Fake Horoscopes for Dark Times

Aries (3/21 – 4/19):  

Do you ever have that thing where you sit down, home alone, mix yourself a good Manhattan, and then get that benevolent feeling like you should send Jimmy Carter a love letter and knit a scarf for AOC and make hats for all your friends? And then, you look up and think oh my god, this situation is way beyond hats and scarves.   I know.  It's okay, Aries.  We'll all just keep doing the best we can.

Taurus (4/20 – 5/20): We've learned this week that the new secretary of defense is the current weekend host of a right wing tv show.  He's being lifted from the important work of defending fox viewers from actual news to being in charge the most powerful military in the world.  I guess that's what they mean by draining the swamp?  (Btw, as a wetland biologist who has spent my life trying to STOP SWAMP DRAINING, I'm not a fan of that phrase.) I'm curious about how many people a talk show host supervises.  Me, I work alone in the woods but I oversee my dog (HA HA HA! She's lying on the couch laughing at me just like Putin is laughing at us right now).  But here's my question, Taurus: Is it difficult to scale up from however many people a talk show hosts oversees to supervising over 2 million people (with weapons)?  I don't know the first thing about talk shows, but I'm thinking they supervise the makeup guy ("can you make me look less oily, and more like a guy who could host on a weekday?").  And maybe the haircut guy (Jeez, fire that dude.).  Are they also the boss of the guy who lines up the guests, or are the weekend guests just leftovers who didn't call back the weekday guy fast enough?  Anyway, Taurus, scale up this week! Take on a little bit more work for justice and integrity.  You can do it! 

Gemini (5/21 – 6/21):
The new head of Health and Human Services, aka Brain Worm Guy, shown here with his buddies consuming a big mac and pepsi, I think they're on Jeffery Epstein's airplane.    Anyway, the new guy recommends that we take an eight year break from trying to cure infectious disease.  Okay, Gemini, bear with me for a little side story: When I was a young college grad, I lived for a few months on an island helping a graduate student with her research on harbor seals.  She did a necropsy on a dead pup and ended up with a weird infection on her hand that we called "seal finger".  With all the money we'll save on studying the regular diseases that normal people who don't decapitate dead whales and drag bears around get, we'll finally be able to focus on seal finger and brain worms.  But that's not your horoscope, Gemini! Here it is: oh shoot, I got nothing.  The stars, the planets, blah blah blah, carry on.  We love you, Gemini! 

Cancer (6/22 – 7/21):  Do you know the word, "petrichor"?  It describes the smell when it rains after a long dry spell.  That earthy, calming aroma that happens at no other time -- there's no cologne, air freshener, dryer sheets (sparing you the side rant about dryer sheets, but WTAF?).  No petrichor scented candle.  It's a unicorn of smells -- you have to be there at just the right time to experience it.  Cancer, be there at the right time! For all things.  And if at first it seems like its not the right time, could it be an attitude?  Do your magic to make it so.  But also, help me answer this question:  why would there be a special smell just for that one thing?  Create something special for just one thing or person this week.  You can do it!

Leo (7/23 – 8/22):  Well, Trump has picked two more (known) sex crimers for his cabinet (besides himself).  We now have Matt Gaetz, who grinds up ED medication in redbull so that he can sustain the energy and erection needed to rape underage girls.  And we have Pete Hegseth, three times married guy who paid off a woman who accused him of sexual assault.  This is the family values crowd, I said to my dog.  She said, hey, let's go out for another walk! But I stray from the point.   Jumping Elon isn't in the cabinet (yet), but he's another accused sex offender.  What seems weird to me is that these guys profess to be anti-abortion.  You'd think, well..  Anyway.  Leo, be flat on your back for the winter, if that's the best you can do.  (We call that "thinking" here.) But see if you can get up, stand up, stand up for your rights.  This week, and all winter long.

Virgo (8/23 – 9/22):  Here's a true story, Virgo.  Once upon a time in the little town where I live, on one magical day a few years ago, little plastic toy collies appeared everywhere.  They were on benches and windowsills and in planters; pretty much every nook and cranny, a collie.  A very tiny plastic dog snowstorm had occurred during the night.  Since then, every day I wish for another dog storm.  Will it be terriers? Beagles?  But so far, nothing.  Virgo, create a miniature storm of goodness, the way you always do.  

Libra (9/23 – 10/22):  Our new health and human services lady will likely be the dog murder lady, who killed a puppy due to misbehavior.  Oh, and a goat.  She murdered a goat for being mean.  Hard to get behind this  I guess this qualifies one for being in charge of the well-being of Americans?  Looks like Mercury is in retrograde and we are going back.  We're going back to a time when it was okay to murder a puppy for eating chicken.  Do any of you eat chicken? BEWARE.  Libra, keep your wits about you.

Scorpio (10/23 – 11/21):  The rapey red-bull/viagra guy says he's gonna go over to the justice department and "start cutting fucking heads".  It might just be me, but I think RFK is the guy for cutting heads, at least whale heads.  We don't know what this is going to look like for sure, but the path ahead looks dark.  The ancestors have endured worse.  I mean, 55 million years ago, we and the whales were one.  Carry on, Scorp.  

Sagittarius (11/22 – 12/21):  In a strange melding of fact and fiction, The Onion, a parody news account, has purchased Newsmax, which used to be an angry, meanspirited fake news site because the deranged owner, Alec Jones, had to sell it at a fire sale to pay debts related to his cruel conspiracy theories.  Infowars site was down, then up again, so don't click there yet.   The fact of it is, though, Sag, we need to be astute.  Ferret out the truth.  Do not succumb to the fake news.  

Capricorn (12/22 – 1/19):  We also have a new nomination for Secretary of Transportation,  Sean Duffy.  His Wiki article says he started log-rolling at age 5; I suppose that's a good background for a transportation guy.  Bring on the logs, Duffy.  We'll all be rolling, one way or another, soon enough.  Capricorn, this week, use your stubborness for good.  Step away from the abyss.  Look at it with binoculars or a telescope, and maybe pull out those eclipse glasses.  There's no need to get all cozy with it just yet.  

Aquarius (1/20 – 2/18):  We're all suiting up for the days ahead, trying to capture the last bits of sun I mean Biden/Harris to store in our sparkle suits for the long dark time ahead.  Music, Aquarius.  Gather music, make playlists.  Lot's of them.  Don't be afraid to put cheesy pop songs on them, like this.  Whatever works.  There's no shame.  Also, Aquarius? We need some new, catchy protest songs.  No particular reason.  See what you can do.  

Pisces (2/19 – 3/20):
The good news, Pisces, is that the salmon are returning in big numbers this year.  They don't know what they're up against, with a new EPA director who doesn't even do log rolling, if wikipedia can be trusted.  But still.  They swim upstream, over and over.  Well, only once, as it turns out.  But we can do that! Learn the back float for the really rugged times, but keep swimming.

Do I have this straight?

If you've been too busy having an actual life, or perhaps riding out the dog days of summer like this pretty girl, let me recap what's happened in the past few days.

Trump got hit by a speeding bullet and wore half a kotex on his ear for a few days in public, and lots of his supporters, who tend to call liberal people “sheeple” for being blind followers, also wore white pads on their ear. The ear is apparently all healed up now, nary a scratch. The shooter was a young republican NRA member. We haven’t seen as many AK-47 lapel pins since the shooting, but truth be told, the giant white pads may draw your eye away from the lapel area and towards the ear. 

 Trump picked JD Vance as his running mate, who, a few years ago described himself as a never trump guy and called Trump, “America’s Hitler”, an idiot, etc, but is now his biggest fan. Rumors (untrue) abound that Vance has had a fling with a couch. The pictures of the crowds wearing maxi pads on their ear have been replaced by photos of Vance oogling a couch.  New slogan emerges, "Couches for Kamala."

 Republicans have been trash-talking Biden for being too old to be president for months. Biden decided to let his younger, capable running mate be the candidate instead of him, in a supreme act of selflessness and patriotism, and Republicans are now threatening to sue to keep him on the ballot. They wasted money on signs that say, “Let’s go Brandon”, which apparently is a slur and means you’re voting for trump, but let’s be honest, it’s not super clear. We’re not sure where Brandon is supposed to go or why, per the signs. I’m not a real political analyst, but if I were, I’d suggest that they put the candidate’s name on the signs. A guy who spent $10,000 on Let’s Go Brandon signs is also suing Biden. Perhaps he can find a candidate named Brandon? 

 Trump announced that Elon Musk, who owns a social media site that everyone continues to call “twitter” will be donating $45 million a month, and because of this, Trump’s plan as president is to help Elon, one of the wealthiest people on the planet. We’re not sure why he needs help, although maybe because Elon makes his money on electric cars, which trump is opposed to? Something about sharks and electricity and wind killing the birds, maybe a spot of Hannibal Lecter tossed in there. Elon says he’s not really giving that much money.  We're not sure if there's lying, backpedalling, or both in this situation.

 The attacks on Kamala Harris have begun in earnest. They attack her intelligence, her laugh, the fact that she never bore children (although her husband’s ex-wife issued a statement today saying that Kamala has been a parent of her children.) Apparently, if a woman runs for president, the birth canal must be involved? (This does not apply to men.) Some republicans are claiming that Kamala is “not really black” (because as we know, being black is an advantage in this country; lots of black presidents!). They’ve also been claiming she’s not really a citizen (although she was born in the USA) in a sorry rerun of the birther business from the Obama years.

I'm excited to report that the author Celeste Ng has selected my modern love essay to read for the Modern Love podcast next week. Such an honor! It will air on March 6 on the Modern Love Podcast

Salad

The other day I was in QFC getting stuff for salad because, well, I guess that’s what we’re supposed to eat for longevity. (Side bar: I’m not all in on longevity as a goal – but I’ll aim for it half-heartedly until something better comes along.). Anyway, there was this older-than-me woman who looked kind of grumpy, but not like she was always grumpy like the one lady in the FG. More like a nice lady, temporarily stricken by irritability, which I can totally relate to. I wanted to hear her back story, so I kept very mildly getting in her way and then saying, “oh, I’m sorry, am I in your way?” (I guess that’s kind of weird now that I type it out. I wasn’t trying be passive aggressive or provoking but it seemed like the best way to strike up a conversation. (I know, I could probably just say hi but I was feeling a little shy.) Anyway, after three or four of these she actually looked at me and I asked if she was doing okay and she said, in a very tired voice, that she wished there were a better selection of organic produce. I concurred, and then asked my real question, which is, “Do you have any thoughts on what should I have for dinner tonight?” Because she seemed like someone who would know. She had a list and a plan and maybe I could just draft on her organization. But she just looked at me and said, “You could have pizza. Get it delivered right to your house.” I thanked her and then tried to avoid her for the rest of shopping time. I’m not sure why I’m posting about this little tiny thing.

Horoscopes: The Babies Are Coming Edition

 

Horoscopes: The Babies Are Coming Edition

Pisces (2/19 – 3/20):   It turns out I've run out of excuses to not write horoscopes.  The pandemic, coronamalaise, blah blah blah.  In the meantime, while I wasn't writing horoscopes, I also wasn't writing a book.  I tried though! It was supposed to be a story about a woman living alone with her dog in a pandemic.  Lotta world-building goes into that, let me tell you.   The goal was to write a smart, funny literary book about ... yeah, that's where I'm stuck.  not a lot happens.  We'll see if I can get past it via the horoscopes.  Astrological sign by sign, buddy.  Pisces, see if you can get back to something you want to do.

Aries (3/21 - 4/19):  I've been living like a traveling salesman for wetlands lately, driving a lot, spending nights in cheap motels, waking up in one horse towns, peddling my wetland boundary trick, singing King of the Road in the car.  It's a little like being a rock star without the fans, roadies, and blow.  Anyway, what I've learned is that a lot of down and out people live in motels these days.  What strikes me, over and over, is the kindness of the desk clerks.  "Sure, Gunner, I'll put you down for a few more days.  Would you like to stay thru Saturday?," she says as she offers him a packet of microwave popcorn.  "This is on us."  And you can tell Gunner isn't really going anywhere for a long long time.  Aries, be that kind of kind.  Be the kind of kind where people are struck by it.

Taurus (4/20 – 5/20):  Writing a book is probably not the best plan if you have the attention span of a very small insect.  But what do we actually know about their attention spans?  Could it be that they are watching us, thinking, jeez, all it takes is one little fly-by and these giant meat treats lose their focus!    Mosquitoes are the leading cause of death for humans, and yet they are so very small.  You could put dozens inside one tiny basket.  Taurus, strong like bull, see if you can make out a horoscope out of that.  

Gemini (5/21 - 6/21):   We should all have a solid opinion about time travel.  Do you think it's impossible to travel back to a time before you were born for physical reasons, or because it's a paradox?  Do you believe in the kind of time travel where the word "yet" is key?  As in, no time traveler has prevented the holocaust yet.  (Though, of course, there may be other atrocities that were prevented; we just don't know about them.)  And so on.  Be able to defend your position, if needed.  (And Gemini, if you go time traveling without me, leave a note!)

Cancer (6/22 – 7/21): I spend a lot of time making string.  I know.  We already have a lot of string already in the world, enough to tie ourselves in knots and then some.  But something compels me to do this like a tree turning color or a fish swimming around in a bowl or, more hopefully, making its way upstream.  String out of wool, string out of silk, string out of grass and cattail and dandelion stems.  As we say around here (and when I say "we", I mean the dog and I), the wheel has already been invented, why not use it to make string?  I don't know why we say that.  It's messy here, with reeds and grass and fleece and things all over the place, but I guess that's the way of it.  Cancer, see if you can untangle a horoscope from that. 

Leo (7/23 – 8/22): Have I mentioned my obsession with tiny baskets?  They aren't very good craftsmanship-wise, but I do like them and one day I'll make a tiny hat for each basket. In the mean time, if you need a very small begging bowl, you know where to come.  Leo, you will have no need for a begging bowl this week. It will literally be a bowl of cherries! Just like they say.

Virgo (8/23 – 9/22): Have you stopped to appreciate the simple delight of drinking a big glass of cold water? During the pandemic I started drinking sparkling water in cans because it was fun to have something happen. Peel back a tab, hear that noise that I don't know how to spell, and then, glug glug glug. Bubbles! Who put all the bubbles in that can? A minor miracle. But, if you don't finish it all up right away, and you come back later to drink, it's disappointing. It tastes like water that's been stored in a can. All of the bubbles have been freed like so many hostages, making me realize that they don't really like living in a can. And can we blame them? So I'm mostly back to delicious tap water. But I play this video when I drink it. Virgo, just play the video, even if you're not thirsty, and be grateful for this watery planet that offers drinks. Free the bubbles!

Libra (9/23 – 10/22): Each day that a child is born is a holy day, we say. (Each sock is a holy sock too, but that's a different matter.) The babies are arriving, each one as perfect as can be. These brand new swaddled fresh people, little ones who can't begin to know what they're in for, sleep peacefully. Later, they'll know love, loss, fear, excitement, dread, boredom, joy, grief, uncertainty, confidence, the satisfaction of learning a skill, the contentment of old friends, the sparkle of new friends, the adoration of a dog, the magic of an eclipse. They'll ponder the Big Questions, and they'll notice that some days are good, some not so much. They'll grapple with the observation that humans can unleash unbearable cruelty on one another, and can also be exquisitely tender and thoughtful, here on the planet. They'll learn that they can cry at a movie where the underdog wins, or at a beautiful piece of prose. They'll have a favorite song, and build forts and sand castles. At this perfect moment, the little babies don't even need legs because their people will carry them wherever they need to go. They're surrounded by the adoration of parents and others who have loved them well before they were born, and will love them madly forever and ever, come what may. These new parents will spend sleepless nights feeding, worrying, wondering how it's all going to go, comforting their children when they're afraid of the dark or bees or riding the school bus, reminding their offspring to get off the computer and go outside. They'll wonder how their parenting is going: if should they do this or that, if they were too firm or too lax, too distracted or too involved. They'll teach them all the things, like to write thank you notes and try hard, and take good care of people and things, and they'll encourage them to discover what they care about and then pursue it with passion. It's a tall order. May the road rise up to meet you, new parents.  

Scorpio (10/23 – 11/21): If the pandemic has taught us anything at all, it is: NEVER run out of toilet paper, olive oil, coffee or half and half. We don't know what's ahead -- while we're worrying about a tsunami, an earthquake happens. While we're anxious about democracy being taken out by a bunch of rich thugs, a meteor hits. And so on. So I guess we're supposed t let go of trying to control everything and enjoy each moment. The moments, my dear Scorp, are better with coffee and half and half. Do what you can.

Sagittarius (11/22 – 12/21): Did you hear about the fossilized footprints they found, 23,000 years old, in New Mexico?  Oh my word.  That's a game changer.  Stay tuned.  Sag, have a great week, and keep bringing the magic!

Capricorn (12/22 - 1/19): I cleaned my laundry room yesterday (side note: do you see why the book is, well, not the page turner we were hoping for? Um, hello, page 1: I'm home alone cleaning! Page 2. yup.). Anyway, cleaning happens once in a million years, and this time I even pushed the big laundry machines around so I could get the dust and whatnot from under the washer and dryer. Guess what? I found a rebate check from my insurance company from almost a year ago for $260! (A plot! A very tiny plot.) Who woulda known I was sitting on that kind of riches?  I immediately called my boss and retired.  Oh, turns out I am the boss, so I hung up.  It was hard to tell who was hanging up on who.  Anyway, if you believe in that sort of thing, you'd posit that this is the universe's way of encouraging me to clean things up a bit.  Will do, Universe.  Capricorn, you too! Clean, find money, retire! Easy peasy.

Aquarius (1/20 – 2/18): Never swerve for revenge, as William Stafford said.  Let people who disappoint go without a fuss.  They're doing the best they can with the tools they have, and it won't serve you to retaliate in any way.

The Money Laundering Edition

I haven’t been writing much because, well, who’s going to play the Freecell? Right?  How do you get all of the cards in the proper piles if you’re writing?

That’s one thing I've done:  won a fuck-ton of free cell games.  That’s what I have to show for the pandemic so far.  All of the time spent home alone for the past year and a half when I could have been creating, or cleaning, or Making Good Use of My Time, I don’t.  I stare at the abyss, which is very close, and play another round of Freecell.

But I’d like to write more, I really would.  

 

Yesterday, I went on a walk with a dear friend and all of our dogs. The dogs ran off to find the river, duh.  But access to the river in that location was a steep unstable sandy slope, and we know about steep slopes.  It’s easy to go down, hard to get back, exactly like the abyss, which is why we try to keep a safe distance.  

We could hear the dogs splashing and playing, and then the two younger spry dogs scampered back to us but my beautiful middle-aged girl with arthritis was stuck, and I had to go down the slope and push her a little bit by the haunches, and pull her a bit by the scruff of the neck. 

 Luckily, someone who had come before me had driven a long piece of rebar into the bank and tied a rope to it, so it wasn't that thing of oh, now two people (well, one person and one dog who thinks she's a person) are stuck down there.  Whomever installed the rebar is Making Good Use of Their Time, that’s for sure.  And it made me think like there should be more metaphorical and figurative rebar stakes attached to ropes surrounding the abysses of all types so you can explore a little bit without getting stuck.  We really don’t want to be pushed back up by the haunches.  

The second interesting thing that happened on our walk is that we came upon a woman walking alone, taking photographs of the beautiful day, and we started chatting.  She had some interesting new information, like, did we know that the pupil of a goats eye is rectangular? (No! Didn't know that.).  And we wandered from there to viviparous snakes and so on, which was quite pleasant and interesting, and made me think I could ask some of my questions.  

I have the same questions all of the time, and mostly I can’t even remember the questions, but here they are.  Things I should understand but don’t.  

1. Heat pumps.  Really?  You attach a box-shaped thing to your house and suddenly, without pipes or ducts, your house is heated and cooled and your bills go down and you save the planet.  Does that even make sense?  I might be a heat-pump denier.  And no one really understands them.  Ask anyone.
2. Mining for bitcoin.  I’ve had brief moments of clarity where I get it, why and how vast networks of computers are mining for block chains, which are just series of numbers (why don't they call them that?) that translate into wealth.  If you think about this for very long, it just seems ridiculous.  I may also be a bitcoin denier.
3. Money laundering.  I understand the concept: someone has illegally obtained money, and they need to bring it into the normal banking system without drawing attention.  But I get fuzzy on the details of how it works and when I really try to act it out with my fisher price toys and a tiny suitcase full of fake cash, I am unable to do so.  

Anyway, back to our walk.  Here was this woman who seemed to know a lot of stuff about snakes and goats, so I asked if it was appropriate to ask my questions.  The two people I was with both looked at me like I was a little bit off, but I’m used to that and forged ahead.

“Do either of you know how money laundering works?”

And, like a tiny miracle, the woman who knew about goat’s eyes and live snake birth was prepared for my question as if she had been standing there with a little power point in her pocket, ready to explain money laundering to random passersby.  “Yes.  It takes three steps.  First, you actually put the money in the wash so it looks a little older.  Then, put it into a business…. (this is the part where I always get confused because really, how do you get the money back?  

Here’s how it goes when I act it out:  The little fisher price guy with blue overalls, the one doing the crimes, has a miniature satchel full of drug money.  We’ll call that the suitcase money.  (By the way, feel free to act this out at home.  There’s no shame in that.). He buys a restaurant with regular money because he can’t use the suitcase money.  His main problem in life, besides that there are a bunch of shady people trying to kill him, is that spending the suitcase money could land him in jail.   But now he can spend suitcase money on the restaurant.  So, if you’re playing along at home, take your blue overalls guy and have him hand a few thousand dollars from the satchel to the guy wearing the chef’s hat.  Chef hat guy will redesign the menu and boss the people in the kitchen around.  Now, overalls guy is out the regular money that he bought the restaurant with, plus the suitcase money he gave to chef’s hat guy.  

But overalls guy can write in his tiny little ledger that he spent a few thousand dollars in business expenses, so that money is now legit in the system.  I guess that's good?  But he doesn't have the money anymore.  He does have some business expenses so his taxes are reduced, but jeez, that seems like a complicated way.  He has laundered a tiny fraction of the money in the suitcase, but he also owns a needy restaurant full of people who are sending their chicken back because it’s too cooked or too raw, or they didn’t know there would be a sprig of parsley near it, or they thought the salad would come first, and the dishwasher called in sick, and the servers don't want to tip the bartender, and the chef is wearing sandals so you got written up by
the Health Department, and so on. This is where I start thinking it would be easier to just do the regular job that the overalls guy is supposed to do.  

Anyway, everyone had to leave just as she was starting to explain the confusing part about money laundering, so I still don't really know how it works, but I will count this encounter as a minor miracle.

Apocalypse

 

It’s been bleak lately.  Covid deaths are up +1,357% in King County over the past 2 weeks.  Pointless deaths.  It’s been smoky and sweltering and boring and maddening a little scary to think that this is pretty much how the future will be.  Masks and diseases and wildfires and heat waves and pollution keeping us inside and selfish people not rowing along with the rest of us.  Rowing backwards.  But we do what we do, we carry on, but with high irritability.  

Last week, I thought I’d go to Costco, which has morphed, surprisingly, from a dreaded giant warehouse where I’d get lost and spend too much money, to a fun outing.  This switch happened early in the pandemic when we weren’t supposed to go anywhere.  Of course, we could still shop for food.  Costco was like a free pass to get out of the house.  Anyway, during this miserable week where it’s been too hot to keep the windows closed and too smokey to open them, I remembered about Costco.  Air conditioning! Food!  Diversion!  So I went and it was disappointingly annoying, probably due to my own high irritability but quite possibly due to all the obstructionists who spread themselves out in the aisles, talking to one another and blocking traffic and generally being oblivious.  Families, large extended families forming blockades in each aisle.  But then I noticed that on the far side of the store they were offering samples again! A sign of better days! The olden days, when you could walk through a store and snack on things you didn’t really want but they were FREE!  So I decided that yes, I’d take off my mask when I got there and have a little snack.  This carried me through the whole miserable part with the aisle-blockers and the Search for Washcloths and so on.  Eventually, I would get a little treat.  Ok, I finally get there and guess what they were handing out?  The nice lady in the hair net had little portion cups full of mayonnaise.  Not even a cracker with them.  Straight up mayo.  We made all of this effort to live through the pandemic only to get a dollop of room temperature mayo?  Is this my best life, I wondered?  

So I tried to remember the things that always interest me even when I’m feeling lazy, sweltering in place alone with the windows closed and a panting dog.  Twins separated at birth, Jimmy Hoffa (does it seem like it’s been a while since someone’s NJ backyard was excavated to look for a body?) and, my all time fave, D.B. Cooper.  

Here’s my recommendation, people:  DB Cooper! There are thousands of people who are truly obsessed, and spend so much time thinking about it, sharing theories and new information.  They know stuff.  Like, one thing they know is that in the 1970’s, the door on a boeing airplane wouldn’t open if the plane was pressurized.  Or maybe depressurized.  I don’t recall.  And they know what diatoms would normally colonize a pile of money near the Columbia River, and what shape their imprint on the bills would be, and how to find the list of serial numbers of the bills that DB was given, and so much more.   This sweet obsessive curiosity that harkens back to a better time, a time when conspiracy theorists were eccentric and harmless, and worried about aliens and sought out bigfoot.  They didn’t try to mess with elections or the health of their communities.  Anyway, my recommendation is DB Cooper.