At Last We Have a Diagnosis

I've read Fred, usually via Vanderleun, on rare occasions.  I hate to link to him.  He is, I think, a former journalist, which is to say, an ass.  I find him semi-amusing, at times, in very small doses.  But, I had to grab this quote:

Fourth: “Therapy.” This disguised witchcraft is very much a subset of the female fascination with emotional relations. It allows them to talk endlessly about their feelings. Men would rather be crucified. Thus everything becomes a “disorder.” Among these absurdities are things ilke Intermittent Explosive Disorder (appropriately, IED), and Temper Irregulation Disorder. These disorders have only been discovered since women took over the schools.

IED.  I've probably told this story before, nevertheless.  Dad owned a pretty good John Deere baler -- back in the square bale days of the sixties and seventies.  My cousin lived a mile from us, less across the field.  My dad being his uncle, we would swap work.  He and his boys would help us get our hay in then we'd pull the baler over to his place and put up his hay.  We did this for years until all of us boys were grown up and gone and Dad switched to the modern big round bales.

This particular year, we had successfully gotten all of our hay crop, several thousand bales, up and hauled to the barns.  Dad pulled his JD baler up into the yard, ready to go to my cousin's place the next day.  He decided that he ought to sharpen the rotating knives that cut the twine before he started on his nephew's hay.  So he got a wrench and started unbolting them from the frame.  One bolt was a little reluctant to turn. 

I asked if he wanted me to try it.  He replied, "No, you're apt to twist it off."  Every time I tell this story I stop and sincerely thank God Dad didn't hand me that wrench.  It was about one more turn until we heard that odd little ping followed by the head coming completely free.  There was the raw, gleaming metal of the broken bolt staring up from out of that green steel. 

Dad looked at it for a second then began to violently and repeatedly strike the heavy chute with his wrench.  Clank! Clank! Clank!  I'm not sure he even cussed, he was so mad.  He just kept whaling on that baler for what seemed like five minutes, though it was almost certainly less than a minute.

Little did we know back then that my father was afflicted with IED.