John McAfee Is a Pretty Entertaining Blogger

Whether or not you’ve been following the saga of cyber security millionaire and bath salt aficionado John McAfee, you’re going to want to check out his new blog, The Hinterland. It’s a fascinating glimpse into the mind of an apparent madman. This is the same man who’s wanted by police for questioning regarding the murder of his neighbor, American ex-pat Gregory Faull, who had recently filed a complaint against McAfee for “roguish behavior.” If you’re wondering what exactly that could mean, look no further than The Hinterland.

Purportedly launched as a means for clearing the air about his character, McAfee’s new blog only serves to cloud it more with questions about the 67-year-old’s sanity. McAfee has been no stranger to the press since we learned of his fugitive status from Gizmodo, where McAfee chronicler Jeff Wise has been following the story. The same day as the Gizmodo scoop, Wired published an interview with McAfee, who sounded extremely paranoid but insisted upon his innocence. Whomever killed Faull was coming for him next, McAfee told the magazine. The Hinterland is an extension of that interview, a chronicle of McAfee’s life on the lam. I’ve put together a little highlight reel for you.

“The press is out to get me.” In his very first post, McAfee jumps right to the point: The press is blowing this whole thing out of proportion. At the center of the coverage is Jeff Wise, who McAfee says “has made a life work out of smearing my character.” Why would he want to do that? Because of a Belizean sex scandal, of course. McAfee traces Wise’s personal vendetta against him back to when the journalist wrote a story on him for National Geographic Explorer years ago. Funny business was had when Wise was hanging out with McAfee’s friends in New Mexico, McAfee says.

One of those friends was a beautiful young woman named Goldy Ivashkov. The first day he arrived he ended up spending the night with her. While camping, their intimacy was flaunted to the point that around the campfire, the lap-sitting, face kissing, fondling was so intense that I jokingly and loudly said “somebody get pictures of this to send to his wife in case we get a bad story from him”. It was a joke. I joke a lot. Unfortunately, many pictures were taken and, as I am told, his wife did receive some. I had nothing to do with it.

“The press owes me money.” McAfee must not understand the traditional arrangement between journalists and their subjects very well, because he wants to know where his cut of Joel Johnson’s salary is. Johnson published excerpts from McAfee’s diary last week, and McAfee now wants to know why he didn’t get paid.
bq. I am running out of time again. I’m sorry these missives have to be so short. When I come back I will talk a little more about the press – specifically Joel Johnson who claims he absconded with my “private diary” from a “private website” and published it on Gizmodo. His rationale was “moral imperative”. I emailed Joel and asked whether moral imperative shouldn’t dictate that he send the money he received from Gizmodo to me. After all, it was my effort, my photos, my time, my words. Shouldn’t I get the money? He did not respond.

“Meet my young mistresses.” John McAfee doesn’t hang out with girls that are half his age. He hangs out with girls that are a quarter of his age. From the 17-year-old Amy who helped him through a police invasion of his property in search of an illegal meth lab to Samantha, who’s been washing his clothes while he’s on the lam, McAfee needs his harem.

[Samantha] is a natural raconteur and mimic. She has also helped me evade detection by grabbing me and kissing me, in public, in a fashion that causes passerby’s to feel embarrassment at the thought of staring and by creating emotional scenes that cause the curious to momentarily forget what they were looking for. She is acutely aware of her surroundings and is as street smart as a sober hobo.

“I needed to do my own investigation.” Did you know that John McAfee is also a private eye? He’s not, but he thinks he is. The former software engineer’s account of disguising himself and trying to figure out exactly why the police are after him deserves to be quoted at length.

The first day I colored my full beard and my hair light grey- almost white. I darkened the skin of my face, neck and hands carefully with shoe polish and put on an LA Saints baseball cap with the brim facing backwards and tufts of the front of my hair sticking out unkempt through the band. I stuffed my cheeks with chewed bubble gum stuck to the outside of my upper and lower molars – making my face appear much fatter. I darkened and browned my front teeth. I stuffed a shaved down tampon deep into my right nostril and died the tip dark brown – giving my nose an awkward, lopsided, disgusting appearance. I put on a pair of ragged brown pants with holes patched and darned. I wore an old, ragged long sleeve shirt. I donned an old Guatemalan style sarape and toted a bag containing a variety of Guatemalan woven goods. I adjusted my posture so that I appeared a good six inches shorter than my actual height and slowly walked up and down the beach with a pronounced limp, pushing an old single speed bicycle and peddling my wares to tourists and reporters using a broken English with a heavy Spanish accent. On my second day, while peddling small wooden carvings, I nearly sold a dolphin carving to an Associated Press reporter standing at the edge of my dock. He was pulled away from my enticement by an urgent phone call.

“If I am captured…” McAfee must be a pretty fast writer, because in the handful of days that he’s been running from the police, he seems to have written quite a lot of blog posts!

If I am captured, this blog will continue. I have pre-written enough material to keep this blog alive for at least a year. In addition, the administrator, Chad, will continue to monitor comments. He will administer the reward and post any information received. In truth my continued involvement from this point is irrelevant.

In case you’re hungry for more McAfee, just stand by. His story will soon be a graphic novel, also called The Hinterland. I can’t wait for the e-book version.