This week, a $40/hour creative writing project was available to me on the AI training platform that's my sole source of income, and I missed it to go to a city council meeting that I could have watched online. I regret that. I was there to express my opposition to the ICE detention center, but I didn't even make a comment because I didn't bother to figure out how city council meetings work and sign up to make a comment beforehand. That's life, if you define life as me making unnecessary mistakes. Anyway, the city council already opposes the ICE detention center, so this was more about encouraging it not to back down. At least eight people expressed that sentiment.

A fat redneck stereotype expressed a different sentiment. He started off sarcastically thanking the council for cutting off water to the warehouse even though ICE agents can shower at home and bring bottled water, and then he went on an unhinged rant about four "illegals" who committed violent crimes in places that aren't Utah, which somehow bothered him even though he obviously voted for a serial rapist who was best friends with a child sex trafficker. I swear to God, one of the Hispanic council members left the room during his rant. I was gratified when a math teacher diverted from her prepared comment to explain to him (and any other high school dropouts who might have been in the room) how percentages work. After the meeting, I flipped him off because punching him in his dumbass racist teeth was illegal. (Yes, he could have flattened me alone, but I wasn't alone.0 Then my keys, loosened from emptying my pockets for the security check before the meeting, fell out. And he said, "You dropped your keys, bud." So that was humiliating. Now I've increased my credibility by sharing this humiliating anecdote instead of casting myself as the triumphant hero of the situation.

On Saturday, I attended the Salt Lake County Democratic convention as a delegate, which is something that I've never been interested in doing but did anyway because fighting fascism can't be fun and games all the time. I had friends there, and I picked up a decent amount of free food and candy, so those two things salvaged the event from being as boring as General Conference. I went to a dance protest at the ICE detention center afterward because fighting fascism is fun and games sometimes. Something like eighteen cops were there to flush our tax dollars down the toilet. They sat in their darkened vans and watched us for two hours, and then, as soon as the guy with the speakers left, they pulled him over and cited him for an expired registration, disorderly conduct, and being too loud for this neighborhood of empty warehouses. It's all very obviously a bullshit attempt to intimidate us, squelch our First Amendment rights, and protect the fascist secret police, and of course we're not putting up with it. Also, we just found out that the city considers drawing with chalk on the sidewalk a Class B misdemeanor. I have no words.

Hungary just ousted its far-right authoritarian president, Viktor Orbán, who pleasantly surprised me by not rigging the election or refusing to concede. His successor, Péter Magyar, is center-right, which would make him a Democrat in the US. His party, Tisza, also won a supermajority in parliament that will help him reverse the damage to democracy caused by his predecessor. Orbán has spent his sixteen years in office patiently dismantling the checks on his power. Trump openly admires him and has been trying to speedrun the same strategy, with less success. Trump sent JD Vance to campaign for him recently, having somehow failed to notice that nobody in the world like JD Vance. Also, like Trump, Orbán is an ally of Putin who's blocked aid to Ukraine and caused turmoil throughout Europe. This is a great day for a lot of people and a bad day for some very bad people. Orbán is a very bad person - but again, he did concede the election on the same night. Trump still hasn't conceded the election from over five years ago. Trump is a worse person, and I'm just grateful he has a lot less time (both in office and on this Earth).

This is an op-ed I recently sent to the Salt Lake Tribune, which I'm publishing here and now because, predictably enough, they didn't.

​Around that same time, in one of my Signal chats, I also suggested protesting the church's silence at General Conference. I hoped someone more experienced would run with the idea so I didn't have to do the work, but I was willing to do the work if I had to. It got some interest, but not enough to encourage me to persist after someone brushed it aside to talk about the NIck Shirley protest at the Draper aquarium instead. I kid you not, a couple of weeks later, the same guy suggested the same idea. I'm not mad. Whatever it takes is fine by me. Then some women took over the planning, made it into a protest against the church's sex abuse cover-ups, and said that the men were welcome to participate but the focus needed to remain on them. I felt that this topic would be less timely and effective than one tied into the current national political situation, but of course I still supported it. I encouraged everyone to keep it respectful, not because the church deserves respect but because triggering its members' persecution complex would be counterproductive. We were all on board with that. The other guy still backed out after he became too concerned about alienating his Mormon parents. I didn't worry about that because my Mormon parents alienated me years ago.

By most measures, frankly, the protest was a flop. We ran out of time to make signs beforehand. Some people showed up to the rendezvous point late, so the Mormons attending conference were inside by the time we reached Temple Square. We just walked up to the Capitol in Handmaid's Tale robes with no signs. It wasn't originally part of the plan for me to wear one, but we had an extra after a woman had to back out, and walking to the Capitol in it was much less embarrassing than walking to the rendezvous point in a suit on conference day and making people think I was Mormon. Waiting for the bathroom in the gift shop was a little weird, but I survived. So anyway, I don't think we accomplished much, but people took notice of us and I had a great time with my friends, and that's important too.

Oh yes, and after our protest, a woman with no shoes approached us in the parking lot, sobbing, breathing hard, and telling us that she'd been framed for murder and every cop in the city was looking for her. She wanted to go to her uncle's house so he could say she'd been there the whole time. We took her to the general area she said her uncle lived in so she could go sleep off whatever she was on. So once again, this was a very worthwhile experience.

Oh yes, I suppose today is Easter. Naturally, after another protest today against the Supreme Court legalizing verbal conversion "therapy" because First Amendment rights somehow trump professional standards of conduct, I'll celebrate in my usual manner by getting high at home by myself. Respectfully, THC has blessed my life more than Jesus ever did.

I had a marvelous time at the No Kings protest yesterday, of course, but not as marvelous as this evening at Liberty Park, where I gathered with friends and acquaintances to celebrate someone's birthday by destroying a piñata shaped like an ICE agent.

This was near the drum circle, an amazing weekly celebration I just found out about where people drum in a circle. The park is huge, the crowd is huge, and it gives off the "cool multicultural city" vibe that my previous hometowns never have. I'm sure half the people there were on drugs, and I intend to be on drugs there too at some point, though I'm taking a break from that stuff for a few weeks so I don't fry my brain. Anyway, several people noticed what we were doing and loved it. They laughed, they cheered, they took pictures, they got in line to take swings at it. I didn't get to swing because I let everyone go ahead of me because I loved seeing them have fun. There was enough stuff inside for everyone, and without being greedy, I scored a granola bar, a papaya, a few Hi-Chews, an "Abolish ICE" pin, and a Ruth Bader Ginsberg T-shirt. I love how this turned into a community event. I love how complete strangers had their day brightened. This picture doesn't even show all the people who were there.

On Tuesday, I protested at the governor's mansion against the warehouse that ICE just purchased behind the state's back. KSL interviewed me, and I even got first mention in the article, but I'm not crazy about how I was quoted.

This gives me some insight into how the news makes quotes. I didn't volunteer that bit about the governor; the reporter asked me if I thought it was likely to sway him, and I had to think about it for a moment, and I said probably not. The likelihood of success simply hadn't factored into my decision to speak out for what's right. I'm disappointed that he left out the part where I said ICE detentions are basically concentration camps and listed specific examples of the inhumane conditions - bad food, inadequate medical care, inadequate sleep. I feel like trimming that down to "It's just really inhumane" makes me look kind of dumb. I also said that the governor, the legislature, the LDS Church, and anyone else with a voice should speak out against this (even though I know they won't), and I also said that I wasn't advocating for open borders and lawlessness, but that the current anti-immigration push is less about legitimate security concerns than about making people afraid so they'll keep supporting Trump and others like him. I get that it was standard practice for the reporter not to use everything I said, but he cut all that and went with "I don't want another one to open in Salt Lake City" - the most basic, self-evident part? Really? (I did say words to that effect when he asked why I was there, but still.)

That evening, I continued my activism in a much less sexy way. The last caucus I went to was the Republican caucus in Logan, Utah in 2016, where most of the conversation revolved around stopping Trump from becoming the nominee. I don't remember anyone asking if anyone liked Trump; they just got down to the business of stopping him. If I recall correctly, we came to a consensus to nominate Ted Cruz instead. Though I'm not unafilliated and didn't want to go because I knew it would be boring, this week I went to the Democrat caucus, which once again had the agenda of stopping Trump. The urgency of our situation and the existence, despite the legislature pulling out all the stops to stop it, of a district that will actually represent us motivated a much bigger Democrat turnout than usual in this area. Still, only one other person from my precinct showed up, so now I'm stuck being the vice chair. I was really glad that he wanted to be the chair. He's well-spoken and very passionate about the Rio Grande plan, which has something to do with moving and/or restoring train tracks in the city for a better use of space and a massive economic boost. He explained it, but it went over my head.

The next day, I protested at the ICE warehouse with hundreds of other pissed-off people. The organizers asked us to disperse and go home when things got dicey, but no matter what the news says or who got arrested, I only saw ICE agents throwing rocks at their own windows. I could tell by their masks.

On Friday, I protested at the ICE center in West Valley, as usual. I enjoyed hanging out with my friend's kids, but nothing much happened there. The employees go home early on Fridays because of us.

On Saturday, Nick Shirley, the little shit who started the lies about Somalian daycare center owners committing fraud in Minnesota because conservatives don't understand that it's normal for daycares to lock their doors and not let in random creepy men with cameras, charged idiots an obscene amount of money to have dinner with him at a measles hotspot, the aquarium in Draper. I didn't feel like making the trip for that protest. I stayed home, earned some money, and didn't feel guilty about practicing self-care and having balance.

This afternoon, I went to a singing resistance event at the First Baptist Church. There are several progressive clergy members in this city doing what the LDS Church should be doing on a much larger scale but won't because it has no balls. They sang at the warehouse, too. Despite all the problems with Christianity's truth claims, I think Jesus is a great symbol, and these people are using him the way he should be used. I wish their churches all power and success. The sense of community was great, and experiencing joy was, in itself, a powerful act of protest against a fascist regime that wants us frightened and discouraged, and that's what life is really about regardless of beliefs. They're going to try to get everyone to sing with them at No Kings this weekend, which of course I will be at and strongly encourage everyone in the country to be at. It's going to be a very bad weekend for the orange taint.

Utah's Republicunt legislature has pulled out all the stops to thwart the will of the voters, violate the law, and deny representation to Salt Lake City's substantial Democrat population, but as of now, the non-gerrymandered map chosen by the judicial branch to comply with the law still stands, and a district with a chance of electing a Democrat to Congress still exists. I'm not a Democrat, but I'll probably vote for Democrats for the foreseeable future because Republicunts are a cancer. On Monday, the 71 Percent Coalition (a pro-Palestine group) and Black Lives Matter Utah hosted a town hall attended by all the Democrat candidates that don't suck (not Ben McAdams and Kathleen Riebe), which I'm sharing here for some reason even though I don't think anyone in Salt Lake City reads my blog. Wait, it's private? Um, okay. How silly.

Anyway, the main reason I wanted to mention it was to share a beautiful life lesson. I attended in person - actually, I arrived late, and I'm sorry if I was a little brusque toward the person who prevented me from just walking into the auditorium like I wanted. "Are you here for the town hall?" No, I thought this was a Nickelback concert. I didn't notice the signs or the huge banner that said "Town Hall" before I tried to walk in. I didn't say any of that, but it probably came through in my tone of voice when I said "Yes." So I was there, but after a while, it occurred to me that I could have stayed home until it was over and then watched it on Youtube at 2x speed, thereby giving myself more time to earn money training chatbots from home. I thought maybe my being there was a pointless waste of time.

Afterward, though, I crossed paths with Mustafa, a gentleman from Palestine who co-founded the 71 Percent Coalition. I see him at a lot of things. For some time, he's greeted me warmly and sometimes called me "Old Faithful" for my attendance at their weekly protests before the ceasfire. He gave me a keffiyeh, though he's given lots of people keffiyehs, so I'm not saying that makes me special. I and two mutual friends visited him at his car dealership a couple of months ago. For an hour, we talked about things besides Palestine or politics, and we had Arabic coffee (which it turns out I hate, but nothing personal) and some of his employee's birthday cake. He encouraged me to do more to promote my books. I was very impressed by his ability to compartmentalize and focus on everyday stuff while such horrific things are going on in his homeland. In an alternate timeline, his granddaughter could have been one of the children murdered by Israeli soldiers.

It's not like we're best friends or anything, so I wasn't expecting him to say, "It's my favorite person!" Or maybe he said, "How's my favorite person?" I've already forgotten. I'm getting old. I was like, "Really?" And he was like, "Yes, you're the only person I see at every event. You're an inspiration." Again, I've forgotten the exact words, but "You're an inspiration" is the gist, unless my brain is fabricating that to stoke my ego. I must point out that my attendance at every event isn't just a result of my dedication but also of my work schedule being literally whatever I want. But hey, I could still be doing other things with my time, so I'll take the praise anyway. Then I walked outside and talked to some other friends I've made my protesting. The beautiful life lesson, in case you missed it, is that I've made a positive impact on people even though it doesn't often feel like anything I do matters.

They asked how I like my new place, I mentioned the cockroaches, and one of them said he once lived in a place with so many roaches that the floor turned from black to white when he turned on the light, and they would swarm his face and stuff. That was probably in a third-world country on an LDS mission. It reminded me that seeing one to three cockroaches a week isn't so bad. If they ever swarm my face, I think I'll kill myself. If they ever change the color of the floor, I think I'll burn down the apartment with myself inside. Mine don't really scatter, though. They either keep going about their business or freeze like they think I can't see them if they don't move. They only run when I come after them, and they're not good at it. So far, I have a 100% kill rate - one escaped under the cupboards, but I lured it back out with a Roach Motel, so it avoided my fist only to slowly die of thirst. I still think its life had more value than an ICE agent's.

Anyway, I'm not sure which of these delightful District 1 candidates to vote for. Policy-wise, none of them stood out to me as clearly better than the others, but Michael Farrell's attitude got my attention as the night wore on. He called people in this administration "fascist freaks" and "pedophiles" and complained about "the stupidest man in the world" being elected twice. At one point, he had to restrain himself from saying "motherfucking." I think that's exactly the attitude and energy we need in addition to good policies. This administration has normalized corruption, cruelty, and evil on an astonishing scale. It all needs to be un-normalized. We're not up against legitimate politicians with valid differences of opinion, we're up against fascist freaks who should be in jail. It's refreshing to hear someone seeking office speak that truth so bluntly and not care whether it's "proper." I'll probably vote for him, but I'd be happy with any of these people. I'm just worried that we'll get McAdams or Riebe instead.