47F and damp. Cold blew in yesterday afternoon, and hasn’t left.
Presidents’ Day means I’ve got the kids at home. Wife will be working, and hoping she can get a lot done without interruptions.
I did get some things done yesterday, but not anywhere near enough. We’ll see what today brings.
n
Been relocating to the new house in Fulshear. Very sore. We close on the old house tomorrow.
Saturday and Sunday were clear and cool (60s) but this morning dawned cold and overcast 32f. We are told to expect a week of rain to follow. It seems like it’s been raining almost every day for months. The lawn is super saturated and feels like walking in a swamp.
Cool today, but clear. Rain is supposed to start sometime tonight and be around for the next six days. Projections is for 5-7 inches of rain. That will cause major flooding. TVA has already lowered the water levels of the lakes in anticipation. Of course, this forecast is from the same folks that said we would get 4 inches of snow. Never saw a single flake.
We have gotten a couple of inches over the last couple of days. Siphoning water off the pool cover now. With a hose and not much drop in elevation the 5 inches that are currently on the cover will take a couple of days to drain. If we get the rain anticipated the siphon will run for several days, maybe into next Monday.
There is a problem on the road that runs in front of my house. The water that drains from the area runs in an underground culvert. Somewhere that drain is blocked. I suspect it is the pine needles and leaves I blew into the drainage ditch in front of my house that drains into that culvert. Not my problem. Anyway, the drain clogs and does not drain forcing about 3 inches of water over the road. Fun to watch unsuspecting people hit the water and fight to control their car. Not a high speed road, 3o mph maximum except for a few idiots.
@ech, that’s great! I thought you were rebuilding your flooded home? Is that the one you’ve sold?
Every time I drive thru Fulshear I think about getting a bit further out of town. Sealy might be a bit further, but they’ve got other issues too.
How’s the flooding in your new area?
n
21º and snow on the ground here. Not enough to be a problem for us, but outsiders would probably have trouble.
I spent the night in the ER. Wife started coughing up blood (pink phlegmy blood, not dark chunks). Turns out she has pneumonia again. 3rd time since early December. Waiting for X-rays, and the application of antibiotics kept us up most of the night. I finally got to bed an hour after I usually get up. Such is life. Given that there could have been other (worse) causes, we’re pretty happy it’s “just” pneumonia and can be treated.
@JimL,
My best to your wife. Pneumonia may be treatable, but nothing to mess with. Seems as if you are on top of this. Ain’t modern medicine wonderful?
I probably don’t have to mention that just a hundred years or so ago, this could have been a death sentence. Ooooh, think better thoughts!
Hang in there Mr. JimL. I pray for the best for your wife. Pneumonia is a tough on to beat, but she can do it.
Guess who showed up on the last day of the Latinex Chicongo conference? The One. The Only. Butto!!! MrsAtoz tried to get a pic with him but he was swamped. Funny, the night before we ate at Shula’s Steakhouse with some Latinex friends. MrsAtoz mentioned Butto wasn’t Hispanazoid and the dumbfounded looks were hilarious. I said Butto is White Irish and jaws dropped. lol! Ole Butto has ‘em fooled. Where does the $$ come from to just wander the country for months? lol! The wolf in Latinex clothing.
@jimL, one year I had pneumonia 3 times. Help you wife take the drugs, get the rest, treat it as serious and take the time to get well.
The hardest part for me was continuing to believe I was sick after I started to feel better. After all the yuck, you want to get back to normal. Don’t. Take the time and follow Dr orders….
Keep track of what worked.
n
How could anyone mistake Robert Francis O’Rourke for a Hispanic? How gullible are people?
This weekend I have been told I am naïve to seriously believe that open borders would allow drugs and sex traffickers access to the US. Because, as CNN says, ALL want-to-be-immigrants are well educated, hard working, law abiding people simply looking for a better home. And we all know that if it’s on CNN it MUST be true. And if it’s NOT on CNN it must not exist. Sigh.
Um, where do they think all those MS 13 murderers in Long Island and NYC came from?
Or all the fentanyl that is on every front page??
n
Been relocating to the new house in Fulshear. Very sore. We close on the old house tomorrow.
Hey, I had no idea that you were moving. Congrats ! And I know that the majority of Fulshear is nice and high. Go eat a BBQ sandwich from Doziers BBQ for me.
http://doziersbbq.com/
I know where it comes from:
1. Export the precursors from China in previously retired, last generation oil tankers,
2. Produce fentanyl in previously closed down tequila distilleries in Mexico City, D.F.
3. Lastly, successors to El Chapo then…….
Freefall: “Captain’s Log. 17 days until liftoff.”
http://freefall.purrsia.com/ (today and tomorrow)
or
http://freefall.purrsia.com/ff3300/fc03242.htm (after Tuesday, 2/19/2019)
Heh.
“How 1984 turned into an instruction manual”
https://www.sovereignman.com/trends/how-1984-turned-into-an-instruction-manual-24609/
“So Billy Joel’s famous song “She’s always a woman” would become “They’re always a non-binary gender. . .” Somehow that just doesn’t ring with the same sweetness.”
Swan Eaters: “Grandma’s Story”
https://www.gocomics.com/swan-eaters/2019/02/18
No !!!!
How could anyone mistake Robert Francis O’Rourke for a Hispanic? How gullible are people?
Rush Limbaugh calls him Bozo O’Rourke now.
I’ve been calling him “Burrito” oroarke. White on the outside, full of beans on the inside. Wife says “that’s disrespectful!” I said, OF COURSE IT IS. I”M MORE HISPANIC THAN HE IS.
How crazy is race in the US that one genuine hispanic turned his back on it and uses a white bread name, while a white bread irishman uses a hispanic name, both thinking they have the right choice to fool the voters?
n
How crazy is race in the US that one genuine hispanic turned his back on it and uses a white bread name,
I assume that you are talking about Ted Cruz. I wonder if he would have won if he had campaigned using Rafael Edward “Ted” Cruz ?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Cruz
I was talking with a friend last night at our bible study. He thinks that Bozo is going after John Cornyn (Texas senior senator) in 2020 and will win.
Jen says thanks. She’s feeling better already but will stick with the Antibiotic regimen until completed. We both fear superbugs. Doctor told us last night that 3 or 4 times in a season is not unheard of. It really does take time to clear up properly, and the cold, dry air this time of year makes it difficult.
Newspeak. Doublethink. Facecrime. Makes me nuts. Do people really not understand? Telling you words you MUST NOT SAY or be subjected to hate is unbelievable.
I have a friend that posted this morning:
What worries me is that he really believes that kind of thing.
Jen says thanks. She’s feeling better already but will stick with the Antibiotic regimen until completed. We both fear superbugs. Doctor told us last night that 3 or 4 times in a season is not unheard of. It really does take time to clear up properly, and the cold, dry air this time of year makes it difficult.
Most excellent ! And yes, clearing up pneumonia is tough this time of year.
Funny, the night before we ate at Shula’s Steakhouse with some Latinex friends. MrsAtoz mentioned Butto wasn’t Hispanazoid and the dumbfounded looks were hilarious. I said Butto is White Irish and jaws dropped. lol! Ole Butto has ‘em fooled. Where does the $$ come from to just wander the country for months? lol! The wolf in Latinex clothing.
Fourth generation Irish-American. Pure. His mother’s adoptive father was Secretary of the Navy under JFK.
“How crazy is race in the US that one genuine hispanic turned his back on it and uses a white bread name”
I assume that you are talking about Ted Cruz. I wonder if he would have won if he had campaigned using Rafael Edward “Ted” Cruz ?
I don’t think Ted Cruz turns his back on his heritage, but, growing up in Florida, you learn that the exiles got what the United States was about and set a goal for their children of assimilation.
Walk into La Carretta, the big Cuban restaurant on SW 8th in Miami, and a picture of Ronald Reagan hangs on the wall (or did the last time we were there).
Ted has probably been “Ted” since he was a kid. I’d be surprised if the parents called him Rafael at home … unless the mother was mad. 🙂
I was talking with a friend last night at our bible study. He thinks that Bozo is going after John Cornyn (Texas senior senator) in 2020 and will win.
Cornyn will have the full support of the Texas Republican party and the Governor not distracted by his own re-election effort. The challenge facing the Dem nominee will be a lot tougher. Cruz creeps people out where Cornyn doesn’t.
I don’t think the Castro family can let the Senate race go by without the other brother taking a serious shot at the nomination, even if it means tearing up Robert Francis in an effort to win. The Castro family dynasty is at stake in 2020, and brother running for President doesn’t even have a prayer of being VP.
Robert Francis will be the VP on the Dem ticket. The party needs either Texas or Florida to win, and the only politician recognized state-wide in Florida left with a (D) behind their name is the still relatively unknown Ag commissioner.
If I’m wrong about Florida, I challenge those of you not from the state to name another viable Dem besides Gillum or Bill Nelson without Googling.
A white man may not be at the top of the Dem ticket (I believe Newsom is biding his time), but they still need to play the Electoral College … for now.
@JimL: first off, continue to take care of your wife and yourself. She needs you, but you that.
You said above:
I have opinions, based on real facts and experience (both harder and harder to find these days). It’s okay to have a difference of opinion, but too many people today feel the need to become disagreeable, caustic, and hateful if you challenge their opinion. To me, that is a sure sign of a false/unfounded opinion.
I just attribute their bad attitude to poor self-esteem resulting from small, unsightly, or diseased primary or secondary sexual characteristics. That might not be literally true, but it pisses people something wicked when I suggest it, so my theory has been proven in the crucible of debate.
RickH, my daughter wrote her review of Light Blink and I posted it on the Amazon page, but it hasn’t shown up yet. Five stars, decent write-up (though in my opinion not up to the standard I normally require). I’ll poke the site or the admins if it hasn’t appeared within a couple days. (And in my own reading, I’m all the way up to 8% in! In less than two weeks!)
I filled out this morning an adoption application for another dog. I had to click on the circle for either M or F. No other choices such as LGBTQ. Huh, how ’90s is that?
Saw this elsewhere and it fit my mood.
“Oh, sure, everyone complains about the weather, but nobody bothers to sacrifice a virgin . . . sometimes the old ways are best.”
indeed.
n
“Oh, sure, everyone complains about the weather, but nobody bothers to sacrifice a virgin . . . sometimes the old ways are best.”
Not as easy to find one anymore.
Cowboy Slim wrote
Umm, Slim, was that choice for you…or for the dog?
“Cassidy white paper responds to Democrats’ Green New Deal Resolution”
https://www.ogj.com/articles/2019/02/cassidy-white-paper-responds-to-democrats-green-new-deal-resolution.html
“Natural gas already is reducing US greenhouse gas emissions more effectively than what congressional Democrats proposed in their Green New Deal Resolution, US Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.), who chairs the Energy and Natural Resources Committee’s Energy Subcommittee, said on Feb. 14.”
““If the Green New Deal is a dream for the left, it is a nightmare for the American people. It would force middle-class families to tear down their houses, pay higher electricity bills, get rid of their cars, and give up their jobs,” the senator said.”
@SteveF
Thank your daughter for me for the review! I don’t see it yet either, but reviews of any kind are appreciated.
Amazon reviews sometimes take a while to appear, for some unknown reason. I’ve noticed other authors (and reviewers) complaining about it. I’ll keep an eye out for it.
Book 2 writing still in progress. Got sidetracked with some other projects that past couple of days, but the story progression is still wandering around the back of my mind.
Appreciate the update. You are hereby given permission to spend more time reading it.
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-02-18/motive-revealed-smollett-case-actor-concocted-hate-crime-after-racist-letter-failed
n
Amazon reviews sometimes take a while to appear, for some unknown reason. I’ve noticed other authors (and reviewers) complaining about it. I’ll keep an eye out for it.
I’ve got a book review hanging on Big River from over the weekend also. I suspect the daemon got hung and it will be fixed when Amazon employees go back to work tomorrow.
I just attribute their bad attitude to poor self-esteem resulting from small, unsightly, or diseased primary or secondary sexual characteristics.
Or their Momma dressed them funny. 🙂 That was once a good line.
I’m tired of hearing about Jussie Powerbottom. Never heard of him or the show he’s in until his -20F “lynching”.
How could anyone mistake Robert Francis O’Rourke for a Hispanic?
Well, if you live in an area with few Mexicans and all you really know is watching some Mexican TV …. they don’t look very native indian on TV.
Weird. How did the local Dodge dealer get my e-mail address? Not from me or the County/State from registering the truck.
“Conventional Oil Change, Tire Rotation and Multi-Point Inspection $ 24.95*” sounds like a quite a deal. Sure, adding tax and shop rags will make it $30.
All I know that they will find is that one of the rear license plate light is out. It’s a bad wedge socket and the bulb fell out. Then again I just had it inspected to renew the plates and they didn’t notice. [shrug] I doubt they would notice a couple of the dash lights are out…. I didn’t until a month or so ago, that’s how much I drive at night. The a/c controls may or may not have lights but I don’t care enough to take the dash apart to find out if they were not connected when the heater core was replaced.
I had the oil changed/chassis lubed/ etc. in August and have put all of 800 miles on the truck since. It cost $6o or so. I do run it long enough to get completely warm. When I run it.
The check engine light seems to be fixed. I pulled the charcoal evap purge valve and sprayed it with starting ether. I couldn’t find the carb cleaner. I let it sit upside down for half an hour, shook the excess out, and re-installed. Hmm. I think I fixed it. The gas cap doesn’t give a big “whoosh” when removed. The light has not come on. So far, that’s $25 still in my pocket.
Now to attack the van’s EGR valve. $85 and up to $300 for the part on eBay.
Weird. How did the local Dodge dealer get my e-mail address? Not from me or the County/State from registering the truck.
Like Bob Seger said, “Rock and Roll never forgets”. And neither do car dealers. I’ll bet that you gave them your email address in the last 20 years or so. Or, maybe they got it from the NSA.
Got to be the NSA.
They used my “real” address. Not “tractor” at my domain like Tractor Supply. Or “lowes” or “homedepot” or “walmart” or “amazon”, etc. that feed my inbox. Yeah, I do that or I just say no. (hello Walgreens.)
If I had ever given the dealer my address it would be “pt”.
I’ve made one purchase at the new location. Mopar transmission fluid. The Stratus needed half a cup at 120,000 miles. What the heck, get the official stuff and not some sort of Dextron stuff from the grocery store.
I did try to buy tail light grommets. Not in stock and a week to get them, not sure of the price but maybe $4 each. I bought a box of 25 that contained 26 on eBay for $15 delivered in three days. I used four. A friend has a couple of Dodges that can use the same part when he needs it.
Like Bob Seger said, “Rock and Roll never forgets”. And neither do car dealers. I’ll bet that you gave them your email address in the last 20 years or so. Or, maybe they got it from the NSA.
Ever since we got hosed with my wife’s Exploder, every piece of obvious junk mail from the dealership and/or parent company Group One gets marked “Return to Sender” along with choice profanity telling the management where they can stick their offers of oil changes and/or trade ups. It doesn’t seem to dissuade them from mailing more.
I doubt we’re buying Ford again, much less walking into that dealer’s showroom, but they’re hungry out there right now.
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-02-18/motive-revealed-smollett-case-actor-concocted-hate-crime-after-racist-letter-failed
I’m not buying the new spin as just an “Empire” publicity stunt gone wrong. The timing was suspicious. If it had worked, Smollett would have walked on stage at the Academy Awards as a hero of the Resistance next Sunday night, part of the celebration of the Greatest Movie Ever Made In This Or Any Other Millennia.
Something or someone bigger is pulling strings. What they didn’t count on was the sheer stupidity of the “victim”.
[snip] Oh, sure, everyone complains about the weather, but nobody bothers to sacrifice a virgin . [snip]
Virgins were sacrificed because they weren’t good for anything else!
I doubt we’re buying Ford again, much less walking into that dealer’s showroom, but they’re hungry out there right now.
Well, I’ve put 400,000 miles on my last three Ford trucks so they are good by me. And one was an 1996 Exploder with a 302 V8 that ran like a scalded cat. Until some lady ran a red light and I tboned her with it, was never the same after my front suspension horns crashed through her roof (Nissan Sentra, don’t be in one during a wreck).
I sure would not buy a Chevy truck now even though my son’s 2006 Silverado has 140,000 miles on it. He is ok until he needs some parts.
I sure would not buy a Chevy truck now even though my son’s 2006 Silverado has 140,000 miles on it. He is ok until he needs some parts.
Dodge has stolen the spotlight among non-Ford trucks. And Sergio probably had a few more surprises in the pipeline before he died.
One of my co-workers at CGI bought a Chevy SUV on an 84 month car loan. He was four years into payments, a year out of warranty, when a problem hit that he couldn’t afford to fix for a few grand. He couldn’t afford to sell the car either since those loans are always underwater.
The dealer was suggesting scrapping the car and folding the old loan into another 84 month payment plan. I have no clue about how it turned out since I landed the new gig about a week later.
Cue the song. “I owe my soul to the company store … “
Dropped the Crosstour off at the dealer this morning. They had it done by 1:00. Service advisor was first rate. Offered a loaner car, but I declined since we were both off and could get by. Did their typical multi point check. Only thing they were able to find was that the rear brakes need replacing soon, I didn’t tell him I knew that. Overall, a good warranty experience.
This “organizing consultant” is allegedly behind a lot of the supposed glut of Stuff being dropped off at Goodwill and other thrift stores:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marie_Kondo
One of my co-workers at CGI bought a Chevy SUV on an 84 month car loan. He was four years into payments, a year out of warranty, when a problem hit that he couldn’t afford to fix for a few grand. He couldn’t afford to sell the car either since those loans are always underwater.
If you are buying a vehicle on an 84 month loan then you cannot afford it. But, you know that.
I’m not seeing any glut of stuff at Goodwill…. They are starting to lower prices though. Every so often, the new guy realizes that resellers are making money off of Goodwill stuff, and why should those guys make all the money??? So they raise prices to ebay levels and stuff stops selling. As crap piles up and their turnover slows down they start dropping prices until they are back at their natural level- more than garage sale, less than ebay.
Down here the stores were emptied after Harvey. Then they didn’t refill because Harvey either destroyed peoples’ excess or people gave stuff directly.
Currently, the charity shops are a bit understocked vs historical levels, at least in Houston.
n
Y’all just ain’t Japanese enough in Texas.
If you are buying a vehicle on an 84 month loan then you cannot afford it. But, you know that.
Oh, sure, but CGI didn’t pay the kids enough to afford cars period in an era of $20k Corollas. IMHO, I made okay money for what I did, but some of the young’n’s were severely underpaid for high octane development work.
If I had to guess, the 84 month loan victim was paid in the upper 30s, maybe 40s, and that was a number subsidized by Federal, state, and county tax incentives. The “onshoring” concept is a crock.
One kid who left before I did was five years out of school with an Auburn CS diploma making $46k/year for extremely high end JBoss programming. IIRC, he doubled his salary in Austin.
This “organizing consultant” is allegedly behind a lot of the supposed glut of Stuff being dropped off at Goodwill and other thrift stores:
Blaming Marie Kondo is a bit unfair. Boomers are starting to die off, and my generation doesn’t want to deal with the cr*p. Certainly the “tiny house” generations after us don’t want it either.
Y’all just ain’t Japanese enough in Texas.
Huh ?
Wait, the minimalist thing.
I was confused because my wife is “Japanese”. Born in Yokohama. Grew up eating sushi, now she won’t touch the stuff, says it is nasty. Her home there had rice paper walls. Now she likes real walls. And like all good ‘mericans, she has way too much stuff, almost as much as me. Supposedly, she is welcome back to Japan at any time since she was born there at an USA Army base.
Of course, her actual heritage is 1/4 Cherokee and 3/4 English. Her dad was an army medic serving in Japan in the middle 1950s until 1962 or so. He was an x-ray tech, helping out with quadraplegics from the Korean war that they could not bring back to the USA due to the six week journey on a ship at the time.
Boomers are starting to die off, and my generation doesn’t want to deal with the cr*p. Certainly the “tiny house” generations after us don’t want it either.
Reputedly, my parents own two more houses in their town (besides their house) that they are using for storage of worthless stuff. It is going to be horrible when they pass on.
The first son has a 1,700 ft2 3/2/2 that he says is full of his crap (I have not been there in years). I’ve been telling him to take his two pickup loads of Marine Corps stuff to the Army-Navy store but he won’t do it. Says a lot of it has serial numbers that are locked to him. I say they don’t care since he has been out for a decade now.
I forgot to add that Julian Castro showed up in Chicongo. MrsAtoz (a professional speaker) attended his luncheon keynote. She said he had as much charisma as a slug. He could be the next Jeb!
He could be the next Jeb!
Heh !
“He could be the next Jeb!”
Heh !
To be fair, Jeb! was a decent Governor, and his ex-Playboy Bunny girlfriend was an open secret in Tallahassee. He must do something right.