COVID SPRING: Bridget, Small Town South Dakota Resident

Excerpt from "COVIDsteria: An Oral History of America's Great Reset" - see https://covidsteria.substack.com/p/covidsteria-table-of-contents

Urban areas followed by the suburbs had borne the brunt of the devastation of the COVIDsteria years. But most exurbs, small towns, and rural America were largely untouched by the Great Die-Off. When the purges began, residents of these areas were the first to fight back and led the resistance against the Feds. 

It was only natural that after COVID Spring, demographics and political power shifted dramatically in many states back to more rural areas. Unshackled from the tyranny of the cities, small-town and rural America is now booming - especially since most manufacturing is now coming home from abroad.

I met Bridget for coffee and homemade spiced pumpkin pie on the front porch of her family farm just outside of her small yet bustling South Dakota town…

My family emigrated from Norway and arrived by covered wagon to my little town on the prairie in the late 1800s. It was here they built a sod house, started farming, and slowly helped to build a tight-knit local community. Through the years and several generations later, we as a community have survived blizzards, locust plagues, hail storms, tornadoes, and farming busts. But our patience and survival skills were soon to be put to the test by a new plague… [She frowns.]

How did the COVIDsteria pandemic impact you and your small South Dakota community?

Oh, you mean that ROsteria scamdemic! That was what we all called it here in our little town on the prairie! [She rolls her eyes.] 

At first, that ROsteria scamdemic did not impact our lives much at all. Our Governor had refused to lock the state down. 

There was a bit of a toilet paper shortage in the early months, but not because everyone in town rushed out to buy it. This shortage was mainly due to only having one big General Store. They were not able to get more toilet paper from their out-of-state suppliers.

The media kept telling us this ROsteria virus was like an airborne Ebola and a Black Death with some Spanish flu mixed in that required a great reset to contain. They also said there were no treatments for ROsteria until you needed a hospital ventilator. But I don’t know. To me, that ROsteria sounded like another bad but treatable flu from China that only the elderly or those in poor health needed to watch out for. 

Besides, our little town on the prairie was already battling a much bigger plague than the ROsteria so-called “pandemic.” Our plague came in the form of a growing number of insatiable Yupholes who were causing us constant headaches. We had been trying to deal with this Yuphole infestation or the Yuphole problem as we called it for some time now. But thanks to that ROsteria so-called “pandemic," the Yupholes in our town started multiplying like rabbits.

And you could not just go out and shoot every Yuphole like we shoot rabbits or wolves. Although I have to admit, the thought of shooting them did cross all of our minds from time to time as our frustrations with them mounted. 

But soon, it was getting to the point where we could no longer live in a town infested with so many…

I am sorry to interrupt you... The Yupholes are what, some type of voracious local Prairie Dog or locust? 

[She rolls her eyes.] The Yupholes are not a type of Prairie Dog or locust! [She laughs.] After all, you can shoot Prairie Dogs - so long as the government does not catch you doing it! [She laughs again.]

The Yupholes are what we call the big city Yuppies or Yups! They would move here to our little town on the prairie to escape their expensive big city hellholes! Usually, the Yupholes from Minneapolis were the worst – not that the ones who came down from Fargo or up from Omaha were any better! As far as we were concerned, all Yupholes were a pain-in-the-ass no matter what big city hellhole they moved here from!

As soon as any Yupholes move to our little town on the prairie or the surrounding rural area, they would immediately go to our town council meetings. Then they would start in with their never-ending insatiable demands for changes to make our little peaceful corner of the prairie just like wherever expensive big city hellhole they had just escaped from! [She rolls her eyes.]

First, they came to our town council meetings demanding we spend our tax money on fancy, or as the Yupholes might say, “proper” city sidewalks. The worst Yupholes were always those who moved to our town to open up fancy antique shops or Yuphole coffee shops with overpriced coffees with fancy names served in tiny cups. They were always the most vocal with their demands to have “proper” city sidewalks on our little Main Street.  

However, there are good reasons our roads do not have “proper” city sidewalks. They are expensive to build and maintain as all the cement must get trucked in from out-of-state. These so-called “proper” sidewalks would also make our roads more difficult to plow in winter when blizzards dump 10 feet of snow at once. Then there would be an even bigger mess during the spring thaw when all that snow melts. You see, “proper” city sidewalks would need extensive storm drains to handle all the snowmelt. 

But try to explain all of that so-called “small town” logic to big city know-it-all Yupholes with graduate degrees in art history! [She shakes her head.]

Then after we repeatedly said no to the Yupholes about spending our tax money on “proper” city sidewalks, they would come back to our town council meetings and demand that we pay for bike lanes and bike trails. It is not like there is a lot of traffic in our little town on the prairie. Besides, we only have a couple of months of summer weather for bike riding anyway. And who the hell, other than a Yuphole, will ride a bike in 50 below zero cold? Or when 10 feet of snow is on the ground? [She throws her hands up in the air.]

After we said no to the Yupholes about putting in “proper” city sidewalks, bike lanes, and bike trails, they demanded our town switch to clean green energy by putting up giant windmills. They said we needed to do our part to save the planet from global warming or climate change or whatever they call it now. Do you know how cold it gets in this part of South Dakota during the winter? Most of us would not mind some global warming to help lower our heating bills! [She rolls her eyes.]

But the worst things about those giant windmills are how they kill all the migrating birds that use the prairie as their flyway and how ugly they are. Not only that and contrary to popular myth, but it is also not always windy up here on the prairie. What happens when there is no wind in the middle of winter or during a blizzard? And what happens if a big tornado hits a giant windmill? [She rolls her eyes again and frowns.]

After we said no to the Yupholes about putting in “proper” city sidewalks, bike lanes and bike trails, and windmills, they said we needed to put in electric car charging stations. They also said it would make our town more attractive for Yupholes to visit from or commute from to Minneapolis. But the last thing in the world that any of us local townsfolk wanted was more damn Yupholes in our little town on the prairie, either as visitors or as permanent residents here! [She frowns.]

After we said no to the Yupholes about putting in “proper” city sidewalks, bike lanes and bike trails, windmills, and electric car charging stations, the Yupholes wanted to put in mass transit and have streetcars or trams running up and down our little Main Street. We are a small prairie town of 5,000 people with a five-block-long Main Street. Why on earth do we need a mass transit system and have streetcars or trams running up and down our little Main Street? [She makes a facepalm.]

And every time we said no to the Yupholes, they would act like we were a bunch of small-minded small-town folks. We could not think big like they did because they all had fancy art history degrees. We, the local townsfolk, were just high school or trade school graduates – if even that...

But it only got worst with the ROsteria scamdemic. More and more damn Yupholes started moving to our little town on the prairie from places like Minneapolis. They could now work from home and escape all the big city crime and lockdowns. ¹

We could always spot a Yuphole in our town during the scamdemic. They would strut six feet apart from everyone else or bike down the middle of Main Street to avoid contact with other people. They would also all be wearing gloves, face shields, and one face diaper, then two face diapers, and then three face diapers as they kept adding masks to those crazy national face diaper mandates. When the final lockdowns came for the Russian ROsteria scariant, they were all dressed up as astronauts in full PPE!

Meanwhile, we locals never bothered to wear face diapers, lock ourselves down, and do any of that social distancing nonsense. After all, we had lots of fresh air and just miles and miles of corn or cows for as far as the eye could see surrounding our little town on the prairie.

But the Yupholes got all upset with us. They said we were not taking the ROsteria scamdemic seriously. They also behaved like we all had Ebola or the Black Death or something! 

I will give you just one example of some Yuphole nonsense: I would go into our General Store to buy a spiced pumpkin pie. If I did not stand at least six feet away from a Yuphole, they would take out a tape measure, extend it six feet, and start screaming at me that I was trying to them! The Yuphole would then file a police report on me claiming I had purposely tried to kill them by standing too close!

Luckily, our little town on the prairie has a volunteer police force. They had an unwritten rule to never seriously investigate any complaint about a local coming from any Yuphole. Besides, any Yuphole's complaint about a local was always utterly ridiculous – like when they complained about the smell of manure or all the dust from harvesting corn. [She shakes her head again.]  

But then that stupid Ostrich News Network (ONN) talking head Fredo Ratto, of all people, came to our little town on the prairie. He came to do a primetime news story about a “divided small town on the prairie.” 

Stupid Fredo claimed most of us locals were “refusing to take COVIDsteria seriously" because we only listened to Talk Radio, Coyote News, and QAnon telling us "it was all a hoax!” I do not even know what that QAnon stuff is all about, but that was what that stupid Fredo claimed! Or maybe that was what our local Yupholes told him! 

We all felt like punching him in the face along with every Yuphole he talked to while our local cattlemen wanted to give them all a good swabbing if you know what I mean! [She rolls her eyes.] 

What bugged us the most, though, was what happened as soon as they turned off the news cameras. That stupid Fredo would immediately take off his mask and start coughing all over the place without covering his mouth! Then we later heard he probably had ROsteria when he visited our little town on the prairie! And not only that, he was refusing to properly quarantine himself or even wear a face mask when not on TV! 

So I guess it was a good thing he only talked to and interviewed our Yupholes in their antique and fancy coffee shops on Main Street! [She smiles.]

How did you feel about the COVIDsteria anal swabbing mandate issued by the new Administration?

As a late-middle-aged woman, the anal swabbing mandate bothered me only in the sense that the government was mandating something intrusive to do all sorts of things that we, as a free people, had taken for granted. At my age, whenever I go to the doctor, I expect to be poked, prodded, and manhandled the same way our local cattlemen treat their cows in the stockades before they are castrated or taken to the slaughterhouse.

It was not like I go into many government buildings or airports. I am afraid to fly, and the nearest airport is a couple of hours away. So we just drive long distances whenever we need to go somewhere out here on the prairie.  

I think the real turning point, though, was when that Chinese woman got dragged off her Lagoon Airlines flight like Rosa Parks for refusing to give up her seat to be swabbed or to give her seat to someone who had bent over for the government. I know it was their Kung Flu and all, but that Chinese woman still did not deserve to be treated like that. If the government can drag a Chinese woman off a plane for an anal swabbing or force her to give up her seat to someone who was, they could drag me out of my house to be swabbed or give my home to someone who was! [She sighs.]

I just know that after that incident, all the younger hotheaded cattlemen and farm boys in our little town on the prairie started to hate those anal swabbing mandates with a passion. They also wanted to give all the Yupholes in town a good swabbing, if you know what I mean... [She smiles.]

I also ended up spending $29.95 to buy Swabholes: How the Left is Swabbing America!. The book opened my eyes to what the left was doing to this country and people living in small towns like me in particular!

What happened in your community when the nDNA vaccine program started – especially when the new Administration took over? And did you or many residents of your community take the vaccine?

Out here in our little town on the prairie, we have a simple saying or belief, "Pioneers always get rewarded with arrows in their back." Being a lab rat for a galactic speed nDNA injection was the same as being one of the first pioneers on the prairie. There was a good chance you would end up with arrows in your back.

We also have another saying on the prairie, “What difference does it make?” You can do everything right and still have a hail storm or a tornado destroy your crop of corn or kill your herd of cattle. You can also do everything wrong and not have a hail storm or a tornado destroy your crop of corn or kill your herd of cattle.

Some of the oldest residents here had survived the Spanish Flu epidemic. When asked if they wanted to take that galactic speed nDNA injection, they all said, “What difference does it make? If my time has come, my time has come. I am not going to argue with the lord almighty." [She shrugs.]

So almost none of us locals, including me, ever got our injections. Besides, we had all stopped worrying about the ROsteria scamdemic long before that galactic speed nDNA injection ever became available. 

The other reason we did not get our injections was that stupid Fredo Ratto was always saying how there was “absolutely nothing to worry about” and everyone just needed to “trust science!” Given how he came to our little town on the prairie and just smeared us as a bunch of QAnon wackos, we locals did not believe a word he or anyone in the media said about the vaccine!

At one point, that stupid Fredo even did an utterly ridiculous story where he claimed those of us who were not getting injected believed the vaccine would implant trackable microchips in us. He even claimed we believed the nDNA injection would program us into downloading and playing Hungry Crickets all day long, turn us into 5G transmitters, or make us magnetic! [She rolls her eyes.]

Then he and the rest of the media would repeat over and over that people like me were not getting injected because I wanted to kill the country's grandmas along with all marginalized people. But let me be clear, our little town on the prairie is not full of racist hayseed hicks!  

However, we all resented how the new Administration, or rather Team Sciencey, as we called them, was prioritizing the injection of so-called marginalized people first. If the injection was as lifesaving as everyone claimed, why not first inject the elderly or the unhealthy? They were the most at risk of getting seriously ill or dying of ROsteria. 

Team Sciencey’s injection policies just made no sense to us so-called small-minded small-town folks. They were just like how all the stupid Yuphole ideas for “proper” city sidewalks, bike lanes and bike trails, windmills, electric car charging stations, and mass transit never made much sense to us either. [She frowns.]

What did you think about the $600 payments to get vaccinated?

To be honest, we small-town folks found those payments to get injected to be particularly distasteful. You do not pay people to go to church. You go to church for the salvation of your soul and to seek forgiveness from the lord. If the injection was a lifesaving necessity, why do you need to pay people to get it? And why only $600 to certain marginalized groups?  

We were also bothered by the fact that all of our local Yupholes were not members of marginalized communities, nor were they particularly elderly or known to be unhealthy. Yet they all somehow managed to get injected first! Maybe that was because our state was more efficient than other states when injecting people who wanted to get injected. But we were all suspicious our local Yupholes had found a way to jump the injection queues.

But the bigger problem for our little town on the prairie was how our Yupholes behaved after their injections. Every single one of them turned into Yuphole-Vaxholes! [She rolls her eyes again and shakes her head.]

What do you mean by that?

These Yuphole-Vaxholes would not let any non-injected person into their fancy antique or coffee shops on our Main Street – not that we locals ever went into those fancy Yuphole places as it was. It was just the idea of discriminating against non-injected people that bothered us. We felt that was no different than making black people like Rosa Parks sit at the back of the bus. Or, for that matter, throwing Chinese women off of airplanes for refusing to be swabbed.  

And if you bumped into, I am sorry, if you came within distance of having a conversation with a Yuphole-Vaxhole, the first thing they demanded to know was your injection status! And if you told them you had not gotten injected, they acted like you had Ebola or the Black Death.

Then they would try to virtue signal their moral superiority by screaming how they were not racists who wanted all the country's grandmas and marginalized people to die of ROsteria! [She sighs and shakes her head.]  

What happened in your community when the Great Die-Off and then the purges started?

We started noticing and hearing about strange things happening to our local vaccinated Yuphole-Vaxholes. We heard many of them were getting easily sick and often with colds and the flu. They were having a hard time getting rid of these illnesses and were coughing or sometimes gasping for air. And then some of them started dying from these illnesses, or they were dropped dead of apparent heart attacks.

What was particularly odd was how many of our Yuphole-Vaxholes started to constantly complain about having problems with their mobile reception, wi-fi, or GPSs. But the rest of us were not having any difficulties. And even if we were, it would not matter much to us.

In little towns on the prairie like ours, word travels surprisingly fast via word-of-mouth. Sure, we use smartphones, messaging apps, and social media, just like the big city Yuphole-Vaxholes use. But we small-town folks still prefer to talk to one another face-to-face. We prefer face-to-face conversations as we can be frank with each other and not worry about our words suddenly getting used against us five years down the road.

By now, we were also hearing and seeing all sorts of strange things. We would discuss what we were hearing and seeing after church, while socialized at the Cattlemen’s Club, when we bumped into each other at our General Store, and at our community meetings. Those places are where we small-town folks get most of our news and information about our community and the world around us.

When we would meet face-to-face, some people started sharing pictures, videos, and memes of growing stacks of bodies, empty New York nursing home beds, and dead homeless people who were half-eaten by rats on the streets. We could not be sure if the pictures and videos were old ones from the original COVIDsteria pandemic or if they were new and that people were dying because of the injections.

So when Team Sciencey in Washington DC suddenly announced a nationwide lockdown on Christmas Day for the Russian ROsteria scariant, we were very suspicious and refused to do any quarantining. Of course, all of our local Yuphole-Vaxholes started quarantining themselves as soon as the executive order went out.

But our quarantining Yuphole-Vaxholes soon faced a big problem. Our local General Store refused to do online, phone, or app ordering or do deliveries. They also only accepted cash because I doubt they were reporting everything they earned to the government. This and the fact that the rest of us were refusing to quarantine ourselves enraged our Yuphole-Vaxholes. 

Eventually, our Yuphole-Vaxholes would be forced to leave their homes for supplies wearing not just their usual three face diapers, gloves, and face shields, but dressed up as astronauts! They even dressed up like astronauts to get the mail from their mailboxes in front of their houses! [She rolls her eyes.]

Now I do not want to sound like a conspiracy theorist and all. But to tell you the truth, we local townsfolk started growing ever more concerned about what the government was doing with their so-called quarantines for the Russian ROsteria scariant. We heard that many vocal critics of the government, and especially anti-swabbers, were all suddenly coming down with that Russian ROsteria scariant. And they were disappearing into so-called “quarantine camps.” 

Social media and media people that stupid Fredo Ratto claimed these quarantine camps were "just like summer camps or resorts." But I don’t know. A quarantine camp sure does not sound like a summer camp or resort to me. And it seemed like nobody ever survived or got out alive from those so-called quarantine camps.  

The media and the government also claimed that Federal agents had attempted to arrest the former President, our new President Emeritus, or whatever he likes to call himself now, along with his entire family at their compound in Florida. However, they had somehow escaped to Russia and were now traitors colluding with the Russians to take over the country again. Now I was not born yesterday, but none of that Russia conspiracy stuff ever seemed to add up to anything real for me.

What concerned all of us the most, though, was if the local Yuphole-Vaxholes might now be secretly plotting online or through social media with the government to put the rest of us into the so-called quarantine camps. We local townsfolk all knew that our local Yuphole-Vaxhole population had a private social media group. It was where they gossiped and complained about us local townsfolk and plotted all their weird big city demands at our town council meetings. We local townsfolk were never allowed to join this private social media group, but we knew it existed. 

We also knew that social media and messaging apps were the primary methods of communication for the Yuphole-Vaxholes. That was where they all got or shared their news when they were not listening or watching particular radio, cable, or broadcast news networks.

But after the nationwide lockdown got announced, my social media feeds only had goofy cat memes and advertisements for spiced pumpkin pies or recipes. If I tried to post anything asking what was going on, it was not allowed! It also seemed like I could not message anyone else unless I wanted to talk about spiced pumpkin pie recipes in the message. But none of this mattered much as we local townsfolk were still having our face-to-face conversations because we were not quarantining at home.

Finally, we started seeing more and more unmarked black helicopters crisscrossing the prairie skies in the distance. Everyone in town said they had either saw a black helicopter or knew someone who had seen one. We were all concerned about what might happen if they were to land in our little town on the prairie. We had no idea what they, together with our local Yuphole-Vaxhole population, might do to the rest of us. [She shudders.] 

What happened in your community during COVID Spring?

By the time COVID Spring had started, there were already so many wild rumors circulating our little town on the prairie. Everyone by now had heard through word-of-mouth but sometimes through SMSs, messaging apps, and coded social media messages or memes, that something big was happening all over the country. The media, social media, and the government insisted on using words or labels like “insurrection,” “rebellion,” “revolt,” “uprising,” and finally “siege” to frame this pushback. They claimed it was being led or done by “homophobic racists” who wanted to "kill all the country's grandmas and marginalized peoples.”

However, we were hearing that ordinary Americans were finally stepping up and saying no to idiotic lockdowns, the wearing of three face diapers, being anal swabbed by their government, and so much more by taking direct action on their own. They were no longer waiting for a political messiah to magically appear and lead them into battle to regain all of our lost freedoms. They were also pushing back against any local Yuphole-Vaxhole know-it-all-holes and all of their nonsense by taking direct action in their local communities.

So sometime before the final Capitol Siege began, our town council called an urgent meeting of all residents of our town who were not Yuphole-Vaxholes. They wanted to discuss our Yuphole problem or the Yuphole question and what sort of direct action we could take against our local Yuphole-Vaxholes population. 

At our meeting, our community quickly and collectively decided that what our little town on the prairie needed was to have a great reset. It included having a final solution for our Yuphole problem or the Yuphole question. [She smiles.]

"A final solution for our Yuphole problem or the Yuphole question?”

Yesss… [She sighs.] I know talking about final solutions sounds a little Nazi-like. But you got to understand that years of frustration with the Yupholes, now turned Yuphole-Vaxholes, had all of us in our little town on the prairie at the breaking point!

So the local cattlemen volunteered to go out immediately and do a Yuphole-Vaxhole round-up. They rounded up and herded all the surviving local Yuphole-Vaxholes into our town’s main corrals and stockades until we, as a community, could decide together what our final solution would be. The rest of us then went to our local community center, where we debated, hashed out, and voted as a community on a final solution for our Yuphole problem or the Yuphole question.

And what was the hmmm… final solution that your community agreed on?

[She sighs.] We, as a community, decided to have our first ever Yuphole-Vaxhole hunt as that was how we used to control the local rabbit population when they would breed out of control because rabbits breed like, well, rabbits. We would all get together as a community, bang on pots and pans, and corral or herd all the rabbits in a farmer’s field into a big pen. Then we would either shoot them or beat them to death with baseball bats. Then we as a community would have a big potluck dinner, eat the rabbits, and play baseball. [She smiles.]

Oh hmmm... I see… Did your community implement a similar “final solution” to deal with your hmmm… Yuphole-Vaxholes? 

Nooooooooo!!! [She emphatically shakes her head “no” and then sighs.]

I do have to admit that at first, we were all excited about having our first ever Yuphole-Vaxhole hunt! I even baked a whole batch of my favorite special spiced pumpkin pies that everyone around here loves!

We all went down as a community with our guns, our baseball bats, and our home cooking to the corrals and stockades, where the local cattlemen had herded and were guarding all of our town's surviving local Yuphole-Vaxholes.

But when we got there, we saw all those poor stupid Yuphole-Vaxholes wearing their three face diapers, gloves, and face shields. And doing their social distancing with their little tape measures; waiting for someone to tell them what to do or think; and coughing or gasping for air like crazy as they all seemed to be pretty sick with colds or the flu, we started to feel sorry for them. I mean, they were all just a bunch of dumb mindless big city Yuphole-Vaxholes with fancy art history degrees who did not know any better! They were never gotten taught to think critically or for themselves or to contemplate that other people might think differently than they do!

They were just like the dumb cattle the cattlemen usually rounded up and herded into those corrals and stockades, but at least cattle are good for something. Yuphole-Vaxholes are not good for much of anything that I can think of off the top of my head... [She scratches her head and pauses for a second.]

Those poor Yuphole-Vaxholes just kept staring at us through their face shields. While we could not see the look on their faces because they were all wearing three face diapers, we knew they were all scared to death of us prairie townsfolk. They were also scared because it looked like the local cattlemen had been a little rough during the round-up. All the Yuphole-Vaxhole guys were now walking around like penguins! 

And unlike the completely mindless cattle that the cattlemen usually put in those corrals before castrating them or taking them to the slaughterhouse, the Yuphole-Vaxholes did have some inkling of what we might do to them. They knew we all had guns, and we also hated their guts for all the trouble they had caused us.  

Come to think of it - I know the real reason why the Yupholes hated us non-Yupholes who had and liked having guns. They knew we were not afraid to use them to protect ourselves and defend our country or our way of life. And that scared the hell out of all of them! [She sighs.]

We small townsfolk might not have fancy college degrees like the big city Yuphole-Vaxholes. And we might not be able to think as “big” as they do. But we do have kind hearts and the ability to forgive and move on. 

We decided as a community to cancel our first-ever Yuphole-Vaxhole shoot. Instead, we went back to the community center, hashed out, and voted on a new final solution for our Yuphole problem or the Yuphole question. 

The final solution we decided on was to have a great reset. We gave all the local Yuphole-Vaxholes exactly 24-hours to get their electric vehicles fully charged up, to pack up their fancy coffee machines and factory-made furniture, and to go back to whatever big city hellhole they came from.

And that was what our Yuphole-Vaxholes did. They could not wait to get the hell out of our little town on the prairie back to their hellhole cities and never come back to bother us again! [She smiles but pauses in thought.]

You know, and I hate to admit this because it is embarrassing, and it might get the other townsfolk talking behind my back. There is only one thing I miss having after we drove all of the Yupholes out of our little town on the prairie...

What could that possibly be?

[She hesitates and lowers her voice.] Pumpkin spice lattes… [A big smile appears on her face.]

One of the fancy Yuphole coffee places that used to be on our Main Street would make them for the other Yupholes to drink. Yupholes do not drink drip coffee out of giant mugs or thermostats like us small-town folks do. They usually only drink fancy espressos and lattés that require fancy little cups with saucers, or they use Styrofoam cups.

Those pumpkin spice lattes were delicious, but they cost $7! It was a little ridiculous in a small prairie town like ours! I could go to the local Cattlemen’s Club and get half a steak or a couple of pints of beer for the same price! [She frowns and shakes her head.]

Luckily, I do not need the Yupholes’ fancy coffee shop anymore. I found a great recipe video on the Internet showing me how to make pumpkin spice lattes at home. And it sure does not cost me $7 to make one myself! [She smiles.]

1. Hanson, Victor Davis (August 30, 2020). “Cultural Suicide Is Painless (The story of all Dark Ages is that when civilizations finally prefer suicide, they do it easily, and the remnants flock to the countryside to preserve what they can—allowing the cities go on with their ritual self-destruction).” American Greatness. (Archived 1 Sep 2020)