Chapter 285

I was out of bed around 6:40. Long gone is the commitment to rise at 6 every morning, so I don’t take time to do tai chi or yoga in the morning, but I still slowly get ready, walk the dog and go to work with time to spare.

I had a lab period with the eleventh-graders, then I went home and ate leftovers while watching videos that further blackpill me about the gangrenous state of Western civilization. Ah well, it was a good run, over what, 25 centuries, more or less? I can’t say I’m that mad, I’m unwilling to fight much against what is pretty much inevitable at that point, it’s a case of lying in the bed now that it’s made, all that. But I’m no accelerationist and I don’t find schadenfreude-like joy in the whole downfall, and in fact I do find it extremely bizarre that so many Westerners themselves cheer on the train wreck that is the complete deterioration of the culture they were born in. Whether they’re masochists, useful idiots, commies, or brainwashed, have they at least given a bit of thought about what’s going to come next once the paradigm has shifted completely? I’m not saying it will necessarily be worst, but it’s unlikely to be better, that’s all.

Anyway. I got back to work and braced myself for a fully blocked schedule. While the twelfth-graders did review exercises, I paced around and looked at their answers, and something stuck to the wall caught my eye. It’s a contract of some sort, with all 30 students’ signatures at the bottom. I squinted to try to decipher the Chinese, and it’s a commitment to eat less takeout, because it’s unhealthy and is a problem for the environment. I can’t read every single Chinese character of the tens of thousands in use, but I can diagonally read a text and make up the general meaning. However, I also often find myself looking at a block of text, thinking I understand most of the words, but once I’m done, if I try to come up with a summary I just can’t. I guess that makes me “functionally illiterate”. I remember reading somewhere that 800 000 of Quebecers are illiterate, and I told myself “No way! That’s over 10% of the population!” but what is meant by that is not the complete inability to read words, rather it is about reading comprehension past a certain primary school grade, whether it’s due to a low IQ, brain damage because their mother smoked during pregnancy, or low education. Yet, those people have the right to vote, and their vote counts the same as mine and other big brains’. Well, joke’s on them! I haven’t voted in over 15 years.

I walked in Crazy Classroom, and the students (those who were not asleep, so maybe five of them) were all surprised. They showed me the schedule on the wall, it says they have a politics class, but my schedule says it’s chemistry time. I asked the principal which one prevails, and it’s the former, there’s been a mistake. Ah well. I got a welcome breather then, and sat in the office preparing tomorrow’s review. I looked for something to listen to and settled on Rorschach, a hardcore band that was way before its time, incorporating elements of dissonant metal and post-rock in there, it was a very enjoyable listen.

I had one more class, then went home. It had been a long day, and I was weighing my options. Should I decompress by sitting around at home and resting, or should I decompress by going to the gym? I chose the first, rest days are important. I bought meat and vegetables at the stinky market, and made couscous with big chunks of beef and pork, scrambled eggs and raisins. Couscous is great, and dead easy to make.

I watched the movie Zero Dark Thirty, about the military operation that led to the gunning of Bin Laden. Well the last thirty minutes were, and it was a cool and well-filmed action sequence, exactly like I had read in a Navy SEAL’s memoir a few years ago. The first two hours were about the CIA conducting interrogations (read: creepy torture), cross-examination, surveilance and eventually finding where the World’s Most Wanted Man was hiding. All of this was spearheaded by a Bad Ass Woman™, who went around being disobedient to her stupid cisgendered white male (ew!) hierarchical superiors with snarky comment upon sassy comment, disregarding protocols, condescendingly put down special forces military personel, and generally being a Bad Ass Woman™. At any point I expected her to storm into Barack Obama’s office uninvited and say “What’s up bitch, when can we have the funding to go bomb those civilians?!” before doing one of those mic drop hand gestures like a Bad Ass Woman™ would. So yeah, the movie wasn’t bad, but it was about an hour too long and you couldn’t help but wonder how it glorifies those “enhanced interrogation techniques” that are clearly leading to false positive results.

The dog and I rode to the girlfriend’s workplace when she was done with supervising night study. Then she drove us home. I made her her favorite cocktail, and poured myself one, why not. I was in bed early enough, read a few chapters and crashed.