It’s the middle of September, but is the warmth of summer already a distant memory? Welcome to the Meerkat Muse!

Back to School

After several weeks of doing nothing, punctured by the occasional venture to town, London and even Sicily, it’s time for the regular routine to return in earnest. My daughter is back at school, which means obscenely early alarms, and all sorts of fun and games. We’re into GCSE territory, so this is where the pressure goes up, and I aim to do whatever I can to help her out. I confess to being nervous on her behalf. The routine is also well and truly back in terms of work. The early alarm is something I have always been used to, even during the holidays, it’s just that on days off I could leave it off. Not anymore. Now, whether I have work or not, the alarm is set for obscenely early. Urgh. Still, it is what it is.

The Toilet Seat Problem

A couple of weeks ago, I tried to assist my stepdaughter in removing a toilet seat from her loo, so as to replace it. I say tried, because the damn thing proved incredibly stubborn. One of the bolts came off easily enough, but the other… we tried oil and WD40, and it still refused to budge. I dare the word ‘intransigent’ was invented for this bloody bolt!

15 Years

The other week, my wife and I marked our 15th wedding anniversary! I know I’ve driven her mad down the years, and she’s had her moments too, but here we are, together for 20 years and married for 15 of those. It is impossible for me to imagine not having her in my life. Seeing as our daughter returned to school on the same day, it was a fairly low-key occasion, but certainly a warm, pleasant one.

A Friendly Beer

These days, it’s not often that I go out down the pub with my old office retail friends. Arranging things around our jobs is not easy, and so it’s nice when plans come together and we get to meet up. There is something soothing about enjoying their company, and of course a pint! Mind you, I continue to discover that I am not really able to hack the typical evening drinking session as much as I used to. Three pints left me… not exactly drunk or hungover, but certainly more discombobulated than usual.

It was good to catch up. There was discussion of a larger reunion, but as to whether that happens… who knows?

Yucking on Others

In this day and age, there are a lot of different tastes out there, across a host of fields and subjects. Different people like different things. I am a huge Trekkie, but I know people who haven’t seen a second of Star Trek, and that’s absolutely fine. I know people who love the music of Rage Against the Machine, which is not for me, and that’s fine. I would never pour scorn on someone else’s tastes. I might express my personal dislike of certain genres, but I would never attack someone else or demean someone else for enjoying them.

Not too long ago, I read a book called Legends & Lattes. This was a delightful story, one that somewhat subverted the fantasy genre, and reminded us all that we should not judge a book by its cover. This book seems to have triggered rage in a hard-line conservative whinger by the name of Razorfist. Razorfist probably believes they are being edgy in their critique of ‘corporate fantasy’, as they put it, but I cannot help but believe they are merely a misguided snob, and that they are also jealous of the success of Legends & Lattes. The book is a New York Times bestseller. I wonder if Razorfist – who is allegedly an author as well – has come anywhere near such status in their writing? Their remarks are especially sad, given that an author should understand the trials and challenges of getting published and getting noticed. We can haul each other up, or we can cruelly tear each other down. I know which path I prefer.

The Weather Truly Turns

Sometimes, it feels as though the weather gods flick a switch when September starts. Whilst there were still some sunny spells to start with, within a few days the weather has become grey, overcast, and more damp too. This is a sad inevitability with UK weather, and one hopes that the sunnier conditions will cling to the country for a little bit longer, but I suspect we are out of luck on that score.

My daughter rather prefers the cold, which to a certain degree makes her similar to me. I don’t tend to feel the cold as much as my wife does (she detests being cold). Where I differ to my daughter is that whilst I have a higher tolerance to the cold than my wife, I don’t enjoy it. It is not my preference, not at all. Meerkats are summer creatures.

The Local Pride Event

In a festival virtually certain to aggravate hard-right, religious conservatives, my town hosted a Pride event the other weekend. I was working, so unable to go along, but my wife and daughter went. It is always a carnival of colour, music, and people being free to be who they are, as opposed to the constraints the religious right would impose. My wife got a few pics, including of this… um… dragon?

Remember…

On the 9th of September, the news broke that James Earl Jones, famous for a number of film and TV roles, but perhaps most famous as the voice of Darth Vader from Star Wars, and the voice of Mufasa from The Lion King, had passed away at the age of 93. This humble giant of stage and screen breathed life into two of the most iconic, legendary characters to ever exist. Almost everyone can quote Vader and Mufasa. They live because Mr Jones made sure of it. He leaves us with an incredible legacy.

The Mashup Dream

I don’t know how to compute one of my most recent dreams. What I remember is that I was the character of Shadow the Hedgehog from the Sonic franchise, and I, along with a bunch of nondescript people, was being stalked by General Grievous from Star Wars. In the midst of being hunted by the lightsaber-wielding cyborg, I was exploring an underground base. At some stage, I was aiding Spider-Man in dispatching henchmen, and from there, uncovering a mystery relating to some old documents/boxes (from what I recall). From there, I woke up!

Kamala Harris kicks Trump’s Ass

By most reasonable metrics, Kamala Harris comfortably won the first presidential debate against Donald Trump the other day. She deftly demonstrated that Trump is easily derailed, and emotionally led. Whilst Trump snarled, raged, and at times spouted off easily-corrected falsehoods, Ms Harris appeared controlled, whilst Trump appeared anything but. It saddens me that so many people continue to fall for Trump’s aggressive and dishonest rhetoric. It saddens me that they overlook his record of failure at a corporate and political level, based on his previous term in office. With luck, Trump’s latest debate performance will convince undecided voters that someone so easily rattled should not be allowed near the White House for a second time.

To emphasise as to Trump’s instability, he quoted false claims about immigrants eating pets. Truly, he has jumped the shark. Apparently criminals are also getting trans surgery in jail too. There was much to process from his unhinged rants, too much really, and at times I was lost for words.

For a great rundown of Trump’s failures as president, check out the link below:

https://vm.tiktok.com/ZGeKE8YFa/

The Investment Email Scam

Sometimes, I do wonder if all these scams where people offer to send me money, are in fact genuine offers. Imagine if somewhere, there are people sitting on piles of money, trying to give it away, and everyone keeps saying no! Of course, this is exceptionally unlikely, especially when we’re dealing with the sum of millions of dollars.

I was recently offered commission on the sum of $10.5 million, with the aim of protecting the funds in my account, from some random stranger. Needlessly to say, this email slipped into the spam folder, where it rightly belongs!

The Angry Dream

I have no idea what provoked it, but the other night I had what can only be described as a fraught, angry dream. I dreamt I climbed into my dad’s car in the small hours of the morning, proceeded to get extremely frustrated with it, and then started to vandalise it. In the middle of my stress, I vented at my parents, and got myself arrested. I then insisted the only person I wanted to see was my daughter. I have no idea what made me so angry in the dream, because I love my parents, and indeed my family at large, and would never cut anyone out. It would take something truly vile on their part for me to ostracise them. This dream came right out of left field, so to speak, and it shook me up a little.

Fox-Hunting Fools

Many thanks to Ellen Hawley for her post on the subject of fox hunting, and specifically the notion that fox hunters should be protected as an ‘ethnic minority’. Ms Hawley shares my disparaging opinion that fox hunters somehow deserve any special status. The very notion is insulting, especially since it is being used to defend something cruel.

I despise fox hunting. I thoroughly understand the needs of farmers to protect their livestock and livelihoods, and I understand the need to control the population of disruptive animals, but fox hunts are not in the name of pest control or protection. The people who dress up in poncy outfits, unleashing packs of dogs whilst riding horses and armed to the teeth, are not engaging in pest control, and they cannot truly claim theirs is a sport, since sport implies a fair competition, and there is nothing fair to the fox in this situation. It is a throwback, a barbaric practice, and in my view, hardly something worth saving.

The Electrical Incident

Last Friday (which so happened to be Friday the 13th!), I went to use cooking pot. I switched it on, and the bloody thing coughed up a loud bang and a bright flash. I leapt out of my skin, swore rather loudly, and went briefly deaf in my right ear for good measure. I may have been slightly terrified! It’s probably clear from my posts that I am not generally a superstitious person (though I do have my quirks), but sometimes, in moments such as these, I do have to wonder…

A Tired Bunny Meerkat

Last Saturday saw a fair bit of physical work. I am not particularly built for that, but it’s what’s required of me, so I did it. I cannot claim to have enjoyed lugging 1200×600 tiles around, especially since we seem to have loads of them, and for Sunday, there was the very real prospect of lugging them around once more. It’s part and parcel of the job, but I will admit that at times it aggravates me. Circumstances do tend to leave me doing a lot of this sort of work, and on more than one occasion I’m doing it single-handedly. Needless to say, this winds up knackering this old greymuzzle!

Things would only get more exhausting. I was to have three – three! – consecutive days of lone-trading, from Monday to Wednesday. This is not necessarily a problem, except if it gets remotely busy it can be something of a nightmare. Then again, the flipside of seeing no one is boredom, which isn’t exactly favourable, especially for three days on the bounce.

In the end, a colleague did join me for the first two days, albeit not in a direct store capacity, for he is part of a regional team, and he needed a desk. In terms of store stuff, I was still on my own, so to speak.

Genuine or False Flag?

This is the question that I have to ask. On Sunday, there was another alleged assassination attempt aimed at Donald Trump. Perhaps unsurprisingly, some of his conservative, religious right supporters are up in arms, declaring this to be the responsibility of the Democrats, claiming that the assassination attempts are the result of left-wing rhetoric. It is however worth noting that the timing of this is awfully convenient. By any reasonable metric, Trump lost the debate with Kamala Harris, and Ms Harris has gradually been extending her lead in the polls. Trump has already proven himself to employ unhinged diatribes and flat-out lies, so is it really so far-fetched to believe he wouldn’t resort to desperate measures, in order to make himself look like a victim?

OK, I will grant it is extremely unlikely he would go as far as to stage assassination attempts against himself, but the timing is suspect. He is under scrutiny for his poor debate performance, and is clearly on the defensive. This takes some of that heat off, it allows him to play the sympathy card.

Whilst his worshippers supporters may declare this to be a result of the left inciting violence, it is worth noting that the majority of violent rhetoric comes from Trump and his supporters. Trump is the one who suggested there would be a bloodbath if he lost the 2020 election. There are some scary examples of what he, and some of his fellow Republicans, have said down the years:

Meanwhile, Trump regularly calls journalists the “enemy of the people” and praised Montana Gov. Greg Gianforte for body-slamming a reporter who dared ask a question; Trump and his sons mocked Rep. Nancy Pelosi after her husband was nearly killed by a politically motivated attacker; Trump said a “bloodbath” would result if he lost the election; and, by the way, he also said that Biden is “the destroyer of American democracy.” He agreed with the violent January 6 mob calling for lynching Mike Pence. The list goes on and on. 

https://www.hcn.org/articles/who-is-spouting-violent-rhetoric/

Of course, inciting or threatening or simply exuding violence is a central tenet of the new GOP. And that sort of violent rhetoric is part and parcel of authoritarianism. Remember when Rep. Paul Gosar circulated the anime of him murdering Rep. Alexander Ocasio Cortez? Or the time Marjorie Taylor Greene called Democrats “flat out evil” or wielded a high-caliber sniper rifle in a campaign ad? Rep. Lauren Boebert likes to put guns in her kids’ hands and make them pose for Christmas cards, and Blake Masters, the failed Trump-endorsed Arizona candidate for U.S. Senate in 2022, made a creepy ad featuring a gun that is “not a hunting rifle. It’s designed for killing.” Sure, it was only for killing “bad guys,” but in MAGA World wouldn’t that also include most immigrants, Democrats, and Liz Cheney? Donald Trump Jr. retweets images of Biden bound and gagged in the bed of a pickup truck. And Kevin Roberts, President of the Heritage Foundation, the organization behind Project 2025, told a podcaster: “We are in the process of a second American revolution, which will remain bloodless if the left allows it to be.”

https://www.hcn.org/articles/who-is-spouting-violent-rhetoric/

These are troubling times, filled with disinformation and manipulation, and believe me, this comes from the right of the political spectrum, as much as the left.

So, we are bang up to date with this Muse, and it is therefore time to draw the curtains on this entry. As ever, kept watch for prompts, The Meerkat Q&A, and other general shenanigans! Until next time!