Thanksgiving blues, the re-mix

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ancona

Praying Mantis
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And so the post-Thanksgiving spectacle of black Friday begins in earnest. Some retailers, the greedier ones, opened their doors at eight o’clock last night to thousands upon thousands of crazed consumatards, all of them climbing over top of one another to get some shiny gadget or another. As usual, a number of people got trampled like roaches in the mad scramble, and yet more were injured in the inevitable riots that erupt as mob mentality takes over where common sense should rule. As it all unfolded on TV, commentators ran clips showing lines of tents filled with idiots waiting in line, hoping to be first in the store. A few of these knuckleheads have been camping out for a week in the cold so they could buy a fucking TV set. Did you read that? A fucking TV set. What in Gods name are these fucking dimwits thinking about? Is the economy really that good that folks can afford to take a week or more off of work to save a couple hundred bucks on a plasma TV?!?!? The sheep have been properly indoctrinated to go and buy their shiny plastic shit on cue, and if necessary, kill to do so. If this is how the masses act when offered a discount on blue jeans or sneakers, I don’t want to see how they act when the ATM’s stop working and the EBT cards don’t get re-loaded.

Year after year this scene devolves deeper in to an orgy of consumerism and greed, farther and farther away from the day of thanks for all of the blessings we have enjoyed in the previous year. Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter and all other holidays for that matter, have been completely subsumed within the corporate playbook and turned in to sick commercials of their previous meanings. I can remember as a kid, if you ran out of something on Thanksgiving day, you were waiting until Saturday to buy some more. Period. Everyone was home with their families for the holiday without exception and all stores were closed. The main drag in my little burg was a ghost town, wonderfully quiet and devoid of traffic and people. Today, the roads are jammed with idiots racing against some imaginary clock to be the first dumbass in line at Wal-Mart so they can buy up more crap they neither need nor can afford.

Yup, the holidays get me down these years, because they have been stripped of their meaning. Gone are the days when kids were let out of school for a couple of weeks to celebrate Christmas, now it is Winter Festival, all so we could pacify a few vocal atheists who were “offended” by the use of the word Christ. Gone are the nativity scenes at City Hall, replaced by the religio-neutral “Happy Holidays” signs, or “Seasons Greetings”. Gone are the days of picking up a few gifts for your loved ones and having a quiet morning opening them up and later, having an agreeable ham dinner with yams and ‘taters. Cue in Black Friday and hordes of shoppers lining up to see who can spend the most and impress their friends, families and relatives with meaningless purchases of plastic shit. I have acquaintances that spend thousands of dollars on their darling children every single year. They are compelled by some force or another to buy extremely expensive and unnecessary gifts that more often than not, are either returned for cash or used a few times and forgotten. In a sad testament to their compulsion, these folks are perpetually in debt, with no hope of ever digging themselves out.

This year in Anconaland, we will be observing the holidays for their original meaning and foregoing the consumerist bullshit that has so deeply infiltrated and perverted them. We have agreed that in our home, gifts may only be purchased for one another as a result of your own free volition and that we will no longer be compelled by some unwritten rule that we simply must spend, spend, spend on Christmas. No longer will we pray to the High Priest of the Holy Retailers, we have abdicated and will now opt-out of their conditioning.

Sorry about the rant.
 
My wife asked me what I might like this holiday season. I told her I had everything I needed and I wasn't wanting for anything (small stuff anyway) really. Maybe some ammo.
 
We have agreed that in our home, gifts may only be purchased for one another as a result of your own free volition and that we will no longer be compelled by some unwritten rule that we simply must spend, spend, spend on Christmas. No longer will we pray to the High Priest of the Holy Retailers, we have abdicated and will now opt-out of their conditioning.

A dash of sanity in an insane world. :clap: :cheers: :judge:
 
MMerlin,
They say there is a fine line between genius and insanity. I have been accused of crossing it more than once, I can assure you of that my friend! ; - )
 
Excellent, A. Front page of Drudge is full of articles of "shoppers" stabbing, shooting, macing, running over one another for cheap crap. Wait till its food and their kids are hungry....
 
I decided to enjoy black friday by taking numerous relatives to the local gun range and get rid of some excess ammo.

:cheers:
 
I decided to enjoy black friday by taking numerous relatives to the local gun range and get rid of some excess ammo.

I did the same! Enjoyed the fresh air and sunshine, thereby avoiding the mayhem and chaos of the day. Also cut, split, and stacked a couple cords of wood. A good day, in my book.
 
Excellent rant Ancona, up there with your best !

and as an alleged insane genius, theres really no need to apologise (-;
 
wow. just wow. My wife said they are just mindless, shallow materialistic consumers, then went shopping with them a few minutes ago. wow.
 
Your wife may be suffering from undiagnosed subliminal conditioning, since my wife did the same thing, I suspect they may have a related 'condition'. Although Mother Bear went out to pick up some A/C filters, she did theoretically participate in the post-thanksgiving madness.
 
Your wife may be suffering from undiagnosed subliminal conditioning, since my wife did the same thing, I suspect they may have a related 'condition'. Although Mother Bear went out to pick up some A/C filters, she did theoretically participate in the post-thanksgiving madness.

she also suffers from hot flashes and dripping palms and weapons hidden all over the house.....
 
Thank God my wife no longer has the hot flashes, and that she "tolerates" my continued "obsession" with owning ever more consittutionally protected firearms, which are also all over the house. At least she doesn't insist thaty they all be locked up all the time, just the ones that are superflouous to our home security. That leaves six or seven for strategic placement. She can and will shoot, but it is quite unusual that she is uncomfortable with having one in every room. Go figure...
 
Thank God my wife no longer has the hot flashes, and that she "tolerates" my continued "obsession" with owning ever more consittutionally protected firearms, which are also all over the house. At least she doesn't insist thaty they all be locked up all the time, just the ones that are superflouous to our home security. That leaves six or seven for strategic placement. She can and will shoot, but it is quite unusual that she is uncomfortable with having one in every room. Go figure...

there are several projectile throwing machines around our house, but my wife also has bolos (machetes), cans of hair spray etc everywhere. (She is a fair shot and not at all scared of firearms (shes the one who ultimately insisted we arm up)). The best I can figure is that when she was little, her father was robbed at gunpoint in his house in the Philippines, and that has some residual effect in the way she looks at things today. With regards to the lock up the guns thing (we have a 28, 17 and 11 year old at home still) she asked me about four years ago why we were locking up the guns when we might need to get to them in a hurry. Off came all the trigger locks. The kids all already respect guns and like to shoot, although we don't as often as I would like.
 
The trend with my kin- is random- small gifts for no reason.

Consider this- food banks are low- people who used to donate now in need- budget racks are picked out fast- not as stocked as they were say a year ago.

These same people camped out at the stores. My niece and sister went- I wish them well- but I find it hard to get excited over "stuff".


For thanksgiven-shirley spent 3 days prepping a meal- a guest decided everyone was picking on her.
So instead of holding her tongue she made a scene.

family was going to come in- and I am glad they did not- I got a rebate check I forgot about- so I was able to pay someone I owed $40 to- an put $10 in the gas tank.
 
nice rant.

I've not been one to "want" or ask for things for Christmas or birthdays...but this year, i have to admit that i have asked for a couple of things. Both serve an actual purpose.

I want a food dehydrator to assist with my food preparations. and i want a decent grain mill......also to assist with my food preparations.
 
Needs and wants are two separate and disparate categories sir! I would place these "wants" in the first category, and so if someone wishes [of their own volition and purely out of friendship] to buy you one, then bully!

Be sure to get the hand grain mill to start, because as you know, as long as you still have an arm, you can still grind wheat, et. al. as you please. The dehydrator will become your obsession as you learn to dry all manner of food and fruit! Oranges packed in sugar dry out in to the single most delicate candy you have ever had, with the concentrated sugar, citrus and acid, your pallate will explode. Kiwi's are REALLY hard, but worth the effort. All other foods do just as well. Garden celery chopped in to half inch slices and dried shrinks to about a fifteenth it's original size, and when put in an old-school coffe grinder [hand crank of course] with some sea salt, becomes the most flavorful celery salt you will ever taste.
 
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I'm glad my family is not really big on gift giving, but when we do it is usually something fairly practical.

I was thinking of sending out a couple of EDC bags this years. Just a small bag with a basic 1st aid kit, keychain flashlight, little multitool, water bottle, energy bar, and maybe a local map (made out of paper, no iLost for my family).
 
i apologize for the side-bar in the conversation:

the grain mill that i want need (because at this point, it is a need because of the food items i have already purchased)(http://www.pleasanthillgrain.com/family_grain_mills.aspx i want combo h1, but i wouldnt complain if i were to receive combo h5)

The dehydrator (recommended by someone on here, Thanks to whoever it was) is the excalibur 9 shelf that i have asked santa (the wife) for. But i consider it a want, and not necessarily a need at this current point. It may change to a need, come next years harvest time, depending on what i decide to grow and what kind of harvest i actually get.
 
There are some great tutorials on-line about using psrtd from a household fan and ambient wind within a screened box to dry foods without electricity.....
I'm just saying...
 
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