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My brain 24/7. 😂

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I’m ugly crying. 😭😭😭😭

A Tale of Nine Lives by Akimiya Jun

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It’s just because our feet are never warm.

The Philadelphia Inquirer, Pennsylvania, January 19, 1922

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I think you could find MJ seeds in birdseed through the 70’s. My parents used to pick it out and grow it. 😂

The Times, Shreveport, Louisiana, May 7, 1931

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Because it is ducking hilarious, that’s why. 😂

Banana for scale. Via u/PpLEMons

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He’s on Insta. Look up Free Quilty

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Gorgeous. *Wishing I could do the same while waiting for my pizza to arrive. 😂

A win for us all. Also, Halle Berry is 53, so this took more effort than I'm ever willing to put into working out.

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Scottish and proud. 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

Scotland is not boring

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What?!?!??! I need to look into this. Side note, I go to have Endo surgery on Tuesday.

The medical community on literally every female specific health issue ever: “very common condition” “no known cause” “no known cure” :))))))

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BIG DISCLAIMER: i was 9 when 9/11 happened, so this might be more about my own crystalizing tastes than anything else. i think it’s a pretty darn good theory tho and other people have validated it.

BIGGER DISCLAIMER: i am not saying that country music prior to 9/11 was free from nationalist, racist, misogynist undertones - i just think that these themes became more the norm!

MY HOT TAKE:

with very few exceptions, including goodbye earl, before he cheats, and daddy Iessons (side note - all women!) 9/11 ruined country music. around 2014 onward we’ve got margo price, sturgill simpson, jason isbell etc., who are making country music great again (wink), but those folks are mostly considered “alternative” country. the mainstream country music for well over a decade now is a glut of trash performative patriotic / working-class-but-not-really lab-crafted budweiser-sponsored nonsense that has managed to sound rebellious (or has convinced its fans that it sounds rebellious) without ever actually questioning any power structure. so much so that artists who ACTUALLY criticized the government were literally blacklisted for nearly a decade (the dixie chicks)

pre-9/11 country music, though not perfect or ideologically pure by any stretch, did not have the raging american flag painted truck boner that comes to mind for a lot of people who say “i like everything except rap and country”

SPECIFICALLY, toby keith’s “courtesy of the red, white, and blue (the angry american)” (2002) literally destroyed country music. it was a direct answer to the 9/11 attacks and war song in support of the invasion of afghanistan. the lyrics read like a disjointed feverish email chain letter forwarded from your great uncle sprinkled with glittering american flag gifs and heavily saturated pictures of bald eagles. the entire song is lifted from an estimated 248 peeling bumper stickers collected from rusted trucks on cinder blocks in overgrown yards, cut up and arranged to fit a catchy, formulaic tune that is almost certainly the background music playing in george w. bush’s head at all times.

“we’ll put a boot in your ass, it’s the american way and uncle sam put your name at the top of his list and the statue of liberty started shakin’ her fist and the eagle will fly, and it’s gonna be hell, when you hear mother freedom start a'ringin’ her bell”

country music and the new country musicians that toby keith paved the way for became so pro establishment and so unquestioningly nationalistic that, again, the dixie chicks who went against this grain were blacklisted by the industry and received death threats from country music fans. hell, there are folks who STILL froth at the mouth at the mere mention of the dixie chicks.

9/11 killed outlaw country - how can you sing the praises of law breakers when your main circuit consists of singing to troops? there are some great classic country songs critiquing the police state - especially from johnny cash and merle haggard - now country music artists hold fundraisers for FOPs. new country music is basically in-law country music.

you don’t have to write a pro-bush patriotic anthem to be part of this post-9/11 ruination. playing meaningless songs about living in the heart of (read: white) america, eschewing the city (read: not white), and cracking open a cold one with the boys for “authentic” country music is also important to the war effort.

there’s a progression of themes here:

post 9/11 top tier: war anthem, vocally patriotic, directly used as pro war propaganda; which paved the way for: “things used to be so much better” thinly veiled racist laments, good for campaign ads; which paved the way for meaningless party anthems - attempts to make things “like they used to be” and craft a reality that neither the artist nor listener likely ever experience.

that brings us to what most people think of today when they say they hate country music: the country party anthem - “tiny hot gal in tight jean shorts who can drink beer like the guys, she doesn’t like beyoncé Like Other Girls, oh she’s so into me and my truck, i’m gonna take her fishing after i finish sowing my corn - sung by a guy who’s never touched a tractor” - has overtaken the tragic, done me wrong, despairing country ballads of tammy wynette, george jones, and even up into pre-9/11 contemporaries like reba mcentire and george strait. you didn’t necessarily have to be country to relate to their pain. now you have to perform suburban redneckness to enjoy luke bryan.

when was the last time you heard a sad country song?

after 9/11, cowboys (whether or not they had ever been near a cow) weren’t allowed to be sad anymore (no more done me wrong country), and they certainly weren’t allowed to question authority (no more outlaw country). partying hardy became the most important American Thing and if you don’t sing about that, our Enemies Will Win.

so - understanding that country music has always had bad stuff, and that like any genre it suffers from commercialization, 9/11 DESTROYED COUNTRY MUSIC. and toby keith gleefully helped destroy it.

for some further evidence of the decline of country music, please listen to the dixie chicks’ “long time gone” which is an indictment of the industry (i believe it was written before 9/11 but my point still stands - the genre was on the decline and 9/11 was the major cultural event that hastened the decline).

maybe i am a curmudgeon - almost every generation of country music has had its own “country music is not what it used to be” anthem, but i really think something distinct happened with 9/11.

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Come here  

No, you come here

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Cool. Those snakes you get with the 4th of July fireworks. I love those things.

Burning ammonium dichromate via u/N8theIngr8

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Getting back in #boss shape. 30lb weights. Gonna be really happy when I can afford to cosplay again. #theboss #thebossmgs3 #mgs3 #snakeeater #broke #need$ #comeonlottery #adulting #bodybuilding #weights #weighttraining #bodypositive #bodytransformation https://www.instagram.com/p/BsZGuSmDsrY/?utm_source=ig_tumblr_share&igshid=1mkpl5dugr2by

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Sasha is in good health and is estimated to be 7 years old. No microchip though. Gonna have to find her people the hard way. #blackcatsofinstagram #blackcat #notmycat #cat #catsofinstagram #cats #homelesscats https://www.instagram.com/p/BrYs6ObHkee/?utm_source=ig_tumblr_share&igshid=bd3bcedhhog

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Lost: Sweet Black Cat-Please help me find my humans. I was found today by a nice lady at at the Country Cupboard on 422 in West Lebanon, PA. But I’ve been lost for a long time. I’m skinny and up until this afternoon was also hungry, dirty and covered in fleas. (Well, fleas still pending till my topical kicks in 😾) I want to find my family. I’m all black with a tiny white patch of fur on my chest. I have green eyes that have little brown speckles and I don’t have any front claws. I purr a LOT! Also, if my water isn’t moving I like to stick my paw in it and stir it around. It tastes better that way. I don’t know how old I am but the human here thinks I am in between 6 and 10, but she needs a vet to look at me to be sure. Speaking of vets...I need one. (What cat ever says that right?) I need to be checked for a microchip and get medicine for parasites. This human has been great but does not have a lot of money to take me in right now. If anyone can help me/her please send her a PM. If a vet can take a look at me for free or at a discounted rate I would be so happy! Right now I’m staying in the “penthouse” of this nice lady in Annville. If I can’t find my people, I will need a forever home. I’m working on convincing this human to keep me, but she insists that she can’t. (He he, she’s doomed. She already calls me Sasha 😹) BUT I like to keep my options open too. I would be the purrrfect addition to any house and just in time for Christmas! 🎄 TYFN!! @coleandmarmalade @monkandbean @nathan_thebeachcat @burmaadventurecat #blackcatsofinstagram #blackcat #lostcat #lostcats #foreverhome https://www.instagram.com/p/BrMN0rNnEn8/?utm_source=ig_tumblr_share&igshid=10wpj6vecfbv5