OK, I can do this. Deep breaths. The semester has launched, now if I can just keep my head above water, I’ll survive.

Also, the students seem nice.

I met with my first group of new student advisees this morning. I think we’ll keep them.

Also, totally irrelevant: we’re supposed to have begun the partial eclipse here in Morris, but unfortunately the sky is a uniform sheet of light gray cloudiness — I can’t even see the sun anywhere. Maybe the moon ate it.

Alex Jones visited downtown Seattle to record himself ranting on street corners about immigrants and evil antifa, and posted the video. Sadly, he later took it down because, I suspect, the response of the locals wasn’t very encouraging.

…former Seattle City Council candidate Michael Maddux approached Jones. Jones, in turn, asked him to talk. Maddux responded, “I don’t talk to racist fucks.”

Only a candidate? He needs to make this the centerpiece of his next campaign.

But my favorite part was this:

While ranting, Jones was confronted by BlöödHag singer Jake Stratton, who called out that Jones was “trash.” When Jones confronted him, Stratton threw coffee on him and taunted Jones before telling him he was going back to work, “where they have more coffee.”

We have reached peak Seattle: racists fucks getting doused with coffee by the lead singer of a two-umlaut band. I’ve got to get back and visit sometime.

Hey, I’ve seen this guy around town.

Nice way to become the most famous guy in Morris.

I have been receiving complaints from readers and other bloggers for months — and recent posts praising Fox News and blaming black Americans for racism were the final straw. We do have an ethos here, laid out plainly.

We are skeptics and critics of dogma and authoritarianism, and in addition, we recognize that the nonexistence of deities entails a greater commitment to human values, and in particular, an appreciation of human diversity and equality.

We are for feminism, against racism, for diversity, against inequity.

It’s a general sentiment, but if you can’t meet any of it, you don’t belong here. We’ve been agonizing over rejecting Anjuli Pandavar all summer long, and the consensus of the active members of the FtB community was that her continued presence was a betrayal of our principles.

The coming eclipse is a sign of the unreliability of solar power, I guess. Kentuckians are planning to protest.

If you’re planning to visit Hopkinsville, Kentucky, to see the total eclipse of the sun on August 21, 2017, be prepared. Hopkinsville (a.k.a. Eclipseville) is globally recognized to be the epicenter of the eclipse. Hundreds of thousands of spectators will converge on the town to see it. Among them “Kentuckians for Coal” will be in the vanguard protesting the eclipse.

Kentuckians for Coal is an ad-hoc coalition of miners, union officials, family members and coal users created to defend the Kentucky coal industry against encroachment from renewable energy industries and from economic development initiatives aimed at lessening America’s dependence on coal. Kentuckians for Coal stands against the eclipse and those who worship it.

Hopkinsville is actually calling itself “Eclipseville” now, and apparently has a number of reasons to be proud of itself.

Hopkinsville, with a population of 33,000, has two other great claims to fame. One is as the birthplace of the world-renowned psychic Edgar Cayce. He made his home in Hopkinsville, and died there in 1945, after predicting the date of his own death. The other is the notoriously pagan annual celebration of extra-terrestrials, which commemorates a terrifying landing by space aliens in 1955, 62 years ago to the day, known as the Little Green Men Festival.

Awesome. It’s true: a nearby farm was the site of extraterrestrial invasion, or maybe, owls.

The press release takes pains to make Hopkinsville sound hellish for the day of the eclipse.

When more than 250,000 people descend on the town for four days in August, including busloads of Amish from Pennsylvania and rumored Arab royalty, hucksters will peddle overpriced souvenirs as area hotels jack up their room rates by 400%; gas stations run out of gas; and cell phone service crashes due to demand. Traffic jams, a run on available food, an invasion of prostitutes, and rowdy crowds will test the patience of both local residents and the extra law enforcement brought in to maintain order. In addition, there is the serious threat to spectators’ eyesight if they look at the sun without special eclipse-viewing glasses.

It’s going to be full of coal miners, too! Horrible, dirty coal-miners shaking their fists at the sun! I think I’ll pass.

I saw the Pickle Rick episode of Rick & Morty last night, and all I can say is…that was pure raw genius. Short synopsis: Mad scientist Rick turns himself into a pickle to get out of a therapy appointment, and then has to construct an exoskeleton out of cockroach and rat parts save himself after falling into a sewer.

Yeah, you’re saying that sounds nuts.

Stick with it, though. It’s amazing. After this elaborate series of improbable events, Rick does finally end up with the therapist and there’s this wonderful dialogue (taken from Film Crit Hulk, which really gets into this episode):

Therapist: “Rick, why did you lie to your daughter?”

Rick: “So I wouldn’t have to come here.”

Therapist: “Why didn’t you want to come here?”

Rick: “Because I don’t respect therapy. Because I’m a scientist. Because I invent, transform, create, and destroy for a living. And when I don’t like something about the world, I change it. And I don’t think going to a rented office in a strip mall to listen to some agent of averageness explain which words mean which feelings has ever helped anyone do anything. I think it’s helped a lot of people get comfortable and stop panicking, which is a state of mind we value in the animals we eat, but not something I want for myself. I’m not a cow. I’m a pickle – when I feel like it – So… you asked.”

Therapist: “Rick. The only connection between your unquestionable intelligence and the sickness destroying your family, is that everyone in your family, you included, use intelligence to justify sickness. You seem to alternate between viewing your own mind as an unstoppable force and as an inescapable curse. And I think it’s because the only truly unapproachable concept for you is that it is your mind within your control. You chose to come here, you chose to talk, to belittle my vocation, just as you chose to become a pickle. You are the master of your universe. And yet, you are dripping with rat’s blood and feces. Your enormous mind literally vegetating by your own hand. I have no doubt that you would be bored senseless by therapy. The same way I’m bored when I brush my teeth and wipe my ass. Because the thing about repairing, maintaining, and cleaning is – it’s NOT an adventure – There’s no way to do it so wrong you might die. It’s just… work. And the bottom line is some people are okay going to work and some people, well, some people would rather die. Each of us gets to choose.”

That last bit — after 20 minutes of unbelievable adventure and violence and exotic super-science — suddenly grounds the whole story in mundane reality and speaks of a far deeper truth than is possible with a talking pickle.

It would be good to use this cartoon in a discussion of bioethics, except that I fear students might be more distracted by the hyper-violence that comes before. But man, I know a lot of people who would nod enthusiastically to everything Rick says, and would spit on everything the therapist said…when the therapist is the one to bring some real insight.

Maintain, everyone.

I know that Elon Musk has said and done some stupid things publicly, but I had no idea that his personal life was also such a mess. His first wife, Justine Musk, has some stories to tell. It seems he regarded her as his Starter Wife, who he tried to shape into his Trophy Wife, and who he then discarded when she was sufficiently obliging.

Still, there were warning signs. As we danced at our wedding reception, Elon told me, “I am the alpha in this relationship.” I shrugged it off, just as I would later shrug off signing the postnuptial agreement, but as time went on, I learned that he was serious. He had grown up in the male-dominated culture of South Africa, and the will to compete and dominate that made him so successful in business did not magically shut off when he came home. This, and the vast economic imbalance between us, meant that in the months following our wedding, a certain dynamic began to take hold. Elon’s judgment overruled mine, and he was constantly remarking on the ways he found me lacking. “I am your wife,” I told him repeatedly, “not your employee.”

“If you were my employee,” he said just as often, “I would fire you.”

He maintains that same transactional, what-have-you-done-for-me-lately, and treats his assistants like disposable crap.

Here’s a good lesson for anyone thinking about asking for a raise. In his biography, Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, and the Quest for a Fantastic Future,” author Ashlee Vance tells us what happened when Musk’s assistant, Mary Beth Brown, asked for a big raise after working for him for 12 years.

According to Business Insider:

In response, Musk told Brown to take two weeks off, during which he would assume her responsibilities and see if she was really critical to his success.

When Brown returned after two weeks, Musk told Brown he didn’t need her anymore.

Musk also told Vance that he offered Brown another position at the company, but she never returned to the office again after that.

That is also, by the way, a really out-of-character article for BoingBoing. It essentially blames Brown for asking for a raise from a billionaire, and tries to advise her on the proper way to be an indispensable corporate slave. I guess that it would also explain to Justine Musk that, despite having five kids by him, she was a terribly inadequate Starter Wife and deserved to be discarded by Musk.