APRIL, COME SHE WILL (AND SHE'S BRINGING MY 55TH BIRTHDAY WITH HER)

I'd like a Trump conviction and a book deal as gifts from the Universe, please

April is the cruelest month, breeding
Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
Memory and desire, stirring
Dull roots with spring rain
Winter kept us warm, covering
Earth in forgetful snow, feeding
A little life with dried tubers…

I used to agree with T.S. Eliot, but then social media apps told me that negative thinking is the opposite of manifesting. Lately, I’ve been trying to take a more optimistic approach to the death rattle of civilization because tarot card readers on TikTok said so.

But when your birthday month begins with a day of jokes, pranks, and other forms of deliberately evil trickery, it does set a slightly ominous emotional tone for the following 29 days. My birthday is the 26th—as if you couldn’t have guessed I’m a Taurus without that info—and I’ll be (gulp) 55.

Yup, Dublin will be putting up the double nickels.

That’s a solid line I plan to roll out anytime anyone eschews politeness and asks a lady for her age. I never lie about how old I am, and it’s fun watching it register on peoples’ faces that I’m older than what they thought. F-Y-to-the-Izzo, “You look great!” is sufficient for a compliment, no need to add “for your age.”

Anyway, my big day arrives 11 days after the traveling Bible salesman begins his first criminal trial, the Stormy Daniels hush money one. The sundowning adjudicated rapist fraud was having another normal Easter Sunday, posting a total of 77-one for each year of his miserable existence—all-caps rage-sharts on his floundering meme stock, Truth Social.

So loving and Christlike.

There aren’t even half a million users left on Pump’N’Dump Trump’s SPAC app, so watching this next bubble burst all over his stupid shiny suit and ridiculously long tie will be a nice bonus bday gift for the woman who was cyber-harassed by his MAGA minions.

Donny Photo Op also used a dead New York police officer to try to compete with President Joe Biden’s sold-out fundraising gig at Radio City Music Hall, which raised a record-shattering $25 million in one night. Dark Brandon brought his pals Barack Obama and Bill Clinton. Cynthia Erivo, Lizzo, and Queen Latifah were among the performers.

Monsignorant Three-Card-Monte could never sell enough crappy gold sneakers or autographed $60 Bibles to take in that kind of haul, and no one would ever show up for him like that fundraiser. AND HE KNOWS IT.

Trump Schadenfreude is my favorite flavor of schadenfreude. All of his sad MAGA cult followers were working extra hard this weekend to be extra terrible. When they weren’t weakly dragging the Presidents at Radio City (how dare Joe Biden raise money for his campaign while Trump made a funeral all about him), they were losing their collective shit over the confluence of Easter and Transgender Visibility Day.

Now, I know I don’t have to tell you about the sublevel of humanity occupied by the transphobic Trumptwunts. It was the added bonus hypocrisy in all of their snowflakes fee fees that made it painfully obvious that these cult fucks are too in love with their hate to make any space for actual truths to calm them down.

Trans Day of Visibility has always been on March 31st for the last fifteen years. Yes, even during the four years Trump was illegitimately squatting in our White House. He’s just too much of an ingrate to issue the annual proclamations. Which Joe Biden did last year and the year before on March 31st. But those March 31st’s weren’t also on Zombie Jesus Chocolate Bunny Egg Hunt Day, so MAGA collectively lost their tiny little hateful minds.

In tweet after tweet, they clutched their pearls of non-wisdom and screamed about the “love of Jesus Christ” while pushing hateful tropes about the transgender community in the same sentence. These deeply religious Christians literally spent their holy day fighting on the internet instead of in church or hiding eggs in their backyards.

It didn’t matter if you pointed out that Easter’s date changes every year while the Trans Day of Visibility is always March 31st. MAGA wanted Joe Biden to change it because it *checks notes* ruined their shitty ham from Costco?

Move your precious egg hunt if you’re so mad, you giant stupid babies.

Also, they were justifying that Trump AUTOGRAPHED A BIBLE. I’m the least religious person you’ll ever encounter, and even I was offended by the next-level blasphemy. One MAGAt told me, “The names of our family members are written in my Bible.”

Donald Trump isn’t a member of your fucking family, Cletus. And it’s an AUTOGRAPH of his deteriorating EKG scroll, for fuck’s sake. “I make a lot of notes in my Bible,” justified another MAGAt who was trolling me on Jeebus’s Special Day. Take this note: NO ONE IS SUPPOSED TO AUTOGRAPH A BIBLE. I asked one who the author was—because they were trying to bully me about writing a book (pauses to let pain from hard eye-roll subside)—and they said “GOD.”

I am a facepalm.

I did my usual “The Bible is a work of fiction that didn’t fall out of the sky” routine, but that MAGA cult is a tough audience, I tell ya.

SPEAKING OF MY BOOK, I’m just five copies away from hitting 600 copies sold! Two weeks from now, The Sound of Settling will be on the shelves at the world’s greatest bookstore, Powell’s. I will absolutely be recording that momentous occasion, because I’ve been walking its aisles for years with the same mantra in my head: “Someday, my book will live here.”

CUE THE FEELS.

April is the perfect time for you to buy my rock and roll love story, because I’d love to have it be my best-selling month yet. I’ve been busy querying agents and relentlessly tweeting about it. The MAGA trolls have jumped on this, because I have 111.3K followers and they think 600 books isn’t a big deal. They also don’t read, BUT YOU DO! So please get your copy—free with Kindle Unlimited, also available in paperback—whether you order it from Amazon or ask your local indie bookstore to stock it. If you can’t afford it at the moment, please just share the link on your socials and say it’s at the top of your TBR list. Word-of-mouth continues to be my best means until the Yes Person shows up.

Which would be the best birthday present of all.

@taradublinrocks#TheSoundOfSettling #signtara taradublinrocks.com

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