Civil War Reenactors Arrested In Gettysburg

Gettysburg, PA Dec 30, 2018: A group of Civil War re-enactors, attempting to get the jump on the 158^th Year Anniversary of the Civil War caused considerable damage in the Town of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania this week when rowdiness fueled by alcohol and lingering hostilities caused events to spiral out of control and eventually led to the shooting of a local man. Police in Gettysburg released a statement Thursday night that the situation was now under control but warned residents to stay inside while police continued to scour the streets in search of any remaining combatants.

“This whole thing just seemed odd from the start,” said Amy Soffy, a local historian. “First off the original battle was actually fought in July and these groups were attempting to reenact the battles in the snow and mud of December. Really, the whole town is a mess right now, mud and debris everywhere, there were thousands of these guys participating in this,” added Soffy.

Things started out fine with thousands of participants coming into town and filling the restaurants and hotels. There were only a few isolated incidents on the first day of the reenactment which took place on Tuesday. Mostly it was just a bunch of these clowns dressed up and running around in their costumes pretending to be Civil War soldiers, said Gettysburg Police Chief Joe Weissbard. One of the incidents on Tuesday allegedly involved three Confederate soldiers who were in the 7-11 store on Hawthorne Street buying Keystone Lottery tickets when a customer yelled something about the Confederacy sucking. One of the soldiers fired back calling the man an asshole and telling him it was a reenactment. Things escalated and one of the soldiers hit the man in the face with his cell phone according to witnesses. “It seemed really odd when that guy pulled out his cell phone and hit the man in the face,” said eye witness Allison Davies. “These 3 guys were all dressed up in period costumes right down to the buttons and suddenly this guy yanks out a cell phone and smashed the fat bald guy in the face.” When interviewed by police after his arrest, Chad Landon from Richmond, Virginia said that he was supposed to have been killed on Culp’s Hill that afternoon but they were lying there in the snow for 8 hours and eventually got bored so one of the other dead guys suggested we get some Slurpees and lottery tickets and then this guy inside the store started messing with us.” 

The Confederate camp was located near Cemetery Ridge. That first night at the encampment was great. Several women from Philadelphia came over wearing bonnets, gloves, fans and candles. Most of the woman that showed up that night had actually made their own costumes and were there to “work the camp.” Everyone was having a great time and then the incident at the 7-11 was retold.  Everyone in our camp got really angry. They couldn’t believe that the townspeople could be so rude to dead soldiers like that. These people keep screwing with us fumed Don “Scooter” Dilson a member of the Army of Northern Virginia. “Isn’t it enough that they won the war? Why do they constantly try and put us down up here? Now they attack our fallen heroes. It’s starting to get so bad that we are not going to pretend to fight up here anymore said Dilson. Let them come down to Alabama or Mississippi for the next Gettysburg battle. 

Evidently, several soldiers from the Virginia Militia took it upon themselves to load real musketballs instead of the regular blanks they fire during the reenactments into their muskets in order to exact revenge. Early on day two near Cemetery Ridge a musketball struck local resident Carl Robinson as he and his wife returned home from purchasing Kwanzaa candles. Mr. Robinson was struck in the right buttock and was taken by ambulance to a local hospital. Not only is he expected to survive he also claims that the shot that hit him was far from an accident. “That cracker ass son-of-a-bitch in the gray suit shot me on purpose Robinson claims. He yelled something about Martin Luther and then he drilled me in the ass. I saw him and his posse run away while I was rolling around on my driveway.

“I think it’s really sad that a couple of bad apples can really ruin a good thing,” lamented Captain Larry F. Dixon, CSA, the man responsible for organizing the December reenactment. I have been doing this for years and have had one of the most memorable experiences of my life while camped right here in Pennsylvania back in 1983. I was a member of the camp band that year and after we finished playing “Dixie” for the troops, general Robert E. Lee himself strode up to the stage and said right to me “Sir, that is one of the finest renditions of Dixie I have ever heard.” That was the year that Aaron Berkley from Norfolk Virginia was pretending to be Lee. He was a colonic irrigation specialist back home in Norfolk and he had Lee down cold. It still gives me chills when I think about it and now some young hooligans are ruining the whole thing for the rest of us.”

Police have still not identified the actual shooter but Chief Weissbard said that the investigation is still ongoing. The Chief also downplays the reports of riots throughout the town after the shooting. That was no riot, said Weissbard, those idiots were all just scrambling to get the hell out of town after the black dude got shot. By the afternoon the Union Army outnumbered remaining Confederate soldiers about 15,000 to 0. We knew we were going to win, said General Meade, played by Dave Dwyer, but we never thought we would beat them this bad. I can hardly wait until next year if they will let us come back. As a result of the police curfew the Daughters of the American Revolution were also forced to cancel their Pot Luck dinner and guest speaker, which was scheduled for 7:00 pm tonight.  No reschedule date has been announced.

Antisocial Media

Social media, by definition, should be one of the best ways for people to be sociable. Unfortunately, research has uncovered that it is having the opposite effect leaving people more isolated than ever. Ironically, the more social media sights that an individual signs up for the less likely they are to see their friends in person.

Just last week I met up with some old college friends that I hadn’t seen in months. We went out to a bar to have a few drinks and catch up and before I knew it half the table was staring into the blue light of their phones completely disengaged with the world around them. In the off chance that they stopped taking staged selfies with their beverage so that they could measure their worth against the virtual likes they received they talked about something they had seen on whatever platform had poached their attention at the time. “Did you see what Janet just posted?” “Can you believe that Gary would post this?“ “Jesus, Paul got fat!” It was a complete nightmare.

This is occurrence is becoming all too common in society today. While this problem doesn’t discriminate by age it seems to be most prevalent amongst millennials. According to a study done by Flashgap, 54% of social media users said that they feel compelled to check social media because of a fear of missing out even when out with friends. Furthermore, 76% of females admitted to checking their social accounts at least 10 times while hanging out with friends compared to 54% of males.

LooseEnds, an app designed to track, monitor, and return the “social” aspect to social media found that people with three or more social media apps see friends in a social atmosphere an average of only one time per month. Conversely, those with only one social app see friends an average of six times per month and rarely go more than three days without seeing friends. Unfortunately, almost a quarter of people in America use up to three social media sites.

LooseEnds creator, Daniel Lewis, stated: “I find it a bit depressing that something originally devised to bring people together is now instrumental in keeping us all apart, with just over 22% of people admitting to seeing their friends less frequently since they started using social media.”

Human beings are social animals- they have been since the dawn of time. As a result, friends are important for the health and happiness of our species. Despite this, research by evolutionary psychologist Robin Dunbar suggests most people can only maintain five intimate relationships at any given time. It’s a matter of how much time and energy one can invest in developing and maintaining them. Unfortunately, our average time on social media now makes up a large percentage of our day- time once spent developing these relationships.

According to recent research, people in the modern world will spend almost four years of their life staring into smartphone screens at their social media accounts. This cellphone addiction has not only hurt our ability to cultivate new friendships and preserve old ones, it has been shown to lead to depression and anxiety as well as hurt cognitive growth.

We, the social animals that have harnessed the resources of the world, built the pyramids, and landed on the moon through teamwork and collaboration have now reduce a great deal of our collective existence to “socializing” online from the comfort of our armchairs. At the moment, we have become completely attached to our smartphones and social media. These technologies, initially designed to serve mankind, have been abused to the point where they have become a serious issue in society. While social media is useful, it needs to be used within reason. Obsession with the medium is without question making people less social. In the age of technology and constant, unfettered connectivity with our peers, we are alone.

Some interesting social media statistics:

·       29% of people use Youtube ·       22.6% of people use Snapchat ·       21.7% of people use Twitter ·       18.2% of people use Instagram ·       Just a third of people engage with a friend's post every 24 hours ·       Women are more likely to 'like' posts than men

Dogs, Flapjacks, and Scandals

Unfortunately for anyone unlucky enough to be reading this epistle, I looked through the newspaper again this week. Just when I thought I had already uncovered the weirdest and most disturbing examples of human behavior chronicled in what passes for journalism, I uncovered several more horrifying stories. My delicate psychic apparatus is already a bit flimsy and these stories didn’t help.

The first story I read involved a man named Kaz James, a 37-year-old man from England. Kaz details his upbringing and how he never felt like a man or boy. Kaz has decided that he needs to be true to his feelings and he has decided to transition. Now, at first, I thought, no big deal. Many people struggle and/or are not comfortable with their gender assignment and choose to make life changing decisions that make them more comfortable. That is what I thought when first reading this article. That is, until I came to the part where Kaz is uncomfortable being human and is transitioning into a dog. He has decided to live life as a puppy and eats his meals from a bowl and barks, in order to communicate. He also enjoys carrying around items with his teeth and snacking on bones. I am attaching a picture so the reader can fully appreciate Kaz’s transformation (he looks rabid). I have to assume that Kaz is now licking his friends and probably humping them too. Maybe he thought the humping, licking, barking and constantly sniffing people’s asses would be better received if he put on the dog suit and wagged his posterior at everyone. Hopefully, his “owner” will leave the gate open and Kaz will get loose and get run over by a car. Kaz is the poster child for neutering your pets. 

The next story involved a man in Australia who recently lost his court case after an appeals court ruled that farting could not be construed as bullying. David Hingst, an engineer who worked in a windowless office accused his supervisor of repeatedly coming into his office and emptying the gaseous contents of his colon while standing behind him. This olfactory assault had been ongoing and continuous for some time. At one point, it forced Hingst to move from the communal office area into the windowless office, in order to avoid his boss’s wind. Hingst nicknamed his supervisor “Mr. Stinky” and claimed that at least 6 or 7 times a week his boss would come into his office and pass gas near him and then leave. Hingst said the smell was unbearable and that often his eyes would tear up and he would begin choking from the noxious odors emanating from his supervisor’s pants. Hingst was seeking $1.3 million US in damages, after he lost his job. The court threw the case out claiming this was not bullying or assault. Obviously, this court has never spent any quality time with my uncle. Ambulances have been called several times after he decided to crop dust a family gathering or share the fumes from last night’s baby back ribs with his coworkers. I have been near him when he produced odors so foul that I would have gladly shoved my nose into a rotting decomposing corpse rather than endure the bouquet of feces launched from his sphincter during his latest assquake. This is not only bullying but assault with a deadly weapon. Each judge should be forced to sit with their nose embedded in my uncle’s hindquarters while he “busts a grumpy.” If they survived, I am confident that they would reconsider this decision.

Another story involved NASA. NASA, in conjunction with the European Space Agency is seeking women willing to stay in bed for 2 months and eat pancakes in order to test the effects of weightlessness on the body. The bed will be inverted at times which will put the woman’s head lower than her feet which will mimic the effects weightlessness has on the body. The article was unclear why it needed women and why they would be eating pancakes. It was also unclear on how these women will be going to the bathroom while having to remain in bed. That being said, I have the perfect candidate for this important assignment. I once had a job where there was a woman...I will call her “Penelope.” She was a large corpulent woman who would often sleep at her desk and snore like a chainsaw. On more than one occasion I watched her consume a stack of flapjacks at lunch that would have distressed a large lumberjack. Eventually, Penelope was arrested for theft after she used a company credit card fort personal purchases (which included an exorbitant amount of money for groceries). The police were called and she was arrested and led out of the building to a waiting police cruiser. They were unable to cuff her as she was too large so they walked her to the car with, what appeared to be some sort of cattle prod. On the way to the car she tripped and almost lost her shoe (which would have required the services of a blacksmith in order to put it back on). I can remember her getting into the car and watching the springs of the car sink to the ground. When they drove her away, sparks were spewing from the undercarriage of the police vehicle as it sagged onto the pavement. Now, if ever there was a woman tailor made for this assignment, it is Penelope. If they flip the bed up where her head is lower than her feet they may not be able to flip the bed back up. They will need to make a few modifications in order to support her girth. Instead of having the taxpayers pay for feeding her in jail (hay, grain and oats are expensive – especially in those quantities) NASA could fit the bill for her groceries and she would be doing a valuable public service at the same time! Talk about a win/win! I am also quite sure, at least temporarily, that she would enjoy the weightlessness experience.

Lastly, I must address the recent scandal at USC, and several other colleges, concerning celebrities and “connected” people paying bribes in order to get their kids into college. Since this story broke, I have been told several times that I must have bribed someone to get in because I’m not too bright. While this may be true (and I am often compared to a monkey trying to open a coconut), my father and mother are neither connected or rich. If they were, it is doubtful they would waste that many piasters for the child they often call the underachiever somewhere on the “spectrum”. My Dad would always make jokes with my mother like – “it’s not the idiot’s fault, you drank a lot when you were pregnant with him.” My nickname as a kid was “Asperger”. This scandal involved sports teams, the water polo team for instance, faking potential team membership and athletic ability, in order to get the student admitted. Thank God I can barely swim! Plus, I could never wear a speedo in public. I tried once and someone suggested I should put a rolled-up pair of socks inside my speedo in order to not embarrass myself. It was one of the worst days of my life. I spent a day with everyone laughing at me because I put the socks in the back of the speedo! They weren’t clear! Big mistake - very embarrassing.

As for getting into USC - I assume that someone just felt sorry for me and let me in after discovering I spent 6 years in the fourth grade, and was given an equivalency diploma after serving on jury duty for a month in the tenth grade. They gave me some speech about being 27 in high school and then sent me on my way. So, go screw yourself! Below is my picture from the USC yearbook that the consultant who helped me get in, submitted on my behalf.