Month: August 2022

Boo Fucking Hoo

Resistance

Look who’s got all fwightened:

FBI Director Christopher Wray has claimed “deplorable and dangerous” threats have been made against the agency following the raid on former President Donald Trump’s private residence in Florida.

What did you think was going to happen?  That Americans would nod approvingly at yet another instance of over-the-top FBI actions?  [See Monday’s post for one prime example]

“I’m always concerned about threats to law enforcement,” Wray said. “Violence against law enforcement is not the answer, no matter who you’re upset with.”

Unless law enforcement is behaving more like an occupying army than actual enforcers of the law.  Once more, with feeling, J.D. Tucille’s excellent quote:

“If cops continue to play at being an army of occupation, they should expect the subjects to play their role in return. Vive la résistance.”

But by all means, FBI Director Wray, please continue to let your black-clad goons oppress us.  Then when it all goes to shit on you — and one day, it must — wonder how people could be so unreasonable and deplorable.

You little Stasi bastard.  Don’t trip on the steps going up to the platform.

This Just In

Gratuitous Gun Pics, The Gun Thing

…from Collectors:

It’s not often that Collectors offers a real price bargain — they’re not a discount outlet, by definition — but this most certainly is.

Of all the .22 pistols ever made, the Trailside is the one I’ve lusted after the most.  I’ve fired a couple, and each one left me speechless with its match trigger and astounding accuracy.  Add Swiss-watch mechanical action and you have, I think, quite possibly the best .22 pistol you can get.  And yes, I offered to buy each one from its owner, and both just laughed merrily as they pried their guns from my envious fingers and put them away.

And here’s the point:  yeah, $650 is a lot for a .22 — but have you seen the price of .22 pistols recently?  Others, of considerably less quality, are selling for about the same nowadays, which makes this a steal at the price.

Aaaargh.  Want.

When It Hurts To Eat

Food & Drink

I’m the grocery shopper in our household, not just because New Wife still hasn’t got used to the different brands and such in the U.S., but because as I’ve said before, there’s not much goes on in a Kroger or whatever that I don’t know about.

So you certainly don’t have to tell ME that grocery prices are going through the roof thanks to Bidenflation.

My average spend, or “ring” per visit has typically been around $40 – $70 each week (the upper end if I’m buying a little meat or deli), and it’s been in that ballpark for about the past five years.  The only time it would be higher than that was if we were buying for company, i.e. when family or friends were coming round for dinner.

Now?

Since the beginning of the year, I can count on one hand the number of times that my ring has been less than $100 — and that’s after cutting back severely on quantities, buying smaller packs and / or cheaper, buying certain items (e.g. deli or frozen foods) less frequently, using all the tricks of the trade I know from my four decades in the supermarket business to make my grocery dollar stretch further.  I probably buy, in item count, about 25% less than I used to buy;  and still the average basket ring is over $100.

Now too, I drive about twice a week less frequently than I used to — combining trips to the bank, say, with trips to the supermarket or farmers’ market, trying to stretch the fuel as much as I can, and over a month, I’m probably in the car about a dozen times less than my old average.

Here’s the thing, though:  gas prices go up and down, and we’re all used to seeing that.  When it comes to grocery prices, however, they never come down.  It’s just a fact of life.

Thank you Biden, you motherfucker, you and all your foul little government apparatchiks who have pooled their efforts to make America unaffordable in the Great Reset.

Real Drought

Weather

Back when I lived in the old Racist Republic, I remember reading a newspaper story of a family who lived on a farm in one of the more arid areas of the country.  One day, the farmer’s twin boys (aged 7) ran excitedly into the house and told their mother that the sky had “broken”.  When she went outside, she saw that it was raining.  The boys had never seen rain before.

In places like that, a seven-year drought is admittedly extreme, but it’s certainly not unknown.

In more temperate climes, though, a six-month drought can be seen as catastrophic:

Europe on course to suffer worst drought in 500 YEARS

You can ignore pretty much all  the copy in the above link, because it’s the same old dreary “climate change is going to kill us all” bullshit.  But the pictures are breathtaking, e.g. this one in Holland:

…where “riverboats” have become “mudboats”.

Elsewhere, you have stories like this one, where one foresighted guy has stored many thousands of gallons of rainwater in underground tanks to keep his garden going.

If I were him, though, I would have kept shtum  about it because this being Britishland, I wouldn’t put it past the local council to force him to pump it all out and “share” it with his neighbors.

Sic semper potentas.

All that said, however, the European heat wave has had some benefits: