24/7 Wall Street has published a list of cities with the worst traffic in the USA.

As you may have guessed from reading this blog, this is a subject on which I have very strong feelings. So, naturally, I can't just let this list blow by without commenting. In order to get the ball rolling, I'll just publish my list and discuss entries on their list after. Because I have some serious disagreements. Their only metric is "lost time due to traffic delays" which is a worthy way of looking at it, but I'd argue that an overall statistic is too general to be useful in specific circumstances. If I'm sitting in traffic I'm not thinking "Thank heavens I'm not in Chicago where traffic is worse" because my driving experience in Chicago is specific, not general. Based on my experience, here's my Top 15 (they did 32 cities for some reason)

1. Atlanta (24/7 Rank: 10)
   Here is a classic example of their list's "general timing" being bizarre to me. Because to find traffic worse than Atlanta on my list, I would have to go International. Atlanta is hands-down, without-a-doubt the worst traffic I have encountered in the USA. I remember very well approaching Atlanta from the East Coast only to run into traffic so bad that it took over an hour to get through what should have taken ten minutes. And within the city itself, driving anywhere means you are just fucked. It takes forever to get anywhere. Even if you circumnavigate the city center. From the airport? Fucked. Heading to Marietta? Fucked. There is no way to navigate anywhere near Atlanta without getting fucked.
2. Los Angeles (24/7 Rank: 7)
   The fact that L.A. doesn't appear until the #7 slot makes me dubious about the list to begin with. I'm not questioning that the data is accurate, but I am questioning how it applies to actual people and their driving experience. As anybody who has ever driven in L.A. (or tried to get out of L.A.) will tell you, traffic is a nightmare without end. I have driven from LAX up to The Valley and honest-to-God felt as though I was caught in some kind of time warp where time slows to a crawl. I used to have to drive from Santa Monica down to Anaheim/Santa Ana and would end up screaming... not at anybody in particular, just out of general frustration. I may have taken my driving lessons in Central Washington, but I didn't really learn to drive until I was working in L.A. regularly in the 90's. Traffic has only gotten worse.
3. New York (24/7 Rank: 3)
   Despite the fact that NYC is in the #3 spot, New York is actually not that terrible to get around in. So long as you are using public transport! But if you attempt to drive in any of the five boroughs, you're 100% fucked. I used to drive from whatever airport I arrived in to Manhattan because I often needed to go out of the city on my work trips. I gave up on my fourth trip. I take public transportation out of the city, then rent a car from there. It saves my sanity.
4. Seattle (24/7 Rank: 10)
   Seattle is surrounded on three sides by water. So there is no "ring road" to get around it... and any attempt to get around it by driving around the East Side is an exercise in futility because it's equally bad over there. Couple that with the fact that the streets are always torn up somewhere or other, and the horrific traffic is multiplied to an insane degree. Of all the cities on this list, I drive in Seattle the most often. My breath is taken away every time, because it's just so horrifically bad. Everywhere.
5. Chicago (24/7 Rank: 1)
   Maybe it's because most times I just take the el (elevated train) to get around and only really drive to get to the city from the airport when a car is required, but I don't get the #1 ranking. Even when I do drive within Chicago, it's always seems like normal big-city traffic and not some insurmountable beast. That being said... from the experience I have had driving, I get it. Nothing quite like hitting the same light three and four times to make your blood boil.
6. Boston (24/7 Rank: 2)
   Boston is a very old city which is a massive mess to navigate. For years I would arrive at the airport and drive up to Maine because flying direct into Portland was too expensive, and each time I would be stuck in ungodly traffic even though I was nowhere near central Boston. And God help you if you actually do need to drive in Boston proper because the traffic is a never-ending source of angst. Whenever I would have to navigate the old street layouts and ridiculous routes needed (all while trying to avoid potholes) my anxiety would escalate. I was exhausted at the end of the trip even though it technically "wasn't that terrible." Even so, I don't get the #2 ranking here. If you're a smart driver that can handle it, Boston is far better than Seattle of L.A. to navigate.
7. Miami (24/7 Rank: 5)
   This is one of those cities where your experience very much depends on where you're driving. If you're driving from South Beach to Little Havana, let's say... yeah. The number of cars on the road is absurd. And while that's true for the rest of the city as well, it's to varying degrees. When I was driving from Miami to Palmetto Bay every year in the 90's I didn't think it was all that bad. Maybe it's far worse now? But you could say that about everywhere.
8. San Francisco (24/7 Rank: 6)
   I have driven in San Francisco the second most on this list after Seattle. Yes, the traffic is bad. Yes, navigating the city can be baffling. Yes, there is construction often. Yes, people can be jerks. But traffic-wise? It's busy, but not to the extent of most big cities. Maybe it just seems that way because it's fairly compact? Like Seattle, the city is surrounded by water on three sides, which makes it impossible to improve things much, but driving the Bay Area never caused me more anxiety than the cities above.
9. Washington D.C. (24/7 Rank: 8)
   Yeah... it's pretty bad. But not as bad as it could be if you know the streets to avoid. Some of it is, of course, unavoidable, but I've been all over D.C. and just don't find it to be bad enough for the #8 ranking. Seattle, San Francisco, and Atlanta are exponentially worse in my experience. It's been six years since I've driven there, so maybe it's gotten a lot worse... but what cities haven't gotten much worse?
10. Philadelphia (24/7 Rank: 4)
    Philly traffic got so frustrating to me that I ended up refusing to drive there, and stopped renting cars because my blood pressure would become so elevated that I considered it a health risk. So I totally understand it landing in the #4 spot. That being said... worse than Atlanta?!?? Are you kidding me? Philadelphia has serious problems when it comes to traffic, but it's an absolute cakewalk compared to Atlanta! For one thing, navigation doesn't seem to be as bad, which maybe makes the traffic not seem so bad to me. I don't know. But the fact I refuse to drive in the city and use taxis/public transport is still very telling.
11. Houston (24/7 Rank: 11)
    Houston is problematic to me in so many ways... but the traffic doesn't even rank in the top five reasons I am not thrilled to have to go there. But it is still a very large problem. Most times when I am in Houston for work, I have to drive out to some location in the burbs, and getting in and out of the city makes that a problem because the roads are jammed at all the wrong times. Many times I will just circumnavigate the horrors of downtown to get from the airport to my destination, but then if you want to experience the many terrific restaurants in the city, you have a choice to make. Do I really want to have a Hillstone veggie burger that bad? Unfortunately, the answer is most often "yes," and the fact that the restaurant is not even in the worst traffic in Houston won't save you because it's still bad. And don't get me started on the parking. San Francisco is the absolute worst... don't ask my why Houston is nearly as bad. I honestly don't understand it. Maybe I hang out at all the wrong places?
12. New Orleans (24/7 Rank: 9)
    Driving in New Orleans can absolutely test your patience. Especially if you're foolish enough to attempt to drive through the tourist-heavy regions like The French Quarter. My most hated drive, however, is the one to and from the airport. Not sure why they can't do something to improve this... probably a question of money... but I would have a much more favorable impression of the city if this route weren't so dang slow.
13. Portland (24/7 Rank: 13)
    This is highly dependent on where you are driving. The outskirts of the city are usually not that bad, but anywhere else... especially from the airport... can be a serious challenge. Oddly enough, the city proper is hit-or-miss, and many times I've driven it weren't terrible at all. This is also time-dependent, I think. But, yeah, rush hour is a mess and there is some weirdness to navigate certain areas, so it's understandable how traffic can seriously put a damper on your transit times.
14. San Diego (24/7 Rank: 18)
    It's not just San Diego proper... it's the entire region. To the South is a mess because there's border traffic. To the north is a mess because there's limited corridors and popular cities like La Jolla and Del Mar are there (not to mention Los Angeles!). Going East isn't quite as bad (I had work in Spring Valley that I'd drive to)... but the rest? Disastrous. And I don't truly understand why that is. Sure there's a lot of people and it's between to high-traffic destinations, but even in the city proper it can take a long time to really get anywhere. I've drive in San Diego more times than I can count and found traffic to be a problem most every time. Maybe it's just California?
15. Austin (24/7 Rank: 17)
    Not only can Austin be a complete bear to navigate, but the public transportation is fucked. I have had busses blow past me many times despite the stop being on their route. Not just once... many times. It seems as though drivers only stop if there's enough people waiting to be worth their time? I have no idea. When it comes to driving Austin proper, it probably doesn't actually deserve my final spot... it's busy but not prohibitively so... but I'm putting here anyway because the busses piss me off that much.

One of these days I should make a list that includes foreign cities. But I don't know that my heart could handle even the memory of some of these places!

I think I've written a few times about my love for the Yes Theory YouTube channel.

I can't remember where I first heard of it. In all likelihood somebody via the internet... probably even a total stranger... who contacted me through this blog. They see that I loved traveling the world and meeting new people and discovering new things and said something like "You should really check out Yes Theory on YouTube". And so I did. This was many years ago, and I've watched everything they've ever released.

And the members of Yes Theory have meant the world to me. Because they don't just want you to watch, they invite you into their lives and you get to experience everything with them. It hasn't always been an easy road, and there have been many changes over the years.

Which is why this reunion video is so incredibly special to me...

The way Yes Theory looks at the world is how I want the world to be.

I cannot wait to see what happens next.

And if you're looking for a massive dose of positivity in your life, I highly recommend checking out their channel. But be forewarned... if you are remotely human, those videos are addictive. You cannot watch just one.

Not so long ago I noted how strange it is to hear about tragedy in a place I've been on Facebook.

Since I've been to a lot of places on this earth, this seems to happen more and more often.

Not so long ago I posted this:

And now this...

For around a decade I had work taking me to Lisbon, Maine.

Twice a year I would fly into Portland then drive up to the city of Auburn, where I always stayed at the Hilton Garden Inn. It's a nice, reasonably-priced location overlooking the Androscoggin River. The region is home to some very nice people (including those that I worked with), and has interesting eateries across the river I enjoyed like She Doesn't Like Guthries and Pedro O’Hara’s*, a Mexican-Irish restaurant.

Also across the river? The city of Lewiston.

If you've been watching the news since Wednesday night, you know why this has been haunting me.

A single shooter with an assault rifle mass-murdered 18 people in two locations in Lewiston, Maine. Needless to say, I had a rough night followed by two rough days wondering if anybody I know was hurt or killed. As of now I am still wondering because I can't bring myself to email anybody to find out. They have enough to deal with, as the shooter is still at large.

This fucking sucks.

My post about Bangkok was 23 days ago. I didn't even have a month to get over that before this happens. And that's just places I am familiar with. There's loads upon loads upon loads of places going through exactly this kind of thing week by week. And I'm mortified that it's just become background noise to me.

Until it's not in the background. Like Lewiston, Maine.

Lewiston may be the second-largest city in Maine after Portland, but it's not a big city. The first shooting at a children's league bowling alley event is just next door to a restaurant I liked. The second shooting at a cornhole competition even bar & grill is just down the street from a McDonald's that I stopped at for breakfast dozens of times. So, yeah, you might say I'm familiar with the area where the shootings occurred. An area where on Wednesday night people were just living their lives, never knowing that 18 of them would end up dead with even more injured.

Which is all kinds of fucked up. Especially when now-a-days you can't even say you're sad that 18 people were murdered without being told you're "anti-gun" or "woke" or whatever other bullshit labels get hurled by assholes lacking any sense of empathy, decency, or compassion. Something I'm getting used to, despite it never making any sense.

Not that anything surrounding mass-murder ever could.

---

*Sadly, Pedro O'Hara's closed in 2021.

As I was driving over the mountains for the Peter Gabriel concert with Jester, a big pickup came roaring up behind me. I was in the passing lane, but I was... A) Actually passing somebody, and B) Wasn't going under the speed limit... so there was no cause for him grinding on my bumper. The speed limit was 70mph, I was passing at 75mph. As what usually happens, the person I was passing increased their speed, which meant I had to increase mine to 80mph... then finally 85mph just so I could finally pass them and get that truck off my ass.

The minute I pulled right again, the truck went blasting past me. Probably flipping me off in the process, because isn't that what these aggressive asshole drivers do? Even when I wasn't doing anything wrong (except exceeding the speed limit so he would get off my ass).

But then?

Sweet Justice.

As we rounded the next corner an unmarked police car was pulling off the side of the road with lights blaring.

And sure enough, I caught up to the pickup that was likely going 90mph as he was pulled over.

Ultimately I don't give a shit if somebody wants to exceed the speed limit (although I think that 20mph over the limit is probably too dangerous a speed to be going). Heck, I bounce around 5mph over myself. But holy crap... is it really necessary to terrorize people on the road to do it? It's not like I was driving in the passing lane under the speed limit and not passing anybody! I was using the lane as it was designed to be used!

Oh well. Assholes will be assholes and all that.

Don't worry about all my looming deadlines at work, I still have time for you, dear reader... because an all new Bullet Sunday starts... now...

   
• The Bicycle Thief! All this pupper wanted was some pets... even if it was from a bicycle thief...

I hope that the dog didn't run away. That would be worse than losing a bike because your automated garage door opener (likely) screwed up (it's happened to me).

   
• Cat Coaster! I can't get enough of this (here's a link in case Instagram is being a dick)...

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by meow addictzz (100K) (@meow_addictzz)

I wonder if, from the cat's viewpoint, they feel like this is the real deal? And that has me wondering if it's traumatizing. Though I suppose they could alway jump out.

   
• Virus! Yeah... I'll take all the vaccinations. All of them. SCIENCE, BITCHES!

Even that might be enough to save me, but at least I can say I tried.

   
• Strange New Gorn! Despite a bit of a continuity problem when it comes to the Gorn, the second season finale for Star Trek: Strange New Worlds was incredible...

My mind is still boggling at the thought that this is my favorite Star Trek now. I never, ever thought that anything would eclipse the original series for me.

   
• Florida? The repugnant shit going on in Florida to teach kids that slavery was a good thing because enslaved people learned “job skills” that could be used after emancipation can be easily refuted. But this gentleman vividly illustrates why it’s a bullshit concept that doesn’t deserve any consideration (here's a link in case TikTok is being a dick)...

@garrisonhayes

Florida’s efforts to rewrite, redeem and santize the worst parts of American history *for white comfort* is exhausting. Here’s why, from Tennessee.

♬ original sound - Garrison Hayes

Fuck FOX “News” and their white suprematist agenda forever.

   
• Rao No! Well, shit. Campbell's Soup bought Rao's Homemade sauces. Guess we can kiss that brand goodbye. Like every other great brand that gets bought by a mega-corp, Campbell's is most certainly going to fuck up the recipe with cheaper ingredients so they can squeeze more money out of it. The way Kraft fucked up Boca Burger is still very fresh in my mind. It was good while it lasted, I guess.

If there's one thing you can count on, it's that companies with billions of dollars to throw around will ruin the brands they absorb, despite them always saying "We won't change a thing!" Because do you know how many times this has been promised? Current CEO of Campbell's says "WE WON'T CHANGE THE RECIPE!!!" But then he gets replaced or fired and the new CEO is all "WE MUST USE CHEAPER INGREDIENTS TO GET MORE PROFITS!" and then it's "WE ARE CHANGING THE RECIPE TO REFLECT CURRENT TRENDS" or some such bullshit. I do not believe it for one second. Not one. This has happened an astronomical number of times with a crazy number of brands. Profits are always the focus of these huge companies. ALWAYS. Maintaining the integrity of Rao's isn't the priority. It's a short game to buy the brand and squeeze as much money out of it as they can before they ruin it. And then they're on to the next beloved brand.

   
• RUINED!!! I had to step away from my TikTok "For You Page" for a while, because people who "Had their Maui vacation ruined!" or "Had their Maui wedding ruined!" or what the fuck ever were enraging me to entirely new levels. There was a "social media coach" bitching because her 25th birthday to Honolulu was ruined when her flight was cancelled... SO SHE WENT TO MAUI... and took away much needed resources from people trying to survive the fires. I’m amazed... but not surprised at these assholes. This guy says what I’ve been thinking (here's a link in case TikTok is being a dick)...

@thomas_thevillain_bishop #Inverted it’s not about you. It’s about survival.#fyp #thevillainsguild ♬ original sound - Thomas Bishop

Sorry about your vacation... but there are people still missing. Have some perspective for crying out loud.

   
And that's a wrap on bullets.

I did not sleep much last night.

My head was overwhelmed by the fire in Lahaina (which I talked about yesterday), and I kept grabbing my phone off the nightstand to see if there was any news. Which there really wasn't. Just a few minor updates and repeating the same news over and over.

This afternoon more information started to trickle into the newsfeeds. Apparently the fires are either out... or at least contained... and photos of the devastation are being released. It's a sobering sight to see almost the entirety of a city wiped off the map... and profoundly sad to so many, including myself...

Photo by Richard Olsten/AFP/Getty Images

   
I had mentioned yesterday how heartbroken I was over the 150-year-old Banyan tree which was brought from India and planted in 1873 when it was only 8-feet tall. Eventually it grew and spread to cover an entire city block.

Miraculously, at least some of it seems to have survived. Whether or not it can actually be revived I have no idea, but it would be amazing if at least part of it can be salvaged and allowed to grow out to its former glory...

Photo by Rick Bowmer/AP

Down on the street, things look much more grim for the poor thing, but people have come forward to say that banyan trees are tough to kill, so nobody should be giving up hope just yet...

Photo by Patrick T. Fallon/AFP/Getty Images

I dunno if I'll sleep any better tonight... but at least there's a little hope to cling to, and that ain't nothin'.

I'm just gutted today.

This morning when I woke up at 5:30am I had a lot of emails with a lot of work attached to them. I set to the tasks at hand and only stopped long enough to feed the cats at 7:00am. 49 minutes later, I got a text telling me that Lahaina, Maui, Hawaii was on fire. And not just a little on fire... a lot on fire. The flames had started to invade downtown along Front Street, and many of the historic buildings were being destroyed.

The news only got worse as the day went on.

The first time I visited Lahaina was in 1987 with friends...

And, up until it caught fire, it never changed that much.

Sure, over the years different businesses have come and gone from the city. Including "Longhi's"... an Italian restaurant with a verbal menu that I loved (and was very sad to have seen closed). And the first Hard Rock Cafe I've ever been to (and was also very sad to have seen closed)...

But, by and large, the one thing you could count on is that Lahaina would be much as you remembered it. I was trying to count up how many times I've been to Maui, and I think it ended up being eleven or twelve times. And I walked down Front Street of Old Lahaina Town at least once every trip. It was a tourist trap for sure, but the restaurants and galleries and shops kept taking me back.

I have a lot of great memories with my friends from the city. And some great memories with my mom as well (I took her along on a couple business trips to Honolulu where we diverted to Maui for a quick vacation). She love poking around Lahaina... and loved eating at "Cheeseburgers in Paradise"...

And I'm trying to wrap my ahead around the fact that it's likely all gone. The historic buildings. The many homes. The shops. The restaurants. The galleries. All of it. And that's really difficult for me to accept.

But it's more than that.

Lahaina is home to a massive banyan tree... one of the largest in the United States. It was brought to Lahaina from India in 1873 and just kept growing and growing. Which means it's been a fixture in the city for 150 years...

Survived 150 years, and is likely gone. Just gone.

I've studied photos of the devastation, but either the tree has been utterly wiped from existence or I'm looking in the wrong place. But, in my defense, it's almost impossible to know what I'm looking at despite having been to the city over a dozen times.

This is a nightmare scenario. But a bigger nightmare could be to come. When they rebuild the city, are they going to try and recapture the charm and uniqueness of the structures? Or will everything be replaced by a bunch of cookie-cutter buildings, condos, and strip malls that destroy the city again?

Time will tell.

As it always does.

I don't know what's going on with me. My energy is at an all-time low this week.

Which is to say that I have been watching a lot of YouTube videos. Including the entire back-catalog of Eddy Burback videos. One of which is him and another YouTuber driving to every Rainforest Cafe in North America. Of which there are a lot fewer left than I remember.

It's pretty funny...

And this got me to thinking... how many of these things have I been to? They were never a destination to me. Most time I went to one was because I was in town and noticed it, or (more likely) I was in town to visit a Hard Rock Cafe and it was nearby.

Anyway, here's the list I came up with...

• Anaheim, California (Downtown Disney) - CLOSED!
• Atlantic City, New Jersey
• Bay Lake, Florida (Animal Kingdom)
• Bloomington, Minnesota (Mall of America)
• Chicago, Illinois - CLOSED!
• Costa Mesa, California - CLOSED!
• Denver, Colorado - CLOSED!
• Gurnee, Illinois
• Houston, Texas - CLOSED!
• Kowloon, Hong Kong - CLOSED!
• Lake Buena Vista, Florida (Disney Springs)
• Las Vegas, Nevada
• Las Vegas, Nevada (MGM Grand Hotel) - CLOSED!
• London, England - CLOSED!
• Nashville, Tennessee
• Niagara Falls, Ontario, Canada
• Philadelphia, Pennsylvania - CLOSED
• Sunrise, Florida (Sawgrass Mills)
• San Antonio, Texas
• San Francisco, California (Fisherman's Wharf) - CLOSED!
• Toronto, Ontario (Yorkdale) - CLOSED!
• Tukwila, Washington - CLOSED!

Wowzers. Twenty-two? That's a lot.

And I think that I ate something at all of them except the London and Costa Mesa locations. In both of those cases, my time was limited and I had Hard Rocks and Planet Hollywoods to visit.

Priorities.

I'm burnt, y'all.

It was the annual Fabulous Fourth Weekend Float for my friends and I. This year our Summer came early, so the creek and river were lower than usual. This made it a little tough to go through spots, but it was still a fun float in the end.

How it started...

How it ended... Note that I put on two coats of sun screen, but still got royally burnt...

As usual, there were plenty of awesome dogs floating as well. I never get tired of seeing dogs in life preservers...

And there were a lot of duckies out too...

So... yeah! Another great float in the bag. Even though I'm so wiped from being out in the sun that I think I'm good for the year.

Not that it matters much given how low the river is.

Recovering from being deathly sick has never been more fun... because an all new Bullet Sunday starts... now...

   
• Toast! Awww... my little Toast nightlight arrived!

It's a nightlight that I put in the dark corner of my kitchen next to my toaster. Get it?

   
• Buses? These captchas are getting frickin' stupid ridiculous...

So what? Now we're just supposed to be clicking on every fucking square on these idiotic things?

   
• Good Omens 2! This looks even better than the first one. The casting was note-perfect for these characters, and seeing more of them is something I am very much looking forward to...

It's weird how flawless the casting was for these.

   
• Schlage Rage! It went something like this...
ME: "I hate my Schlage Sense smart lock SO much. Flames... flames... on the side of my face... Which lock should I get to replace it? Preferably one with HomeKey."
HOMEKIT FORUM MEMBER: "Definitely the Schlage Encode Plus."
ME: "IS THIS SOME KIND OF JOKE?!? I hate hate HATE the Schlage I have now!"
HOMEKIT FORUM MEMBER: "I understand. I agree. But know that all the bad things on the Sense have been improved one thousand percent on the Encode Plus. And be sure to get the Plus if you want HomeKey."
OTHER HOMEKIT FORUM MEMBERS: "Hard agree!"
ME: "Just so you know, if I hate this lock I am coming back to haunt all of you."

And... they were absolutely right. No more stupid battery pack cable. No more stupid setup fails. No more stupid "lock not found." No more stupid random lock resets. No more stupid random lock cycling. No more stupid HomeKit disconnects. It's an entirely new product. So good on Schlage for listening and improving, I guess. Doesn't change the fact that they unleashed a shitty product that I've been suffering with for seven years though.

   
• Hilarious! Zuckerberg on Apple Pro Vision: "Our vision for the metaverse and presence is fundamentally social. It’s about people interacting in new ways and feeling closer in new ways. Our device is also about being active and doing things. By contrast, every demo that they showed was a person sitting on a couch by themself. I mean, that could be the vision of the future of computing, but like, it’s not the one that I want." This is the stupidest fucking thing I've heard this week. How many times have a GROUP OF PEOPLE all put on their Facebook Quest VR goggles and sat around interacting in the same room? Nah, buddy. They're sitting alone on the couch! How is the Facebook headset more "social" when you're wandering around as a cartoon floating torso that's always gripping hand controllers? Apple at least went with uncanny valley avatars that attempt to look like you and leave your hands free...

Apple's take will cost HUGE MONEY... to start... but it will get cheaper over time. Facebook, who has lost millions (billions?) trying to do VR... and ultimately failing... shows Zuck's statement for what it is... fear. And bullshit. I'm not sure ANY of this is the "future I want." But I'd take Apple's vision over Facebook any day.

   
• Crossing the Street in Vietnam! Not a lie. Which would have been fine... except I had my mom with me, and most intersections are far busier than this one! I'll never forget the first time we went to cross a street. The intersection actually had a crosswalk signal (many don't). But it was totally ignored. We had the light but it made no difference at all... you're just expected to cross like this...

@travelwithpat Crossing the street in Vietnam is something you need to prepare to do #travel #vietnam #tiktoktravel ♬ Super Mario Bros Main Theme

But still... it's s country like no other and worth a visit. As is this guy's TikTok.

   
• Church & State? Okay, government funded Christian schools are a thing now... so are they going to also fund Muslim schools? Buddhist schools? Hindu schools? So much FOR FUCKING SEPARATION OF CHURCH AND STATE!! This is a big slap in the face to all Americans, even if they consider themselves "Christian." Absolutely outrageous. Can't wait until the government is forced to sponsor Church of Satan schools because they're so fucking stupid that they don't have the fist clue about the can of worms they are opening. Jesus. OR NOT. THAT'S *YOUR* FUCKING CHOICE IN THIS COUNTRY!!!

   
And now I guess I had better make my bed, take a shower, and try and get some sleep .