A Compass for Where the Wasteland Ends

I've decided to put the "Whoville Chronicles" to bed, for the time being at least. I have the feeling that what's left to say is more of the same. The Whos and the Spencers have been outlined, and their dysfunction and insanity has been exposed to the internet. Revenge is mine!!! The broader subject that deserves specific attention is my attempt at escaping this thing called The Matrix, or the American Hologram. It's a story that encompasses more than just the first place I landed after my escape, the Whoville sector of Palookaville, and more than just the people who reside here and their ridiculous antics. To continue with this specific story I would most certainly have to begin fictionalizing it, and I have contemplated doing just that, but I've finally elected not to. I've been told by just about everybody who knows me well that I should write a book. I always respond with, "I have written several books." What they mean is that I should publish a book and get paid for my efforts. I'd love to get paid for writing, but I'm afraid that's not in this deck of cards. I'm just too pessimistic to believe that publishing a book, especially in today's world, where everything is monetized, is worth the effort.

There is the incessant rub; money appears to be the only thing that The Hologram cares about. How simple of an epiphany to make, and yet it has been almost 33 years in the making for me. I can tell you that by the age of 18 I had already made the majority of the "epiphanies" I would make in my life. It was like I had already formulated the chapters of my spiritual and intellectual life, and what was left was for me to understand them all with more depth. You can drink a wine after a couple of weeks of fermentation, but if it's done right, after years of resting in itself properly, it will taste magnificent. Still, you have to have the refined palate to taste the subtle and nuanced differences. In the beginning, after the initial fermentation process, it's still fundamentally the same substance it will be after years of resting, yet it's not the same is it? It is qualitatively very different. Now, when I read what I wrote from the view point of an 18 year old, I can appreciate that I really had no idea what I was talking about, yet I did. I understood in a very single visioned, flatland, horizontal, Cartesian and youthful way. How could I understand any differently? The lion's share of epiphanies have to be lived.

I struggle with the need I have to read and write. What I've come to understand is that what matters most in life is how you conduct yourself. What do you spend your time doing? That is how you are the change that you want to see in the world. What can be more important than that? I've read a lot of books and written thousands of pages searching for that one epiphany. What matters is what you do with your time. When I'm reading, or writing (or participating in my favorite escapism which would be movies), what am I doing? I'm sitting on my ass not being the change that I want to see in the world. Yet it doesn't have to be as rigid and defined as that, and it isn't. I can just as easily argue that the sage sitting in meditation in a cave is changing the world in the most important way possible...spiritually. The answers I have come up with to the question of what change do I want to see, are mostly a product of Permaculture. The reasons for that being my answer are many, but Permaculture is also not my destiny, and if it is than I can't see it. If it is my destiny then why have I landed in Whoville?

I can't state with enough conviction what it means for me to have finally realized that there is a reason why I have always felt so different from my fellow human beings. It feels like a homecoming, and it makes me very emotional, which is very ironic given the specific condition I'm referring to. This condition makes it impossible for me to register unspoken communications that are supposedly received through things like facial expressions and body language. Now, I have learned how to read these things over the years, but I am unable to read them in any way other than intellectually. It's not something that comes naturally. This deficit goes a long way towards explaining why I have always avoided people in general. Again, probably as a matter of survival, around 17 years old I developed an intense interest in understanding human psychology. Now I know that I was searching for the protocols that would allow me to "fit in." All of this is only gained in retrospect after receiving the key that belongs to the lock that has kept me in this cage. With Aspergers exposed to the light of my conscious awareness, I feel like I now have the last remaining puzzle pieces to the puzzle of my life.  It feels like figuring out my destiny has gotten much closer.

The thing is, I have had my entire life to adapt to this condition. Psychology was one of my intense obsessions. I learned how to hide in societies day light. I waited tables and tended bar successfully (of course I think my regulars were just entranced by my eccentricities and that's why they continued returning...cause they couldn't figure me out). These are activities that somebody with this condition are not supposed to be able to do seeing as how they deal with other people. I do just fine with people, so long as it's one on one, or it's a well defined social situation. Put me in a group of people that I'm supposed to interact with (like the permaculture tribe I spent time with this year) and a minute feels like an hour. I feel like every person in a group is a vampire that is feeding off of me, but that can't possibly be true...and it's not true, it's just my way of being in this world. To be clear, I have not been diagnosed, but I know it's true like I know that I'm a male human being on planet Earth. I know it with enough certainty to know that I don't need to waste my time, and lack of money, on paying professional shrinks with certificates and licenses to verify it for me. Although I imagine I'd get a LOT of money from the government due to their failure to detect it while I was in military entrance processing. Definitely since I got kicked out with an "other than honorable discharge" when it should have been a medical discharge for psychological reasons. I also don't want some incompetent ass hole telling me that I'm wrong and sending me back into that cage of lonely isolation.

When I was growing up, my mother used to repeat to me "it's not what you say it's how you say it." I never could understand what the hell she was talking about, and it always just pissed me off even more. "What the hell are you talking about...how I say it...how the fuck am I supposed to say it," followed by storming out of the house to escape in my newly acquired personal transport vehicle to do something crazy like jump off of a rail road trestle head first with a bit of rope and metal. In my marriage, my wife has been brought to the brink of insanity for the same reason. It just doesn't register with me. It's cold, calculating, and rigid reasoning. I could make the best defense attorney the world have ever known if I didn't have a soul and could play the game. Or is it just because when I was five my father abandoned me? It's all bound up and hidden in the dysfunction of my own life. Yet I know it to be true, and the fact that my half brother has been diagnosed is enough of a diagnosis for me.

My son is different already. He's two and a half and Wendy and I both know it as well as we know it of me. Sometimes he covers his ears up for no apparent reason. He walks up to adults at the park and sits in front of them and babbles on as if he knows them. He refuses to be contained in one space and likes to run off to the fringes when in a group of people...like a wild animal trying to escape a cage. He already has an obsession in all things king. In a bit of synchronicity, at the park the other day, a ten year old girl with Aspergers showed up. She walked up to me and started telling me about a little girl who was running around the park with no underwear or pants on a few days prior. Her dad instantly pops off with "she's talking about that because she's autistic." I responded with "aspergers?" He looked at me as if I was psychic. How could I have known that after only a minute of interaction. It's easy, I recognized it in her because it's in me as well. I was just recognizing my own kind. How mysterious that is to me, to be around somebody that I recognize in that way. Did I mention that she's ten?  Her and Ayden hit it off like fleas on a furry dog.  

How does this all fit into permaculture and what my destiny is? Asking me to be a community leader is sort of like asking a fish to live out of water. I'm simply not cut from that cloth, and now I understand why. They say that Aspies should concentrate on their abilities and not on their disabilities, and my ability is not in groups of people. If I could take the community and explain it to them each one on one, maybe, but that's not the way it works. It simply takes too much energy from me to be responsible for fostering community in person. It takes too much talking to people about trivial things.  I would rather dig a very deep hole all day long.  Writing on the other hand. I am definitely suited for rallying the troops in this form, with the written word. The irony is that the one thing I have determined is needed in this world is the one thing I am simply incapable of. I can do Permaculture, but I can't be concerned with convincing the zombies of the hologram that they should do permaculture. Yet permaculture is more than just putting the right plants in the right places while capturing rain water and building soil. It's about a way of life that centers around community.  

When I become interested in something, it quickly becomes an obsession. I read about it and do everything with it until I am exhausted and bored...usually. Permaculture is starting to fall into the exhausted with it category, and yet it can't be because everything I know intellectually says that it can't be. I came to Permaculture because of my obsessive study about the future of our planet. Yet what am I, one man, going to do about it? Plant some trees in my yard, grow some soil, collect some water? I want the entire thing intellectually, but in reality it's the last thing I want. It's like I told Dylan, one of the instructors of the Permaculture In Action class I attended, "I'll dig a hole a hundred feet deep wherever you want it for permaculture, but don't ask me to talk to people." I don't know, it's a conundrum for me. I've painted myself into an intellectual corner.

The "Whoville Chronicles" are now complete. Epiphany Now has never been about anything other than my epiphanies. So it is, and so it shall continue to be. I'm not sure where I'm going now, but I want to know my destiny, and so I have to figure it out. Unfortunately money has something to do with where I'm going, and that has nothing to do with what I want, because money is the last thing I want to be concerned about. Yet, I'm a husband, and a father...with another on the way, and the hologram does not care about my ideas about the change I would like to see in the world. I can't move to where the permaculture is right now because of money, and I can't spread it in Whoville because nobody gives a shit, and dealing with people in a community way is just not possible for me.

It appears that my destiny, at least in the near term, is to re-enter into the Matrix for a prolonged mission with the objective of money extraction. That means downloading some more credentials from the mainframe. It appears that come January, days before my 33rd birthday, I'll begin the download. The program is called EMT-Paramedic, and it's my families meal ticket. At least until the world starts caring about the future of our planet, sustainable food production, and our progeny's survival in the not too distant future. I'm not returning with my tail between my legs, and I think it's important to put that out there. When Neo was learning how to bend the rules in the Matrix, after he had unplugged, he hit the asphalt after falling from a building. It bloodied his nose, but he learned. Justin of the blog "Americana" said as much in a comment to one of my blogs. It's true. One thing I've learned from my resignation, and my dealings with the inhabitants of Whoville, is that the skills to reside outside of the Matrix require that bloody nose. This is by no means recognized by me as a defeat. Quite the contrary, it's only made me stronger.

Optimistic Pessimism Awesomness

Warning, this post is full of dorky badassness and it's meant to be read that way.  Ego having fun with itself, but maintaining the balls to be a spectacle for others amusement. A Kung Fu Panda tribute.  Cause he's pretty bad ass, and we should hang out.  In fact, we hang out every day at the Foxhaven. 

Honestly I spend too much time on the pessimistic spectrum, but then it's not as if you weren't warned. Especially if you've made it thus far in the saga that has been my life. The saga of bad luck? Is luck a real thing? Or is it just a fantasy that is brought on as a side effect of optimistic laziness? Hell if I know; I do know that I am indeed an optimistic pessimist. A good friend convinced me that I have a way with creating connections with other humans with words. She is correct, but I am unable, at least nearly, to do the same thing in person using sound. Musical sound maybe. I pretend like I know what a guitar is from time to time, at my most rapturously rhapsodic. Music is beautiful, and easy, if you know how to surf with sound. That is the only requirement. Anybody, no matter how intellectual, can learn to surf...in some way.

Today, I swung on a swing with my son, and we watched a crescent moon in the blue Carolina sky swing back and forth with us. There was a rainbow overhead as well. It was beautiful in the Wordsworth Zen sort of way. My sons middle name is Zen, and I'm almost convinced that he is a reincarnation of something Japanese. Maybe it's because I trained in Nihon Goshin Aikido for four years, and subsequently blossomed spiritually in Buddhism and not Christianity, the religion I was born to. My name is a Christian name. Aaron, Moses's brother. But it's also chalk full of scotch/irish. McCarty is my fathers last name and McCant's is my mothers maiden. This is my real name. Aaron McCarty. Names have always been important to me, just as age has been. I'm not afraid to be alive, and this is who I am.

I found myself in the bowels of an Applebees today, cause this is America, if'n you don't liike it, git out. I could explain why I ended up in an Applbees, but I have to much stinky gas to comprehend it. Those farts sure do feel good, and with all kinds of sauces to. What kind of sauce you want for dippin' boy. Hell, a pitcher of good ole Bud wasn't but 5 dollars. Shiiit, fill me up bubba. This is the insanity that American's spend their hard earned Jihads on. What the fuck? Seriously...I'm reminded of Bill Hicks in these times of rhapsodic reminiscences. I'm reminded of him telling marketers to kill themselves right now, no this is not a joke, if you are a marketer...kill yourself because you are destroying everything that is sacred and holy. There is a lot of wisdom to be found in the concept of letting food be your medicine and medicine be your food. Applebees is on the poison end of this medicine I'm sure. I can't prove it cause that shit taste so good, but I have a hunch. I much prefer to get my out food all Mexicano. I trust Mexican food for some reason. Maybe because it's at least got a hint of an honest tradition. Corn chips with multiple dips composed of things that are actually containing recognizable whole foods. Honest cheese and dead animals. And the poor workin' man beer of the Mexican is waayyyy better than his Northern conquerors. A 32 oz. glass of Dos Equis Amber draft puts Bud to shame. Especially when you are used to drinking crafted beer made to poetic perfection in a brewery 10 miles from your house.

R.J. Rockers is the true Beacon of Spartanburg SC, where I've spent an overwhelming majority of my life. That's as close to Whoville's actual address as I'm ever going to hint at as well. I'm proud to call Spartanburg my home, and I am indeed a true Spartanite. In fact, when I came home from bombing Afghanistan, smoking green on a USN air craft Carrier during "Operation Enduring Freedom", and potentially making little tall, hairy, tan babies of half Eastern and half Druid descent all over Asia (talk about a fuckin' real life Kung Fu Panda), my high school was a level clay field. Why, might you ask, would a high school that was built in the 60's be a clay field? One word...Walmart. Yes, they bought my god damn high school and fuckin' turned it into a Walmart Supercenter the size of a typical city. Ever seen Walle? Spartanite pride right there. This goes a long way towards explaining why I hate the man...and Walmart.  

I feel like this is all very boring. That's how I feel when I'm trying to be optimistic...boring. Yet, I do have a tale that I can tell. It's a true first person account of Aikido awesomeness. Then I'll conclude this rather challenging feat of optimism I'm writing just now. My chickens were recently moved in next to Trailer Park America in the Whoville sector of Palookaville, and I wanted to warn those who might try to mess with my chickens. I wanted them to understand that it would be a dangerous proposition to be dishonest in the general vicinity of my chickens asses, or eggs, or...asses. They needed to know that allowing their youngins to say...throw rocks at them...could possibly result in somebodies broken bones, or feelings for that matter. So I got real stoned on a plant (not the stones the kids were throwing at my chickens) and decided to dust off my 32 year old Aikido joints for a spectacle. It wasn't the first ninja roll I ever did as a 30 year old either. I had done a few ninja rolls for my wife and sons amusement in the past month.

So there I am in my chicken run staring at the end of a circular fence that composes the perimeter of it. It's made of that 4' tall green plastic fencing that you can buy at Box Store America. My intention is to run twenty feet to it at full bore and do a ninja roll over it in the direction of the local drug dealers house. First I had to prepare for the jump (I should also mention that I pole vaulted in High School). I had to know exactly how many strides to take before jumping into a horizontal position whilst sailing over said fence. My landing pad was grass at about six inches tall on a slight hill towards the chain link fence that's about five feet past the run. I walked to the opposite end of the circular run and took some gallivanting leaps in slow motion towards the other end of the run to mark my strides. I did this again, and again, speeding up each time to get a good average memory in my leg muscles. I looked like a complete ratard to anybody watching, including my wife who was busting her guts open laughing at my stupid ass (although secretly very worried that her son was gettin' ready to be fatherless due to me breakin' my fool neck). By this time some of the trailer park was peakin at me all stealth like through their used sheet curtains and brown cigarette stained windows. It was time to commit to my chickens welfare.

I took off like a boomerang gone mad, counted my barreling strides, and from a distance you could see the grass that was getting flung as my feet broke the sound barrier. I hit the final mark and blasted off into the atmosphere into horizontal flight. With the chain link fence approaching, I tucked my head and turned myself into a circle. Aikido is all circles. I lightly made contact with the ground and circled to my feet while allowing all of the force to exit my body through my feet and into the earth. I ended in the Aikido stance ready to start parring the laughter that was about to be blasted my way. There was no laughter, just the sound of deafness at my pure awesomeness. Who wants some was what I said to the drug dealin' trailer park as sound once again returned from the gravity my flying ninja roll had created. Ever since that day, they have been too scared to anger me with their ridiculousness...and my chickens have been safe. I'm a Zombie Whispering Green Wizard Permaculture Ninja, and if you want to get down, you'll never see me coming...or leaving.

So that's it, my highly inflated superhero sized autobiographical description. My most optimistic true tale. Po is correct, in Kung Fu Panda, it doesn't matter who you were. Who you want to be, and therefore become, on the other hand, does. It's all in the dancing interplay between your fate and your destiny. One is foretold and the other is created by you and your actions. How you are in the world is what matters when the chips are down and the bill is due. How you conduct yourself and your intentions towards life are what you are scored on karmically. Whatever you want to call it, it's there. Our times are interesting and dark. There is a looming cloud out in the distance of our technological, industrial Wasteland. The Wasteland does end, but not all brilliant and apocalyptic in the biblical sense. It ends one person at a time, and it has always done so.

The Fox Den Endangered

It's important to note how crucially important our living in Whoville is to my wife and I's intentional plan for our lives. When Aunt Bee offered her house to Wendy and I, it was the opportunity I needed to complete the puzzle of how to resign from the Matrix. The main problem for me was figuring out how I could live mortgage free while having a mortgage. Aunt Bee is the reason I was able to resign, because without her there is noway I would have done so with a wife and child. Even so, we took a high stakes gamble by moving in with somebody that neither one of us knew much about. We just knew that the family considered her crazy, but as I have said that means nothing to me because I consider the average person in our society to be completely insane. To me, if you are under the influence of the American Hologram's thaumaturgy, then you are by definition quite insane. I don't need to go into an explanation as to what exactly the Hologram is. I've blogged about it extensively here at Epiphany Now.

I was a few months into this experiment, dealing with the nuisance of the Whos, when Mordred and Tina LeFay attacked, and it was a serious injury. It called into question the viability of what we were doing in Whoville. As I've been illustrating, Whoville is not populated by awakened individuals. The populace of Whoville is not concerned with broadening their awareness or expanding their consciousness. They are not Peak Oil aware and do not care about climate change. PO is not even on the radar and climate change is just liberal conspiracy theory attempting to "fukin' mess with naescur god daamitt...fukin' liberals tryin' to spread that mooslim jibber jabber." There are non-redneck inhabitants of Whoville, but they are still unaware of the Hologram. This has been the most challenging aspect of living in Whoville for me. Here I am trying to spread Permaculture to a populace that is unaware that there is a problem with the American lifestyle to begin with. I'm at best a fledgling permaculturalists with very limited plant knowledge. I'm in no position to spread anything and need somebody to follow myself. On top of this I am being assaulted by completely retarded Southern Baptist Satan worshipers.

What exactly did he mean by "Satan's Authority"? Was it just his damaged brain spurtin' out the first thing that came to mind in the heat of our encounter. Is he actually worshiping Jebus in the front of the church and then Satan in the basement of the church with a handful of other ratards after the morning service? I don't know, and I don't really care to find out. I just want him to stay the hell away from our homestead because he's no good for us, or anybody else for that matter...to include himself. Aunt Bee later told me that Mordred had warned her that I had "the Earth spirit in'em." The "Earth Spirit"!!! What the fuck? No doubt this is some shit he's heard from his preacher. Apparently this is what he told Bee at their lunch just before he brought his scandaling ooziness to my homestead. They were sittin' in a Chick-filet (a southern baptist owned fast food joint...no really, you have to be a professed southern baptist to work there) with Mordred reading the bible out loud at the table to Aunt Bee over chicken biscuits. I'm not makin' this shit up either...it's non-fiction and being reported as it occurred to me.

When Wendy got home, I gave her the entire report of what had transgressed in her absence. She was furious and extremely embarrassed of her relatives. I was still in a state of shock for having been treated in that way by family. It's not an exaggeration to say that it caused some strain in our relationship as husband and wife, and for no other reason than her guilt over being related to that atrocity of a man, combined with my legitimate fear of her insane family (cause I haven't even breached the topic of her mom's crazy ass yet). After this incident I found out that Mordred and Tina were pretty much excommunicated from the Spencer family already for past shenanigans. The eldest brother Randy Spencer (and pretty much the only "normal" member of the Spencer family...at least as far as I've been able to determine), and Wendy's mother Susan, both disliked Mordred from their youth. Mordred stayed in Grandpa's house until he met Tina in his mid 20's. He stayed at home because he was lazy and didn't want to work. He spent his days smoking weed and getting drunk (not that there's anything inherently wrong with that) whenever he wasn't at church praising Jebus. That's where he met Tina actually...in church. Tina took the place of Grandpa Spencer for Mordred. I guess he just needs somebody to bitch slap his poor ass around and tell him what to think and do.

Aunt Bee was the only Spencer that stayed in touch with Mordred. He kept her around because she gave him money. In fact, just about everybody in Aunt Bee's life was around because she gave them money. That's how she has learned to relate to family, and it's also been a challenge getting her to understand that she doesn't have to pay for our affection. She doesn't see a problem with it, and actually enjoys the position it gives her. She likes buying things for people because she likes looking like she's got money, and she likes the position it puts her in, but also because she really is just a kind individual whom likes helping people.

I realize that Wendy and I are also benefiting from Aunt Bee. It's just that our relationship is a bit more symbiotic and fair. We are not taking her money...at least not directly. We have actually managed to save her money in utilities by getting her to understand that when it's nice outside you can turn the air off and open the windows, and that when it's cold outside you can put on clothing in the house and sit under a blanket rather than turning the thermostat up 10 degrees. When we moved in, Aunt Bee would turn the thermostat up to 80 degrees so that she could take a shower. She didn't like feeling cold when she got undressed to get into the hot shower. We got her a little electric space heater to heat just the bathroom up rather than the 2000 square foot trailer. We got her to stop buying paper towels as we use wash clothes in their place. We hang dry our clothing when we can. We stopped all of the money that was leaving the house for things like fixing leaking toilets, steam cleaning all of the carpet in the house every month, and cutting the dirt and weeds twice a week. If something needs fixin' or maintenance done, I do it for free. After all, it's my home now. My point is that we have saved Aunt Bee a lot of money by living the way that we do. Unfortunately I must report that all this has accomplished is to enrich the Matriarch and her conniving brood of vultures. All of the money, and then some, that we have saved Aunt Bee, she has given to the Whos. The Matriach of Whoville has her trained very well. Anytime Aunt Bee has extra money she ends up calling her and coming up with ways she can spend money on the Matriarch. They'll go out to eat, or get their hair cut, or go shopping. I understand that Bee likes spending money. It's not just the Whos fault. That doesn't take away from the fact that they are still taking advantage of her.

Wendy was enraged by Mordred. She decided that the best course of action would be to call 911 and report the incident so that we could have them trespassed. I talked her out of calling the police, but she printed up a trespass document online that was supposedly official, had me sign it, and mailed it certified mail to Mordred's residence. We never got confirmation that he signed for it. I have suspicions that Aunt Bee called and told them what it was so that they would refuse to sign for it. I could care less about the notice because if he ever shows up again, as I have said, the first thing I'm going to do is call 911. The second thing I'm going to do is get my 12 gauge. My suspicions about Aunt's Bee's honesty have been proven correct since the attack of Mordred and Tina LeFay. I'll get into that soon. The next adventure in the Whoville Chronicles involves something as simple as beating back the onslaught of Mother Nature. Of course this aspect of the story will also explore Aunt Bee's honesty, and therefore ethics, and the issue of how we will be able to meet our unspoken agreement to fulfill the conditions of this arrangement we have entered into with her.

The arrangement I'm talking about is our method of payment to her for allowing us into her home, now our home, to live utility and mortgage free. The unspoken agreement is that we will care for her into her "golden years." We will take care of her financial and medical concerns. We will care for her in old age as if she were our own beloved parent. She has no children, and her husband has passed. You are now qualified to make a biased opinion on how things would work if the Whos were to take charge of these issues for her. It's not as if the Matriarch required payment to help take care of her dying brother at the end of his life. The fact is, our agreement is just as beneficial to Aunt Bee as it is to us. As free as our mortgage and utility free lifestyle is, it comes at a cost...just not a financial one. In fact, we have been paying the cost of living this lifestyle since the day we moved here. Again, you are qualified to make your own biased opinion on the matter having read up to this point.

Before I get into the issue of Mother Nature's relentless onslaught, and the insane tactic our society uses to combat it, and how the issue of Aunt Bee's honesty weaves into this, I'll explore one other aspect of our situation. What we have done...moving in with family like we have, is an option that I imagine is available to a healthy portion of my readers. In fact, it's probably an option available to a majority of Americans. I'm talking about moving in with family to forgo the rat race. All that is required to drop out of the Matrix, or the American Hologram, is the ability to live mortgage/rent free. If you can manage that, than you can probably manage to not need your own vehicle. If you can live mortgage/rent free, and you don't require a vehicle, than you can probably get by without working. The only other issue is going to be the one of health insurance. I would say that this is the largest sacrifice my family has made by choosing this option. We are dealing with this now due to our second pregnancy.

I've written about this topic before. If you have any elders in your family, there is a good chance that they have a home (pending they haven't been sent to one of our amiable geezer freezers yet). There is a good chance that they spend a lot of money on getting things done around the house that they can no longer do themselves...like having the grass mowed, plumbing, and issues revolving around a houses tendency towards rot and decay. This is a potential opportunity for you...and your family. It's a way to tell the Hologram to go fuck itself without having money. That is mainly what the Whoville Chronicles are about. This is just one anecdotal report from one individual who is putting everything he's got into resigning from the Matrix/Hologram/Rat Race (it goes by many names), and doing so with a growing family. Of course there is always the potential option of moving back in with your parents. Naturally you have to grow the ability to not care about what people are going to say about you. Our society wants us to believe that you are not successful unless you have your own home and therefore lots of debt. It's the game that everybody else is playing. It's bullshit. The "ownership society," is how Bush put it. That's exactly right, as in the Corporatocracy owns your ass, and in perfect double think, you think you own it. What you own is the right to no longer participate.

The majority of the world, for the majority of recorded history, has lived with family for generations. A multi-generational household has always been the norm. It's my opinion that the industrial revolution is largely responsible for changing that fact. This could be boiled down further to our magical petroleum inheritance being responsible for the lose of the generational household. Why do we feel the need to have our own homes? What is wrong with living in a family unit beyond husband, wife, and children? Isn't this sorta what a tribe is? True, there is a lose of privacy, and? What does that really matter? Is it really that much of a nuisance to hear somebody else taking a shit, or making love, or having an argument? Does it really matter if your family happens to find out your business? Is it that important to be able to run around in your house naked playing grab ass and hide the sausage with your wife (or husband). The point I'm trying to make here is how much privacy do you need? At least privacy from your family. Besides, if you work for a corporation, it's not as if your ass hole has much privacy, nor the contents of your urine.

Living with family has some major challenges. I believe that those challenges can be overcome. The fact is that the world is pretty much finished supplying us with the infinite growth paradigm delusion. Beyond this, refusing to participate in the Hologram is just more authentic and honest no matter who you are. In the next segment of The Whoville Chronicles I'll be picking up where I left off. I'll be telling about Admiral Dumpy and how I managed to push her off of Aunt Bee's financial teat. To be clear, it was not my intention to do so. It just happened that my doing "the right thing" resulted in her being pushed off the teat...but not before she extracted one last bit of Whoville homage.

On Satan's Authority

I'm gonna slow down posting after this post...I didn't want to keep anybody waitin' around for this scene to resolve itself.  I noticed that "Mordred and Tina LeFay Spencer" got read more than "Grandpa's Whipping Bog."  People are busy, got jobs to work, and lives to live off of the net, and I don't want to take up too much time for those who are interested in reading Epiphany Now.  I'm going to try to keep it to one post a week for that reason.  I've already got the next post on the backburner...

After Private Dickweed's failure to get me to comply with his demands in my house, it was time for the witch to show herself. She began a barrage of assaults on my character. I had a beard of about three months at the time, I'm Scotch/Irish with some Prussian to boot, I grow hair like most people collect junk mail. "How are you going to get a job with a face like that," said the witch.

"I'm not looking for a damn job."

"Not looking for a job, so you're just planning on mooching off of Aunt Bee indefinitely?" Let's keep in mind here that neither one of these douche bags have a job, nor are they looking, and Private Dickweed had a beard longer than mine at the time. They both live in government housing and get government checks. "Don't you ever clean house?" As she points at the wreckage that was the kitchen. I hadn't had a chance to sweep and mop since the storm came through the day before.

"A storm just came through yesterday," I said incredulously. "And at any rate, who the hell are you to question me in my own house?"

"Your house," piped up Dickweed, "this is my sister's house." He made to get back into my personal space and the witch pushed him away and behind her. At this time it was getting pretty heated in the room. My face was red. I only had a couple of clicks left before I reached full bore savagery. My son was standing beside me loosing his shit at this point in response to the energy in the room. I picked him up and took him into his room and shut the door. I wasn't sure what was about to happen and I didn't want him to witness it. It was a mistake because he doubled up on loosing his shit when I left the room and shut the door. I opened the door and picked him up in an attempt to try and calm him. That's when Mordred decided to try and grow some balls.

"How long are you gonna stay in my sister's house?"

"We've moved in indefinitely. We're not going anywhere."

"And another thing, you don't tell my sister what to do. If she wants a t.v. she can have one. I don't want to hear any reports of you telling my sister what to do again...you hear me?" (Shortly before Wendy and I moved in with Aunt Bee she decided she would give her flat screen idiot panel to Rapunzel as a gift, making Mordred's comment that much more idiotic)

"What are you talking about? If she wants a television she can have one. I don't tell Aunt Bee what to do. She can do or have whatever she wants. What is he talking about Aunt Bee?"

"My house, my rules."  Said a monotone Bee. 

"We're gonna leave soon, and when I come back in a couple of weeks you better be gone." Commanded General Douchery. "You aren't welcome in this house."

"Don't you care at all about your niece's family? Don't you know that I'm married to your niece and this is her son that ya'll are freakin' out right now." He didn't say anything in reply. He could care less about his niece.

"All I know is that you need to pack your bags and leave." Said Mordred.

"Who do you think you are coming into our home like this, comin' at me like this? I could pack our bags and leave, and we'd go to California, and you'd never see your niece again. Don't you care about that?"

"So are you saying you are going to move to California then?" Said Mordred.

"I could, but Aunt Bee asked us to move here. I resigned from my job to move here. I didn't lose my job. This is all intentional.  I'm still an EMT intermediate by state, and by the National Registry of EMT's until 2014.  If I want or need to go back to work it won't be a problem.  Where are you workin' at?" Aunt Bee's brain was stuck on a loop, and from this point on all that she would say is "my house, my rules."

"You need to pack up and leave. You better be gone the next time I come here." Said Mordred. The tone had been escalating during this exchange. Ayden was still crying and freak'in out. I had a ball of anger in my gut that was growing unmanageable. I was beginning to worry for my son. I had to keep him safe, and I didn't want him to witness the Kraken. I began to become afraid because of this. I was afraid that I was going to lose it and force my son to take in primal violence. This kicked off an onslaught of emotion that I could do little with. I wanted to cry and at the same time I was getting close to the desire to kill. More because of what was to come then because of what had happened already. I sensed that it was only going to get worse, and I was right. We had only just moved in several months ago. Our house in Suck Hill was occupied by renters for the next year. We had nowhere else to go except California 2300 miles away. Wendy was in Charlotte. Her family was attacking me. Everything I was doing was being called into question because I was not going to be treated this way in my own home, or anywhere else for that matter.

"I've never in my entire life been treated this way, and by family nonetheless. Why are you treating me this way?" I said with a quiver in my voice.

"Because we don't want you here." And that's when I advanced on him. I set my son down and I started to move into his territory to do I don't even know what to him, but nothing good. Tina got between us and pushed Mordred towards the door. "Go outside," she commanded. He didn't protest much, just did what he was told and went outside. I picked my son back up since he was at my leg screaming. Tina came at me, and I had to put my arm up, bent at the elbow to keep her a foot away from my face. She backed me into the wall. I was holding my son.

"Lady, if you don't back up I'm gonna drop you." I said sternly.

"He's scared of me," she said, "he's scared of me...ha ha ha ha haaa, he's scared of a woman, look at him.  Go ahead boy, drop me!!"

"My house, my rules," cried Aunt Bee who was still covered with a blanket and rocking herself silly. "My house, my rules."  As she increases the speed of her rocking.

"He's scared of me, look at him Aunt Bee, he's about to cry." Indeed, I was. I had my son in my arms. I couldn't lose it on this woman because who would watch my son while my wife was gone to Charlotte incomunicado for the next five hours or so due to photographing somebodies special wedding day. In spite of all of this I felt myself losing control in the direction of reptilian violence. I was also feeling the need to flee, to give in, pack my son and I up and leave. I thought I'd call my wife from the road to California and tell her to meet me there. I wasn't going to deal with this, her family, any longer. I knew that I had one more click before I transformed into deadly raging berserker. I knew that if this happened I would be hauled off to jail, no questions. This was a woman after all. With one last ability to reach logical thinking I placed my son and I between this witch and our couch. This four feet of space allowed me to calm just enough to know that I could not lose control. I had to keep control of myself because I had to protect my son's best interest. However, I was ready to kill. In fact I've never been ready to commit deadly violence like that before or since that moment. I wanted to rip her head off, and that's when Mordred brought his punk ass back into the house. This is also when I could no longer keep from using four letter anglo saxon words.

"You two get the fuck out of this house now before I end up going to prison for murder."

"I'll leave when I'm good and ready," said Mordred.

"Who gives you the authority to come into this home and treat your family like this?" I screamed Mordred with my voice cracking. His answer baffled me. In fact, it still baffles me, and I'm not sure exactly what he meant by it. But this is what he said.

"I'm here under the authority of Satan!!!" The cat was out of the bag. I could tell by Tina's face that she was upset with him for divulging this information. These two spend most of their time at their Baptist church. The kind where they speak in tongue. I knew as much, but what exactly did he mean by "under the authority of Satan"? I didn't want to find out.

"Get out, the both of you, get out before I kill you. In fact, you aren't welcome here ever again. I'm not going anywhere. The next time I see either of you the first thing I'm going to do is call 911." That gave me the idea to get the phone. Holding the phone I said "if you don't leave right now I'm going to call 911, and then I'm going to choke your stupid ass until you stop trying to breath."

"My house, my rules," Aunt Bee was still repeating to herself. Tina pushed Mordred out of the house and left behind him. I watched as they got in their vehicle to flee. The anger dropped out of me as they left and it was replaced by a storm of worry, regret, and sadness. I didn't understand what had just happened. Why? I didn't know Aunt Bee well enough yet to trust her. I wasn't sure what she had told them at lunch. I wasn't sure what to believe any longer. What was I going to do now? Staying here wasn't an option because I was never going to be treated like that again if I could help it. I went into the kitchen and sat down at the kitchen table and began weeping. I was an emotional wreck at this point. It felt like I had all of my energy drained from me. All I could do now was to weep, and shake, as the threat had temporarily passed. What had I done by moving my family here, to Whoville? What was I going to do now?

By this time Aunt Bee was standing in the kitchen in front of me nervously.

"Do you know how long it's been since I've cried?" I asked. "The last time I cried was bout eight years ago. What did you tell them at lunch? Why did they come here and act that way? I've never been treated like this in my entire life. Not by anybody, and especially not family. Is this how your family treats its members?"

"I don't know why he came here and did that?" Said Bee.

"What did you tell them at lunch? What was he talking about with the television. Do you think we are keeping you from a television?"

"I don't know what he was talking about. I just told him that I wanted a television in my room so that I could watch church on Sunday. I didn't tell him that you were keeping me from a television."

"So he just came up with that all by himself?" I asked.

"Yes, I didn't say anything about ya'll except that we were all happy together in my home."

"So he just made all that up? They came here and attacked me all by themselves?"

"I don't know why he did that." Said Aunt Bee as her eyes wandered off into la la land.

"I need you to understand something. I'm never going to be treated like that again." I said. "You have to make a decision now. It's either us or them. If I'm going to stay here than he is not welcome back again."

"I asked you to move here." Said Bee.

"Do you understand what I'm saying to you now? They are not welcome back here, or I'm packing our bags and taking my family to California. What's it gonna be?"

"Well I'll just have to call him and tell him to not come back here. If he wants to see me he'll just have to meet me out for lunch somewhere away from here."

"The next time I see them I'm going to call the police, and if they don't leave I'll be getting one of my guns out to make them leave. There won't be any talking. I refuse to be treated this way, and I won't let my son witness something like this again if I can help it." That's when the phone rang. It had been about ten minutes or so since Mordred and Tina LeFay left. It was Mordred, and I could hear what he was saying. Aunt Bee told him that I was very upset and it would be best if they not come back and that she would just meet them out if they wanted to see her.

"Okay...okay...bye bye," and she hung up the phone. "He said he was sorry for acting that way. He said he had no business acting that way in my home and that he was sorry." I heard the conversation. He did apologize...to Aunt Bee, but not to me. He didn't tell her to tell me that he was sorry because he wasn't. He just had time to figure out that their brilliant plan had failed. He had time to begin worrying that the Aunt Bee money train had derailed. He was calling for immediate damage control after their failed plan.

"Don't tell Wendy about this" pleaded Bee.

"Why would I not tell her? She is my wife!"

"Just don't tell her, she doesn't need to know. I don't want her to worry about it." But it was already too late. I had texted Wendy shortly after they left. The text read:

"you're family is crazy...I think we're going to have to move to California because I won't be treated this way again."

Mordred and Tina LeFay Spencer

Here we are. We've finally arrived at the event that the Black Snakes coming foretold to me. I'll just jump right in this time. My wife had just left to Charlotte NC to photograph a wedding when coincidentally enough her uncle Mordred and his wife Tina LeFay decided to schedule a lunch with Aunt Bee. They showed up to our house and the mood was off, but I couldn't figure out why exactly. It had been a good eight years since I'd had the misfortune of dealing with Mordred and his family. He's a sickly looking man in his early 50's. He's got a gray beard that he keeps about an inch long complete with beady eyes that exist in two holes of sickness. Misery exudes from every hair on the man's head and you can't help but feel the terrible magnetism as it attempts to pull you into its suffering.

They came into the house and he appeared to be angry at something, while she had a fake plastic smile that scared me even more than his miserable facial expression. I had no idea what or why. Aunt Bee wanted to show my wife and I's new bed off for some reason. Just as we moved, my wife managed to score us a 4000 dollar king size Kincaid bed with a memory foam mattress for 250 dollars. One of her friends boyfriends parents were selling their house and farm to move to Virginia to be farm hands there. They were downsizing their lives, just as we were, only they were going to be less comfortable doing so while we were planning to be more. They had to liquidate all of their things at fire sale prices so that they could get on with it, and that is how we ended up with that beautifully ornate and expensive bed that Aunt Bee wanted to show off. We all went to my bedroom, which was weird, but Aunt Bee is nothing if she's not idiosyncratic, so I just pigeon holed the weird behavior between her brother and her at that. It was extremely weird with all four of us in my room looking at my bed. Mordred walked in and just as quickly walked back out. "Did you see the bed?" asked Aunt Bee of Mordred. Tina was standing there with a creepy large shit eating grin on her face. "Yeah, I seen it," quipped Mordred as he departed from the room more aggravated and miserable than before.

Shortly after this strange scene they were on their way to Chick-filet to have some chicken biscuits for lunch. Mordred and Tina had several plans for that day. One of the main plans was to extract as much of Aunt Bee's money as possible to help pay for their sick daughter Rapunzel's medication no doubt. Which of course is a crock of shit since they have medicare and medicaid and all other manner of government check on account of their sick daughter. They have simply gotten used to Aunt Bee giving them money to help with Rapunzel. That money train had ended shortly after our arrival, which had little to do with us except for the Who's upping the pressure on Aunt Bee's money because of our presence. Tribute must be paid in Whoville. I called my wife while they were at lunch to report on the weirdness and to get her opinion on her uncle's strange behavior, but she didn't answer because she was busy with the wedding. Ayden Zen and I decided that we would take'er easy and watch the "Fantastic Mr. Fox," sometime after they had been gone. That's what we were doing when the three of them came back from lunch. Tina kept insisting that "Fantastic Mr. Fox" was a "strange little program," and I kept on insisting that it was not a program but a movie. We went back and forth with this behavior for a minute or so, and I realized then that something was terribly off with this woman. She was watching the idiot screen with the movie on it like I imagine I would watch a Donkey show in Tijuana, and she kept repeating "this is a strange little program."

Mordred was not present, just Tina and Aunt Bee. Aunt Bee informed me that Mordred was outside having a look at some of the damage on the back garage. The wood around the door frames to the garage had begun rotting at the bottom where the wood meets the ground. It's just exterior wood that's not foundational. Mordred had quoted Aunt Bee 900 dollars to fix it which amounts to 20 dollars or so in 2x4's and his time. I told her I would fix it for free. However, that, apparently, was why he was not in the house upon their return. "Maybe you can go out there and talk to him about it," said Aunt Bee innocently enough. That was a good idea I thought. After all, the man's work was contracting and I figured I could pick his brain and learn a few things about what I needed to do to fix the garage. I didn't know at the time that the man hated my very existence.

I went outside and he was not at the back garage. I walked over to the top garage, the one near the house which features my man cave inside, and just as I approached the garage out came Mordred. He was in my man cave, snooping. He came barreling out of the garage having no doubt sensed my presence outside and therefore having his snoopathon cut short. "Did you have a look at the bottom garage?" I asked. He just sneered at me with a look of hatred as he passed by on his way back to the house. He didn't say a word, but the look on his face sent my defense alarm off into a high pitch scream. Something was very wrong with what had just happened. I turned around and followed him into the house fast on his heels. I had herbage in that there garage. I had reason to be worried beyond that look on his face. Aunt Bee is old school, and while she is on a powerful regimen of prescription frankenchemical fukitol pharmaceuticals, they are all prescribed by a doctor and legal. Herb on the other hand is not recognized by her as anything other than "Refer Madness." Consequently, after this happening, I began the practice of keeping all herbal medicine and paraphernalia under lock and key in a safe. Luckily for me, his look had nothing to do with my modest herb stash for he found it not.

He entered the house and quickly traveled into my bedroom. I was right behind him. "Hey, where are you going man?"

"To the bathroom," he gurgled as he entered my room. My wife and I have the master bedroom which features a pretty large bathroom area. It's got a large tub, a separate shower, a toilet, two sinks with a large mirror, and a very large walk in closet. It's not a bathroom that's meant to be used by guests as you have to go through the master bedroom to get to it. There is, however, another full bathroom in the living room. He was completely aware of this.

I later found out that Mordred, Tina, and Rapunzel had lived in this house with Aunt Bee for a six month stay a couple of years before our arrival. They left on their own accord, and it was never meant to be a permanent situation. Their house had been foreclosed on and they needed a place to stay while they got their free government housing lined up. Upon their departure from living with Aunt Bee, Tina LeFay took the opportunity to tell Aunt Bee that they would never live with her again. Tina LeFay did not appreciate the way Aunt Bee didn't let her rule the roost in Aunt Bee's house. There was no thanks for letting us live with you, just a fuck you very much we'll never live with you again.

"Wait, I don't think you understand, this is Wendy and I's private bedroom. There's another bathroom in the living room." This kicked off the psychological battle that was to ensue. I had no idea. He turned around and quickly appeared in my personal space with his big gnarly finger waging an inch from my face. "Let's get something straight" he growled. "This is my sister's house. You are a guest in this house, and I'll do what I want to while I'm here." He turned, entered the bathroom, and slammed the door. I experienced a sharp pain as my lower jaw slammed into the floor in disbelieve. What, pray tell, the fuck had just happened? My brain shorted out as it tried to wade through the disbelief. I paced back and forth in my room, next to my bed, next to my dresser, next to my wife's dresser, next to our stuff...in our bedroom, and tried to figure out what the hell to do now. I exited the room after envisioning myself kicking the door down and strangling that piece of shit, but I had plenty more wherewithal to remain all tactful and diplomatic like at that point. My son was home, and I didn't want him to witness me strangling somebody and consequently being cuffed and hauled off to the slammer.

I exited the room and headed to the living room where Tina and Aunt Bee were to report my disbelief about what was occurring. "Mordred is in the bathroom in our room," I said to Aunt Bee. She looked up and said "there's another bathroom right there if you need to use it," and she pointed at the bathroom in the living room. "I know that," I said with my brain still shorted out by the weirdage, "I live here." Tina was looking at me with a very large maniacal grin. It was all going according to plan. I went back to my room and paced some more just outside of my bathroom. "This is not cool man," I said through the closed door. I turned and went back out to the living room to wait for Mordred's punk ass to finish doing whatever he was doing in my bathroom. Or walk in closet for all I knew. I keep my guns in a trunk in my closet. I keep a lot of my personal stuff in my closet as does my wife. It's in the bowels of my bedroom. It's a pretty private location to keep my private stuff. This ass hole was not respecting my space. I was standing in the kitchen after about ten minutes had passed with him in my bathroom when he finally emerged from my bedroom. The look on his face was now more of a grin. It was now more of a you're gonna get used to this behavior boy, and you're gonna do what I say. Only "no, no I'm not fuck stick. I'm gonna fuck you up if you don't change your tone" is what I was thinking as my brain clicked over one more notch towards savagery.

He walked passed me and sat down in my lazy boy, the one that I had replaced the one that was given to the Matriarch with. It was about to be on like Donkey Kong. I stood there transfixed on Mordred. I could hear Tina's cackles echoing in her mind as her plan was so beautifully working. Mordred pointed his worthless finger at me, and then pointed it at the couch just next to him, looked me in the eyes with his sickness and boomed a large "sit downnnnn." I just stared in amazement. "Sit DOWNNNNN" he popped off again. "SIT DOOOWWWNNNN" he commanded for a third time. I could see in his face that he was a scared coward only doing what he was told. "Who do you think you are?" I asked still trying to sort this behavior out. After all, this assault was coming from family...at least technically. Not blood, but family nonetheless. He just snickered at me in reply and looked to his witchy wife, Tina, to take the helm of the plan to be rid of me.

Grandpa's Whipping Boy

I was going to wait until Tuesday to post this next segment of the "Whoville Chronicles," but I've got the next three posts finished already.  I see no point in just sitting on them.  

Evil is a real thing, and I know that because I have met it face to face a few times in my life. I've even been tricked into helping it from time to time. I'm indirectly responsible for an unknown amount of innocent death by bombs in Afghanistan. The carrier I was on, the U.S.S. Carl Vinson, dropped three million tons of ordinance on that god forsaken desert mountain land. I did my part helping the nuclear power plant function to make the steam that made the whole thing possible. Evil goes by many names and comes in all different shapes and sizes. Although I participated in that evil, it didn't feel as diabolical as a much smaller breed. The insult of the evil I'm speaking of now pales in comparison to that boat evil I participated in while serving in the USN, but it shook the foundation I stand on just as powerfully. This evil was dished out by Mordred and Tina leFay Spencer...in-laws.

Mordred Spencer is the youngest of the Spencers, and his depravity has no bottom. Even after the assault I'm going to write about, as terrible as it was to me, I still feel sympathy for his misery and pain. Nobody should endure the type of suffering that he has endured, but I'm convinced his suffering is the hand of fate. We make our own beds, and we sleep in them. Mordred's suffering started with Grandpa Spencer I'm sure, but I know very little about it. I'm quite certain that it involved grandpa's whip, and Mordred does a good job perpetuating the Spencer Crazy. His wife, Tina LeFay, is an exceptionally witchy witch. She is one of the only people whom have ever brought me to the reptilian core of my brain. After her, I learned what the saying "seeing red" really means. I was never as close to killing another person as I was with her. I could easily be writing this from a prison cell for 2nd degree murder because of that witch, Tina LeFay. But enough chirpin' this shit up...let's move on with the story.

It was some time in early spring, just after the Black Snake Drone incident that kicked this whole clusterfuck off. I went to Asheville and initiated into permaculture via an opening ceremony that featured a fire, and the calling of ancestors in a quasi new agey ceremony meant to add depth to the experience. I brought a piece of maple wood from our new home in Whoville to burn in that fire, and I called the spirit of my recently deceased maternal grandmother (who died a week before) to that ceremony. I blew on that piece of maple wood and threw it into the fire. I was supposed to state my watershed as I did so. This was a practice deriving from some Native American spirituality. Apparently "tribe" derives from "tributary," and this all has to do with the watershed dictating where you belonged. I wasn't positive about my watershed, but it didn't matter. I stated that I was from everywhere and that my watershed was the rain that fell from the sky. My people are all people who can treat one another with mutual respect. This is my only requirement...respect. If you treat me with respect, I will abide your presence next to mine, and I will reciprocate that respect. My people are all people who practice this simple ethic for conduct, but my tribe was etched out that day as a Post Petroleum Human Tribe of Permaculture.

I drove back down the mountain after initiating into this new tribe, and I immediately had to deal with Mordred and Tina Spencer. The day after I returned from Asheville a storm blew threw Whoville. 60 mph winds and quarter sized hail laid waste to my fledgling permaculture design. The roof blew off of my chicken coop and I watched as the birds faced the brunt of that storm unprotected. Archimedes, the rooster, stood tall as a beacon for his hens, as they were pummeled by climate change. Just after the storm passed, my wife and I were busy replacing the coop roof when the Mad Madam Mine, high matriarch of Whoville, called to work some of her evil magic. We were down at the coop replacing the tarps that composed the roof, and Aunt Bee hollered down to us frantically. "The Mad Madam's roof blew off," cried Aunt Bee, "can you go over there and help her fix it."

The Mad Madam had been hard at work fucking with me since the day I arrived. A few weeks prior to this storm, the Matriarch had Aunt Bee send me over to her house to get a free, like new, computer that she had no use for. It was left by some family member. I went on over to the Matriarchs dilapidated farm house, and was shown to the attic via the stairs that led up to it. I poked my head up into her attic and there it was, an old CRT computer monitor from the 80's. It didn't even have a power cord to it. I grabbed a hold of it and brought it down from the attic. "I can't use this," I said to the Mad Madam, "and even if I could there's no power cord." "Ohh," she said "I wasn't sure about it and I thought you might could use it. What about any of this other stuff?" She pointed to a pile of refuse that she had put together for this moment. I picked threw it just to be nice. It featured an impressive supply of worthless junk that needed to be hauled off to the dump. There was an old c.d. case from the 90's, some tacky clothing, a particularly worthless and flimsy cooler with a tear in the side, and various other consumer widgets just past their expiration dates. "I'll sale you the whole lot for 30 dollars," said the Mad Madam.

"No, I can't use any of it...thanks anyways."

"Well alright, so you don't want the computer then?"

"No," I said.

"Well just set the computer down and I'll haul it off to the dump." Now keep in mind that this thing weighed in the neighborhood of 40 pounds and the Mad Madam is in her lat 60's early 70's. I'd just be an ass to not take it at this point.

"No, that's alright, I'll haul it off to the dump for you, I've got plenty of trash that needs to be hauled off anyways so it's no trouble." (it turns out that I had to illegally dump the damn thing at the dump due to new regulations. In order to be rid of it legally I would have had to have driven to the main dump 30 miles away rather than the satellite dump that I make use of 4 miles away. I basically smuggled the damn thing into the dump via a contractor bag...which was illegal, this is the Mad Madam's type of magic).

"Well thank you" said the Mad Madam Mine as I turned to leave with the piece of shit CRT monitor with no power cord. That bitch new what she was doing. She got me over there to force me into hauling that piece of shit off and to try to sell me some worthless shit. The whole thing was an attempt to pinch some money out of me. She learned that I was pretty impervious to being taken advantage of directly. But she still ultimately got her way by forcing me, through my kindness, to haul that computer off (which by the way, I would have freely done if only I was asked...but that's not how things are done in the south).

Around the same time she managed to steal a 600 dollar micro suede recliner from Aunt Bee. She did that by convincing Aunt Bee that she needed it more. Wendy tried talking Aunt Bee out of it, but by the time we were informed it was too late because Aunt Bee had already "gave her word." We had two of these recliners in the house. One of them was somewhat broken because the ottoman had a bad habit of not staying in the up position. When the weight of your legs is applied it limply lowers to the ground. The one she gave to the Mad Madam was identical in every way except the ottoman actually worked. Not only did the Mad Madam cry her way into this recliner (that's how she manipulates Bee...by crying to her on the phone about how poor she is), she also managed to force me to deliver it to her house. I put the damn thing in my truck and drove across the street to deliver it. She directed me into the mysterious Who daughters room. "You don't want this in the living room," I asked. "No, just put it in my mysterious Who daughters room...she's going to use it there." I delivered it to the mysterious who daughters room, just in front of an idiot panel. I was more than a bit incredulous as there was barely any room for it and no need really. It was just that she enjoyed taking whatever she could get from Aunt Bee. Shortly after this incident I found myself delivering a 500 dollar kitchen table to the Mad Madam courtesy of Aunt Bee. My wife and I began to fear that the Matriarch of Whoville would somehow talk her way into having us deliver our shit to her house for free. This was the only behavior I saw from the Mad Madam Mine. Just, how much can she take from Aunt Bee just for the sake of taking. It's very difficult behavior to abide because it's very transparent. Aunt Bee is aware of it, but she doesn't mind due to the 19 years of Who conditioning. She's been conditioned to not mind that it requires tribute to live amongst the Whos. I, on the other hand, do not pay tribute.

So when the Mad Madam called up to the house after the storm to try and force me into helping her, I told my wife that the Matriarch of Whoville could go fuck herself. My wife saw that I was at my whits end with the Who's, and walked up to the house to explain to Aunt Bee that I was busy dealing with the carnage of the recently passed storm at our own house. She told her to have the Matriarch call over to Admiral Dumpy the Chicken Liver Extraordinaire's house and have her fat dumpy ass get up on the roof and fix it. That's just what happened. Admiral Dumpy took her fat ass over there and fixed the siding that had blown off of the house, not the roof. Fuckin' evil ass triflin' witchy bitch and her god damn conniving Who brood. I know she was over there with her fuckin' binoculars watching us fix the coop and that's why she called with her "roof damage" cackling the entire time. That's the kind of trifflin' shit the Who's practice as a way of life. Just how bad can they fuck with your no tribute payin', interloper, not from around here ass. Just who do I think I am living in Whoville and not paying tribute anyways?

The Mad Madam has managed to take advantage of my kindness since the "roof damage" incident, but I'm constantly ever vigilant against her black magic. Another time she managed to get me to haul all of her trash off for free because she was sick with a bladder infection from drinking nothing but soda religiously. Somehow that translated to me hauling off all of the Who's garbage to include the Chicken Liver's due to her association with the lesbian Who. I even offered to haul off her trash every week, when I haul ours off, if she would only start recycling. In this county it's commingled recycles as well, so it's just two separate containers that you need. Paper and cardboard is one and glass/aluminum/plastic is the other. The Mad Madam Mine, shitty Matriarch of Whoville declined my offer on account of she couldn't be bothered with that liberal douchary practice of recycling. She'd continue hauling off her own trash, thank you very much, and don't get any of that liberal douchary on me.

I meant to go into the story of Mordred and Tina LeFay Spencer, and ended up being sidetracked in more Whoville Who's weedy growth of conivationing conivations somehow. I don't know, maybe it's therapy for me to tell it. The world needs to know how shitty the Who's are...what can I say. The storm had passed and wrecked a lot of my labor. The house was a wreck on the inside from having leaves and various other outsidery tracked in after the storm. Two maple tree branches a good eight to ten inches in diameter and 20 to 30 feet long snapped off and took flight in our front yard due to that storm as well. Luckily they blew to the south therefore missing our house just to the east and 20 feet away from the tree. The two branches flew about fifty yards before stopping just at the fence that surrounds the perimeter of our property. Another foot or so and we would have been paying a lot of money to replace the chain link fence that would have been demolished.

The next day I got up and saw my wife off to Charlotte where she had a wedding to photograph. Aunt Bee informed me that her brother Mordred and his family were going to be showing up to take her to lunch. There relationship is a very unfortunate one. Mordred has been sucking on her bank account tit like a feral leech for quite some time now. His main excuse is his daughter. She is 18 years old now, miraculously, seeing as how she had her pituitary gland removed when she was around eight years old. I had met Mordred, Tina, and their daughter Rapunzel a couple of times in the past. I had gone to their home for a thanksgiving shortly after my wife and I started dating. This was one of the only Spencer events I can remember all of the Spencer's together. They don't even like each other, so it's rare to have them all together. In fact, it hasn't happened since and that was around eight years ago. At any rate, I wasn't particularly impressed with either Mordred or Tina. I thought Mordred was kind of a push over wussy who was just more pathetic and miserable than anything. I thought Tina was exceptionally annoying and superficially nice, and not very good at either. I just chalked them both up to being shaped into who they were by their tragic daughter Rapunzel's plight.

Rapunzel Spencer is unfortunate all around. She has no friends and her parents have kept her confined to their home her entire life. She's been home schooled by her witch of a mother Tina leFay. Due to her pituitary gland being removed at a young age she has had little to no growth. Her body is that of a 10 year old, and any growth that she has achieved has been due to hormone therapy. She's quite difficult to be around due to her social awkwardness due to her lack of interaction with the world outside of their twisted home. Luckily for this tragic lot they have Jebus to take them by the hand and lead them to heaven. How you worship Jebus and Satan at the same time I'm still trying to figure out. I guess it doesn't have to make sense, but seeing how this is the beginning of page five, I'll have to get into that in the next segment of the Whoville Chronicles.