Jonald J.R. Trumbiden

After my last post lamenting the absurdity of the 2024 Presidential Debate, the craziness continues to unfold... an attempted assassination of Trump, Biden getting COVID again, the unhinged RNC convention where people are wearing bandages on their ear like Dear Leader (or is it "Ear Leader"?)... the shitshow continues!

The Official Monkey Buddha solution to all this political madness is simple-
Take the best of both political worlds, and meld Joseph R. Biden & Donald J. Trump into a single entity. Ladies & gentleman, with the help of A.I. imaging, I present to you:

Jonald J.R. Trumbiden

American Shitshow: 2024 Election Edition

Due to the general craziness of my home life with a toddler & infant in the mix, I haven't posted in awhile. After the sad, sorry spectacle that was the first Biden / Trump Presidential Debate of 2024, my younger self would have posted about that immediately. Like so many people, my wife & I watched in shock about how absolutely befuddled the President of the United States looked. We know Biden's pretty old & as my wife says, "He should be home, being a Pop-Pop." Once the debate started, though, we were like... holy shit, dude. Over the past weeks, I've been kind of absorbing the craziness of it, & observing the fallout. I've always commented about politics here, so I felt like I had to write about this.

It was definitely painful to watch, especially as one of the many who see Donald Trump as an existential (yes, exi-fucking-stential) threat to democracy & its institutions, not just in America, but around the globe. Despite the direct threat to law, order, & common decency that he represents, Trump is still just a buffoon, an egotistical moron with the wits and taste of a donkey. Any competent political opponent should make a complete mockery of such a foolish, boorish man. It's really not difficult to expose his obvious and constant lies, or call him out on his insufferable bullshit.

The fact that not as much attention was given to Trump being a shamelessly lying maniac with stupid, insane statements shows two things:

1) Everyone is so used to Trump constantly being a shamelessly lying maniac with stupid, insane statements that it's just like, "Oh, there he goes again!"

2) Biden was so unbelievably bad & clearly impaired, that nothing like it has been seen in all of televised politics.

What a fucking train-wreck. It would have probably just been sad if it was a semi-competent candidate debating Biden, but with Trump's lunacy it became absolutely surreal. Biden was completely helpless to counter any of the nonsense that should have been easily dispelled. The optics were just brutal - Grandpa Joe standing there mouth agape, forgetting anything even resembling a train of thought. 

People around this country and around the world were horrified to see that the last line of defense against an immoral, criminal, fascist fuck at the head of the most powerful nation on Earth is a mentally declining slightly-more-elderly man who could not even put a convincing thought together (forget making compelling policy arguments). It was a complete shitshow, and the aftermath has been just as nuts.

Biden & the DNC, have potentially royally screwed this country if Trump pulls off a victory by them not preparing another candidate to replace Biden after one term (as he promised). Although Kamala Harris is really the only person who could replace him and keep the campaign funds & infrastructure, America is still full of racists and misogynists who would never vote for a female President with dark complexion.

So we are less than half a year away from the General Election, and we are in the political equivalent of the twilight zone. Trump even being in the running to be President again is a complete & utter travesty. He is fraud and perversion personified. 

Meanwhile, the man who is supposed to be the Leader of the Free World is  calling President Zelenski of Ukraine fucking "PUTIN", and his own Vice-President "TRUMP"... & this is after he is supposed to convince us that he is still fit to lead. Joe is rocketing past Justice Ginsberg & Senator Feinstein in letting hubris & self-assured arrogance tarnish their legacy. By clinging to their positions in government, they've caused serious damage to the institutions they claimed to be serving.

It's embarrassing that our entrenched, rotting 2-party system has thrust these choices on us, out of millions of capable citizens. Let's be clear - I will vote for Joe Biden's re-animated corpse before I vote for Donald Trump. I think Biden's administration has done positive things for the country and I admire his tenacity, but it is clear that he's not cognitively & functionally up to the tremendous task of leading the country. 

We, as a society, cannot let a vulgarian such as Trump gain positions of power again, without severe detriment to our system of government. The question at this stage of the game is how is he stopped, without creating an even riskier scenario if Biden steps aside? I don't know, but I do know that if the Trump Family, Steve Bannons, Stephen Millers, and Heritage Foundation zealots get in control of things again, it's gonna be a bad time. We are in an amazing era, where technology and knowledge are opening up unbelievable possibilities... and these assholes want to take us back to the feudal ages.

 Let's hope that the bizarre crap-shoot of life somehow averts the national & global disaster that a second Trump administration would bring. It's definitely a worrisome set of circumstances, and it shows just how totally wacked-out American politics is, in general. I guess, like always... we just have to sit back and experience the puppet show.

Clematis Vine Flowering Cycle

My wife & I have a trellis in front of a cinder block wall shed, and several years ago I began trying to get clematis vines to grow on it.

We also planted a rose bush, so now it is a colorful Spring display of pinks & purples. 

Nature Photography
by Paul Micarelli

 

I love just looking at the infinite details of these beautiful plants. It's a wonderful feeling to take a deep breath, be present, & truly smell the roses.

 

This year I took some photos of the clematis flowers at different stages of blossoming. 

 It is kind of freaky about halfway through- the flower resembles a strange alien creature as it opens...

 

 

Springtime Bees

 One of the awesome signs of Spring is the bees buzzing around the flowering plants & collecting pollen. 

 We have a lot of plants & flowers at our house, so there are bees everywhere. Here are some pics I took of honeybees & bumblebees getting that sweet, sweet pollen.

Trump's Asshole Mouth

Trump's Asshole Mouth

To commemorate Donald J. Trump's first day in court as a criminal defendant, I created this classy new Trump meme!!! It has been widely commented that Trump's mouth looks like a butthole (everybody's saying it). When he puckers his lips while excreting his verbal bullshit, it's both an uncanny & revolting resemblance.  

Trump has come oh so far since I mockingly made a graphic way back in 2011 imagining Trump as "President A$$hole", thinking it was a completely absurd possibility. 

 The Monkey Buddha Archives:
Trumping Birther Madness

Not only has he (unbelievably) been President, but was impeached twice & after leaving office has faced almost 100 felony charges from different jurisdictions. He's defrauded countless people & organizations, and tells numerous verifiable lies in almost every conversation he has. He tried to instigate a hostile takeover of our democratically-elected government, & install a plutocratic autocracy. The guy is a true fucking scumbag, regardless of the admiration he receives from self-proclaimed MAGA "patriots". 

Trump's Asshole Mouth is the prime expression of his vulgarity- spewing the aforementioned lies, juvenile bully behavior, name-calling, and just generally stupid discourse. 

Today is the continuation of his existing legal clusterfuck, but it is also the beginning of the "criminal defendant" stage of Trump's court battles. We'll see how fast Trump's Asshole Mouth gets him in real trouble.

Techno Viking A.I. Goblin

 

Artificial Intelligence is doing something that was definitely NOT what most people would have thought the machines would be capable of - simulating & re-creating (at least visually) what people experience in psychedelic states. 

This trippy application of computer software gained prominence with the "Deep Dream" programs about 10 years ago. It generated hallucinogenic animations in which barely-recognizable imagery would cycle as weird textural features.

The Monkey Buddha Archives:
Deep Dream Images

Now, A.I. programs are just outputting the craziest, most mind-boggling imagery & video. We are breaking through to a singularity-type situation of infinite amounts of novel imagery, generated continuously. One thing I've been thinking about lately is how fusion power is developing in tandem with A.I.. Perhaps we will need a new power source to accommodate the massive amounts of clean energy that will be needed for emerging technologies in computing. It's fascinating how these interconnected innovations are evolving simultaneously.

I've posted about the possible outcomes of this paradigm-shattering technology, but I am just left in awe thinking about the implications. I don't even pretend to understand the coding & technology to produce this kind of software. It's basically Enochian magic, as far as I know. The biological human brain & society eventually won't be able to keep up with the madness that's about to ensue.

Check out this amazing A.I. alien goblin remix of the old "Techno Viking" video that had me dying:

When you partied a little bit too hard
and transcended into another dimension

The Prophecy of the Trump Bible™ is Fulfilled!

WHAT...THE...FUCK?!? HAHAHA The Absurdity-Meter has officially gone thermonuclear, & obliterated all sense of irony. After seeing something about it online & thinking "Holy Shit, you've gotta be kidding me", I was going to post about this, before even watching the video... but after actually sitting through it... just WOW. 

 

Through divine inspiration, I created a satirical ad for a Trump Bible in 2020. I know he's a total scumbag & there is no bottom to his barrel of bullshit, but I thought the idea of Donald Trump selling Bibles was way too ridiculous even for him. I was clearly wrong (but also right!). 

I am truly surprised that he didn't have the gold TRUMP logo imprinted on these Bibles, which is the most shocking thing about this pathetic display.

At this point, one has to ask... Is there any more hypocritical and foolish human being than a Christian Trump supporter? The word "gullible" doesn't begin to address the cognitive dissonance needed to believe anything Donald Trump says about religion and spirituality. To listen to this crass advertisement for the Holy Bible by the most corrupt, dishonest, and immoral politician to ever grace the American political landscape & NOT immediately think "This guy is clearly the Anti-Christ archetype we've been warned about," is pure goddamn stupidity on a level that is difficult for a rational mind to truly comprehend. 

I Spy A.I. Lies

I continue to be astounded at the developments in the field of artificial intelligence. It's partly amusing & partly horrific to see these insanely powerful tools developing so rapidly that the human race doesn't really know how to handle it.

The most disturbing aspect of A.I. (so far) is the ability to deceive people. We can no longer trust what we see or hear in digital or print media to represent objective reality. As a graphic designer, I've always been able to easily spot "Photoshopped" or digitally-altered images. Now, with more advanced A.I. renderings being so realistic, I don't trust anything I see anymore.

However, I can still often tell when images are produced by A.I. programs. Unfortunately, the general public is not as discerning as I may be. It's easy to see how people could get fooled by the amazing technologies out there, if they are used for deceptive purposes.

One recent example that has already achieved "meme" status is a Willy Wonka-themed event in Scotland that had families so upset that the cops were called. The organizer/promoter used A.I. generated imagery to evoke a magical "Wonka Wonderland" that definitely did not properly represent the lame reality of the actual event.

Parents lured to immersive Willy Wonka experience by AI ads show up to near-empty warehouse with no candy

The most iconic image to come out of the situation is the viscerally real "Sad Oompa Loompa Lady," who looks like she's cookin' up some Wonka Meth:

 

Another recent eaxmple of using A.I. technology, this time for for audio fakery, is the Joe Biden robo-call that used an A.I. generated simulation of Biden's voice to mislead Democratic primary voters:

Magician says political consultant hired him to create AI Biden robocall ahead of New Hampshire primary

We are in for a very wild ride into the future, as the implications of A.I being used for nefarious purposes becomes clear:

• Is that the actual voice of a politician, using a racial slur? 

• Did that celebrity really get caught in a compromising sexual situation? 

• Have we come into contact with extraterrestrial beings in the real world?

• Are soldiers of a particular nation truly committing war crimes?

We are already at the point where we will not be able to believe anything we see online. If we don't experience it directly with our own biological sensory organs, it could be a very convincing A.I. lie.

This is one of the aspects of artificial intelligence that people are totally not prepared to deal with... It will be interesting to see how we as a global society address these challenges and deceptions that we all will inevitably face.

The Insane Horror of War

Although I'm fortunate to have never been in an active war zone, I've seen many, many horrific images of war. I don't want to shy away from those realities because it is necessary to really understand the many (sometimes disturbing) facets of human nature & our existence.

The video of the screenshot above really hit me hard, because it instantly reminded me of my 3-year old son (one of the 2 reasons I haven't been posting here as often). However, instead of his brown eyes being filled with the joy & playfulness that a child should be experiencing, this poor boy's eyes are filled with traumatic, debilitating fear. It's a sickening & disheartening scene, and reveals the unfathomable insanity & horror of war. 

The YouTube video is labeled as a Palestinian child, who was showing signs of shock, being comforted by a doctor after an Israeli attack in Rafah in southern Gaza. This took place not long after the ruthless Oct. 7 attacks on Israel by Hamas. I have been wanting to write this post for awhile now, with this boy's terrified face haunting my mind.

I've always been generally anti-war particularly when it comes to wars of aggression, but having become a father has taken my disgust for humanity's brutality to new depths. Seeing what happens in wartime to innocent people, and especially children like this, is just gut-wrenching to the point of despair.

What in the hell are we doing to each other, our fellow human beings on this Earth?? ...and for what?!?

As I get older while now being a dad, the more I grow in pure wonder & amazement at this world we inhabit, while simultaneously being completely fed up by the fucking stupidity of people. War is one of those things that makes me realize we're still just idiotic apes bashing in each other's skulls, 2001: A Space Odyssey-style.

The Israeli/Palestinian situation has been fucked up for so long, that it's seems like a conflict with no end and no solution. I'm not going to rehash the recent history of the region, but I will say that it's a cycle of violence that will self-propagate indefinitely... unless some triumph of human spirit and resolve can work toward a better path for all the peoples involved.

It is an unbelievably tough situation- you can't let murderous terrorists invade towns full of innocent people and wreak havoc, but... goddamn, retaliating by bombing out whole civilian population centers & infrastructure is a sure way to continue the hatred & resentment in future generations. Fighting terrorism by terrorizing innocent people is such an obvious hypocrisy, but psychos can still justify it by dehumanizing people they deem as The Other", instead of seeing them as fellow humans and living, feeling, thinking beings.

I'm old enough to remember the days of Ariel Sharon while Dubya was President & the atrocities of that time. I cynically knew that this horrible event would be used as a pretext to eliminate the Palestinian presence altogether. As I've watched the catastrophic aftermath unfold with the rest of the world over the past several months, it has turned out to be true:

Netanyahu’s apparent rejection of a post-war Palestinian state
adds to tensions with Biden administration

Of course, there are elements on all sides who want the conflicts throughout the world to continue, for various perverse reasons- war profiteering, consolidation of power, & what seems to be a driving force for so much of the bullshit... nationalistic / religious ideology.

People are so childish when it comes to nationality and religion, everyone thinking that their thinking is the only way to think... but they're really not thinking at all. That's the most depressing thing about the Middle Eastern conflict- Jews and Muslims hate each other because they believe a bunch of old stories & laws that are kinda the same, but different enough to get all tribal about it. Everyone believes that their religious ideas are correct. It's all mental constructs that people have mistaken for external reality. Then, you also have certain Christians basing their loyalties in this battle on their own beliefs about Jesus magically re-appearing. It's all so ridiculous, but countless people are murdering other people over it.

This, of course, is not a new phenomenon, nor is it only a feature of the Abrahamic religions. People have been murdering and brutalizing each other en masse all over the world, forever. This is something I always emphasize to those who lament at the current state of affairs. I've been listening to the awesome podcast, "Fall of Civilizations" during my commute to work, and it's a stark reminder about how fucking violent humans, & the societies they create, have always been.

There's so much fighting and hatred over imaginary lines in the desert sand, & whose self-righteous ideas about the world and the Infinite God are the best... it's all just insane, horrible shit. There is no foreseeable end to all the war & fighting in the world. That is the unfortunate, but inescapable fact. So, we just have to try to be a light in the realm of influence we have, to try to make the world a slightly better place.

Gnome in My Home

 Everybody talks about the Elf on a Shelf...

but what about the "GNOME IN MY HOME"????

#gnomeinmyhome

 

Artificial Christmas Spirit

 One of the most significant developments this year was the explosion of A.I. technology. We can't even imagine the possibilities that will be presenting themselves in the coming years.

It's the holiday season, and my son is 3 plus it's my baby daughter's first Christmas, so it's a lot of fun (& very exhausting). 

To celebrate this holiday of the human spirit, here are some Christmas creations, by a machine!...

-Images: Stable Diffusion AI Software
-Prompts & Curating: Paul Micarelli

"amanita mushroom dressed as santa claus"

 

"elf skank"

"robot dressed as santa claus in a futuristic space sleigh"

 

*Check out A LOT more A.I. madness on my social media pages:

Instagram:

@ac_artificial_creativity

Facebook:

@AC.Artificial.Creativity

Monkey Neuron Activation

This is what happens when you browse The Monkey Buddha Archives.

(Seen on Giphy @mikethedead)

Trump's MAGA Insane Asylum

This level of devotion to ANY politician (or celebrity, or person in general) is stupid & totally insane... but to show this amount of adoration to a criminal, doofy asshole like Donald Trump is just really fucking weird.

Trump aka. "Inmate no. P01135809" tried to overthrow the Presidential election & has committed crimes that would put other people behind bars immediately. He has pushed the limits of corruption in both business & government to extreme limits that were previously unimaginable. His toxicity to politics and culture have inflicted immeasurable damage to the collective consciousness of our country & the world. 

However, there are still people so detached from reality that they're still listening his endless stream of bullshit nonsense & somehow NOT thinking "Wow, what a goddamn ignorant jerk this guy is!!!" There are also people who simply hate Democ-Rats & Creepy Joe Biden so much that they support Trump just to "own the Libs". It sucks that American politics is such a 2-team sport that these are the only choices. Republicans will slavishly support a human being as immoral & odious as Trump, because he represents their "team". 

Some especially gullible people believe that Trump actually cares about this country & its citizens. You have to be a complete sucker to fall for his nationalistic rhetoric, because there's only ONE entity that Donald J. Trump gives any shits about - and that is Donald J. Trump. Everything else exists to serve his endless narcissism & out of control ego.

 

As an former senior official close to Trump has reportedly said, 

“He lacks any shred of human decency, humility or caring. 

He is morally bankrupt, breathtakingly dishonest, lethally incompetent, and stunningly ignorant of virtually anything related to governing, history, geography, human events or world affairs. 

He is a traitor and a malignancy in our nation and represents a clear and present danger to our democracy and the rule of law.”

 

If you don't think this describes Donald Trump accurately, then holy crap, you are a piss-poor judge of character... & may very well be an inmate at the MAGA Insane Asylum!

 

Everything You Need to Know About the Brain

(click to enlarge)

 

These simple, easy-to-follow charts are fun, comprehensive visual guides to the complex physical, biological structure of the brain, as well as the resulting emergent phenomena that we internally experience as sensory input and mental activity.

The functioning & processes of the brain are utterly fascinating to my brain.

I saw these infographics on r/197, but upon downloading the hi-res images & looking closely among the dense layers of information (conveyed through increasingly smaller text sizes), I was able to find the source:

http://thehighestofthemountains.com/

So, the website is very passionate about the details & facts of science, but scientific understanding is used as a means to prove the divine engineering of God, whatever that is. 

I personally feel that deeply understanding scientific ideas and discoveries should absolutely lead to a revelatory insight into the mystical nature of this endlessly intricate reality. However, I feel like biblical justifications and personifications of the deity "God the Architect/Engineer" miss the fundamental nature of existence completely. 

It's interesting that levels of genius that can create such insanely detailed displays of scientific & technical information can still look at a spiritual work such as the Bible as something that scientific endeavors exist to somehow qualify. To be fair, I have read through the site and think there's a lot of valid moral & spiritual wisdom to go along with the scientific details. I just think that the personification of God in any aspect doesn't jive with the reality of the situation- which is that Source, The-All-In-One, The Universe, Infinite Energies of Creation, Quantum Field, God, Unity just IS- there is NO motivation, purpose, nor plan behind the Universe in any sense as we humans know it... and that is the breathtaking truth that can be truly terrifying to most people. 

 There is clearly a wholly incomprehensible hierarchical pattern of fractal & holographic organization that underlies our world. My issue is with giving this Infinity attributes of our human psyche.

 "Nature is not human-hearted."
-Lao-Tzu

Speaking of incomprehensible, the first chart was just a warm-up... here is the second graphic showing the mind-bogglingly numerous pathways and processes in the brain. My brain apologizes to your brain in advance, for exposing it to this visual labyrinth of information about itself:

(click to enlarge)
 

3D Recreation of Tenochtitlan

I love the use of 3D modeling programs to re-create ancient cities & environments. It is an immersive way to virtually travel through time and experience the glory of past civilizations. Playing the Assassins Creed games always impressed me with the way you got a sense of the historical time period, such as Renaissance Rome or Ptolemaic Egypt.

It is exciting to come across projects where artists and historians accurately replicate the appearance of an ancient site. I found this website by Thomas Kole that is devoted to the rendering of Tenochtitlan, capital of the mighty (& brutal) Aztec empire, in the location that is now Mexico City:

Portrait of Tenochtitlan

The renderings shown on the website are stunning. The Aztec city built in the middle of a lake surrounded by mountains left the Spanish conquistadors awestruck when they first saw it. (Of course, the awe was only temporary & didn't' prevent them from subjugating and eventually destroying the magnificent city.)

It was an absolute marvel of engineering & city planning, and 3D computer renderings like this are now the only way to experience the majestic nature of this lost metropolis. I would highly encourage visiting the website above & spending some time soaking in the beauty of Tenochtitlan.

I've long been fascinated by ancient Mesoamerican cultures. I've studied the art, astronomy, engineering, and societies of the Aztec and Maya people extensively. There is so much to learn from them, but unfortunately so much has been lost to conquest and time.

That is why it is so amazing to be able to use this technology to visualize the details of the time period, especially when it is done is such a meticulous and historically accurate way. Eventually, we will be able to use these digital reconstructions and virtual or augmented reality devices to "time travel" and visit such sites in an even more immersive context.

A.I. Architecture - Futuristic Green Cities

I have been dabbling in simple A.I image generation. I created pages on Facebook & Instagram under @ac_artificial_creativity.

I've been using the online program Stable Diffusion. I actually don't like the newest version, so I found the older Stable Diffusion v1.5. It's actually faster, & generates 4 images at a time. The newer version only generates one image (which is more "polished" looking), and is much slower. The one thing I like about the older version is the glitchy & weird images it could produce.

The explosion of A.I. generated art is still blowing my mind. There is now endless novel artwork being created, & I don't think we've full grasped the implications of this technology on human creative efforts. I look through my social media feeds of all this amazing imagery, thinking it's just overwhelming.

 I've also begun to use generative tools in my professional life, which is just as amazing. I couldn't find the right photo of a chocolate bar online to use for a food label, so I used A.I. to make one that I could plug into the design. On another project, I had to use a photo of a cheesecake with the end cropped off, so I used Photoshop's new "generative fill" tool & it completed the crumble crust end of the cheesecake perfectly. I just thought, "Holy shit, this is insane."

Anyway, when I first started generating A.I. images, one of the series I made that made me sit back and just feel totally awe-struck was of architectural illustrations. The prompt I used was "a futuristic organically inspired city with greenery and sleek rounded architecture". The results were so impressive & beautiful, I couldn't believe they were generated by a computer program. 

I think artificial intelligence software could help advance mankind in unimaginable ways, if it's not used to make a dystopian inescapable control system first. Even before the current proliferation of these programs, I've long thought we should get rid of human politicians whose self-interest & corruption fucks us all over, and feed policy problems into A.I. for the optimal solutions that benefit the greatest number of people. 

Here are some more more images depicting the potential green urban utopia that A.I. could help us to implement. I think they're absolutely fantastic:

 

Summer of Bugs

 This summer, I was able to take a lot of nature photography, especially macro close-ups of insects & spiders. Being able to zoom into the intricate details of these creatures gives you a deeper appreciation of their amazing complexity.

Nature Photography
by Paul Micarelli

This post is a roundup of photos I've taken of interesting creatures in my backyard. (I try to use my finger for scale whenever possible.)

First up is this little jumping spider that was staring at me as I snapped his pic:

Here are some alien-like macro shots of a kaytdid. Thankfully, I'm part of a local Facebook nature photography group, so they are a big help in identifying some of this wildlife. Otherwise, I would've thought this was just some kind of grasshopper:

 

Have you ever seen a katydid breathing? Now you have:

The next photos are actually post-mortem of what I was later informed was a cicada killer wasp. I was in the yard with my 3-year old son & it started buzzing around our heads. So, I took Paulie up to the porch, tracked it down, & sprayed it. I'd already been stung by multiple bees & wasps this summer, and this one looked it could definitely hurt one of us. I watched it fly across the yard & drop. I went over to the dead wasp & decided that it was pretty insane-looking, so I might as well get some photography of its physical features. 

Well, I caught a lot of shit from people in the nature photography group, because I had killed it. It actually cause a bit of a debate among the members who were defending me vs. the wasp defenders. Lol. I found out that cicada killer males put on a false show of aggression & actually are not super-dangerous. Although I don't want to kill any kind of life if I can help it, I truly felt that this wasp was a threat. I don't feel bad about taking out a wasp to prevent my son from possibly getting injured. Despite it's potential threat level, it's details were definitely fascinating:

Here's another really tiny spider, that was in a web on the leaves of a hibiscus plant. It was so small, I couldn't even pick up fine details with my macro lens:

This little green fella turned out to be a juniper stink bug. I knew it was shaped like a stink bug, but thought it was a small beetle or something. I'm used to the ugly brown stinkbugs.

 

Finally, this alien-like praying mantis was waiting for my family on our back door, as we came home from a Labor Day party yesterday. It was about 4-6 inches long. My wife refused to open the door until I got it the hell away from there.