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David McElroy

making sense of a dysfunctional culture

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Smallest ray of hope can make us feel a change we need is coming

By David McElroy · July 14, 2019

The physical space around me is almost always a reflection of how happy I am.

When I’m unhappy and feeling lost, my house becomes a wreck. I don’t clean much. I don’t pick up after myself. Before long, it looks as though I live in a place where there’s been a tornado.

When I’m happy and feeling loved, my habits are entirely different. I’ll happily keep things fairly neat and clean, at least by my standards. When my heart is happy, I keep things looking decent, which satisfies my mind’s need for order — and that reinforces my happiness.

I haven’t been cleaning the house much lately, so it’s been a mess.

But for the past few hours, I’ve been cleaning. I’ve been sweeping and vacuuming and filling bags of trash. (Lucy and the cats still hate the vacuum cleaner.) Late Saturday night, I looked around and realized it was time for change, so I launched into a cleaning spree that might take all night.

Why? The only explanation is that I suddenly had a vision of something powerful — something that I need — which suddenly seemed real and possible.

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Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: cleaning, community, family, happiness, love

Goodbye, Anne (2009-2019)

By David McElroy · July 11, 2019

On June 23, 2009, Molly gave birth to four kittens. They were tiny and always seemed sickly. Sometime Thursday, the last one of them died. Anne was the only one to make it to 10 years old.

A couple of weeks after their birth, one of the kittens died without an explanation, but three of them lived to become Charlotte, Emily and Anne. They loved to sleep on books, so they were named for the writing Brontë sisters.

In 2015, Emily became the first of the sisters to die, with no explanation. In 2016, Charlotte died, too, again with no warning or explanation. Their remaining sister, Anne, died while I was gone to work today. She seemed perfectly fine this morning, but she was cold and still when I arrived home.

There seems to have been something tragic in the genes of that family, because their Aunt Bessie — named for my own Great Aunt Bessie — died without explanation or warning last year.

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Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: animals, cats, death

Pursuit of perfection leaves me feeling shame when I’m flawed

By David McElroy · July 11, 2019

I’m terrified of not being perfect.

Admitting that scares me. Talking about the concept makes me look around to make sure nobody is listening. I don’t want to talk about it, because I know my beliefs about it are contradictory and self-defeating. It’s even worse to admit this to you.

I found out Wednesday night that I made a mistake at work last month. I sent a couple thousand dollars that should have gone to one company to somebody else instead. I’ll go over a transaction in detail at the office tomorrow to be sure, but I’m almost positive I screwed something up.

The problem can be fixed, so nobody’s going to lose any money, but I am humiliated. It happened because we don’t have adequate controls in place for this one particular thing, but I’m still the one who failed to handle this one transaction in a different way.

You see, I’m not supposed to make mistakes. Never.

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Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: family, father, perfectionism, psychology

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Future Photo Display

As part of my effort to rid my life of social media, I will no longer display links to my two Instagram accounts here. Those accounts will be dormant for the time being and will eventually be deleted. I plan to have a method for displaying photos here instead, but the solutions I’ve tested so far have been disappointing. I’m still working on it.

My Instagram

Sunset, Leeds, Alabama — August 27, 2026 Sunset, Leeds, Alabama — August 27, 2026
Sunset, Leeds, Alabama — August 19, 2026 Sunset, Leeds, Alabama — August 19, 2026
When I got home at midnight Monday, I was doing so When I got home at midnight Monday, I was doing some work in the studio and Oliver wanted to join me, so I showed him around to acclimate him to the place again. He rarely goes in there, but I have pictures of him in that studio on the night I brought him home as a kitten. 😺
Earlier this week, I found two photos of Lucy and Earlier this week, I found two photos of Lucy and me that I had never seen. I loved finding the pictures, but seeing these photos left me thinking about the effect it has on us when we lose an animal we love — and it was also a reminder of how much my life has changed for the last nine months it’s been since I lost her. I wrote an essay about this. You can find it as the most recent post at davidmcelroy.org right now if you’re interested. I really do miss this sweet girl.
When I take lightning pictures, I’m always hoping When I take lightning pictures, I’m always hoping to get just one usable photo, but I got two dramatic images tonight. You might recognize the water tower and communication tower that you’ve seen in many of my sunset photos. This is about a mile from my house in Leeds, which is just east of Birmingham.
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
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This little guy is confused — and I don’t blame hi This little guy is confused — and I don’t blame him. This is presumably his first night inside a house, so everything is new to him, including the smells and noises. He keeps coming to me to ask to be picked up, at which point he purrs hard, but then he quickly decides he wants down. But once I put him down, he demands to be picked up again. He seems to be trying to decide what to think about this bizarre development. As I told him earlier, I would be just as confused and concerned if I were suddenly removed from the environment I’d always known and held against my will. I suspect he’ll be happy with the long-run results, but I feel bad for him tonight.
If all goes according to schedule, the stray tuxed If all goes according to schedule, the stray tuxedo cat will be going to my vet for an evaluation Tuesday. He’s in the house this evening for some more acclimation to the environment — separated from my other three cats, of course — and he seems cautious but reasonably happy so far.
From the CritterCam: Early Sunday afternoon, Sam w From the CritterCam: Early Sunday afternoon, Sam was asleep in the cat bad on my desk and Alex was sleeping on the desk next to him when some noise outside the side of the house caught their attention.
From the CritterCam: I’ve really been seeing Sam’s From the CritterCam: I’ve really been seeing Sam’s confidence grow lately and that makes me happy. The webcam caught this video tonight that shows Alex asleep in a cat bed on my desk when Sam decided he wanted the same bed. Sam got part of the way into the bed, waiting until Alex decided to strike back — and then he chased Alex out of the spot and went to sleep. This was originally about three minutes long, and I cut out the dead parts to make it slightly more than a minute. Sam has been totally intimidated of the other two for most of the last two years, so this is new.
The stray tuxedo cat is hanging out inside my hous The stray tuxedo cat is hanging out inside my house again Friday evening. My current plan is to take him to my vet Tuesday — after Labor Day Monday — and then start the process of acclimating him to my cats. Those three are not going to be happy campers, but it should end well eventually.
Alex is on his way home from the vet, where he had Alex is on his way home from the vet, where he had his annual shots. He didn’t like it any more than his brothers did Tuesday.
Late Tuesday night, Oliver is finally starting to Late Tuesday night, Oliver is finally starting to forgive me for taking him to the vet for his annual shots today.
At the vet’s office Tuesday, I met a sweet woman w At the vet’s office Tuesday, I met a sweet woman who recently rescued this tiny kitten. Her dog — who was also there for shots — seemed to love the kitten and was protective of her. (She named the kitten Dot after her late mother.) I loved watching the kitten crawl all over the woman. 😺
From the CritterCam: Since Alex didn’t make it on From the CritterCam: Since Alex didn’t make it on this trip to the vet, he’s at home by himself just hanging out on the cat bed on my desk.
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Briefly

It hasn’t happened yet, but there’s a possibility that I might be taking in a fourth feline. A couple of months ago, a cat-loving neighbor asked whether I’d seen a “tuxedo cat” hanging out in the neighborhood. I hadn’t, but this guy eventually wandered past my house a few weeks later — and we haven’t been able to find evidence that he has a home. I’ve been giving him water and food for the last week and he finally let me pet him two nights ago. He’s purred for me two nights in a row and he let me take a low-quality selfie with him Thursday night. Tonight, though, he let me pick him up and bring him inside to look around. This went surprisingly well, as you can see from this photo. I don’t know whether he’ll be joining the family, but I’m certain that Alex, Oliver and Sam would vote no, at least until they get to know him. I’m trying to make certain he doesn’t have a home, but if he does join us, what do you suppose his name will be?

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.

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