3/15/2023

Have I mentioned that I have been feeling more creative of late than before? Oh yes, I did.. What's nice is this burgeoning feeling of creativity seems to have maintained itself which is a good thing. I've already shared some ideas with a receptive friend, not to mention passing along some awful and punny jokes to yet another friend I became acquainted with via the fortean website.

Of late I've been listening to H.P. Podcraft at work while processing invoices. It's a podcast about H.P. Lovecraft's literary oeuvre, there's more than a decade of episodes available, and the hosts are affable enough even if they have quirks like mispronouncing 'Innsmouth' and getting some things wrong about Grandpaw Theobald. The past couple of episodes had them repeating the theme from Lovecraft's work about the Great Old Ones awakening and clearing the Earth of human life so they can return it to their playground paradise. Hearing this more than a few times struck a chord and I have an interpretation of the circumstances when 'the stars are right'.

In Lovecraft's fiction his protagonists go mad when facing cosmic horror. 'Wrong' angles in non-euclidean architectures, blasphemous and alien shapes of interstellar interlopers, inscrutible phenomena with the hallmarks of life yet not truly being alive are some of the primary means by which one apprehends that madness underscoring how humanity's tiny bubble of reality is an outlier rather than the norm in a cosmic sense. Some of that madness is illustrated by Lovecraft in The Call Of Cthulhu when he wrote:

Then the liberated Old Ones would teach them new ways to shout and kill and revel and enjoy themselves, and all the earth would flame with a holocaust of ecstasy and freedom.

Perhaps madness isn't all that bad and it may be a symptom of humanity's 'growing pains' as true reality is apprehended by the entirety of our species.

Then again, perhaps not.

Many decades ago I remember being on a family trip to Florida. Our sojourn began at Walt Disney World for a week, give or take, then taking advantage of an offer to stay at an inlaw's relative's house for free for some more time. Upon arrival the house was a complete wreck, infested with bugs, vermin, and rodents but the prospect of free lodging was quite strong. My biological parents purchased bug bombs and set them off inside the house while we went elsewhere for however long the bug bombs needed to do their dirty work.
Upon our return the house was even more unlivable as the floor was covered in dead bugs, and my biological mother made a point of repeating, "...and this mouse puked before it died!" much to my horror. We wound up patronizing a hotel near the beach until our return to New Jersey.

Many chemical compounds used recreationally by humans exist as a defense against pests. Psilocybin, THC, and others developed over the aeons to prevent those plants and fungi from being eaten. Some of these concoctions are deadly, e.g. atropia belladonna's atropine, hyocyamine, and scopolamine or alpha-amanitin in nightcap mushrooms, while others are benign or downright recreational to humans and other animals including pests.

As stated before the Great Old Ones will awaken when the stars are right to clear the Earth of human life so they may claim what was once theirs. As Cthulhu and others like Cthulhu awaken, they'll drop their equivalent of 'bug bombs' around the world near cities and other locations of dense infestation.
Yet the chemicals used are not deadly, rather their intent is to relieve humanity of their reasoning (hence these beings being heralded as 'gods'), induce chemical madness that will be interpreted as true psychological madness, whereupon they can either squish us under their analogue of boots or watch as humanity destroys itself in short order.
As for those who bear witness to the Great Old Ones and fall into madness, those beings were already protected by their version of Deep-Earth Off to repel humanity by inducing mad hallucinations.

Many decades ago, my biological parents were Great Old Ones.

Except they couldn't be bothered cleaning up the mess after the chemical carnage, leaving behind a free vacation spot for a paid location offering better hygiene.

Will the Great Old Ones be as lazy or simply not care about the ensuing mess?

marriage and divorce

Recently I heard on The Decoder Ring podcast about how most divorces are initiated by the wives, rather than the husbands. When no-fault divorce became legal, suicides among women dropped precipitously as the implication being women felt they had no way out other than pursuing drastic measures like suicide.
I thought I wrote about this here. Here's where I first wrote about the phenomenon.
On Tuesday the yentas around me were talking about their husbands. Each had the same story where a husband would come home and go straight to play video games or watch television. One related how she went upstairs to watch television in the bedroom but when she came back downstairs, her husband was bewildered and asked, "Where did you go?" What really struck a chord in me was how these women felt invisible and inconsequential in their homes by their husbands's attitudes.
I was no better, coming home, barely giving Leah any attention and thinking in my head, "Yep, we're both going to our separate corners and we only come out to fight" to use a boxing analogy. Sure I'd play video games, albeit infrequently, but mostly my time was spent shitposting on Twitter back when it was good. Or writing. My pursuit of writing was diminished when I ditched heptapod.org for Leah in hopes of making peace. Rather I wound up doubling down on my Twitter shitposting, first as @triceracocks then @tobadzistsini, instead of getting to know Leah as a friend and partner.
Here the erosion began.
During that late(?) Tuesday morning hour I felt for them. I kept my mouth shut since it wasn't my place and, because they're women, I figured they'd become defensive and angry with me for giving my two cents. On one hand I heard a voice in my head saying I'm not like that anymore and learned my lesson the hard way. On the other hand, I completely saw myself in those husbands but I looked down upon them harshly for their actions and/or inactions. On the gripping hand, I beat myself up for my marriage sins of neglecting Leah. With all those hands juggling different thoughts, those thoughts reached a crescendo and I needed to take five in order to calm down and not crack my poker face at work.

I am thinking those seemingly unhappy marriages are staying together because of the kids, these women are breeders evinced from previous conversations I've couldn't help but eavesdrop upon, or because the husband earns enough money to assure a comfortable life for his partner, or he just has a big dick. Mind you my conjectures are based upon my own prejudices and may have no basis in reality. Or, despite those criteria, they just know how to make it work.

Which only underscores my failure as a human being and husband.