So, again, not funny, but hey, not every terrible thing that happens in Florida has a ridiculous side. Sometimes it just sucks. DOn’t worry, this is the last of it…back to funny-ha-ha next Friday.
A two-year-old boy from Nebraska, Lane Graves, was attacked by an alligator and dragged into the Seven Seas Lagoon at a Disney Land resort, despite their “very proactive program” of “removing alligators that pose a threat.” The body was found sixteen hours later. The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission stated that in excess of two-hundred-twenty alligators were removed from the resort from 2006 to 2015, then increased to more than 40 from 2015-2016 alone. After Graves’s death, removals doubled to eighty-four in 2017. A few days prior to the incident, four six-foot or larger alligators were removed from the park, and two days after the body was recovered, five alligators were removed and euthanized. It’s almost as if wildlife lives there.
Despite a history of domestic violence and being investigated twice by the FBI for alleged ties to terror networks, Omar Mir Seddique Mateen not only passed a 3-day wait period to purchase a handgun, as per Florida Law, but was also able to walk out of the story with an AR-15-type gun the same day of purchase—again, as per Florida law. He went on to kill 49 people and wound 53 at the gay nightclub, Pulse, in Orlando. He was shot eight times by police on the scene with no drugs or alcohol in his system and wearing two pairs of socks.
To be honest, I have spent very little time on this blog lately. All the posts from The Beast of Gévaudan and Florida Man were scheduled months ago, and while Beast ended a whole ago, Florida Man has just come to an end (citations notwithstanding). And from those citations, Florida Man Friday will continue, I believe, at least until March. [I need to update the Florida Man table of contents, which I will, soon.]
So, what’s been going on…well, I started work on my first non-fiction book — a band biography of the fabulous Swiss tech-thrash trio, Coroner. Super excited about it. I’ve been digging into old magazines and fanzines (which really are a little social habitat of their very own — taking me way, way back to my teen years) and sorting through the many varied releases, both official (yay) and pirated (boo-hiss). I’ve collected what is probably the most complete collection of tour dates and am reaching out to gig attendees for their best memories of particular shows. I’ve got a bunch of contacts, kindly provided by Marky, but have yet to really reach out for interviews, as I need to get solid with all of this information myself before I start bothering people with questions, especially questions relating to activities from, geez, 30+ years ago. All in all, happy with the work, happy with the progress, happy thinking it through and putting things together.
2020, eh? Sucks. Since about March, I’ve seen/heard much commentary on the difficulties of isolating/quarantining, but I have to say, I didn’t start getting itchy until about August or September, and only then when it really hit home that I couldn’t leave the country. For whatever reason, that bothered me more than being stuck in my house. Well, there are known reasons that I won’t get into, but suffice to say, I needed an attitude adjustment, which I managed, and now I’m back to what I suppose many writers do — we stay home, researching and writing. Though, admittedly, it’d be much easier on everyone involved, and faster, if I could hop on a plane and spend a few weeks in Zürich to physically go through these zines and mags myself. Otherwise, I’m relatively content to keep riding this out in my study.
Been painting a little, too. It functions as meditation, so I do both. Hit the gym (the garage). Deal with my fluctuating perimenopausal hormones — what a complete fact of life shitshowthat’s been.
In terms of Covid itself, it’s inching ever closer. For months it had been friends or family of friends, which is disconcerting enough, but lately, it’s been friends and family, directly. My sister and her guy have just pulled through, though she was at the ER yesterday for Covid-related pleurisy, which, apparently, can be an issue even in the recovery phase (she’s okay so far). Thankfully, an elderly aunt tested negative. And friends, whom we care about as much as family. So far, though, no one’s been admitted to hospital and everyone’s recovered or recovering.
It’s fucking wild out there. Everywhere (for the most part), but we must concede that the United States has screwed this up probably more than anyone. We can blame Trump, sure, and he deserves an ass-load of it, but honestly, much of this was basic common sense. Basic survival instinct. That should have kicked in, right? What can we say about a society who’s collectively lost its foundational instinct for survival? Well, not much good can be said of that, and it speaks volumes to where we’ve been politically and where I suspect we’ll go. Unfortunately, even if the knuckle draggers are a minority, that’s all it takes for a virus to spread out of control, and the majority suffer for it. We can say the same politically, and despite the light reprieve, I don’t have very high hopes that 2022 or 2024 is going to mitigate the condition of the society that welcomed this entire mess. I think we might be too far gone. But, who knows…?
Speaking of how suck-ass 2020 has been — we had seven cats and now we have five. I can’t even go into it, it’s so heartbreaking, but basically we lost two of our most vulnerable, most in need of care, rescues — one to FIV in July and the other to kidney disease just a few weeks ago. I won’t go into it, but suffice to say, the deaths weren’t easy and the gaps left are huge, because they required so much. I know, I know…cats. But it’s hard to take responsibility to a living, sentient being and not be able to save them from everything. We did the best we could under the circumstances, which weren’t easy. But moving on, because this is depressing…
Since the scheduled posts are largely up, I suppose I will have to post here more actively. which is fine, but don’t expect me to blow your mind every time. I’ll talk about whatever I’m working on, whatever’s going on and immediately on mind, and I don’t know…cat pictures. Plenty of those. Well see…
I’ll leave you with some Watchtower, the chapter for whom I just finished reading in Mean Deviation.
Kevin James Loibl—raised by a violent, abusive mother who eventually died of an aspirin overdose (possibly purposefully, at his urging), then lived with his father’s violent girlfriend, dropped out of college due to a World of Warcraft obsession, had to be maneuvered around departments at work due to severely bad social skills, became infatuated with a celebrity to the extent that he believed them to be soul mates, lost 50 pounds, got LASIK surgery, got his teeth whitened and hair implants, and converted to Christianity to impress her—was somehow able to procure two handguns, one of which he used to shoot Christina Grimmie the times, and the other to shoot himself in the head.
There’s a black market on just about everything, but this makes a certain amount of sense—women’s lingerie is just too damned expensive. Daniel Espinosa and his juvenile co-culprit saw their opportunity and they took it—on three separate occasions. They stole 850 pairs of underwear—over $15,000 worth—in November and December of 2013. Espinosa was a recent high school graduate, lived with his parents, and had no money in the bank, so we can presume these were not for personal use.
Unnamed Florida Man had to be rescued from a vending machine at Alpha Packaging company in Jacksonville. “Authorities”—presumably the Jacksonville Fire & Rescue spokesman—would not provide additional information as to how the man became “entangled,” how he was rescued, nor the extent of his injuries. Of course, the imagination soars. That said, this is really the best part of the story: “A person at Alpha Packaging picked up the phone and hung up without providing any additional information.” Fair enough, Alpha Packaging.
Typical Florida Man fodder—Ian Freudenreich got busted with a one-pot meth lab in his pants after the police got a tip. One-pot meth lab, you ask? Indeed. No more complicated set-ups—meth labs have become mobile, according to a July 2013 online educational article with the headline: “What Is A One-Pot Meth Lab?” According to this source, “major meth labs are a thing of the past.” If you come across a bottle with a white residue and a strong chemical odor, it is suggested that you should not handle it. The chemicals on it could “burn your skin and (these bottles) should be treated like a bomb.” Good to know, because my first inclination is to pick it up and rub it all over my face. Mr. Freudenreich has a history of various drug-related offenses.
Plot twist—you would have thought the one-armed man wielding the hammer was our usual Florida Man suspect. Jeremy Randolph, drug-fueled and angry, was having an altercation with his live-in girlfriend, like you do. Perry Glover, our one-armed hero witnessed the fight and stepped in to break it up. When Randolph violently objected, Glover snatched up a hammer with his one hand and proceeded to whack Randolph in the head until he evacuated the premises. Randolph was arrested and booked for battery; as of the writing of the article, possible battery charges for Perry were pending review by the State Attorney’s Office. A public record search reveals the charges against Randolph, but not against Perry.
The usual political clusterfuckery we’ve come to expect here in the 21st century. Southern Baptist minister Charles Van Zant served as State Representative for Florida’s 21st District for four years and then the 19th District for six. In reference to the American Institute for Reasearch—an organization the state paid $220 million to design a standardized test—Van Zant is quoted as saying: “They will promote double-mindedness in state education and attract every one of your children to become as homosexual as they possibly can.” To be honest, I do expect this flavor of far-right Christian conservative to express their lunatic concern about tests turning kids gay, but I don’t think anyone’s expressed concern about the level of gayness prior to this. Unsurprisingly—what with their moral compasses with machine precision—he, his wife, and his son (Charlies Van Zant, Jr, former Clay County School Superintendent—have been embroiled in various ethical investigations. If only they’d had standardized tests growing up that turned them into decent, principled citizens.
Following a physical altercation, Casey Molter smashed his girlfriend’s cellphone and then proceeded to go after her car. He broke off the passenger side mirror, deflated the tires, and bedecked the hood with condoms and messages written in “creams and lotions,” which the police termed “love notes.” What would drive a man to behave in such a manner? Well, let’s face it—probably drugs of some kind, however, there was more to the story. Apparently, Molter’s unnamed girlfriend—whom he described as “spiritual”—rendered unto Casey a prophecy for the ages. She told him that his dead grandmother would visit him in a dream state and there she would “commit an unusual sex act to him involving an adult erotic device.” It was an image he couldn’t scrub from his psyche and he eventually snapped, resulting in the aforementioned incident. Overreaction? Maybe. But, to be fair, in what appears to be the 2013 obituary for Molter’s grandmother, Nada, she is described as an “incredibly nurturing personality,” having gotten a teaching degree after raising six kids, teaching for many years, and promoting drama and music programs. A vegetarian, she was “frequently donating her time and resources” to animal causes, adopting many dogs, cats, birds, and “other animals” over the course of her life. And, of course, in lieu of flowers, it was requested that friends and family donate or volunteer at the Human Society of Indian River County. In light of all that, Casey’s “spiritual” girlfriend can eat it. As for Casey Molter, other than this one episode, he does not appear to have a criminal record.
Lee Harper Oswald 