Missing Lagos

Edit: A friend of ours, Judd Blevins, is under attack by the usual suspects and could use some help in his fight. He is a good man trying to serve his community, but the freaks and weirdos are trying to ruin it. Here is his story and a way to send him a few bucks.


This week was the final escape from Lagos, which had been in the works for a few years but took off toward the end of last year. I am not a young man anymore, so I cannot just pack up and leave when the spirit moves me. Not only do I have commitments to fulfill, but I also have stuff. When your stuff fits comfortably inside the trunk of your car, moving is about waiting until the sun goes down. When you need a truck for your stuff then you have to put some thought into it.

Baltimore has been my home for twenty years. I lived there longer than anywhere else so despite the harms of Charm City, there are some things I will miss. The thing I will miss the most is the look when I say I am from Baltimore. One time in Ireland I told some locals I was from Baltimore, and they did not believe me. They had seen the series The Wire and could not accept that I lived in what they saw. I showed them my license and some photos. They were terrified of me.

There are other things I will miss, like the constant sound of basketballs striking the sidewalk at all hours of the day and night. I exaggerate a bit here, but the thud of a ball hitting the sidewalk is like a weird metronome to the place. So much so that I created a special filter for my podcasts to remove the sound. No matter when I record, there is, now was, that sound of a ball striking cement. Oddly, Baltimore produces few college basketball players, despite it all.

Another thing I will miss is the shouting. The first time I was in Copenhagen, I experienced an eerie feeling the first day walking around the city. It struck me that the reason for this is the relative quiet. No one was shouting. The Danes quietly go about their business on the streets. If they need to speak to someone, they go up close to them so they can talk without shouting. Even on public transport the Danes are quiet, not Japanese quiet, but never shouting or blaring music.

Baltimore is the other end of the spectrum. It is perfectly normal for a man to stop on one side of the street and scream at the top of his lungs at another man on the other side of the street. At first it is to get his attention, but after that they will hold forth like it is perfectly normal for two men to be screaming at one another on the street, because in Baltimore it is normal. People also scream at each other from their house windows, open car windows and even rooftops.

One reason for the shouting, but certainly not the only reason, is the constant sound of alarms from emergency equipment. This is another filter I have created for recording podcasts that I may never need again. It is not just the police sirens, which are common, but other sorts of emergency vehicles. Often, I would see the local fire department take their trucks out and blast the sirens for no reason, other than to make a racket and drive the things around the block a few times.

Probably the hardest thing to get used to will be locks. In a place like Lagos, anything not locked up or locked down will be stolen. Even if it is worthless someone will pick it up and carry it away. When we had an office in the city, we would leave old computers on the sidewalk, and they would vanish. The only thing that did not disappear this way was dead bodies, but the scenes from Haiti suggest that this is something that happens in the next stage of social development.

For the last week I have been locking doors after I pass, because it has become second nature at this point. Yesterday was a nice early spring day here in the hills, but leaving the door open to let the air in was too much. Instead, I opened the window of the office so I could keep an eye on things. Perhaps in time I will forget what it was like to live on guard every minute of your life. I may now understand how men who did long stints in prison feel when they get released.

Something I am not sure I will miss is the general stupidity of the place. The best example of this is car inspections. When I moved to Lagos, I had just bought a new truck, but it was registered in the prior state. I learned I needed a safety inspection before I could swap plates. Getting a safety inspection on a new car seemed weird, but how long could it take? It took all day. The guy crawled all over the thing and even wrote up some things that came from the factory as questionable.

I asked the guy why he was doing this as in other states a safety inspection is just a walkaround to make sure every important bit works. The guy told me with compete sincerity that the cars were safer in Baltimore. He could have said it was the law or that his boss required it, thus acknowledging the idiocy of what he was doing, but no, he was fully on board with the policy. Baltimore combines the mindset of the postal clerk with the intellectual dexterity of the population.

One thing that Baltimore has that I have seen no where else is street walkers, by which I mean people who walk in the streets rather than on the sidewalk. You see it the most when it snows and the cars are less controllable. The locals will walk in the middle of the streets. Even in the summer this is common. They will saunter along in the middle of the road without a care in the world. Of course, they jaywalk at a pace that suggests they take pleasure in holding up traffic.

Finally, the last thing I will miss is the tropical summers. Starting in mid-June Baltimore turns into a jungle. Jungle as in weather. It rains almost every night and is suffocatingly humid all day. Yeah, it is hot and humid in the South during the summer, but that weather in a city is a special form of miserable. Baltimore is below sea level, so it is a concrete heatsink in the summer. In fact, the Baltimore – Washington area is a giant metro area plopped into a swampy jungle.

Lots of people reading this will say it gets miserably hot where they live in the summer, and that is probably true, but hazy, hot, and humid in Lagos is unique. I have been in the South in summer. I have been in Texas during a heatwave. I have spent August in Florida and that is about as close as it comes to Lagos. The big exception is Florida has the beaches and lacks the haze. If you want to know what Hell is really like, spend a summer in Lagos and you will sin no more.


If you like my work and wish to kick in a few bucks, you can buy me a beer. You can sign up for a SubscribeStar subscription and get some extra content. You can donate via PayPal. My crypto addresses are here for those who prefer that option. You can send gold bars to: Z Media LLC P.O. Box 432 Cockeysville, MD 21030-0432. Thank you for your support!


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Robbo
Robbo
6 months ago

You mean no Amish? 🙂

Vinnyvette
Vinnyvette
6 months ago

There’s peace in them there hills Z…
God speed!

WCiv911
WCiv911
Reply to  Vinnyvette
6 months ago

I can verify that fact Vinny.
Welcome to the neighborhood, Mr. Z.
Country roads, take me home,
To the place I belooooong!

Alzaebo
6 months ago

Took a while but now I get it.
What the Zman misses most is being addressed as “Bwana Z”,
That and his pith helmet.

Farm Boy
Farm Boy
6 months ago

A woman brought a limp duck in to the vet. After a brief examination, the vet shook his head and said, “I’m sorry, your duck has passed away.” The distressed woman wailed, “Are you sure?” “Yes, I am sure. Your duck is dead,” replied the vet..”How can you be so sure?” she protested. “I mean you haven’t done any testing on him or anything. He might just be in a coma or something. Can you please do some tests?” The vet left the room and returned a few minutes later with a black Labrador Retriever. As the duck’s owner looked… Read more »

usNthem
usNthem
6 months ago

Wow Z. Just think how plain vanilla your new life will be – the excruciating lack of diversity will be……. GLORIOUS! Congrats and all the best.

Snooze
Snooze
Reply to  usNthem
6 months ago

Take my diversity please.

Dulaney High School Vice Principal
Dulaney High School Vice Principal
6 months ago

Zman lived in Cockeysville, which is a mostly quiet, mostly White suburb a few miles north of Baltimore. It is light years from some kind of urban hellhole. He has even blogged about the yuppie Wegmans supermarket nearby and biking around the area for Christ’s sake. This is just another example the typical lying we always see from Rightists.

3g4me
3g4me
Reply to  Dulaney High School Vice Principal
6 months ago

Dulaney: 53% White is not “mostly White” in my book. A former close friend’s parents lived in Cockeysville and, when I visited in the mid ’80s, it was a nice area. By the early aughts it was not so nice, and she was moving her then widowed mother out. That was few years before Zman moved into the area.

Surely you can lie somewhat more convincingly. Try harder.

WCiv911
WCiv911
Reply to  3g4me
6 months ago

Generalizations are like that. There may in fact be exceptions to a rule, but that does not imply that the generalization does not hold.

Maybe you do live in an oasis, but take this to the bank: crime & lawlessness is spreading and your little suburban enclave will soon begin to see it too.

Mikew
Mikew
Reply to  Dulaney High School Vice Principal
6 months ago

Cockeysville. 21% black. Yikes. I’ll pass

David Wright
Member
Reply to  Mikew
6 months ago

Given the bad ratio of places I have lived in my youth I wouldn’t be too afraid of living there. Of course , not if I can help it. Everybody wants some street cred.

Alzaebo
Reply to  Dulaney High School Vice Principal
6 months ago

People. PEOPLE. It’s a comment from the “Dulaney High School Vice Principal”…!!!

JerseyJeffersonian
JerseyJeffersonian
Reply to  Alzaebo
6 months ago

A Principal at Vice? I heard that they went belly up. So maybe this clown now has a lot of time on his hands, yet still can’t break free from the corporate “culture” at Vice of compulsively lieing, so he gets his dopamine hit by coming here and indulging himself.

More to be pitied than despised?

hokkoda
Member
Reply to  Dulaney High School Vice Principal
6 months ago

I did find it funny that you agree an area that is majority white and a few miles away from the highest concentrations of diversity is far less likely to be considered, as you called it, an “urban hellhole”. Everybody thinks their version of racism is just fine. Just like you! lol Your’s is just a weird blend of noticing that being outside the city center is likely safer and quieter because it’s whiter, but at the same time recognizing that inside the city center is the opposite. I commend you on proving a point that is made often here:… Read more »

Haven Monahan
Haven Monahan
Reply to  Dulaney High School Vice Principal
6 months ago

Funny. I, too, have a PO box and it’s sixteen miles from where I live.

Apex Predator
Apex Predator
6 months ago

This is probably a good time for me to riff off Z-Man’s Exodus Story with my own. Many long time readers know the highlights of my story as I’ve been an active contributor here for years and shared my tale of woe. I am Z’s neighbor in DC, and I too, have recently after years of chipping away it and struggle, made my escape from Sodom on Potomac. 10 years ago, almost to the day, I got into a bit of a conflict with a minority on the job. No big deal. These things happen, right? In an attempt to… Read more »

Winter
Winter
Reply to  Apex Predator
6 months ago

Damn. Thanks for sharing your experience. It’s a terrific, yet terrifying, reminder of what we’re facing and how careful we need to be.

Xman
Xman
Reply to  Apex Predator
6 months ago

Thanks for sharing your story. It’s simply terrifying to know that you can not only have your career destroyed but that you can also be criminally prosecuted by these nutjobs for absolutely nothing. I did not, thankfully, experience anything nearly as traumatic as you did, but I got an inkling of what is possible and it was more than enough. Twenty years ago I worked at a college that was staffed by unqualified leftist cunts, and when they found out that I wasn’t on Team Left they conspired to find reasons to get rid of me. One of the things… Read more »

3g4me
3g4me
Reply to  Apex Predator
6 months ago

Apex: Very best of luck to you, Sir. Genuinely hope you have better luck warning your new neighbors of the dangers of ‘tolerance’ then I have had here in our humble abode. Wonderful, salt-of-the-earth people, but utterly naive when it comes to on-the-ground racial reality.

Tired Citizen
Tired Citizen
Reply to  Apex Predator
6 months ago

All I will say is that I wish there was a tool in existence that could measure the rage level that this makes me feel…

There are no words to describe how much I hate this fucking hellscape.

Citizen of a Silly Country
Citizen of a Silly Country
Reply to  Apex Predator
6 months ago

Apex,

Congratulations. I can’t imagine what you’ve gone through. The worst that I’ve dealt with is a neighbor conducting a very public campaign against me.

I wish you the best in your new life.

Compsci
Compsci
Reply to  Apex Predator
6 months ago

“I stupidly sent some joking text messages as one would do to a less brown colleague. (ex. “Yes I could tell you, but I would have to kill you afterwards 😊)” Horrendous story, thanks for sharing. My immediate thinking upon seeing the above quote was, “oh, come on…who the hell takes this quite old quip/joke seriously”. I remember saying this as a young man among friends, the joke being played off of the then current genre of spy novels and movies of the time. Hell, I still remember making this “joke” when in university. Then it came to me. I’m… Read more »

Alzaebo
Reply to  Compsci
6 months ago

My gods, we are sitting ducks, aren’t we?

Zulu Juliet
Zulu Juliet
Reply to  Compsci
6 months ago

Try instead “I could tell you, but you’d have to eat your brain”.

Stay safe out there!

usNthem
usNthem
Reply to  Apex Predator
6 months ago

Best of luck dude and stay in touch with the group here – always enjoy your input.

Moran ya Simba
Moran ya Simba
Reply to  Apex Predator
6 months ago

Happy you landed on your feet. Insane injustice will be the lot of many whites in the years to come.

Range Front Fault
Range Front Fault
Reply to  Apex Predator
6 months ago

Good God, man! You did it! You pulled the plug. So, so very glad for you. I say this to both Z and you, Mr Predator! Very cool indeed. Couldn’t happen to a better guy. Z, you shall get used to the silence ; quiet and contentment are wonders. Good for you. You have no idea how many times I have thought of you and prayed for you to get out. Apex man, I envy you. Saw this coming over 20 years ago and here we are. I couldn’t pry the husband loose so southern Utah is my last stand.… Read more »

Vxxc
Vxxc
6 months ago

Welcome back to Humanity.
Perhaps after adjusting you’ll think better of us.
Now… be careful… this IS the MOST DANGEROUS time for you, quite seriously.
This is when it happens.
Your guard is just starting to drop, you’re in transit and transition from jungle to civilization- the predators will strike now.

Pyrrhus
Pyrrhus
Reply to  Vxxc
6 months ago

Normal people are even leaving Madison, WI now…the diversity is becoming a problem..

Hemid
Hemid
Reply to  Pyrrhus
6 months ago

As Sailer used to point out weirdly often, Wisconsin has (or had) the most criminal black population in America. I don’t remember what his theory about it was. Something clever I’m sure. Mine is that there’s nothing special about Wisconsin blacks, but they’re very, very unlike the local white population they migrated into. Scandinavians strongly activate certain other races’ predatory urges. The Minnesota Somalis are probably worse than the Wisconsin blacks now that there are enough of them to…be worse. The last great black crime outburst in Minnesota, the early ’90s “Murderapolis” era, was plausibly blamed on a surge of… Read more »

Ostei Kozelskii
Member
Reply to  Pyrrhus
6 months ago

Normal people in MADison? Pshaw!

Alzaebo
Reply to  Pyrrhus
6 months ago

Isn’t that where radical feminist university socialism began?
Of all places, I know, but Madison has a special reputation.

ray
ray
Reply to  Alzaebo
6 months ago

Madtown is an evil place. I had to preach against it once. In front of the state capitol. Loudly. With all the govt. office people watching from the cafes.

Some dood actually applauded when I got done.

Nick Nolte's Mugshot
Nick Nolte's Mugshot
6 months ago

Zman I always imagined you ensconced in your mansion in some green leafy gated enclave of Lagos. It sounds like you were living in the thick of the action.

Lovemore
Lovemore
6 months ago

Stop it Z Man! Look what you’ve done…given me vivid flashbacks to post-apartheid South Africa; specifically Soweto-on-Sea. 🙂

Mr. Dark
6 months ago

Home. Its mythical resonance, balanced on the tip of the tongue, makes it one of the most powerful words in any language. The messages that get sent when one describes one’s home city or town are electrifying. If you’re from a small Southern town, that defines you. If you’re a Yankee from Maine, that also defines you. Our residences make us who we are. Growing up in a different town year after year is like living permanently in a foreign country. Moving around is hell. The only good time to move is as a comfortably settled adult, as described HERE:… Read more »

Ploppy
Ploppy
6 months ago

And to think after all these years not one basketball american teenager broke into to your home just to result in you teaching him how to write so he could get into a fancy private school and then pay it forward by teaching all the racist white kids how to bounce a basketball.

You’re the man now, dawg!

Marko
Marko
6 months ago

Yes, summers in American cities are pretty bad…worse than what you’d find further south. Most cities are in a basin, plus the traffic fumes and the endless concrete creates a hellish scenario. Even northern cities such as Minneapolis and Chicago get intolerable sometimes. Everyone thinks Florida is some kind of summer hellscape, but it really isn’t. Yes the humidity gets high, especially inland, but the temperature never gets above 95, plus you have the afternoon rain which cools things down. Also there’s plenty of water bodies where you’re not too far from a decent breeze. I lived in cities where… Read more »

Pozymandias
Reply to  Marko
6 months ago

I can vouch for this. When I moved to FL I was shocked that you could have a hot humid day with absolutely clear, clean air. There’s no haze and yes, there’s often a breeze from the Trade Winds or a thunderstorm to cool things off. It’s also true that there are no days over 95F. It’s probably just that at that low latitude the summer days are too short for the heat to really build in the afternoon.

Pyrrhus
Pyrrhus
Reply to  Marko
6 months ago

Cities stopped being nice places to live when the 3d worlders ( including Puerto Rico) began showing up..In Chicago, they were confined to the south and west sides, and the rest of the city was really nice, with a beautiful lakefront…Now they’re downtown and North as well, and everyone with a brain has left…

Major Hoople
Major Hoople
Member
Reply to  Pyrrhus
6 months ago

Chicago is looking at Detroit and calling them a rookie. Every big city in this country is going under. Question in my mind, is can you have a viable society when all the cities are destroyed?

Steve
Steve
Reply to  Major Hoople
6 months ago

Question in my mind is, “Can you have a viable society before the cities are destroyed?”

rasqball
rasqball
Reply to  Major Hoople
6 months ago

Mott the Hoople, I have unwavering response to the “question in your mind” : No.
I know that these are fighting words for many, Cities and Civilization go hand-in-hand.

DaBears
DaBears
Reply to  Pyrrhus
6 months ago

We’re still pretty segregated in Chicago. My mostly white neighborhood prices out most folks but it is located by a popular beach, so in the heat of the summer there will be daylight rapes and shootings. A few flash mob days. Mounted CPD were out yesterday and bicycle police are practicing summer enforcement. It’s still safe enough, if I arise early, to ride my 47-mile bicycle circuit that bookends N’western and U.Chicago as my pylons. I can’t wait to move to Alaska but that dream is a decade off. I’m staying for now because it’s pretty difficult to sue companies… Read more »

Spingerah
Spingerah
Reply to  DaBears
6 months ago

Alaskafrom Chicago, interesting
There are a fair amount of southerners
& likely a few Chicagoites.i just haven’t ran into one.
Lot of people come but don’t last more than a couple years.
Don’t wait too long. It’s not easy for a lot to get used to.

DaBears
DaBears
Reply to  Spingerah
6 months ago

I am quite experienced in the particularities of Alaska. Several dozen fairly lengthy stays there, mostly in the remote woodlands, AK is the perfect place for me. Not so much for mine, a very pretty CT Irish-yankee and Harvard prodigy. So I’ll just continue to work, probably into my early 70’s. I won’t be enabled to fly pax, but I’ll fly cargo to the oil fields and villages as a break-even proposition because I love flying and appreciate Alaska. I grew up, mostly, in a sleepy beach town in western Michigan but my annual gift was a subscription to Nat’l… Read more »

p
p
Reply to  Spingerah
6 months ago

Ahh, Alaska, no-see-ums, devilclubs, skunk cabbage, bears going through your garbage in the spring. Drunken natives. Everyone flies to Hawaii for a week as soon as the annual Exxon check arrives. High prices for everything because it has to be flown in from outside. No sunlight at all from Halloween til Valentines day. Used to be there were 2 kinds of people in Alaska in winter, those that join clubs and meddle in local politics, and those that drink whiskey and beat their wives. Alaska is great for men and boys but it’s really hard on women and girls.

Xman
Xman
Reply to  DaBears
6 months ago

Maybe you can work for Everts and fly a DC-6 every day, LOL. What a hoot that would be…

DaBears
DaBears
Reply to  Xman
6 months ago

Fairbanks is a great place with some air quality and touristy downsides. If Chicago people don’t move to Anchorage, I can see them moving to Fairbanks. Everything else is a burgh, if. Personally, I know where I want to live and this sted is none of these places. Installing a greenhouse and airstrip inter alia. It’s why I need the money and live in Chicago. My deathwish, other than provisioning for my financially successful wife, is to get paid for flying Alaska. And I won’t be enabled to fly pax. Say what you will, but I’ve experienced the seven continents… Read more »

Compsci
Compsci
Reply to  Marko
6 months ago

“… summers in American cities are pretty bad…” It’s the urban heat sink effect. Here in Tucson, we are at night an average 15 degrees cooler than the Phoenix area 100 miles to the North. The Phoenix area has had nights never getting below 100 degrees. Even in Tucson, as I drive to where I live just outside the city, against the mountains, I’m 10 degrees cooler than the (Tucson) city proper. I can leave my windows open at night and need a blanket. Of course, the grifters now in power are blaming global warming, but the reality is that… Read more »

Ostei Kozelskii
Member
Reply to  Compsci
6 months ago

The fact that Phoenix, North America’s blast furnace, is now the fifth largest city in AINO is a pretty good testament to the present madness. Why would anybody want to live in that kiln? Tucson, OTOH, is quite nice.

jrod
jrod
6 months ago

As we think of Zman, we should remember – He’s in a better place now 🙂

1660please
1660please
6 months ago

I live among Diversity, in another city, and I can confirm some things which Mr. Z describes. The shouting? Yes, there’s very much of it, and in my experience it’s often pointless, except that some shouters seem to very much like the sound of their own voices. And, it’s often used of course for bluster and intimidation. Another similar joy is continual horn-honking from parked cars, presumably from drivers too lazy to get out and let someone inside know that they’re there. This happens at all hours. Of course there’s also the frequent blasting of “music” from cars, and from… Read more »

the audacious mendicant
the audacious mendicant
Reply to  1660please
6 months ago

Once you are retired the moves get much easier because you have the time to pack up, in small slices, and have time to plan the dates of your departures. Also, you can allow more time for the people from whom you bought your new home to move out because everything doesn’t have to be done on a tight schedule. It wasn’t the moves that got to me as much as getting accustomed to new sounds, like a different refrigerator hum, or a new traffic pattern sound outside your bedroom window, or finding out where the most convenient bank, grocery… Read more »

1660please
1660please
Reply to  the audacious mendicant
6 months ago

Thanks, audacious. Once some family and work obligations are sorted out, I’m hoping to at least make it to a small town. I’ve lived in the country and loved it, but family issues forced me to leave my little utopia, on the edge of a forest.

3g4me
3g4me
Reply to  the audacious mendicant
6 months ago

audacious mendicant: Traffic pattern sounds? What are those? Living at the dead end of a dirt road miles off the paved one, there is no traffic. Even hearing/seeing airplanes overhead is now a rarity (and I lived in Rosslyn, VA a few times). After a lifetime of urban and suburban living, I am now truly ‘living the dream.’ One of the first things I do each morning is feed the deer waiting in the yard. Paradise.

the audacious mendicant
the audacious mendicant
Reply to  3g4me
6 months ago

Onion trucks hitting their jake brakes going down the hill at 5 AM. I am in very rural ag land.

rasqball
rasqball
Reply to  1660please
6 months ago

You are cautioned, Sr. 1660: choose carefully when you decide to opt-out of “Vibratopia.” Yours Truly relocated from Gotham to “Contemporary White” – to a storied (but alas, propped-up!) ‘burg you’ve all heard of. Surely, many of you have visited: Although very much a part of Northeastern Yankeedom, it’s 25 mi. from the nearest interstate, and – of course! – 95%+ Cau-cas-ian. Trouble is, it’s a magnet for “our betters.” (One of the first western outposts of New England Puritanism, the “King James” that Joseph Smith used for his research and marginalia when putting together the Book of Mormon was… Read more »

1660please
1660please
Reply to  rasqball
6 months ago

Thanks, rasqball. Yes, college towns USED to be nice places. I ran into that dykiness too in one where I was for a while.

“And the Bioleninists shall inherit the cities and towns, laying waste to all the quaint places of the earth, until truth and the Lord come to reign again.”

Jeffrey Zoar
Jeffrey Zoar
Reply to  rasqball
6 months ago

I would rather live around hispanics than shitlib whites

rasqball
rasqball
Reply to  Jeffrey Zoar
6 months ago

That, essentially, is what I was trying to illustrate.
(Are wealthy, “establishment” shitlibs better than the “Adjunct Set?”
I dunno…
But I wanted also to illustrate that the “Dually crowd” ain’t ‘zactly “jolly” with anybody driving a benz – of any vintage – even if it IS a diesel.
Once the ice is broken, they’re ok, but they’re not really “open” people, and they seem incapable of reaching out and forming friendships (allegiances) outside their gens.

Jeffrey Zoar
Jeffrey Zoar
Reply to  rasqball
6 months ago

I suspect that many of the younger idiots who express a desire to live around more “diversity” have subconsciously come to the same conclusion about shitlib whites, or consciously think that these shitlibs represent white people

Steve
Steve
Reply to  rasqball
6 months ago

But I wanted also to illustrate that the “Dually crowd” ain’t ‘zactly “jolly” with anybody driving a benz – of any vintage – even if it IS a diesel.

Nope. History tells them (us) that more than likely anyone driving a Benz is not cool with a Gadsden Flag, let alone a Battle Flag of the Army of Northern Virginia.

That’s why it’s important to get out early. You do not want to be thought of as “free preps”.

3g4me
3g4me
Reply to  Jeffrey Zoar
6 months ago

Jeffrey Zoar: Please, no more of these “pick your favorite poison” mini-threads. Is ‘x%’ strychnine better than ‘y%’ arsenic preferable?

How about NONE OF THE ABOVE?!!!

Tars Tarkas
Member
6 months ago

PA has a state safety inspection that is statewide and an emissions inspection which only applies to certain counties. But the inspections are done by private garages. Of course, as expected, this opens the door to graft. There are lots of garages that will pass a car no matter how bad it was so long as you allow them to do a few hundred in repairs, whether or not you actually need those particular repairs.

Captain Willard
Captain Willard
Reply to  Tars Tarkas
6 months ago

VA operated like this too when I was a kid. My Dad depended on this “parallel market” to keep his junkers on the roas lol.

Ploppy
Ploppy
Reply to  Tars Tarkas
6 months ago

Oregon has state-run emissions inspection stations. To be fair I never get stuck in line or have it take too long, and they are open in the evenings now in order to inspect nocturnal emissions.

Kralizec
Kralizec
Reply to  Ploppy
6 months ago

real hands-on, huh?

3g4me
3g4me
Reply to  Tars Tarkas
6 months ago

Tars: Texas required inspections and all the south of the border ‘newcomers’ all had cousins who had friends who would ‘inspect’ – and pass – anything at all. Just another way for the State to pick your pocket under the pretense of ‘safety.’

No inspections where we now live, and we’ve seen far fewer visibly dilapidated vehicles on the road here.

Tars Tarkas
Member
Reply to  3g4me
6 months ago

Yeah, Philly is loaded with jalopies that shouldn’t be on the road, usually driven by people without a license or insurance either. Though, to be fair, I think Philly is the highest insurance county in the US. It is so expensive it used to be very common to register a car in NJ for the better insurance. Jersey is the highest insurance costs state in the country. You are right, it is the illusion of safety and a way to get in your pocket. Because even though the state doesn’t do the inspections, they still get a fee plus charge… Read more »

Ostei Kozelskii
Member
Reply to  Tars Tarkas
6 months ago

Used to live in Princeton and frequently drove through Trenton. Many of the vehicles in Trenton smoked like London chimneys, had busted tail lights and windows, bumpers barely hanging on by a single bolt, etc. It was so common and laughable that even now, some 20+ years later, when my wife or I see a terribly delapidated vehicle down here in Texas, we immediately call out, “Trenton hooptie!”

panzernutter
panzernutter
6 months ago

Congratulations Zman, I was lying in bed last night and laughing to myself about the fact that I know which agency is passing the house by the color of the lights reflecting on the wall, pure red, fire, red with a little blue, cops . I’m pretty close to your age and can still remember leaving the key to the front door under the mat or in the milk box. Yes milk box. Look it up lads . . We’re talking 70’s here. As far as people walking in the streets, the Koreans do it all the time while wearing… Read more »

Tars Tarkas
Member
Reply to  panzernutter
6 months ago

In my area, milkmen were a thing of the past by the 1970s. I did know a guy in high school (80s) whose mother had a milkman, but it was just regular milk he would deliver. It was literally cartons of milk that you could buy in the store and not fresh milk in a reusable bottle. Totally pointless.

Walking in the street is pretty common here in Philly, but only tertiary streets and usually only kids.

JerseyJeffersonian
JerseyJeffersonian
Reply to  Tars Tarkas
6 months ago

Worked at a university in Camden, NJ for a bit over a decade. Had to transit through neighborhoods near to campus on my way to work. Got used to the local mid-street/crosswalk Camden Mosey, definitely passive aggressive.

Ostei Kozelskii
Member
Reply to  JerseyJeffersonian
6 months ago

Camden, eh? You’re lucky to be alive.

KGB
KGB
Reply to  panzernutter
6 months ago

Born in 1971 and I remember having a milkman. At some point in the mid-late 70’s he went the way of the dodo, although we kept the metal dairy box on our back steps for a couple more years.

JerseyJeffersonian
JerseyJeffersonian
Reply to  KGB
6 months ago

When I was a younger kid, home delivery of dairy products was still a going concern, so we had a foam-insulated metal milkbox. Still have it, but now it is a home for outside dog toys. For the first years of living in our South Jersey home, we had an open, but roofed breezeway between the garage and the kitchen door, but still, drifting snow was a problem. So, my parents turned it into a closed mudroom with storage cabinetry and HVAC ducts to improve its utility. At that time, dairy delivery was still a thing, and so a special… Read more »

Pozymandias
Reply to  panzernutter
6 months ago

In the Portland area, during the Coof panic, I almost hit several of these streetwalkers. There was a species of Covidian who would walk in the road to avoid breathing the same air as fellow pedestrians. These people were apparently so mathematically challenged that they failed to understand that the risk of being killed while walking in the middle of a busy road far exceeded the risk of dying from the Big Bad Head Cold. I’m from Baltimore too though and this reminded me of dodging the kind of streetwalkers Z is talking about.

Ploppy
Ploppy
Reply to  Pozymandias
6 months ago

I just remember driving through pee-town after the summer of love and it being like a scene from an apocalyptic movie where there would be no one outside except one or two bums shuffling around like zombies and all the buildings boarded up.

I got the take out my parents wanted and it was one of those where they had set the bag of food on a table in front and everyone working there was hiding in the back from the plague.

Pozymandias
Reply to  Ploppy
6 months ago

Pee-town. Yes, I like it. That’s basically about all that’s left there, piss, shit, and weed all co-mingled in the endless rain. P-town is a giant gray-green toilet.

Ostei Kozelskii
Member
Reply to  Pozymandias
6 months ago

Perhaps I won’t build my summer home there, after all…

Lanky
Lanky
Reply to  Pozymandias
6 months ago

Heard a streetwalker arguing with a store clerk one day.
“You don’t unnastand, ma boi! I’m a mathematician.”
Apparently it was something about the change.
Want to know what the mathematician was buying?
Lottery tickets.

Ostei Kozelskii
Member
Reply to  Pozymandias
6 months ago

Would have been a dam’ shame if some of those fools had gotten run over, wot…

Compsci
Compsci
Reply to  panzernutter
6 months ago

IIRC, we used to drink a lot more milk in those—90% White—days of our country. I still remember my father ordering a large glass of milk with his dinner at the restaurant. Toss in a 50% brown/Black minority population and “milk is for kids”.

JerseyJeffersonian
JerseyJeffersonian
Reply to  Compsci
6 months ago

For some of our Vibrants, their gene set makes them lactose intolerant.

TomA
TomA
6 months ago

Welcome to old age. Reminiscing is like visiting with an old friend and sharing stories about the bygone times. Of course, this should be conducted on the front porch in rockers accompanied by a corn cob pipe and glass of lemonade. It should carry on until dusk and there should be creaking when you get up to go inside, but you will be unsure if the creaking is in the chair or your knees. And the best stories are told to your grandkids in the hope that they will benefits from a few scraps of wisdom before you expire. European… Read more »

p
p
Reply to  TomA
6 months ago

I remember being entertained as a child by the simplest things–a new jump rope, one of those tiny turtles that could be bought from the dime store for a dime, marbles, riding your bike everywhere (“be home by suppertime”), coloring books, playing “funeral”, pine cone fights with the kids from across the road, new adventure/mystery books from the small library in our town.

Ostei Kozelskii
Member
6 months ago

Back in the 80s, Bawlmer was just about the biggest hotbed of high school basketball in the country. Almost every high school had major-college talent, but Baltimore Dunbar produced the most. In fact, along about 1984 they had probably the best high school team in history. It featured David Wingate, Tyrone Bogues, Reggie Lewis and Reggie Williams. All four had excellent NBA careers. Lewis, in fact, was an NBA All Star. And he didn’t even start for that 1984 Baltimore Dunbar team. But Baltimore, like the vast majority of other AINO metropolei, doesn’t produce the basketball talent it once did.… Read more »

Jeffrey Zoar
Jeffrey Zoar
Reply to  Ostei Kozelskii
6 months ago

Video games seriously reduced the number of kids hitting the courts and the time they spend there. Among the worthwhile things that have been lost through this phenomenon, basketball is probably far down the list.

Captain Willard
Captain Willard
Reply to  Ostei Kozelskii
6 months ago

Yes, but DeMatha started “recruiting” from Baltimore and later it became a free-for-all with private academies poaching the talent from Dunbar, Cardinal Gibbons and the other hotbeds.

Stranger in a Strange Land
Stranger in a Strange Land
Reply to  Ostei Kozelskii
6 months ago

Ostei – to the graveyard–>Len Bias. Univ of MD, but think he was a product of the Baltimore area.

Ostei Kozelskii
Member
Reply to  Stranger in a Strange Land
6 months ago

I think he was from Hyattsville, MD (DeMatha). Reggie Lewis, too, bit the dust at a very young age. Coke may or may not have been a contributing factor to his sudden death.

Jeffrey Zoar
Jeffrey Zoar
6 months ago

When I moved to the state where I now live, in 2019, and went for my new car tags, they didn’t even ask for proof of insurance. I knew right then I’d made a good decision.

It is altogether possible I’ll never again set foot anywhere on the eastern seaboard north of North Carolina. Mainly because I can’t think of why I should want to.

bruce g charlton
bruce g charlton
6 months ago

Just an excellent article!

One that I expect will stick in the memory.

Ostei Kozelskii
Member
Reply to  bruce g charlton
6 months ago

Agreed. And a mos’ refreshin’ break from Ukrainiana.

trackback
6 months ago

[…] ZMan waxes nostalgic. […]

Tom K
Tom K
6 months ago

We moved three years ago. The day after we moved almost every car parked on the street at our old house was broken into. I don’t know who did that but there had been a lot of goings-on since the people who became known as the “pool people” moved in behind us. The previous two owners were not known as “pool people” even though they made liberal use of the pool each summer so you can imagine the culture shock we and our neighborhood experienced after the “pool people” moved in. This is the nub of the problem no matter… Read more »

imbroglio
imbroglio
6 months ago

Lagos, the home of Agora Publishing.

Hope you make it back now and again to feast on Bertha’s mussels. The best in the world.

For vehicle inspections, be glad you’re not back home in Massachusetts if that’s where you’re originally from. It’s gotten so awful that there’s now a bumper sticker to match “This Car Climbed Mt. Washington.” It says “This Car Passed The Mass. State Inspection.”

Ostei Kozelskii
Member
Reply to  imbroglio
6 months ago

Pit beef sandwiches are Bawlmer’s greatest gift to the the culinary world. I make them down here in Texas on a fairly reggler basis.

Captain Willard
Captain Willard
Reply to  Ostei Kozelskii
6 months ago

crab cakes!, not some beef sammich

Owlman
Owlman
Reply to  imbroglio
6 months ago

I live in a state where on and all live in fear of the dreaded “check engine light” right around the annual inspection. So much so that many shops have a business model that can be summed up as ‘extortion’ by way of what ‘repairs are needed’ to ‘pass inspection.’ The big one is low hanging fruit: BRAKES. There is a large chain that is named after an woman’s name from long ago that got one family RICH by having a pay phone, back in the day, next to the counter. “You’re gonna need brakes” said counter person – there’s… Read more »

Owlman
Owlman
Reply to  Owlman
6 months ago

I know of those scammers I won’t name, first-hand.

So here in this state, where they run Tee Vee commercials, you know the ‘free scan’ of your check engine light, usually show a nice black lady putting in your new battery.

Normie takes it up the shoot. Get one of those $30-ish OBD 2 scanners, the find that show the state of the ‘computer’ — if it is cleared after YOU clear the CEL.

Ignore the intructions on them ALL that you need to have the ‘ignition on car not running…’ They work fine, car running, including clearing codes.

Owlman
Owlman
Reply to  Owlman
6 months ago

Clear any codes that might hold up inspection, keep plugged in until computer is ready to be tested. Wheel down to pirates, get your little state sticker. Typical codes, O2 sensor, gas tank fume recirculation system, stuff like that that old cars go years without a hitch, but can cost you thousands at these thieves. At worst, pull own codes, repair with knowledge. Always KNOW so you avoid being extorted. Clear non running condition and safety codes to get your little sticker. And if the pirates say you need brakes, make them SHOW YOU your brakes. Look up what a… Read more »

Steve
Steve
Reply to  Owlman
6 months ago

Good luck with clearing those codes. The “important” ones are “permanent” — clearing them just allow the engine light to be reset if the problem persists. Get a $2k scanner (like the ones the Smog Check agencies usually use) and you will discover those codes will stay on the computer for possibly thousands of miles after being “cleared”, particularly if it’s an intermittent issue.

There is a way to clear them from the vehicles OBDII, but you might as well have it fixed for what it will cost to do so.

Herrman
Herrman
Member
6 months ago

If this is the first time you’ve lived in the country I have a couple humble suggestions, as I’ve lived in both giant american megalopolises and very remote hinterlands (where I’m at now thank God). Walk every day no matter the weather. If possible not on roads but through the woods and fields. After a year or two you’ll start to notice things and the place will take on a deeper meaning. Don’t worry about being the solitary grumpy old guy living in the woods. I come from a long lineage of old guys who moved to the woods and… Read more »

Major Hoople
Major Hoople
Member
Reply to  Herrman
6 months ago

Well said. That’s my approach.

Alzaebo
Reply to  Herrman
6 months ago

One astute country lad said he got tired of being ignorant.
He went around his place and learned the name and nature of each and every plant and tree. I’m afraid he might be at potential danger of being radicalized into birdwatching. Pray for him!

Mis(ter)Anthrope
6 months ago

Your mention of the constant sound of basketballs bouncing off the pavement reminded me of how seriously negroes take their basketball skills. Going to high school in the ghetto of Hampton, VA, I would occasionally get into pickup games in the gym after school. I was never a good basketball player, but I had good hops for a white boy. I was about 6 feet tall at the time and could dunk a basketball if I didn’t dribble. Guarding a negro was fun because, at some point, I would block the negro’s shot. There is nothing more humiliating for a… Read more »

Captain Willard
Captain Willard
Reply to  Mis(ter)Anthrope
6 months ago

Are you a Navy brat by any chance? You’re the first white guy from Hampton I’ve encountered lol. And I was raised in Va. and university there too.

Mis(ter)Anthrope
Reply to  Captain Willard
6 months ago

I was a military brat. We were bussed into the wonderfully diverse school system of Hampton.

Alzaebo
Reply to  Mis(ter)Anthrope
6 months ago

Cucks: “But, but Truman (a literal Klan member) integrated the armed services!” He also rushed to recognize a certain plucky little country, and authorized the formal creation of the CIA.

You know, maybe a fair share of the blame doesn’t lay so much on LBJ. “The road to hell is paved with good preconceived notions and all that.”

And to be honest, we tried our best. We really did, we gave an inordinately fair hearing to all we were told.

Wanda Sherratt
Wanda Sherratt
6 months ago

I’m glad you made it out. I’ve been worried about you for the last 2 years, afraid that some depraved halfwit would get you before you could escape. My husband was in the foreign service, so we moved a lot, and one tip I got was to completely fix up one room in your new place. Get everything set up the way you like it, with pictures on the wall and everything, and move out ALL boxes. That way when you’re tired or stressed you can go to that little spot and feel like you’re in a proper home, not… Read more »

Paul Gottfried
Paul Gottfried
6 months ago

It is good that you left before Haiti-style cannibalism became a new fashion in Lagos. Otherwise you could add another topic to your “things I miss” 🙂

Do you think white liberals will also accept the practice so that they are not called racist? They already went from classical music to rap.

Ostei Kozelskii
Member
Reply to  Paul Gottfried
6 months ago

I’ve heard there are already bistros in Burlington, Vermont, the Hamptons and Martha’s Vineyard serving dishes such as sous vide long pig short rib with peekie toe crab, pea tendrils and jackfruit coulis…

Alzaebo
Reply to  Ostei Kozelskii
6 months ago

Oh, ha! Ostei, you’re killin’ em out there!

LineInTheSand
LineInTheSand
Reply to  Paul Gottfried
6 months ago

“Do you think white liberals will also accept the practice so that they are not called racist?” Good eye. When you can spot a trend like this and watch it develop, it’s fun. When gansta rap was breaking in the 90s, I wondered if the feminists all around me would criticize its treatment of women. It was fun, educational, and depressing for me to observe the white liberals learn that no, they could not. White liberals must kneel before savage blacks. My prediction: white liberals will accept black cannibalism with a few apologies that the cannibalism is caused by the… Read more »

Ploppy
Ploppy
Reply to  Paul Gottfried
6 months ago

Naming that bugman drink “Soylent” suggests they’re already of an amenable mindset.

Maxda
Maxda
6 months ago

Weird sort of quiet national divorce going on right now. People are selecting where they live based on politics and beliefs. We went from deep blue NJ after the rigger 2021 Governor’s election and the vax mandate was going to cost me my job – to deep red South Carolina. While almost all the locals are some strain of “conservative”, many of the recent arrivals are thoroughly red-pilled having seen the beast up close and escaped. Having spent my time in and near both Boston and NYC, I know that the opposite happens there – left leaning types flock to… Read more »

Xman
Xman
Reply to  Maxda
6 months ago

The South Carolina of Lindsay Graham, Senator from Israel? And Nikki Haley? “Conservative,” LOL.

South Carolina is almost 27% black according to the census. I’m not sure that’s an improvement from my 99.6% white town 30 miles from the Canadian border.

My observation of the Deep South is that there are Negroes and singlewide trailers almost everywhere. The places that are nice to live are very expensive and the riffraff get priced out.

I’m sure Hilton Head is great… Allendale County, probably not so much.

Maxda
Maxda
Reply to  Xman
6 months ago

I’ve yet to find a fan of either. In 2026, the party will probably arrange a dozen challengers to Graham in the primary so that he ends up with a plurality. That’s how our democracy works.

LineInTheSand
LineInTheSand
Reply to  Maxda
6 months ago

Is Graham popular with the locals that you mentioned? Seeing him booed recently made my day.

Maxda
Maxda
Reply to  LineInTheSand
6 months ago

I don’t think so – not among those without political connections. He actually showed up at our church’s 175 year anniversary celebration.
People were polite of course, but the applause for him was the most tepid of the entire event.

Mike
Mike
Reply to  LineInTheSand
6 months ago

Graham is a poster child for election rigging I think. He doesn’t seem to be popular in SC and is always behind big in polls but ekes out a pretty easy win every time. Same thing with McConnell in KY too. If Dems are doing it, it just stands to reason that the uniparty favorites like them are beneficiaries of rigging too.

Ostei Kozelskii
Member
Reply to  Xman
6 months ago

Yeah, there’s no way in hell I’d live in the South just because of the oppressive negro presence. I suppose the mountainous regions of Arkansas, Tennessee, Kentucky, Georgia, Virginia and the Carolinas might not be too bad. Nuggras don’t seem to like mountains for some strange reason.

Stranger in a Strange Land
Stranger in a Strange Land
Reply to  Ostei Kozelskii
6 months ago

I live in the upstate of SC – please spread the word far and wide, to one and all that they would hate it here – best not even to visit..
Also, I hike in said mountains frequently. There has been a noticeable increase in vibrancy along the trails in recent years – at least on the more popular trails. Smoky Mt. national park is a veritable UN.

Lanky
Lanky
Reply to  Stranger in a Strange Land
6 months ago

Mark my words: there will be far, FAR more mathematicians per capita in NJ than in SC after ten years time. The state is eager to accept them. Moving to a red state is just a matter of buying time. I was in NJ during coof and I vowed to move. Now, I’m in SC, and I’m trying to get my family northwest. Too bad there aren’t as many restaurants, say my wife’s family.

Getreal
Getreal
Reply to  Stranger in a Strange Land
6 months ago

I also plan my move — whenever I mention to the swanky, liberal affluent whypipo that infest my zone, they say they “hate the cold” —- to which I reply, “good!”

Nope, they are all moving south, infesting places like Charlotte, where one of my ex nay bores is and recently bragging about his useless ‘electric truck’ pickup, such care for Gaia.

With the exception of shitholes like what they made of mine-a-sota, cold reaches clear the air of germs, and other pathogens. I travel to them for outdoor sports and watch the real estate prices….

Ostei Kozelskii
Member
Reply to  Stranger in a Strange Land
6 months ago

Well, that sucks. The Park Service is probably busing in the Hutus. You know it must have been a knife in the park rangers’ guts to see nothing but Blue-eyed Ice Devils on the trails.

Alzaebo
Reply to  Xman
6 months ago

Of course there are singlewide trailers and hostile natives.
We’re settlers like in the West Bank.
The good news is, we started out on these continents in exactly the same way.

Seeing the ADL’s reaction to Tiktok antisemitism (Greenblat stated their top priority is that they’ve lost the young, so shut it down!) is giving me great hope.

Gen Z and Gen Alpha are going to make it through the Forge, and be our enemies’ greatest nightmare.

Tired Citizen
Tired Citizen
Reply to  Maxda
6 months ago

Maxda

My wife and I are roughly 15 years from retirement (God willing), but we’ve been lokkkng at where we want to go. We are in central Texas now, but it’s getting a bit too dark here. Things have changed as the demographics change. I’ll leave the details to your imagination…

Anyway, South Carolina sounds like our kind of place. We’re looking for a small, but nice house and access to fishing very, very nearby. Maybe we will go check it out.

Maxda
Maxda
Reply to  Tired Citizen
6 months ago

It is nice but not perfect. Prices rising with all the people moving in.

Ostei Kozelskii
Member
Reply to  Maxda
6 months ago

Moving from places such as San Francrisco, Portland, Seattle, Chicago and New York to somewhat more normal places such as Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas and Wyoming is almost akin to immigrating from the USSR and Warsaw Pact countries to America back in the 80s. And those who move/immigrate are/were the most sober about the horrors of Leftism.

Steve
Steve
Reply to  Ostei Kozelskii
6 months ago

And those who move/immigrate are/were the most sober about the horrors of Leftism. Nonsense. The tony gated communities of NW Indiana are 100% Chicago emigres, and reliably vote commie, in some precincts, exactly zero votes for any Republican on the ballot. It’s like they can’t wait to get out of one shithole and turn a nice place to raise a family into a shithole. It’s why I roll my eyes at all this “tribe up” stuff — y’all obviously have not met many white folk. No more than about 10% make good neighbors, and less than 1% should be allowed… Read more »

Steve
Steve
Reply to  Steve
6 months ago

Now get off my lawn.

3g4me
3g4me
Reply to  Steve
6 months ago

Steve: One of the biggest nearby towns (about 13k people, 30 miles away) is a hive of ‘escaped’ Chicagoans. Other than twice when I absolutely had to return an Amazon item via UPS, I have not been there in the year since we moved here. They’ve recreated their golf-course communities and built 5000 sq ft mcmansions on 2 acre water-view lots. They are busy trying to ensure they have a choice of ethnic restaurants nearby. A pox on them all. I prefer to spend my dollars at the local hardware store and the county feed store. And I think ‘tribe… Read more »

Ostei Kozelskii
Member
Reply to  Steve
6 months ago

I’m obviously not referring to Leftists who move. And I never met an immigrant from the USSR/Eastern Europe who wasn’t a hard-shell right-winger.

And incidentally, if you take voting Republican as an index of ideological normalcy, you’re barking up the wrong tree.

Dr_Mantis_Toboggan_MD
Member
Reply to  Maxda
6 months ago

We left the Atlanta suburbs to pursue mountain life and I don’t regret it one bit. There are tradeoffs. I have a two-hour, one-way commute four days per week to either of my job sites. I don’t really hit traffic until I get closer to the city if I head south, but it is kind of boring driving that far every day. But our property has views of the Blue Ridge Mountains, a beautiful mountain stream that crosses part of our acreage, an artesian well with all of the clean, tasty water we could use and no marauding gangs of… Read more »

3g4me
3g4me
Reply to  Dr_Mantis_Toboggan_MD
6 months ago

We are in the Ozarks, and your description matches what I see out my window every day. The hills, clouds, trees, wildlife, sunsets, etc. I wake up every day and thank God (and my husband) for enabling us to escape DFW and live here. We are truly blessed (even though we are currently under a tornado warning and don’t yet have a safe room).

Maniac
Maniac
6 months ago

Don’t vacation in Baltimore.

And never go to a Haitian barbecue.

Stranger in a Strange Land
Stranger in a Strange Land
6 months ago

“…the Baltimore – Washington area is a giant metro area plopped into a swampy jungle”…
Literal and figurative. If ever there was an apt metaphor…

Maxda
Maxda
Reply to  Stranger in a Strange Land
6 months ago

Why waste good land on them?

John Perry
John Perry
Member
6 months ago

I’ll need a big flatbed trailer to move all my machine tools when we build our barn-diminium on the farm.
.

Chet Rollins
Chet Rollins
6 months ago

Whenever someone has to live in the belly of the beast, they either fanatically embrace the ideology of the empire as to why things are the way they are, or they become one of us. There is no middle ground. Whenever I’ve talked to someone who made a Peace Corp stint in some hellhole, or volunteered to teach in an inner city school, it all followed the same pattern. There’s a certain type of person who stares into the abyss and can’t comprehend what he’s seeing, and it has nothing to do with their intelligence or honesty. Some people have… Read more »

LineInTheSand
LineInTheSand
Reply to  Chet Rollins
6 months ago

I think what you’re talking about it the ability to think independently. Most people would probably agree that this ability is real, like acute vision or intelligence, and that it’s more than just an impressive sounding title that some odd thinkers flatter themselves with. I have no idea how to quantity the ability to think independently. It can’t just mean agreeing with contrarian beliefs. But it is still useful to discuss subjects that we can’t quantity. Talking about temperature was useful before we could measure temperature. Most people would probably agree, but not say out loud, that men have more… Read more »

Steve
Steve
Reply to  LineInTheSand
6 months ago

But how would you convince the skeptic?

That’s the thing the classical liberals got right. You shouldn’t have to convince him. So long as he has no say over your life, liberty and property, who cares what he thinks?

Worldly government is not a priori, it’s empirical. How much does “the law” have to punish offenders to keep them from infringing on others’ life, liberty and property? Stake a couple AWFLs down over a fire ant nest and the rest will come around.

LineInTheSand
LineInTheSand
Reply to  Steve
6 months ago

The value proposition of classical liberalism, I’ll leave you alone and you leave me alone, is not persuasive to most people on the planet.

I agree with you the enforcing classical liberalism on most people would require force. It’s one of my favorite ironies.

Steve
Steve
Reply to  LineInTheSand
6 months ago

There’s no irony there. Classical liberalism does not oppose the use of force.

Lovemore
Lovemore
Reply to  Chet Rollins
6 months ago

Third option – because they’re trapped in the fetid swamp by age, economic circumstances, family ties…whatever…they engage in Freudian displacement by turning inwards (living in gated communities) and rationalize (often to an astonishing degree) the “benefits and beauties” of existing where they exist. Self-constructed B&B’s include such trivialities as the food, circles of friends, natural scenery, and Rotary Club-style community projects avec les indigènes noirs. Beating strong in their hearts is the quaint notion that positive change is just around the corner, crime and corruption will fade and that next year will be better. It’s kind of like the good… Read more »

3g4me
3g4me
Reply to  Lovemore
6 months ago

Lovemore: God, this. The rationalizing and deliberate refusal to notice (particularly on their block or in their school) is absolutely insane. Let them reap what they have sown.

Moran ya Simba
Moran ya Simba
6 months ago

Absolutely true about Copenhagen being quiet compared to an American city. I think it’s true of most European cities north of the Alps.

I think it’s a good thing you moved. If something really bad happens with the economy, a place like Baltimore is not going to be a good place to be. A week of no electricity and you’ll see the first instances of Haitian barbecues. Facts about the state of affairs from the economy to culture and demographics, say that’s where things are headed

Tired Citizen
Tired Citizen
Reply to  thezman
6 months ago

And for no reason at all, the cities were peaceful and quiet…

Ostei Kozelskii
Member
Reply to  thezman
6 months ago

Uh huh. “Reasons” indeed…

Mow Knowname
Mow Knowname
Reply to  thezman
6 months ago

My visit to Copenhagen was many years ago, but the visit is seared into my memory: summer, blue skys and leggy blondes on bicycles.
Best city ever.

Hemid
Hemid
Reply to  thezman
6 months ago

Quiet is civilization.

When I first went to Japan the first thing I noticed was that I could hear people’s footsteps everywhere. Over the years that faded as more businesses started playing shopping music and the general noise level rose to match. It’s still quiet in non-commercial places, but you used to *hear shoes* at the Shibuya crosswalk.

A long sad graphic novel about an old man remembering that sound—mostly fetish drawings of girls’ shoes—is sold in loudly beeping stores (I imagine).

Zaphod
Zaphod
Reply to  Hemid
6 months ago

For daring to reminisce, Winston Smith, I hereby sentence you to spend the weekend enjoying those two traditional Edo Earworms: The Bic Camera song and the Don Quixote Jingle.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3CxkDNCAE74

(Just the one is plenty)

Or Room 101. Your choice.

Ostei Kozelskii
Member
Reply to  Hemid
6 months ago

“Quiet is civilization”

That is a profound observation. I daresay the higher the level of noise pollution, the lower the level of culture. And few places are louder than AINO.

3g4me
3g4me
Reply to  Ostei Kozelskii
6 months ago

Ostei: “Quiet” is when the noise my husband complains about is the frogs in the evening.

ProZNoV
ProZNoV
6 months ago

“Of course, they jaywalk at a pace that suggests they take pleasure in holding up traffic.”

People who’ve never lived in a city like this don’t believe it.

See also:

Ability to determine:

“Who won’t pick up dog excrement when walking their dogs. With free bags and a waste bin literally 10 feet away.”

“Who will ride a gas powered scooter on a purpose built walking/bike riding path”

“Who will play loud music/videos without a headset on public transport. Including airplanes.”

Enjoy the countryside.

mmack
mmack
6 months ago

he thing I will miss the most is the look when I say I am from Baltimore. One time in Ireland I told some locals I was from Baltimore, and they did not believe me. They had seen the series The Wire and could not accept that I lived in what they saw. I showed them my license and some photos. They were terrified of me. Well, that and your deep voice. 😏 Even though I don’t live around there anymore, Chicago went from: “Ah, Chicago, Al Capone, rat-a-tat-tat!” (Speaker pantomimes firing a Tommy Gun) To “Ah, Chicago, Michael Jordan!… Read more »

KGB
KGB
Reply to  mmack
6 months ago

Wasn’t there a quasi-viral video this winter of a jogger who found himself at a ski resort and struggled to comprehend the fact that white people left their skis unattended while taking a break in the lodge?

Steve
Steve
Reply to  mmack
6 months ago

Me? Everything is locked, even the car when it’s on the driveway and I can see it.

A pretty good sign you don’t have good neighbors. In a decent community, you can leave your keys in the ignition where they don’t get lost.

mmack
mmack
Reply to  Steve
6 months ago

Old habits die hard my friend.

Steve
Steve
Reply to  mmack
6 months ago

I hear you. Took me a couple years after moving away from the Twin Cities. My son said the hardest part of moving away from home was remembering to take the keys out of the car and to check the doors at night.

Junger Generation
Junger Generation
6 months ago

When you make films/tv show in cities there is typically a police film/tv unit that is present on outdoor location shoots. On “The Wire,” that unit would tell the cast and crew that you must stay within a few blocks blocks during the shoot or else they could not protect them. I worked on the show once-location was the Inner Harbor-the stunt coordinator told me I was very lucky because that was the only safe and nice location they ever worked in. My Aunt lived in Bel Air, ~30 minutes outside of Baltimore and we’d visit every summer in the… Read more »

PH Wilson
PH Wilson
Reply to  Junger Generation
6 months ago

Bel Air is still pretty nice. It’s one of the few Republican majority area in eastern Maryland. I’ve been here for 25 years but won’t be staying after retiring even though the local government is decent. There’s simply too much control coming from the rest of the state for it to be able to maintain what it has.

West Virginia is probably where I’m headed as well.

Mr. Dark
6 months ago

Your tale of Baltimore makes me glad to live in Vancouver, on the Pacific coast of Canada. Here the big problem is the rains. For days in a row, off and on it will rain. Then — this is winter — it snows and the cars and buses can’t handle it. They will skid. For some reason, during the warm summer months, all the mestizos of Latin America come to Vancouver. Not the purebred Spaniards. Not the whites, El jefe. The prosperous half-breeds who work as foremen for their white masters. Their jibber-jabbering of rapidfire Spanish and exotic looks give… Read more »

Stranger in a Strange Land
Stranger in a Strange Land
Reply to  Mr. Dark
6 months ago

It is a beautiful place to visit – have been there when there is zero sun for days on end – which I suppose makes one appreciate the contrast when it is sunny.
Always appeared to me the masters were of the…Oriental persuasion.

Mr. Dark
Reply to  Stranger in a Strange Land
6 months ago

As to the masters, it’s a shared duopoly, Oriental/white. At the provincial level, the whites tend to dominate more. Don’t underestimate the tenacity of minority Whites to hold onto what is theirs.

Chris
Chris
6 months ago

Best of luck in the new place Z, hopefully the “wildlife” will keep at bay as long as possible. Is it true that they recently lengthened a stretch of interstate to extend out of the swamp and into your new home state?

Lib dis
Lib dis
6 months ago

Oh after a month or two you will.miss the smell of naggers. Just wait and see.

I live in Tampa in a fully Hispanic area. Even no English in Publix. I had a brainwashed freind of mine, not lefty but brainwashed enough say to me. It’s a hell of a lot better than living around blacks.

It must be the smell. You’ll miss it…

Oswald Spengler
Oswald Spengler
Reply to  Lib dis
6 months ago

Z-Man’s parting message to the denizens of Lagos on the Chesapeake.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yL9Y24ciNWs

Moe Gibbs
Moe Gibbs
6 months ago

You forgot the /sarc tag, Z. Every one of those things you are going to “miss” after escaping from Baltimorgue is jogger-centric, but I admire your restraint in not mentioning the devils by name (or even by euphemism) even once, aside from referring to the place as ‘Lagos’. We did not usually lock our house or our cars while living for decades on Long Island in one of the tonier, more secluded areas, for the absence of basketball-Americans was total. Now that we’ve relocated to a small town in Texas we are a little more wary, but it is still… Read more »

flashing red
flashing red
Reply to  Moe Gibbs
6 months ago

Idaho, in the parking lot of Bi Mart, a car with the window rolled down, keys in ignition, purse on the front seat–and it was still there when I left 30 minutes later–Eagle Idaho is for the rich, Emmett Idaho is for the independent minded (Ammon Bundy lived there), Weiser Idaho is for welfare recipients. Fruitland Idaho is being massively “subdivisionated” (because of shopping and services available next door in Ontario Oregon) but its all off the back roads so you don’t notice it, farmers fields that last month had leftover potatoes and cornstalks in them are now being scraped… Read more »

Mow Knowname
Mow Knowname
6 months ago

You need to do a follow up report in a few months on what your new neighbors think about “that single guy from Baltimore who bought the place down near Apple Holler”.

Despite spending all of my life visiting my ancestral family/ friends Up North, I’m still “Mow from Bug City”.

MikeCLT
MikeCLT
6 months ago

Be careful as you detox. Lagos withdrawl is real. 🙂

spamspamspamspambaconeggsandspam
spamspamspamspambaconeggsandspam
Member
Reply to  MikeCLT
6 months ago

Ha, It’s no longer Lagos withdrawl., I’m looking foward to Z’s podcasts in West Virginia with “drawl”.

Ivan
Ivan
6 months ago

“swampy jungle”

Hence the swamp!

RDittmar
Member
6 months ago

A song for when you’re feeling nostalgic about Lagos:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hz1orhaHPk0

Oswald Spengler
Oswald Spengler
Reply to  RDittmar
6 months ago
Oswald Spengler
Oswald Spengler
6 months ago

I still remember that Z-Man quote — his answer to the question why he chose to live in Baltimore of all places.

“I wanted to get a sneak preview of what future America will be like.”

David Wright
Member
Reply to  Oswald Spengler
6 months ago

Twenty years is more than a sneak preview.

Forever Templar
Forever Templar
Reply to  David Wright
6 months ago

Damn near a full-on career in military intelligence complete with 20 year letter.

Moran ya Simba
Moran ya Simba
Reply to  David Wright
6 months ago

True but after college age, “temporary” places to live have a funny way of becoming longer term. Moving becomes more cumbersome and moving between countries and continents, as I know several other readers here have also done, is it’s own special kind of hassle hell

Jeffrey Zoar
Jeffrey Zoar
Reply to  Moran ya Simba
6 months ago

“The warm summer breezes, french wines and cheeses, put his ambitions at bay, summers and winters, scattered like splinters, and 4 or 5 years slipped away”

Jannie
Jannie
Reply to  David Wright
6 months ago

It’s how he was able to save for his ranch in the mountains and Arabian horses.

Arshad Ali
Arshad Ali
6 months ago

Hmmm, well, it seems to have been a case of a plethora of noggers. Another thing I’ve seen besides the shouting and the paucity of vocabulary is the use of laughter as a filler (among noggers, that is), reminiscent of the doctor in “Idiocracy.” In fact, it’s quite easy to gauge the calibre of a person not only by the content of what he talks about but by the range of his vocabulary.

Living among noggers is desensitising, no question about it.

David Wright
Member
6 months ago

You are a different sort, no doubt about it.

Ostei Kozelskii
Member
Reply to  David Wright
6 months ago

When in Bawlmer he was a horse of a different color.

Alzaebo
Reply to  David Wright
6 months ago

I figured he was like the original Tarzan of the novels- the natives were either terrified of him as a demon in the night, or openly worshipped him as a sun god by day.