BJ LOAM
Brother, if ever there was a homie of mine who I knew would positively nut up, meaning do more than just drop the one-line mics or other, more long-winded zingers on FB about their politics and not back their shit up, it’s you. You nutted up in precisely the fashion I figured you would. Now, let’s fucking do thi:
Not sure I mentioned this to you, but I did a solo trip to Panama recently. Yeah, it was great. I know why so many Americans move there now. The food (delicious and affordable), the women (curvy and Spanish-soap opera hot and a bit bitchy), Ubers (stupid cheap). Couple quick stories: Panama city is a huge, major metropolis with zero, repeat zero, road signs. It made for interesting navigating for this asshole who left his GPS in US mode. I also met a group of female Israeli soldiers on holiday after their two year duty was up there. Everyone serves in the military there before “university.” Fuck dude, imagine if our youth served two mando years in the military or some other civil service? Something tells me that if I were to ever run for office, and that were included in my platform, I wouldn’t get far with the likes of you. I shouldn’t say that. I don’t know all your stances. Anyway, bitchy Panamanian women and good looking female soldiers from Israel wasn’t what stood out the most about my recent trip to Panama, prominent as they were. It was the masks.
In our lovely home state, as you know, the moment you venture outside Seattle, the number of masks seems to taper. In Panama, let’s say three hours outside Panama City, on the way to Playa Venao, a woman walks with her son to or from a bus stop. Both wear masks.
Randomly on the roadside, miles outside any town, others walk to I have no idea where. Work? A friend’s house? They’re well dressed. All are wearing masks.
Four hours outside the city, and just about to Playa Venao, construction workers are taking a break by the truck. Not your usual break. They’re wearing masks.
To say nothing of the protocols in my city hotel–masks and temp readings required, and a bellhop who spritzes your bags with something that goes immediately dry to the touch.
Did I mention this all took place in 90 degree heat and 90% humidity? I remember rolling down the window of my rental, sticking my hand out, and it literally turning into the dampness and feel of a razor clam.
All that to say it was remarkable and humbling, Brother. A sober reminder of just how heavy and serious Covid weighs on the world. I never, ever made out a single frown or scowl underneath a mask or heard one complaint. And Panama in July, I promise, is a freegin steam room.
Covid is a thing, Brother. You’ll never hear me say otherwise. It is not, however, a call to force me to inject something into my body (whose efficacy is in serious, serious question) or lose my job. Happening as we speak, Brother.
As for Sir Juiced A Lot, Arnold Schwarzenegger, who recently likened vaccination to patriotism and referred to those who don’t needle up as “schmucks,” I guess what’s his next line going to be for those who refuse the booster shot? That we’re all just a bunch of sad cases of Trump voters? That’ll be rich. And pretty original, too. Fascists like in his native, childhood Austria? Even richer.
But fuck Arnold.
This booster shot, Brother, when’s it end?
BLAH
When does it end? When does your vacation story end. I thought we were debating vax and masks and you start off the conversation with a rambling (though engaging) half-horny, post-Noriega, Rum Diaries/I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell dispatch from Panama.
Although you don’t mention if any of them are vaxxed, according to your email, Panamanian women and hot Israeli soldiers on holiday in Central America love masks so much they don’t just wear them on their faces, they pair them up for bikini tops and tie the strings together for g-string bottoms. I was waiting for you to write about how after a few too many you went full Borat 2 and donned your own KN95 down under.
But back to the pandemic at hand.
The main question I have for you is, what do you military guys have against putting government issued materials in your bodies? Out in liberal la la land where I live I don’t know a lot of vets but a few of the vets I do know are saying they don’t want to get the vax cuz it might cause them to grow a third ear or arm. I’m thinking two tours in Iraq or Afghanistan are more likely to result in a third arm (or losing one of the first two), but you know, everybody’s entitled to their own phobias in the land of the free/home of the brave. Still, I would have thought soldiers or servicemen or service people would be the first up to take 2 pokes to protect their fellow (hu)man and flag. Not to question your patriotism on the grand scale, but just to say that in this case the reluctance to vaccinate confuses me. It seems so often born of a “you can’t tell me what to do” mentality that runs contradictory to folks who sign up to be told exactly what to do for every single sir yes sir second of a two or four or more year stint. If your Current Commander in Chief clearly wants you to do it, why not follow orders now?
My first response to a worldwide plague is that I want to do everything I can to avoid it and protect my loved ones from getting it. To me that means vax and mask and keep your distance and avoid crowded indoor spaces. It doesn’t mean turn my brain off or hand my nuts over to Nancy Pelosi to put in Hillary’s purse. As far as that old steroid-shrunken-sack of Schwarzenegger is concerned, I shared the piece because I thought the Terminator might be able to pump up some of you manly men decide to needle up and stop the spread of this increasingly Predator-like invisble plague. Help convince some junior Jesse the Bodys and bad attituded Bill Dukes to “get to the choppah” before COVID skynets us all. Or just a mere few million.
Now I know that lots of libertarian leaning vax-resisters love to talk about how us girly-men and manly girls on the left are chicken-littling COVID when for most it’s little more than a bad cold crossed with a jager-shots hangover and that really only old people and fat people or people who were already sick for other reasons need to be afraid and that anyway aren’t all you Green-New-Squealers the ones always going on and on about overpopulation and how we need to have less people and no cows and no beer and definitely no guns because we’d all be better off eating kale and soy exclusively until everybody ends up so gender fluid and there’s no such thing as men and women or sex anymore just theys and thems and no more continuation of the specie unless it takes place consensually via code in some weird VR safe space.
Which, all that being said, I don’t necessarily disagree with, but because that sentence was so long I’ve gone and forgotten which part I don’t necessarily disagree with. Oh yeah, the part about liberals exaggerating. I too get annoyed and disgruntled when my fellow Democratic Socialists of Alexandria Ocasio Cortez’s America (DSAOCA) claim that COVID is gonna kill everybody, or that all the people who don’t vax are all gonna die, or deserve to die. Most people who get COVID very clearly and scientifically aren’t going to die nor deserve to die and it’s stupid and spiteful to say so. But for me personally it’s less the getting sick I worry about and more the passing it on. To others who could get sick. Or die. No exaggeration.
Also: right now hospitals are filling up again almost nearly statistically exclusively with infected antivaxxers or didn’t bother to vaxxers, or simply those who are very concerned about Critical Race Theory. So many hospital beds filled with newly intubated anti-sheeple people—tapping out messages in morse code that they wish they had gotten the vaccine before and blinking twice to confirm that they want the rest of their family to get the vaccine now right away—that the hospitals can’t take other patients, that nurses and doctors are burning out from never ending shifts, that we’re getting close to having to go back to building make shift hospitals on ships or in streets, or digging graves en masse instead of individually.
I don’t know. I’m approaching novella length myself now but unlike you have yet to introduce any remotely interesting characters or attractive scenery. I don’t get why you don’t wanna vax. Why you wouldn’t want to take the extra step to help end the transmission and reduce chances of further and worsening variants. Not saying it isn’t your right not to get vaxxed. Not saying you don’t care, not saying you’re doing nothing. And definitely not saying you’re not a patriotic and proud/brave American. But I want to beat this virus and get our country back to being the high octane, 20 grams of protein per serving, full-throttle, Bernie Sanders regulated, free market, open for business, tax Jeff Bezos back to earth America that I’m not supposed to love but actually do love, genital warts (aka Florida) and all. And the best way I see for that to happen is for us all to vax and mask and work together to kick this virus’s fuckin’ ass.
Thanks for the kind words about my nuts in your opening paragraph. I agree with you that post high school compulsory national service would improve our country. Looking forward to round two.