The Big Squeeze

Searching for title phrase in the old memory hut called this blog, I thought I had entitled an essay, but the earliest use of the term is from a January 4th 2013 entry: More 2013 Prognostications: A Lot of Negativity

I've expressed humanity's dismal chances before and this essay considers The Big Squeeze in terms of latitude loss of habitat in a warming world. We are heading for Hothouse Earth or are already in it. Hothouse weather sucks, Icehouse weather sucks, Interglacial Just Right. Well, we are out of the natural interglacial cycle now and the squeeze is coming from every direction.

Consider in Hothouse North America, we lose arable land to the north and south. Southern creeping desertification, and miasmic swamps with toxic metal streams and rivers to the north. Farming moves north but only so far.  Certainly not the scraped clean Canadian shield to plant crops, and the fertile valleys in the Canadian west are already at 100% use. So, a big squeeze.

It is fitting that Trump renamed the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America. The Gulf of Mexico was incredibly lush, vibrant and a great well of life. Sadly, most of the USA's fertile soils lie at the bottom of this gulf, agricultural runoff feuling dead zones of greater and greater size. Toxic industrial waste and every form of offal and filth has turned the lively and lovely Gulf of Mexico into the grisly dead Gulf of America.

Bug Apocalypse already in progress. Only our vermin survive nicely. Soylent Green overbudget and behind schedule. Another squeeze.

Fresh water, more specically fresh aquifer water is dangerously low throughout the Continental west and central plains. The best example of land subsidence is California's Central Valley with area drops of up to 40 feet. Meaning subsurface rock is getting squeezed like a sponge. The problem is the water is not replenished, and in fact goes to waste into a rising ocean. Many aquifers will be gone in five years

How many more squeezes? Science itself is creating more and more affluent people, with larger and larger appetites, so much so that just the past 10 years has used up more shit than the past 100, and the last 20 years equals the same amount of planetary devastation as the last ten thousand. And the next 20 years a million times faster still.

Can't really put the blame on Boomers for this one, huh kids? You complain about the state of the world we left you and yet you eat it in front of us. Cake of the world on petulant frowns, munching away

Soviet Texas

I had a dream last night I was at the White House and met Trump. Even though I hate the fucker I'm still civil. I don't call him Sir or Mr. President. I just say hey how you doing, and he's all smiling. Invites into his office, not the Oval office but a private one. It's covered in junk his toys everywhere.

Something I say makes him stop and turn and looked at me and said "You're a very positive person aren't you? " I was like "sure why not?" He liked that and we sat down at a table.

Things took a dark turn when Don Junior shows up and sits next to me. The old teeth grinder throws naked photos of me on the table, obviously my home is bugged. Trump tears little squares of paper off a sheet and tosses them on the table. They contain quotes of me saying bad things about Trump. Mostly off of my phone.

So then I woke up. Drinking  alcohol suppresses needed REM sleep.

Absence of alcohol let's the brain make up for lost fun. So yeah I've been having wild dreams and the wildest are the pee frustration dreams, which have become elaborate architectural tours of place and interiors of elaborate patterns and... just a love of material that I get from this built world. From primitive to future sterile and all parts between.

How is this tiny brain of mine able to reproduce this universe and the answer is it does this when awake as well honeybunch.

This is your brain mirroring the universe all the result of evolution.

Late July I got a butterfly fairy woman tattoo and it blew out like no one has ever seen.

My artist was mortified but I was sure it was just bruising. Nope. Frail old sun damged skin. Not her fault. 

So I'm like, this isn't setback. This is an opportunity. We will make weird fairy clouds around her, and I said yes. But we hold off on that until the tan goes away.

I got another tattoo this past Tuesday and she was a little leery, some PTSD. Everything was fine and I got a wonderful coffee branch with flowers and berries. 

No New Bronze until December-

-or at least no new bronze with existing conditions at the college. There are infrastructure projects going on in the foundry area that involve replacing current air systems for the wood shop spray booth, replacing the defunct air compressor pump and dehumidifier, and getting a new foundry furnace to replace the dead one. 

I'm slightly pissed about the air compressor. That thing was a POS back when I was lab tech and told them for a decade it needed to be replaced. The dehumidifier was worthless, water in the lines even in winter, and it turned out that was supposed to be replaced every five years. 

So we had one last bronze pour and this time I made sure we had a cookout. Bought a charcoal grill and we had burgers. I also brought my cocktail mixer and made some hand-dipped shakes*. You cannot have community without food. 

Funny thing little light bulb moment for me was finally equating cooking and art, or rather my cooking and my art making. It is empirical exploration. I had always made a face when I hear artists talk about exploration but that's what I do with cooking. I may follow a recipe but taste is the final arbiter. And so with visual art. I spend way more time looking than I do making and I suppose it is like tasting. This may seem a trivial revelation but it seems to have removed biases and prejudices about art.

I still will often experience imposter syndrome, that I'm not a real artist. But I can cook, so I'm making art, and so I am indeed an artist.

At any rate, no molten bronze unless I break out my mini furnace or help a buddy set one up. I'm inclined to work in clay and grill. Here's some picks from the bronze  pour.

*I have determined from 30 years of foundry work that the best hydrator is milk. If you want to make it fun, chocolate milk. And if chcolate milk is good, chocolate shake is better. The best.