This post was originally offered early in 2012 when I first started blogging for everyuselessthing. This list of questions I answered back then were an attempt by me to introduce myself to new readers. To see the original answers will require that you to search through my archives but the answers will be much the same now as they were then.
I want my readers to understand me. It’s the wish of almost every other human being on the planet that someone “gets us”. I’m going to list one hundred really stupid and simple questions and then post my answers. If you read them all and then bundle them into one huge ball of useless information, you just might have a better understanding of me. It may work or it may not but you’ll never know until you give it a try. To test it further ask a friend, lover, or family member to answer them. You might be surprised to find out they’re not exactly the person you thought. Here we go.
1. Do you sleep with your closet doors open or closed? Open.
2. Do you take the shampoos and conditioner bottles from hotel? Yes.
3:Do you sleep with your sheets tucked in or out?Tucked out.
4:Have you ever stolen a street sign? Yes
5:Do you like to use post-it notes? Yes
6:Do you cut out coupons but then never use them? No, I hate coupons.
7:Would you rather be attacked by a big bear or a swarm of a bees? Bees, at least I’d survive.
8:Do you have freckles? A few scattered here and there.
9:Do you always smile for pictures? No, I hate being photographed.
10:What is your biggest pet peeve? People who talk-over me while in conversation.
11:Do you ever count your steps when you walk? Almost always.
12:Have you ever peed in the woods? Yes, it’s the best.
13:What about pooped in the woods? I have but it’s unpleasant.
14:Do you ever dance even if there’s no music playing? Only when I’m alone.
15:Do you chew your pens and pencils? Only pencils.
16:How many people have you slept with this week? Does my cat count? If she does then “2”.
17:What size is your bed? Queen.
18:What is your Song of the week? Marvin Gaye – Charlie Puth
19:Is it okay for guys to wear pink? Yes.
20:Do you still watch cartoons? Almost never.
21:What’s your least favorite movie? Anything with Will Ferrell in it.
22:Where would you bury hidden treasure if you had some? None of your business. It’s called ‘hidden treasure’ for a reason.
23:What do you drink with dinner? Seltzer Water or wine.
24:What do you dip a chicken nugget in? Ketchup.
25:What is your favorite food? Hamburgers.
26:What movies could you watch over and over and still love? Anything prior to 1950.
27:Last person you kissed/kissed you? My better-half.
28:Were you ever a boy/girl scout? Yes.
29:Would you ever strip or pose nude in a magazine? No, it might scare people.
30:When was the last time you wrote a letter to someone on paper? 1990.
31:Can you change the oil on a car? Yes.
32:Ever gotten a speeding ticket? Oh yeah.
33:Ever ran out of gas? Once in 1975.
34:Favorite kind of sandwich? BLT, with lots of B.
35:Best thing to eat for breakfast? Bacon, eggs, toast, and coffee.
36:What is your usual bedtime? 11 PM.
37:Are you lazy? No.
38:When you were a kid, what did you dress up as for Halloween? At 45, I was Woody Allen.
39. Who is your favorite dead singer? Amy Winehouse
Loved Her
40:How many languages can you speak? 1.5
41:Do you have any magazine subscriptions? Yes, one.
42:Which are better Legos or Lincoln logs? Legos.
43:Are you stubborn?Yes.
44:Who is better…Leno or Letterman? Johnny Carson.
45:Ever watch soap operas? I used to.
46:Are you afraid of heights? Not really, no.
47:Do you sing in the car? Sometimes.
48:Do you sing in the shower? No.
49: Do you sleep clothed or naked? Naked.
50:Ever used a gun? Yes.
51:Last time you got a portrait taken by a photographer? I was two years old.
52:Do you think musicals are cheesy? Some are, some not.
53:Is Christmas stressful? Yes, it’s a pain in the ass.
54:Ever eat a pierogi? Hundreds of times, Yummmm!
55:Favorite type of fruit pie? Apple.
56:Occupations you wanted to be when you were a kid? Archeologist.
57:Do you believe in ghosts? No.
58:Ever have a Deja-vu feeling? Yes.
59:Take a vitamin daily? Yes.
60:Wear slippers? Yes.
61:Wear a bath robe? Yes.
62: How old were you when you lost your virginity? 14.
63:First concert? Harry Chapin.
64:Wal-Mart, Target or Kmart? Walmart, to people watch.
65:Nike or Adidas? Dr. Scholl
66:Cheetos Or Fritos? Cape Cod Potato Chips.
67:Peanuts or Sunflower seeds? Cashews.
68:Ever hear of the group Tres Bien? Hell no.
69:Ever take dance lessons? Yes. as a kid, 3 years.
70:Is there a profession you picture your future spouse doing? No, there won’t be a future spouse.
71:Can you curl your tongue? Yes, and I know how to use it too.
72:Ever won a spelling bee? No.
73:Have you ever cried because you were so happy? Yes, at my divorce hearing.
74:Own any record albums? Yes, vinyl and CD’s.
75:Own a record player?Yes.
76:Regularly burn incense? Yes.
77:Ever been in love? Yes.
78:Who would you like to see in concert? Celine Dion.
79:How many tattoos do you have? Six small ones.
80:Hot tea or cold tea? Hot.
81:Tea or coffee? Coffee.
82:Sugar or snickerdoodles? Sweet’n’Low
83:Can you swim well? Yes.
84:Can you hold your breath without holding your nose? Yes.
85:Are you patient? Not really.
86:DJ or band, at a wedding? DJ.
87:Ever won a contest? Yes.
88:Ever have plastic surgery? No.
89:Which are better black or green olives? Green.
90:Can you knit or crochet? Neither.
91:Best room for a fireplace? Bed room.
92:Do you want to get married? Never again.
93. Do you wear glasses? Yes.
94:Who was your HS crush? Beth.
95:Do you ever cry and throw a fit until you get your own way? Only as an infant.
96:Do you have kids? Yes.
97:Do you want kids? No more thank you very much.
98:What’s your favorite color? Blue.
99:Do you miss anyone right now? Yes.
100: Have you ever been stung by a bee? Yes.
* * *
There you have it. My screwed up and over-explained personality in a nutshell. Remove a few of these questions and add your own. Personalize it as much as you think is necessary. Then have a few of your friends compete the questions and invite them over for a few bottles of wine and a group discussion. It might be a great deal of fun but even if it isn’t make sure you’re serving a really good wine.
I love to dream and I’m not sure exactly why. It started when I was kid of about eight laying in the grass in my backyard. It was a sunny day and my eyes were closed and I could almost see through my eyelids. I saw crazy swirls and colors that totally captivated me. A few weeks later I was trying to sketch a tree in the yard and I discovered that trees were really boring. I then decided to try and sketch some of those patterns and swirls I saw. It was exciting for a young kid to make that discovery and I actually completed a sketch of them. I tried on a number of occasions to explain what had happened but it was impossible. My mother, a part-time artist herself, politely listened, then just shook her head, and we never talked about it again. Lets jump ahead ten years.
Now I’m eighteen and enjoying my first year of college. It was a school known for it’s excellent art programs and I was finally in my element. All of my friends and acquaintances were artists of a sort and it was a atmosphere in which we were all beginning to thrive. As with any art program you have a certain amount of freedom but are somewhat restricted to what is acceptable for good grades. The wilder and crazier your creations made it more difficult it to get the grades needed to appease the teaching staff. When I tried to do paintings or drawings of bowls of fruit, I wanted to scream out loud. So effing boring. If I wanted a good representation of a bowl of fruit I’d take a picture. My best pieces where those that came to me during what I called my times of half-sleep. Half-sleep is those minutes between REM sleep cycles and the beginnings of wakefulness. It freed my mind and imagination and supplied me with a steady stream of ideas and offbeat perspectives. From that point on I consistently tried to remember and sketch those ideas as I received them each morning.
Jump ahead 50 years. My half-sleep time has now become an important resource which I still use today. Just before I awoke this morning I was half awake and dreaming about this subject and how to best write about it. I woke up and forgot to jot down my notes (always a mistake) and lost the idea immediately. Fortunately as I was relaxing later in the afternoon I began to recall what I’d been dreaming and here we are.
This has been a rather hectic month for me and mine which hasn’t really happened too often since the Pandemic reared its ugly head so many months ago. With the Delta Variant coming into it’s own it appears that masks will be coming back as a fashion statement once again. It just seems that this virus and it’s many faces refuses to fade away. I guess it’ll be here to stay for much longer than we all anticipated. Fortunately for me there isn’t anything I did before that I can’t do now with a mask on.
This will have to do!
Being a senior citizen makes looking back at my life a little nostalgic at times. I wonder what my sex life might have been all those years ago if I’d been forced to comply with the restrictions that the pandemic requires. I feel really bad for the young and sexually active today. It would be well neigh impossible to maintain a reasonable love life if a six foot separation is mandated as well as the ever so attractive masks. It will take a very inventive person or couple to take the steps necessary to have sex and still comply with all the pandemic safeguards.
My Place or Yours?
Truthfully, I’m being sarcastic and a bit facetious as I hope you realize. There isn’t any pandemic that I could think of that will slow anyone down who has sex on his/her mind. For years we couldn’t get people (men) to regularly wear condoms to prevent pregnancies. Then the HIV/AIDS epidemic struck and condoms immediately became the norm rather than just a circular indentation on the back of a wallet. If AIDS didn’t slow everyone down who cares about silly old Covid-19. Where there’s a will there’s always a way.
Where are all the up and coming entrepreneurs when you need them. How about a one size fits all body condom. Maybe a mask with an adjustable opening allowing for the occasional French kiss. We need to find the next Steve Jobs to help us get the ball rolling on some ingenious new devices to assist our lovemaking efforts during these trying times. He could start his own new company and become a zillionaire overnight selling pandemic related sexual devices. He could call the company, CHERRY, just to give Apple something to worry about.
Just a thought or two while I’m sitting here on the deck relaxing. Now it’s time for a Jack and Pepsi to keep my creative juices flowing.
Being the cynical bastard that I am and having less love for our human race than most, makes this topic concern even me. Most of my life and career has been involved with close personal communications (interviews and interrogations) with hosts of diverse individuals. I’ve been able thanks to years of training and experience to read them exceeding well, hence my overall dislike of so many. Granted a majority of people come across in a good way but once pressures and stresses are introduced to the mix, all of the negative reactions become easily recognizable. My educated guess is that the best people are those with a much stronger control of their basic instincts. I can’t blame the negatives on emotion alone because we all deal with them equally.
The Pandemic has brought us all to the emotional edge in a number of ways through intense worry and fear. It’s interesting in the extreme to recognize both the good and the bad effects and who handles them the best. I won’t even try to explain the negative behaviors of people whose lives are completely consumed by politics and the media. They come to this discussion already biased and flawed. Then we have the medical professionals and first responders who as they always do show us the way things should be done. Compassion, caring, and fearlessness are their norm. A few bad apples have been observed through this horrible period but overall we as a people owe them praise and thanks. Fortunately the negative and selfish people with concerns only for their personal agendas are easily and quickly identified. I’m not here to name names but you already know who they are if your paying the least bit of attention.
I fear that the pressure of death, serious financial ruin, job loss, and long periods of isolation have begun to take their toll on all of us. I’ve noticed in recent weeks the edginess of ordinary citizens doing ordinary things and showing a total loss of patience for each other in a mean and nasty way. All that tells me is that the Pandemic is having a much deeper and long-term harmful effect than I first thought. Returning to the new normal still requires a huge change for all of us from the old normal. We humans are not big fans of change, large or small. This intolerance for each other will hopefully wan as time goes on but who knows for sure. We’ve been told for more than a year now to stay the hell away from each other or else. Some of the incidents I’ve observed lately fill me with doubt that there is a short term solution. We must all wait and see and then do what we can to help remedy this confusing situation.
As always I will remain the pragmatic cynic.
That being said its now time for a little humor. Anyone who follows this blog knows of my deep appreciation for really erotic limericks. I’ve delved into my archives and found this little ditty. Enjoy!
There’s a feckless young fellow named Goody
Who insists that he wouldn’t, but would he?
If he finds himself nude,
With girls in the right mood,
The question is not would he, but could he?
Surprise…it wasn’t quite as erotic or lewd as you were expecting. Next time it’ll be a doozy.
I’m now considered by most people that I know to be an older citizen (fart) that should be respected and taken care of. Of all the things I’ve had to adjust to that is the hardest. I understand that kind of pity is accompanied by a lot of love and caring since I went through the same thing when my parents reached their platinum years. That’s right, PLATINUM. The golden years end at 70 and then the platinum years kick in.
I’m not complaining but just stating the obvious. The biggest blessing that I’ve discovered in my platinum years is my continuing education supplied to me by my grandchildren. They see me so much differently than their parents and sometimes it makes me laugh out loud and other time brings tears to my eyes.
During my year of hell with surgeries and chemotherapy I made sure to keep the oldest grandson (age 5 at the time) aware of what was happening. He examined my stitches and staples and was more than a little interested in the chemotherapy and all the tubes and pumps I was required to wear. I didn’t want him to be frightened by all of it and he paid very close attention and asked a million questions. Towards the end of the chemo I was feeling extremely sorry for myself and was bitching and complaining about my horrible life. He brought a shot of reality into the conversation very quickly. He lightly touched my hand and simply stated “All of this is better than dead grampa.” From the mouths of babes.
His younger brother missed out on most of that but has since brought his own way of seeing things to my attention. He is quite the artist which pleases me so much. We have something in common which is a great place to begin a real relationship. I’m sure the fun with him has just begun,
Then comes grandson number three who is all of 1 1/2 years old now. I was worried how I’d be able to connect with him since I only met him for two days when he was a new born. His arrival had me a little apprehensive since he lives in California and is someone I won’t get to see all that often.
I don’t know why I was so worried. He arrived with his parents and stole the show. He isn’t talking much but he gets his message across very quickly. I was a little standoffish at first but he was having none of that. He kept smiling at me every chance our eyes met and he teased me along until I loosened up a little. On his last day here he walked over to my chair and indicated he wanted to come up. I picked him up, he laid down his head, and went to sleep. I held him for two hours and I was in heaven. My education continues….. lucky me.
Over the years I’ve wasted a great deal of my valuable time and efforts arguing about politics and political strategy. How stupid am I? Don’t answer that. It always feels good at first when your spewing your expert opinions to anyone who will listen. Fifty percent of them listen politely, smile, and later talk about what a bore you’ve become. The other fifty percent listen politely, wait until you’ve stopped talking, and then begin filling the air with their opinions and nonsense. They’ve listened to none of your ideas but waited patiently for you to shut up. You just gotta hate those A Type personalities.
I’ve always enjoyed finding and reading quotations from deceased politicians and a very few politically deceased politicians. Some are inciteful but many are not. The current hoard of elected officials never have quotes that are even a tiny bit interesting. Realizing that has forced me to find some lesser known politicians and journalists with quotes from the past that could actually impart some information that’s worth reading. You may not recognize some of the names but the quotes will speak for themselves.
“A politician must often talk and act before he has thought and read.” Thomas Babbington (1859)
“A politician thinks of the next election; a statesman thinks of the next generation.” James F. Clark (1888)
“Our great democracies still tend to think that a stupid man is more likely to be honest than a clever man, and our politicians take advantage of this prejudice by pretending to be even more stupid than nature made them.
Bertrand Russell (1951)
“The press conference is a politician’s way of being informative without saying anything. Should he accidently say something, he has at his side a press officer who immediately explains it away by “clarifying” it.”
Emery Kelen (1960)
“Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong remedies.” Groucho Marx (1977)
“I offer my opponents a bargain: if they will stop telling lies about us, I will stop telling the truth about them.
Adlai Stevenson (1952)
These kinds of quotations were once plentiful but no longer. With newspapers losing readership there’s much less chance of any pearls of wisdom making the headlines. It’s truly a damn shame. Here’s one last and extremely old quote which remains as true today as it did in 1947.
“Politicians . . . rise predominantly from . . . the “lower middle class””; most are self-made men . . .; most depend on their political jobs for a livelihood and most have little time, inclination, of opportunity for adult education; hence the dominating qualities of so many are greed, vulgarity, attention to special interest, avarice, and selfishness.
I haven’t been blogging for a while, just laying back and enjoying my summer. I’ve been avoiding the news and current events as much as possible because so much these days is fake or just plain BS. I see things slowly returning to normal but I remain wary. Many people think the pandemic is over but I’m not a believer just yet. I honestly have difficulty believing anyone these days. I’ve decided that I’ll continue to mask up in crowds and in buildings until more time has passed. Booster shots of the vaccine will probably be in our immediate future and I’ll wait it out with my mask firmly in place.
“HOPE FOR THE BEST AND PREPARE FOR THE WORST”
I can’t resist taking a shot at the anti-vaxers. My suggestion to them is that they be as careful as possible when spreading their propaganda. They could easily end up with a seriously sprained neck. It’s hard to make a believable point with your head shoved so far up your ass. And please don’t waste your time or mine sending me any of your bullshit emails because as I’ve stated many times in the past, I.D.C. ( I Don’t Care) about anything you have to say.
Now I’ll return to my new deck and have a serious alcoholic beverage to celebrate the day.
In the past I’ve created lists of things I love and things I hate. After roaming around for the last few months and people watching it occurred to me that another category needed to be documented. Here is my list of things that have morphed from ‘Things That Annoy Me’ to ‘Things That Bore Me’.
* * *
Drug companies and their endless advertisements to cure damn near everything. In most cases you’d need a small mortgage to pay for them but at least the side effects are free.
Organic labeling normally just pisses me off but I’ve come to realize if people are stupid enough to buy the “organic” song and dance then there’s nothing I can do. To quote one of my favorite comics, Ron White . . . You can’t fix stupid!
Anyone named Obama or Bush. No further explanation is needed or wanted.
AARP Mailings. I refuse to belong to any organization of liberal leaning seniors that enjoys sucking up to the Dems for more government handouts. You’d think that their current government subsidies would be enough.
Any bumper sticker that insists on telling me things I could care less about. I don’t really care what your children are doing or where they’re doing it. It’s just more eye litter.
SPAM in all it’s forms.
Verizon Wireless and their need to call me ten times a week because I’m now eligible for an upgrade on my cell phone. I’ve already blocked 26 of their numbers but they continue to annoy me from every state in the country.
Hilary Clinton and her endless health problems, her endless mental problems, and of course her endless marital problem, WILD BILL.
Maxine Waters. It’s time for a rubber room and a straight jacket for this wingnut.
The Maine Stream Media in all of it’s manifestations.
George “I Want to be King of the World.” Soros.
Trump Bashing.
Trump Bashers.
Hollywood idiots voicing their opinions about what they think on every topic except their acting, singing, or dancing.
Tipping waiters and waitresses when I’m now doing most of their work. Table computers are fine if I can cut my normal tip in half. All the waitresses do these days is deliver the meal and smile pretty. I think that’s worth no more than a 3 percent tip.
Facebook and Twitter. They should really be on the list of things that annoy me but they bore me as well.
The egocentric morons who frequent most retail stores and are always in line at the register directly in front of me. Where’s my stun gun when I need it.
Bait and Switch is one of the oldest and most misleading types of advertisement. It seems to have become much more commonplace that ever before.
Men talking to me while we’re standing at a urinal. I guess they don’t fully understand how focused I need to be while peeing. Talking is OK I guess but no peeking please.
Cell phone ringtones. Enough already . . . I don’t give a shit that you got email. Put it on vibrate moron.
Facial tattoos. It’s an instant judgement call when I see a person with them. Idiot, dumb ass, or moron, take your pick.
The new and improved Leggings fad. I admit that in many cases they just make my day but whatever you do don’t go into Walmart. You could be struck blind if you’re lucky.
Baseball caps worn backward. Any idiot that still thinks this is cool should get a free facial tattoo.
Homeless beggars. I hesitate giving money or cans to someone who is supposedly poor and unemployed while he’s wearing a better pair of Nike shoes than I have.
President Trumps continual tweeting. Just ridiculous.
Katy Perry. Sing a song, leave the stage, marry an asshole, cut off your hair, and then tell me what a political moron I must be for not supporting Hilary. God women . . . Get a frigging life.
Sex with lifelike robots. Only two terms comes to mind immediately, “Organ Grinder” and “Ex Wife”. Way too scary for me. Thanks but no thanks. Yikes!!!
The human race in my opinion is seriously flawed. There’s all sorts of speculation from the scientific community these days concerning the coming “Singularity”. They say that’s the point in time when the machines will be more intelligent than mankind and will assume control of things. I actually read one recent statement that machine intelligence could be the next logical evolutionary step for the human race. I honestly have no answer to that kind of thinking but who knows. There are times when I think machines would probably do a much better job than we’ve done so far. Everything humans get involved with starts with strong emotions which and slowly devolves into ethnic and religious biases and conflicts. Nothing gets accomplished and the arguing and fighting eventually result in some sort of armed conflict and endless killing.
I’m sick to death hearing about religions spewing their self-serving propaganda to any fool who’ll listen. I don’t hate or even dislike people who are true believers in their religion of choice but I also need to make clear that I have no love whatsoever for any current organized religions or sects. That being said I intend to pass along a few tidbits of information supplied to me by a trusted friend. He’s a diligent researcher and most of what he’s offering is factual. A few of you religious fanatics out there will insist on refuting everything I’ve written but I honestly could care less. As we all know opinions are like assholes. Everyone has one and this one is mine.
I’ve made a point over the years to read everything I could find on as many religions as possible. I had the pleasure of reading translations of the Torah, the Koran, Old and New Testaments of the Bible, The Egyptian Book of the Dead, and many associated writings of the Greeks and Coptics. What it all has amounted to for me is a forty year migraine headache. The only thing worse that reading religious propaganda is trying to rationally discuss religion with allegedly intelligent religious people. These are the people who are similar to the People’s Temple Kool-Aid drinkers that followed the Reverend Jim Jones to their death in Guyana in 1978. They hear only what they want to hear and immediately attack anyone who disagrees in the slightest. They loudly disagree only to interrupt any discussion they might bring into question their own belief system.
Here is the information as I received it.
* * *
The following paragraphs are just rough estimates of all of the fine works accredited to RELIGION. Read them and weep for mankind.
German Peasants’ War – A series of peasant revolts during the height of the Protestant Reformation, spurred on by a mix of economic and religious causes. 100k deaths for Christianity.
Moro Insurgency – Islamic rebels in the Philippines have a long, bloody history of resistance against colonial and Philippine governments alike. 120k deaths for Islam.
Northern Crusades – Crusades to root out the Baltic pagans. Couldn’t find any good casualty estimates, but 150k deaths for Christianity seems reasonable.
Algerian Civil War – More Islamist rebels. 200k deaths for Islam.
Lord’s Resistance Army – Christian militants in Central Africa. Remember Kony 2012? 200k deaths for Christianity.
Albigensian Crusade – France leads a crusade to root Cathar heretics out of the Languedoc. Estimates vary wildly from 7k to 1mil, but let’s just say 200k deaths for Christianity.
Great Turkish War – A “Holy League” of Christian states rolls back the Ottoman Empire’s conquests in Eastern Europe. 300k deaths for Christianity.
Afghan Civil Wars – A variety of Islamists, including Al Qaeda, vie for control over Afghanistan. 400k deaths for Islam.
Rashidun Conquests – The Islamic Caliphate conquered its way from being a desert backwater to the world’s most powerful state in an incredibly short period of time. I can’t find anything resembling an estimate for the casualties involved, so I’m going to completely BS this one: 500k deaths for Islam. Trust me, it won’t affect the winner.
Ottoman Conquests – Mehmed II leads the Ottomans on a merry path of conquest over Eastern Europe. 800k deaths for Islam.
The Crusades – All of Christendom spends a few centuries banging it’s head against a Holy Land-shaped wall. 1mil deaths for Christianity.
So far, Christianity’s crusading habit is definitely a big source of casualties, but those pesky Muslim militants have pushed Islam into the lead. The score is neck and neck at 1,950,000 deaths for Christianity and 2,120,000 deaths for Islam.
But three wars that most people have never heard of completely blow this competition out of the water.
French Wars of Religion – The French Protestants and Catholics spend 36 years massacring each other silly. 3mil deaths for Christianity.
Thirty Years’ War – Protestant and Catholic princes duke it out for control of the Holy Roman Empire (modern Germany). War is waged between mercenary companies that loot the countryside to support themselves. One third of Germany dies. 10mil deaths for Christianity.
So that’s 15 million deaths for Christianity and a mere 2 million for Islam.
But in the year of our lord 1850, a new challenger blows them both out of the water.
Taiping Rebellion – Hong Xiuquan was born into a poor family in southern China. In 1837, he fails the imperial civil service examinations– his only hope of getting ahead in life– and has a nervous breakdown. Long story short, he reads some pamphlets from Portuguese missionaries, gets some freaky visions, decide’s he’s Jesus’s younger brother, rounds up some followers (known as the God Worshippers), and launches a rebellion against the Qing Dynasty that results in the deaths of over 20 million people.
It’s entirely possible that Christianity has made up the 5 million death gap with smaller wars and general low-intensity persecution over time, but without any good statistics on that, I’m going to say the most bloody religion of all time is the God Worshippers, a religion that existed for less than 30 years.
EDIT: Meir Lipnick points out a glaring oversight– Timur used Islam to justify his conquests, adding 17 million to Islam’s score. I’m sure there are plenty other wars I’ve missed.
* * *
This deadly human virus arrived on this world in an unknown fashion and as any good virus will do . . . it slowly began to methodically destroy it’s host.
Being a lifelong animal lover has it’s ups and downs and living here in Maine makes things even more interesting. With the harsh winters and constant snow cover the wildlife here has become quite deligent in their hunt for food. I’ve been a loyal bird feeder for most of my life because I really enjoy having the birds around. My better-half is also a bird lover and we currently have six feeders we keep filled. I estimate the birds are eating close to 125 lbs. of feed a year not counting the many packages of suet we purchase to keep the woodpeckers healthy and happy. Add to that two or three quarts of sugar syrup for the hummingbirds and you begin to truly understand.
It became apparent some months ago that the birds living in this area have a rather accomplished communication system to spread the news concerning food sources and the location of predators. This came to my attention when a herd of wild turkeys showed up out of nowhere and began feeding from the food accidently dropped from our hanging feeders. Needless to say my better-half was quick to buy more corn and began strewing it everywhere. That’s all they needed to make our home the number one spot on their regular feeding rotation. With the heavy snow cover this winter they needed to do something inventive to help them survive the winter. Thus began the feeding of a another new group of dependents that I couldn’t claim on my taxes. As always I just went along thinking that would be the last of the additions to our extended family of two hundred or so really hungry birds. I was sadly mistaken once again.
Last year I erected a squirrel feeder on a nearby tree hoping it might convince the little buggers to stay away from the bird feeders. Once again, no good deed goes unpunished. We found out very quickly that turkeys and the occasional deer are also fond of corn. So began the battle for the corn that lasted most of the summer and into the winter. My better-half still insists on bringing home an endless supply of corn to keep the battle going. I left one of the bags sitting in the basement and hoped she would forget about it. She forgot for a time but the field mice did not. They like corn too and we soon found ourselves overrun with mice. Since the untimely demise of my lifelong best friend, my cat Stormy it’s been difficult to keep them under control. He died a year ago and the mice discovered his absence rather quickly. A new war was a brew’n.
A quick visit to Lowes supplied me with an armload of mouse traps and a determination to keep the mice out of our home. I did discover that putting cheese in a mousetrap is a waste of time. At first the mice were able to pull the cheese from the trap without harming themselves. After some research I discovered that JIFF creamy peanut butter really gets the job done. I’ve peeled 13 little corpses off those traps so far and I hope there will be many more to come. I toss their little corpses out onto the snow bank in the backyard where the crows and coyotes fight over the free meal. At least with the mice I only have to feed them once.
I wish that was the end of this sad story but no such luck. Next on my list is a large group of industrious little chipmunks who have quite a nice residence under our home. My father always told me if you see one chipmunk you probable have at least ten. If that’s true then we may have upwards of a hundred roaming around. Oh yeah, they also love corn and bird seed just like damn near everyone else. It’s a little more difficult for them because they’re so small and the birds are constantly chasing them away.
I’ll begin working in our garden within the next few weeks and “Job 1” is to be certain that the fences are intact. All these little varmints, birds, deer, and skunks are just waiting for me to make a mistake and then my garden will be trashed. Don’t even get me started about that big fat skunk that patrols our property looking for trouble. If he was any bigger I could just ride him around like a horse.
So begins another summer here in Maine. It should be interesting.
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