The Last Word

Issue #496

February 2016

Do people pop?

Let me be clear: Do people pop?

Do they???
When I was about 6 years old, one of my gravest worries was that people might poplike a balloon. I
had an image in my mind of a person walking down the street and simply popping for no apparent reason.

Because of the frightful prospect of spontaneous human poppage, I took every opportunity to ask my mom if
people popped.
I have an important question. I mean, its really, really important. Do people pop? I frequently inquired.
I asked at the dinner table. I asked at the store. I asked during every household chore I had to perform. The
question was always the same: Do people pop?
The usual answer: No, people do not pop. You have nothing to worry about.
For some reason, I didnt believe her. This was around the time I figured out Santa Claus wasnt real. So
why wouldnt adults fib about something just to save my feelings? So I kept asking, until one day when she
become much more emphatic about the answer: I keep telling you! People do not pop! Thats the silliest thing
Ive ever heard of! Why do you think a person would pop?!
I still wasnt satisfied. I think my real fear wasnt that total strangerswho I had no attachment to
would pop. It was that somebody who I cared aboutlike my dogwould pop. So I rephrased the question: Do
animals pop?
No! Animals do not pop!
After all that, I still couldnt
believe that nothing besides inflatables
such as balloons, swimming pool toys,
and bubble gum didnt pop. I was like
the guy on the Internet who kept
insisting tires could implodeeven
after folks tried informing him over
and over again that tires cant implode.
So I upped the ante: Do toilets pop?
GET OUT OF HERE!!!
I just wanted to know if toilets
popped! Toilets have a bulbous
appearance that suggests poppage is
imminent. If anything popped, it would
be a toilet. Alas, toilets do not pop.
They just sit there looking toilety.
Go back to bed. People dont
pop.

Mister Rogers was

cool and talked about
heavy shit
You know Mister Rogers
Neighborhood must have ruled,
because he was on right after Sesame
Street. Whenever one show is discussedand believe me, Sesame Street and Mister Rogers Neighborhood are
discussed quite a bit around here, because thats what cool people talk about when they get togetherthe other is
often mentioned with it.
Of course, it was funnier when people mentioned Sesame Street. Just like how Charles Schulz said it
wouldnt have been nearly as funny if Peanuts character Schroeder admired Brahms instead of Beethoven. When
I was about 10, one of my main goals was to hear Casey Kasem mention Sesame Street, and I finally got my wish
when he did a story on a well-known musician who played in the band on Sesame Street. But Mister Rogers
was a cool dude nonetheless.
I dont even think his show is still broadcast on TV. If you know any families with small children, notice
that the only thing the kiddos watch on TV nowadays is cartoons about talking screwdrivers and their parents
game shows. Theres no Mister Rogers anywhere in sight.
YouTube is like Mister Rogers with more swearing. You can find a few old Mister Rogers episodes on
YouPube, but if you want to show them to your kids, you may want to paste a folder or a sheet of opaque paper
over the lower part of your computer screen so they dont read the X-rated language that inevitably fills the
comments for every video.
In one old Mister Rogers installment that can be found on YouTube, we see that his program dealt with
death years before Sesame Street killed off Mr. Hooper. In this 1970 episode, our favorite TV neighbor finds a

dead goldfish in his fish tank and proceeds to bury it in the yard...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zm-IJpJBfm0
In that episode, Mister Rogers says that he heard that if you place a dead fish in salt water, it might
revive it. Where did he ever get a ridiculous idea like that? If that was true, fish in the ocean that die would all
come right back to life. After this maneuver fails to resurrect the dead fish, Mister Rogers makes occasional sad
glances at the camera as he buries the fishs decaying carcass. Then he talks about how when he was growing up
he pretended his dead dog was still alive.
This episode also has another treat: It ends with the famous Mister Rogers Nightmarehood closing that
shows a drawing of the trolley on a track while a flute-like twirl is heard. Many folks say this closing terrified
them when they were growing up. I recall a few episodes in my early childhood in which this closing was
accompanied by a witchs laugh. Someone on the Interpipes said those were probably the installments where
Margaret Hamilton made a guest appearance.
I wonder if Mister Rogers ever did a show on whether people pop.

The Tea Party: coddling criminals for over 30 years

The drug warriors have spent decades calling everyone else a druggie. They think Judas Priest is druggie
music. They think Dungeons & Dragons is a druggie game. They think Michael Dukakis is a druggie
governor. They think Atari BASIC is a druggie programming language. They think the POP command in Atari
BASIC is a druggie command.
Nowat long lasta real drug case has fallen right into the drug warriors laps. Their response: total
inaction.
Why? Because politicians want to protect their own right-wing cronies, who are the ones selling the
poison. I am 100% certain of this.
As many of you know, I filed a small claims lawsuit against someone way back in October after she
claimed to have kidney cancer and borrowed money from mebut actually used the money to buy drugs and
wouldnt pay it back. I know this, because theres plenty of evidence. Theres no allegedly about it. The syringe
I found outdoors after I loaned the money was a smoking gun, and so was the fact that I overheard another
individual accusing the defendant of buying pills.
She relocated only a few days after I filed the suitbefore authorities could serve the papers. But then
in Novembera local police department posted on their Facebook page a surveillance photo of someone using a
stolen ATM card outside a bank. It looked like the defendant in my lawsuit, and I thought there was a strong
chance it could be her. So police were notified. A few days later, police posted that the suspect in the photo was
identifiedbut they didnt publicly name her.
Job #1 for me was finding the defendant so my lawsuit papers could be served. If she faced criminal
charges for other incidents, that wasnt up to me. Im not the police, prosecutor, or judge. Nonetheless, the police
only said the woman in the photo was identifiednot arrested or charged.
Around Christmas, another local police agency posted a series of surveillance pictures of someone using a
stolen credit card at convenience stores. I was absolutely certain it was the defendant in my lawsuit. Not a shadow
of a doubt. It was her. Again, police were notified. So police now know. No question about it.
From the location of these crimes, I could figure out what part of town she probably relocated to. But the
police have more resources than I have, so they could have figured out exactly where she moved to. For instance,
she has a kid in school, so they can just get the school records. Plus, they know about the existence of other
people who know her, so they can just ask them.
And maybe they didbut didnt act on this information, because some Tea Party elected officials ordered
them not to, for it would mean going after her dealers. And I am sure the dealers are involved in the Tea Party in
some way. Even the Koch brothers dont have enough money to finance all of Team Tyrannys activities, so the
money has to come from somewhere. Tea Party groups are dropping millions of dollars in special elections in
Kentucky as we speakand I bet most of that is drug money (in addition to corporate donations from the likes of
cable giant Comcast, which has donated to a leading Tea Party group that is interfering in our elections).
A criminal gang is selling dope in our community, and nothing is being done about iteven after weve
been forced to hear for the past 35 years about how theres a druggie hiding under every bed. While my lawsuit
deals with getting my money back from an addict, a greater punishment should be imposed on the organized
crime racket thats out there selling drugs.
Im discussing all of this here because I know it wont spoil the criminal case against the person Im
suing. Thats because Im pretty sure there is no criminal case. The case was dropped as soon as authorities got
their marching orders from right-wing politicians. How long does a police investigation possibly take? I happen to

know the defendant was under investigation since at least Augustvery likely May or earlier. If the case hadnt
been dropped, shed be busted by now.
This also means the lawsuit papers will almost certainly never be served. The papers cant be served if
authorities dont know where she lives, and theres no reason for them to find out where she lives if theyve
dropped the criminal case.
It amazes you. It truly does. I know people who were sent to abusive, phony rehabs and called druggies
to their faces even though they never touched drugs in their lives. And if police investigations take so long, why is
it that cops wasted no time whatsoever in arresting me for trespassing for the crime of using a university
library when I was no longer a student? Why did they squander absolutely no time in breaking up Occupy
Cincinnati? Im supposed to believe that the investigation of the person Im suing has taken at least 6 months after
Occupy lasted less than 2 weeks before being raided?
Meanwhile, police immediately respond to complaints by Tea Party groups like Citizens for Community
Values to shut down legitimate enterprises. A vice squad in one local jurisdiction ruined merchandise at a shop
recently by throwing it on the floor and trampling it. They also shoplifted from that establishment.
Because its obvious that I dont have law enforcement protection, I feel morally justified in holding Tea
Party property as collateral to recoup the economic losses that they caused me to suffer when they sold drugs to
the defendant in my lawsuit. Then youd see that our police are quite activebut unfortunately, Id be on the
wrong end of their action.

Pizza shop helps itself to a piece of the pie

Someone just got a bad review on Yelp.
Once in a while, I have a pizza delivered to my humble digs from a certain chain of pizza shops that
operates primarily in the Midwest and South. A week or two ago, I had absolutely no energy to go to a store to get
food (because of my disorder), so I again buyed pizza from this firm and had it delivered here.
For some reason, they only accept credit cardsno cash. American currency purports to be legal tender
for all debts, but that doesnt mean you can actually buy anything with it. Its like how in the 1920s company
towns you had to use scrip. Credit cards are like coal company scrip: They are issued by our corporate masters
and have become the only way to pay for many items they sell. When my bank statement came, I noticed this
pizza shop charged me several dollars more than what the pizza, delivery fee, tip, and tax were supposed to cost
altogether. For no apparent reason.
Maybe its just that particular locationbut theyd never done this to me before.
Besides that, the pizza wasnt anything to write home about. It was edible, but not spectacular. It wasnt
nearly as bad as the pizza at NKU that got thrown into the outgoing mail slot at the post office, but its not as good
as it used to be, and its nothing Id spend that much money on again.
In the immortal words of Judge Judy: Thats outrageous, what makes you think you can do that?!
Copyright 2016. All rights reserved.