Wed. Jan. 10, 2024 – what do people who don’t read books do when they don’t want to sleep?

By on January 10th, 2024 in culture, decline and fall, march to war

Cold and windy again. The wind never stopped blowing yesterday. Chilly and windy. At least the sun helped. Today should be the same, jackets and long pants, maybe even hats during the day. But no rain.

Did some auction stuff, but mainly had some gastric distress most of the day. Dunno what I ate, but I wish I hadn’t. Stayed close to home all day. Then did kid school run stuff in the afternoon. Not much actually accomplished. I did break down 10 pounds of pork loin for the freezer. Sliced some chops out of it, and made thin, breaded and pan fried pork chops for dinner. With pork being so cheap, I’m looking for new ways to cook it. I imagine I’m not the only one. Family liked it.

Speaking of cheap meat, I went back to get more of the cheap rib roasts, both pork and beef, but they were already gone. Missed that, much to my chagrin. Goes to show how important it is to get it while you can. I’ve got very little freezer space left here anyway, but I’d have found a way to fit more until I could transfer some to the BOL. I’m almost full up there, but I can use the freezer I had earmarked for the neighbor, and I’ve got an upright there I haven’t even plugged in. If the opportunity arose, I’d try to fill them too.

Today should be catching up what didn’t get done yesterday. Kid stuff in the afternoon, auction in the morning. Clean up and domestic bliss somewhere in there too.

It’s a great life if you don’t weaken, right?

Stay strong, and stack on!

n

67 Comments and discussion on "Wed. Jan. 10, 2024 – what do people who don’t read books do when they don’t want to sleep?"

  1. SteveF says:

    With pork being so cheap, I’m looking for new ways to cook it.

    Throw a pork shoulder into the crockpot and cook on Low for 10-12 hours. You may cut the skin and excess fat off before cooking; my mother-in-law wants the skin so I always cut it off. I don’t bother seasoning it at this point, though others say to rub salt and pepper in before tossing it in. When it’s cooked, pour off the liquid (not down the drain; it’s fatty), pull out the bone and then stir up the meat with tongs. You now have pulled pork, suitable for mixing in barbecue sauce, putting on sandwiches, or whatever.

    I usually stir in Eastern Carolinas Barbecue Sauce:

    • 1 c white vinegar
    • 1 c cider vinegar
    • 2 tsp salt
    • 1 Tbsp black pepper
    • 1 Tbsp white sugar
    • 1 Tbsp red pepper flakes (optional)

    Ideally, stir this all together before you start cooking the pork and let it sit in a covered glass jar, out of the sun. If you need to, though, just plop all of that on top of the pulled pork and stir it in. ECBS is tangy (duh, vinegar) but really good on the pork.

    Best served hot in fresh rolls.

  2. Greg Norton says:

    I haven’t mentioned what a revolving p.o.s. Win10 is since last year. 

    You are going to love Windows 11. Much more of the same with several Apple user interface items ripped off.

    Apple? No, Redmond is ripping off Fedora with Windows 11.

    If Microsoft is going to put Windows on top of a Linux kernel, they will need a Wayland Compositor and a replacement for Systemd. I’ll bet that they’ll go for something built on top of Fedora, cutting a deal with IBM.

    IBM/Redhat owns X and Wayland, and, IIRC, the Systemd guy now works for Microsoft.

    Fedora 40 will be a huge release this year, and will be the foundation of RHEL for a decade.

    I wouldn’t be surprised if Microsoft bought Steam as the stock eclipses Apple.

  3. Ray Thompson says:

    Every time it fails  to wake from sleep* I imagine the M.I.B. scene

    Some, maybe most of that, can be contributed to the MotherBoard and an issue with the BIOS. I have a fairly recent ASRock motherboard with an updated BIOS. I have never had a problem with the system waking up. My Surface laptop that at one time was running W10 never had a problem waking up with any keypress. I am now running W11 on both of those systems.

    The system my wife uses is a Dell machine that was purchased from Costco many years ago. I upgraded the disk drive to an SSD three years ago. The system is about eight years old, still running W10 as the system does not qualify for W11. In all those years the system has never failed to wake up with a keypress or mouse movement. She never powers off the system.

    Check the MB site and see if there is an update to the BIOS.

  4. Greg Norton says:

    I usually stir in Eastern Carolinas Barbecue Sauce:

    You can also use a taco seasoning packet of your choice.

    When we got desperate for a grocery store in a semi-touristy area a few weeks ago, we ended up at Natural Grocers. I noticed even that place had premixed seasoning packets, Frontera/Rick Bayless brand for the PBS/NPR demographic usually shopping that store.

    It makes sense. Lots of Taco Tuesday Boomer stucco sarcophagi around if the houses hadn’t been turned into AirBnB rentals.

    We went in for antiperspirant for my wife, and we got a lecture about how people are meant to sweat.

    Fortunately, Apple Maps revealed a WalMart hidden about a mile away.

  5. Denis says:

    Hope you’re feeling better today, Nick!

    In all those years the system has never failed to wake up with a keypress or mouse movement. She never powers off the system.

    I always turn off power management in the bios of my computers, whether laptop or desktop. I have been burnt too often in the past by machines that went to sleep and wouldn’t wake up, leaving work lost.

    In other news, I saw a hoopoe yesterday. In flight, it looks a bit like a woodpecker, but on the ground it is unmistakable.

    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hoopoe

    11
  6. Greg Norton says:

    The system my wife uses is a Dell machine that was purchased from Costco many years ago. I upgraded the disk drive to an SSD three years ago. The system is about eight years old, still running W10 as the system does not qualify for W11. In all those years the system has never failed to wake up with a keypress or mouse movement. She never powers off the system.

    The Dell laptop which I use as a “road” machine occasionally has problems waking from sleep running Linux. I guess I could put a bunch of time into researching a real solution, but that would take time away from the fun of problems like figuring out printing or SMB sharing from my server.

    Unix/Linux is a guru full employment act.

    The laptop sees continuous use maybe two weeks a year. I need more vacation time.

  7. Ray Thompson says:

    In all those years the system has never failed to wake up with a keypress or mouse movement

    Wish I could say the same about my spousal unit.

  8. JimB says:

    Sleep, or suspend to RAM, and Hibernate, or suspend to disk, is always a motherboard or BIOS and power management issue, in my experience. In my years of Linux experience, with several computers and a dozen distros, I could get one or neither to work, but never both. Windows is better, but not perfect, except on my wife’s Dell notebook, which came preloaded with a clean OEM version of W10. That one works perfectly.

    My older HP Z400, which was refurbished and came with an OEM version of W7, then upgraded to W10, also works OK, but has the nasty habit of waking up on network traffic. I looked into it, but there are so many potential causes I decided to ignore it. Power management on desktop BIOSes is never perfect, in my experience.

    I have only had one Linux computer fail to resume from sleep, and it was random. That corrupted open files, but recovery was easy.

    I have also had Linux wake from sleep on network traffic, but worse was not waking when I wanted to access it on the LAN. Obviously, power management is still a work in progress. So is SAMBA on Linux.

    Overall, Windows has always been dependable for me.

  9. lpdbw says:

    re: small hardware and parts

    I eat bulgarian yogurt, which comes in a clear quart glass jar.  I’ve started running them through the dishwasher and I’m filling them up with my collection of nails, screws, and other small parts.   Pickles and mayo and other stuff would work, too.  It’s the clear glass that lets you immediately see the contents.

    I got a few of these parts sorter trays, cheap, at the Rockler store.   Cheap and Rockler are not words you see together very often.  You can dump a quart of mixed screws and nuts into it, sort them out to get what you want, and then use the funnel edge to dump the rest back into the jar.  Easy peasy.

    If you are inclined to do fine sorting into separate jars, you can use the tray to help you do that, although at this point I think it’s not necessary.    Good enough is good enough.   If I were in production rather than a hobbyist, that might be a good thing to do.

  10. JimB says:

    That Rockler sorter looks good. I have been using a piece of corrugated board with a crease in the middle for decades, and it hasn’t worn out yet. I dump the contents of a small drawer or container onto it, pick through to find what I need, and carefully pick it up and fold on the crease to about 90 degrees to pour back to the drawer. Works well, and cost me nothing. It also stores flat near the side of a set of drawers.

  11. JimB says:

    Rick, condolences for your brother. We never know when we will have to leave this earth. I hope all of us are pleasantly surprised with the result.

    Also sorry for your power chair carrier. I don’t see many of those on the road, but do see some bicycle and cargo carriers around here. Most of them look flimsy, and rock in the wind. These also put a lot of cantilevered stress on the hitch receiver. I hope you get a better one. Check the fasteners that hold the hitch to the car frequently. I use Loctite on everything critical. Vibration and metal fatigue are always an issue.

  12. Greg Norton says:

    Did something happen to Joe Montana or Cybil Shepherd?

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oEi85XTqzoE

    49ers in the playoffs?

    Yucs fans dread the playoffs coming down to 49ers vs. Yucs given the long history of both teams with Tampa and current San Francisco GM John Lynch being part of the Yucs defense that came within one blown penalty call of ending “The American Underdog” story before it began.

    Of course, that doesn’t make the movie.

  13. JimB says:

    @jimB, thanks for the battery info.   Haven’t heard from Dadcooks in a long time, despite pings. IIRC he spent time underwater with batteries in the Navy, so used to contribute on the subject.  If anyone knows the ins and outs of lead acid batteries, I’d imagine the US Navy sub service does…   FWIW I’ve got most of my standby power batteries on a NOCO Genius battery charger/conditioner/maintainer…  Time to check on them and rotate stuff around.

    I miss DadCooks, and many of the other folks missing from here.

    I have seen reviews of the NOCO line, but haven’t tried any. Same for CTEK. Both make impressive claims. I have a cheapie that looks like one of the CTEKs, but have had trouble with the fan. I have to oil the sleeve bearings occasionally.

    Keeping a lead acid battery in storage from becoming sulfated can be done with any of these smart chargers. Just make sure they are temperature compensated. I used to think that occasional (every 6 months?) high rate discharge helped, but not any more with these chargers. Still, lead acid batteries do have a calendar life limit. Only the old telephone batteries could last forever – with occasional rebuilding, which resulted in a new battery. Kinda like George Washington’s axe. Oh, this is for true deep cycle batteries. SLI (Starting Lighting Ignition) batteries will not last much beyond 20 years, no matter what is done to extend their life. They are not simple lead and acid systems, and they do deteriorate.

  14. Ray Thompson says:

    no matter what is done to extend their life. They are not simple lead and acid systems, and they do deteriorate.

    Sort of like my body recently.

  15. Nick Flandrey says:

    I was up late last night and then early this morning to get the folks out of the house, afterwhich I could crash in my chair at the desk – or in bed.    Given my current neck pain and misalignment issues, I took the “bed” choice and added 2 hours to my sleep total for the night.   Total of 5 now which will suffice.  For a while.

    It was 36F at 7am, and frost was on the roofs and grass.   Naturally the bus was 6 minutes late, with D2 shivering.   Had to be mechanical issues.  The bus was the old ‘backup’ bus, which is a rattletrap.   We’ve had the same bus driver since day one this year, and he’s been within a minute of ‘on time’ almost every day.   Dunno what it takes to get the right guy in the seat, but I hope he’s getting enough of it.   Last year we had new drivers every couple of weeks.

    It’s warmed up a bit, still windy, although the sun is nice.

    ———–

    The Roku search and indexing issues was apparently at least partly my fault.  It finally completed this morning.   And found no compatible video files in the folder.    Reading online, it must have tried to determine file type by opening EVERY SINGLE FILE and running whatever it runs to make the determination.  Since it was running against my “all music” folder, that is 10s of thousands of files.  Oy vey.

    For the record, if you set search to “video” and select the “videos” folder, with about 900 items, the index only takes a minute or two, three at most.

    And if you choose “audio” and select the correct folder, then it takes a few minutes to open the folder, sorted by name.   

    It sure would have been nice to have it scan for file extensions, and if finding none, offer a more detailed scan.   That would have caught my mismatch very quickly.

    I still can’t open the folder “all media” because of the way it’s searching for stuff to display. 

    —————-

    FWIW, instant coffee has improved to the point I can’t really tell the difference after cream and sweetener.   I have a vietnamese brand of decaf I got a case of in an auction, and it is great for the mornings I would like a second cup.   Lassacoffee? The logo is graphical, and I can’t resolve what the letters are actually supposed to be.

    I put the single cup pouches of starbucks coffee in with my Mountain House, and I’ve got regular and decaf on the shelf too.

    WWII was fought on coffee and cigs.

    n

  16. Nick Flandrey says:

    One giant step BACKWARDS: NASA delays its eagerly anticipated return to the moon due to ‘safety concerns’ – with the crew now not landing on the lunar surface until 2026 

     

    Artemis II was expected to be the biggest space mission of 2024 – but it’s been delayed until September next year. Artemis III, meanwhile, won’t happen until 2026.

    n

  17. Greg Norton says:

    The Roku search and indexing issues was apparently at least partly my fault.  It finally completed this morning.   And found no compatible video files in the folder.    Reading online, it must have tried to determine file type by opening EVERY SINGLE FILE and running whatever it runs to make the determination.  Since it was running against my “all music” folder, that is 10s of thousands of files.  Oy vey.

    Across WiFi, yes, that would be slow even if you had a folder of legitimate media files on the other end of the connection.

  18. Greg Norton says:

    Artemis II was expected to be the biggest space mission of 2024 – but it’s been delayed until September next year. Artemis III, meanwhile, won’t happen until 2026.

    I’ve never believed SLS would launch more than once.

    The Real Live Tony Stark has to deliver the landing vehicle Starship by 2026. We’ll see if that happens. He has to get a Starship into low Earth orbit first. Maybe a couple.

  19. Greg Norton says:

    The other NFL playoff news which caught my eye was how quickly Houston purged the stink of Lovie’s failure from the building.

    The Yucs needed much more time, but Lovie followed the “Rah” Morris failure.

    Plus, Lovie took Jimbo’s word that it would work in Tampa after the Yucs’ owners took Tony Dungy’s word that Lovie would work.

    The crazy thing is that NFL beat reporters believe both Lovie and “Rah” will get another shot at a head coach job in the NFL.

  20. Rick H says:

    The crazy thing is that NFL beat reporters believe both Lovie and “Rah” will get another shot at a head coach job in the NFL.

    Well, there is now an opening for a head coach in Seattle….

  21. Greg Norton says:

    The crazy thing is that NFL beat reporters believe both Lovie and “Rah” will get another shot at a head coach job in the NFL.

    Well, there is now an opening for a head coach in Seattle….

    The trustees are dragging their feet selling that team. No one decent will want that job right now because a new owner will clean house in the coaching staff.

  22. Lynn says:

    Speaking of cheap meat, I went back to get more of the cheap rib roasts, both pork and beef, but they were already gone. Missed that, much to my chagrin. Goes to show how important it is to get it while you can. I’ve got very little freezer space left here anyway, but I’d have found a way to fit more until I could transfer some to the BOL. I’m almost full up there, but I can use the freezer I had earmarked for the neighbor, and I’ve got an upright there I haven’t even plugged in. If the opportunity arose, I’d try to fill them too.

    I thought that we had agreed to buy stuff when we saw it rather than going back and expecting it to still be there ?

    My wife and I are having disagreements on this very matter.  She wants to buy one of anything that we need whereas I go in and buy five of whatever it is.  Then she tells we that we cannot store the extras so I go put them in my closet.  

    Of course, I bought 50 of the Avon Vita Moist hand creams two or three years ago and gave her the box with 40 and I threw 10 in my night stand.  I am now almost out so I went looking for the box and it is gone.  She caught me stealing one of the last few she had and made me give them back.  If Avon ever stocks them again, I will buy 100 this time. Maybe 200.

    https://poshmark.com/listing/Avon-Vita-Moist-hand-cream-15-oz-brand-new-638cfdd117fb4bf660d96727

  23. Lynn says:

    I usually stir in Eastern Carolinas Barbecue Sauce:

    • 1 c white vinegar
    • 1 c cider vinegar
    • 2 tsp salt
    • 1 Tbsp black pepper
    • 1 Tbsp white sugar
    • 1 Tbsp red pepper flakes (optional)

    Where is the Louisiana Hot Sauce ?

       https://www.heb.com/product-detail/louisiana-the-original-hot-sauce-6-oz/33384

  24. Lynn says:

    Apple? No, Redmond is ripping off Fedora with Windows 11.

    If Microsoft is going to put Windows on top of a Linux kernel, they will need a Wayland Compositor and a replacement for Systemd. I’ll bet that they’ll go for something built on top of Fedora, cutting a deal with IBM.

    IBM/Redhat owns X and Wayland, and, IIRC, the Systemd guy now works for Microsoft.

    Fedora 40 will be a huge release this year, and will be the foundation of RHEL for a decade.

    I wouldn’t be surprised if Microsoft bought Steam as the stock eclipses Apple.

    I first saw that user interface style on DecWindows on a personal Microvax back in 1989.  Of course, they ripped it off from Xerox who was running it back in 1984 or something like that.

  25. Lynn says:

    “Astronomers witness star eat its own planet. Earth may share same fate.”

        https://www.chron.com/news/space/article/astronomers-planet-eating-star-18081886.php

    “In five billion years, the Sun will likely devour Earth as it runs out of fuel and balloons outward. ”

    You know, I have thinking about good old Sol lately.  I am totally amazed that God fueled it for ten+ billion years.  That is not trivial and shows that there was some serious long term thinking going on.

    Of course, Sol runs at a system efficiency of 1.5% since it does not have pumps or compressors and uses natural circulation.  Once you get it started everything is cool but that initial start is a real beast to get going.

  26. Lynn says:

    “Astros-Rangers rivalry highlights early Sunday Night Baseball schedule”

        https://www.chron.com/sports/astros/article/astros-rangers-sunday-night-baseball-18600223.php

    “ESPN announced several games from its 2023 slate on Wednesday.”

    ESPN still has a big checkbook.  Does not look like Disney is going to spin them off anytime soon.

  27. Alan says:

    >> One giant step BACKWARDS: NASA delays its eagerly anticipated return to the moon due to ‘safety concerns’ – with the crew now not landing on the lunar surface until 2026 

    Gotta double check the torque on a lot of bolts…

  28. Lynn says:

    Gotta double check the torque on a lot of bolts…

    The big problem is radiation hardened cpus.  You don’t buy those off the shelf and they are backordered over a year with nothing showing up.  The price starts at a quarter million dollars each.  The reject ratio after hardening will make you sick, I am hearing 99+%.

  29. Lynn says:

    Of course, Sol runs at a system efficiency of 1.5% since it does not have pumps or compressors and uses natural circulation.  Once you get it started everything is cool but that initial start is a real beast to get going.

    I have been reading up on Thermal Lances lately.  Not easy to get started but when you do, look out !  A cutting torch that runs at up to 8,000 F (4,400 C) and can cut up to 18 inches thickness of steel.

  30. paul says:
    • 1 Tbsp red pepper flakes (optional)

    Where is the Louisiana Hot Sauce ?

    I buy the Hill Country Fare version.   As for pepper flakes, cayenne powder works as well.

  31. Greg Norton says:

    I first saw that user interface style on DecWindows on a personal Microvax back in 1989.  Of course, they ripped it off from Xerox who was running it back in 1984 or something like that.

    Alto? Late 70s.

    Xerox was not interested in being IBM.

  32. Greg Norton says:

    ESPN still has a big checkbook.  Does not look like Disney is going to spin them off anytime soon.

    ~ $15 of every cable TV bill.

    I believe Sling also assesses a fee from every subscriber.

    Divesting ESPN would be a legal and financial nightmare for The Mouse. Separating ABC would be easier.

  33. paul says:

    I get some push back when shopping.  “We don’t need six pounds of butter” for example.  Yet, when the house runs out of butter I wander out to the spare fridge in the EDC to tote a pound back to the house and I’m a hero.  Or something.

    I ordered some stuff on Big River today and I know I’ll be scolded. 

    https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00NGJSCMK?tag=ttgnet-20

    Kraft Mac and Cheese.  35 boxes for $24.  69¢ a box.   It’s $1.11 at the store and $1.12 at Wal-Mart.  HEB’s store brand, not the Economax, is 68¢ a box.  

    I’m going to semi-vac seal aka “not crush the boxes flat” in packs of 5 or 6, depends on what size bag I use, and drop into the freezer for a week or so to make sure any weevils are dead.

    Then there is toothpaste.  Colgate “new and improved” a few years ago and it makes me gag.  Maybe whitening your teeth involves stomach acid.  Who knows but I’m not a fan.  I switched to Pepsodent.  HEB stopped selling it. Wal-Mart stopped last year.

    https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00HX2PJ90?tag=ttgnet-20

    Ok, $1.75 not 98¢ a tube.  It keeps.  I’ll find space. 

  34. Greg Norton says:

    So is the plan Gavin/Hillary or Hillary/Gavin? 

    Gavin’s money people funded Robert Francis and both of “Doors” runs to learn how to work the vote in Texas.

    “Doors” had serious money behind her. Both the quality and the air time devoted to this ad were off the charts.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zi6v4CYNSIQ

    My wife says something is wrong with her eyes.

    I don’t think they live in that house, but it works to rip off “Goodfellas” opening. I think we looked at buying that place when we first moved here.

    Vets went for her in a big way, of course. That was the idea.

    And girls stick together. Both running for Congress and Senate, Hegar’s ads implied that the opponent was like her abusive father *who was out of her life around the time she turned two*.

  35. paul says:

    I believe Sling also assesses a fee from every subscriber.

    Not sure.  ESPN and ESPN 2 and 3 are included in Orange.  Blue adds FS1.  Sports Extra is $15 a month and adds FS2 and the all so very very important Longhorn Network.

    Orange and Blue are $40 each or get both for $55.  Plenty of overlap between the two.  Sports Extra is $15 extra.   It’s all $70 a month plus tax.  $75 and change.  

    DirecTv was up to $143 when we dropped them in 2017.  The way they were ratcheting the price, I’d guess about $170 if not more a month now.  And true story!  After getting rid of DirecTv and that always on and noisy DVR tuner box, my electric bill dropped $10 a month.  It never spun the disc down…. 

    Meh.  I just pay the bill, I don’t watch any of it.   I don’t have the patience to get through the commercials pushing all of the drugs anymore. 

    I’m good with the news on 36 once in a while.  Austin is almost totally insane now but the weather forecast is good.   Wheel of Fortune for sure.  And then it’s whatever which lately seems to be Mayberry and Green Acres.  I’m cool, I walk the dogs after supper and we go to bed.  Me and the dogs that is.

  36. Greg Norton says:

    DirecTv was up to $143 when we dropped them in 2017.  The way they were ratcheting the price, I’d guess about $170 if not more a month now.  And true story!  After getting rid of DirecTv and that always on and noisy DVR tuner box, my electric bill dropped $10 a month.  It never spun the disc down…. 

    The Death Star buying DirecTV was all about the programming licenses and, after Uverse failed, the set top box technology. The execs don’t really care about providing the satellite service or doing much to improve the quality, especially once Texas sold its soul for fiber.

  37. paul says:

    I’d like to have fiber.  Just because of Weather.  Ain’t gonna happen.  I’m four miles by road from the Post Office and HEB.  Yes, the first mile from the house is a gravel/dirt road to the pavement.  I’m two miles from the airport as the crow flies.

    Anyway, HyperFusion is doing a very good job with their wi-fi stuff.   Usually around 80/80 because of interference and the time of day. 

  38. Lynn says:

    DirecTv was up to $143 when we dropped them in 2017.  The way they were ratcheting the price, I’d guess about $170 if not more a month now.  And true story!  After getting rid of DirecTv and that always on and noisy DVR tuner box, my electric bill dropped $10 a month.  It never spun the disc down…. 

    The DirecTV DVR is always recording what is on the tuners to the 90 ? minute buffer on the disk drive.  That recording is happening 24x7x365 so the disk drive cannot be shut down.

  39. Bob Sprowl says:

    My local Electric Co-op installed fiber in my neighborhood last Spring.  Now I have fiber to the house and shop at 500MB with Wi-Fi covering the whole yard for $89 a month.  I bought a year of YouTube for $400 up front and Peacock for $5  month.  Rock solid service.

    I wonder what I have to add to get March Madness.

  40. Lynn says:

    Divesting ESPN would be a legal and financial nightmare for The Mouse. Separating ABC would be easier.

    Yup.

    But my point is that The Mouse is still spending big bucks on content for ESPN.  I would think if The Mouse was having cash flow problems that it would cancel all new content.

  41. Lynn says:

    “20 CEOs of avionics companies were all on a plane, just before taxiing away from the terminal. The purser came down the aisle, and whispered to each CEO that their company’s avionics are controlling the plane. 19 out of 20 CEOs got off the plane immediately, while the 20th stayed in place.”

    “The purser said that he/she/it must be very confident in the company’s avionics, to which the answer was “with the programmers we employ, the plane won’t even take off!””

    Stolen from:

       https://www.codeproject.com/Lounge.aspx?msg=5981494#xx5981494xx

  42. Lynn says:

    “Intel’s CPU branding was already confusing, and today’s new CPUs made it worse”

        https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2024/01/intel-freshens-up-its-old-laptop-and-desktop-cpus-with-speed-bumps-new-names/

    “Some are 14th-gen Core and some are Core (Series 1), but they’re the same thing.”

    I’ve been confused with Intel’s CPU branding for over a decade now.

  43. Greg Norton says:

    But my point is that The Mouse is still spending big bucks on content for ESPN.  I would think if The Mouse was having cash flow problems that it would cancel all new content.

    The TV contracts have to be honored. The Mouse increases cash flow on the front end by extorting the cable companies for more money like they did with Charter on the opening weekend of the college football season.

  44. Bob Sprowl says:

    I just bumped into a very interesting article about statistical modeling – very thought provoking…

    https://statmodeling.stat.columbia.edu/2009/05/24/handy_statistic/

  45. Greg Norton says:

    “The purser said that he/she/it must be very confident in the company’s avionics, to which the answer was “with the programmers we employ, the plane won’t even take off!””

    But they are a very diverse group. And they dress well, especially the elementary music major who may have flunked out of CS in her freshman year but flunked out of CS at Baylor.

    Her resume listed her degree as “Interdisciplinary Studies”.

  46. paul says:

    The Death Star or as we call it, The Borg, bought a lot of stuff a phone company has NO  business buying.

    Why, I’m so thrilled the Borg spun off Warner/Discovery and that  dropped the quarterly check by half.  Got a $15 check from Warner/Discovery as a something, a fractional share payment? and nothing from there since.  So I assume I still have as many shares of SWB now known at AT&T stock but the value was cut in half.  I’m sure that shit went over super duper well with the Old Widow Woman group.

    I suspect the same to happen again when DirecTv is jettisoned. 

    Oh, hey, it’s like buying stock via payroll deduction while working at CircleK.  !!!!  I had about a grand of stock,. never got a dividend check,  and there was some sort of reverse thing divide shares by ten and then some other thing and Whee!!! My stock was worth $4.80.  Thieves. 

  47. Greg Norton says:

    I suspect the same to happen again when DirecTv is jettisoned. 

    DirecTV isn’t going anywhere. The long standing rumor going back to my exit was that The Death Star would unload California on Frontier along with the DSL Uverse tech if things got tight.

    Management broke the union in 2009. I don’t think even the execs expected that the plan would work, but Steve Jobs was highly motivated to help in order to make sure that the iPhone 3GS was released on time and without any drama in order to keep revenue flowing from poorly-written third party software in the App Store.

    Frontier went bankrupt, but that wasn’t a surprise.

    California, legacy PacBel, would have been a pain in the a** in a strike.

  48. Lynn says:

    “Avoiding the next inflation may now require a Zombie Apocalypse”

        https://www.sovereignman.com/trends/avoiding-the-next-inflation-may-now-require-a-zombie-apocalypse-148624/

    “Earlier this week, leaders from both major parties in the Land of the Free announced a grand bargain that, in theory, should avoid a government shutdown later this month.”

    “According to their agreement, Congress will supposedly cap its ‘discretionary’ spending at $1.6 trillion for Fiscal Year 2024. That’s down from about $1.7 trillion in FY23.”

    “So, yes, technically this $100 billion reduction represents about a 6% decrease over last year. And if we want to be even more cheerful about it, we could call it a 9% decrease on an inflation-adjusted basis.”

    I feel the same about a Zombie Apocalypse as I do about MAD, Mutual Assured Destruction.  Both are ELEs, extinction level events.  Inflation does not rank anywhere close to these two events.

    But when true inflation is 100% per year, and the Social Security COLA is 3%, things are gonna get spicy.

  49. Lynn says:

    Next Monday’s low temperature forecast is now 19 F.  Here we go !

         https://www.wunderground.com/forecast/us/tx/richmond?cm_ven=localwx_10day

    North Texas is looking at 9 F with all temperatures below freezing on Monday and Tuesday. We used to get the puckered back end on those days since the electricity usage doubled and stayed constant over the entire day.
    https://www.wunderground.com/forecast/us/tx/carrollton/33.02,-96.88

  50. Greg Norton says:

    Next Monday’s low temperature forecast is now 19 F.  Here we go !

    Austin is supposed to be 34/21 on Monday, but Wednesday’s high should be 58.

    It isn’t a rerun of Feb 2021 … yet.

    Regardless, everyone working in various levels of government in Austin will leave work tomorrow after lunch and try to stay gone until Tuesday. That is, if they headed back to work after the New Year.

    Swimming naked. State government “leadership” is proabably safe, but an ugly event would mean that Rafael Edward would have a tough reelection fight as Abbott and Paxton threw him under the bus.

  51. Greg Norton says:

    North Texas is looking at 9 F with all temperatures below freezing on Monday and Tuesday. We used to get the puckered back end on those days since the electricity usage doubled and stayed constant over the entire day.

    The windmills will save us.

    Does everyone in Texas have their water shutoff wrench and know where to use it out by the curb?

  52. Lynn says:

    Does everyone in Texas have their water shutoff wrench and know where to use it out by the curb?

    We don’t have a curb on our roads.  No shoulders and deep ditches.

  53. Ken Mitchell says:

    Does everyone in Texas have their water shutoff wrench and know where to use it out by the curb?

    No, but I’ve got a heat lamp in the pumphouse, and extra insulation around the well pump piping. Nothing froze in 2021, and I don’t think anything will this time, either. And I agree with Lynn; no curbs here.

    But I have brought any cold-sensitive plants either into the pumphouse or into the garage.

  54. EdH says:

    Does everyone in Texas have their backup generators and portable propane/kerosene heaters ready to go? 

    RVs & outbuildings have their fluids drained?

    Electric heat won’t do any good if you are depending on the grid and it goes down.

  55. drwilliams says:

    @brad

    re: plagiarism charges against Neri Oxman:

    I have not tried to follow any online discussions, as I am not familiar with the forums and have no knowledge of the veracity of anyone posting. 

    Ackman has been busy:

    Our lawyers used the Wayback Machine to check MIT’s plagiarism policy back when Neri wrote her thesis in 2009. 

    It turns out that MIT’s academic integrity handbook did not require citation or even mention Wikipedia until 2013, four years after Neri wrote her dissertation and used Wikipedia for the definitions of 15 words and/or terms.

    To be clear, Neri did not use Wikipedia as a source, but only for the definitions of 15 words and/or terms for her dissertation. 

    While there was no way for us to do this research in the 91 minutes we were given before Business Insider published its story, our lawyers found it in about 24 hours. 

    This finding wipes away 15, or more than half of the plagiarism claims made by Business Insider at 5:19pm last Friday night. 

    https://townhall.com/tipsheet/mattvespa/2024/01/10/it-looks-like-the-liberal-medias-sad-plagiarism-attack-on-bill-ackmans-wife-blew-up-in-their-faces-n2633400

    Giving someone a few minutes to respond before an article is published is a pretty strong indicator of bad faith. Playing fast and loose with a plagiarism charge that does not meet the definition in force for half the examples cited is pretty good proof. 

    Axel Springer’s [parent company of business insider] review has dismayed BI staffers, from senior editors to rank-and-file journalists, who think the parent company shouldn’t have gotten involved, say people familiar with the situation. 

    Not surprising that would-be journos acting as an ideological hit squad would be sensitive about having their work checking another party’s work itself checked. How dare they!

    I note for completeness that taking 15 of 30 charges off the table still leaves 15, so I’ll wait to see what happens there. 

    Also note that Axel Springer (est 1946 by the journalist of the same name) is not related to Springer (aka Springer Science) (est 1842) the academic publisher that uses the horse colophon.

  56. drwilliams says:

    Fetterman Unplugged: He’s Based Now and He’s Talking

    “[Menendez] accused his colleagues, I guess that would include yourself, who called on him to resign or to leave Congress, of acting politically. What do you say to his accusation?” another reporter chimed in to ask the Pennsylvania Democrat.

    “No, I think it’s my aversion to gold bars in your mattress and over half a million dollars stuffed around your house,” Fetterman replied.

    https://hotair.com/karen-townsend/2024/01/10/fetterman-unplugged-hes-based-now-and-hes-talking-n604109

    Fetterman would make a better VP than Haley. Trump should talk to him just to drive the left bonkers, and see what the resulting Inquirer poll on such a ticket does to PA’s electoral votes.

  57. Ken Mitchell says:

    The man currently posing as Festerman is an impostor; his face and earlobes are different, but Fetterman’s most distinctive feature was his Ferengi-style forehead ridges, which this impostor lacks. Of course, the impostor is also making sense when he speaks, which Fetterman never did. 

    So perhaps a Trump/Festerman ticket would make a certain amount of sense. 

    5
    2
  58. Greg Norton says:

    Well, sooprise!

    It isn’t really to anyone who watched my alma matter come within 30 seconds and a blown call of holding Alabama to 10 points in September. Better to go out now than end up like Bobby Bowden.

    Plus, the extracurricular activities of the players were starting to be too much to cover up.

    https://www.nbcnews.com/news/sports/alabama-football-nick-saban-retire-crimson-tide-rcna133361

    Oh, Christmas Tree
    Oh, Christmas Tree
    The thrill is gone
    In the SEC

  59. Greg Norton says:

    Fetterman would make a better VP than Haley. Trump should talk to him just to drive the left bonkers, and see what the resulting Inquirer poll on such a ticket does to PA’s electoral votes.

    Incitatus? Really?

    He’s just another pol with Daddy issues whom the Dems have allowed to wander off the reservation.

  60. nick flandrey says:

    D2 is re-watching Blues Brothers while working a puzzle…

    And singing along.

    n

  61. Alan says:

    >>  “According to their agreement, Congress will supposedly cap its ‘discretionary’ spending at $1.6 trillion for Fiscal Year 2024. That’s down from about $1.7 trillion in FY23.”

    IIRC the ‘agreement’ doesn’t (yet) include any money for Ukraine nor Israel.

    Pass the popcorn… 

  62. drwilliams says:

    “Fetterman’s most distinctive feature was his Ferengi-style forehead ridges, which this impostor lacks”

    Botox.

    “The man currently posing as Festerman is an impostor; his face and earlobes are different”

    Lobe job?

    Seriously, Fetterman is 6’9″. Say you use lifts to get 3″ (2″ is more practical). The candidate pool for an imposter minimum 6’6″ in height is 0.1%, or 1 in 1,000, before screening to be able to correct for facial recognition.

    I can believe a body double for FJB. The stakes are a lot higher, and the words are consistent.

    For JF, I don’t see the motivation. And the risk is huge: getting found out invalidates the imposter’s votes in the Senate, throws government into chaos and probably brings down the Democrat Party with all the co-conspirators in jail.

  63. drwilliams says:

    “Really?”

    How abysmally stupid does a pol from SC have to be to not have an answer to the Civil War question, then toodle off to NH and strut for the camera calling Iowa caucus voters stupid?

  64. Lynn says:

    I just rewatched the original Jurassic Park on Netflix.  Great movie, it still holds up even though it is 31 years old.  Scared the you know what out of me, I had to do a lot of forwarding.  Highly recommended.

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  65. Nick Flandrey says:

    Past my bedtime I’m afraid, and listing the deficiencies of political candidates would keep me up for days…

    n

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