The Skeeter Daddle Diaries

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Scientists on the South End have announced yet another major breakthrough in the genetics front. Hot off the heels of the first known cloning of old growth nettles, the labs at Tyee Technologies have grown meat from the stem cells of Wanda Davenport’s Rhode Island Reds, blue ribbon winners at the county fair three years running for biggest chickens. Dr. Frank Steinberger brought reporters from the Stanwoodopolis Gazette to witness the world’s first Hot Wings artificially grown on yo-yo strings in the sterile environment of their laboratories. From petri dish to deep fat fryer in 30 days, the zesty morsels were sampled and declared ‘hotter than a Texas abortion debate’ by patrons of the Diner where the tasting was conducted.

Dr. Steinberger, asked what the purported production costs might be, stated that to feed, say, a half time Super Bowl party of 6, would be in the range of $250,000. Or over $50,000 per person. “In other words, Bill Gates might afford this if he didn’t invite two many gridiron pals.” The scientist did say costs would drop appreciably when Full Production was reached and that Tyson Foods had already expressed an interest in the formula for the secret sauce along with Tyee Technologies’ advanced bio-engineering know-how. “Already we have teams working on Teriyaki Wings, Honolulu Lava Wings, a Cool Ranchero dip and others I’m not at liberty to divulge at this time.”

Asked what the nuggets would taste like without their grease-released flavorings, Dr. Steinberger, ever the comedian, cracked up the packed crowd of reporters by saying, “they taste a lot like chicken.” He went on to explain that artificially grown poultry would soon supplant the muss and fuss of “that barnyard mess, feather picking, manure and the ever dangerous bird flu. In a world clamoring for hotwings, we foresee a bright future. I think you’ll find the venture capitalists doing the flocking from now on,” he crowed.

This reporter hoped they were working on bio-engineered Pepto Bismol.

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Well, buckaroos, Skeeter’s back. Tanned, rested and ready for the political wars of the internet. Out in the Montana backcountry, we didn’t get much news. We missed the whole Korea Summit and only just learned we won’t have to build our bomb shelter, safe now from nuclear holocaust at the hands of Little Rocket Man. What a president! What a negotiator! Maybe we’ll build a greenhouse instead.

Somehow when you’re traipsing the trails and driving the byways of America’s west, the woes of the world don’t seem so immediate. The forests go on for what seems like forever and the mountains are still peaked with snow even if the glaciers are retreating rapidly. The Missouri Breaks were our turnaround point, about where the steamers had to stop too back in the mid 1800’s from the other direction. We passed through Glacier Park, Great Falls, Ft. Benton, Flathead Lake. Huge sweeping panoramas that humble a mere human. And if you ever felt like America was on the decline, well, maybe so, but my god there’s a wealth of resources and raw beauty out there that we sometimes take for granted or forget completely.

Wide open spaces, big roaring rivers, two mile high peaks, one of the largest fresh water lakes in the world by area, the longest river in America, all superlatives, all super natural. You need a tonic for political cynicism, this is my recommended panacea. Go see America. It will make you want to step up to its grandeur. It will make you want to be Better.

Course, there are folks who can’t see a forest for the trees that need clearcutting. And those who only see land as real estate to be parceled and sold. The Flatheads sold theirs on the lakefront and now have acres of sagebrush and scrub pine. I guess maybe we’re the Flatheads now. We came for the gold and the beaver and the timber. We gave the railroads right of way and land. We killed the buffalo and that killed the tribes and if that didn’t, we finished the job by hand.

But the America we exploited is still out there, a continent more than a country. For awhile at least I’m going to live there and not the internet.

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Skeeter’s burned out. What can I say, it’s been a hard week of fake news. The President ran up to Canada to piss on the legs of our (former) allies, mocked them for being upset he’d started a trade war, then for good measure called on them to include Russia and his pal Putin back in the G-7 or 6 or maybe 8. He set in motion new measures to kill Obamacare, small stuff like canceling the provision that you can’t be denied coverage for pre-existing conditions, then jetted off for a Summit with Little Rocket Man. It’s more than enough to make a bobble head’s head spin, but mine is about ready to fly off my shoulders. The mid-terms can’t come quick enough for me.

And if the country decides Trump is their boy once again after a year and a half of idiotic shenanigans, anti-democratic rantings and monkey wrench after monkey wrench in established world policies, well … maybe it’s time to admit I don’t know America, not really. I don’t understand it’s heart, it’s people, it’s love of a real estate huckster with deeply despotic tendencies. I will finally admit to being a stranger in a strange land after all these years. And make decisions accordingly.

Meanwhile, I need a break from the moronic monstrosities of the daily news. I need some wilderness. So … we’re hauling out to Montana to a cabin hopefully out of cellphone range, beyond the reach of digital TV, smack dab in the middle of nowhere, a place we won’t wonder if it’s fake or real. It’s real. It’s nowhere like where we are now.

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No doubt you were as cheered as me recently to hear the news that a lab had successfully cloned a monkey. Human clones can’t be far behind. Probably all Kardashians. Or maybe Lottery winners. Sure not going to pick genes from losers. It’s a treat to live in a Brave New World. Clones, artificial intelligence, robots, drones, Facebook, cellphones, heated car seats — the future sure looks bright!

What I think is the genie’s out of the jar and he’s not granting three wishes. The guy who cloned the chimps said he can’t imagine cloning humans, too dangerous given the high failure rate. Monkeys okay, they can use them as experiments and save the ‘real’ ones. I’m kind of wondering what happened to the ‘failures’. Did they live, any of them? The humans? Will we keep the botched clones? Will we make a separate category of Homo Sapien? Can we expel them as illegal immigrants? Would you let your daughter marry one? Dr. Frankenstein is working on one now, you know it, I know it, Igor knows it. Just a matter of time before he succeeds, less for him to fail, then we get to make decisions afterwards.

Will we use them as the new scapegoats? Make them use separate bathrooms? Substitute them for crash test dummies? All kinds of great potential. Personally, I figure we’ll opt for bright robots. Cloned people? Passe’. Be like buying eight tracks over I-pods, maybe a nostalgia market, but not real big. And of course, the narcissists. Breed a few more of themselves. Nothing in the constitution yet that says multiple Donald Trumps can’t run for president.

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Tim Cook, the poor schmuck running the trillion dollar company called Apple, sat down for an interview yesterday after introducing an app that would let Apple users monitor their addictions. In a speech earlier he had told appsters how Apple was a company dedicated to making humanity better. Google states it somewhat differently, Do No Evil, but in the end all these techno-innovators are convinced they are the salvation of the world. Asked if he thought his company had addicted millions to his device, Tim took umbrage. No, not at all. His device gave them freedom.

Earth to Tim, then why do they need an Apple app that tells them how much they use it? Just another product, he said, that gives its customers more flexibility. And as far as addiction was concerned, well, he told his interviewer, he was not a clinician. He also mentioned how surprised he was at his own time spent on his marvelous device, something he really hadn’t noticed previously. Why he needs the app, I guess.

I’m not a clinician either, but I doubt if I need a degree in psychopathology to diagnose the folks sitting at a dinner table who manage to operate their thumbs incessantly and only occasionally, if at all, join in a conversation. Or the people in a checkout line who work the phone while their groceries are bagged. Or the ones in aisle 8 calling a spouse to see if the mayo is the correct brand. Watch how many people jump in their car and immediately pick up the phone. When’s the last time you actually had a conversation with a kid who didn’t have earpods jammed in or who wasn’t checking text messages? I haven’t had one since about 2006.

Addiction? Oh baby, we’re addicted. We’re addicted to our devices. We’re addicted to TV. We’re addicted to video games and email and text messaging and Facebook. We walk around all day with the syringe plunged deep into our brain and the guyz who brought us this smack say they’re not clinicians. Neither is the heroin dealer in my neighborhood.

They’ve rewired our brains. They’ve transformed our society. They’ve altered our politics and they’ve pulled the rug on democracy. Let’s imagine, like Tim, that this is for our own good. That this will be a brave new world. That with his device we’re so much more free. But I’m not buying it, literally or figuratively, and yeah, I know, I’m going to be left in the exhaust. There’s an old Ry Cooder song that comes to mind that probably applies to me, my very own app: The Very Thing That … Makes You Rich … Makes Me Poor. I know, Tim, you’re not an economist either.

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