Hitting the fan

 Critically endangered, my ass.  Cinda Mickols lives on a hilltop north of Los Angeles and is paying the price for all that natural beauty.  A flock of California condors invaded her deck and trashed the place, and now they won't leave.  The birds have a ten-foot wingspan and are not impressed when the five-foot-three-inch Ms. Mickols waves her cane at them.  Their shit is everywhere and so is their smell.  "Yeah, protected species," they taunt.  "Whaddaya gonna do, shoot us?"  Insert Hitchcock reference here. 

People who track stuff continue to track Long March 5B as it hurtles back to earth we know not where.  Best guess this morning was Sudan.  According to the Washington Post "There are no recorded instances of a human ever being killed by reentering space debris -- though a cow in Cuba did lose its life in 1961."  That was right around the time Fidel Castro decided to order some Russian missiles.  Probably no connection.

Ron DeSantis's unhinged WELCOME CORONAVIRUS!! policy may cost Florida its lucrative Norwegian Cruise Line business.  The company sensibly requires all passengers and crew to show proof of covid vaccination before sailing and Florida does not.  NCL's CEO Frank Del Rio, clearly part of the "woke mob," laconically observes that his ships can operate from less idiotic states and also from Caribbean ports just as easily.  Last year there were multiple outbreaks on cruise ships -- Google "floating petri dish" -- and most sane people don't want to go back there.

TripAdvisor has deleted a review of Auschwitz which called it "fun for the family," but only after being asked by the Auschwitz Memorial and Museum.  Initially they found that it complied with submission guidelines.  The reviewer has also been "cancelled" by TripAdvisor, so add them to the "big tech tyrants" Josh Hawley is gunning for.  (Wait...do you suppose he took the kids to Poland this year?)

Remember the Twinkie defense?  Back in 1979 Dan White got seven years for a carefully planned double assassination because the jury believed his claim to have been under the influence of junk food.  Maybe another jury will believe Anthony Antonio took part in the January 6 coup attempt because he was under the influence of junk television.  Antonio was stuck in a house for six months where he was subjected to non-stop Fox News, and he went mad, or got mad.  Anyway, he's all over his "Foxmania" now and would like to go home.  Is this a can of worms the insurrectionists want to open?  After all, Fox only amplified the Big Lie told by Trump.  

Then there was the unprecedented Washington Post op ed signed by all ten living former Secretaries of Defense, warning that Trump might try to use the military for an old-fashioned Banana Republic(an)-type coup.  In the New Yorker Susan B. Glasser reveals that it was organized by soon-to-be-former Republican House caucus chair Liz Cheney.  She'll be lucky if her family doesn't get a fish wrapped in her pants suit.

Can the news out of India get worse?  The mind-boggling numbers, the shortages of everything, the dead and dying in the streets?  Yes, it can.  Mucormycosis is a black fungus that results from uncontrolled blood sugar; half its victims die.  The treatment involves amputation; the symptoms are appalling.  And the Indian variant has now been found in San Diego.  I have a terrible feeling this virus is just getting its second wind.

"It's time for a spirit of forgiveness to be happening," says Roger Marshall (R-Kumbaya).  The senator supported every attempt to overturn the election results but he's "just so ready to move on."  Come on, people, smile on your brother, it's not Benghazi.  Hey, Democrats, admit you stuffed the Arizona ballot boxes with panda paper so Roger can get to more important things.  Like repealing the extra $300 the unemployed have been getting.  Go back to work, you lazy slobs!  Marshall's a doctor -- well a "pro-life OB-GYN," anyway.  This one's for you, Rog.