Take a piece of meat. Lightly brown it on all sides. Don’t burn it; scrape any bits that stick, they’ll add flavor to the gravy.

In the same pan, add a few centimeters of water and cover. Lower heat to a simmer. (You’ll hear it cooking, but it’s not trying to splatter its way out of the pan and isn’t likely to have all the liquid steamed away.) Most stoves: Low heat.

Flip the meat a few times during the course of cooking it. If it starts running out of water, add a bit more.

The cook time is dependent on the thickness of the meat, the amount of meat, your personal tastes. If you want it rare, medium-rare, or medium, use a meat thermometer to reach your choice doneness. Remove the meat from the pan and let rest. (If you don’t rest the meat and let it cool, all the juice will drain out when you cut it.)

  • About 15-30 minutes before the meat is done, you can add some peeled and halved potatoes to simmer with the meat. You’ll probably have to add a bit more water and flavoring.

If you want a softer meat, keep simmering it until it falls apart when you pick at it with a fork.

  • When your meat is close to doneness, microwave some frozen vegetables. Either serve sprinkled with salt or give them a toss through the gravy. (The microwaving with not much water will cook the vegetables while retaining their nutrients.)

Add some cold water to some cornstarch or flour, enough that it becomes a pourable liquid. Stir it into the meat juices and let it simmer a minute, then shut off the heat. You should end up with a thick enough gravy.

  • Slice up the resting meat and either plate it or swipe it through the gravy. Spoon some more gravy on top of the meat.

Combos:
1. Meat and potatoes with gravy, with a side of vegetables.

  1. Meat and vegetables topped with gravy, maybe served with some crusty bread.
  2. Use the meat, potatoes, vegetables, and gravy in a pot pie.
  3. Use the leftover gravy to eat on toast, or mashed potatoes, or on egg noodles.

If you make enough, save some meat to slice thin for sandwiches the next day. Might be good on steak rolls with an au jus sauce and French fries.

I might sprinkle the meat with salt and/or I’ll add some bouillon. I have to be careful because my dad has a tendency to feed the dog scraps, otherwise onion, garlic, and black pepper tastes great. Same with celery (dog safe), bell pepper, carrot (dog safe), peas (dog safe), green beans (dog safe), corn (dog safe), tomatoes (dog safe), mushrooms (dog safe), dill (dog safe), basil (dog safe), paprika, turnip (dog safe), cooked beans (dog safe), okra (dog safe), parsnips (dog safe), parsley (dog safe), broccoli (dog safe), zucchini (dog safe), lentils (dog safe), cooked millet (dog safe), cabbage (dog safe), bok choy (dog safe)…

There’s a few things–mostly favored spices–that dogs should not be fed. And you should definitely keep a close watch on the amount of salt. But for the most part, dogs can benefit from a diet containing vegetables, beans, and non-wheat grain (barley, oats, rice).

Sometimes it’s kind of a hassle, as I really like garlic and soy sauce and crushed red pepper, but the dog is just so happy to be eating with his people. And he’s getting older, so the vegetables and added nutrients are really better for him than some of the canned foods out there that are really just doggy junk food.

I would also make food for the cats, but they are very spoiled and demand their specific brands. It’s not worth it to fight them, as every cat owner knows a cat is more stubborn than a dog is in the face of their hunger.

A dog will gratefully eat. A cat will slink away to pout under a bed or in a box.

And if you have excess meat and no animal friend to help you eat it… You can add sliced meat to a freezer safe container or a ziploc bag and cover it with gravy. Let it cool in the fridge before freezing. When you want to eat it, microwave the meat in the gravy and serve on top of mashed potatoes, egg noodles, or rice.

Just chop up a couple of green onions and stir into the heated gravy. Or add a dab of cream to give the gravy a Swedish meatball-flavor.

Kakushigoto 01 at Amazon

Sometimes I start babbling on Twitter and it becomes a big long screed, and then I reread the screed and realize that maybe it deserved a blog post. So that’s what this is. Sorry not sorry? Sorryish?


MONKEYPOX

I’m not worried about sewers full of monkeypox. They add a bunch of chemicals in the waste treatment process that will (hopefully) kill the live virus.

No. I’m worried because they’re refusing tests for people showing symptoms if they don’t meet the criteria of being gay men. (For reals: They are turning away sex workers trying to get tested and vaccinated because they’re not gay men. People that come into contact with human fluids REGULARLY are being denied a vaccine for a disease that is spread through human fluids.)

The fact that people are pushing the "It’s a gay disease!" LIE so as to minimize the danger to the public… Like, who the fukk is saying this shizz???

Where did the lying start? Who began spreading this misinformation and WHY? What is the end goal of creating a public health crisis? Who benefits? What is the purpose? Who is trying so hard to make people sick?

Monkeypox is not a gay disease!

It does not ONLY affect men indulging in anal sex.

You can shake someone’s hand and catch it!

Someone scratches their balls, or wipes their nose with their hand, or coughs on you… and boom!

You start forming big ol’ sores.

It’s not magic. It’s not "God’s punishment from above."

It’s science.

Wash your hands with soap and water!

It’s like, have you ever been talking to someone and they just casually start picking their face?

Or you’re sharing a bowl, and you look away, and out of the corner of your eye you see them pick their nose and wipe their fingers on their pant leg before passing the bowl to you?

I’m a compulsive handwasher. In the wintertime, I HAVE to use lotion because otherwise my skin will crack and bleed.

There are people out there that don’t wash their hands after taking a poop–"Unless I get shit on them."

And they ALWAYS grab the stair railing.

They’re out there pushing the elevator buttons. They’re fondling the jugs of milk. They’re flipping through books and magazines. They’re handling the fruit.

Every human being is the main character in their own story.

And no human being wants to admit they’re a filthy person.

They’re all like "I touch my own food with my hands. Why don’t I get sick? Herpaderp?"

And my dude: You don’t get sick from ingesting your own urine and feces because they came from your body.

Let them sit out a while, and yeah, it’ll mess you up. But direct from the tap?

You have immunities to the filth that comes out of your own body.

Other people don’t.

They come into contact with your poop, and next thing you know someone’s "got the stomach flu."

"I don’t know how I caught it. Must’ve been a 24-hour bug."

No. You ingested feces.

Or think about this:

Do you wash your hands BEFORE you use the bathroom? Do you make sure to not touch anything with your wiping hand before and after you use it?

So why don’t you wash your hands before you change your baby’s diaper?

Is your baby not susceptible to disease?

Those little kids getting the monkeypox…

The grossness isn’t "OMG, must be pedophiles!!!"

No. It’s "OMG, people were out there touching other people and surfaces and whatever… and not washing their hands before hugging and kissing their children!"

The monkeypox is not a gay disease.

It is a highly communicable HUMAN disease that anyone can catch.

"Why are all these disease suddenly cropping up? What’s happening???"

My dudes: People have stopped practicing basic hygiene.

Wash your hands with soap and water!


VACCINATION

And like, all the diseases being spread around, and the resurgence of polio and measles and all kinds of diseases that we have been BLESSED to not have to deal with in our lifetime…

About 30-years ago people stopped vaccinating their children.

Some celebrity decided that their child’s autism diagnosis was tied to their infant vaccinations and STARTED SPREADING LIES.

They wrote a book. They went on the talk-show circuit. A once credible news network gave them a platform.

And antivaccination became the popular thing to do. It was the crystals of the ’90s, but with dead and disabled children.

Grifters glommed onto the idea of selling vitamins and supplements. They paid people money to write blog posts about "How to use silver mercury to cure pus-filled sores" and "Don’t trust doctors! They’re treating people FOR MONEY! It’s a scam. All they want is to be PAID! (Buy our products.)"

And all I can think about is the now-adult people walking around today WITHOUT basic immunities to things.

Like, that dude that caught the polio… From what I understand, he was not vaccinated against polio. He went to another country(!!!) where they use the oral polio vaccine (OPV) that has the live virus and someone there got vaccinated with the OPV, and they shed the live virus and the dude caught it and ended up with polio.

22-years old, and he wasn’t vaccinated AGAINST POLIO.

What the fuck are you people doing???

And like, all those people with their super sad stories about their "normal healthy babies" that "suddenly have autism*" or other developmental issues…

My dudes: You did not vaccinate your baby.

Flat out: You waved away the NECESSARY vitamin K shot when your baby was born.

At some point, the baby slipped off a bed, bumped their head on the side of a table, whatever.

Without the NECESSARY vitamin K shot that EVERY NEWBORN should receive AS SOON AS POSSIBLE, your baby likely had an invisible brain bleed that resulted in brain damage.

And if you’re asking "What’s a vitamin K shot?" and you have children…

My dudes: Babies are born with a limited amount of vitamin K in their bodies that they received from their host parent. Their bodies do not yet have the capability to produce it on their own.

"But I had my baby at home. How did the baby get a vitamin K shot?"

Well, if you went to a competent midwife, they likely gave your baby a little shot right after you squeezed it out. And if they didn’t, and they didn’t recommend that you get one within a day or two… They’re terrible at their job and you’re lucky you and your baby didn’t die at their hands.

Without the vitamin K shot, the likelihood of a baby dying in its first year is HUGE.

One of the BEST THINGS the modern world ever did was introducing vitamin K shots globally. People in the most backwoods of places have babies that survive into childhood because they receive a vitamin K shot.

MILLIONS if not BILLIONS of babies survived infancy because of the invention of the vitamin K shot.

We have been BLESSED with vaccinations and minor cures for big conditions… and people CHOSE to piss it all away.

They don’t even know what herd immunity is, but they’re sure they have it. Because they’re ignorant as fuck.

And they just keep opening their mouths and spreading the lies they were purposefully fed by TERRIBLE PEOPLE that profit off their misery.

It’s sad.

But also, at some point, you look at them and you look at their children, and you just have to shake your head when they die. Because an ounce of prevention something-something.

It’s sad. It’s wasteful. It’s "tragic". And it was all easily avoidable.

  • Some of those kids have never been diagnosed as autistic. The parent, refusing all medical care for them due to distrust of the medical industry, just start saying that their kid has autism or whatever diagnosis they come up with. "My child is a STAR BABY. They are infused with cosmic energy and are an alien being that I have been blessed to show the way of human life. They should not be disciplined or asked to behave in public. They NEED the freedom to be themselves, even if that means dumping plates of food onto the floor in restaurants or using the N-word that they have magically taught themselves."
Witch King at Amazon

Lotta shit happening in the world today. And I mean that in the most literal of metaphorical ways.

As-in, “These people are literally taking a metaphorical shit on all our heads and telling us its raining because they want to get into heaven someday and someone told them it could only happen if they each make 144,000 people miserable.”

Like “My mission in life, as assigned by my lord and high savior, is to go out into the world and spread the message of some crazy guy that wants to marry and impregnate 12-year olds, so we have to make it legal otherwise he’s going to be so unhappy about people yelling at him about all the 9-year olds he had sex with. You know, for Jesus.”

Ugh. I really have to use the bathroom!

The bathroom and all its water sources are currently off-limits as he’s working on the pipes, but all I can think is that I really want to use the toilet. Like, my brain has shifted from “I think I might have to go” to “This is becoming a serious issue and I wonder if we have any coffee cans or plastic bags.” Ugh.

There’s people out there bitching that mental illness isn’t a real thing because “how can someone suffering lingering and undiagnosed pain become so depressed as to not do anything? That’s a personal choice” and here I am squirming because I need to use the toilet and it’s LITERALLY the only thing I can think about.

I can’t get up and do anything, because I desperately need to use the toilet. It is becoming the main focus of my ENTIRE BEING, and until it happens, I’m not going to be able to do or think of anything else.

Yet some dude is right now wondering how chronic pain can fuck up someone’s entire mood and life.

My dudes: You refuse to wear a mask during an outbreak of a deadly and debilitating disease because “It makes my face itch. I just can’t do it” yet we’re supposed to nod and agree when you say shit like “Mental illness isn’t real” and “Depression is a personal choice”?

GTFO. You’re made out of nonsense.

Anyways, they’re also trying to call a 10-year old a “woman” and they’re bending over backwards to do so.

And it’s like, rather than wondering why grown adults are trying to claim a 10-year old can safely carry and birth an infant likely 1/3 the size of their own body… The focus should ALSO be on why they’re so insistent on using the term “woman” for a child.

“You’re watering down the term ‘woman’ so as to make women lesser people” is a psy-op argument.

Whether the psy-op is transphobes trying to erase trans women* or anti-abortion people trying to place the blame of the pregnancy on a child because “That woman should have kept their legs close”… it doesn’t matter. Because the outcome is the same:

Rapists and rape apologists are victimizing children. And people are defending them by making the claim that only women can become pregnant.

The optics of someone saying “I want to have sex with that 9-year old child” looks bad compared to “That woman shouldn’t be allowed to have an abortion… think of the life of the child!”

Policing language to the point that people can’t use “pregnant people” because “only women can become pregnant” is a way to victimize children.

Because if “only women can become pregnant,” then people begin disregarding sex crimes against children.

“Why didn’t that woman keep her legs closed?” becomes the words of a total asshole when you consider that the “woman” in question is a CHILD.

And that transphobes and misogynists are shaking hands and Liking and Retweeting each other and sharing each others’ messages?

Not a surprise to anyone that lives in reality.

I mean, I just saw a story about a pregnant trans man going to the hospital with stomach pains and telling the doctor “I’m pregnant and it feels like there’s something wrong” and THEY DID NOTHING. Why? Because “We thought he was just an obese man suffering from heart problems because he was so super fat” was an acceptable excuse they could use for medical negligence that resulted in the miscarriage of a wanted pregnancy.

head explosion

My friends: Doctors and nurses PURPOSEFULLY ignored a man’s medical issues because

A) trans men don’t exist, which means he wasn’t really pregnant.
B) overweight people don’t deserve medical care.
C) the doctors and nurses are terrible people.

Exclusionary thinking results in deaths and disabilities ALL THE TIME.

Trying to tell me that “Ignore this problem because it doesn’t apply to YOU” while purposefully policing language and medical terminology doesn’t make you the anti-abortion transphobe king.

It makes you an agent of evil and you should seek psychiatric help rather than spreading your message of destruction far and wide.

“Pregnant people” = women, trans men, intersex people, and children.

Making pregnancy solely a “women’s issue” shifts the onus of the consequences of rape from the perpetrator to the victim.

Stop it.

Pax,
~HarperWCK

  • I specifically mention trans women because they’re the ones receiving the bulk of the hate. Like, the argument that intersex people “don’t exist” and trans men being regularly ignored in most conversations is just another “interesting” facet of modern transphobia.
Uramichi Oniisan 01 at Amazon

I wrote this on Twitter a tweet at a time.

Here’s my point of reference:

and here’s the tweet thread: https://twitter.com/HarperKingsley0/status/1547633608357134336.

SHINY TOWN

The Mayor of Shiny Town stood in his pressed trousers with the red suspenders, heavily embroidered vest, and blazer to survey the townsfolk going about their day. Each person was made distinctive by the clothes they wore.

The clothes they couldn’t remove.

Ever since that weird kid with the staff had passed through, nothing had been the same.

The kid had said their town was called "Shiny Town," and Shiny Town it had become.

They hadn’t had any rain in close to two years now, yet everything remained green, though oddly plastic.

Food had an odd taste to it now, even the things that came from cans.

The Mayor wondered if it was the food whose taste had changed, or if it was that his own taste buds had been changed with the odd metamorphosis he’d been forced through.

They’d all been transformed by that weird kid, from the oldest elder to the smallest of infants. The Mayor tried not to think of Little Sweetheart, as the kid had renamed her, the baby that hadn’t grown a single millimeter since The Change.

There was quiet speculation that Little Sweetheart was never going to grow up. She’d stay a 7 month old baby until she died of old age. Never gaining enough awareness to realize the hell they’d been trapped in.

Sometimes the Mayor envied Little Sweetheart her ignorance. Most times he wallowed in the unrelenting pity of the situation.

There was a lot of self-pity on his part, and while most times the fixed cheery smile that remained on his face was close to what he felt, there were darker times when he wished that he could frown. That the huge glossy orbs his eyes had become could cry.

But he wasn’t allowed the freedom of tears. No one was.

The kid had wanted cheery people, and that’s what they became. The cursed inhabitants of the now-named Shiny Town.

Sometimes the Mayor tried to think of his old name. His old life. His old self.

But it wouldn’t come. Had actually faded more in the last two years, until the things he’d yearned for on first becoming different were no more than memory shadows.

He’d see his name written down, and his eyes would blur over the letters, his mind unable to hold onto them.

He was the Mayor of Shiny Town. It was the sole identity he was allowed, the curse tightening around his mind whenever he tried to remember who he really was. Had been.

Likely never would be again.

Sometimes he looked in the mirror at his own cartoonishly huge eyes and the whiskers that refused to be shaved, and he hated that nameless child that had so-carelessly waved around such powerful magics and changed everything about him and the rest of the town.

He would try to find glimpses of who he used to be, and they seemed lesser everyday.

He was fading away from himself. Dying while still walking around with a body and a voice. Forced to follow the scripted phrases the kid had BURNED into him.

"Welcome to Shiny Town. I’m the Mayor and I’m here to help you."

"Please follow me and I’ll introduce you to the most important people in our town. We’re so glad you’ve finally come, Great Hero. We’ve been waiting for you to come save us."

"The monster has been attacking us for many a night. Good thing you’re here to take care of it."

And the Mayor tried not to think about "the monster," or what the kid had done to it… him? her? Whoever that poor thing had been before the Change.

A part of him was glad not to remember who the monster had once been. Though the searing ache in his heart made him fear the monster had been someone he’d loved.

Someone he could no longer remember, as he was forgetting himself.

He’d touch the clothes in his closet… the dresses, the pretty shoes… and it hurt to know he’d once been different. Happy.

Until that kid had come to town.

/END?