Mushroom Hunt: False Chanterelle.

From Charly, who notes: I remember finding true chanterelle only a few times in my life around here, as a child, and only a few tiny specimens at that, but my parents told me they used to grow a lot here. Then they disappeared completely and I have not seen them for thirty years at all. They went from very common to very rare during my lifetime. These false chanterelles are not too common either. I have only seen this one specimen this year, and I only ever encounter a few each year. Latin: Hygrophoropsis aurantiaca. Click for full size!

© Charly, all rights reserved.

They Aren’t Laughing At Me Now!!1!!

Jim Bakker’s Yuck in a Bucket.

Jim Bakker seems to be under the impression that no one is laughing at him anymore. It won’t take very long to dispel that notion.

“These things, when God does them, God doesn’t fool around!” Bakker bellowed. “Yesterday, I almost lost it. You know, for the last several years, preachers—even in this city—and evangelists have beat the you-know-what out of me and made fun of me because we store food.”

“They preach about it,” he claimed. “Whole revivals just preaching about Jim and Lori, ‘Ha, ha, ha, they’re storing food, that stupid Jim Bakker.’ I just came from the flood zone! Nobody was laughing at me! They all wanted the crazy preacher’s food!”

“When the crisis comes, you people that are ready, your kids that laughed at you won’t laugh any more,” Bakker added. “And I want to tell you something: You ain’t seen nothing yet!”

I had no idea your fellow christians were beating the shit out of you all the time, Jim. You must have a great make-up person. I fully expect they teased you no end, because oh gods, that yuck looks disgusting, and I doubt people who weren’t in a dire situation would want anything to do with it. Considering how many people there are in this country who go hungry every day, seems to me the christian thing to do would be to distribute your yuck in a bucket to those who are just that damn hungry. But we all know what matters to you, don’t we, Jim? Almighty Money Money Money. People are still laughing, Jim. They’ll be laughing more in a moment…

On Thursday, Jim was opining on how he could be shot for wearing a ball cap with a cross on it. (I saw it, it’s in the bucket of yuck video, plain brown with a small white cross on the front). That’s just how gosh darn horrible it has gotten for christians. A fair number of people are running around wearing various moronic Trump hats, draped in confederate flags, and they aren’t getting shot. There are degrees of offensiveness, and while I’m not a fan of christians constantly waving their favourite method of execution around, it’s not terribly offensive. Crosses are fucking everywhere, no one is going to get that bent by a little white cross on a cap. It would actually go quite a long way in protecting you from all the really nasty folk, like Trumpholes, so let’s lose the persecution game, Jim, you suck at it.

Bakker went on to declare that “everything God’s ever spoke to me has come to pass” while fuming that society has made Christians afraid to share their faith. But Bakker refuses to be controlled by that fear, even though he knows he could be killed simply for wearing a Christian hat in public.

“I wear them out in public and I know I could be shot,” he proclaimed. “I know that. There are crazy people out there, but I’m not going to deny the cross. I will not deny the cross! I won’t.”

Who asked you to deny it? Does anyone give a fuck? Because I’m pretty sure no one does, Jim. I don’t care if you dress up as a furry cross, dude. Whatever floats your boat and all that. I would not be remotely surprised if in the near future, Bakker pays someone to shoot him, in a non-fatal manner, of course. Or shows up with a bullet hole in his cap, claiming a miracle.

Via RWW, one, two.

Draft.

There’s yet another piece lodged in my brain, and it won’t let go. I am out of paper though. Eeesh. So, a first draft of I Have Seen The Moon will have to suffice for now, plus, painting! :D A good occupation for a wet, glaucous day. Click for full size.

© C. Ford, all rights reserved.

Mushroom Hunt: Rufous Milk Cap.

From Charly, who notes: A very common mushroom here and inedible one. There are a few species of the Lactarius genus around here, most inedible. But some years there is enough of Lactarius deliciosus – saffron milk cap, edible and very tasty – to be worth collecting. This time I only met the rufous.

A fun anecdote – I never collected milk caps, but I showed one of my friends in high school once how to recognize the L. deliciosus from the other common inedible species growing around here (it has orange milk and turns to green on bruised areas, whereas others have white milk), and his whole family started to collect them en masse in consequent years and they liked them very much. I did not even remember showing him until he thanked me a few years later. To my horror, because I am sure I never recommended anyone to actually collect mushrooms I do not have personal experience with. To trust a teenager who was just showing off with a trick learned from an atlas on mushrooms is not wise. But they are all still living 25 years later. Latin: Lactarius rufus. Click for full size!

© Charly, all rights reserved.