Cold again. Maybe some rain. Probably grey and overcast, but I’ll be inside anyway, just like yesterday. 3pm felt like 6 pm …
I was in class all day, then home. Didn’t get much done other than that. Sometimes it be that way.
Plan for today is the same.
Plan for Monday involves some grocery shopping.
Also loading up some bins for a local auction. I’ve got a lot of that to do.
Meanwhile, the players continue their dance. The ‘western’ allies voted to cut Russia off from SWIFT, but Russia’s been planning for that for some time. We’ll see how that plays out. Could turn out to be the end of SWIFT and the petrodollar. Force people to come up with an alternative to your fully captured system, and when they do, you are a dead system walking.
It’s important to remember that none of the things we expect as “the way things are” are actually written in stone. There was a time before the Fed. There was a time before fractional reserve banking. There was a time before NATO. A time before just about anything you care to name, and there can and WILL be a time AFTER too.
Whatever is coming after, that’s what I intend to see, and get through, and get my kids through.
Stack the things. All the things.
n
41F and 96%RH at 645am. Sun might be peeking out, which would be nice.
Time for some breakfast.
n
Congress keeps punting on issues like CAFE. They've only had 50 years.
Cars are about to go away for most people, and no one seems to care.
40 F and soaking wet out west of the Brazos River this morning at 7 am. My dog went outside, took care of business, and went immediately back to bed.
Drainage. 800 days on market is a big red flag.
The place next to it has a pond, also. Maybe a small nuclear reactor?
Another disaster directly caused by “plugs The Last”. More important matters are on his mind like ice cream in Delaware and a quack Woman of Color on SCOTUS.
Speaking of popcorn:
Trump just announced he’s running in 2024…
LOL!
He had his chance and lost his nerve in the face of "The Science".
The prospect of a liberal Justice in the Roe seat who cannot write does not make me sad.
Blackmun and Breyer could write, and look what that gave us for the last 50 years.
Heck, The Elders should let Mittens “vote his conscience” on this one.
Mosquito farmer.
Six year old “daughter”, mother wants to move to California. Really? I have never said anything about my penis in public. And mine is the real deal and something I want to keep. The only reason the daughter would do so is to brag and shock. California deserves these loonies. They should fit right in with the other crazies. I suspect the mother also wants the state to pay for the surgery.
Paxton hit piece. Early voting turnout in Texas has been really light due to weather and general lack of interest.
The LSM and Democrats (redundant, I know) are trying to blame the invasion of Ukraine on Trump as the corrupt pedophile with a cranium full of mushed peas undergoes another weekend of extensive drug therapy in a basement in Delaware in preparation for his Pinocchio imitation for another week.
The lies are easy to expose.
First, a good overview:
February 27, 2022
President Trump in 2018 called out the factors that led Putin to invade Ukraine
By Rajan Laad
https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2022/02/president_trump_in_2018_called_out_the_factors_that_led_putin_to_invade_ukraine_.html
which provides extensive background to that talk to NATO leaders, as well as noting some of the key players who have enriched themselves with Russian blood money, including, of course, the Bid Guy and the rest of the Biden crime family.
Second, a good link to the Trump video of criticism referenced above:
President Donald Trump Criticizes Germany At NATO Breakfast
Jul 11, 2018
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_yO8RhG370w&t=11s
Third, a rather long but well-written for the very-well-informed* intelligent layman summary which makes a good case that the "science" of the global warming zealots is simply wrong:
Climate Change, an Emergency, or Not?
The Impact of CO2, H2O and Other “Greenhouse Gases” on Equilibrium Earth Temperatures
By David Coe
with the freely accessible full published paper linked at the bottom.
*Very-well-informed. A certain background in science is needed to begin to understand the discussion. For those not familiar with basics like chemical reactions, gas mixtures, mass and energy transport in the atmosphere, ternary phase diagrams and adiabatic lapse rate, it's very difficult if not impossible to follow.
>> Had pizza, well, flatbread, for lunch. Pizza can not have bbq chicken chunks on it. Flatbread may. You have been notified.
+1
Nor pineapple. Actually, it should only have tomato sauce, mozzarella, a bit of EVOO and some fresh basil.
>> Like everyone else, Putin probably expected that the Americans would bail him out by now by extracting the Ukrainian president.
Instead, he’s facing dug in resistance and Germans sending the kind of anti-tank weapons explicitly designed to defend their territory from … Russian tanks!
Got popcorn?
So I stopped at the grocery store to get some popcorn, but for some reason that apparently we're not intelligent to understand, there was none on the self.
>> Biden and EU use 'financial nuclear option' and REMOVE Russian banks from SWIFT network: Task force will target oligarchs and their 'yachts, luxury apartments and ability to send their kids to fancy colleges in the West'
So we leave them loopholes – all of a sudden the 'non-key' banks get very busy, and why stop only 'most' transactions?
With a BS Chem Eng degree and a 45 year career in aerospace engineering, I get it.
That's the white devils' science so it doesn't matter and it's all lies and it was stolen from the Black Kangz who invented it 6000 years ago. And you're a racist.
>> https://www.har.com/homedetail/2746-wilson-rd-el-campo-tx-77437/7343365
How the heck do you keep that stone shower clean?
Pressure washer??
And besides the 886 days on the market there's also this price reduction:
Reduced 46.67%
Original List Price: $1,500,000
Price Reduced: -$700,000
Current List Price: $800,000
Last Reduction on: 10/03/2019
Nonetheless, imagine how much stuff @nick could stack in the non-living space!
To leave them an out. Yes.
Putin's hand obviously wasn't as strong as he made it out to be, but he had a point about NATO being that far inside the old Soviet Union.
How the heck do you keep that stone shower clean?
It has a reduced price! Maybe the pond is to water the road. Must cost a lot to heat and cool.
No idea on the stone shower. We had a custom built tile shower in the previous house. No problems.
Only the conditioned space (3,000 ft2 to 4,000 ft2) of the building is heated and cooled. The 6,000 ft2 to 7,000 ft2 unconditioned space just needs a couple of Big Ass Fans.
https://bigassfans.com/
That is serious boonies. Someone's retirement dream possibly, but not everyone has the same dream.
Drainage. 800 days on market is a big red flag.
I was thinking crawdad pond.
Congress keeps punting on issues like CAFE. They've only had 50 years.
Cars are about to go away for most people, and no one seems to care.
Nah, cars are not going away. But, we are getting ready to look like Cuba with all the pristine 1950s cars.
I was thinking gub disposal facility.
Pearls Before Swine: The Covid Game
https://www.gocomics.com/pearlsbeforeswine/2022/02/27
I don't think the game is winnable, you just gotta outlast it.
An electric pressure washer? For the price of the place one can afford a cleaning lady and she can deal with it.
I would think it would be coated with a flat or low gloss polyurethane.
The rest of the house part looks kind of "duh". I’m not seeing how the rooms connect. And no one planted any trees or shrubs or even toss out some grass seed?
Most barndominiums pictures I’ve seen all have high vaulted ceilings. That makes a lot of sense in Texas for the a/c needed. Me? I’d have a regular looking house section and the space above would be a huge second floor attic.
Hey I resemble that.
Nah 40-50 years ago it was Texans that bugged me. Much of the Dust Bowl migration came from Texas, not just Okies (and lots of other states). I used to yank the chain of friends that had a drawl. I guess it's what Tejas has now with californicators headed that way.
http://www.bakersfieldobserved.com/2022/02/gunfire-breaks-out-at-loan-oak-lounge.html
50s cars didn't have computers, turbo chargers, or EFI.
The masses have the delusion that they will all drive a Tonymobile or Ford Jesus truck at “ludicrous speed”.
>> Like everyone else, Putin probably expected that the Americans would bail him out by now by extracting the Ukrainian president.
Instead, he’s facing dug in resistance and Germans sending the kind of anti-tank weapons explicitly designed to defend their territory from … Russian tanks!
Got popcorn?
So I stopped at the grocery store to get some popcorn, but for some reason that apparently we're not intelligent to understand, there was none on the self.
Welcome to the new real !
Nonetheless, imagine how much stuff @nick could stack in the non-living space!
You have no idea how much crap XXXX precious stuff that my family and I have.
Sounds like my wife, Her stuff is precious, mine is crap. That's invenereal. When you need it you need it.
That don't make you special bud. My wife inherited her mother's hoarding skills. If I don't keep them in check we would be overrun. Even now the effort is not entirely successful.
Home from my class.
Beautiful blue skies and moderate temps. 63F and 41%RH make it very nice out.
Not much of the day left, admittedly.
—-
– flaming meteor of hate, smite us now…
n
It's reported that the Chinese use an anal swab…
Around 1/3 of the crowd in Home Depot today had masks when I stopped.
Some were even masked wandering around the garden center.
Somebody needs to seed a convincing-looking study to the LSM that shows that masks are most effective when worn up over the eyes.
The rest of us stay off the roads for a few days and suddenly everything looks brighter.
>> Meanwhile, the players continue their dance. The ‘western’ allies voted to cut Russia off from SWIFT, but Russia’s been planning for that for some time. We’ll see how that plays out. Could turn out to be the end of SWIFT and the petrodollar. Force people to come up with an alternative to your fully captured system, and when they do, you are a dead system walking.
I've worked on several SWIFT projects back when they still let me write code. Overall quite a lot of message types but not that big a challenge to start with the essential ones. Heck, might as well reuse the existing formats. Add some secured messaging and the money transactions will start to flow, outside of SWIFT. As others here have commented, some/all of this may already be in place.
Depending on how the Texas Supreme Court rules on a pending case, we could have mask mandates back in Austin and surrounding counties with like-minded "Judges" fairly soon.
"Ukraine-Russia LIVE: Putin’s humiliating losses exposed – 4,300 dead and 146 tanks smashed"
https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/1572568/Ukraine-Russia-live-invasion-vladimir-Putin-mocked-resistance-kyiv-Volodymyr-Zelenskyy
"Ukrainian deputy defence minister Hanna Malyar said on Sunday that the number of dead could be as high as 4,300, but it still needed to be clarified. She also said on her Facebook page that Russian troops lost about 146 tanks, 27 aircraft and 26 helicopters."
Hat tip to:
https://drudgereport.com/
Supposedly Russia started this with 180,000 troops. I’ll bet that he can find more if need be.
Depending on how the Texas Supreme Court rules on a pending case, we could have mask mandates back in Austin and surrounding counties with like-minded "Judges" fairly soon.
Not gonna happen. The Texas Supreme Court are all Republicans and back the governor.
"Around 1/3 of the crowd in Home Depot today had masks when I stopped."
I was in several stores today. SWAG is <10% with masks. So, are some Californians smarter than some Texans?
I was surprised to see that many. Two months ago it was less, then we had the Moronic panic. Now, most mandates have been lifted. We are an independent bunch this side of the mountains.
Most of the mask clad I see in that stretch of stores are Indian or SE Asian. As for the whites, I would imagine that the majority are recent West Coast transplants.
There is video on the net showing captured Russian tanks. The interiors look like something you might find in Africa.
Best video is a tank being stolen by a farmer, using a tractor to tow it away.
Colorful turn of phrase from a legend:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sUJd3N8X9Rg&t=84s
Russia's problem is finding *experienced* soldiers.
If you opt to invade another country with sufficient logistical infrastructure to support Fedex and McDonald's, your troops need to know what they are doing.
Where have the Russians deployed lately beyond Syria?
The Americans didn’t show up to take the Ukraine leadership out of the country on schedule. Putin needs a way to declare victory and go home.
There is video on the net showing captured Russian tanks. The interiors look like something you might find in Africa.
Best video is a tank being stolen by a farmer, using a tractor to tow it away.
Nitpick: Some (most?) of the so-called "tanks" are actually AFVs (Armored Fighting Vehicles.) A tank ain't a tank unless it's got a long gun mounted in a turret.
Also, modern tanks weigh upwards of 45 tons. You're not towing something that heavy with a John Deere (or its Slavic equivalent.)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T-90
And the Truth?
Because:
Full details at https://www.space.com/elon-musk-says-spacex-starlink-active-ukraine .
Well, elon just insured that about half the world's governments will never give him a license to operate starlink in their country.
n
Where have the Russians deployed lately beyond Syria?
Georgia in 2008, 14 years ago.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russo-Georgian_War
@mediumwave
https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/moment-ukrainian-tractor-steals-huge-26344388
which was an apc.
If the CNN talking head is correct in reading what he was handed:
https://www.cnn.com/videos/world/2022/02/26/russian-tanks-ukraine-video-pleitgen-vpx.cnn/video/playlists/russia-ukraine-military-conflict/
they were tanks
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T-72
Didn't actually see any Russian soldiers in the interiors of the captured vehicle that was filmed, so it my have been their meals-on-wheels with live hogs for dinner.
If half the world's governments don't grant Starlink a license, and if the suppositions voiced here that Starlink is being backed by DoD, then More for Us!
to
LEOs
Really want LEOs to succeed.
@Nick
Half the world's governments weren't going to give him a license to sell to the citizens anyway.
Including the FCCP, Myanmar, and most of the countries pronounced as full glotal stop followed by hacking a lugie on the wall.
And it's doubtful that Trump will let him sell to any country that doesn't process payments through Swift.
Augh!! Editor is impossible on Android. Rick, h e l p!
Srsly, whashoI do?uld t
see Tweet from U.S.Embassy Kyiv:
https://www.republicworld.com/world-news/russia-ukraine-crisis/us-embassy-in-kyiv-trolls-russia-with-meme-showing-history-of-kyiv-and-moscow-articleshow.html
it's doubtful that Trump will let him
-I see what you did there!
n
My dad would have been 89 today. I managed to avoid that thought for almost the whole day.
Miss him.
n
@drwilliams: The videos tell it all.Thanks for confirming my suspicions! 🙂
@nick
A friend advised me to remember the birthdays, not the death anniversaries. good advice.
I hope that with the inevitable sadness, good memories of your dad filled your mind.
Today my mom would have been 79. I wish she’d found a different way than alcohol to cope with the pain of being human. However today was mostly good memories of her. She was a skilled and talented woman. A useful artist. Violin and fabric were her medium. She fostered my love of music even if I didn’t inherit her innate talent or musical work ethic.
Warm again. Mid thirties today. Roads are a mess with 8-16” tire grabbing ruts on the side streets. Enough to break an axle. Used a sled to move a bale of hay down to the rabbits, and to haul 6 bags of poopy straw to the driveway. Warm enough I opened the end of their fabric carport for a good airing and sunlight. They were stretched out and relaxed so I think they enjoyed it.
Fur Rondy started this weekend and will run for ten or so days. We entered a couple of the contests. One of my husbands snapshots was selected for exhibit in the amateur photo contest. Daughter entered a couple model cars into the junior division of another contest. We admired the work of other amateurs in woodworking, models, photography, etc. great fun.
The best thing we saw were two scratch built models of the ships Queen Mary and Queen Elizabeth. The first took the man twenty years, the second a mere five years. They were astonishing in their level of detail snd faithfulness to the originals. He started them as a lark, first effort at model building. He was encyclopedic in his knowledge of the ships, their histories, how they participated in war and other important events. They’ll be sent to Long Beach and go on display with their inspirations sometime after Fur Rondy. Listening to the model builder talk was a fascinating history lesson. They’re big models, 60-70 pounds and probably around 6’ long. Gorgeous.
Huh, Fur Rondy, something I'd never heard of! Thanks for sharing, the breadth and depth of experience here is sometime still astonishing, even when I expect it.
n
"Claim: Electric Vehicles are being Shipped in Fire Retardant Bags"
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2022/02/27/international-maritime-organisation-electric-vehicles-to-be-shipped-in-fire-retardant-bags/
"This latest fire on the Felicity Ace is the fourth since, in 2019, the Grande America, a roll-on roll-off vessel with more than 2000 new and used vehicles on board, sank in the Bay of Biscay after the cars ignited. The crew of 26 tried to combat the fire but, within hours, the heat was so intense that it weakened the structural integrity of the ship’s bulkheads and hull. There was little that any of the crew members could do but to abandon ship."
Do not park these electric vehicles in your garage. Especially if anyone sleeps in a bedroom above the garage.
"How to Live Out of Your Car: Solid Advice from People Who Made It Work"
https://thesurvivalmom.com/how-to-live-in-your-car/
"If you need knowledge, read a book. If you want to really know something, experience is the best teacher. So it is when it comes to living out of your car, which is one of the fastest-growing forms of homelessness. The best advice comes from people who have actually done it for more than just a week or two."
She is serious about this ! Of course, there is that movie about the lady who lived out of her camper van while working for Amazon.
@nick
Fur Rondy started with the fur traders, and continues to feature fur auctions on one of the weekends. This weekend was parade, fireworks, and spring dog races. Next weekend is the Iditarod sled dog ceremonial start, then another 10-12 days of the dog teams making their 1,000 mile race for Nome across gnarly and at times bleak wilderness.
The Rondy site is dreadful but you can get a taste of it. The organizers have been experimenting in recent years with new events and retiring old events to breathe new life into the tradition without ticking off the woke crowd. Fine line.
the Running of the Reindeer is a real spectacle and drew in a lot of new participants.
https://www.furrondy.net
Trump running again. Yuck. Not that there are any better candidates, but choosing between two ancient fossils? Presumably Hillary, but if not her then someone similar. Both utterly out of touch with reality – just in different ways. Both beholden to shadowy outsiders – just different outsiders.
However, corrupt the Ukraine is, look at their present leader. Tell me that either Trump or Hillary (or Biden, for that matter) would *actually* sit in a bunker with their troops, or would turn down the opportunity to flee, requesting more ammo instead. I don't believe there is a major US politician with that kind of guts.
Meanwhile, although Russia is likely to win by sheer mass, it looks like it's costing them a lot more than they expected. And then they get to try and control a population of 300,000,000 that doesn't want them there. That should be fun.
Putin has shown himself to be a brilliant guy, but he has screwed this up beyond saving. One has to wonder why – did he accidentally believe his own propaganda? Or are there internal pressures among the Russian elite that we are unaware of? Whatever else, he has united most of the world against Russia.
It's not that there are loopholes. It's that there are other payment systems. SWIFT is dominate, but not alone. In particular, there are other payment systems within Asia. China is probably the only major power left that is trading with Russia.
I expect those alternate payment systems are the unspoken reason they were reluctant to ban Russia from SWIFT. This could backfire and end SWIFT's dominance, at least outside the West.
He answered that question already. Asked what countries can do, that don't want Starlink available, he said something like "shake their fists at the sky". The only control they can possibly have, is to prevent import of the ground terminals.
@Brad. Population of Ukraine is approx 44M – big, but not 300M (Russia about 144M).
Oops, added a zero too many. Thanks for the correction.
Concur.