a good little thug and will likely wait until the weekend before the election to indict the entire Obama Administration including Biden, there’s a chance he might drop that particular turd in August to let it linger in the national consciousness for a few months.

The Second Great Depression Officially Starts
As you may know, the Republicans are dicks and simply refused to do anything about propping up the economy because, lulz, Trump’s going to indict Biden anyway, so fuck you. But there’s a chance, at least, that the economy, which has struggled the last few months (to say the least) will finally crater because of the lack of an extra $600 in the unemployed’s pockets, no $1,200 stimulus check and lack of eviction protection. It could be that by the end of August, the economy will finally be so bad that the mouthbreathing knuckle draggers of MAGA might, at last, sit up and take notice. If Trump’s approval rating begins to drift down towards 30-25% on a consistent basis, when the Russians hack our election systems as part of Trump’s quid pro quo with them (his part being removing 1/3 of our troops from Germany) the disparity between the polls and votes might be so dramatic that someone, somewhere might begin to ask questions. (This is, of course, a lulz, because fuck you, Bill Barr is going to make sure that’s not an issue and House Trump is able to consolidate power through a second term Constitutional Convention.)

Trump Finally Snaps
This, in a sense, is the absolute worst case scenario. But just as death be not proud, going bonkers be not proud. It’s not like when someone goes bonkers that they say, “Well, this is really going to hurt Republicans, so I’ll go bonkers now.” Nope. While, in general, I believe Trump will, in fact, inevitably go bonkers, it could be well into his stolen second term when it happens. But if this happened in August, just about the time he’s set to be formally nominated by the Republicans, it would be a political crisis of an unprecedented nature. The system is simply not designed for something that dramatic this late in the process. The issue about Trump going bonkers is at first we wouldn’t even notice it because he’s generally bonkers as it is. If he finally snapped, it would have to be REALLY BAD. So bad, so depraved, so offensive, that the entire country would grind to a halt while we figured out what to do. CNN would be giving us minute-by-minute updates as to what was going on. With this one, there’s simply no known endgame. It’s very possible that after about 24 hours of silence, Republicans would bounce to his defense, no matter what. They’re a death cult and they honestly would rather Trump nuke us all to hell than risk the abstract dangers of Communist progressive liberals attacking the sanctity of marriage. If Trump’s bonkers behavior go so absolutely bad at some point in August that Republicans simply, at last, had no defense of Trump other than “fuck you,” well, who knows what might happen.

Something REALLY Bad — And Unexpected — Happens
This would be something I simply can’t predict. Something so jaw-dropping that all the fucked up things that have happened so far in 2020 pale in comparison. I’m thinking things like either Trump or Biden grow gravely ill (physically) ill for some reason. The Senate Republicans finally figure out a way to knock Biden out of the race through their investigations of Hunter Biden or, I don’t know, COVID19 mutates and becomes far, far more deadly.

‘Believe’


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

While I continue to worry someone is going to cherry pick from my development on this Website, I simply don’t know how they would actually do it. I guess I’ve explained the general gist of the novel, but I’ve never explained what’s going on in detail.

I guess it’s still possible, however.

I’m more worried about someone stealing a march on me than anything else. I’m worried about someone simply doing something so close to what I’m working on that it makes my novel moot.

But I am learning a lot about how to write a novel, so even if either one of those things happens, I should be able to bounce back pretty quick and throw myself into a different novel.

Did Trump Kill Snark?



by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I’m reading the book “The Fourth Turning” for the novel I’m developing and I can see why people like Steve Bannon like it so much. But it has got me thinking just now about other cycles in culture, outside of the political.

We are definitely in something of a funk when it comes to edgy, provocative writing and art. It happened in the 2006-2008 era for some reason. We really haven’t had good snark (or pop rock) sense then. We don’t have any popular, yet edgy pop culture to consume these days. And the case could be made that the Trump administration’s lack of shame and self-awareness has killed irony and snark for all times.

I kept expecting some punk Millennial to pick up a guitar and start writing punk songs, but that has yet to happen. I now have to hope that “Zoomers” are going to do it — that they managed to punk Trump’s asshole campaign manager Brad Pascarle is a promising sign of a possible future.

And, yet, I almost think the very ideas of “irony” and “snark” no longer are applicable in this hyper connected world. Maybe there will be no Fourth Turning. Maybe it won’t come roaring back.

Maybe irony is dead. Maybe Trump killed it.

Wait, What? My Webstats, The Unredacted Mueller Report & Trump’s Taxes



by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Something weird is happening in my Webstats. When weird things happen there, I have absolutely no context. All I know that it’s happening. So, here’s the weird thing: twice in the last week or so, someone has randomly looked at some of my writing leading up to the Mueller Report.

I’ve given it some thought, and there are three options:

  1. Someone knows something about the unredacted report, given that a judge is looking at it right now
  2. Someone agrees with me that Mueller and Barr may have had a “gentlemen’s agreement” to wrap it up as quickly as possible for “the sake of the country.”
  3. Their interest in what I wrote isn’t about the Mueller Report, but Trump’s taxes.

My reasoning for the last one is this: if SCOTUS rules against Trump, it’s at least POSSIBLE that we could be in for a severe political crisis, so severe some pretty fucking surreal things could happen just a few months before the election.

I guess there’s a fourth possibility — someone knows something and they know that any crisis about the unredacted Mueller Report would be the first of Trump’s ill-gotten second term.

My Webstats Suggest Someone Is Developing a ‘Big Chill’ For The #COVID19 #Pandemic #Trump Era



by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I wish I had the resources to do it, it’s so obvious — a quickie, updated version of The Big Chill set in NYC during the current COVID19 Pandemic. The plot writes itself — a group of six 40th somethings (and one younger person) come together for a series of COVID19-related funerals and talk about the modern world.

Pretty much all you have to do is find a decent screenwriter and some high-end movie equipment and you have a movie. It could be super timely and it would give you the opportunity to explore — and maybe have some catharsis — about the current fucked up Trump Era.

I say someone is producing this movie because twice in the last few weeks someone has looked at a post I did two years ago suggesting such a movie. But now that funerals are starting up in NYC, well, it’s very easy to see an indie movie about what I’m proposing popping up.

You could do it really, really fast and maybe even get a well-known actor to be a producer and pay for the whole thing as well. You need six people. I tried to come up with a dream cast, only to realize if everyone (expect one person) is supposed to be in their 40s, you’d have to think about who would play which character and I’m not really into putting that much energy into this post.

Anyway, good luck people who are writing and producing the movie I thought up two years ago.




Things Are Going Well For (At The Moment) With The Novel



by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Well, things are moving fast with the novel right now. I hope to wrap up the outline no later than around the July 4th weekend. After that, I will start writing against in earnest.

I’m doing a huge amount of reading as well.

I probably have about 30 books to read and it’s unlikely I’ll read all of them, even if I read really fast. But I’m glad that I am, at last, doing what you’re supposed to do — if you’re writing, you’re reading.

There’s so much I don’t know about the process of actually getting a novel published. Maybe someone is going to “steal” my concept, or steal a march on me. That’s all very possible. But I know enough about how to tell a story now that after I stop sulking, should that happen, that I can use what I’ve learned to dive back into a new story pretty quick.

But I love, love, love this novel’s concept. I love the characters and I love the “big ideas” that it’s going to address.

I am still very nervous that someone is reading this blog with the hopes of “cherry-picking” what they can from it for their own, similar project. But, for me at least, what I’m doing on this blog is part of the developmental process of the project. You’re not supposed to be totally miserable when you create art, at least, not if you can help it.

DPRK, WTF?



by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Out of the blue, I’m hearing a lot of chatter about the DPRK doing something against ROK. What it could possibly be, I have no idea. In fact, it’s not so much them doing something at this point but WHY would they do something against their brothers to the south?

The Sister
Kim Yo-jong may, somehow, in an unexpected position of power. The DPRK is a blackbox, so the idea that Kim Jung-Un is actually secretly dead is not a weird as you might think.

Trump
It’s possible the DPRK can see what we all see — that Emperor Trump I is an invalid moron — and they may feel it’s now or never. If they don’t strike the ROK now and try to get some sort of border adjustment, it’s just never happening.

Covid19
Maybe things are a lot worse in the DPRK with Covid19 than we know and this is kind of a deathrattle freakout.

But there are some problems.

All of them involve the U-S-A.

Trump is just too both moronic and bonkers. If he felt he might be able to win re-election as part of a Rally Around The Flag war against the DPRK, he would likely go at it with great gusto.

And, then, well, things escalate and NYC, or LA are vaporized in a limited nuclear exchange between the two nations.

I just don’t see any of that happening.

It’s just another time where the DPRK wants some attention.

On The Nature Of Fate



by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

As a form of entertainment, I have begun to play the lottery little bit more than I used to. The likelihood that I will ever win has definitely not improved, but I do dwell a little bit more on what I might do with the money if I ever did win.

I find myself thinking about the events leading up to that day’s drawing, wondering if there is anything of note or out of the ordinary about them. Anything that might give me some sense that I might actually win.

I think that, in itself, pays the price of the ticket. All that dwelling on what I might do with a sudden huge amount of money is enough to keep me entertained for a little while.

Anyway, today has been rather dull.

Nothing out of the ordinary has happened.

Why I Play The Lottery (And You Shouldn’t)



by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I lead a very hum-drum life. Not much ever happens of note. I generally think playing the lottery — any lottery — is extremely obscene due to its regressive-tax nature.

And, yet, I find myself playing the lottery these days on occasion for no other reason than it gives my otherwise dull life a modicum of excitement caused by the feeling of you-just-never-know that comes from buying a lottery ticket.

I have, however, come to think the Mega Millions and Power Ball lotteries (the two I play on occasion) are fixed, fixed, fixed. They futz with the calculations of the drawings so the prizes get huge and, as such, draw attention to the game. I also think they focus on certain participating states like South Carolina for some reason. (It always seems to be someone from South Carolina who wins these lotteries.)

With that in mind, I often go to really strange places to buy lottery tickets simply because I hope maybe that will improve my luck (given that where I usually buy my tickets have not be successful to date.) I also am very aware of anything weird happening in my life in general. In the past, that was the only reason why I would play the lottery at all — if something bizarre happened around the time I bought one.

Whenever I play the lottery, the ticket pays for itself by all the daydreaming I do about what I would do if I won. These dreams can grow quite grandiose. I would move to NYC and become a bon viant. I would change people’s lives in a big, historical fashion.

Then I lose, yet again.

So, I think it’s safe to say that I’m wasting my money every time I play. Though, I will note that something I once was told about the lottery did happen recently — if you dream of a dead relative, play the lottery. I dreamed of my late mother over the weekend. I have no idea what that means. Though, I think the exact adage is if you dream of a dead relative “play your lottery numbers.”

Who knows.

Anyway. Don’t play the lottery. You won’t win.

The Worst Case Scenarios Of The #NBCUniversal Goons At The #DCProtest


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

There are two really, really bad worst-case-scenarios with the goons I saw with the NBCUniversal guy. (If that was, in fact, who he was with.)

1. He wasn’t with NBC Universal and it was all an undercover op on the part of the authorities to monitor who was at the protest.
2. He WAS with NBC Universal and NBC Universal is in on some sort of protest monitoring operation on the part of the authorities.

Ugh.

Both of of those make me sick to my stomach with their implications.

So very curious. (The two meatheads to the left of the guy in white were with him.)

Maybe NBC Universal just thinks their guys need added security at protests. That must be it, right?