The Skeeter Daddle Diaries

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Alaska Bob and I were swapping stories last night, one I told about the bartender in Jeno’s (now Jimmy’s) in Stanwoodopolis calling the cops when she thought we were laughing a little loudly, something hard to do in the best of times in that town, which reminded him of a visit to Pekin, Illinois back about 1980. “I was having a beer in the Holiday Inn lounge,” he reminisced. “Only three guys at a table across the room and me at the bar. They were all agitated about the name of their mascot being changed, getting a little heated.”

Pekin apparently was named for their sister city, supposedly a direct line through the center of the earth to Peking, something another Illinois town believed had similar to its namesake Canton. Probably they had different surveyors but for the point of this story, let’s not worry about the veracity of lines through the earth’s core. The point is that Pekin had adopted for its mascot names, the Chinks. And even as early as 1980, some liberal snowflake pre-Woke yahoos had taken offense at using a racist slur for their teams’ names. The Chinks. Who’d have thought anyone would mind? Down the road the roller skating emporium was called, amusingly enough, the Chink Rink. All in good sport, eh?

The boys across the lounge wanted to know what Bob thought of this ‘mess’, changing the hallowed name of their beloved mascots. And Bob avowed as how it didn’t bother him, might even be a sensible move, times even then being what they were. This, needless to say, provoked the Chink lovers and a brief but long distance argument across the empty lounge ensued, neither backing down until finally the leader of the group who mentioned he was the mayor of Pekin, said he was going to call the police if Bob didn’t shut the hell up. Bob could see the handwriting on the wall, mandarin maybe but translatable, diplomatically stated that he would finish his beer and be on his way, nice talking with y’all.

In 1981 Pekin High School changed its name to the Pekin Dragons. Who knows if the Chink Rink bowed to the liberal crybabies? Not if the mayor had anything to do with it! As for Canton, until 1932 they were the Plowboys then the Little Giants named after an International Harvester tractor. And Peking, China? Your guess is probably better than mine but I’m hoping it was the Rednecks.

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I got more than a couple of friends who think the economy — the world economy, no less — is on its way down the toilet. Huge debts, large deficits, the Federal Reserve printing money like it was Charmin — they see a Fiscal Armageddon on the horizon. Depression, unemployment, then the collapse of civilization as we know it. They’re wondering if it’s time to buy a gun. Or an arsenal. They’re wondering if they should buy Chinese currency or a year’s supply of food and water. They’re wondering what to do with their money that will keep them afloat when their neighbors drown.

I remember one of my dad’s pals, Malcolm, building a bomb shelter in his basement. Great guy, Malcolm, salt of the earth, a family man, just taking care of his family down in Northern Georgia near the foothills of the Appalachian where we lived. He took me down into his basement — I was all of 12 years old — to show me the shelter that would keep his family alive after the communists attacked us with nuclear weapons, an event he saw as inevitable.

He had water tanks and shelves full of canned goods. He had gas masks and a propane stove. He had flashlights and a ton of batteries. “Electricity’ll be gone. Maybe forever,” he told me. There were bunk beds and a portable toilet. It looked like Motel 6 had mated with a Goodwill. It really didn’t look like a home for months of subterranean living, unless you were gophers.

In the corner by the door Malcolm had his hunting rifle. “For food?” I asked, thinking maybe a dinner of radioactive deer might be the way to go. Malcolm picked up the gun and gave me a ‘serious’ look. “No, Skeeter,” he said solemnly. “Your dad didn’t plan for what’s coming and … well, when you all try to come to our shelter, I’d have to stop you. There’s only room for us.”

Now, I wasn’t the sharpest kid on the block, but I took his meaning pretty quick. “You mean you’d shoot us, Malcolm?” Malcolm set the rifle back in its spot and nodded. “I have to protect my family first. That’s the way it is.”

It’s real hard to like a man who tells you he’d kill you, whether you’re 12 or 64. The world after a nuclear war, and probably an economic Armageddon too, would be filled with Malcolms. They see the bleakest future and the darkest side of human nature, I suspect because they find it in themselves. Me, I’m not interested in either. But I’m always glad to know who to avoid, catastrophe or no.

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Just up the road from where I buy my homegrown eggs, being too lazy to raise chickens anymore, there’s a sign that says: URIGANDA. I suspect it’s Hindu, roughly translated: Dead End. You wouldn’t know it was there except there’s a constant stream of traffic in and out and it IS the last place on the dirt dead end road. I figured at first just another house going up, tradesmen going in. But I was wrong. It is, in actuality, a commune.

More factually, it’s a chain commune. They have franchises down near Seattle and Gomorrah, but rumor on the dirt street is that they’re hoping to feed the flock with what they grow up here on the South End. Their neighbor, a goatherder and cheesemaker met them and offered her expertise, but they’ve retreated back into the nettles for now, no doubt googling info on Nubians and Alpines and hybrid goats with milk yields in gallons, not quarts. Today’s communes, I’m fairly certain, aren’t consulting Whole Earth Catalogue or Mother Earth News for hippie bargains or tips on how to build a greenhouse out of discarded shower curtains from the local thrift stores.

I don’t know one small thing about them to pass on as juicy gossip. They haven’t taken over the county government like the Bhagwan down in Antelope, Oregon back in the ‘80’s. They don’t patrol the perimeter with armed paranoid zombie members. They don’t poke their heads up much at all. Seems to me they came to the exact right place for the exact same reasons as the rest of us refugees from corporate America. They just like to flock up more than us apparently.

I say welcome to the party! And good luck to you folks no matter what flavor Kool-Aid you prefer. Life’s a winding road and I guess we’ve all looked for a good roadmap or an intuitive GPS to help us navigate the shifting terrains and the dirt road potholes. Like us, you’ve found a detour. Hopefully the South End will prove more a destination than a wayside, but remember, there’s always another Path if this one proves too difficult. Worst case, you can do like a lot of us who arrived with starcharts in our heads and dreams of spirits guiding us. You can always become an artist. And if that doesn’t cut it, Windy Rear has plenty of room for another real estate agent.

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Sure, she seems like the Great White Woman, billionaire artist, role model to millions, what’s not to admire? She’s even got a football hero boyfriend. Can you say Hetero Love? But trust me, the MAGA hate her … and for good reason! She’s not what she seems. She’s a menace dressed to kill, a Barbie with a brain that’s gone rogue, a femme fatale who plots to use the Super Bowl to bring America to its knees. She’s the Manchurian Candidate, a shill for the progressives hoping to invade the minds of her followers. She’s going to ask them … are you sitting down? … she’s going to ask them … to vote.

On the surface it sounds innocuous enough. Just go out and cast a vote, exert your American right to go to the ballot box, do the patriotic thing. But the MAGA know better. They always know better. She’s a wrecking ball in tights, a destroyer in sexy garb, a songwriter singing the death dance of democracy. They see through her little game. Riches aren’t enough for her, fame isn’t enough for her, a football star boyfriend isn’t enough for her. No, she wants Power. She wants what they want, control of America. But not for Good, not like their Chosen One, the One denied the last election when it was stolen from them. She wants to keep the Evil Man in the White House.

Today is Super Bowl Sunday. All eyes in America will turn to the duel in Las Vegas. If you think this is about football, take the blinders off! Will Taylor be in the stands? Will her boyfriend be on the winning side? Will they pass secret messages between themselves, messages that will decide the fate of this once proud country? Watch for yourselves but in the end MAGA will decipher the clues. MAGA will tell you who won. And more importantly, who lost. In any event it won’t be a football team. Football will be collateral damage. All part of her sinister plan. Enjoy your woke Bud Lite. If you can.

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