Mon. Oct. 5, 2020 – lotta layoffs, more coming…

By on October 5th, 2020 in decline and fall, march to war, personal, WuFlu

Cool and nice.  Dry and breezy.  That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

Like Sunday, without the late afternoon threat of rain.

I did make it out of the house.  I decided to head to Home Depot.  I needed dirt, drip irrigation, and some paint  stuff for my wife’s project.  Then off to the pet store for dog food (to replace the 2 bags that were ruined by mold.)

Then surprise surprise, wife wants me to look at a house for sale.  Better section of our neighborhood, bigger, and has a pool.  Spent an hour doing that, plus there and back.

Other than getting some grass seed planted and some low spots in the yard filled, not much of anything got done around here.  And that is becoming an issue.

A quick survey of headlines shows that meanwhile in the world, crazy is breaking out all over.  Trump is in the hospital, at death’s door to hear the media salivating, then he’s out, but he’s the most irresponsible person evah, but the covid will guarantee his victory, except that the covid will guarantee his defeat, and on and on.

Turkey is helping stir the pot in one of the oldest conflicts in the world that continues to this day, with actual cities being shelled.

The hell that is NYFC continues to get worse in every way.

Disney laid off 28000, each airline is going to or has already laid off about 15k-20k workers, and on and on.  That’s about half a million pink slips coming with a few more companies joining in in a few weeks time.  Tell me that that won’t have an effect on the economy and just before the election.

Portland is rioting again.

We are just getting started with spicy times.  Do what you can in the time you have.  Keep stacking.

 

nick

 

(and if you missed it in comments, my wuflu test was negative, so dodged that this time)

80 Comments and discussion on "Mon. Oct. 5, 2020 – lotta layoffs, more coming…"

  1. Greg Norton says:

    Portland is rioting again.

    Unfortunately, it was a nice weekend in Portland so the amateurs were out.

    Next weekend looks like the ugly weather begins finally. Soros and his like minded friends will have to start paying professionals.

  2. Nick Flandrey says:

    ” Soros and his like minded friends will have to start paying professionals. ”

    –I think you mean, “resume paying the next training class”….

    n

  3. Ray Thompson says:

    According to CNN the secret service agents are ticked off at Trump for taking a cruise. Concerned they might get the virus. These same agents who have all pledged to take a bullet for the president are now concerned about a disease for which they would get premium treatment and an almost 100% survival rate. The agents have no underlying conditions are in good health. Their chances are excellent.

    It is mostly CNN making up headlines according to their agenda.

  4. Greg Norton says:

    ” Soros and his like minded friends will have to start paying professionals. ”

    –I think you mean, “resume paying the next training class”….

    Didn’t think about that. Lots of small, bankrupt colleges in remote locations selling real estate to pad the trustees pockets one last time.

    Heck, some of the trustees are probably among Soros’ like-minded friends.

  5. Nick Flandrey says:

    I can’t be the only one getting pissed at all the whiners, leakers, and inappropriate talkers surrounding the White House.

    FFS, if I have to read about Kelly Conway’s 15yo brat as if she’s the font of wisdom any more I’ll have to start drinking again….

    n

  6. Greg Norton says:

    According to CNN the secret service agents are ticked off at Trump for taking a cruise. Concerned they might get the virus. These same agents who have all pledged to take a bullet for the president are now concerned about a disease for which they would get premium treatment and an almost 100% survival rate. The agents have no underlying conditions are in good health. Their chances are excellent.

    “According to CNN”

    There’s your problem.

    My wife has a uber-liberal friend who ended up in the Secret Service after college, protecting Dick Cheney for eight years. She *loved* the Cheneys on a one-on-one basis and I had no doubt that she would have taken the bullet … or a virus.

    It isn’t about politics with them. It is a point of pride that they aren’t going to lose another President for any reason.

    The agents were probably ticked off about the impromptu nature of the cruise, but probably no more than usual.

    We’re still a long way from the end result of H1N1, which I’ve stated before is what I believe will be the similar tally from Covid: 60 million infections. Just hanging around DC is risky for the agents.

  7. Nick Flandrey says:

    @greg, declining enrollment has been a killer for all the small liberal arts schools sucking up federal ed dollars. The lockdowns should be the final nail in the coffin for a whole bunch of them.

    n

  8. Nick Flandrey says:

    Whoo hoo, here comes TS Delta!

    n

  9. Mark W says:

    The headlines used to be how “poc” and women were more at risk of a bad outcome from covid. Now that Trump has it, men are more likely to have a bad outcome.

  10. MrAtoz says:

    I am currently binging the fifth season of “Lucifer” on Netflix. Maybe I should jump to “Buffy” for a while.

    My Twins and I binged Buffy over the Summer and most of Angel. I finished Angel when they had to head back to Vegas for uni. Buffy is a classic. I’ll binge it again in several years.

  11. MrAtoz says:

    I can’t be the only one getting pissed at all the whiners, leakers, and inappropriate talkers surrounding the White House.

    FFS, if I have to read about Kelly Conway’s 15yo brat as if she’s the font of wisdom any more I’ll have to start drinking again….

    Unnamed sources are the go to for the ProgLibTurd MSM. Trying to control the prog narrative.

    As far as the Brat, she would have no resources if she was mine. When she turned 18, “I love you honey, don’t let the door hit you in the butt on the way out.” Tough love.

  12. Nick Flandrey says:

    WTF is wrong with people? How do we keep having kids run over by riding lawn mowers?

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-8805615/Girl-3-loses-leg-running-reversing-ride-lawnmower.html

    And how do parents not know that it’s dangerous to be around a mower?

    “and is now warning other parents to be aware of the dangers of lawnmowers. ”

    n

  13. Chad says:

    Disney laid off 28000, each airline is going to or has already laid off about 15k-20k workers, and on and on. That’s about half a million pink slips coming with a few more companies joining in in a few weeks time. Tell me that that won’t have an effect on the economy and just before the election.

    Now that the federal government isn’t paying their paychecks they’re being let go. If our tax dollars hadn’t been propping them up they would have been let go 5 months ago. I feel for them. Losing your job sucks. Hopefully, they have been using this borrowed time (and yours and my tax dollars) to aggressively seek other employment.

    WTF is wrong with people? How do we keep having kids run over by riding lawn mowers?

    The obvious solution here is to slap a dozen more annoying safety features on the lawnmower. Maybe we’ll finally invent the safety feature that mitigates idiot parenting. It’s sad that we have to explain to parents that allowing small children to frolic in front of and behind a moving machine with a spinning steel blade is a bad idea. What’s next? A special reminder to turn off and unplug the hand mixer before licking the beaters?

  14. Greg Norton says:

    WTF is wrong with people? How do we keep having kids run over by riding lawn mowers?

    “Kids left in hot cars” ‘accidents’ mystify me.

    As soon as my oldest could walk, he could get out of any car seat. The drive home from daycare was always one hand on the wheel, one hand on the kid.

  15. Chad says:

    “Kids left in hot cars” ‘accidents’ mystify me.

    I’ve always wondered how many hot car and SIDS deaths are truly “accidents.”

  16. MrAtoz says:

    And how do parents not know that it’s dangerous to be around a mower?

    I wouldn’t even let the dogs out while mowing.

    Plus, peeple is dumb. Not ignorant, just plain stupid.

  17. Nick Flandrey says:

    yeah, me too. Remember last year the guy who murdered his kid? google history F’d him up.

    n

  18. Nick Flandrey says:

    Ok, wtf is up with windows and formatting micro sd cards? I’ve spent an HOUR trying to get a card or usb stick formatted so I can do a live boot with linux. F’ing windows just won’t do it. First the explorer right click only formats 1.10Gb, then disk management won’t start if the card is in the pc, then disk management will see the 1.1gb, and the 13gb unformatted part, but won’t extend the 1.1gb. It will format the 13 as a new partition… still won’t delete or extend the 1.1… It’s been more than 5 minutes of sit and spin for the ‘delete partition’ command so far….

    added — gave up. got out a new card

  19. Greg Norton says:

    Ok, wtf is up with windows and formatting micro sd cards? I’ve spent an HOUR trying to get a card or usb stick formatted so I can do a live boot with linux. F’ing windows just won’t do it. First the explorer right click only formats 1.10Gb, then disk management won’t start if the card is in the pc, then disk management will see the 1.1gb, and the 13gb unformatted part, but won’t extend the 1.1gb. It will format the 13 as a new partition… still won’t delete or extend the 1.1… It’s been more than 5 minutes of sit and spin for the ‘delete partition’ command so far….

    You need a copy of one of the Windows tools to write *.iso to the USB key.

    Writing *.iso to USB is simple in Linux, one of those chicken-and-egg scenarios.

    Also, make sure that the USB key does not have any security features embedded. And only use a USB key sourced from a big retail chain not likely to buy knockoffs. I buy mine from Sam’s or Costco. Walmart works too.

    Fry’s? I’m not sure at this point.

    You can burn the ISO to a DVD directly and boot using a USB DVD drive if all else fails. That’s what I have to do to get Intel Clear Linux onto my junk laptop.

    Your meatspace hobby friends could probably help get you going. Linux and Ham have a long history of overlapping interest, and, contrary to popular depiction, Linux people love to help spread the word as much as they can.

    Otherwise, if you let me know what you want to boot, I can burn the *.iso to a USB key.

  20. Pecancorner says:

    My children were all born before mandatory car seats… but I had continual nighmares about losing them or forgetting them until each was old enough to talk. Distracted, busy parents and sleeping or quiet infants has always been a worrisome combination.

    Modern car seats train children to sit helpless, and I hate that element of them. Just like the childproof automatic locks and locks that require the fob’s presence to operate. They are all far more dangerous in creating helplessness than any security/safety benefit they may offer. Look up “trapped in locked car” … adults die from being trapped in their own hot cars due to those electronic locks.

    I suspect – but have not yet been able to find much research on it – that the massive restraint of child safety seats is on its own injurious to health of children. I’ve found a few articles noting that long car rides in them, of more than an hour, are dangerous. Also have seen some that show that children who sleep in a car seat that is not in the car can cause death – they never go so far as to admit the same seat may cause death of a child while riding and drowsing in the car.

    On the other hand, car seats prevent the child from becoming a missile in accidents. Many of the dangers could be avoided if laws would simply allow parents to put the car seat in the front passenger seat where the child is visible to the parent at all times – and where the child can see the parent.

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  21. Nick Flandrey says:

    “if laws would simply allow parents to put the car seat in the front passenger seat where the child is visible to the parent at all times”

    –but you can’t because the law required passenger air bags. Then the air bags killed kids in rear facing car seats by internal decapitation when they deployed. So the law was amended to prohibit rear facing car seats in the front seat. Now kids get left in the car, and soon there will be mandatory sensors for rear seat occupancy. I have already seen articles about using cameras in the vehicle for that purpose.

    n

  22. Nick Flandrey says:

    added- in vehicles without rear seats, there is a key switch to turn off the passenger air bag if you HAVE to put a car seat there.

    It’s like when the laws requiring seat belts started. There were vehicles that wouldn’t start if the seat belts weren’t used. So people just fastened the seat belts. THEN they added weight sensors to the seats. And cars wouldn’t start if your groceries or suitcase was on the seat. So THEN they used a better sensor and only enforced the seatbelt requirement for weights over 40 pounds. and THEN someone died or was raped because the car wouldn’t start without the seatbelt, so they FINALLY dropped the mandatory enforcement, but kept all the rest.

    n

  23. Nick Flandrey says:

    Oh, and yes, car seat restraints are bad for little babies, so now they require rear facing… which led to the other issues.

    n

  24. Nick Flandrey says:

    WRT thumb drives. Apparently other OSs can F up thumbdrives for windows. They somehow get formatted to 1.10 GB regardless of capacity and windows can’t do anything about it thru normal tools.

    This fixes it, courtesy of teh interwebs.

    Run Diskpart.exe
    .. You open a dos command window WITH run with admistrator privlage . then type the following cmds.
    – Diskpart Starts program Do Not type the – (ie diskpart> List disk then enter key)
    – LIST DISK (shows all disk, look for Disk Number of the Drive (Your USB drive)
    – SELECT DISK X (For X insert USB drive Number)
    – DETAIL DISK (Detailed information of the disk that has the focus This will show if you have selected the correct drive.)
    – CLEAN (One of the most practical and most dangerous: it removes at once all the partitions on the selected disk.)
    Note for the next two do NOT use the size=n)
    – CREATE PARTITION EXTENDED (Creates an extended partition on the current drive. After the partition has been created, the focus automatically shifts to the new partition.) THIS IS WRONG— Create partition PRIMARY—–
    ———-the following also doesn’t work on win8.2——————-
    – CREATE PARTITION LOGICAL (Creates a logical drive in the extended partition. After the partition has been created, the focus automatically shifts to the new logical drive.)
    – EXIT (Quits DISKPART and returns to the command prompt classic)

    You should now be able to format the drive (WITH the correct space) using windows

    Instead, once you have the primary partition, right click on the drive in file explorer and select format. NOW it should offer the full capacity of the drive and format. Disk Management WOULDN’T format the drive, although it did show the primary partition.

    What a cluster flock.

    n

  25. JimB says:

    trapped in locked car

    ?Really? I tried to look this up, but everything I saw just assumed it was possible. I can’t believe there are no lock buttons, levers, or equivalent in even a few cars. That would be a legal nightmare.

    All my (admittedly old) cars have ways to manually open all doors from the inside. A couple have “child redistant” selectors on the rear doors, but I leave them in the “irresponsible” position. All front doors open with the inside door handle, even if locked.

  26. Nick Flandrey says:

    That’s a couple of hours of my life I won’t get back, and I STILL haven’t actually done the tasks I set out to do- get a bootable linux install drive to install dual boot on my NVR pc to test if the linux version of my NVR is more stable than the windows version.

    Bloody hell. Some days I’m filled with hate for computers.

    n

  27. Nick Flandrey says:

    “All front doors open with the inside door handle, even if locked. ”

    –there was a version of the corvette that wouldn’t allow the doors to open or unlock. I broke the window, reached in, and absolutely couldn’t open the door. That was mid 80s though. My kids know to climb into the front and use the front doors.

    n

  28. JimB says:

    WRT flash cards, Don’t think I have ever formatted one. They just work… until they don’t, a different issue.

    I HAVE formatted SD cards in cameras, because some cameras are picky, but they still work just fine in all my other devices.

  29. SteveF says:

    I was just about to mention Francis Porretto’s tale of being trapped in his 80s ‘Vette. IIRC he got out through the sun roof.

  30. RickH says:

    Re: memory card formatting

    I use the SD Card Formatter software to format a card that will boot in my Raspberry Pi systems. https://www.sdcard.org/downloads/formatter/

    They say:

    It is strongly recommended to use the SD Memory Card Formatter to format SD/SDHC/SDXC Cards rather than using formatting tools provided with individual operating systems. In general, formatting tools provided with operating systems can format various storage media including SD/SDHC/SDXC Cards, but it may not be optimized for SD/SDHC/SDXC Cards and it may result in lower performance.

    Free download, works on Windows or Macs, easy to use.

  31. Mark W says:

    Windows is strange about SD Cards and sometimes won’t let you change the partitions even in disk administrator in administrator mode.

    The solution is Linux or the DISKPART command in Windows. Linux is easier for me.

  32. Greg Norton says:

    “if laws would simply allow parents to put the car seat in the front passenger seat where the child is visible to the parent at all times”

    –but you can’t because the law required passenger air bags. Then the air bags killed kids in rear facing car seats by internal decapitation when they deployed. So the law was amended to prohibit rear facing car seats in the front seat. Now kids get left in the car, and soon there will be mandatory sensors for rear seat occupancy. I have already seen articles about using cameras in the vehicle for that purpose.

    New Subarus know when your eyes are not on the road and record the information. Seat occupancy is still a research topic that isn’t quite there.

    Our customers would *love* to avoid paying cops — and, in WA State, “snitch” line operators — to enforce HOV lanes using cameras and software. My bosses would happily provide it if someone came up with a system that worked.

    Beyond the safety issues intrinsic with air bags and child seats, there is the Takata recall issue. Essentially, for now, the US Government is willing to accept a certain number of deaths from defective airbags as long as the number of deaths doesn’t get *too* high.

  33. Greg Norton says:

    WRT thumb drives. Apparently other OSs can F up thumbdrives for windows. They somehow get formatted to 1.10 GB regardless of capacity and windows can’t do anything about it thru normal tools.

    I’ve had Linux hose USB key drives so badly that the only thing which cleared the drives for me was Disk Utility in Mac OS X.

    Recent versions of Gparted on Linux work fairly well, and it is possible to get a bootable *.iso with enough OS to run the utility … from a bootable USB key.

    Chicken. Egg. Chicken. Egg.

    USB seems to have lagged on Linux. At some point during our tenure in Portland, the girl running the USB section of the kernel as her paid gig at Intel got fed up with what she felt was Linus’ “intolerable” profanity and rudeness in merge request feedback. Linus dialed back for a while, but it created a rift in the community which doesn’t seem to have completely healed.

    The Linux kernel is what I call a “hierarchy of benevolent dictators”. Sometimes the dictators don’t use nice language, but, as I’ve learned with my current work stinky, some of the snowflakes can’t handle bad words anymore.

  34. Ken Mitchell says:

    Nick, I would discourage moving within your neighborhood. If you’re going to move, move FAR away from problems, and TO someplace where you can do something about them. I’ve just moved from Sacramento, CA to San Antonio, TX, to a larger and more rural property.

    Moving ANYWHERE is difficult, time-consuming and expensive.

  35. Greg Norton says:

    @Lynn – Tell your son that I pulled 70 MPG in my Camry making a quick run to work to pull a few things from my cube at work. No traffic, 65 MPH on the cruise control.

    If the computer isn’t broken or the car isn’t burning oil, who needs a hybrid? The 2018 still has lousy acceleration, though, and the incorrect cylinder boring issue looms.

  36. Ed says:

    Bloody hell. Some days I’m filled with hate for computers.

    Just some days?

    I was trying to format an SD card for MX-Linux last week, to boot as live/persistent on the little “convertible” Inspiron, and then install a Jupiter notebook app. Couldn’t quite get it to work, could only find an 8GB SD card around the office anyway, and had other projects, finally gave up.

    I then remembered that I had Mint…uh…18?… on a desktop. Hex core AMD, GPU, 16GB Ram and 256GB SSD. I was attempting (and failing) to compile FreeCad from scratch late last winter. When I get time I’ll hook it up.

    Today, while cleaning, found a still-in-the-shrinkwrap 32GB Sandisk SD card.

    The gods are toying with me.

  37. Pecancorner says:

    Re electric car locks. Here’s the one that first caught my attention, from 2015. And another case where a teenager wanted a little more sleep before class, and couldn’t get out without the fob.

    They may SAY there are manual overrides, but unless those are well marked, easily operated, AND known to every passenger, they are useless. After I read about these incidents, I gave every driver in our family a ResQMe window punch for their key ring – and I carry one even when I am not driving, as being trapped in the back seat of someone else’s car scares the dickens out of me. I come from flash flood country.

  38. ~jim says:

    Proud Boys: Far-right group becomes LGBT trend online

    I have to agree with Tarrio. This is hysterical.

    “Enrique Tarrio, chairman of the Proud Boys group, told US broadcaster CNN he is not sure what social media users are trying to achieve.

    “I think it’s hysterical,” said Mr Tarrio. “This isn’t something that’s offensive to us. It’s not an insult. We aren’t homophobic. We don’t care who people sleep with.

    “One of the messages they want to send with this is that they’re trying to drown out our supporters, they’re trying to silence us,” he added. “When you’re trying to drown out other people’s thoughts, I don’t think there’s anything progressive about that.”

    I have no idea what the Proud Boys propound, any more than I do of Qanon (or whatever that thing is). The whole notion of “rights” for black, gay, women, transgender… Bleeech! Equal rights, equal opportunities. Period

  39. ~jim says:

    @lynn

    Here’s a ‘cocktail party’ conspiracy theory for you. 🙂

    What if Covid-19 really *is* a biological weapon, primarily designed not to inflict death, but to gauge the response to such a threat for use in future?

  40. JimB says:

    Regarding air bags, they were originally supposed to replace seat belts. Didn’t work out. A well designed and employed three point belt protects very well, especially with multiple collisions in the same mishap.

    An old stat I remember said the contribution in preventing death of an air bag added to a seat belt was tiny, something like a 5% improvement, based on accident analysis. Too long ago to be very significant, especially when we now have ubiquitous air bags.

  41. lynn says:

    According to CNN the secret service agents are ticked off at Trump for taking a cruise. Concerned they might get the virus. These same agents who have all pledged to take a bullet for the president are now concerned about a disease for which they would get premium treatment and an almost 100% survival rate. The agents have no underlying conditions are in good health. Their chances are excellent.

    It is mostly CNN making up headlines according to their agenda.

    For every person who wants to leave the secret service, there 100 people waiting on a list to get in. It is the premiere resume security job padder in the world.

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  42. Nick Flandrey says:

    While not exclusively white, they have became notorious for violent confrontations against left-wing rival groups. Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and YouTube have all banned the Proud Boys from their platforms.

    –nice rhetorical technique there. Conflates white with violent, while simultaneously damning with faint praise. Then the circular logic of using the unjustified bans as justification…. brilliant.

    –“While not exclusively white, they have become notorious for violent confrontations against rival groups. Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and YouTube have all supported antifa and BLM on their platforms. ”

    n

  43. lynn says:

    “Clarence Thomas: The Supreme Court Needs to ‘Fix’ Its Same-Sex Marriage Decision”
    https://pjmedia.com/culture/tyler-o-neil/2020/10/05/clarence-thomas-the-supreme-court-needs-to-fix-its-same-sex-marriage-decision-n1005573

    “On Monday, the Supreme Court declined to take up the case Kim Davis v. David Ermold, which revolved around former Rowan County, Ky., clerk Kim Davis, who notoriously refused to grant same-sex marriage licenses to a homosexual couple, citing her belief that marriage is between one man and one woman. While Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas agreed not to take up the case, they argued that the Supreme Court needs to “fix” a central error in Obergefell v. Hodges (2015), the case that legalized same-sex marriage, because the Court’s ruling supports anti-religious bigotry.”

    “Ermold, one of the homosexual men who applied for a marriage license, sued Davis after she refused to issue one. Davis argued that she was protected from lawsuits under qualified immunity, but a judge found her in contempt of court and jailed her for five days. Ermold won the lawsuit, and Davis appealed it. The Supreme Court refused to reopen the case.”

    “Alito and Thomas concurred with the judgment not to hear the case, but Thomas wrote (and Alito joined) a powerful condemnation of the way Obergefell mainstreams hostility toward conservative Christians and others who hold that marriage is between one man and one woman.”

    Freedom of religion is a right spelled out directly in the USA Constitution and is senior to the right of the homosexuals to get married.

    6
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  44. lynn says:

    Nick, I would discourage moving within your neighborhood. If you’re going to move, move FAR away from problems, and TO someplace where you can do something about them. I’ve just moved from Sacramento, CA to San Antonio, TX, to a larger and more rural property.

    Moving ANYWHERE is difficult, time-consuming and expensive.

    It cost me over $100K to move when you included the loss of money invested in the old house for what I sold it for.

  45. lynn says:

    That’s a couple of hours of my life I won’t get back, and I STILL haven’t actually done the tasks I set out to do- get a bootable linux install drive to install dual boot on my NVR pc to test if the linux version of my NVR is more stable than the windows version.

    Bloody hell. Some days I’m filled with hate for computers.

    n

    My new neighbor told me yesterday that he has a 20 TB array of drives for storing three weeks worth of video from his seven cameras around his house.

    Note to self: stop streaking in the back yard at night time.

  46. Greg Norton says:

    It cost me over $100K to move when you included the loss of money invested in the old house for what I sold it for.

    Yikes! We spent about that much moving from Florida to Portland and then halfway back to Texas.

    Truck both times was ~ $13k even though the distance was less on the second run. I’d hate to think what booking space on a truck out of Portland or Seattle would cost right now.

  47. lynn says:

    It cost me over $100K to move when you included the loss of money invested in the old house for what I sold it for.

    Yikes! We spent about that much moving from Florida to Portland and then halfway back to Texas.

    Truck both times was ~ $13k even though the distance was less on the second run. I’d hate to think what booking space on a truck out of Portland or Seattle would cost right now.

    I had $453K invested in the old house. Sold it for $404K. There were selling expenses also (realtor, etc).

  48. Nick Flandrey says:

    I have essentially promised to get all my business inventory off our property or she will just buy a house and move. Whether I join her or not is not a concern of hers. Or at least that’s what was said in anger. I am taking it seriously.

    There is no practical or logical reason to move 8 blocks. Same HOA, same schools, slightly better section of the development. Shallow and wide lot, no back yard because of the pool and patio, no place for a shed or cabinet to store lawn machines even. No place for a gennie, water tank, or smoker. No attic storage. The house has more square feet but because of hallways, stairs, a wet bar, and closets, the rooms are all actually smaller than my current house. No way to fence and gate the driveway. There is a more secure approach to the front door, but that’s about it.

    The lake house we were looking at sold too.

    n

  49. SteveF says:

    For every person who wants to leave the secret service, there 100 people waiting on a list to get in.

    I wasn’t one of them.

    When I was getting off of Army active duty I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do. Each of the defense contractors that I’d been working with for the past couple years was interested in hiring me but I wanted to do something a bit more active. I talked to the CIA*, a mercenary company**, and the US Secret Service. The latter seemed interested only in having me be part of the uniformed security service. Right. Trained and experienced intelligence analyst, helped to overthrow a government, demonstrated coolness under pressure as an agent, experienced (but not trained) interviewer and interrogator, and they wanted me to be a glorified mall security guard. Pass.

    I didn’t bother to talk to the NSA. Buncha assholes, every time I dealt with them.

    In the end, I took a job with a defense contractor, most likely the worst of the defense contractor options I had, but at least it was better than being a mall cop.

    * I never figured out if it was a personality profiling interview or if they were thinking of setting me up as a saboteur and/or assassin. It would have been a logical extension of some of the things I’d been doing. As may be, after talking with their recruiters a few times I didn’t have a warm fuzzy so I withdrew my application.

    ** Not Blackwater or anything similar. This was more like what you’d see in Soldier of Fortune a few decades ago. Decent pay, potentially very good pay if the bonuses their personnel guy was talking about were real (and were paid by the clients, which I understand is an ongoing problem), and likely all the excitement I’d want even as a staff intel officer. There’d also be opportunity, encouragement, and need to learn more languages, a plus in my book. On the downside, the guy was a bit too enthusiastic in talking up the essential lawlessness of where I’d be sent, and how as a matter of practice if I felt the need to shoot or torture someone to get information from him or his friends, I could get away with it. And how, as an officer, I’d have a teenage girl, or preteen if I preferred, or boy if I preferred, housekeeper/sex slave who came with my room. Mmmmnope. I draw the line at slavery, sorry.

    (To be honest, I’m not sure if all of the above came from that one mercenary personnel guy/recruiter. I’ve talked to a handful of former mercs over the years and I may be, probably am, mix-and-matching between conversations.)

  50. SteveF says:

    Nick, what about a large self-store, at least until you can work out something better? It would be a pain to move things twice, but you could probably get started tomorrow.

  51. lynn says:

    Cool, I have been down voted twice today ! And the day is young.

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  52. lynn says:

    “Biden Threatens Religious Freedom, Suggests Christians With Certain Traditional Views Are ‘Dregs of Society'”
    https://pjmedia.com/election/tyler-o-neil/2020/10/05/joe-bidens-insidious-threat-to-traditional-christianity-n999097

    “Liberals often mock conservative Christians for supporting a notorious sinner and philanderer in Donald Trump, but the left has grown increasingly hostile to biblical (small-o) orthodox Christianity. Even the ostensibly moderate Democratic nominee Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. represents an insidious threat to the religious freedom of conservative Christians. He also represents a threat to Roman Catholics, even though he is himself a practicing Catholic.”

    “How could this be? Biden’s rhetoric and policies single out those who adhere to traditional religious beliefs and moral convictions, aiming to limit their ability to live by their consciences and ostracizing them from polite society. The Democrat may outwardly campaign on a platform of unity and diversity, but his candidacy truly represents a threat to traditional religious believers.”

    Just another reason to vote for the Trumper. Only eight days until we start voting in Texas.

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  53. lynn says:

    The lake house we were looking at sold too.

    People are taking inflation seriously and buying real investment property. And money is incredibly cheap which is making things worse XXXXXX better.

  54. Ray Thompson says:

    Note to self: stop streaking in the back yard at night time.

    Why? Not your problem. Start streaking in the daytime.

    Currently have the RV at Cumberland Mountain State Park. About 1 hour drive from home. Nice park. Much more crowded than the last time we were here. Still good to get out of the house. It will be cool tonight, down in the low ’40s. May have to break out the heater. I use an electric heater rather than propane. It’s the parks electricity. No sewer but water. WiFi is surprisingly good.

    Replaced the shower head and will try it tonight. Biggest concern is wife will like the shower head and take longer showers. May be an issue for the holding tank. Only staying three nights so should be OK.

    Electric jack worked fine. Slow but better than cranking, I guess. Cranking was faster but pushing a button is easier for the spousal unit.

    Brought along some movies for the TV to watch. Fire tomorrow night and Wednesday night. Smores of course, lightly toasted, none of this charcoal stuff the wife likes.

  55. Greg Norton says:

    Just another reason to vote for the Trumper. Only eight days until we start voting in Texas.

    NBC Sports’ Peter King dumped all over Texas and the Goveror’s decision to restrict mail-in-ballot collection sites to one per county in his weekly column this morning, asking the reader to “Explain how that is not voter suppression.”

    I went out to read about Tom Brady and the Yucs’ come-from-behind, throw 5 touchdowns victory yesterday. I believe that Texas voting regulations got more space *in a football-oriented column*.

  56. Nick Flandrey says:

    Ah, you either like em charred or not. I like them toasty brown with a uniformly soft middle… hard to do with metal forks.

    @stevef, I’ve got a LOT of storage. Two units, and 1800 sq ft, already. The problem with storage is that it goes in but never comes out. It’s too easy to forget about it if it’s out of sight.

    I think I’ve talked her down off the edge, but that was closer than I like.

    n

  57. Nick Flandrey says:

    anyone have a preference for these windows managers? I’m 8 years away from the last time I sat in front of a linux box, HATE MS tiles, and would like something that looks and has stuff in most of the same places as win7/8

    THis is for my NVR, will run a server, and probably chrome as a browser and that’s about it.

    Cinnamon (64-bit)

    MATE (64-bit)

    Xfce (64-bit)

    n

  58. RickH says:

    @Nick

    Don’t have tiles on my Win10 system. Deleted them all. Have a few program icons on the Start menu that I use for often-used programs.

    And there is this, which tells how to fully remove tiles: https://betanews.com/2016/06/03/disable-windows-10-live-tiles/ .

  59. RickH says:

    @Nick

    Maybe your spousal unit has a good argument. I haven’t seen your property, but my imagination sees it as a house with a driveway full of piles of ‘stuff’, maybe covered by faded/torn tarps, and more of the same to the side of the driveway or garage. And a garage full of the same stuff.

    So perhaps a focused effort on using your storage area as your business/shipping/receiving area, and a current inventory of items to keep you informed. And a commitment to ‘working’ the storage area x hours a day.

    Right now, I image your front yard as similar to “Sanford and Sons”.

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  60. Greg Norton says:

    anyone have a preference for these windows managers? I’m 8 years away from the last time I sat in front of a linux box, HATE MS tiles, and would like something that looks and has stuff in most of the same places as win7/8

    I run MATE with Linux Mint, but a lot of people like Cinnamon.

    You can install both and switch at the login screen.

    With Fedora, I use whatever is the default Gnome environment on Workstation. Same with Ubuntu.

  61. Nick Flandrey says:

    “Right now, I image your front yard as similar to “Sanford and Sons”. ”

    –not with an HOA…you’re right about the driveway, but the tarps are new. UV does a number on them.

    yeah it’s way past time and the auctions here are being very slow to accept my stuff. For a while there, I thought stuff was finally leaving. Lots did go, but there is a lot more too.

    n

  62. MrAtoz says:

    I read with hilarity the MSM morons heads exploding because tRump made a video without a mask. Like they aren’t on the boobtoob nightly without a mask.

  63. lynn says:

    @stevef, I’ve got a LOT of storage. Two units, and 1800 sq ft, already. The problem with storage is that it goes in but never comes out. It’s too easy to forget about it if it’s out of sight.

    I think I’ve talked her down off the edge, but that was closer than I like.

    You need to do something now. Buy a bigger house on a bigger lot in Katy. How about this one ? Has 4,483 ft2 two story, two barns and a two story garage on 1.5 acres for $685K. No HOA, no MUD. Tons of storage space. Your girls can have horses. Built in 1994. Did it flood ?
    https://www.har.com/homedetail/29020-dove-ln-katy-tx-77493/11043047

    BTW, she ain’t on the ledge. You are.

  64. lynn says:

    “President Trump Set to Leave Walter Reed: ‘Don’t Be Afraid Of COVID’”
    https://www.outkick.com/president-trump-set-to-leave-walter-reed-dont-be-afraid-of-covid/

    “Trump advised Americans not to fear COVID-19:”

    ““Don’t let it dominate your life. We have developed, under the Trump Administration, some really great drugs & knowledge.””

    We need four more years of Trump ! I truly do think that God blessed the USA with him.

    Hat tip to:
    https://thelibertydaily.com/

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  65. Nick Flandrey says:

    Oh yes, if we are moving I want outbuildings, not a lot so small I can’t get a shed on it.

    That is a nice looking property.
    n

  66. ~jim says:

    Do you want us to put it plainly for you mate? You’re a packrat. Get a clue because you can’t justify it any more.

    Your wife is questioning your marriage, ferchrissake.

    As they say in India, “Do the needful”.

    We’ll be here.

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  67. Nick Flandrey says:

    CDC’s October Covid Update, with the official word. There have been changes.

    Link

    n

  68. Nick Flandrey says:

    Your wife is questioning your marriage, ferchrissake.”

    yeah, that was a bit of a wakeup call. She’s much calmer today. She’s talking about rural properties again and acknowledges the problems with the neighborhood house.

    If I don’t get the stuff out now though I’m cooked.

    n

  69. ~jim says:

    When she sees you packing stuff away to the point where you can’t find a bloody “micro-irrigation apparatus” I’ll bet she feels more than irritation, even if she can’t express it beyond “My way or the hiway”.

    What she wants you to do, in order to address her desires, is another, unknown matter. Perhaps you should *ask*, before you get ‘cooked’?

    “Honey, my accumulations seem to disturb you. How can I help us and the children?”

    I have a simple algorithm which every couple, or government, should follow. Ask for what you want, be willing to take No for an answer, and then entertain compromise.

  70. Nightraker says:

    @nick: Classic Shell, freeware, is a Win 7/8 Start menu clone that runs on Win 10. Tile killer.

    Packrats: Describes my family and myself well. I’ve lived only in apartments which limits somewhat, but only somewhat. OTOH, Dad, Uncle, Grandmother kept plenty of “stuff” of dubious utility.

    Worst is my brother with the 6000 sqft industrial building and similarly sized fenced yard, 36 (!) storage units, at last outdated report, and the 3000 sqft basement of the family home. Never mind the garage, front porch and patio. Jammed, stuffed, tenuously stacked. Had to threaten to call the fire marshal to complete his buyout when we inherited. He sells classic Chevy parts on Ebay and as a full time job, has high volume but…

    Don’t let that encourage you! He never married. (small voice) And finish the bathroom, too.

  71. Nick Flandrey says:

    My problem isn’t the prep stuff, or even the household maintenance stuff (it’s possible, and she agrees, that we just left the micro irrigation stuff at the rent house when we moved out.)

    The accumulation is stuff I bought to resell, that hasn’t sold.

    The prep stuff is mostly organized and stored reasonably. I can walk out and put my hands on almost any of it right away. This is especially true after the start of this latest disaster. I stacked and racked all the stuff I thought we would need.

    The ebay and auction stuff is not. It’s piled up, tucked under, stacked (literally), and sometimes forgotten. It came in at a steady pace but did not leave. It’s made worse by the nature of the auctions I sourced from. You may buy a pallet to get one item, and the other items have value, more than just throwing them out, but not a priority to sell. So I get a $400 mini-CNC mill I can flip easily, but also 5 beat up boom boxes, 10 VCRs, 12 DVD players, 6 printers, and a box of computer cables. There is a LOT of low value, high bulk sitting in various places around my house and storage units. A couple of years ago I sold 44 pallets of that sort of stuff in one auction and grossed $1000. Not gonna send the kids to school on that. Getting rid of it has been a low priority. It’s moved up my list dramatically.

    nick

  72. Norman Hills says:

    I always use unetbootin on win10
    https://unetbootin.github.io
    For creating bootable/install jab sticks, give it a try.
    cheers
    Norman

  73. Norman says:

    of course that’s “For creating bootable/install usb sticks” 🙂 curse this bloody tiny phone keyboard

  74. Nick Flandrey says:

    You can’t be “wealthy” and “middle class” at the same time

    ‘You don’t own someone’: Myleene Klass slams wealthy, middle class families who talk about ‘Filipino girls’ and ‘Filipino cleaners’

    And if she’s using “class” as a social signifier, since she appears to be British, I thought there was Upper and Lower. Middle is distinctly economic.

    But hey waddda I know? I’m not the product of a thousand years of class consciousness.

    n

  75. Nick Flandrey says:

    Such wonderful people. We should invite them here.

    Data released by independent watchdog group Alto al Secuestro [Stop Kidnapping] found that abductions in Mexico increased by 15% in August [137 kidnapping victims] compared with July [119].

    The states with the highest abductions were Veracruz [22]; Mexico State [20]; and Jalisco [10]. Mexico City, the nation’s capital, was fourth with six kidnappings, followed by Zacatecas [5].

    Stats for September have not been reported yet.

    Since President Andrés Manuel López obrador took office in December 2018 up until August, a total of 3,663 people have been kidnapped in 2,874 incidents.

    n

  76. Nick Flandrey says:

    So much fail in one link

    Gay men hijack #ProudBoys hashtag and post images of themselves ‘doing very gay things’ to ‘reclaim’ label from far-right group in trend started by Star Wars’ George Takei

    Takei, 83, took to Twitter to call on other gay men to post pictures of themselves ‘making out… or doing very gay things’ with the hashtag #ProudBoys
    Thousands of gay couples responded to his tweet with photos of themselves, and many also included images with their children
    ‘Make this hashtag about love, not hate,’ one person urged while sharing his own photos with his partner
    The viral campaign comes after President Donald Trump told the Proud Boys, a far-right group, to ‘stand back and stand by’ during the presidential debate
    In response, the Proud Boys appeared to pledge their allegiance to Trump, telling him that they were ‘standing down and standing by sir’
    Proud Boys organizer Joe Biggs wrote: ‘President Trump told the proud boys to stand by because someone needs to deal with ANTIFA… well sir! we’re ready!’

    In another article, the Proud Boys were laughing about it, and made the point that trying to drown out another’s voice was hardly a progressive attitude (although par for the course.)

    n

    added

    Enrique Tarrio, chairman of the Proud Boys group, told US broadcaster CNN he is not sure what social media users are trying to achieve.

    “I think it’s hysterical,” said Mr Tarrio. “This isn’t something that’s offensive to us. It’s not an insult. We aren’t homophobic. We don’t care who people sleep with.

    “One of the messages they want to send with this is that they’re trying to drown out our supporters, they’re trying to silence us,” he added. “When you’re trying to drown out other people’s thoughts, I don’t think there’s anything progressive about that.”

    Founded in 2016 by Canadian-British right-wing activist Gavin McInnes, the Proud Boys is a far-right, anti-immigrant, all-male group.

  77. Nick Flandrey says:

    CDC says coronavirus DOES spread through the air after retracting similar guidance that officials said was posted ‘in error’ two weeks ago

    The CDC updated its coronavirus guidelines on Monday to say that airborne transmission does play a role in the spread of coronavirus
    It comes two weeks after it took down similar guidance, claiming that update had been made ‘in error’
    On Monday, the agency walked this back and said that in some scenarios, the virus may spread further than six feet in aerosols from talking or breathing
    Previously, CDC said the virus is spread through respiratory droplets and close contact, but that there may be evidence the virus is airborne

    By Mary Kekatos Senior Health Reporter and Natalie Rahhal Us Health Editor

    Published: 14:41 EDT, 5 October 2020 | Updated: 20:52 EDT, 5 October 2020

    The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) now admits that coronavirus does spread through airborne transmission, according to updated guidance on the agency’s website.

    It comes two weeks after CDC officials said their previous warning about airborne transmission was ‘in error,’ making Monday’s update the third time in a month the agency has flip-flopped on how the virus spreads.

  78. paul says:

    So I get a $400 mini-CNC mill I can flip easily, but also 5 beat up boom boxes, 10 VCRs, 12 DVD players, 6 printers, and a box of computer cables. There is a LOT of low value, high bulk sitting in various places around my house and storage units.

    The mini-CNC that you can flip, flip. The rest isn’t worth the packaging and postage to be worth selling on eBay. Haul it off to Goodwill where someone may find “something cool”. Or the dump.

  79. Nick Flandrey says:

    The mini-CNC that you can flip, flip.

    –just an example. I sold 3 of them and a couple of mini-CNC lathes in 15 minutes last year. People couldn’t get their money out fast enough.

    There is a time cost to getting rid of the extraneous stuff that I have been avoiding paying. Lots of other things to fill my days than sending scrap away. But I let it go too long and now need to make it a priority.

    n

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