Getting In the Mood 2021

 

I recently started resharing my "GETTING IN THE MOOD" posts from last December where I was sharing some great and some of my favorite Christmas/Holiday songs to try and boost my holiday spirit. To be fair, my mood is down a good deal more than it was last year. I'm feeling pretty flat on Christmas and I hate that. I'm going to do my best to turn that around this week, but today I'm giving you a song that sums up how I'm feeling.

"Be Good at Christmas" by Katie Malco. And after this, checkout more of Katie Malco. She isn't talked about enough and her 2020 album "Failures" is the best album that was released in that God awful year!

Alright, let's get Holly fucking jolly!

Farewell 2020, Hello 2021, More of the Same

 

It's New Year's Eve and it seems like a lot of people are hanging their hats on 2021 being a better year. Kind of hard to do worse right? I don't know folks. 

The U.S. is sitting at 344,000 COVID deaths and the infection rate and death rate are not slowing down. The Trump administration talked a big game about have 20 million people vaccinated by now but we're only at 2 million. We may be stepping into 2021 but the vast majority of things won't get better tonight or tomorrow or next week. If we are lucky we are months and months away from things getting better COVID-wise. 

Politically it's still going to be a mess. We have assholes like JOSH HAWLEY to deal with. This dipshit says he’s standing up for the 74 million Trump voters. He’s doing so by saying us 82 million who voted for Biden don’t count. This is treason. This is leading to authoritarianism and from his past history, it’s subtle but not too subtle racism. Hawley, just say what you mean: 'Those minorities that voted for Biden shouldn't count. As a matter of fact I view all of you 82 million people as niggers.'

 Besides Hawley we have to deal with that prick Mitch McConnell and closet case Lindsey Graham. Today it was reported that a couple House republicans expect at least 140 of their colleagues to object to the Election results. I get that people say this is just a show and no big deal because it's all procedural bullshit, but the fact is, it's damaging to Democracy and how people, not just citizens here, but around the world, view free and fair elections. 140 House Republicans are traitors to the oath they took, The Constitution, Democracy and the people. The GOP is full of traitors and have made it clear they are not the Patriots they claim to be and excepting of a Trump Authoritarian rule.

Democracy is under attack, Thanks to Trump and his Trumpism cult.

So flipping the calendar isn't going to fix that.

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2020 has gotten the blame for every bad thing that has happened. Ruth Bader Ginsburg died, 2020 got the blame instead of cancer and old age. Eddie Van Halen died and instead of Cancer and a stroke, 2020 took the bullet. Kobe Bryant and his daughter died. 2020 got the blame instead of the helicopter/weather and whatever else. Countless other died and people lazily blamed the year instead of the illness or violence.

Wildfires in the U.S. and Australia destroyed, lives and property and wildlife. 2020 got the blame, even while scientists and a young girl tried telling us, that shit is our fault.

Life is all fucked up and lots of shitty things happened and we blamed the year instead taking a long, hard look in the mirror.

Shitty things happen every year.

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In 2020 My oldest daughter did not get to have her traditional Senior year of high school. No graduation, no Prom, none of that. Then she lost out on going away to college as she is forced to do the first year online, from home. My son is doing high school from home and he has a focus on art classes which is a bitch from home, not getting the full hands on teaching and doing things in a proper environment. My youngest daughter is doing school from home as well. Fourth grade, and they have made it clear the focus is on Math and English. There is going to be a whole generation of kids lagging behind when it comes to science, social studies, art, music and physical education.

 2020 lead to an increase of depression, frustration and alienation. It's also shown the true colors of many. It's clear now, there is a frightening number of Americans that don't care about others. Wearing a mask to protect themselves and others, including loved ones, is too damn inconvenient and is part of 'a hoax to control us all.' Americans love to talk about how tough we are and we can do anything and deep down inside we're all Marines and can "Adapt and Overcome."

BULLSHIT!!! 2020 has shown us that far too many Americans are selfish. Far too many Americans are pussies. They can't handle staying home for a month, let alone a week. Too many aren't willing to do anything for the good of the country or humanity. Too many can't "Adapt and Overcome." They're just full of shit, selfish, pussies and they are part of the reason why there are 344,000 dead Americans and counting.

Americans have overrated themselves. The only way 2021 is better is if we start being better humans. Otherwise it's just going to be the same fucking shit-show we've been living in.

(Sorry, this post feels a little disjointed, but fuck it, it's 2020! Right?)

Happy New Year!

Getting In The Mood

 

We all know 2020 has been a big-ole bag of shit and I would say a large number of us are in a battle with anxiety, stress and depression. Personally I have been feeling on edge for weeks and have waves of depression. COVID life life sucks! 

Our family started earlier then ever pumping Christmas cheer into our house. (Yes I said Christmas! I celebrate Christmas, I respect other holidays, but I celebrate Christmas, and I'm talking about me and my life so I'm talking about Christmas, not Holidays! Not everything is a political and social justice fight.) We put the tree up and decorated before Thanksgiving. I did the outside lights a week later. The Elves on the Shelf have been in full force. In our house we have three Elves and three Elf pets to deal with. We have watched a bunch of Christmas movies and have driven around looking at lights. We're really trying...But I'm not there yet, and that's unusual for me. 

In the past I have posted blogs about my top and favorite Christmas movies and songs. I started looking through them and they are definitely changing as time goes by. Instead of doing a ranking, since we are ten days away from Christmas, each of these ten days I am going to post a Christmas song I love. No order, just what I'm feeling that day. 

Today's song, since I think getting some snow falling might help me get in the mood, I give you a song from one of my favorite bands, Dead Sara : "Snow in Los Angeles"

There Is No God

That's a title that probably isn't surprising to see considering the epic cluster fuck that is 2020...And we still half the year to go...It's easy to look at COVID and the Trump Administration, and Police Brutality, and murderous cops who are still free, #JusticeForBreonnaTaylor...And the fact that there are secret police in Portland, and Americans that scream about athletes kneeling during the National Anthem, who turn around and wave Nazi and Confederate (flag of traitors of the United States) flags while they scream against equality and Black Lives Matter and scream about their mayors and governors trying to keep them safe and healthy by asking them to wear masks during a global pandemic...

All of that alone is enough to make someone say, 'there is no god'....

But faith, religion that's a personal thing...Yes some try to push it on others and cram it down our throats...But it's a personal choice/belief system...So this post comes from a personal point of view...I went to Catholic School for 12 years...In 8th grade I told my parents I didn't want to make my Confirmation because I wasn't ready and I didn't believe in it...They asked me to "just do it and get it over with."  My folks were never super religious...But I think they just wanted to give us a foundation to work off of...

My Catholic high school actually did give us a taste for one semester of other religions, pointing out the differences and similarities...It felt like a propaganda class to pump themselves up...What it did for me was to get me to checkout other religions...Come to find out, they all steal different things from each other and they're all somewhat full of shit...Yeah, for some people it's a good thing to have a fake all power feeling being watching over you...It helps explain shit away...For some it gives a moral compass...Maybe that's a good thing for people who were raised by assholes and didn't get morals and common decency instilled in them...

But then a few days ago I read THIS article on Irish Central...It was a good article but what sent me spinning down this spiral was the comments on Irish Central Facebook page below the link for this article...It was non-stop shitheads...Bashing the LGBTQ community...So many people telling the gay community to get out...There of course those that misquoted the Bible, those that didn't know it had been edited in 1946...There were those who slipped in anti-Semitic comments as well, completely clueless that The Old Testament of their Bible is ripped from the much older, Tanakh, AKA; the Hebrew Bible...As a matter of fact, most of Christianity's doctrine was ripped from other religions...So their high and mighty outlook cracks me the fuck up...

But it just kept driving me crazy that this faith that is suppose to be all about love and caring and helping one another is full of fucking assholes...Bigots, sexists, racists, misogynists, rapists, child rapists, fucking assholes...Intolerant, uncaring, fucking pieces of shit that push away anyone that doesn't fit into their perfect little idiotic box! Except you fuckers are the farthest thing from perfect...Shit, have you read your "good book?" you're the farthest thing from it's teachings...

So how can there be a god, if so many of his followers are ignorant as fuck? Yeah, I know it's not all of you, but it's way too many of you...Where the fuck is the vengeful that punishes assholes?

As I said, I was in a spiral after this shit...It just got me thinking more and more about the religion I was raised in, and the whole GOD question I've been dealing with for pretty much all my life...And then I thought about the situation we (my family) are in right now...I touched on it a couple weeks back in a 'Monday Moaning" post...Since COVID we had to move my Mother-in-law in with us...She has dementia and it has taken a toll on my wife, my kids and myself...We saw my father-in-law go down this same road and it sucked...but now it's here, in our house, every day....And we've learned that sadly, some of a person's true thoughts and feelings and quirks come out with dementia...

I'm not going to bite my tongue...She's a pain in the ass...It's often like dealing with a bratty child...She bitches about the men in her life that have died, husband, brothers, friends, "they took care of me"..."they were suppose to take care of me"....but she ignores that we are taking care of her, and bitches about us taking care of her...If we didn't, she'd be lying in a gutter babbling...She steals things...She laughs about stealing things...In the early weeks of her living here she talked a lot about how she always "had to break rules growing up"..."Even just something small, I had to break a rule everyday"....Yeah, well, she's a thief and hides shit in her underwear drawer...Sometimes it's dumb shit, like a box that was in our recycling bin, that she just had to have...

She lives every day in a house with three of her grandchildren and doesn't remember them at all and looks at them like 'what the fuck are you doing here?' You tell her who they are, and she has no interest in trying to remember them or re-get to know them even if she forgets tomorrow...

Based on the fact that she barely worked in her life, her tales of how everyone else (Brothers, Husband, Fiends, ) who took care of her, including the bank teller that would just fill out a slip for her and give her money from her mother's account, she was always spoiled...And other than being the mother to 4 kids, and my wife will tell you how she checked out on that in her early teens, that's all she did...That's all she contributed to society...

She has flat-out said that "all the fun in her life ended after she got married"...Her life was miserable after she had kids..."She just wanted to scream all the time"....She's rude as hell to us, and ungrateful as fuck...She doesn't get it that it's either here or locked up in a nursing home's Dementia ward where no one will be able to visit her because of COVID...

I'm stuck with her...A woman who, not her fault, is useless and is an anchor to my family...But you do what you have to for family...You help those in need...you bite your tongue to and you get up everyday make her tea, mop up her piss, cook her meals, give her meds,  answer the same question 70 times, take her on walks, explain shit over and over...I didn't need god and religion to tell me that...I learned that from my parents...You do what you have to do for family...

And she is stuck here...in her moments of lucidity, asking "is it okay to pray to die?"  Because the only people in here mush brain she cares about are dead...Her knees have no cartilage and she's in constant pain, but her doctor can't let her get knee surgery because her dementia is so bad there's no way she could handle it and the rehab...She has no idea where she is and what's going on in the world, let alone in this house...She sometimes doesn't even recognize my wife, her daughter...Her brain is fucked and it won't shutdown...She went to Church every week of her life until COVID...And Sunday's are the toughest day of the week in this house, trying to repeatedly explain why there is no church....Yeah, she might be a thief, but she always went to church and said her prayers to God...

What kind of God does this to one of his loyal followers?  Why would a god make her suffer?  Why would a god make her daughter suffer through seeing both her parents go through this?   Why would he allow her to be such a bitch to her daughter who is doing all she can to take care of her?  

My mother died 3 years ago after a long fight with cancer...She was an amazing mother, great wife, great friend and the greatest grandmother you can imagine...She was full of life, and love and strength...She was a fully functioning being...She gave to this world...She was always the calm in the storm...

What the fuck kind of God takes that away?

What the fuck kind of God takes her away and leaves a suffering mess to drag the people caring for her down?


I know, "Everything happens for a reason"..."God only gives you as much as you can handle"....I've heard them all, I have even said a few...It's bullshit!

And as I just rattled off of pile of shit that is going on these days with me and in the world, religious people will try and point out to me how God is in things like he mothers in Portland who stood in front of the protesters and sang in lullaby fashion, "Hands up. please don't shoot me"....Which I loved and retweeted and shared on facebook...But I say NO...that is people standing up...If  God was so damn great he would have struck down the murderous police officers that have spurred on the protest across this country...They would have been hit by lightning or less dramatic, a heart attack, before they killed George Floyd and Breonna Taylor and so many more...

If there was God he would have known this world still needed my mother.

~ Yours Truly, 

A Broken Catholic