The Skeeter Daddle Diaries

You have to tip your MAGA hat to a man who will excoriate football players who take a knee during the National Anthem as unpatriotic, but call soldiers who lost their lives in a war losers and suckers. It takes a lot of chutzpah, let me tell you, to attack veterans, although we learned the depths folks will sink to when John Kerry, a silver star decorated veteran, was demeaned by the Swift Boat folks as a fraud and a coward. Thank you, Mr. Kerry, for your service … loser.

And you folks who voted for him, thank you for your service too … suckers! You got your tax break for the wealthy but not much for you, you got rid of regulations that adversely affect mostly you, you got your Supreme Court justices who will protect the corporations hoping you might get Roe v Wade reversed, you were told Covid was no big deal and now nearly 200,000 of you are under ground and yeah,you got a Bible thumping yahoo who wouldn’t know the New Testament from the Old. Job well done! Sure, vote for him again, why don’tcha. What’ve you got to lose?

Indeed. What have you lost already? The toll from the coronavirus is still going up, the unemployment numbers are still way down, the world economy is going to take a huge hit from the pandemic, that rioting in the urban streets stoked by your hero is still going on, coal mining is on the way out, global warming whether you believe it or not is here right now, the country is more divided than any of you have ever experienced, the United States is fast becoming an isolationist nation if not the pariah of the world. Nice job!

Oh, but the stock market is setting record highs every week, you say? The economy must be doing great, you say? Most of you folks who voted this guy into office probably have the least amount invested in the stock market. The rich buy stocks, the rest buy groceries, pay the rent, try to save what you can. You notice the interest rates on your meager savings lately? Compare that to your credit card interest. If you had any money you’d place a bet on the Dow Jones too.

Oh, I get it, you’re mad as hell and you’re not going to take it anymore. You hate the damn guvmint, you hate the big corporations, you hate the Congress, you hate the BLM, you’re sick and tired of fighting wars we lose, you’re plenty fed up with the whole damn thing, whatever the whole damn thing is, and I can tell you for a non faux fact, it isn’t Qanon. You thought it couldn’t get worse, didn’t you, so why not throw the dice, see if this stuffed suit of a reality TV star, a self-made biznessman who started out with multi millions and only declared bankruptcy how many times? might be the knight in shining armor. You were sold a bill of goods, brother, snake oil by the Snake King himself. If you think the only people he thinks are suckers and losers are the military men and women, you better buy yourself a floor length mirror. Or use the money to buy stocks so you can join the 1%.

With garden planting already under way, I’ve been searching for seeds. Usually I roll into the nearest hardware or grocery or garden supply store and load up on whatever seeds I need, plenty to choose from, some organic, some not. This year I found the display racks pretty much empty. So I did what any modern gardener worth his manure would do, I went online. I found some of what I was searching for, not all by any means, and the price was at least double what it would be ordinarily. After a few days of letting my fingers do the walking, I let my credit card to the talking.

I recalled back in those early plague days long ago when not just toilet paper was being hoarded, but yeast and flour too. I’m a bread maker so it was more than marginally disconcerting to discover some of the basic ingredients were unavailable, although I already had a large supply of wheat berries, seeds, grains, molasses and flour stored up. The other day a friend who sells us beefalo called to let me know he’s swamped with calls from desperate people wanting him to sell them meat. Another buddy mentioned that freezers were selling out all over. You could order one, but hell might freeze over before your meat got frozen in a new cooler.

The latest tactic to avoid food shortages in these End Times seems to be the purchasing of baby chicks. Wait a few weeks and you got eggs by the dozens and even fricassee once you’re sick of omelettes. You can use the chicken droppings on the garden, double your lettuce production. E-I-E-I Oh! We’re all going back to the land, maybe buy a couple calves, build a barn behind the garage.

What are we to think? Are folks expecting the plague zombies to surge into their grocery stores and clean out the shelves to the last loaf of white dead bread? Are they planting gardens, growing food, storing meat and pizzas, baking bread and fermenting homebrew? If the internet goes offline suddenly, you can bet your crop of zucchinis that panic will ensue within minutes, gun safes unlocked, doors bolted, a siege mentality spreading across the Home of the Brave. Only those with guns and cans of pork and beans will survive. Looters will decimate the sad little backyard gardens and no freezer without a kryptonite lock will keep the hordes from emptying their booty.

I give it a month before the rabbits munch down the lettuce and the carrots and the neighbor dogs feast on the chickens out in the crummy pen thrown up by the sandbox. Maybe two before the bread making experiments and the brick-like loaves stop seeming worth the trouble. Three before the bathtub gin starts poisoning entire neighborhoods. Believe me, we’ll clamor for an end to the quarantine. Death by virus might seem a welcome relief.