Cool and damp, mid 60s to low 70s, and overcast. Yesterday was cool enough that I switched to heat in the house. It was clear most of the day though.
I spent the day cleaning the house at half speed. Not really feeling up to anything demanding, but I can clean and put away and sort. So that’s what I did. D2 made some Tollhouse cookies, and I ate them, but that was later.
Today I’m hoping to get a load dropped off at my auctioneer. I’ve got about 5 bins sitting in the foyer, and a couple more in my storage unit that are ready to go. I keep finding stuff as I move and organize. There is a LOT of inventory kicking around. I’m hoping I have time to do about 6 ebay listings too. I’ve got that many pairs of men’s dress shoes ready for sale, and getting them out of my bedroom will make everyone happy. There are a lot of other things to list too, but most need to be tested, or cleaned before listing, and that is just more than I want to do today.
This cold is slowing me down. Lots of running nose, some sneezing and the occasional cough, coupled with the achy “sick” feeling, and I’d prefer to sleep all day. Can’t. Got too much to do, but I’m not busting azz either.
Fortunately nothing is especially pressing today. Tomorrow I’ve got a site visit planned at my client’s house to replace a switch and PoE injector, and do some housekeeping with the system. I’m not pulling cable and hanging new cams, not this visit. Like my own houses, there is always something that needs doing…
Do what you can when you can. Try to keep up. And stack.
nick
If the convention is in a Texas city and attracts Furries, don’t even think about using the hot tub.
I remember it as “FIGMO”. F**k it, got my orders. Since I was in the Air Force it may have only been an Air Force thing. I never heard the term “feeling short”.
In the Army, it was always “short timer.”
On the IRS and doing taxes, people ARE afraid of the IRS. Make a mistake and they put a lien on your house. The other reason people are afraid of taxes is math. Somebody pointed out: ask a person what 2X3X4 equals and their brain shuts down. I’ve met many liberal arts PhDs who can’t even do that simple math in their head. They won’t even try. “It’s too hard!” Ask somebody to add a 20% tip to a bill and they won’t even try. “What’s 20% of 100?” “Fcuk you, math nerd.” I’m not kidding.
Short Timer in the Navy. Remember the chains we put dog tags on? People would count down on those cutting one ball off every day.
50F and clear this am. Coffee is inside me where it belongs. Kids are in school. Time to continue my quixotic quest to clear some space in the house while my wife is gone…
n
If the bulk of the population understood the math, the economy would have cratered a decade ago.
The car and housing markets would certainly look a lot different right now.
The car and housing markets would certainly look a lot different right now.
Some older friends of mine are moving back to Fort Bend County after an absence of a decade. Their old house neighborhood now sells for over $600K that they sold for $300K when they left. They have been retired for two decades so they are looking for a $300K house. They are looking in starter home neighborhoods now. There is not much choice and the quality is poor.
They are getting back close to their son who has severe brain damage in a nursing home. He cannot talk or recognize them or his three daughters.
I had two dog tags, one on a short chain that looped through the long chain that went around the neck with the second dog tag. I still have one of those tags.
It’s more evil than that. I got a letter many years ago stating I owed $11K+ in taxes for some year. Unless I paid within one week my house was going to put up for a tax sale. Multiple pages of evidence and what I had to do to avoid the sale. The IRS had the wrong SSN. I had to go to the office in downtown Knoxville and provide proof it was not me the IRS was after. The clerk, after putting a note on the account then stated “We will investigate and if it is you, we will seize the house and your bank accounts”. I then asked “what part of different SSN do you not understand?”. She just looked up and said “Next”.
I never heard back from the IRS where they admitted their mistake and the seizure was no longer valid. The IRS is the only organization where a taxpayer has to prove a negative, as in never receiving money. In the mind of the IRS a person is guilty and must be treated as such. The IRS can destroy a person’s financial life and there are no repercussions for their actions. In my mind the agent involved should be brought up on criminal charges when the accusations, and seizure of property, of the IRS are not true.
Their son is Joe Biden? How interesting.
Oof. Horrible situation. But I have to ask: Why can we not euthanize people like this?
The family dog we would take pity on and put down. People must suffer for years, sometimes decades. Their family suffers even more.
I take it you’re not familiar with family court.
Where’s the money in that??? Priorities, man!
Seen online:
Q: How bad was 2023?
A: Christmas was a Monday.
Because people are fallen and cannot be trusted with that power. And governments are even worse.
Because people are fallen and cannot be trusted with that power. And governments are even worse.
EdH: Thank you. I could not articulate that.
I read a story recently where a woman in her 20s was being euthanized for migraines. I do not recall where but it was a western country. Once started, where does one stop ?
I finished Band of Brothers on Netflix last night. On episode nine, EZ company found a Jewish work camp in the boonies. I have no idea where they found that many starved men but it was horrible.
Because people are fallen and cannot be trusted with that power. And governments are even worse.
— see also, Canada. Where it has expanded. Never be worth more to someone dead than alive… (or cost less being dead) if you want to live.
n
Sarah Hoyt is freaking out. She’s got a keen eye, a sharp wit, and an outsider’s perspective. She also suffers from clinical depression, and even in the post she’s warning it might just be her personal big bad that she feels is coming.
https://accordingtohoyt.com/2023/12/04/last-call/
John Wilder thinks we’re getting closer to the edge too.
https://wilderwealthywise.com/end-times-review-part-2-defining-the-dragon/
https://wilderwealthywise.com/the-only-thing-you-need-to-read-today-wilders-end-times-book-review-the-face-of-the-crisis-and-the-aftermath/
And even Commander Zero is feeling weird…
https://www.commanderzero.com/?p=10587
Of course I’m feeling it too. Something is in the wind.
n
I like Elon more and more the more I see him.
And I feel a bit of relief knowing that I like the attitude of the man that controls our access to space, and our best chance off this rock, as a species.
n
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/elon-musk-disney-worlds-biggest-example-go-woke-go-broke
Ooo. I’m in love…
Sassy T gub girl! I wonder if Mr. Lynn can fire a wheel gub like her?
The Governor, Legislature, and voters participating in the off year election last month dedicated the state budget surplus to keeping the housing market plates spinning for another two years with property tax “reform”. Interest rates may force the issue, but I doubt price discovery will begin before next November.
@MrAtoz:
She put a lot of lead downrange quickly. But how accurately? Or was the whole point of the exercise just pure firing speed?
Not denigrating the speed. But accuracy is at least as important – no point in loosing off lots of rounds, if you don’t hit what you’re shooting at.
G.
I think in some states, Oregon I believe is one, a person can participate in their own suicide. Takes a lot of paperwork and several disinterested parties to sign off. The problem is that the person must be mentally competent.
As to your question I think it involves being a civilized society where we are concerned about, and generally try to help others. It is not within the scope of our decision powers to decide on terminating the life of others. That is my thinking although I don’t necessarily agree with it. Criminals are not civilized and are an entirely different scenario.
Then there is the matter of war. Where the taking of lives, or severely injuring others, is sanctioned, applauded, and even rewarded. Yes, it does not make sense.
In the case of my aunt, who for four years of her life, was a complete vegetable. She recognized no one, did not know where she was, spent 12 hours in bed, 12 hours in a wheelchair staring at the wall. She had no life. Yesterday’s food was scraped off one end, and today’s food shoved (or squirted) in the other end. She was adamant when she had her mental faculties that she did not want to live that way. She had even said that if she got that way that she hoped someone would terminate her life.
But no, instead the state had to pay $200.00 a day to keep a vegetable alive. A vegetable that did not want to live that way and would have preferred death. Was keeping her alive tantamount to torture?
Thus, I think your question is still valid.
The camera wasn’t in the best position, but I could hear target strikes on most shots. And as I understand the rules for these competitions, you lose points for missing.
I also heard a lot of tinging. Other shorts are shot with a look down-range at the targets. You don’t become a State champion by missing.
@lynn, re: hand strength and dexterity and the gub thing
Paul Harrell just dropped a video on the MC 14T, a niche .380 13-shot semiauto pistol, for people with compromised hands.
No need to work the slide at all, ever. Pop-up barrel on a .380. Can carry cocked-and-locked or DA/SA.
No need to change from your wheelgubs, and it has some flaws, but I figure you may want to be aware of higher-capacity options.
xkcd: Space Typography
https://xkcd.com/2863/
“If you are ever lost in the Solar System …”
Explained at:
https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/2863:_Space_Typography
Also, the previous one is cool too “Typical Seating Chart”.
https://xkcd.com/2862/
No need to change from your wheelgubs, and it has some flaws, but I figure you may want to be aware of higher-capacity options.
My wheelguns takes anywhere from five rounds to seven rounds. That is good enough for me.
Josey Wales carried four wheelguns. Two .45s and two .36s, all blackpowder. Plus he had spare loaded cylinders. So my thought is to just carry more wheelguns in bad situations.
I must admit that I carried my XDM .40 semi auto with two 16 round mags into a fun house with an 300+ lb instructor behind me holding onto the back of my belt. There was a woman screaming at 100+ db and two guys yelling at her to shut up. Plus the instructor yelling “shoot him ! shoot him !” in my ear at full volume. I shot everything in sight except the screaming woman. The walls, the ceiling, the inside door frame, the two bad guys pointing guns at me. I can’t imagine doing that in real life. I shot one mag out fully and half of the second mag. That was ten years ago at Front Sight.
Paul Harrell just dropped a video on the MC 14T, a niche .380 13-shot semiauto pistol, for people with compromised hands.
No need to work the slide at all, ever. Pop-up barrel on a .380. Can carry cocked-and-locked or DA/SA.
https://eaacorp.com/product/girsan-mc-14t-tip-up/
Sarah Hoyt is freaking out. She’s got a keen eye, a sharp wit, and an outsider’s perspective. She also suffers from clinical depression, and even in the post she’s warning it might just be her personal big bad that she feels is coming.
https://accordingtohoyt.com/2023/12/04/last-call/
John Wilder thinks we’re getting closer to the edge too.
https://wilderwealthywise.com/end-times-review-part-2-defining-the-dragon/
https://wilderwealthywise.com/the-only-thing-you-need-to-read-today-wilders-end-times-book-review-the-face-of-the-crisis-and-the-aftermath/
And even Commander Zero is feeling weird…
https://www.commanderzero.com/?p=10587
Of course I’m feeling it too. Something is in the wind.
Watching that ninth episode of Band Of Brothers on Netflix really freaked me out. I had no idea that was coming. The starved Jews in the “work camp” “Arbeit Macht Frei” was creepy to the max. And I must admit wondering what would it take to get those camps here in the USA for conservatives.
Once the gold stars were handed out to the unvaccinated, camps would have been only a matter of time.
Maybe we will see the camps with the next bug.
Control is still ~ 20% of the population.
Ooo. I’m in love…
Sassy T gub girl! I wonder if Mr. Lynn can fire a wheel gub like her?
Shoot, I would have shot myself in the foot just pulling the gub out too fast.
From SRW in the Fort Bend Journal:
“Overheard at the supermarket:”
“Husband: “For the last 30 years , all you have done is find mistakes in everything I say!””
“Wife: “31.””
Catching up from the weekend…
>> Worst is my pair of Ruger Mark I .22s. Which, of course, aren’t called Mark I, since that designation didn’t exist before Mark II, III, and IV came along.
Sorta like calling an event “The First Annual.”
>> Lee Child’s plotting is far from perfect, but his Jack Reacher character is finely drawn. So far Alan Ritchson has done a credible job, he’s had a good supporting cast, and the port to the small screen has been pretty effective.
Tom Cruise was never believable as Reacher. Ritchson is a much better choice.
>> Tacked on top of the management fee they get whether my total balance goes up or down… they get their 3.xx% no matter what.
Just my two cents but you should be getting stellar returns for a three plus percent management fee.
>> I really like our local place, and I grew up in Chicago eating pizza that was unique to each store…
Another two cents, but for someone that grew up in NYFC, it’s a bit touchy to call what you get in Chi-town ‘pizza.’
>> I have a Keltec Sub2000, and I’m not especially happy with it. I’ve only but 100 rounds or so through it, but I find it difficult to aim; my head doesn’t bend that way. It’s probably just a matter of practice.
I had a Kel Tec P17 and wasn’t happy with it. Too many FTLs and FTEs. Sold it on-line for a good price and went for a Taurus TX-22 which so far has been more reliable.
>> Love him or hate him, if he’s alive, DJT will be running for President. He has no choice if he wants to stay alive and out of prison.
Liz Cheney warns Trump will never leave office if he’s elected president again
So what’s the issue with that?
>> I’ve been using a CPA who is also an Enrolled Agent, for about 30 years. Same one for most of that. She knows what we’ve done in the past, what is on a schedule, what got charged, what is depreciating, etc. The finished paperwork is about an inch thick when printed out. IIRC I started out paying a couple hundred, then 600, and it’s probably more now.
+1 for using an Enrolled Agent for any complicated tax scenarios…especially those that used to work for the IRS. Nothing beats having sat on both sides of the table.
3+% is a third or more of the typical annual gains in a broad stock fund like an S&P 500 index.
typical annual gains
– except for the years when there is an annual loss…
Says right on the prospectus that past performance isn’t a guarantee of future success… or even much of a suggestion.
n
it’s a bit touchy to call what you get in Chi-town ‘pizza.’
– depends if you mean “chicago style pizza” or “deep dish pizza” that a couple of places in Chicago made famous? ‘cuz there ain’t much difference between NY style and Chicago style, except that Chicago cuts it into squares, and NY into wedges you have to fold in half to hold…
We can both agree that California Pizza Kitchen only occasionally and mostly accidentally sells a pizza… and that anything with BBQ chicken or feta cheese might be a tasty flat bread, but it ain’t pizza.
n
I think it was a Heinlein character who suggested getting a shot off quick to rattle your opponent, then take your time to aim the 2nd.
So, if you are fighting a known Heinlein fan, ignore their first shot & take your time to aim your first.
Or, you know, same if you are up against any gang banger in Chicago.
Now, now, let’s not be judgmental … maybe it identifies as Pizza (being Californian ).
typical annual gains
– except for the years when there is an annual loss…
Says right on the prospectus that past performance isn’t a guarantee of future success… or even much of a suggestion.
n
The minute your fund reports awesome gains, the extra money will come flooding in. And then what worked at 1X does not fly at 20X.
Zachary’s in Oakland (Rockridge) is serious Chicago-style deep dish pizza.
Or, at least, it was. Geesh, the last time we went to the area was 2004.
@EdH
Heinlein filtered through Lazarous Long in one of the interludes in Time Enough for Love.
Also in Notebooks, IIRC,
https://www.theblaze.com/news/german-judge-lets-8-men-who-gang-raped-girl-walk-free
Hold a reunion party and invite the judge’s daughter.
There is a bunch of spam slipping through the gmail filter today. Looks like most of it is coming out of AI.
“And I must admit wondering what would it take to get those camps here in the USA for conservatives.”
Enough delusional Democrats and quisling Republicans who believe that they could survive the result.
DNA is being collected to make sure they are wrong.
Saw an add claiming that searching with AI was better.
Better than what?
Better than with all the search engines that have whored themselves for advertisers?
Who thinks the AI’s won’t?
Biden Administration Considers Breaching WA’s Snake River Dams to Save “Imperiled Salmon Species”
https://legalinsurrection.com/2023/12/biden-administration-considers-breaching-was-snake-river-dams-to-save-imperiled-salmon-species/
next-to-last paragraph:
“…if you are interested in regional destruction, weakening the nations, and spreading human misery…destroying hydroelectric dams is an excellent plan.”
The only hydroelectric dam that I would consider destroying is Cacafornia’s Hetch Hetchy dam, which provides water to the city of San Francisco.
n
Um I thought this was settled years ago?
n
How is it that a fit young lady, naked, can be completely unattractive?
Oh, right.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-12823735/Lottie-Moss-poses-TOPLESS-posts-raunchy-video-OnlyFans.html
Don’t put your d!ck in crazy, or broken.
n
Easier to create the future than to predict it…
That is a lot of scratch.
n
>> Of course I’m feeling it too. Something is in the wind.
Nothing to worry about…Ray had spicy Mexican food for dinner today…
Toxoplasma Gondii? Why yes, yes it was.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toxoplasma_gondii
Too many tattoos. Tats on women are a serious turn-off for me.
Yeah, like teeth and claws on a tiger, they are a warning to stay away.
They are really bad tats too. Just random graffiti.
n
Too many tattoos. Tats on women are a serious turn-off for me.
Well… gives you something to read while you’re stoking the fire I guess.. 😀
For me it’s variable. Discrete ink, especially small and delicate images, on a private but not intimate spot (not in the bikini areas but under street clothes, ie ankles, feet, torso, covered shoulder, are fine, to me. I’m more turned off by multiple / facial / intimate piercings. Hey, if I can’t take you on a tour of a particle accelerator or MRI lab without risking bodily injury, what kind of future could we have? (I am not a scientist, nor do I play one on TV).
I have a story, mostly NSFW told to me by a friend who spent a couple of decades touring with heavy metal bands. It involves a co-worker that had a couple of pounds of metal in his … junk. Whipped it out on a dare, dropped it to the table with a thunk, and shocked a whole strip club full of Thai hookers… I’m guessing it takes a lot to shock a Thai hooker.
Post 9-11 and with TSA ascendant, it would get to be a lot less fun to travel with that sort of ‘heavy metal’.
Heck, one of my co-workers is still carrying around some bits of metal from his time in Her Majesty’s service, and he’d get hassled at TSA checkpoints all the time, usually resulting in him pulling off his shirt to show the scars… a lot harder to drop trou, and a lot less likely to end with sympathy and apologies.
n
gives you something to read
– the current trend for lines of text and quotes from who knows where is bound to have a very short half life, then it will look as classy as the “porn horns” or “tramp stamp” across the lower back. or barbed wire around a bicep… or chinese characters…
n
All a matter of personal taste, I suppose. I’m not a fan of tats at all, but small and tasteful can look ok on a woman. In the case at hand, the ones I dislike are the seemingly random selection on the arms. Why would you have a bandaid? A poorly done celtic cross? Piercings, much the same. Ear piercings are fine. Small nose studs on the side are ok. Nose piercings in the middle make me think of cattle. Lip piercings just look unpleasant.
Also, a minor observation about the quality of modern journalism: Am I the only one bothered by the fact that some of the photos are reversed? Sometimes a tat is on her left, sometimes on her right.
some of the photos are reversed
– I think that is because the source for the photo was a “selfie” which for some reason most phones reverse…
n
And with that, I’m off to bed.
Tomorrow’s post is long enough I could enter it at jwesleyrawles site for one of his contest articles… dunno if it is interesting or ‘good’ enough, but y’all get it for FREE!!!!!! and I get to bask in the egoboo. Someone might even comment about the post. ;-P
n