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PERRIN LOVETT

~ Fiction, Freedom, and The West

PERRIN LOVETT

Tag Archives: fiction

(Weak Christmas Fiction) COLUMN: Buddy’s Christmas Tree

23 Thursday Dec 2021

Posted by perrinlovett in fiction, Other Columns

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Buddy, Christmas fiction, fiction, Jr, weakly column

Buddy’s Christmas Tree

*Hello and Season’s Greetings, Friends! This is what may have to pass for the annual Christmas (micro) fiction. This, of course, is the weakly weekly column, geared to those in the PPN audience. Please enjoy!

 

A studio in a converted garden shed, one December evening…

Perrin babbled away, again: ‘…now, ladies and gentlemen, we’re joined by the most wonderful actress and woman in the world, the lovely and gracious Gal Gadot! Hey, Gal! How’s the high life in Hollywood? Boy, oh boy, did I enjoy Red Notice! Thank you for coming on again so soon…’ The conversation would go on for several hours.

From high on his little FRC box perch, Buddy, Jr. looked on with pity. What a shame, he thought; the big guy should get out more, maybe bite the bullet and date that pretty secret agent woman. He cleared his throat and said, ‘Well, now, I’m running out for a bit. Kind of like you should. Uh. Okay, you just talk to yourself, again, for a while. Bye now.’ Perrin continued to gibber happily – to no one – about movies, and Goodles, and other things he knew nothing about. 

Ignored, as usual, the tiny lizard made his way down the cheap cardboard-like paneling. As he crossed the cold, unforgiving concrete floor, he passed the very spot where Buddy Senior’s tenure had abruptly ended. He crossed himself. Then, he carefully darted here and there through a maze of cigar boxes, empty coffee bags, and other rubbish. Next, he climbed over and past various boxes and crates bearing such odd labels as “RDX” and “Titanium Diboride.” By the door, he stopped and put on his extremely small coat, hat, and mittens. 

A gust of cold wind blew in the crack under the door where the weather stripping had broken away. Buddy was just about to exit when the Old Drunken Spider wobbled in, carrying with him a cricket (that we all know was just sleeping). ‘The big fool talking to himself again?’ the old creepy-crawler asked with a hiccup.

‘No!’ Buddy said emphatically. ‘This time it’s for real. He’s got Wonder Woman on Zoom!’ After a quiet moment, they both fell out laughing.

‘Almost had me there, Greenie!’ the spider chuckled as he staggered sideways a bit. ‘Well, if he’s having another … interview, I’ll just go to the other end and entertain my guest here.’ He patted the cricket – who was still sleeping. ‘You take care out there; it’s starting to snow if you’ll believe it.’

After staring at the mouth-watering sleeping cricket for a second, Buddy said ‘thanks and good evening,’ tipped his tiny hat, and ducked under the poorly-fitted door. Walking under the rusting, dented hulk of what had once been an SUV, he remembered his long years spent forgotten in the glove compartment. Those metal wires sticking out of the tires must be for extra traction, he thought as he emerged into the wide-open space behind the driveway. With little white flakes falling all around, he made his way through the yard and down the lane.

Over on the corner, under the soft rays of an old street lamp, Buddy found the Tiny Postman busy gathering letters from the tiny, special Santa Mail mailbox. 

‘Good evening, Tiny Postman!’ Buddy said. ‘All those gonna make it in time?’

‘Evening, Buddy,’ said Tiny Postman. And, yes, these are just in time. Say, you live in the shed. Any idea if this sad story will feature any other FP characters? Or a real plot?’

‘No, I’m afraid not,’ Buddy said with a shrug. ‘It’s just self-deprecating nonsense, a sleeping cricket, me, and my quest to find the perfect you-know-what.’

‘Ah, well. Maybe next Christmas. Anyway, are you off to the little magic place in the woods?’

‘That’s the place!’ Buddy exclaimed. ‘I’d better hurry. I hear they’re having a party tonight.’

The diminutive friends parted ways and Buddy hurried on. As a surprisingly healthy snow began to fall in earnest, he crossed the vacant lot and entered the woods. As he made his way into the trees, he passed several more friends. With each step, he grew more excited. Finally, he rounded a corner and stood beneath the most magical, special tree in the glade – the Northern Operations Tree of the Prepper Elves! Buddy clasped his little mittened hands together and smiled. He knew that inside that tree was a very special little tree all for him. But then, with genuine shock, he read the sign on the door: CLOSED. GONE TO CHRISTMAS PARTY AT FPHQ. BACK IN JANUARY.

Crushed, Buddy made his way back through the woods. He lamented Perrin’s cheapness and general aversion to travel. They themselves could have been at that party. Should have been. Maybe there, Buddy could have gotten his special little tree. But, as it sometimes happens, some things just aren’t meant to be. Back in the vacant lot, he ran into the Angry Cat. That encounter is the stuff of a story for another day. Needless to say, Buddy survived. He walked slowly through the snow with his head down until he again moved under the wreck of the Old Bug-Out Vehicle and Mobile Prepper Studio.™ Suddenly, he noticed something – something near the shed door that had not been there when he’d left.

Down on the ground by the crack under the door was a very small box with a bow on top. There was also a tiny card with his name on it. He carefully read the tiny card:

Dearest Buddy, Jr,

Here’s a present for the cutest little plastic lizard in the prepping world.

Merry Christmas, from your biggest fan.

Love,

GG ♡

Before he went inside to hang up his tiny coat and hat and mittens, Buddy opened the box. And, what do you suppose he found inside?!

The End

(Not very good, but at least it’s over! Merry Christmas!)

Really Good Shows

19 Sunday Dec 2021

Posted by perrinlovett in News and Notes

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fiction, PPN

Something tells me that the beginning of the week, at least, will see better than average PPN episodes. Songs and cartoons really good. I may be biased. Check in the AM and see.

Also, a new column may come along. It may be a short fiction piece about a Christmas tree. Or, it may be something else, rerun-ish. ??? We’ll know by mid-week.

FICTION: Night of the Living Vaxxed!

31 Sunday Oct 2021

Posted by perrinlovett in Other Columns

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2021, fiction, Halloween, NIGHT OF THE LIVING VAXXED!

*Tonight, friends, thrill and shiver to a tale of the macabre from that ever-popular genre of Vaxxploitation…

Night of the Living Vaxxed!

The 2021 [TPC] Halloween Spooktacular

by Perrin “Maskless” Lovett

*Brought to you by Diet LIME CHIP! Soda – Now in Grape!!!*

 

The Old Covington Cemetery, Halloween…

As the weary sun fell behind a line of ragged pine trees, somewhere a cat yowled ominously. Two somber figures moved among the tombstones of the beloved, the dearly departed, and old what’s his name.

‘Isn’t it a little strange these Halloween stories are always set on Halloween?’ Ann asked as MB kicked ants and confetti off of a low headstone. ‘I mean, it’s not even a little original.’

‘This marker epitaph is original enough: At least he was vaccinated!’ MB said with a grunt. ‘And he was. Good thing. He died of the Detrick-Harvard Variant just last week. Like with Colin Powell, if he hadn’t been fully vaccinated something really bad might have happened.’

‘Alldead?’ Ann asked, arching her eyebrows. ‘What kind of name is that?’

 ‘Paul Alldead. Just got the stone on for him. Another happy customer who will never complain or bounce a check or leave a bad review or ever bother me again,’ MB said while admiring a chip in the granite above a misspelling. ‘Really nice fellow. Hey! There he is now! Let’s say hello.’

Ann looked and saw a stiff, partially-decayed shell of a man limping and shuffling towards them. ‘Why is he out of the grave?!’ she asked with plausibly understandable alarm.

‘Paul!’ MB unwisely called out. ‘Good to see you up and— OH. MY. GOD! He’s a zombie!’

‘Yeah, duh,’ Ann mocked.

‘RUN!!’ they both yelled. And away they did run, just as fast as their feet would take them, or as fast as one needs to run to outrun a zombie that can barely limp and shuffle. Okay, it was more of a jog. It was… C’mon, man. You know the thing.

‘Wait,’ the corpse-like character mumbled after them. ‘Sorry to bother. I’m Ned Halfdead. Paul’s cousin. I came to apologize for the bounced check. Aaand, you’re gone. Oh, my, yummy ants!’

Ned was just bending down to dine like an apologetic, half-dead aardvark when he noticed a shadow. Looking up, he saw a tattered, pale, all-dead-looking man staggering forward out of the gloom. Half in fear, half delighted, Halfdead, and half Formicidae famished, he called out: ‘Paul! I thought you were de—’

*****

In the car, as MB drove madly if nonchalantly towards town, trying to dodge all of the raccoons, missing most of them, Ann scanned the radio. Pausing on NPR, she heard a voice of calm, reason, reassurance, and constant hair-flipping. They both listened to Jen Psaki’s hasty press conference, already in progress:

… all a little concerned. But, no. The president certainly is real, he’s really the president, and he really is not a dead robot. I mean, just because he short-circuited and caught on fire while the greenscreen program crashed… It, uh, it. We’ll circle back to that.

As for the national emergency, there is nothing to be concerned about. Not much. Much at all. Maybe a little. Okay, shit, look! All the recently deceased fully vaccinated thralls are reanimating as brain-eating zombies. They say it is the ultimate ADE or VEI effect, Case Nightmare Zombie, or something. Just, um, just trust science. Maybe the sixteenth booster and those hourly pills can do something? 

Yes. I mean, no. The military is not on it – all service members themselves being lately-deceased fully vaccinated zombies who now eat brains. 

Now, I’d like to point to the success of the recent evacuation. Thanks to Empress Harr-, er, Joe Biden’s very real and legitimate and totally not fake administration, several dozen American refugees were just today airlifted into Afghanistan with the help of our Taliban partners. You, hey you! Non-binary thing from CNN! Why are you drooling like that?! My what? My brain?! Eeeeeeeeeeek!!!

As a faraway production engineer cried, ‘Oh, God,’ or possibly, ‘Mo’ sod(?),’ the signal abruptly ended. Ann turned off the radio and bowed her head. ‘Greenscreen has fallen,’ she whispered sorrowfully. 

‘Best fake president we ever had,’ MB hacked, gagging on a Tic-Tac.

*****

Around the old downtown square, a line of double-masked, plastic-wrapped, CRT-indoctrinated, futureless children stumped along. One to another, they sang cautiously, ‘One, two, Fauci’s coming for you. Three, four, lock the bathhouse door…’

Once again this year, they missed him, as he hid in the dark, fingering his sledgehammer. ‘Imma get that statue tonight,’ the Chairman growled to himself.

Kayla looked down from the balcony of TPC Headquarters, perplexed. ‘What a sad fool,’ she said. ‘Doesn’t he know they already changed the statue? What’s he gonna do? Knock down the new Bankroll Fresh Memorial?’

‘Shhhh, woman,’ Da shushed. ‘Was that another ambulance?’

‘I don’t know about you, but I’d love a gurney full of some Halloween candy! It’s a shame MB lost the petty cash box,’ Kayla mused.

‘I mean, what is there to stop these white militias from getting nuclear weapons?’ Da asked the evening air.

‘Sir, any given day, it’s about twelve Marines and a chain-link fence,’ said a pleasant if unknown voice. Da didn’t notice.

‘Who the hell are you?!’ Kayla asked in candy-starved fright.

‘Hello, ma’am,’ the pleasant, unknown young man said. ‘I’m Abner Snickdowl. The filler character that Mr. Lovett added. You know, with Bess and Ryan and Fred being a little scarce these days.’

Though Da still strained his ear for a siren that never called, Abner and Kayla nearly jumped out of their skin. The shrill, screaming, crying, wailing, greatly-alarmed, desperate-to-flee screaming wail of a cry from the Chairman echoed around the square: ‘Great Lawd Yemaya, SAVE US!!!!!’ They turned in time to see him bolt as if the very foul spirits of the recently be-vaxxed were after him. Down the street he fled, screaming, and never to be seen again. Until sometime later, of course. And, of course, when he did reappear, he was re-elected. His sledgehammer clattered to rest in a pothole he’d promised several times to fix but predictably never got around to.

The moans and groans then drew their attention to the other side of the square. Around the corner, came a slow-moving legion of Vaxx Zombies!™ Now and again, as they inched forward, they let forth the nearly-indecipherable cant, ‘brains.’ Or, honestly, it could have been ‘veins’ or ‘lanes.’ It was maybe just a little south of nearly indecipherable. 

‘Now I’ll never review that candy for the Corner,’ Kayla said, fighting back tears. ‘ZOMBIES!!!’

‘Trust science,’ Da mumbled as he leaned over the railing in his vain search of auditory ambulatory greeting.

‘I have a horrible feeling that I know how this ends,’ Abner muttered dejectedly.

‘Hey!’ Kayla said, completely over her zombie scare. ‘Why do your hands stick out of your shoulders like that? Not to be rude, it’s just…’

‘It’s okay, ma’am,’ Abner said sweetly, flapping his little hands, ‘Mama was a good lady. She trusted science, Thalidomide, and all. Pa trusted science too. The Vioxx got him. My uncle in England trusted science. He died trying to kill bugs with Amiton. Shucks, I trust that science myself! Who wouldn’t, with such a great track record?’

‘Yeah, I didn’t need the whole life story,’ Kayla said dismissively.

Just then, Ann and MB sped into sight. They dodged a few of the foremost zombies, hit the sledgehammer-holding pothole, careened violently, and came to a stop below the balcony. In a moment, they huffed up the stairs and out to join the oddly-paired trio.

‘Some politician needs to promise to fix that damned pothole!’ MB bellowed. 

‘Well, looks like the zombies are here!’ Ann said with surprising and rather misplaced cheer.

‘They just came out of nowhere,’ Abner said, waving one small hand from beneath his sloppily-cut sleeve.

‘Who in the blue blazes are you?’ Ann and MB asked at the same time.

‘I’m Abner Sni—’

‘He’s some dolt ringer or something,’ Kayla said. ‘DO NOT ask about his little hands.’

‘More ambulances by the day,’ Da said with a shrug.

‘What a weird night,’ MB said, holding his lighter between his teeth and poking it with a cigarette. ‘First zombies. Now, this pleasant but unknown character. And all those oversized anthropomorphic raccoons on the streets!’

‘Raccoons?’ Da asked as if coming out of a trance.

‘Yeah, big, man-sized raccoons, a lot of them wearing saggy pants and basketball jerseys,’ Ann explained. ‘All over the place, coming out of all these new apartments. Making odd gestures and signs with their hands, paws. They’re all headed west, it seems. All of them talking about how DAT Raccoon tha Kang! Or, something similar they were saying, maybe.’

‘What’s up with that? Where were all the raccoons going?’ Kayla asked, happy some other strangeness had momentarily displaced the terror of the be-jabbed dead. Everyone shrugged their shoulders. Everyone except Abner. Because, uh…

‘I know,’ he said helpfully; ‘They must be headed to Atlanta to cheer for that giant raccoon that escaped and climbed up the Georgia-Pacific Tower. Took some woman hostage. Y’all hear about that?’

Ignoring Abner – a scenario to which he was well accustomed – they all looked down to the lurching, moaning pack of zombies. The reanimated fully-vaxxed had congregated in the street beneath the balcony. Pathetically, they all extended their hands and arms upward (and one can imagine Abner’s resentment) as if to climb the air itself to dine upon the brains of our beloved TPC staff (and Abner, poor thing). Fortunately for the gang, the particular mRNA poison at issue did not grant the deceased the power of levitation or flight. Still, they were trapped. As more and more victims of the worst hoax and war crime in history stumbled and staggered into the square, the stranded group grew nervous. But then, they heard a sound. It grew louder by the second, a great roaring, grinding noise mixed with notes of modified techno-rock parody music.

And, around the corner and into the square came the racket: speeding along, crushing everything in its path, an Abrams tank roared into full view. Over the whine of the engine and the grumble of the tracks, from two speakers poorly rigged on the turret, “It’s Time To Go” by Boomer Patrol blasted away. The great weapon of war rolled over the back end of MB’s car and proceeded to crush the leading ranks of the zombies. Slowing to a crawl, it abruptly turned and did a short series of donuts in the street. Zombie heads and zombie limbs and zombie bodies and an assortment of ill-fitting clothing that sleepy next of kin had thought appropriate for burial shredded and flew about.

The mechanical beast came to rest, its turbine idling. The music stopped, time paused, and the balcony brigade looked on with interest. After a few moments, the turret began to rotate from the rear-facing position. With a whir, it swung around towards the new memorial. The main gun rose. And, in a deafening flash, Bankroll Fresh’s image joined Robert E. Lee, Jesus Christ, Christopher Columbus, Sacagawea, Hiawatha, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt, The Old Pioneer Woman, Abraham Lincoln, Frank Rizzo, Mahatma Gandhi, Winston Churchill, Frederick Douglass, The Bird Girl, and all the other lately-deposed “racist” Confederate Generals in the dustbin of dystopia. As chunks of obliterated statue rained down among the mindless zombies (the vaxx victims, not the voters), the top hatch opened, a fragrant column of smoke arose, and a voice sarcastically called out from inside, ‘there’s your social justice, bastards. Big guns matter.’

And then, from out the hatch, there emerged, like a knight in cigar-reeking armor, the hero!

‘Perrin, old man!’ MB called out exuberantly.

‘You’ve come to save us!’ Kayla called.

‘Could have warned us about our ears,’ Ann said.

‘Abner on duty, sir!’

‘Did you pass many ambulances?’

‘Yeah, great and whatever,’ Perrin said as he sat up straight in the commander’s perch and jimmied the machine gun. ‘Gimme a second. Ears? Yeah, most uncomfortable vehicle ever.’ 

While the balcony birds lamented not covering their ears and while more zombies shuffled over the remnants of their crushed comrades, flattened like the curve of those two weeks that never ended, Perrin checked the feed on the Ma Deuce. Then, he proceeded to sweep the street, cutting zombies into pieces while cackling like a crackpot conspiracy theorist at play in the all-too-common position of being dead right all along while spraying zombies with .50-caliber BMG rounds from a tank in one of those patented run-on sentences that really does and, yes, on a Halloween evening, as cliche as that might be, or something, etc; and I’ll just stop this one right here, and now, the end. After a hundred or so rounds, or maybe a few more, he stopped, fully climbed out, stood still, and addressed the team.

‘I’m going to enjoy a delicious, cold Diet Lime Chip® soda! It’s better because it’s now available in this great GRAPE flava, er, flavor,’ he said as if delivering a cheap advertising pitch and while unscrewing the bottle top. He paused and read, mostly to himself, the side label: ‘Grape! Purpa Drank! *Skittahz and sizzurp “sold” separately. Big Floyd’s ghost, these idiots pander harder than the cucks in the GOP.’ With that, he took a healthy swallow. And … he immediately began spitting and spewing, hacking and gasping. Throwing the bottle, which hit one of the masked, miserable kids who had hung around and who you’d probably forgotten all about, he staggered to the edge of the turret and vomited all over a zombie below. Still wheezing and spluttering, he leaned down and grabbed the towel-like turban off the head of another zombie, who in life, had been much more American than you, and wiped his mouth – all the while uttering curses too vile to print here.

‘Horrible!’ he yelled in a blind rage. ‘Almost as bad as the original!’ As he continued to rant and pant angrily, he dropped down to the gun again and blasted a few more we’re all in WHAT NOW?! together walking corpses. Finally, he once more stood up and turned to face the bewildered crowd who were still on the balcony, still stranded, and still suffering from painful ringing ears.

‘Nice night, huh?’ Perrin asked with a smirk.

‘Where did you get the tank?’ Ann asked.

‘Well, with the Army all gone and turned into ghouls, the stuff is free for the taking. Of course, it never was that difficult to appropriate their equipment anyway. Armories wide open, coast to coast. Hell, even libertarians did it,’ Perrin said with a gleam in his eye.

‘Oh, no!’ Da cried. ‘I hope nobody gets any assault rifles!!!’

At that, Perrin laughed out loud. ‘Yeah, can’t have that!’ he said while glancing down at the 65-ton main battle tank that he’d just strolled up to, cranked, and driven away in. ‘Anyway, with those dozen Marines out of the way, I’ve got my boys down at Kings Bay picking up the good stuff!’ He leaned down and casually fired off a few more rounds without bothering to aim or look or think – just like Alec Baldwin.

‘Liberty!’ MB said with pride; ‘Legalize Columbia! Democrats racist like tomatoes.’

‘Damn right,’ Da huffed. Perrin fired one last shot while cocking a mildly concerned eyebrow at the balcony.

‘Why’s that bloody rope trailing behind the tow hitch,’ Kayla asked.

‘The whu?’ Perrin mumbled as he looked at incoming Trident II launch system codes on his phone. ‘Oh, crap! That was Laughing Albert from the drug company.’

‘The CEO of—’ Marshall started to ask.

‘Former CEO. And war criminal. I wanted to interrogate him so I tied him up. Forgot about him like the family dog in the vacation movie. Ah well, one torture’s as good as another,’ Perrin said. He suddenly laughed nonstop, just the way Albert had always laughed on television whenever he was asked if he took the death jab his evil company developed in conjunction with the other luciferians. Whereas he had been able to eventually cough out a rough “no,” Perrin concluded his fit, saying, ‘hey, at least he’s in hell with his father, the devil. Good riddance! Now to hunt down the rest…’

‘Why are all the zombies still under the balcony and not gathering around you?’ Kayla inquired smartly.

‘Why? Because they only eat their own. I wasn’t stupid enough to fall for a specialized military operation and take poison from people who have openly stated they want everyone dead, and that the inventor said no human should ever take, and which had a 100% fatality rate in all animal trials, all because of overinflated numbers in a hoax based around weaponized perceptions of the common cold and flu designed to cover up the world economic collapse, at best, and at worst to usher in a new age of international globalist satanic slavery. I mean, really, who could be that retarded?’ Perrin said somewhat smugly, absolutely correctly, and to the chagrin of at least one member of his audience.

‘Wait. Then why do you keep shooting them?’ Ann asked.

‘I mean, why not?’ he answered. The crowd found great wisdom in his simple logic.

‘So, they’re just after us?’ Kayla sought to clarify.

 ‘Oh, yeah,’ Perrin rejoined. ‘One of you must be vaxxed. They can smell it.’

‘I knew it!’ screamed Da, suddenly coming to life. ‘It’s this Abner! He’s come to lead us all to our brain-devoured deaths!’ With that and with a surprising show of strength, Da seized the pleasant, previously unknown, armless character and hoisted him overhead.

While Abner begged for mercy and Perrin retouched the foot of his cigar, the others chanted, ‘Vaxx he azz! Vaxx he azz!’ Then, as one might expect, Da hurled Abner from the balcony. The doomed filler character landed in a heap among the zombies. 

‘My legs! I can’t feel my legs!’ Abner screamed before fading away just as he had feared, having previously read the script, unlike the others. But, interestingly, he neither reanimated nor was of any interest to the science-trusting former TV news watchers. All dead (uh, of the lively deceased, not Mr. Alldead) arms again raised and pawed towards the balcony.

‘Well, crud,’ Da said, slouching guiltily. 

‘Whadda kill my ringer fer?! Whadda kill my ringer fer?!’ Perrin yelled.

‘You mean it’s one of us?’ MB said with a shutter.

‘Looks like it, you Abner-cidal maniacs,’ Perrin said as he lowered back into the turret. ‘If you’ll excuse me, I have a new Christian monarchy to govern. Enjoy the mess you made. You’re on your own!’

‘Wait!’ they all called, as the zombies bobbed and belched below. ‘Save us!’

As he closed the hatch, he called, ‘Read the Constitution to them! Better yet, vote! Vote hard.’

Finally realizing the political futility of their predicament, they sobbed and cursed. But it was too late. They watched sadly as the turret returned to the transport configuration. Then the tank, now sans the Day of the Pillow(!) justice tunes, turned about and drove away down the street. They watched it as it reached an intersection. And, then… They all jumped as an enormous clawed white reptilian foot stomped down with enough force to completely crush the pavement several feet into the ground. Perrin deftly swerved aside just in time. The Piedmonteers looked on in sheer terror as he overcorrected and drove straight through the local CBD store, utterly destroying it. A grievous injury! But their collective gasps and wails were silenced, drowned in a sea of noise from the clouds. Those silly kids had thought the boom of the old 120 was loud. Now, smashing down from above, there came a rolling, undulating roar of defiance and rage. Ears split, windows shattered, and the earth itself shook. Most unexpectedly, several out-of-sequence Japanese people ran around among the zombies, screaming, ‘Ritezilla! Ritezilla!’

Over them loomed a ridiculously tall white lizard, likely a giant albino Iguana or some other very large white lizard. Except this one was beyond very large. Enormous? Gargantuan? L-A-R-G-E. And white. With another roar, the beast picked up a bus and threw it back down. Then it waded through the buildings, moving generally towards A-town.

Having forgotten the now trivial zombies below, the gang stood rooted in fear. At last, MB broke the silence: ‘I wonder if that thing is going after the giant raccoon in Atlanta? That’d be a heck of a fight. Clash of the titans, so to speak. Battle of the monsters: Kang Koo—’ His words temporarily ended when, in a final parting lash, the monster’s tail reduced TPC headquarters to rubble. As the hapless gang dug themselves to safety, far away, carrying on the wind, they thought they heard a tune…

*Now, you’re probably thinking the tune they heard was one of Perrin’s pitiful parodies, perhaps a cheap takeoff on “Godzilla” by BOC. You’d be wrong (for once in a Halloween). They might have heard THIS.

**As originally written for (and about) TPC – where they can no longer be bothered to publish such things. This is, in fact, the final edition. Deo Vindice

Halloween

31 Sunday Oct 2021

Posted by perrinlovett in News and Notes

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fiction, Halloween

Has it lost anything because everyone has been in costume – as surgeons, bank robbers, or zombies – for the last 2 years?! More on that in this year’s spooky fun short story later this evening!

The Weekend Fiction!

28 Thursday Oct 2021

Posted by perrinlovett in fiction

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blog, fiction

What a week! What if we throw a blog and nobody comes?

Anyway, the big TPC Halloween story for 2021 – likely the last one – is coming on Sunday! The theme is already afoot in the popular culture as seen in this great Savage Memes panel.

A New Flavor?

12 Sunday Sep 2021

Posted by perrinlovett in Other Columns

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Diet Lime Chip, fiction, Halloween, preview

That’s the rumor. Diet Lime Chip, Amerika’s favorite nonexistent soda pop might have successfully experimented with something new. No word on if it cures the common hoax. But, look for it, on or about All Hallow’s Eve with some new SPOOKTACULAR fiction aimed at the TPC (and general readership) set!

Boo.

A Review of “A Fatal Mercy, The Man Who Lost The Civil War,” by Thomas Moore (1948 – 2021)

28 Saturday Aug 2021

Posted by perrinlovett in fiction

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"Civil" War, A Fatal Mercy, book review, books, fiction, Thomas Moore

A Review of “A Fatal Mercy, The Man Who Lost The Civil War,” by Thomas Moore

 

*We can add to Tom’s long list of achievements his proper raising of three sons and his very positive influence on his step-children. Within two or three hours of learning of his death yesterday, I had a few ideas and thought, “wow, I need to run that by Tom.” I’m still in the hit in the face stage; shocked to follow, I suppose. Here, I repost my 2019 review of his last major novel, an instant classic on several fronts. He was approached, though I don’t think the porject evolved far, about turning A FATAL MERCY into a TV or Netflix mini-series, which, if done correctly, would be excellent. Don’t wait for that; buy the book. 

 

The boy had it right in quoting his grandfather: “courage and fortitude are never in vain … no good cause is ever lost because all good causes are lost causes.” Even if he didn’t exactly understand the last part of it, that quote expresses an oft-felt theme, if not a rule, of life and of a higher civilization. It is the theme of his grandfather’s story from 1863 through 1913.

 

Was Drayton FitzHenry the man who lost the War for Southern Independence? The man himself certainly thought so, perhaps with good reason. Then again, the reader can, likely will, come to understand that there may have been a good reason behind the losing. The story is simple in its complexity, and visa versa.

 

Moore has really written two books in one. A Fatal Mercy is an in-depth study of the human condition and of Christian morality, Western in origin – Southern by the grace of God. On the one hand, the book is a stirring rendition of The War. In that alone, it is fantastic martial fiction, at once woven by an elegant and commanding imagination and steeped in painstakingly researched history. The story is compelling, riveting.

 

That is especially high praise from me. Unlike my father, I am not a “Civil” War buff. As a child, the old man dragged me from battlefield to battlefield, constantly uttering information gleaned from his (separate) War library. I certainly gained a respect – and the good manners to at least phrase “Civil” with those all-important quotation marks – but I never developed the … obsession. This book, all through its 727 pages, engendered some of that. This is a work my father would have read – and liked. Those of you who knew him, know that is higher praise.

 

Perhaps highest of all, is what that aforementioned history and the associated culture, presented alive and burning, generates with regard to what I see as the second grand interpretation, a thoughtful, reasoned, and unapologetic defense of relevant antiquity, classical knowledge, honor, and the grandeur of Western Civilization.

 

I am a student of classical Greco-Roman tradition. Here, Moore writes as well and true as any: “One reason we study the Classics, apart from the value of the knowledge itself, is for what they may teach us about our times.” With this sentiment, Cicero concurs: “To be ignorant of what occurred before you were born is to remain always a child. For what is the worth of human life, unless it is woven into the life of our ancestors by the records of history?”

 

Today, most Americans, Southerners included, are ignorant of history, children easily led astray from their ancestral heritage. Moore addresses this issue, with direct examples, slightly dramatized, through the eyes of his protagonist. Drayton’s book-long dilemma revolves around a momentary eye of the storm at Gettysburg. Rather, around the eye of the fish hook, as Shelby Foote put it if we stretch Foote’s geographic definitions to include Little Round Top (and it is, topography-wise, a sub-eye). See: The Civil War, a Narrative, Stars in Their Courses, p. 479, Random House, New York (1963).

 

Of that terrible battle and its defining outcome, Bruce Catton wrote: “There was no pattern to any of this, except for the undesigned pattern that can always be traced after the event.” Never Call Retreat, Encounter at Gettysburg, p. 186, Doubleday, New York (1965). If this is true – and who doubts Catton – then Drayton’s dilemma is understandable. Drayton lived out the maxim: “Iniuriam facilius facias quam feras – Easier to do a wrong than to endure one.” – Syrus, Maxims. As he refrained from the former, so he endured the latter. Both counts are attributable to – and tribute to – his wisdom and honor.

 

And, there is an honor, and a wisdom, about Drayton FitzHenry that is rare among literary creations. Odysseus has it, as does Frodo. That wisdom moves beyond the narrative of the War, the horrors of Reconstruction, and into the following age. Along with other, innumerable truths, a lesson and a warning speak directly to us. It finds different ways of expression:

 

  • The kindly nature of a freed slave towards her former master;
  • The correct realization that the War ended the original American Republic, freeing one class of slaves only to create another;
  • Understanding the force and effect of the demonic legal trilogy of 1913: to this end, three separate quotes, conjoined (by me, for my purposes): “Power transmutes into Empire. Empire begets hubris. Hubris brings ruin. … [O]ur virtues will be needed by America, perhaps even the world, more than ever. … We must do the best we can and leave the consequences to God.”

Moore’s articulate, enrapturing characters witness the end of a Republic. We stand at the very possible end of an Empire. Then, in the fable, and now, in our reality, both intelligent free will and resolve to honor Providence properly combine. Sayeth the poet: “Flectere si nequeo superos, Acheronta movebo – If I can’t move Heaven, I’ll raise Hell.” – Virgil, The Aeneid, VII, 312. The men at Gettysburg, of both sides, did exactly that. A Fatal Mercy does the same, does both in fact, recalling the horror and heroism of combat while instilling pride in the genteel, the cultured, the learned, the respecting, and the respectable. It is all of powerful magnitude.

 

The Author states: “My principal goal was not just to write the best contemporary novel of the War, but also to place my protagonist in an excruciating moral and emotional dilemma and see how he would resolve his inner conflict.” Moore has done that, and greater still. This book is a timeless Classic.

 

Also: The letters… The burning of the letters, Chapter Seventeen, moved me. The reader will, I trust, understand soon enough.

 

(Picture: Amazon/Green Altar Books – Shotwell/Moore)

 

A Fatal Mercy, The Man Who Lost The Civil War, Thomas Moore, Green Altar Books, Columbia, SC (2019).

How It Might Happen – the Weekly Column!

19 Friday Mar 2021

Posted by perrinlovett in fiction, Other Columns

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column, fiction, muh check, really-not-fiction, short story, TPC, War

And, this week, it’s another short work of fiction based on highly plausible real near-future events. This one runs exclusively or initially here because 1) I assume it’s the TOO Real Story, and 2) I was notified by TPC’s excellent internal staff communication system that the venerable paper is going on a 2-week Sprink Break (woot!) hiatus. Accordingly, my next two weekly columns will be a little “harder” and will run here (possibly elsewhere – developing [slowly] that). Here goes:

 

 How It Might Happen

 

Brynlee pulled her thong up to fully expose the new marijuana leaf tattoo riding high on her plump, white right cheek. She was delighted TikTok was working again (it had been off-and-on for a few days for unknown reasons) though she was moderately distressed the comments feed still wasn’t active. ‘Weah muh boiz? Weah beo-chez? Thot bee hawt!’ she slurred as she began to twerk for the camera. ‘Yaw git high why I shake dis booty, shake dis booty, shake diss booooo-tay!’ 

The noise from the living room really bothered her – almost as much as the loss of instant gratification from her ten-thousand loyal followers. ‘Turn dat sheeit dow!’ she screamed. ‘Dat bee dee nooz?’

Suddenly, Marqueena, the seven-year-old daughter she’d had with Darnell, a man she barely remembered, stormed into the kitchen. Sober eyes would have detected the fear and distress on the cute little face, have ivory, half ebony.

‘Which ship is daddy on?!’ the little girl asked with a shout.

‘Gah! Gurl, waay,’ the attention whore exclaimed as she tapped off her phone. ‘Wuh? Why? He on dat Ray-gan, da airpane sheep.’

With an ear-splitting scream the child crumpled to the floor in a sobbing heap. Between wails, she bleated, ‘Daddy! Daddy!’

Her wasted, worthless mother stepped over her writhing body and ventured to the doorway. From there, she witnessed something on the 80-inch screen that almost drove the booze and drugs from her underpowered mind. She looked just in time to see the third playing of the first hypersonic anti-ship missile as it plowed into the starboard side of CVN-76. Four more bright flashes followed in rapid succession. Within minutes, over one-hundred-thousand tons of steel, billions of dollars, and six-thousand men – Darnell included – sank to the ocean floor.

While little Marqueena rolled and cried, pounding the linoleum with her fists, Brynlee stupidly muttered, ‘Day-um. Muh check…’

The horrific martial scenes on the television were replaced by a stunned Tucker Carlson. With great effort, he spoke again, ‘And, that was Sunday night. Three days ago. They’ve been lying for three days – lying as if nothing was wrong. Well, it is. It’s worse than wrong, it’s unbelievable. It’s terminal.

‘It took Russian and European reporting – that they tried to block! – to break the truth openly. For three days, President Harris, or Pelosi, or whoever the hell is supposed to be running this failed nation has been lying to us. A training exercise? Retaliatory strikes. Mission accomplished? Your sailor will contact you when routine radio silence is lifted! Lies. Lies. Lies!

‘Here’s what we know – now! – that really happened. The Iranians knew the strikes were coming and they were ready. Not a single US cruise missile or bomber got through. Tehran obviously has this Russian S-400 or S-500 system and it obviously works. They also have, according to new reports we’ve been able to verify, advanced ultra-high-velocity sea-skimming missiles. That’s what sunk the Reagan along with three support ships. 

‘Our Navy is so weak, so unprepared that they can’t even recover the very few survivors. The Iranians, to their great credit, have been picking up our wounded, treating them, and offering to return them as soon as possible. They, it seems, have Allah’s grace; we’ve lost it.

‘Within an hour of the Battle of the Arabian Sea, China moved against Taiwan, their first step being to sweep the US Pacific Fleet aside. That’s when we lost the Roosevelt and the Nimitz and other support ships – lost them to more advanced weaponry and better tactics. That’s when we lost most of our island-based assets in the South China Sea and the Philippine Sea. China, by the way, is not interested in recovering any of our MIAs. Also, by the way, there is practically nothing we can do about any of this…

‘That’s when … that’s how we lost an estimated thirty-thousand casualties – in one hour. That’s why Vladimir Putin sternly reminded Washington of the new Russian defense alliances with Beijing and Tehran. That’s when the failed, satanic, blood-thirsty fools in the White House started lying. That’s how we know this paper tiger has no teeth. Just maybe, maternity flight suits and transgender sex change operations weren’t the right priority. Well, regardless of how we look at it, America’s imperial age just ended.’

Christmas Fiction!

24 Thursday Dec 2020

Posted by perrinlovett in fiction

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Christmas, fiction, FPC, Freedom Prepper Community, short story

As promised and, again, exclusively at FPC. Not a member? Then, join at www.freedompreppercommunity.com.

And a Pardon in a Pear Tree – Christmas Fiction from Somewhat Current Events

23 Wednesday Dec 2020

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column, fiction, short story, Tom Ironsides, TPC

And a Pardon in a Pear Tree

 

London City Airport, Early Evening…

No one had explained a word about the sudden change in scenery. An outside NHS doctor spent over an hour assessing his general condition, at intervals consulting with nurses and his solitary handlers. He thought he’d asked for his attorney or his advocate, but he simply couldn’t remember. The flat American accents had tipped him off, and if he was honest, he had long suspected this day would come. They didn’t even ask him to sign anywhere, nor did they present him any writ or order. Four sturdy men in suits, in addition to the usual guards, had escorted him from the infirmary to the transfer bay. Two of these bespoke Yankees rode along with him in the back of an SUV. He thought he glimpsed unmarked police cars in a short procession, but he wasn’t sure. 

   Little of it, any of it, made sense. And he didn’t have much time to process what was happening. Nearly a decade of hiding, waiting, and suffering had crawled by him, only for this evening’s unexplained venture from Belmarsh, and the short, fast drive under the Thames (he guessed it was the Blackwall Tunnel), and now he was securely in the custody of – someone. Who were his new friends? The FBI? CIA? As the surprisingly well-appointed business jet began to swing around on its approach to the lone runway, he realized something. Whoever they were, they had not shackled him!

   In fact, once on board, they had begun treating him rather well, more like a guest than a prisoner. Something in the cabin smelled sweet, familiar almost. He was seated in a comfortable leather chair and was just sipping from a bottle of Perrier when the pilot hastily announced their imminent departure. One of these agents, if that was the word, a large man seated across a small table from him, gestured for him to fasten his seatbelt. The gesture came with a smile, something to which he was no longer accustomed. No sooner than he had secured himself and turned to gaze out the window than the plane launched forward, soon climbing over the River, passing on the one side a sewage plant and, on the other, the sewer of a prison he’d of late called his home. In a few minutes, he realized they must have already been closing on the Delta, heading, he assumed, due east towards Antwerp. He couldn’t be exactly certain, but there came the feeling that the craft slowed in the air and subtly turned to the south – to what degree, he did not know.

   And, just as he gave thought to another effervescent sip and perhaps a request for something solid to eat, another man kindly invited him forward to the flight deck. Entering through the open cockpit door, he beheld before and below him, shrouded in moving darkness, what he took for the Channel and, far ahead, the lights of the Continent. Two men sat under dim lights behind a sea of screens and controls. The younger one, on the right, was dressed in a similar if more understated fashion as the rest of the crew. He looked like the government issue. The other man, older, and obviously in charge of the flight, bore an altogether different look and demeanor. He was half slouched over to his left, with his arm resting near the window. His right hand lazily, casually held the yoke. His black hair, flecked with sprinkled salt, was shaggier than one would have assumed, as was his short, stubbly beard. He was chewing on a cigar and wore, over powerfully-built arms and shoulders, what could only be described as the tackiest of Christmas sweaters. Upon entering, he caught the end of a short conversation between the pilots.

   The older casual man on the left was quipping in answer to something: ‘…Corona is a hoax, Biden didn’t win, and Gina didn’t kill herself. Eff- it!’

   ‘Yeah, right. Listen, RAF and the Bude are blowing up again about it, Tom,’ said the younger man on the right, ‘like it popped up out of nowhere.’

   Unperturbed, the man of the left gave a dry response: ‘I know. Ninety-high and tracking our position perfectly?’

   ‘You know?’ the young man asked incredulously.

   ‘Yeah,’ the older man hummed, ‘or, I suspected. He’s with us. An escort.’

   ‘Then, who is he?’ asked the younger man.

   ‘Santa Claus…’

   He could no longer contain his bewilderment. ‘Whose plane is this?’ he asked, more to the older man.

   The whimsical pilot immediately pivoted around and smiled sincerely. ‘My brother-in-law’s!’ he said happily. ‘Well, he bought it, as a tax write-off and so forth, but I get to fly her. Keep her down in Hickory. She’s not a lot of use most of the time, what with the price of fuel but, for this jaunt, Uncle Sucker is picking up the whole tab!’

   ‘Who are you?’ he asked, feeling even more bewildered than before.

   ‘I’m Tom,’ the pilot said, extending his hand (leaving the yoke floating momentarily), ‘and this is Freddy,’ he said nodding to the younger man who smiled slightly at the introduction. ‘May I call you Julian?’ Tom asked.

   ‘Yes, uh, yes, that’s me,’ was Julian’s answer, before he ventured another question: ‘Are you CIA?’

   ‘No,’ the pilot said flatly and proudly. ‘The guys in the back are Marshals, or Secret Service, or something or another. Freddy here is Company, but I’m not. Not anymore. I’m just a guy with some cheap time and a plane. Welcome aboard the White Hat Express!’

   He stumbled through his more recent memories for a moment before uttering: ‘Tom? You’re the professor?’

   ‘At your service, pen pal!’ Tom replied with a smile.

   ‘You two have been corresponding?’ Freddie asked with sudden interest or alarm.

   ‘Yeah,’ Tom said dismissively. ‘Now, Julian, where to?’

   ‘What do you mean?’ Julian asked.

   ‘I mean where do you want me to take you?’ Tom asked. Then, he clumsily tapped at a few of the screens above the throttle. ‘I’ve got nine-thousand, or ninety-five-hundred kilometers worth of range. Can’t make Australia, directly, but, there’s … Sweden? No, maybe not. Paris is just over the horizon. You probably aren’t keen on the States just yet—’

   ‘They’re keen on him,’ Freddy added.

   ‘Well, not yet,’ Tom said. ‘You just think about it, Julian, and let me know. I can hold over the Channel if I need to. Try not to take too long. I have a mountain cabin full of women who are probably angry with me about this side trip. Missing Christmas and all that, you know.’

   ‘You’re not taking me to a prison in America?!’ Julian asked perplexedly.

   ‘No, why would I?’ Tom questioned. ‘You’re a free man. It’s in the— Wait, they didn’t tell you?!’

   ‘Tell me what?’ Julian was confused. ‘No.’

   ‘Well then, the honor is mine,’ Tom said proudly again, ‘You’re free! Full pardon. Freddy or one of them has the paperwork. And, not to burden you, but you are requested – at your convenience – for a special consultation on some more recent, pressing matters. The uh, the shitshow, you know? There’s a storm about to hit. Hard. Anyway, Merry Christmas, old man!’

   Julian leaned on the door, feeling a lump moving up and through his throat. A pardon? He thought. For—

   As if reading his new friend’s thoughts, Tom quietly added, ‘Not that you did anything wrong. But, all’s safe and legal now. And, I’m serious. Wherever you want. Got family somewhere? Or, friends? Why don’t you talk it over with her and get back to me.’

   ‘Talk to whom?’ Julian asked as tears filled his lower eyes. ‘Who is her, she?’

   Tom looked sidelong at Freddy and almost growled, ‘You didn’t fucking tell him?! He hasn’t seen her yet? It’s a small plane!’

   ‘We had her scooch down in a rear seat, and she’s obviously still playing along,’ Freddy said defensively. ‘It was going to be part of the surprise, along with the pardon. Then, you had to take off like a wildman and—’

   Tom cut Freddy’s explanation short. Holding the intercom button, he spoke out loudly and clearly, ‘Sweetheart, come on up here. He really needs you.’

   Julian, utterly confused, wiped his sleeve over his eyes. But, she was already there. From behind him, a golden, sultry voice cooed over his shoulder, ‘Hello, beautiful.’

   Turning, he looked into her eyes. His jaw dropped even as she moved in quickly to heartily embrace him. He exclaimed, ‘Pamela!’

*And now, this column [AT TPC] will enter into a short period of festive rest. I intend to return in the new year, not later than the invocation of the Insurrection Act or the commencement of President Trump’s second term. Merry Christmas to all and a very happy 2021! -Perrin

At seen, 12/22, at TPC!

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Perrin Lovett

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