He Shot a Man in the Behind for WHAT?

We say it all the time that truth is often stranger than fiction and sometimes there are things you can't make up. Well, everyone remembers movies like Fargo and Pulp Fiction, so perhaps that's not entirely true. Because out of movies like that a scene like this one would not be all that surprising to see.

Those were some great and entertaining movies, by the way.

If you hadn't heard, there was a 64-year old Kentucy man who shot his roommate in the butt after a dispute over the roommate apparently eating the last Hot Pocket in the freezer. Yep, you heard that right. He shot his roommate in the butt for eating the last Hot Pocket in the freezer!

Beyond the clear idea that people are simply nuts these days and seem to be getting nuttier by the minute, when I read the story one thought came to mind.

There's more to this than just that last Hot Pocket.

I would actually be more interested in hearing what the back story is before this went down. Because of course there has to be one. This was not just a spur of the moment idea, "All right, Imma let him have it!" There's a lot more that has been going on in that house for a lot longer and the Hot Pocket was just the straw that broke the camel's back.

I am reminded of two stories from some years back. One where a man was cited for shooting his lawn mower after it wouldn't start. "For the last time the damn thing wouldn't start, and I'd simply had it," the man told police.

Clearly.

Still, you know, as many times as I have found myself in moments of utter frustration never once has it ever crossed my mind to pull out a gun and blow something to bits. Okay, maybe dynamite came to mind. But of course, it was just a thought. It's not like I would ever intend to actually make good on such an idea.

Well, maybe if dynamite was more readily available. I mean, if I could walk into a Menard's and the guy said, "Dynamite, aisle 6," perhaps I would more heavily consider that. But I digress.

Or take the two old men who were neighbors for something like 30 years. One day one of the men walked over to the other man and beat him to death with a spaded shovel. But, as the man said, "After 30 years of bickering back and forth and irritating each other, I'd just had enough and decided to do something about it."

There were 30-years of back story here. And even in the case of the lawn mower shooter, I am sure that mower was a thorn in that man's side long before the day he shot it. In fact, he probably had an entire garage full of menacing, maddening power tools and other equipment—that lawn mower just happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time and BLAMO! It became history.

Either way, now that the story is out, I bet that will be all we will ever hear about it. However unfortunate for inquiring minds like mine it happens to be to get the whole tale. But hey, maybe the makers of Hot Pockets can take this one to the bank and come up with a new slogan?

Hot Pockets. So good, they're worth a bullet in the ass!

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Can I Get to a Million Followers on TikTok?

Boy, that's a reach, isn't it? A million followers? I mean, it would certainly be something fun to do. Why, I could become the next big TikTok star, you know, and earn lots of money from sponsorships and maybe my fans would kick in some serious money too.

Of course, I am not nearly talented enough to pull that off. My current content is just plain, boring, goofy stuff. But I am a bit creative at times. Who knows? I could pull off a video that goes viral one of these days. 

It happens!

Granted, to be fair, it is not likely. I am just a 50-year old nobody who does a bit of writing and has a few songs I've released—none of which will have me getting my door knocked down by the Washington Post to write some articles for them or initiate getting a message from Shonda Rhimes to spin one of my songs on one of her popular TV shows.

One thing I do over there is to Go Live, and for whatever that's worth every time I do that, I tend to gain a few more followers each time. If I reach enough people perhaps it is just a matter of time before I default to that many followers?

And what about that video content? I can do a lot of stuff I suppose that could be considered at least remotely entertaining. We camp, the wife and I for example. Why not post some camping videos? Especially camping folly videos—those can actually be a bit funny. Or I can do informative things something like what I do with some of my writing.

Maybe that captures a few eyeballs?

I can see it now. Marcus Lemonis contacts me to do some Camping World ads. Or, perhaps I do some financial advice stuff and J.P. Morgan Chase contacts me—all with big money in hand of course.

Ah, the sweetness of the idea of it. Joining the ranks of some of the top paid TikTokers, raking in millions of dollars per year for their video content. Or going live and having viewers lob gobs of Galaxy gifts my way just because they like hearing me talk so much. I mean, let's not discount that a Galaxy thrown at you is worth $10 in real money, folks.

And let's face it, when it comes to the money side of things, people just gift you. And they don't even necessarily need a very good reason to do it. It's part of their fun and game with the whole thing. Even having gone live only a handful of times so far, I have already been able to rake in a whopping $15, and that's saying something since I don't feel like I have done much, if anything at all, to get it.

I was just there. Live and talking. That's it.

Besides, I am telling you, while I am close, I have been wanting to retire to the good life anyway and maybe getting to a million followers might let me do it. Even if I don't achieve the golden level of Paid Creator, with a million followers I could still walk away with a handful of potential loot simply be being gifted from people stopping in for a quick peek at what I am talking about.

In fact, someone I know made $57,000 last year just doing live events alone—he really doesn't have any videos at all, but he does have quite a few followers.

All the money stuff aside, I suppose just getting to a million followers would be enough for me. Just something as a goal to shoot for, you know? Just to see if I can actually achieve it. Just to see if a little old me is able to actually pull it off.

One never knows. Stranger things have happened, and I am not talking about the popular TV show.

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Does Anheuser-Bush CEO REALLY Get the Boycott?

Throughout this whole Dylan Mulvaney, Bud Light boycott debacle the one impression I have constantly been left with is that they just don't get it. On the surface it may appear they are trying to appease the customer base they've pissed off, no doubt. Why wouldn't you want to? This whole issue has cost the company billions of dollars and sales continue to plummet. But are they really?

Meanwhile, conservatives are standing their ground and don't seem to want to relent. At least not yet.

I have even suggested perhaps the boycott should contine despite what the company does since I feel it would have more of an impact to warn other companies that forcing woke culture on its customers is not going to be a good business plan. It is something, I feel, needs to be understood and clearly.

In other words, if companies feel there will be an easy out and only some short-term pain there will be nothing to stop them from considering doing it anyway despite what their customers want or think. They'll just price in the losses.

The latest earnings call with shareholders lead by Anheuser-Busch CEO Michel Doukeris only confirms to me that they continue to not get it. In his comments he didn't really do much to really address how they made their customers feel. In fact, in a way, his comments actually only continued to scold customers. From the first response spokespeople offered that in so many words suggested customers need to just suck it up and be inclusive, to now suggesting customers are hurting "our people and especially our front-line workers."

The latter is true, of course. However, it's not up to the customers to make sure that employee's go home happy with paychecks to feed their families. And that's not to say I have no sympathy for employees or anyone else who may be impacted negatively by the boycott. But ultimately, no one is to blame for any impact but the company itself who made the decision to ignore their customers or to assume their customers would just toe-the-line and not care what kind of marketing the company wanted to do.

In his commentary, the CEO also sort of distanced himself a bit from any responsibility saying essentially, "This was the result of one camp—it was one post, not a formal campaign or advertisements."

Regardless of any of that, when it comes to CEO's, the buck really does stop at their desk and they are ultimately responsible for all things that the company does, including marketing. And let's not forget that no one was ultimately fired for anything. In their words, it was simply a matter of leaves of absense and a little reorganizing of marketing teams. Frankly, and many people caught on to this, that was just a way to make the appearance they were taking things seriously and doing something about it.

But of course, the way it felt was that they did it in a kinda sorta way that seemed to be more of an attempt to "test the customers" and see if it might be enough to backtrack than actually coming out having to admit directly they did anything wrong.

What it feels like to anyone who is following this whole affair, and to anyone who continues to ban Anheuser-Bush drinks from their shopping lists, is that they just want to skirt the issue rather than to actually address customer concerns.

I think that will continue to hurt them. The problem is, and everyone knows it, is that they are still wanting to appease the one group that doesn't really actually matter. The LGBTQ community. Because they only represent about 1% of the population. And they are an even smaller base of their core customers. Because if one thing is true, it's that advocacy groups don't care about companies. They don't care about jobs. They don't care who buys the products. The bottom line is they only care about their cause and the rest of us be damned or pay the consequences if we don't fall in line with what their demands are. And they continue to place heavy pressure on companies like Anheuser-Busch to not back down from their demands and simply ignore their customers and continue to have them force-feed their woke culture come hell or high water.

Doukeris ended his call by saying, "We will continue to learn, meet the moment, and come out stronger, and work tirelessly to do what we do best: Bring people together over a beer and creating a future of more cheers."

In other words, they didn't learn anything because they haven't really signaled they have. They are not meeting the moment, because as of this moment customers have made it clear we are not interested in woke marketing of any kind. And they are not working tirelessly to do anything but try to save their brand while at the same time forcing upon customers "inclusivity" when they say "bring people together."

I grant they are wanting to be careful. But at the same time, what customers are demanding right now is that they (Anheuser-Busch) simply admit that marketing to a 1% group of people forcing down a nation's throat a culture very few people agree with is not being inclusive at all but is rather alienating an entire majority segment of the population and making them out to be the bad guy.

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