ALL I HAVE TO SAY.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

I lost the plot decades ago, and I've been spinning in rage ever since.  Due to events far beyond the control of a young lad, I was sent to live with The Terrible Old Man for 3 years.  This wasn't bad, except that I sort of missed EVERYTHING.  I went from a city where you could walk anywhere you wanted, to a huge abortion called Hamilton, Ontario, where you couldn't walk anywhere.  And since my grandparents were, well, grandparents, I didn't get any of the cool cultural shit that was happening at the time.

My friends at school were watching Black Sheep Squadron, and I had to settle for that fucking Hee Haw, a travesty that is hard to explain to kids today.  It was AWFUL, and it put me straight up a tree at age 9.  HINT:  If a 9 year old thinks it's passively racist garbage, CHANGE THE CHANNEL.  My friends got to listen to Sly & The Family Stone and The Silvers and all kinds of other cool shit you've never heard of, and I got ANN FUCKING MURRAY, the woman responsible for every bad haircut on a Canadian woman since.

But it wasn't just that.  Newfoundland in the 1970s was a special place, special enough that I recognized it and appreciated it at the time.  All the great folk musicians had migrated there to escape the drug haze & sleaziness that the 60s in America had turned into, so there were all kinds of really cool festivals, etc, going on.  The place was packed full of scientists, including my folks, who were there studying metal accumulation in fish.  They got so sick of fish that they A) organized hiking expeditions, etc, and brought me and my siblings along, and B) threw truly hysterical parties that involved hauling a sperm whale's jawbone around and dumping it on someone's lawn (where it had to stay until the next party).  They were all educated people, and they instilled in me a respect for education that has remained with me to this very day, a sense that educated people are more FUN.

But then I was in Hamilton.  Then Chicago.  Then the army, and we won't discuss that.  Then here.  And I woke up this morning, realizing that I'm 3183 miles and 35 years from home, and I'll never, ever see it ever again.  I haven't got any roots, all I have is rage and the terrible feeling of something missing, a sense of loss that I can't really articulate.

Instead, I will fix broken shit for the rest of my fucking life, and until they haul me out feet first, that's all I'll see...Broken shit and broken people and a fundamentally broken society.  Because we can't have nice things like 1970s Newfoundland.  We won't tolerate it.  Instead, we have "culture wars" about who gets to get married and who doesn't, and who is a Good American™, and who is a dope fiend that should be locked up for life in a private prison.  Well done. WELL FUCKING DONE. 

I'd tell you how much I hate you all, all of you Goddamn primates, but it would come off as hyperbole, because nobody would ever believe it.  Ha ha!  That crazy TGRR!  Listen to him rant about hating people, he's such a fucking kidder!  FUCK YOU.  FUCK YOU IN YOUR NO-GOOD, BUSYBODY, PUNISHMENT-FREAK EARHOLES.

That's all I have to say.

Or kill me.  Bastards.

[LMNO]

Whoa.  "3183 miles and 35 years from home."

That's some rough truth.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Whoa.  "3183 miles and 35 years from home."

That's some rough truth.

Thomas Wolfe was right.

[Anna Mae Bollocks]

Whoa.  "3183 miles and 35 years from home."

That's some rough truth.

Thomas Wolfe was right.

SURE YOU CAN GO HOME! YOU MIGHT EVEN FIND A COUPLE OF PEOPLE LEFT YOU USED TO KINDA SORTA KNOW!

AND IT'S NOT ALL NEW STORES!!!!!!!<sup>(tm)

I WENT HOME AND MANAGED TO FIND AN OLD HANGOUT STILL STANDING


AND GRANDMA'S HOUSE</sup>


I have a deserted bar pic someplace too. WAHOOOOOOO!

HURRY BEFORE THEY KNOCK THOSE DOWN!

[Anna Mae Bollocks]

I lost the plot decades ago, and I've been spinning in rage ever since.  Due to events far beyond the control of a young lad, I was sent to live with The Terrible Old Man for 3 years.  This wasn't bad, except that I sort of missed EVERYTHING.  I went from a city where you could walk anywhere you wanted, to a huge abortion called Hamilton, Ontario, where you couldn't walk anywhere.  And since my grandparents were, well, grandparents, I didn't get any of the cool cultural shit that was happening at the time.

My friends at school were watching Black Sheep Squadron, and I had to settle for that fucking Hee Haw, a travesty that is hard to explain to kids today.  It was AWFUL, and it put me straight up a tree at age 9.  HINT:  If a 9 year old thinks it's passively racist garbage, CHANGE THE CHANNEL.  My friends got to listen to Sly & The Family Stone and The Silvers and all kinds of other cool shit you've never heard of, and I got ANN FUCKING MURRAY, the woman responsible for every bad haircut on a Canadian woman since.

But it wasn't just that.  Newfoundland in the 1970s was a special place, special enough that I recognized it and appreciated it at the time.  All the great folk musicians had migrated there to escape the drug haze & sleaziness that the 60s in America had turned into, so there were all kinds of really cool festivals, etc, going on.  The place was packed full of scientists, including my folks, who were there studying metal accumulation in fish.  They got so sick of fish that they A) organized hiking expeditions, etc, and brought me and my siblings along, and B) threw truly hysterical parties that involved hauling a sperm whale's jawbone around and dumping it on someone's lawn (where it had to stay until the next party).  They were all educated people, and they instilled in me a respect for education that has remained with me to this very day, a sense that educated people are more FUN.

But then I was in Hamilton.  Then Chicago.  Then the army, and we won't discuss that.  Then here.  And I woke up this morning, realizing that I'm 3183 miles and 35 years from home, and I'll never, ever see it ever again.  I haven't got any roots, all I have is rage and the terrible feeling of something missing, a sense of loss that I can't really articulate.

Instead, I will fix broken shit for the rest of my fucking life, and until they haul me out feet first, that's all I'll see...Broken shit and broken people and a fundamentally broken society.  Because we can't have nice things like 1970s Newfoundland.  We won't tolerate it.  Instead, we have "culture wars" about who gets to get married and who doesn't, and who is a Good American™, and who is a dope fiend that should be locked up for life in a private prison.  Well done. WELL FUCKING DONE. 

I'd tell you how much I hate you all, all of you Goddamn primates, but it would come off as hyperbole, because nobody would ever believe it.  Ha ha!  That crazy TGRR!  Listen to him rant about hating people, he's such a fucking kidder!  FUCK YOU.  FUCK YOU IN YOUR NO-GOOD, BUSYBODY, PUNISHMENT-FREAK EARHOLES.

That's all I have to say.

Or kill me.  Bastards.

Also THIS.

Hee Haw always creeped me out.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

HOLY SHIT ROGER

Suddenly I have a much better idea of why we get each other so well. SOMEHOW, On opposite coasts, we had THE SAME FUCKING CHILDHOOD.

Well, with some differences that are insignificant.

When I was 11, I was Exiled to Canada. Except it wasn't Canada, technically, it was a US island so close to Canada that we only got Canadian channels. Which are quite materially different from US channels.

Hee Haw, Gilligan's Island, and Rowan & Martin's Laugh In. Year after year.

God help us all.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

When I was 12, they ran The Day After on broadcast. I watched it on my 12" black and white teevee.

You know what? THAT SHIT IS NOT OK. I have NEVER been the same.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

When I was 12, they ran The Day After on broadcast. I watched it on my 12" black and white teevee.

You know what? THAT SHIT IS NOT OK. I have NEVER been the same.

Threads was far, far worse.  In fact, it pretty much spelled the end of Britain's "own, independent nuclear deterrent".

Buy The Day After was bad enough.  I remember watching that when it aired.  Doesn't seem like much now, does it?

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

When I was 12, they ran The Day After on broadcast. I watched it on my 12" black and white teevee.

You know what? THAT SHIT IS NOT OK. I have NEVER been the same.

Threads was far, far worse.  In fact, it pretty much spelled the end of Britain's "own, independent nuclear deterrent".

Buy The Day After was bad enough.  I remember watching that when it aired.  Doesn't seem like much now, does it?

Fuck, that's the scary thing. We're from a byegone era, when graphic depictions of death on broadcast TV were controversial.

[navkat]

I fucking mourn that for/with you. I've spent my whole life looking for (and trying to create) 1970s Newfoundland. Fuck. This put a lump in my throat.

All I can say is that I'm trying to make it for my kid...just a mini-microcosm wherever I can pull the edges of the fabric together and find some bits of tawdry lace to tack it down and cover up the seams. This is all I have, kid. It ain't much but I'm educated. I'm educated and fun and I've found some fun educated people to share this world with. It'll have to do.

And I guess I'll watch out for him in case he gets lost...save up to buy an old, wooden plane in case he wanders too far away. Paint chipping, propeller creaky, I'll get on the thing like...like this guy:
and bring home to him.

[Q. G. Pennyworth]

Fkn The Day After 

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Fkn The Day After 

Listen, in an age where Reagan wanted a nuclear war, the Day After was kinda necessary.  So was Threads.

[navkat]

I've actually written about this elsewhere. The Day After was why I was afraid of two things as a kid: Aliens and Nuclear War.

[P3nT4gR4m]

The cold war, Reagan and nukes and shows like Day After and Threads made me the - live in the moment, fuck the future, fuck the consequences - kinda guy I am today. Nihilism was the logical choice of philosophy back then.

It's probably why I can laugh at the new "terrurism" boogeyman they're trying to scare me with these days. A pale imitation.

[Sita]

I've never seen The Day After or Threads. I was a bit too young when they came out, wasn't even in school yet.
But I have found them and will be watching them soon. Just so I know what everyone is talking about.

Though somehow I don't think it will have the impact on me that it has on everyone else here.