Far Too Proud to Beg

[kimberlysteele]

This morning, I found myself sharing the sob story of my business with the pharmacist who compounds my cat's anti-constipation medicine. Since mid-2020, little Kiki (LOL she's actually huge, around 20 pounds) has needed artificial assistance in the form of an oral medication called Cisapride in order to poop. I suspect that Cisapride is secretly manufactured by artisan elf-monks in the high Sierras out of solid gold that tarnishes when touched by air, because it costs $60 for a 30mg bottle.

I just happened to get the head pharmacist on the phone, and he was exceptionally kind when I told him that I was a small business owner down on her luck because of the Covidapocalypse and $40 was the difference between me and two week's worth of groceries. Though he gave me a discount on Kiki's medication, I don't want a discount.

I want to be able to afford my cat's medication.

Last year at this time, I was doing great. I had money coming in from my usual side work -- recording vocals, PDF sheet music. Plus my music lesson studio had a line out the door. I'm extremely good at what I do. There isn't a singer who walks into my door who isn't a better singer in 6 months time. I also teach piano and guitar, and I know I'm exceptionally good at teaching those as well: as adults, my grown-up ex-students don't stop playing their instruments long after lessons with me are over.

Enough about me and my business. I'm one of the lucky small business owners. I still have a business to come back to. If I owned a dance studio, a gift shop, or a restaurant, forget it. Tracy Walker is (was?) a hairstylist in Alberta, Canada who did everything right. She's on the verge of losing her house, which will displace her, her husband, and her diabetic brother who depends on her for care.  

Tracy managed to create a situation that I've always wanted but couldn't make happen: she runs her business out of the bottom floor of her house, which has been converted into a storefront. It seems the idiots running things in her neck of the woods are of the same breed as the ones in Illinois, because she is unable to do business under a second lockdown.  Here's the thing: even though Tracy has made the decision to stay open against the lockdown order, much like I have done, there's not much one can do if only half the clients are willing to walk through the door.  Fear is powerful, and Tracy, like me and so many other small business owners, can't do much if people are too scared to be in the same room as each other.  There's also the not-small factor of economic collapse, which is cascading through the middle class right now and crushing people's abilities to afford luxuries such as meals out, karate lessons, cosmetic dentistry, hair cut & color, and exorbitantly-priced pet medications.  

I don't want government handouts.  There are people who should benefit from government handouts: all of those old, infirm, and chronically diseased people should be able to access the money they need.  Me?  I am of sound mind and able body and I want to work.  If I were to come into a great fortune tomorrow, I wouldn't close my Studio.  I would still go to work five days a week, though it would probably be via chauffeur as I hate driving.  

There is a silver lining to the cloud: Notice there were no lines outside Best Buy this year and nobody got killed in a Walmart stampede on Black Friday.  This will be the least commercialized Christmas we've had for a long time, and not because Big Retail wanted it that way, but because Big Government cut off its nose to spite its face in the form of self-induced financial collapse.  There is a lot of garbage that won't end up in ocean and future landfills because there won't be as many toys bought this year.  The desperation is palpable in Target and Dollar Tree -- I remember seeing Christmas decorations up in September because they all knew this would be a terrible year no matter how early they rolled out the BUYBUYBUY propaganda.  I hope we never have a successfully commercialized Christmas again.  I hope this year wipes out the frantic, Madison Avenue-driven urge to buy other people's love via material detritus in many individual souls.

I don't want money.  I want bravery.  I want people to stop following mask orders.  I went into Aldi yesterday and I didn't wear my mask.  When a shelf stocker said "Ma'am, put on your mask", I sweetly replied, "Oh my goodness, I must have forgotten.  Thank you so much for reminding me."  I put the mask on and as soon as I was around the corner, I took it off again.  I am going to stop wearing masks when I enter large chain stores, though for smaller places and local chains, I will comply with mask orders so they don't get in trouble.  How sad that it's up to a 4'11" inch woman to stand up to tyrants.  I guess it goes to show how few manly men there are in the suburbs -- I married one of the only ones who can wield a hammer, a paintbrush, and a saw competently.  I suppose I enjoyed myself a bit, gaslighting that poor Aldi employee in such a sarcastic manner.  I don't usually like confrontation and will do anything to avoid it, but this is war, make no mistake.

Comments

Orgies

[kimberlysteele]

Pennsylvania is trying to regulate orgies and California eliminated legal penalties for knowingly transmitting HIV. Yet all these lockdowns are about safety... yeah, right. Lockdowns exist because leftism is a dumpster fire, full stop.

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2020/12/pennsylvania-health-department-issues-preferred-covid-orgy-regulations-wear-face-covering-avoid-kissing-wash-hands-often/

Re: Orgies

[methylethyl]

It is an imbalance. Every culture *needs* a progressive element in order to make necessary changes, adapt to new challenges, and address systemic injustices. But the rulership of any stable society *must* be more conservative than progressive-- it must have a bias toward stability and *not changing*. Because when you settle into something that works fairly well, the bias should always be toward keeping it that way. Progressives by nature *need* change. They *need* to push boundaries. And that is why they can never, ever, be allowed near the levers of power. Any time they take over, it's a complete fustercluck. You can't continually change *everything*. You need most things to remain basically the same. Too much change at once is chaos, famine, and slaughter.

These people are great fun to have along on a road trip. You're an idiot if you let them drive.

Re: Orgies

[kimberlysteele]

They're surely driving now, and they've got a zombie cheat-win President Elect to prove it.

Trump was able to patch up our rattletrap economy into a semblance of prosperity but now the wheels are going to come off. And the Progressives are going to get their free abortions, their Hollywood vice-pushing, and their legalized drugs, but because they are incompetent boobs when it comes to creating stability, they'll begin killing off their own class as homelessness skyrockets (we saw in my last post's comments how well they handle homelessness) and the rich get richer. The middle class is going to become nearly extinct under Biden.

I don't have a problem with abortion, mind you, as I lived my entire young life from age 13 - 31 in fear of conceiving. Having a baby wasn't my choice this time around and that has to do with one of my past lives as well as other reasons. Abortion should be safe and legal, but I would make a rule that any woman who seeks a third abortion is forcibly sterilized. Once or twice is an honest mistake, but a third indicates there is something deeply wrong. Also, parenting should require a basic competency license, and if a person won't even hold the robot doll they're given as a test or change its fake diaper, they should be given the option of free sterilization and strongly encouraged not to become a parent.

[logicalmagic83]

My brother owns his own landscaping business and I jumped on with his crew today to help them finish a job in a day instead of two. His business hasn't been much affected - so far - but nearly all of his clients are part of the PMC. While that lasts, I suppose. Today's site was a typical mcmansion where we installed a bunch of non native, useless plants. Well, they provide oxygen but that's about it. I'm sure planting edibles in this area would be met with horror. I didn't mind helping out as I didn't have any other work scheduled today, but even though everything looked nice when we were done, it felt empty to me. Generic. I loathe suburbia and how it's invaded farmland, wrecked watersheds and resulted in clear-cutting of our forested ridges. I'd be fine seeing it all come to a screeching halt. I don't wish bad on these people, but I'd certainly educate them on making better use of their land. Oh yeah, I have a business doing that. Hopefully the changing times will result in greater demand for my services. I also found it interesting that my brother, who is scared of nothing, is so promask. I think he's buying the line of protecting others. He's very agreeable while I'm remarkably stubborn. Perhaps he's just trying to get through his day with the least amount of resistance. For me, most days feel like I'm literally going against the grain.

[kimberlysteele]

Often that sort of McMansion neighborhood is controlled by a homeowner's association. If you planted tomatoes, the Association would come down on you like a ton of bricks. If the PMC (professional managerial class for those wondering what that stands for... back in the day, we called them yuppies) ever tastes the sting of what they've so gleefully dealt the lower middle classes, we actually will see them barking like dogs at the full moon and throwing themselves off of bridges en masse.

I thank you for going against the grain. Without brave people willing to go mask-less and to question social distancing, we wouldn't have a chance and would be in a freakishly 1984-ish Great Depression already. Since Biden seems to be the one who is going to be in the White House, I feel preparing for a second Great Depression would be wise.

As for your brother, the final frontier of bravery tends to be losing the fear of what others think of you. I have Uranus as a strong natal chart influence, so it helps me forge my own path. It does frustrate me though that people 2x my size and with a great deal more money and power are terrified of polite confrontations with grocery store clerks when freedom itself is at stake.

[(Anonymous)]

Gee, I love seeing a house with tomato plants in the yard. Makes me think of nice old grandmas stirring homemade spaghetti sauce.

—Lady Cutekitten

[(Anonymous)]

Add in a soluble fiber that humans take like Metamucil or something similar...mix it into canned food for the best result, and increase or decrease the amount based on how the symptoms of constipation are affected. A liquid prescription medicine called lactulose works very well, but don't discount the fiber supplements you can get anywhere.

[kimberlysteele]

Thank you! I actually have her on Miralax 2x a day. It helps a great deal. I am going to try pumpkin as well and slippery elm, which my mom researched and found out is safe for cats. Kiki's constipation doesn't seem to be alleviated by lactulose, unfortunately.

[(Anonymous)]

Hi Kimberly. We had a cat with mouth pain who we fed with slippery elm mixed in with his food. It made him able to eat. We did it for over two years. Slippery elm is fine for kitties.

Annette

[(Anonymous)]

metamucil is just psyllium husk with a bunch of sugar added (you can get the psyllium without the sugar!). Be careful with it though-- it's great for maintenance but if you overdo it in an already-messed-up system, it can cause a blockage. Important to have enough liquid! That said, I've also heard of people using it for their pets-- I'm told it makes their turds less stinky and easier to clean up?

[logicalmagic83]

I think one aspect that really irks me is how the mask narrative puts kind and well meaning people in a tight spot. I suspect that's part of what's got my brother going along with it. He's a genuinely good hearted person. When it snows, he's out there delivering for mobile meals, deicing driveways and is very likely to stop for a stranger to help change a tire. He's also 6ft4, 200+ lbs and sounds like Sam Elliott.. No one with any sense is going to say a thing to him about a mask. Meanwhile, my 5ft6 self is constantly on guard for someone to start running their yap. Going to a store is exhausting and I've come to hate it 1000 times more than usual. An additional perspective: I left a 15 year career in EMS in 2019 and when I check in with my colleagues, they're all saying this is a giant overreaction. My former medic partner said that through the spring and much of summer, they didn't run chest pain or MI calls, they ran cardiac arrests because everyone was too afraid to go to the hospital, even with crushing chest pain. That's heartbreaking, even to a burned out grumpypants like myself.

[kimberlysteele]

We need good, kind people like him to start quietly ignoring mask orders. Once they do, the Karens won't have a chance.

Whenever I get in my car to go to work, I see at least one Amazon delivery truck. It's fairly obvious who is benefitting from lockdowns and small businesses going under.

"Going to a store is exhausting and I've come to hate it 1000 times more than usual" Boy, do I feel you on that one. I'm one of those female unicorns... I hate shopping. I hate wearing a mask because I have a deviated septum. Since the plandemic began, I've cut my already sparse shopping habit to 50%. Most people have done this. I can't tell you how many times I have passed up a store where I formerly would have run in to pick up this and that because there is a line queued up outside it. Now I have no money to shop even if I wanted to, and I know I'm not the only one getting killed financially. If Biden shuts us down for eight weeks, we're all going to 1930s conditions, except unlike in 1930, nobody knows how to farm (including myself, I only grew 10% of our food this summer) and we're all dependent on petroleum. Not good. It will be especially not good for the PMC, who will see their pensions, alimonies, and other forms of non-earned income dry up.

I know someone who went into the hospital for a flu -- an elderly gentleman. He went into the hospital and a week later he was dead from "covid". Nobody was allowed to visit him. He died in the company of strangers. His wife, who has Alzheimer's, does not know he is dead. Keep in mind most hospitals get a kickback when a patient is admitted for "covid" somewhere to the tune of $8K - $12K and if they are intubated, the kickback is around $40K. Anyone who participates in this scheme is a monster, and of course that means there are unwitting monsters and well-meaning, kind monsters. Vera Sharav, who survived the Holocaust, says that the old and infirm were targeted by the plandemic just as they were in the time of the Nazis:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h_EDV_7s7Dc&feature=emb_logo

[methylethyl]

You're definitely not the only one who hates shopping! And going into stores has become so much more unpleasant this year. Add on the miasma of holiday stress in the air and it's nearly unbearable right now.

I had to go get a few things this week, and we were literally running out of the store when we were done. Just horrible. Didn't even get everything we came for, because at our last stop, in the frozen veg, a large and obviously deranged man had cornered an employee and was talking at him, very loudly and way too close, about all the languages he was just great at, and how great he was generally. The poor dude in the Mall-Wart vest had a hunted look. I made eye contact and tried to think of some way to extract him, while also looking for the frozen blueberries. Crazy guy saw my inattention and sidled over to try to talk to my kid, so I hustled the cart and kid out of there at a fast clip. Had a productive discussion with kiddo on the way home about the situation. Seriously bad energy though.

Farming: have you tried pumpkins or large squashes? They're very little work, they store for a fairly long time, and are a fair number of calories for the small effort. The vines can take up a lot of space, but you can steer them so it's not space that other plants need.

[(Anonymous)]

All I want is to be able to live a normal life again. The fact that this has become extreme is a very bad sign....

My gloves are coming off

[kimberlysteele]

I'm done with these people and their New Normal. I'm just beginning to get uppity about it. They're on my bad side now!

[fringe_elemental]

My partner and I have been lucky during this nonsense because we are both employed with aerospace/defense parts manufacturing companies that were exempt from the restrictions here in Florida. Our lives are pretty simple and we both like to keep it that way. We bring home basic blue collar wages and don’t have that mentality where we feel the need to gut our old kitchen just to have stainless appliances or marble counter tops. (Any new counter that we get will probably be an epoxy pour experiment!)

Florida has supposedly opened up for business and we actually have a sane governor in DeSantis, but it seems that people just refuse to question the mass media. They refuse to fight back and instead he gets crucified for his relatively free thinking policies.
When this whole thing began last spring and flooded the media I could smell the stink of the lies. When they shut down greedy Disney, I knew that whatever they had in store for us had just become real. I refused to live in any kind of fear and have continued on in my own life with the same habits as before, trusting in the immune system given to me by the Creator of this magnificent universe and it’s ability to fend off what is essentially the flu.

My workplace has been a little paranoid and while it’s a policy to wear the face nappies, I’ve been pretty lacking on that and luckily they haven’t really come down on me about it. I’m not the only one, but I work next to an older woman who wears hers religiously. All day. Every day. I keep my thoughts to myself about the dangers of wearing those filthy things, it’s a lot easier that way because no one would listen anyway. For awhile there they were going around with the silly laser gun and checking our temps, sometimes twice a day! When I started offering my arm, they tried to push the issue about checking the forehead. I told them that I didn’t like the symbolism of it (gun to the head) and maybe they wondered if I had suffered some past abuse where someone held a gun to my head or something. I let them think that and the temp checks stopped. Sneaky me.

While I don’t think that they will push the vaccine for employment thing on us, I’m prepared to offer my refusal and cite the exact reasons why and if they fire me, so be it.
But in the public world, I have never worn a mask. I’ve made that decision and refuse to do it. I’m used to being a bit of an outcast anyway and being a tall skinny woman I’m used to sticking out like a sore thumb so I’ve had lots of practice. And now as an older woman I’ve become fierce about my freedoms and am prepared to have a screaming match with some Karen if it comes to that but so far it hasn’t.

It’s just a bad feeling, though and isn’t for the lighthearted. For example, the last trip I made to MallWart it seemed especially toxic. We were surrounded by the masked pajama people. The normies. The meat. A henpecked soul standing behind his wife in the woman’s clothing section was staring at me from a distance. I stared back, asking out loud “What are you looking at?” He probably didn’t hear me but hopefully he got the message written all over my unmasked face.

No more lingering and wandering around like we used to do. It was more like “Let’s just get the Hell out of here”. By the time we got back to the truck I felt almost physically ill. Psychically bludgeoned.

Everywhere we go, we are the exception to the rule and I refuse to cave in. I’m angered by those who refuse to fight back, especially in our relatively free state of Florida. I’m especially angry with the men. And especially with the cowards who dare call themselves patriots!

Stick with your decision to fight back. I don’t know if it will get any easier. In my case I just have this feeling that I must stay true to myself, my soul and fighting a lie. Even if no one else will. Anything else would make me a hypocrite. If it’s women like us that have to fight back, then fight we must. And fight, we will.

Colleen

[kimberlysteele]

Thanks for this. I'm glad there's someone else out there who grew a set, and yeah, I'm not surprised it was another woman. I worry what I'll unleash on a Karen if one confronts me. I'd rather not be driven to "getting out the big guns". I can get truly nasty, and I certainly have a thirst for vengeance that gets out of proportion.

My husband and I went out to a Greek restaurant tonight. The Greek/family diner places were the first to stand up to our governor's lockdowns. There is a Facebook group for them called Stay Open, Stay Strong.

Whenever I go out, I can feel mass psychosis simmering all around. As we speak, I'm wearing a red bag amulet. It's a good idea to sleep with a bowl of vinegar near the bed too. This is what I believe Nazi Germany felt like before the Nazis really got the upper hand.

Shame on the men, indeed. They're collectively rolling over and wimping out. This is self-evident where church is concerned. What kind of father lets a bunch of tyrannical, hysterical Karens stop him from taking his family to church on Christmas day? Especially when it is our Constitutional right?

The gloves have finally come off. We are at war. I am at war with people who were my best friends in high school because they are the Professional Managerial Class mask-enforcers. I have, in essay form, let them know they are responsible for crippling my once-thriving business. They're responsible for so much more, though. On JMG's blog, a troll tried to bait me by saying she wasn't "responsible" if I caught COVID and gave it to all my friends -- what a scumbag! It was absolutely transparent that she got off on the idea people suffering. She's one of those who unconsciously hexes people and hopes they'll get sick.

But the thing is, she IS responsible. All the fearmongers are responsible. It's a hundred percent their fault 11 year old Adan Llanos shot himself in the head on December 4 during a Zoom class. They are the reason my elderly neighbor died surrounded by strangers instead of his wife and kids. Those things would not have happened without their fear. They are responsible for the terror and grief of thousands and even millions of people who have died or will die alone, including many children, because they were unfortunate enough to die during the Plandemic. I saw this early on and that's why I opposed lockdowns after the first 2 week one was supposed to be over. No sane spiritual person wants their karma. All of that karma for deaths, lost celebrations, ruined livelihoods, and pointless suffering is on the mask-mongers, and it is HEAVY. And they're the sort who already had bad karma headed their way for being generally clueless and privileged. I see many of them being reborn as the poorest of the world's poor in the next few hundred years. The thing is that being poor isn't the most terrible thing by a long shot, but it will be to them.

[(Anonymous)]

We're heading for another full scale lockdown here in Ontario starting December 24. Christmas Eve, everything the government deems non-essential is going to be shutdown; this includes all religious ceremonies, family gatherings, and practically every small business. I'd be willing to bet a lot of money that a large fraction of what is closed is going to be gone for good, and we will be a lot worse off for it...

[kimberlysteele]

Geesh. I'm sure our idiot governor will try something similar in the new year unless a miracle happens and Trump stays in the White House. Personally, I refuse to shut down. They can drag me off in handcuffs and I will go proudly. If I were Christian, I would be organizing mass campaigns to march back into churches on Christmas. We are now at war and sadly it is with the cowards and snitches among us. In the Stalin era, one could be rounded up to go to a labor camp for any reason at all. It would not surprise me one bit if Covidians started up their own labor camps and used their usual gaslighting and greasy excuses to send dissenters off to die in them. They all love to accuse Trump of doing everything they either do or want to do.

I have zero problem if individuals stay home and pad their doors and windows so no icky cooties can get into their fur-lined cells. My problem begins when they march into the world we share and demand to rule it.

[houseofmirrors]

Dare I ask, are they enforcing this on all religious gatherings or only certain select ones while giving certain others a dispensation?

I am considering a Big Retail fast

[kimberlysteele]

One thing that has irked me about the Plandemic is the fleet of Amazon delivery trucks that seems to increase every week and the allowance of cheek-to-jowl crowds just as long as they are within the confines of big box stores. Clearly our strings are being pulled by large corporations in bed with government.

I prefer to "live the change I want to see in the world", so I am considering a fast from all of the big corporate entities. Theoretically, if enough people boycotted big corporations, they would cease to exist.

For me, a boycott of big corporate products would mean quite a few changes. For one, I would not be shopping at Aldi or Jewel/Albertson's anymore for groceries. Instead, I would shop at the small chain grocery chores and farmer's markets. I would yank all of my books from Amazon and forgo any profits that go into Jeff Bezo's pocket first. That said, my Sheet Music Plus store would stay up even though it feeds one of the crappiest music publishing monopolies around, the Hal Leonard corporation. I'd change my web host to a much smaller one. I would have to think about going off of Youtube in favor of a smaller, less censored platform.

Food for thought.

Re: I am considering a Big Retail fast

[(Anonymous)]

I've gotten started on this myself. It takes an insane amount of work to actually avoid the big companies: I'm taking it one step at a time.

Re: I am considering a Big Retail fast

[methylethyl]

We have definitely been working on this. I can't completely escape the MallWart, yet, but I've been strategically transferring as much of my grocery buying as possible over to the local Piggly Wiggly (a chain, but it's a locally-owned-franchise that stocks local products such as honey. Plus: no robot checkouts!), and ethnic grocery stores (no better place to get rice, lentils, and bulk spices).

Amazon is a tricky bugger to get rid of, though. I recently spent a week looking for a good source for socks. Socks! You wouldn't think it was complicated! The regular old Hanes cotton socks that we never thought about before have declined precipitously in quality recently. The last set were essentially single-use disposables. They fell apart in the first wash. So I went looking for something that was still mostly cotton, and not made in China. I found bunches of socks that ran anywhere from $9 to over $20 a pair. I'm sure they were nice, but they were specialty hiking socks and things of that ilk. Hand-knitted out of pure gold by Alsatian monks or something. I finally tracked down some that ran about $3 a pair, made in the USA, 80% cotton, met all the specs... and AFAICT, they *only* sell through Amazon. A lot of small manufacturers simply use Amazon as a pre-built, low-hassle checkout, so they don't have to have an IT department.

I ordered them through Amazon. Sigh. But I have successfully re-sourced a few other things I would normally get from Amazon, so... hooray for small victories?

[(Anonymous)]

For your cat, something that can help is canned pumpkin (if she'll eat it) or mixing a flavorless fiber supplement into her wet food. Lactulose is a liquid medication that can also help, but I think that needs a prescription. Definitely try the fiber supplement if you haven't already.

[kimberlysteele]

Thank you!