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David McElroy

making sense of a dysfunctional culture

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I was in love with her voice and didn’t want that call to ever end

By David McElroy · January 31, 2020

I was already in love with her voice, so I would have done anything to stay on the phone with her that day. I didn’t care what we talked about. I just didn’t want her to hang up the phone.

But that was more than five years ago.

I find myself in an unusual part of town right now. It’s somewhere I rarely come anymore. But as I exited I-59 and turned down a street that felt quite seedy, I wasn’t thinking about why I had come or even about the dangerous neighborhood. I was having a flashback to the last time I was here.

And now I‘m sitting in a darkened parking lot. Waves of emotions are washing over me as I experience what I felt that day. If I close my eyes, I can imagine she’s still on the phone with me right now — just as she was that day.

I was in love with her. I was in love with her voice. Everything about her intoxicated me. And I would have done anything for that call to last for the rest of my life.

We talked about personality theories that day, especially in relation to working styles. We talked about something that had happened to her at work that day. We talked about a dozen things. Maybe more. I didn’t care what we talked about. I just wanted to hear her voice.

I had never told her that I loved her, but the love I had already developed for her kept bubbling over in me. As I listened to her beautiful and mesmerizing voice — a voice that was smooth and beautiful and soothing to my heart — I kept wanting to whisper to her, “I love you.”

She could have been talking about power tools or international trade or the plot-line of a television soap opera. I didn’t care. I just wanted to listen to her. I wanted her to listen to me. I wanted to be a part of an exchange of hearts and minds which I hadn’t felt for years.

As I sit here tonight, it’s as though she’s here with me again. Just because I’ve been driving on streets where this conversation happened, it’s as though part of me is in 2020 and part of me is in 2014 — like something that might happen if a time portal opened up and held me halfway between the two points in time.

She hadn’t yet told me on that afternoon that she loved me, either. I wanted her to love me. I needed her to love me. I longed for her heart to feel the same things that I was feeling. I ached for her to want to touch me, to hold me and to build a future with me.

I needed her to love me as much as I loved her. Nothing else mattered.

I don’t want to leave here right now. I’ve fallen into a time bubble where I can still hear her voice and she still wants to talk with me. I don’t want this call to end. I never wanted that call to end.

The part of me which is in 2020 wants to reach out to the part of her which is in 2014 and beg her not to ever hang up that phone.

I’m sitting here cold and alone in the dark tonight — with my warm heart overflowing with burning love from that day — and I still don’t want this call to ever end. I don’t want her voice to go away.

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For those who are in places where it’s miserably h For those who are in places where it’s miserably hot today, here is a minute of light rain and gentle thunder from my back yard late Saturday afternoon. It’s very relaxing to stand at my back door and watch this, especially since the heat is pretty mild today — 80 degrees (about 26 celsius) — for July in the American South.
Alex was willing to cooperate with me for a new po Alex was willing to cooperate with me for a new portrait late Wednesday night. It’s been roughly three and a half years now since the cold night when I was able to lure him out from behind a garbage dumpster into a trap — but I don’t think he’s sorry at this point that he fell for the trick. 😺
This is the face of a man who’s thrilled that the This is the face of a man who’s thrilled that the weekend is finally here. It was a very long (and productive) week, but the time has finally come that I have time to write and read and think. Late Friday night, I’m at the McDonald’s near my house with a Diet Dr Pepper and a MacBook. For me, it’s like Cheers without the booze.
Donald Trump has figured out who to blame for the Donald Trump has figured out who to blame for the the D.C. Reflecting Pool turning green. The dastardly deed was carried out by a specially trained squad of Antifa cats trained by the Far Left. It’s not his fault. Arrest all the cats! #satire #parody
This was the sunset that faced me as I left Walmar This was the sunset that faced me as I left Walmart near my house just a few minutes ago. It was a beautiful light show for just a few minutes.
Here’s proof that reality and satire are indisting Here’s proof that reality and satire are indistinguishable these days.
This was the sunset I saw from the parking lot out This was the sunset I saw from the parking lot outside of the Walmart near my house just after the sun went down Friday evening.
This little parody was inspired by my trip to buy This little parody was inspired by my trip to buy gas a little while ago. Even at a no-name brand, the price was $4.09. If I remember correctly, it was $2.29 a gallon at the same station on the day the war started. I don’t know about you, but I’m tired of winning. 🤣
For the best and most sophisticated in lawn care, For the best and most sophisticated in lawn care, check out the sponsor of one of my upcoming YouTube video episodes. 🙃 #parody #threestooges
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This has been delayed in production ever since Oli This has been delayed in production ever since Oliver was a kitten in 2023, but I can finally announce that this future sci-fi classic is soon coming to a theater near you. (For anyone who doesn’t get the reference, it’s based on the classic “Attack of the 50-ft. Woman., which I’ll include as reference.)
From the CritterCam: This is what it looks like at From the CritterCam: This is what it looks like at 5 a.m. when a gray cat definitively spots the sleeping spot he’s about to steal from his older brother, who’s made the mistake of getting out of bed briefly.
As soon as I got home and changed clothes, Oliver As soon as I got home and changed clothes, Oliver wanted attention, but I’m not entirely sure that he’s awake. He and I are at a front window in the office to watch birds for a minute. All three of them were asleep when I got home.
From the CritterCam: Oliver was in the cat bed on From the CritterCam: Oliver was in the cat bed on my desk and Alex decided he wanted that spot, so there was a brief standoff which I watched via the webcam. Alex first tried staring intently, but when that didn’t work, he finally tried to evict Oliver — in the video at the end — but Oliver stood his ground. Alex gave up and moved to the castle, so Oliver is now napping in the bed. And that’s the drama from our house today. 😺
The cats have been mischievous again and they’re i The cats have been mischievous again and they’re in big trouble. They got it into their heads that it would be fun to take the Ecto-1 out for a ride, so they somehow made it to the studio and took off with it. Alex drove, apparently forgetting that he doesn’t know how to drive. Fortunately, Oliver didn’t hit anything serious when he fired the weapon (which he had assumed was just a prop). Sam was just holding on for dear life. 😺
Alex posed for me briefly as I was leaving the hou Alex posed for me briefly as I was leaving the house Monday afternoon, but he just wanted assurances that I’d be back by his dinner time. He said the rest of his day is booked solid with naps, so he didn’t want to be worrying about whether I’d be late again.
From the CritterCam: In this brief clip, Alex walk From the CritterCam: In this brief clip, Alex walks past his bed — on my desk — and decides to make the mighty leap to the nearby castle instead. It’s a dark and rainy day, so the office looks very dark.
Sam is watching me from a dark corner of the bedro Sam is watching me from a dark corner of the bedroom at midnight.
From the CritterCam: I’m not there to see what has From the CritterCam: I’m not there to see what has Alex’s attention, but something outside an office window has him concerned enough to sit up in bed. His beauty sleep is disturbed now.
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It turns out that the radical far left has been training “Antifa cats” to sabotage anything important to Donald Trump. Everything he did was perfect. Honest. It was all the cats’ fault. Arrest all the cats! This is the latest of my ridiculous satirical shorts. Please go watch it. Then “like” it and subscribe. Please. I’m begging you. (Too much?) Although a couple of the previous videos have had views in the hundreds, most have still been seen by fewer than 20 people. So I seem to be having trouble letting people know that page exists.

Here’s the latest of my ridiculous parody shorts. It crossed my mind Tuesday to wonder what a slick and fast-talking car dealer might do right now to try to turn the high price of gasoline to his advantage. So I conceived of a fat and lovable character who tried to sell cars that don’t use any fuel — and then I started wondering if it would be funnier if all the characters were felines. Designing the King Cashpaw character took about four hours, but the rest took only another four hours, so this was a relatively quick piece that virtually wrote itself. I know it’s almost impossible for these parody videos to find a larger audience, but at least they amuse me — and there are 19 of them on my YouTube page now. The first few were very limited, but they’re getting more complex.

The Republican Party is dead. It still exists in name, of course, but it’s nothing but a shell. All that’s left are idiots and stooges and con men of the MAGA party. When Donald Trump is gone — which won’t be long — those populist idiots and pragmatic fools will have no one to follow. Democrats will thrive. They will take more power than ever and they will push the federal government further to the radical far left than ever. When that happens, don’t just blame Trump if you’re a conservative. Blame every person who has claimed to be a conservative and has given up on principles, character and everything else that Republicans once claimed to stand for. As someone who worked as a GOP political consultant for many years, this is disgusting and disturbing to me. Those who have enabled Trump to have almost unchecked power are going to be shocked when they see what they will unleash in the long run. It’s been plain all along what this narcissistic con man is. It’s your fault that you chose to pretend not to see what he really is.

We are ruled by the dumbest and most incompetent people among us — and we have a system which allows stupid and irresponsible people to force the costs of their idiocy onto smarter and wiser people. Can we get away with that? Yes, for quite some time. But we eventually reach a point at which the dumbest of the dumb — who are habitual liars and mentally ill fools — lead us to the disasters and destruction that some of us have seen coming for years. We are approaching that point. And yet most of the idiots around us still wave their rhetorical banners of support for the evil people who are leading us to ruin — and all of them point their fingers at someone else, never noticing that their own enthusiastic support of evil is to blame. When things finally fall apart, blame yourself for your blindness to the evil, not whoever happens to be in power when it happens.

I’ve been making some changes to the site lately and there are more changes coming in the days ahead, so don’t be surprised if you some small differences. This is not a wholesale redesign, but rather the addition of some features. Since they’re smarter than I am, I’ve put Oliver and Alex in charge of the technical work, which you can see in this action photo from the control room of our media complex. I recently added a series of landing pages for readers who randomly discover the site from an Internet search. I’ve also changed the YouTube link at the top of the page to go to the new YouTube channel for video essays that reflect things I’ve already published here. (Here’s a little bit about both of the YouTube channels I’m working on.) In addition, I’m trying to move away from using Instagram, so I’m experimenting with photo plug-ins that will eventually allow me to host the pictures — cats, dogs, sunsets, whatever — that I often take. So don’t be surprised to see more changes. Thanks for your patience. Let’s hope Alex and Oliver know what they’re doing.

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