Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Black Jesus loves a paper trail.

If you cannot answer whether trump lost the 2020 election, you are unfit for office.

Marge, god is saying you’re stupid.

Republicans cannot even be trusted with their own money.

Don’t expect peaches from an apple tree.

The truth is, these are not very bright guys, and things got out of hand.

Conservatism: there are people the law protects but does not bind and others who the law binds but does not protect.

Let me file that under fuck it.

My right to basic bodily autonomy is not on the table. that’s the new deal.

Why is it so hard for them to condemn hate?

American History and Black History can not be separated.

It’s the corruption, stupid.

Republicans: The threats are dire, but my tickets are non-refundable!

One of our two political parties is a cult whose leader admires Vladimir Putin.

When I decide to be condescending, you won’t have to dream up a fantasy about it.

Let me eat cake. The rest of you could stand to lose some weight, frankly.

People are complicated. Love is not.

Historically it was a little unusual for the president to be an incoherent babbling moron.

Yeah, with this crowd one never knows.

Let’s not be the monsters we hate.

This year has been the longest three days of putin’s life.

Red lights blinking on democracy’s dashboard

The real work of an opposition party is to hold the people in power accountable.

“Can i answer the question? No you can not!”

You are here: Home / Open Threads / Looks Like We Made It

Looks Like We Made It

by | 178 Comments

This post is in: 

There’s still 75 minutes, but it looks like we made it out of this fucking shithole of a year 2020. I’m not even watching any of the bullshit on tv, I just don’t care. Just fucking go away, 2020.

Nice Zoom chat tonight, with a couple new faces. I wish more of you would show up- especially some of you lurkers. There’s no need to be intimidated, we’re all old and with no fucks to give, so if you have time check in tomorrow. It will be nice.

One last time:

Fuck this year.

Reader Interactions

178Comments

  1. 1.

    Jude

    Aww, I’m sorry I didn’t show up, John. I’m a lurker who adores y’all. Hubby and I popped a bubbly waaaayyyy too early that got me sleepy AF and super forgetful. Will shoot for tomorrow!

  2. 2.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    There’s still 75 minutes, but it looks like we made it out of this fucking shithole of a year 2020. I’m not even watching any of the bullshit on tv, I just don’t care. Just fucking go away, 2020.

    I liked how the NBC NYE Special was titled: “Escape 2020” or something

  4. 4.

    Soprano2

    I’m counting the days until January 20th. That’s when real good changes begin happening.  But yeah, fuck 2020. Gave condolences to a friend tonight whose brother died of COVID.  It got in his lungs.  I will say for me 2012 was worse,  because my sister was killed,  but 2020 is a close second.

  6. 6.

    Mike in NC

    Wife just checked out for the night. Saved her some bubbly for a breakfast mimosa. Emailing greetings to Canadian friends to tell them how grateful we are to shitcan Fat Bastard, the Russian stooge who spent four ugly years being a fucking national disgrace.

  8. 8.

    Zelma

    I forgot to sign up.  I enjoyed the last zoom.  It was fun to put faces to nyms.  I just watched Death to 2020.  Great fun.  I’m so culturally illiterate, I didn’t know who most of the actors were.  I’ll have to look up the cast.

  10. 10.

    prostratedragon

    Some articles of remembrance:

    11 grand figures lost in 2020. The article is originally from Agence France-Presse, but since they picked up Justice Ginsburg, I’m surprised they missed John Lewis. Also, they listed Juliette Greco but not Michel Picoli. Still, a momentous list.

    Artists and friends of Chicago radio station WFMT. Brief quotes from some, followed by a listing, accenting but not restricted to classical music. Many deaths from COVID are noted. Did not know that Harold Budd had died Dec. 8; he did have COVID but since he also was in stroke rehabilitation the cause might be considered ambiguous.

    Little Richard, remembered by Bootsy Collins. Hard to believe this even happened.

  11. 11.

    Benw

    I’m skipping the ball drop and following the countdown on timeanddate.com – my go-to website to navigate time zones when planning international video meetings.

    Why, yes, I am a lot of fun at parties.

  13. 13.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    So jackals, what did you think 2020 was going to be like years and years ago? Nothing like how it actually was, I’m sure! I want my flying car : /

  14. 14.

    HRA

    Hi John I was hoping you would come on today after I read about the mix up about the vaccine for the virus in W Va.

    I am waiting for the right time for my tech person and daughter who had tested positive and never got ill to come set up this new device in my desktop so I can do Zoom some day here.

    Happy New Year to all!

  17. 17.

    cmorenc

    I am putting this hermit-like new years eve to good use practicing guitar – may play a little “black mountain rag” to bring in the new year

  22. 22.

    Ken

    BTW the last timezone to be in 2020 will be UTC-12:00, which has just a few uninhabited islands. But I’m not waiting up another 7 hours to see it completely out — though when put that way, it sounds unpleasantly like the horror movie trope of turning your back on Jason, because he’s obviously been finished off…

  24. 24.

    Gin & Tonic

    I honestly can’t complain too much. Nobody in my family circle or among my (few) friends got ill, let alone died. Everybody is very careful and stays in their own bubble, but as a result we’ve had some family time, and have had the grandkids visit for a couple of weeks. Purely by chance, we got in a 10-day vacation in Aruba literally two weeks before everything shut down, and I spent a week skiing in Utah before that. My work moved quickly to WFH, so I’m getting paid, but the time at home led me to understand that I’m ready for retirement, for which I put in the paperwork. My dear wife, being an essential worker (albeit part-time) got her vaccine, dose 1 so far.

    And we voted out that stupid asshole.

    Apologies for the bonhomie.

  25. 25.

    mrmoshpotato

    There’s still 75 minutes, but it looks like we made it out of this fucking shithole of a year 2020. I’m not even watching any of the bullshit on tv, I just don’t care. Just fucking go away, 2020.

    The first 19 days of 2021 can fuck off as well – oh, and the past 4 years can burn in Hell.  New Year’s day inaugurations anyone?

  26. 26.

    J R in WV

    I just opened a second bottle of sparkly wine… have a tight plug device to keep the rest for Breakfast mimosas, or some such drinks. Watching drunk Anderson Cooper, V amusing, evidently he only drinks on NYE on the payroll. Kinda cute.

    Happy New Year, all. Hope 2021 is way better than 2020 which has sucked harder than most of us deserve.

    We toasted the end of 2020, will toast in 2021 and do the go to bed thing soon.

  27. 27.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): I liked how the NBC NYE Special was titled: “Escape 2020” or something

    It wasn’t “Sorry we sucked off an orange fascist for four five years.  How can NBC redeem ourselves to democracy after we fire Chuckles into the Sun?”?

  29. 29.

    Cheryl Rofer

    We even heard Thurston bark on the Zoom!

    And, sadly, I heard from a friend that her mother, in a nursing home, has tested positive for covid.

    See y’all next year!

  30. 30.

    stacib

    A little over one hour left here in Chicago.  I am so glad to see the end of 2020, and I really, really hope that 2021 brings better times for all of us.  Just think – a year that was fucked up for the entire world.  Who would have ever thunk it???

    I also want to say a super thanks to this community.  Although I’ve been lurking since the days of ABL, hanging out around here this year has been an emotional lifesaver in ways that I’ve never fully appreciated before.  I’ve lost so many people, including my beloved brother.  I won’t bait fate, but let’s keep the good vibes going that this year will see a lot of positive change.

  31. 31.

    mrmoshpotato

    @lowtechcyclist:

    Per U2, nothing changes on New Year’s Day.

    I’ll do my celebrating at noon on January 20.

    Same. I might not even pour the champagne into a glass. Gimme those swearing-in ceremonies!

  32. 32.

    dnfree

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):  I was just thinking that I never envisioned 2020 at all when I was young. I wondered if I’d live to see the new century, and calculated my age if I made it that far. So I am bemused to contemplate that I have now spent more than a fourth of my life in the 2000s.

    But if I had imagined that far ahead, having seen the moon landings in 1969, I might have imagined travel to Mars.

  34. 34.

    JoyceH

    Hah! This must be my group! I just came here to say I’d just seen Death To 2020. So cute. I spent way too long thinking “that history professor looks so familiar, who IS that?”

  35. 35.

    Dan B

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): For some of us 2020 was like a repeat of 1984 – 2000.  There was a heartless feel to the status quo and people dying, but mostly young creative, good looking, guys.  The death was a background noise to most people but the spread to the rest of the world was slow but inexorable, and ignored or dismissed by the same mindset that affects so many more today, or so it seems with the internet of mass influence, and the horrible Murdoch propaganda universe and the evils they have modeled.

    There are wonderful ways to a brighter future and vast riches but the mindset is distracted by the most base emotional triggers that feed power to the already powerful.

    The tasks are clear.  We need to be suitably angry at the people who propagate a glorious spotless past that never could be while refusing to see a bright future because it gores some of their rotten oxen.

    One foot in front of the other and amplify the many many notes of joy.

  37. 37.

    Gary K

    It seems apropos that I finished off the year by giving up playing the piano, since it went so miserably out of tune. (No way our tuner is coming into the house until he and we are all vaccinated.)

  39. 39.

    Emma from FL

    I am in my house with Dad, waiting for the New Year so we can indulge in the three Cuban traditions: twelve grapes, a glass of bubbly, and a small bucket of water pitched out the front door to symbolically cleanse the way for the New Year. My sister is with my BIL across town, waiting to do the same at their house. We four had a lovely lunch of beef stew, a salad of mixed greens, tomato, and avocado with creamy garlic peppercorn dressing, and Rocky Road ice cream for dessert. In the years after my mother’s death our celebrations are smaller and quieter. This year, especially, we just want to move on.

    Happy New Year anyway. Hope should spring eternal.

  41. 41.

    fake irishman

    Happy New Year all! One of these days I’ll join a meet-up or pop in on a Zoom call. I appreciate all of the cranky, whiny, creative, talented, and big-hearted folks on this site.

  42. 42.

    CaseyL

    I kind of feel bad for 2020, as a personified concept, since just about everything that made the year a calamity was something we did to ourselves. I envision 2020 as a very bedraggled, tattered Old Year shuffling off, muttering, “It wasn’t my fault.”

    I’m not sure how I predicted 2020 would be, in years and decades past. The last time I remember thinking at all about the near future, it was back in the 1970s when I was so very sure humans would be exploring and colonizing deep space “in my lifetime.” Half of which has sort of happened, if you count Voyager 1 and 2, and views from the Hubble telescope – but that sure wasn’t how I pictured it happening!

  43. 43.

    Comrade Colette

    @debbie:

    The crescendo of celebratory gunfire will be my cue the new year has begun.

    Howdy, neighbor!

    I’m telling myself the bangs are mostly firecrackers, not gunshots. I love a good fairy story and tell myself that one every 4th of July, NYE, and lunar New Year. I’m satisfied with being right 1/3 of the time.

  46. 46.

    mali muso

    We made it!!!

    too tired to drink the champagne so saving it for the real celebration on 1/20.

  50. 50.

    Chetan Murthy

    @debbie:

    Yep, that was an AR-15 I just heard…

    Really?  Don’t these people know that what goes up, must come down?  Crrrrikey.

  51. 51.

    Kristine

    Happy New Year, Jackals!

    I missed today’s Zoom, but I finished the short story that was due today so go me. Texting with friends as I watch old Dr Who eps  on BBC America, which is pretty much how I’d spend this night even without a pandemic.

    A happy, healthy 2021 to all. ??

  52. 52.

    HumboldtBlue

    It’s been a lonely year.

    The biggest problem I’ll have moving forward is that looking back will always come with 2020 vision.

  53. 53.

    Kattails

    Trying to get the little web camera a friend got for me replaced, there’s visual but no sound.  Since I’m not really used to the idea, it hasn’t been a priority. Plus my conversational skills, never super-adept, have atrophied in quarantine.

    @dnfree: I can totally relate to everything you say here.  Born in 1951, couldn’t imagine 2000 when I would be fifty. Yet, still here, fuck it might as well keep going. So, Happy New Year to all.

  54. 54.

    Percysowner

    YAY! It’s 20201, now I just have to wait for my neighbors to stop shooting off fireworks and whatever so I can go to bed. My poor  dog HATES loud bangs. She’s mostly beagle, but a complete fail as a hunting dog, unless you are into using bow and arrows. She runs and hides at any loud sound, which is why someone dumped her many years ago. My luck, because she is sweet and loving and won by adopting her.

    Obviously, the booze is hitting me right about now.

  58. 58.

    Kristine

    @Chetan Murthy:

    Really? Don’t these people know that what goes up, must come down? Crrrrikey.

    If this year taught me anything, it’s that there are way more stupid people than I ever imagined.

  62. 62.

    Bruuuuce

    Huzzah, we made it! Happy New Year, Fuck the Old Year, and may we all have better days ahead.

  63. 63.

    BretH

    Watched Bridgerton until 11:45! Then turned to ABC and saw … about 10 minutes of commercials and a soggy ball drop.

    All I could think of was … last minutes of 2020 and you could have had a meaningful look back and a remembrance and thankfulness and we got cheesy commercials.

    Sums up 2020 for me.

  65. 65.

    Subsole

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): Given how most people drive, I’m kinda glad we’re keeping the traffic on the ground.

    As far as the future? Cyberpunk, but more punk than cyber. Which is kinda the inverse of what we ended up getting.

  66. 66.

    Kayla Rudbek

    I woke up Mr. Rudbek so that we could watch the last 30 seconds of the year (and the Times Square ball drop).  He fell asleep on the sofa about 9 pm or so, and I was on Ravelry trying to pick out which colors I’ll use in my next mystery knit-a-long.  Who would have thought that the year would end this way?

    Fuck 2020, and may 2021 bring sanity to the world.

  67. 67.

    Subsole

    @mrmoshpotato: If nothing is examined, then nothing can be learned.

    Which means nothing has to be fixed.

     

    Per Goku’s query above, I expected a lot in the future. I did NOT expect America as an entire social concept to just say “fuck it, late-stage Soviet mentality uber alles! We’ll do it live!”

  69. 69.

    mrmoshpotato

    Exactly. Fuck 2020, but fuck everyone into a volcano who made this final (thank you Democratic voters) horrific year of a 4-part fascist shitshow possible. And fuck them for the other 3 years too!

    Always remember: 2020 was not a bad year because of bad luck, it was a bad year because of the corruptness of power and the cruelty of capitalism.— Dr. Lucky Tran (@luckytran) December 31, 2020

  71. 71.

    prostratedragon

    @Gin & Tonic:
    “And we voted out that stupid asshole.”

    I’ve decided that that makes the year a triumph in the end. A high price victory to be sure, but one to put a little rhythm to the pavane for a while.

  73. 73.

    MomSense

    Here is the family group chat starting at 11:59

    Youngest kid: Guys

    YK: I hope that it actually becomes 2021 in a minute

    Yk: And doesn’t just continue being 2020

    YK: Like I’m expecting December 32, 2020

    we all chime in with haha lol happy new year

    me: We Made it!!

    YK: I think so.now let’s just be real fucking cool about this shit and hope it doesn’t notice.

    And scene

  74. 74.

    Mallard Filmore

    @Kristine:

     

    If this year taught me anything, it’s that there are way more stupid people than I ever imagined.

    Besides, they are not shooting straight up in the air, so the bullets won’t fall on THEM, so sure. Shoot them suckers off.

  77. 77.

    mac8

    Okay, thank you to everyone who talked up Death to 2020 here.  I just finished watching it, that was excellent.

  78. 78.

    Splitting Image

    Happy New Year everyone.

    Trump will be out of the White House in three weeks and Limbaugh will soon be underground. Let’s build on that and make it a good one.

  79. 79.

    cain

    I got another 2 hours beore it is the New Years. Thanks all of you for being my go to place all these 15+ years for all things politics. I hope whatever goals you’ve decieded yourself come true and that overall you have a prosperous new year!

  80. 80.

    debbie

    @MomSense:

    Oh, man, December 32nd!  ?

    (My mother once called me on December 1st to wish me a happy birthday. I thanked her, but reminded her my birthday was the day before. She denied that and insisted my birthday was November 31st. I didn’t stop yelling at her until she looked at her fucking calendar and told me how many days there were in November!)

  82. 82.

    Beautifulplumage

    Still a few hours to go on the west coast. Drinking a WA state brut found when cleaning a closet at work. It’s from our last work party in January, so liberated it for seeing 2020 out the door. Cheers to all!

  83. 83.

    MomSense

    @debbie:

    After I had surgery (quite a few years ago now) and was unable to walk, my mom gave me my step dad’s handicap sign to hang on my rear view mirror.  It had expired on 1/31 so she cleverly altered the January to November.  I refused to use it and she thought I was crazy because most people are too stupid to notice the problem.  Now I know she was probably right.

  85. 85.

    Soprano2

    So, fucking 2020 is over in the Central time zone.  Twenty more days to get through……Happy Freaking New Year, here’s to hoping it’s a whole lot better than 2020.

  86. 86.

    divF

    This year is going to be tough going for us, at least to start. A very close friend going back to college days 50 years ago is dying of lung cancer. She lives nearby, and Madame and I are helping her and her family (we are semi-inside their covid bubble). One practical matter that may touch people here: our friend has told her husband that she wants to be cremated, and her ashes placed on the mantle next to those of her three previous dogs and a cat that span her adult life (dog #4 is a 4 year-old Labradoodle, who is utterly devoted to her).

  88. 88.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Gin & Tonic:

    Purely by chance, we got in a 10-day vacation in Aruba literally two weeks before everything shut down

    My wife had a business meeting in Singapore at the end of January, so we tagged along and had a vacation there, and we got out of there literally hours before the first known COVID-19 infected to enter Singapore flew in from Wuhan through the same airport. It was surreal to take the physically longest journey I’ve ever gone on in my life and then spend ten months mostly confined to my house.

  89. 89.

    MisterForkbeard

    Hey, I wasn’t there because I was busy keeping my 4 and 6 year old up. They wanted to see the New Year’s celebration in Animal Crossing, so there went my night. :)

    Sorry to miss all you guys. I really enjoyed the previous zoom meetups.

    ETA: And now, to bourbon and World of Warcraft. And Maple Oreos, for some reason.

  91. 91.

    Amir Khalid

    @NotMax:

    Those look like the firecrackers people set off for Chinese New Year, and might well be precisely that. They were banned decades ago in Malaysia for safety reasons; plus, they left piles of red confetti in the street, supposed to bring good luck and prosperity, that the city would then have to sweep up.

    In guitar playing news, I have come to realise that this is not yet a good time for me to learn Eric Clapton’s Tears in Heaven.

    A very happy 2021 to all jackals.

  92. 92.

    mrmoshpotato

    @MisterForkbeard: Hey, I wasn’t there because I was busy keeping my 4 and 6 year old up. They wanted to see the New Year’s celebration in Animal Crossing, so there went my night. :)

    And how was the New Year’s celebration in Animal Crossing?

  94. 94.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Amir Khalid: In guitar playing news, I have come to realise that this is not yet a good time for me to learn Eric Clapton’s Tears in Heaven.

    Better time for Eruption? :)

    A belated Happy 2021 from across the Pacific (and most of the US).

  95. 95.

    CarolDuhart2

    Hoping this is the year drone exhibitions step up more.  Sound and lighting up the sky with no danger of fire and property damage. That the end of the DNC convention featured them-and how beautiful they were-and safe too!

    I saw the Scotland exhibition and thought it was beautiful and inspiring.

    Drank white wine.  Will be there for January 1st Zoom.

  97. 97.

    Emerald

    SORRY ABOUT THE SHOUTING
    I AM STUCK IN ALL CAPS

    I ALREADY KICKED 2020″S BUTT
    OR RATHER THE LAST 15 MINUTES OF A CHARACTER ON THE MANDALORIAN DID

    MAY THE FORCE BE WITH US!!!!

  98. 98.

    NotMax

    First glass of Prosecco poured and preliminarily sipped. Managed to remember where the pickle bottle stopper is without rooting through drawers, to keep the bubbles in the bottle.

    Bought it for a higher than it ought to be price at the bookstore/gift shop of the Tenement Museum in NYC as way to support them as well as have a useful item.

    Someone down the street is playing music on the radio outdoors, too loud. First round of neighborhood fireworks seems to have abated; three and a quarter hours to go until the sustained big boomies.

  99. 99.

    prostratedragon

    ‘Net and cable went down precisely at 12:01. RCN is working on it, says they have sundry reports. I’m on my phone, and toasting with a Gosling’s Stormy ginger beer. Happy New Year, and may 2021 be a better.

  101. 101.

    MisterForkbeard

    @mrmoshpotato: LOTS of fireworks. And all the kids got glowsticks in game.

    The girls were overjoyed. They said it’s the best holiday of the year. :)

  102. 102.

    Kent

    @mrmoshpotato:You didn’t buy one in 2015.  They were all the rage along with rehydrated pizza.

    Speaking of changing times.  I still remember when I returned to the US in 1989 after nearly 3 years in the Peace Corps in Guatemala in the very pre-internet age.  I drove home across Mexico with a friend of mine and the first US city we hit was Los Angeles after 3 years living in remote rural Guatemala.  I remember being completely mystified about two things:

    Dry Beer:  It was all the rage and stuff like Michelob Dry was being heavily promoted on TV.  And I remember my first reaction was that this is the best invention ever.  It’s going to revolutionize backpacking and camping.  Where can I get me some of this dry beer for the road trip?  I was hugely disappointed to find out it was just regular beer.

    Batman:  There were bizarre Batman logos all over LA that summer.  Whole Billboards with just the bat symbol on them.  Searchlights in Hollywood painting bat symbols on the sky at night.  All kinds of other Batman related stuff.  Turns out it was just a movie.  But since it was the first Batman movie since probably the 1960s it was all very strange if you didn’t know there was a new Batman movie out.

  105. 105.

    FelonyGovt

    Happy New Year all! I plan to make the Zoom tomorrow. About 40 minutes until I can see 2020 safely behind me, here on the West coast.

  106. 106.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Kent: Yeah.  That’s must’ve been quite the shock.  I’d imagine it would be a shock even if you were in a big Guatemalan city for those 3 years.

    Mmmmm powdered beer.

    Marty McFly, Jr.: [re: the tiny pizza from Pizza Hut] Grandma, when it’s ready, could you just shove it in my mouth?

    Middle-Aged Marty: Don’t you be a smart-ass!

  108. 108.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Mai Naem mobile: 2021 Come on down. It is your fucking time to shine.

    And don’t forget to bring the non-traitorous President-Elect and Vice President-Elect with you.

  109. 109.

    Kent

    35 minutes to go here on the west coast.  My neighborhood has been shooting off fireworks for the past several hours.

    Fuck 2020.  I’m not just ready for a new year, I’m ready for a whole new decade.  Which if you want to be pedantic, also starts today too.  I seem to remember a bunch of pedantic twits arguing about how the new millennium didn’t start on January 1, 2000, it actually started on January 1, 2001.

    So strictly speaking we aren’t just starting a new year today, we are starting a whole new decade on Jan 1, 2021, right?

  110. 110.

    Mingobat (f/k/a Karen in GA)

    Started 2020 with my mother dying on New Year’s Day, got a concussion a few weeks later in a fall, got furloughed from my hated job, called back, then laid off, [continues list of shitty things that happened all year], and almost lost Iggy the Wonder Schnauzer on December 30th when he decided to ignore the “wait” command, bolt out the door and head half a mile down the street, where he was attacked by a stray dog just as I caught up to him.

    I fought off the stray, and Iggy and I made it back home safely. So after I got Iggy home, I went out and bought myself an “I survived 2020” gift — a Paul Reed Smith CE24, because there are worse ways to spend a New Year’s Eve at home than playing a gorgeous new guitar and I deserve it, dammit. So today I got a nasty paper cut on the tip of my left middle finger, because 2020 is an asshole.

  111. 111.

    Comrade Colette

    @Kent:

    we are starting a whole new decade on Jan 1, 2021, right?

    Sounds perfectly cromulent to me. Only 23 minutes and about a kajillion firecrackers/gunshots to go here on the eastern Pacific rim.

    My cats hate the noise, and Monsieur Colette decided this was somehow the perfect evening for a belated Airing of Grievances, so bring on 2021.  I am done with this shit.

  112. 112.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Kent: So strictly speaking we aren’t just starting a new year today, we are starting a whole new decade on Jan 1, 2021, right?

    Yes, because we don’t start counting from zero. :)

  115. 115.

    Kent

    @mrmoshpotato: Living abroad in the pre-internet age was a whole different thing from today.  My only connection to the outside world was when my Newsweek subscription would arrive in the mail 2-3 weeks late and often not at all.  Or if I ever managed to pick up a Miami Herald while passing through a larger city.  Sure you could watch the news on Guatemalan TV but that was mostly like like watching a local version of the National Inquirer in Spanish.  Making a phone call home meant driving my motorcycle 15 miles to the nearest GUATEL phone office where you stood in line, wrote out the number in the states you wanted to call, sat and waited for 20 min in the waiting room until they called your name, then went to a little wooden booth to pick up the phone and find your parents in the US on the other end.  You can stay up with big world events when they happen.  I watched Tiananmen Square happen on Guatemalan TV, for example.  And the 1988 election.  But you completely loose touch with the small cultural stuff.

    These days Peace Corps volunteers stay on facebook and instagram on their phones, even from Africa.  There aren’t many towns anywhere on the planet anymore where you can’t just buy a cheap local SIM card and pop it into your iPhone for instant internet and iMessaging or FaceTime with your friends and family back home.  The world is immensely smaller than it used to be.

  117. 117.

    CaseyL

    15 minutes to go here on the Left Coast, and I’m starting to feel sleepy.

    I’ll be watching the Virtual Lightshow which has replaced the fireworks at the Space Needle.  Seems like cheating to me, because you can do anything in CGI.

  118. 118.

    Mel

    @CaseyL: Happy New Year to you!

    Ours consisted of catching up on Star Trek: Discovery, and napping with cats. Not a bad way to kick 2020 to the curb.

    Wishing for a better year ahead for everyone here.

  120. 120.

    NotMax

    After a proper postprandial rest period will come the hard part – finding a way to fit the leftovers into the fridge. Enough prepared tonight to last three or four more days.

    ;)

  122. 122.

    Mel

    @NotMax: What goodies did you have? Here it was comfort food all the way: chicken potpie, potato soup with lots of bacon, and sweet potato cheesecake.

  125. 125.

    DivF

    Yay. Made it to midnight for a change. Lots of cheers and firecrackers in our normally quiet residential neighborhood.

  126. 126.

    NotMax

    @Mel

    Fried chicken and a noodle kugel. Was going to make an additional side dish but then looked at what there was and said “enough.” No dessert, nor tummy room for any if there had been.

    ;)

  132. 132.

    NotMax

    @DivF

    Chicken (boneless breasts this time) done in the air fryer, so doesn’t sit as heavy on the belt as the traditional kind.

  133. 133.

    opiejeanne

    We had Italian white bean and sausage soup for supper tonight, with spinach greens, and some bread I baked during the Zoom this afternoon.

    . I keep forgetting that I have a nice Prosecco in the fridge, but I will toast the New Democratic Senators and President-elect Joe Biden on the 6th.

  135. 135.

    TS (the original)

    @dnfree:

    As a child I just knew I was going to be very very old if I made it to the year 2000 – and here I still am – 20 years past very very old.

  136. 136.

    Comrade Colette

    Huh, far fewer explosions this midnight than in years past. There was a bit of a light show but nothing like the intensity we’re used to here in Sarajevo For Amateurs. I wonder if everyone used up the local supply on and around last July 4, which was by far the craziest and most intense I’ve experienced outside of Christmas and NYE in Central America.

  138. 138.

    Comrade Colette

    Someone close by just fired off something that sounded like a Howler from the Harry Potter books. I NEED to get one of those. I’m sure they’re safe to use indoors – right? Ferinstance, at my kitchen table?

    Also, happy 2021 at long last. Jackals have kept me sane(ish) this past year.

  139. 139.

    Mel

    @NotMax: Noodle kugel is so good, who needs another side?

    Tomorrow, I’m making my grandmother’s Christmas cake for my brother. I haven’t been able to see him in person for 8 months (I’m on immunosuppressants and he’s a teacher, so  no visits are safe) and I miss him like crazy.

    We have always had that cake at Christmas or New Year’s since we were tiny kids. I used to help her make it when I was younger, and the torch passed to me when we lost her 15 years ago.

  141. 141.

    Beautifulplumage

    Very long celebratory fireworks in the S Seattle area. Miss Pearl is NOT happy and is hiding. Worth it to kick out “that year”.

  142. 142.

    Mel

    @Comrade Colette: Our lunatic neighbor has a mini cannon. (Google “firing cannons at Christmas” – it’s unfortunately a thing!)

    The first year we lived here, they fired the damned thing at 8 pm. It was like a sonic boom: windows shook, cats and dogs scattered in a panic , a picture fell off the wall, I tripped on the stairs and might have peed my pants a little.

    Now, it’s not just “the Christmas Cannon”. It’s the New Year cannon, the 4th of July cannon, the Veteran’s Day cannon, the Valentine’s Day cannon, the “it’s second cousin Bob’s birthday!” cannon.  Sigh…

  143. 143.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Mel: the Veteran’s Day cannon, the Valentine’s Day cannon, the “it’s second cousin Bob’s birthday!” cannon

    Which of the Mythbusters is your neighbor?

  145. 145.

    Mel

    I wish! If that were the case, they might make some attempt at a safety protocol!

    Somehow, I suspect think that a keg of Budweiser, a bandana, sunglasses, and some pink Playtex kitchen gloves fit the bill. I fully expect to find a stray finger or ear perching coyly on our grill or in our veggie patch at some point.

  146. 146.

    Mel

    @Mel: Tired – typos above.Mea culpa.

    By the way, the sunglasses are mirrored. Perhaps that ups the perceived level of protection against lethal projectiles?

  154. 154.

    opiejeanne

    @Amir Khalid: Yes, but we are just outside the city limits of the nearest little town, and the county sheriff & deputies are all busy answering everyone’s calls for that very thing, and other forms of idiocy. This is King County in Washington state, where Seattle is. It’s a big county.

  155. 155.

    Steeplejack

    Welp, new year off to a good start. Just received my $600 stimulus check via direct deposit. ? Yee-haw.

    Dozed off about 9:30 last night after reading in bed. Wide awake at 2:00 a.m., of course. But 4½ hours is a good snooze for me these days.

  156. 156.

    Spanky

    @Steeplejack: Greetings from east of the Potomac. Also fell asleep about 9:30 and only woke up because it’s too damned hot. Didn’t hear any booms around here, but the cats are all missing from their usual perches, so maybe I just slept through everything.

    Anyway, Welcome 2021! And a final Fuck 2020! And now back to sleep for a couple of hours.

  157. 157.

    TS (the original)

    @mrmoshpotato:

    So just for a moment, I can be very young. :)   I do feel like today (Jan 1 in my world is almost over), is the beginning of the rest of my life. Being able to turn on the TV and not see trump is happiness in my small world.

  158. 158.

    Steeplejack

    @Spanky:

    No fireworks or noise here in Threadkill Lane. A few years ago I used to hear some fireworks on the various holidays, but the last few it has been dead quiet.

    I’m suffering through a hate-watch of Barnaby Jones and trying to decide whether to stay up or go back to bed. On a normal day I would hang on for Morning Joe at 6:00, but MSNBC has gone to their holiday schedule of reruns, recaps and “punish the lesser personalities” fill-ins. Maybe there’s something on HGTV.

  159. 159.

    ColoradoGuy

    Quieter than usual for a New Year’s celebration. I think everyone is exhausted and just wants things to get better. The best New Year’s gift for me and my sweetie is the Governor saying that everyone over 70 is going to get a vaccination in the next four to five weeks. Colorado has already dispensed 95,000 to health workers statewide, so that goal seems within reach.

    Things are definitely going to turn around. New President, a return to sanity and expertise in the Executive Branch, rollout of multiple vaccines using different technologies, and very possibly, a global renaissance in biotechnology as a result. I think President Biden’s 100 million vaccinations in the first 100 days is a reachable goal, once the full power of the Federal government is activated.

  161. 161.

    Steeplejack

    I’ve been wanting to see Hoarse do a thread on Trump’s status. He has a good handle on Trump’s narcissism.

    This is the most significant window into Trump’s psychology since the election.

    He is so gravely wounded by his loss, even the usual protections a narcissist employs aren’t saving him.

    1/ https://t.co/MbCjgl64mG

    — The Hoarse Whisperer (@TheRealHoarse) December 31, 2020

  162. 162.

    Steeplejack

    @Steeplejack:

    Interesting insight that Trump may now find Mar-a-Lago depressing:

    He went down to his Cheese Palace desperately needing to feel like he was still so very admired and powerful.

    And all he got was an apartment reno that telegraphed “This is where you live now. You actually live at a place where other people just come to play tennis.

    “This isn’t a lavish club you sometimes visit as its wealthy owner anymore. It’s your residence [. . .] because you lost your primary residence—the White House—and can’t go back to the prior one—your New York place.”

    That was likely a bomb to his already wounded psyche.

  163. 163.

    Betty Cracker

    Our New Year’s Eve bird stakeout was a success. We saw some night herons out foraging and heard (but did not see) many owls and other assorted birds, including the usual Limpkins. A few weeks back, we saw a male Snail Kite perched along the river, and yesterday evening, we saw a female. There are only about 1,000 Snail Kites in the U.S., so to see two of them is pretty cool!

  164. 164.

    Betty Cracker

    @Steeplejack: Thanks for the link. I hope losing haunts Trump like a curse for the rest of his days, that he’s trapped in a prison of humiliation he can never escape.

  165. 165.

    Steeplejack

    @Betty Cracker:

    Amen. Maybe Trump is starting to realize that, unlike the past, when his deals went sour and he was able to just walk away in a cloud of delaying lawsuits and P.R. management, now he exists in an arena where things have real consequences and the players play for keeps.

    And it would be great if he has to go through the rest of his miserable life with minor irritations constantly nagging at him: the neighbors not wanting him to “reside” at Mar-a-Lago, him not having the freedom of movement he had before he was president, losing fealty from his former minions, etc.

  166. 166.

    J R in WV

    @divF:

    she wants to be cremated, and her ashes placed on the mantle next to those of her three previous dogs and a cat that span her adult life (dog #4 is a 4 year-old Labradoodle, who is utterly devoted to her).

    Sorry to hear about your friend. We have a few friends of that vintage, and will be lost if they go first.

    So sad about the poor pupper, who will know what is happening, kind of, and not know at the same time. Can you tell I’m very much a dog person that the puppy is who I think of  first?t has kept me more of less sane the past year.

  168. 168.

    Chris Johnson

    @Matt McIrvin:  Yeah, if the military are literally mindless robots.

    Someday we’ll get the story and find out that he’s been stamping his feet and begging to nuke Hillary for the last four fucking years. There are none so kabuki as those who were never intended to be anything more than a figurehead and a wrecking ball in the first place. Of COURSE Trump can’t launch fucking missiles as a lame duck departing President. You’ve got to assume that is the first thing he’d want to do. They know him by now.

    Maybe I’ll drop by the Zoom. We’ll see: last night I had no mojo for anything but finishing up my work for 2020, which I managed to do, yay me :)

  169. 169.

    Steeplejack

    @Matt McIrvin:

    Hoarse:

    Narcissists, statistically, aren’t all that likely to die by suicide—and I would have a hard time imagining Trump would ever self-harm. However, a narcissist who cannot escape a profound public fall from grace is in excruciating pain.

  171. 171.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @mrmoshpotato: Um, that’s Emile Waldteufel, Potatomosh. A woods’ devil, not a devil’s woods.

    For my money they shoulda closed out the year with Danse Macabre.

  176. 176.

    Plausible

    John, As a long time lurker I thank you for continuing your invitation to the reluctant. From your most recent messages I believe that, like I, you are an introvert becoming an agoraphobe. Nine months of Covid quarantine has certainly quickened the pace of my transition. You too?

    For seasoned juicers and you, I pose a question: If individual-1 would be sent to prison, would his Secret Service detail be lawfully bound to accompany him to the slammer?

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