Category: Updates

  • Let’s face it: Donald Trump Likely Failed his Dementia Test

    In case you missed it, Donald Trump has been boasting on national TV about how he recently “aced” a test, bragging that:

    “The first few questions are easy, but I’ll bet you couldn’t even answer the last five questions.”

    Not only did he manage to get all 35 questions right, he claims, but the test was remarkably difficult. So difficult in fact that he challenged Fox News host Chris Wallace to take it, expecting the other man to fail miserably.

    All this boasting begs the question: what on Earth could this challenging test actually be asking? What were the questions which Donald Trump, President of the United States and titular Leader of the Free World have found so ruthlessly challenging?

    Well, fortunately we know.

    Yes, indeed. The test that Trump is boasting to the world about having defeated is asking him if he can tell the difference between a snake and an elephant.

    A snake and an elephant.

    One is the largest land animal which currently exists. And the other is a snake.

    I suppose it it’s not quite as jejeune about bragging that he could answer “1+2=???” or completing a paint by numbers picture without painting over the lines, but it’s certainly below the caliber of the other perennially challenging exam that demand students write 200 words about what they did during summer vacation.

    Though, let’s bear in mind that the above test comes from the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MOCA) test to ascertain whether the taker is suffering from dementia.

    Still, all this begs the question: did Trump in fact ace this test?

    Looking at his past history, Trump has a tendency to loudly boast about his failures by pretending that they were successes, all in his audience will be immune to the Streisand effect this time.

    After all, this was the man who on the first days of his tenure, had his spokesperson declare in a bold faced lie that his inaugural crowds were the largest ever in history and then circulate a cropped image that made the crowd size look more flattering.

    He also boasted that he knows the best people who could help him drain the swamp, even as most of them were revealed to be petty criminals and many of whom landed in jail in under 2 years.

    And then there were his failed businesses and scam college. All these rubbish fires certainly are what brought in the wealth he loves to brag about.

    Let’s not forget this is the man who Colin Powell said “Lies all the time.

    Now, I assume he doesn’t law all the time – I mean, when he orders a big mac, I assume he really wants it – but his track record is certainly lying most of the time.

    So let’s face it, and go with what we know. The old orange probably failed his exam and wants to cover his tracks by boasting that he aced it.

    Of course, like the Streisand effect, if he hoped this would make people look the other way, it’s only done the opposite.

    As I pointed out above, the whole world knows the President is proud of the fact he can successfully name an elephant and not confuse it with a snake.

    Or rather, claims he can.

  • Books I Read in 2019

    In 2019, I read 39 books. About half were for my research and the other half novels or non-fiction.

    2019 List

    Harari – Sapiens
    Morgan – Woken Furies
    Morgan – Market Forces
    Rose + Bourdain – Hungry Ghosts
    Puzo – Fools Die
    Puzo – The Last Don
    Archer – Not a Penny More, Not a Penny Less
    Archer – Sins of the Father
    Archer – Best Kept Secrets
    Lynch – Selling Catholicism
    Crichton – Timeline
    Cantor – Prime Time Television
    Noonan – Missionary with a Mike
    Noonan – The Passion of Fulton Sheen
    Hoover – Media, Television, Family
    Ridpath – Where the Shadows Lie
    Ridpath – 66 degress North
    Ridpath – Meltwater
    Ridpath – Sea of Stone
    Gaiman – American Gods
    Olsen – The Scarred Woman
    Sheen – Treasures in Clay
    Berle – My Father, Uncle Miltie
    Shannon – From Bowery to Broadway
    Fisher – On the Irish Waterfront
    Ray – Diary of a Space Traveller and other stories
    Ludlum – The Bourne Identity
    Murakami – South of the Border, West of the Sun
    Murakami – Sputnik Sweetheart
    Sopher – The Mind Body Syndrome
    Kepler – Rabbit Hunter
    Kimball – Galaga
    Pane – Megaman 3
    Dowd – Irish Americans in Popular Culture
    Various – Columbia Guide to Relgion in American Culture
    Wilson – Watching Television
    Doherty – Cold War, Cool Medium
    Corey – Leviathan Wakes

  • December Update

    It’s been a busy last quarter of the year with numerous back and forths with editors! Here are some updates on my upcoming publications:


    My story “Detour” was accepted into the next anthology coming out by Shotgun Honey. The contracts should be coming out early in the new year for an anticipated spring publication.


    My essay “Time Enough” on the work of Robert A. Heinlein and homosexuality (or the lack thereof) which was accepted for publication last year in the Speculative Masculinities anthology by Galli Books should be come out in the near future. The anthology was delayed a couple of times but the editor is still fighting ahead and hopefully it will see the light of day soon!


    I just went through with the editor of my story “The World’s a Junkheap” with Andromeda Spaceways Magazine, fixing the last of the typos and continuity errors. That volume still looks on track to be released in the coming months (or over the holidays).


    I also did final reviews and edits for my story “Oxygen Charges May Apply” with Mad Scientist Journal. It will be their final publication – which is too bad, since they were a fun publisher (but at least they cranked out a number of volumes – including where one of my first stories was published two years ago).