Me Thinks Thou Doth Protest Too Much

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Hey, welcome back to another episode of Call Me Donovan.

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I'm trying something a little different this time.

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I got a little bit inspired by Scott Johnson's Diary of a Cartoonist, where he even pointed

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out that some folks were like, "Why are you not using your fancy schmancy PR40 microphone

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when you record these?"

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And you know, I normally do too.

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Sometimes I'll record these things on my phone and then I'll run them through Adobe's AI

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enhancement so that it sounds a little bit better and almost sounds like I'm on a professional

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microphone.

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But at the same time, as these episodes are more of a train of thought, just a dumping

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of just my thought process, things that I want to talk about, things that occur to me,

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give you an update on alcohol retirement, which today is day 432, so yay me.

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It is Thursday.

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It's the first day of August as I'm recording this and I'm just walking back and forth in

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my driveway while OJ follows me.

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He's one of our outdoor cats, one of our two originals.

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Like I've said in the past, we've got one that took up residence with us over the last

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couple of years.

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So we have three cats total now that hang out in the sunroom, which is their domain

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and has been for the outdoor cats for 15 plus years.

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We've been living here 18 years now.

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So anyway, so yeah, I'll make the determination whether or not this is something I want to

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do moving forward because I do find that I'm, I don't know about you, but I'm the type of

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person that whenever I'm on the phone, and of course we have this capability now because

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pretty much everybody is on a cell phone, unless you're in an office and you've got

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a desk phone.

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But I wonder, you know, I can't be still, I have to walk around and talk.

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Somebody's running around the yard or the neighborhood with their lawnmower and all.

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Sometimes I wonder if they just...

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Okay, I guess they're backing up.

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I'm not entirely sure what they're doing.

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Please don't come over here and talk to me because I don't need you to cut my yards.

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I cut my own grass.

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Thank you.

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Okay, they're going back.

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That's wild.

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Hell, I don't even know what I was saying now.

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Okay.

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I guess I'll...

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Apologies.

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I'll give it a listen and just see if it's something that is production worthy.

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But I mean the whole point of these things is that they're supposed to be kind of raw.

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I mean unless I'm doing something like, you know, we did the crossover episode with Sam

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to talk about Doctor Who.

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I mean that's a little bit different, you know.

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And honestly I did it with Call Me Donovan because I really don't have anything else

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that that would fit into.

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Of all the podcasts that I've created and then just shit canned over the course of 13-14

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years, it's the one that I currently have that's my quote unquote flagship, if you will.

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I do have another one that's only got a couple of episodes in and is not even published in

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the indexes called The Adkisson Experiment and it's with an X.

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So it's, you know, The Adkisson.

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X P E R I M E N T.

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And that's more of where I talk about other things that would probably be a turnoff for

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anybody that is primarily interested in my sober journey/alcohol retirement and how I'm

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getting on in life and things like that.

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So this was really the only place for it.

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But otherwise, I mean, it's just me just having, you know, verbal dysentery, a brain dump of

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the things that I'm thinking at the time.

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Sometimes I will talk about current events and my opinion on it, but I don't want to

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get too heated.

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I don't want to bring in politics or religion or anything like that, even though that is

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something that Scott did in one of his couple episodes ago.

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And it was just a big question.

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And I thought that was interesting that he would bring that into a personal journal type

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podcast.

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And he touched on this whole brouhaha, opening ceremonies of the Olympics and how the Christian

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right just absolutely lost their fricking minds over something that they, is essentially

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just pearl clutching.

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You know, they can find it offensive.

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They can find anything offensive.

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I mean, anybody can find anything offensive.

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If you're prone to being offended, then you're going to be offended.

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I mean, if you don't like the color green when you walk out and you look at your yard

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and your grass is green, does the grass offend you?

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I mean, you can be offended if you are prone to being offended.

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My biggest issue with this whole brouhaha and the pearl clutching over the opening ceremonies

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is the fact that there seems to be a group of people that think that they are so important

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that everything has to be about them.

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And all it takes is if you're not familiar with it, you're not a history buff, you weren't

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properly educated in history, then that's when you clutch onto the things that you do

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know, not recognizing that what you're seeing is not what you're seeing.

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The opening ceremonies had not a damn thing to do with the Last Supper painting.

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It did not have anything to do with Christianity.

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It did not have anything to do with Satanism.

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It was not religious, modern religion per se.

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It was about the God of wine and fun and parties and etc. etc.

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And it was actually a caricature of another painting, which if you do your research, you'll

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find that Da Vinci's The Last Supper was actually based off of the other painting.

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So yet again, it's one group of people, one ideology hijacking another.

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So at the end of the day, just accept it for what it is.

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Did they go a little over the top, maybe with the dude painted like a Smurf, blue with his

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schlong almost being seen or something like that?

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Yeah, they probably did.

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But this is the fricking Olympics.

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I mean, everything is pretty much over the top, right?

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And that's coming from someone, myself, who I don't give two shits about the Olympics.

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I think it's a waste of time.

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Now, that doesn't mean that I'm not denigrating the athletes.

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These are people that can do things that there's no way in a thousand years I'd ever be able

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to accomplish.

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Especially at my age right now, I mean, no.

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Nor do I have the inclination to do that.

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But the whole Olympics thing, what bothers me about it is all the money that is spent,

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all the money that is lost, every city that hosts it, and I'm not going to say this with

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a hundred percent certainty, but I have read time and time and time again that once it's

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said and done, the Olympics are over.

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The city that was the host city for the Olympics winds up being in debt.

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They don't make enough money out of everything there to pay for what they do.

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They build new stadiums.

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They build new villages.

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And sometimes those things are turned into, you know, maybe it's a stadium now for a football

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or a baseball team or something like that.

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Some of the housing is converted into lower and middle income housing.

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You know, things like that.

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Okay, maybe some good can come out of it.

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But for the majority of it, it's not even a, you know, it's not even a break even most

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of the time.

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I haven't watched a single thing when it comes to the Olympics.

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Don't care to.

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I see little tidbits on the news blurbs.

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You know, sometimes maybe it's covered in some of the things that I do, some of the

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podcasts I watch, YouTube videos, you know, like Philip DeFranco and things like that.

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But I do not go out and seek anything about the Olympics.

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I, you know, kudos to all the athletes, you know, tip of the hat for their accomplishments.

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You know, go Team USA, whatever.

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It really doesn't matter to me.

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But it's so wild that everybody seems to have to get upset about something.

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I mean, I'm not singling myself out as, you know, a beacon of faith and joy and someone

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who doesn't, you know, find myself in that mix sometimes.

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I've had my moments.

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Those that know me, that have known me for a decade or more, they will back me up on

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that.

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I've had my moments.

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But in 2024, it just seems like every time we turn around, there's some new thing that

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somebody's got to be clutching their damn pearls about.

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Oh my goodness, can you believe they did this?

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Oh my goodness, can you believe they did that?

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That is so offensive.

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I am offended.

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I feel seen.

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I will say this, and then I'll try to wrap this up and see if this was even worth saving.

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The way I feel about religion in general, not just Christianity, not Islam, not Judaism,

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Buddhism, just overall.

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If you do not feel that your religion is strong enough to withstand mockery, then is it truly

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something that you need to devote your life to?

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Ponder that.

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And I'm not advocating that religion should be mocked, but I'm not advocating that they

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shouldn't be.

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You know, I'm the kind of person that I'm going to try to respect your feelings, but

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if I think something is stupid, I'm going to tell you I think it's stupid.

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There are aspects in all religions that I think are just straight up stupid.

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It doesn't make sense to me.

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But as someone who believes and has devoted their life to that faith, you should be able

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to recognize that your devotion to it should be to allow that mockery.

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That should make you stronger in it, I would think.

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I mean, look at it from the point of view of us nerds and geeks.

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You know, nerds/geeks, and of course there's an argument between is there a difference

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between a nerd and a geek.

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I'll leave that one to you.

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But those of us who enjoy the different camps of nerddom and geekdom, you know, I'm not

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a cosplayer.

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I've got friends that are.

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But I love the Marvel Universe.

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I love science fiction.

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I love Star Trek.

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I'm okay with Star Wars.

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See I'm a Trekkie, not a Star Wars guy, but I don't shit all over Star Wars.

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They were good movies.

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Basically all of them, some better than others.

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But my thing is Star Trek.

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And it's something that my friend Sam and I touched on in that crossover episode, the

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difference between science fiction and science fantasy.

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Star Wars is science fantasy.

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Star Trek is science fiction.

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And I do kind of align more toward the science fiction side of it.

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But you know, there are people that mock those of us that just absolutely go apeshit crazy

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over these types of fandoms.

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Doesn't bother us.

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We like what we like.

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It's not a religion.

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We don't live our lives by some edict.

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I mean, unless you're part of the Jedi Order, which is apparently a religion.

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But anyway, you know what I'm saying.

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So okay, I guess that's going to be it for this little verbal dysentery that I'm having.

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OJ has given up.

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I have walked by him several times as I'm basically walking a rut into my driveway right

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now.

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But I would walk past him after he would preen a little bit and he would just look at me

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like you know, mouth a meow.

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You couldn't even really hear him.

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Just like, hey, you're going to pet me now, right?

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You're going to touch me.

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You're no, I'm talking.

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Sorry, dude.

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He's the one that was Tyler was always his favorite.

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And so when Tyler does visit, he has to give him a little bit of Tyler time.

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And he literally will.

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Tyler will just pick him up and hold him in both hands and just walk around with him.

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And like OJ is up on some kind of pedestal.

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He's a cat.

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That's the way they expect to be treated, right?

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Anyway, okay, that's it.

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I'm going to get out of here.

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Again, follow me on the socials, insta/threads @donadkisson.

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I'm still on Twitter.

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Man, I debated earlier this week to just kill that particular my personal account because

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I had the Radio Tiff account on Twitter.

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I had the Tifton Talks account on Twitter, but I also have Don Adkisson on Twitter and

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I thought seriously about just killing it.

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But honestly, the reason why I haven't done it is that's the only way I can find out anything

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about my son, Devin.

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And apparently he's still looking for a job.

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Said something about needing a job and he'd love to have a job and love to be able to

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have health insurance.

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And that's not something you want to hear from one of your kids, especially when they

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don't have a tendency to call you up or even send you messages.

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I mean, he, that's, I'm getting off topic here.

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Anyway, that's part of the reason why I haven't killed my personal Twitter account.

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Twitter, not X.

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Fuck Elon.

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All right.

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Alright, that's it. I'm out. Take care. Bye.