We get doorknockers here in my Los Angeles neighborhood, and yes, they’re annoying.
It’s one of the things I miss most about our late doggo, Blaze – he had a fierce bark and an unhinged look in his eye. When one of these dudes would show up trying to sell me a new solar rooftop, he’d go beserk and lunge at the leash, and I’d just say, “Oh, wow, sorry, can’t talk now.”
They were usually quite happy to hightail it right the heck out of there, never knowing that Blaze actually wouldn’t hurt a flea. He was just what you’d call “excitable."
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With Blaze having gone to doggie heaven, though, it’s a little more complicated. My daughter was coming over to visit, so I went out to greet her, and there was the Usual Suspect in the yellow vest with a lanyard specifying he was from some BS outfit or other.
I’m used to these dudes, and although I almost fell for a solar power gambit once, I’m pretty adept at telling them to get off my lawn.
(I’m way too nice, though: all too many of them remind me of my own son, a good young man who was briefly sold a bill of goods about door-to-door reroofing sales. He was just trying to be entrepreneurial, and the company was as slick as Bill Clinton back in the day, and they had him thinking he was really on to something big. Since it was during the dark days of COVID, any opportunity was welcomed. Luckily, it didn't take him long to realize that most folks really don’t like hearing their doorbell ringing from a stranger trying to sell them something dubious.)
Back to the story at hand: So the guy tells me, “I’m here for your appointment.”
I stopped short. I’m a busy person, as are many of us, and I quickly scanned my brain. Did I make an appointment for something but just forgot about it? Searching, searching… No. I can think of nothing.
“I don’t have an appointment,” I told him.
“Oh,” he said, reaching for his phone. “But you spoke with Lydia and set it up.”
I looked at his lanyard. “Sunburst,” or some such crap. He explained that he was here to get me Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP) discounts. Been there, done that. “I didn’t make an appointment, and I’m working right now, actually, so goodbye,” I said.
But here’s where it differed from the usual encounter: he played audio on his phone. And it was ME, saying, “Yes, I’m free in the afternoons, we can do it then.”
Now, I’m not Johnny B. Gullible, but I’d be lying if I claimed I didn’t have an “oh s***” moment. Did I make an appointment and instantly forget about it? Was I losing my mind? Was this the first sign of dementia?
When did I make this appointment, I demanded. On April 1st, he alleged. Now I admit, I’m prone to occasional lapses of memory, and there has been a time or two I had to admit to The Wife™ that “Oh, you’re right, you actually DID tell me about that party,” but I remember yesterday. And there is no way in hell I talked to “Lydia” on Wednesday, because I was working most of the day and certainly hadn’t been downing margaritas to the point where I’d be making appointments that I’d forget.
But "I'm free in the afternoons" is in fact something I would say, because it's the truth.
“Play it again,” I said. Indeed, it was me; that was my voice — but it was just a little off. Hard to pinpoint, just not quite a hundred percent. It was me, but it wasn't me.
I sent the hapless lad off. I don’t necessarily blame him; who knows if he was even aware that he’d been fed a line of horse manure? I blame his handlers.
It reminds me of a horrible story from a few years ago, when frankly evil people tried to scam my late father. He was an extremely intelligent man, but he was in his mid 80s, and when they called and said his grandson — my son — had been involved in a horrible accident, he stood up. My son had killed his pregnant girlfriend, they told him, and he was too scared to call me. They even put “him” on the phone. My dad went to get the $3,000 they demanded, but luckily, his wife phoned some folks in law enforcement whom she knew, and they told her, “Stop now. It’s a scam.”
The family didn’t lose three grand, but the pain it cost my father was heartbreaking. That’s one of the reasons why, if you’ve read some of my previous articles, you’ll note that I am a firm believer in punishment — do the crime, do the time, a notion that Democrats have all but forgotten.
If I could find the people who did that to my dad, I would sentence them to a lifetime of being slapped in the face with wet fish and staring at concrete walls. And that’s my nice version.
Even Captain Kirk is not immune to the evil that is out there:
I wanted to put this out yesterday but given the day and the possibility that it would look like a joke I waited for today. There is a page on @facebook that is using AI to create horrible fake news stories about me. The page is by The Beanstalk Functions Group which is… pic.twitter.com/q0zjSjYkMy
— William Shatner (@WilliamShatner) April 2, 2026
There is a page on @facebook that is using AI to create horrible fake news stories about me…
They have created stories that say I have stage 4 brain cancer, was in some kind of fight with Erika Kirk and that I’m dying. All their stories are monetized. Most of the stories use an AI image of me. Facebook Support will not remove the page.
Artificial intelligence is changing the world as we know it, and some of it is for the good and will hopefully lead to stunning technological and medical advancements, among other things. But it is also a development that can be easily used for evil. The Left would have you believe that Evil is but a concept, and that all people are inherently good, and that we should seek to empathize with the criminals in our midst.
I differ wholeheartedly and think the function of our government and our society should be to crush and annihilate all evil, all the time. If the guys who did that to my father were ever found, and I was in charge of sentencing them, there would be not an ounce of mercy in my heart.
