Today in annoyances

 And now it's June, summer on deck, and that means it's fly season in America. I know this because one of them turned up at an airport in Phoenix the other day and wouldn't quit buzzing around Brittney Griner's head.

This fly has a name, but I won't give it oxygen by uttering it. Suffice it to say he's that species of fly prevalent on social media these days: A self-hyping creature who delights in tormenting people in public places with questions he knows his targets won't respond to in the environment he creates.

Then he hopes they react so he can get it all on video,

Some people actually regard this as journalism, and a valuable service to humankind. Of course, those same people regard the Former Guy as some sort of political martyr, so there you go,

In any event, Griner and her Phoenix Mercury teammates were headed for a flight when this creature showed up, buzzing, buzzing. He kept asking her how she felt about being swapped for an erstwhile Merchant of Death (more on that later). This is because the Fly, and his advocates, think she should have rotted in a Russian labor camp because she's a gay black woman who used to kneel for the national anthem.

Seriously. They thought it was just fine she got sentenced to hard labor for nine years because she inadvertently packed a tiny amount of cannabis oil when she was playing in Russia.

Of course, it probably goes without saying that if she weren't a gay black woman and her politics were different, the same folks who stuck up for the Russians instead of an American citizen would have been calling her a hostage and demanding the president firebomb Moscow or some such thing.

Instead, the president caught a raft of you-know-what from the Fly and his ilk for trading a Merchant of Death for her. This despite the fact the Merchant of Death hadn't been a Merchant of Death for 15 or so years, and had already served more than half his sentence under U.S. law.

Anyway, here comes the Fly, doing his Fly schtick. And when the Mercury and the WNBA released statements rightly decrying it as harassment, they were the ones who were castigated by ... well, by the usual suspects.

Again, seriously. And for God's sake and give me a break and what the hell is wrong with these people, too.

Griner probably did the right thing by ignoring the Fly. But when I read accounts of the incident, I couldn't help thinking the best way to deal with creatures like the Fly would be to Buzz Aldrin the thing.

Remember that? Buzz Aldrin clocking a conspiracy kook who wouldn't stop buzzing, buzzing, buzzing around him, insisting he tell the truth about the moon landing?

Laid the crazy bastard out, Buzz did. Became an internet hero for doing so, because someone caught the whole thing on film.

Of course, the Fly probably wishes Griner had Buzz Aldrin-ed him. Then he could have gone to court and sued her and played the martyr card himself. But you know what?

I'm just naive enough to think America is a still a place where propriety matters. And so I like to think a good chunk of the country would have been applauding Griner for dealing with an annoyance in the proper way. And I like to think whatever judge caught the lawsuit would have told the Fly to get the (bleep) out of his courtroom with that shite.

Yeah, I know. And unicorns are real.