Monthly Archives: March 2021

Aftermath

January 20th, America woke up with a hangover of 
			biblical proportions. 
Which is to be expected after
		a four year bender of 
			authoritarianism
					science denial
			and general cruelty.
Now, after chugging a Monster-sized 
	      drink of reality, 
       we're looking at the mayhem
       we sowed in our orgy 
			of drunken debauchery and thinking, 
			"Oh God, I didn't really do all that, did I?"
"Yeah, you did," our friends and neighbors 
				tell us. "All that 
					and more." 
		Ugh, we know we're not 
				a fun drunk 
		but we never thought 
				we were a mean one. 
	Maybe we aren't. What if we're just the kind 
	who does whatever the fuck we want without 
		considering the consequences?
But now, the fun's over and it's time 
         to start adulting again:
        gathering up all the empties 
        and tracking down where we left our car 
        and figuring out just who we offended 
                    in our drunken revelry 
        (we're not sure but we may have wanted to hang Mike)
		because we need some idea of where to start 
				making amends.
It goes without saying we're never going
		to do this again. We know we were
	incredibly lucky and dodged 
			a major bullet this time. 
But it also goes without saying that we're 
			kind of lazy and no one's sure 
				not even us
		if we're really willing to put in 
			the necessary work to keep it from 
                               happening again.
It doesn't help that we're not great 
    at keeping our more destructive impulses at bay. 
	A quick look at our past history 
			tells us that. We try 
				so hard
			to do the right thing
		but always manage 
			to fuck it up somehow. 
	Not this time, we tell ourselves. This time, 
		we're going to stick to our guns 
			even though we know
				we have 
			the attention span 
                       of a coked-up hamster.
I mean, we'll try. Oh god, how we'll try. But, like every other drunk
	who's had a close call, we'll forget how
		bad we felt the morning after 
	        the last time and we'll keep 
		     bellying up to the bar
		     until our near misses
		stop missing and we wake up to 
	       swastikas and St. Andrew's crosses 
		              every fucking where.

Opening Day for the BetaFiles on Substack

Today I am launching the new Substack page for The BetaFiles where our premium content will be housed. The page will act as a weekly newsletter where new material will be posted for the subscribers of the page.

This newsletter will be broken up into columns each week featuring Reflections from Richard Cranium (the same Richard Cranium from Now See This Here Now Then) and a column of my own called Tales from a Middle Age Father which will look at different aspects of the world through a Generation-X lens. Beginning in May 2021, I will also be posting the first (of what I hope to be many) serialized novels. These will be posted as a chapter a week until the novel is complete at which time I will publish the completed version on Amazon.

You will also have access to our Podcast, The Optic Poet, here as well which will be posted each week on Wednesday for free. The Podcast covers different topics from the perspective of two middle aged white guys trying to find the right way to live in this ever-changing world. It usually ends in a big laugh…

For the first month, March 2021, all content will be FREE! In April, I will set up a paywall for all written content with the exception of two free articles a month. If you enjoy what you read here, you can subscribe for $6 a month or $65 a year. A subscription includes access to ALL content as it is published plus access to the full archive. If you choose to be a patron who wants to give more than the $6 / $65 a year subscription, you may do so up to $200 a year. Patrons will have access to the FULL archive.

Non-paying subscribers will only have access to free articles (anything published in March 2021, and the two free articles per month mentioned above) and the podcast each Wednesday.

Only paying subscribers will have the ability to comment on articles.

Look for weekly articles and stories here, podcasts here, YouTube Videos here, our Facebook page here, or Instagram here.

And that’s that. Welcome to The BetaFiles on Substack. I truly hope you enjoy the material…