Horrible, Wisconsin

Illustration by Michael DiMilo By Geoff Carter Imagine my surprise when I recently learned that I’ve lived nearly my entire life in a horrible city. I never knew that. I’ve always thought Milwaukee was a pretty decent place to live. I grew up, got married, and raised a daughter here, I worked in Milwaukee Public …
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Kickass and Reaction Statement

Attribution: Frederick Burr Opper, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons By Bill Stokes Kickass, the doorstop dog, joins the keeper in acknowledging the widespread use of the following totally meaningless statement in reacting to the Meridian, PA. shooting: “There is no place in our political system for violence.” Every politician says it, and not only is …
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Kickass and July 14th Notes

Attribution: Bidgee, CC BY 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons By Bill Stokes Kickass, the doorstop dog, looks over the keeper’s mish-mash mental notes from June 14, 2024 to see the following:             *Sunrise obliterated by rumbling thunderstorm.             *Assassination attempt missed by an inch.             *400 million guns.             *Second graders.             *Reagan and JFK and Bobby.              *“Just get over it!”             *Secret …
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Kickass and Older Drivers

Attribution: Mick Tinbergen tintels, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons By Bill Stokes Kickass, the doorstop dog, reports that the keeper and thousands of others in his age group face the Biden like dilemma on a daily basis of whether or not their driving ability has lost enough of its edge that it is in the best …
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Kickass and Dog God

Attribution: Takashi Hososhima from Tokyo, Japan, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons By Bill Stokes Kickass, the doorstop dog, is mulling over the keeper’s most recent theory that the Earth is a dog and humans are on this Earth Dog as fleas where they suck enough blood to reproduce briefly before they are scratched off by …
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Kickass and Jim’s Older Brother

Attribution: U.S. Forest Service- Pacific Northwest Region, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons By Bill Stokes Kickass, the doorstop dog, reports a casual conversation the keeper had recently with his neighbor Jim who just celebrated his 94th birthday and thus leads the keeper by a year or so. Jim told of his older brother Bob who …
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Kickass and Meatloaf

Photo by Bill Stokes By Bill Stokes Kickass, the doorstop dog, joins the keeper and Phyllis in a   generational junk handoff with son Mike and granddaughter Sarah as boxes of files and the keeper’s newspaper clippings were transferred as part of a meatloaf dinner overseen by Boo the family dog on the 5th floor outdoor deck at …
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Kickass and Windshield Relevance

Attribution: GREGHERRON, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons By Bill Stokes Kickass, the doorstop dog, supports the keeper’s contention that injecting relevance into memories is something he should spend more time at, considering his inclination to loiter in memory lane. So, there is the memory of the keeper’s first off-farm job at Cliff Horstman’s service station …
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Kickass and the Voice of Gravity

Attribution: NASA, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons By Bill Stokes Kickass, the doorstop dog, commends the keeper for his discovery of “the voice of gravity,” and wonders if his name will now be associated with the likes of Newton and Einstein and the other great gravity thinkers that have preceded him? It happened accidentally, as …
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