No don’t kill him first.

Just once, for GTAV.

They released just after midnight. There was a decent line as I recall, probably less than 50 people. People cracked jokes about the series, and quoted favorite dialogue. The first guy in line strode victoriously to his car, his copy held high, then burned rubber when he hit asphalt. Immediately a cop tore after him out of the darkness. The rest of us went “ooooooo”. Somebody said, “No that’s just one star. He can do this!”

Let Pele take him.

Jesus spent lots of time with prostitutes.

Nah, it’s way easier to send a satellite to take a look.

It’s impossible to secretly launch enough payloads to build a moonbase in the first place. Every launch has to pass through low earth orbit and rockets are shiny. There are too many eyes on the sky to go unnoticed. Even then, there’d be radio chatter between the Earth and Moon, and satellite redirection from the far side. You can encrypt radio signals, but they can’t hide.

Nah, they are nowhere near as good as the movies, nor are the villains all that smart.

That’s neat. I wonder how cheap a drone could be made to destroy them?

Yeah, viral zombies won’t last long in the southwest. I ought to be good with just shutters on the house.

Lots of food is gonna rot.

Why are we paying rent at all?

More than I need anymore. None.

I’m not normal, no. I can’t say I’m doing great. But I’m actually far more stable now than I’ve ever been. I’m preparing for bad times to help others as best I can. I’m not ready enough. I protest when I can. I try to read older books rather than the latest clickbait. My work actually matters, so I don’t feel drained from it. I mostly quit arguing with idiots, online and off. They’ll feel the pain soon enough. Good. I do mock them to their faces. If they change, I might help them. If it gets as bad as I’ve always suspected it will, I’ve already lived longer and better than anticipated. I’ve never feared oblivion. Sounds nice these days. If I die, I’ll die fighting the darkness. I’m content. Let them come. Good people will still live on. If we let the fools and psychos in power destroy our entire biosphere, well then we will have proved Humanity never deserved the stars in the first place.

If we make it, keep pushing humanity forward. We are all one people and we are worth the struggle. We are the only known intelligence in the Universe and we must learn to act like it, or die. Don’t let us down.

So that’s how I’m doing.

Cool. Who cares if the same thing happens to you?

I started with a Steam Deck. Now I’m running PopOS on my Framework 13 and Bazzite on a home theatre PC. I’ve had far fewer issues with them than any flavor of Windows.

I can’t go back. I won’t.

Jesus Christ. I don’t trust any syrupy cheerful, fake happy, overly polite, “I’m sooo sooorry you had the slightest inconvenience” type customer service. No, I’ve done that job. You know you don’t give a shit. I know you don’t give a shit. You know I know you don’t give a shit. We both know you can barely afford to live. The world is spiraling. Pretending otherwise is insufferable. Just be honest and give it to me jaded, bitter, and cynical like we both deserve.

The predictions were always the most conservative estimates. They were trying to avoid panic. The most likely scenario was that this would all start and hit hard within our lifetimes.

I used Windows 10 for a while. But now I’ve completely moved to various flavors of Linux. I’ll get GrapheneOS or something on a phone if possible later.

Only place I still have windows 11 is my work PC. Nearly all the main annoying crap is managed away by IT, and it’s still irritating as hell.

Definitely three times.

Work browser. Same place I only use Windows.

Nope, child free. I didn’t get snipped for nothing.