Because it’s gonna be hot and humid unless it’s actually storming. And then I won’t care because I’ll be inside anyway. Supposed to be a hurry-cane headed this way. I’m not feeling the urgency for some reason.
I really do hope it’s a ball of nothing but some heavy rain. We’ll muddle through in any case.
Yesterday was mostly getting stuff buttoned up at the BOL and heading home. Didn’t do a lot of storm prep here because it was raining when I got here. Since then it cleared and hadn’t rained any more when I wrote this at 1am.
Since I’m completely unprepared, I hope it’s nothing. In case it’s not, I guess we’ll fall back on the preps from the last 15 years…
Y’all be safe out there, as it’s sure to suck for someone.
Mean while, think about the hazards local to you and stack accordingly.
nick
Don’t forget “Blackadder’s Christmas Carol” and “Blackadder Back & Forth”, widely considered to be the series end … at least for now.
The “Christmas Carol” one off is where Richard Curtis created Hagrid, about 10 years before Harry Potter. The similarities go way beyond Robbie Coltrane in the role, as you will discover.
A fifth season has been teased repeatedly for the last 20 years featuring Blackadder as the rockstar bastard secret child of Queen Elizabeth II.
Like many other revivals, however, if it was going to happen, the time was 15 years ago IMHO, before everyone got too old … and the Queen became decrepit and died.
And if you’re going down the Rowan Atkison/Richard Curtis rabbit hole, “The Tall Guy” with Jeff Goldblum should be in the list. That one may not be appropriate for the kids, however, since the flick has a lot of “adult situations”, including Emma Thompson’s first and only topless scene.
Topless Emma Thompson isn’t nearly as hot as the actress in the NHS uniform her character wears.
Or Thompson wearing the wedding dress in “Dead Again” … but I digress.
“The Tall Guy” was Thompson’s first film after a few small TV appearances, starting with “The Young Ones”, and Blackadder collaborator Richard Curtis wrote the screen play prior to “Four Weddings and a Funeral”.
Yeah, “The Young Ones” should be on the list also.
“Dead Again” is a very interesting watch now since the LA of that film’s contemporary sequences is as far in the past now as the 40s LA in the flash back sequences was from the late 80s, when the film was first conceived by Sir Kenneth.
The contemporary sequences try to be timeless, but it is hard to avoid Emma Thompson’s “mom jeans” in the “rain” scene.
Of course Thompson looks hot in the jeans, but, again, I digress.
There is a sleep you can sleep like no other. You stayed up too late, finally went to bed. The bedroom is cool, as cool as you can get it. There’s rain, blowing against the windows and pelting the roof, making sounds that keep you lulled in the arms of Morpheus. You dream deep, deep dreams, and, at some level, you realize just how deeply and restfully you are sleeping.
This is when the GD NWS decided I needed to know there was a flooding alert on my phone.
I’m up to do a quick check of the house for leaks, and going back to sleep. I hope.
The polyp that was removed on Tuesday was pre-cancerous. Dr. says he got it all. I need to go back for another colonoscopy in three years instead of five. Not exactly the news I wanted to hear.
Did they talk to you about the genetic test to determine whether you would want to consider proactive removal of the colon?
I gotta wonder if that is something the insurance companies are pushing as an alternative to spending $13k+ every few years.
I passed on getting the testing, but YMMV.
I had a colonoscopy a couple of year ago during which the GI removed a golf ball sized pre-cancerous polyp that required a followup scope within a year. The followup was clear so I was then instructed to follow up in about three years and got the pitch about the test.
My GP suggested that the test was up to me, but he didn’t provide any clear answer about whether it is a good idea so I decided not to proceed.
No, and if they did, I would pass on such a procedure. I am at the point in my life where if I got cancer, I would seriously consider not having any chemotherapy. A lot would depend on the severity, prognosis for additional years, etc. Let the disease take its course, kill me, and move on, if the treatment was only going to get me 5 years. Prostate cancer is easily treatable. If I had kidney, pancreatic, or liver cancer just put a fork in me because I am done.
Just north of Houston…generator has been running for the last three hours. We are getting a lot of rain and high gusts of wind.
It’s good to be prepared.
A caution: stacks can be a hazard, if you live in black widow territory (desert). Take precautions!
I have a ton of pellets (50x @ 40# each) arriving today, so I rose up before dawn (I do anyways) and shifted the last 20 bags off the old pellet pallet and draged it out to the backyard. Completely infested with black widows.
I need to clean and bug bomb that garage.
Where is all the “free time” I was promised when I retired?
Yup, that’s what I get for marrying the CEO. “Just when I though I was out….” I’m training D5 to pick up all of my regular duties (with a nice pay bump for her).
Oof. 116F in Vegas yesterday. A blast furnace even in the shade. I’m here to help set everything up, then I’m reading and goofing off.
“Where is all the “free time” I was promised when I retired?”
Back in time before the 30% inflation , somewhere between the 28th and 31st trillion of our $36 trillion debt.
For Ray & Others
Several years ago I had my third colonoscopy. It was totally different and referred to as a Virtual Colonoscopy. It was far less discomforting with no liquid laxative to struggle with and no pain reducer needed.
https://www.google.com/search?q=Virtual+Colonoscopy.&rlz=1C1AVFC_enUS998US998&oq=Virtual+Colonoscopy.&gs_lcrp=EgZjaHJvbWUyBggAEEUYOTIICAEQABgWGB4yCAgCEAAYFhgeMggIAxAAGBYYHjIICAQQABgWGB4yCAgFEAAYFhgeMggIBhAAGBYYHjIICAcQABgWGB4yCAgIEAAYFhgeMggICRAAGBYYHtIBCjExMjA5ajBqMTWoAgiwAgE&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8
74 F and wind at 40 mph. No grid power since 4 am but the genny is running just fine. Plenty of natural gas. No cable internet. Verizon is down but Tmobile is up.
12 to 15 inches of rain so far. The back pond was up to the garage back door. The front pond is 5 ft deep and over the new driveway. We are one foot above the water.
I slept through it all and got up at 1030am. The daughter is asleep in her closet, she was very concerned about tornados.
Just checked MyRadar, and the eye is passing over Houston. My best wishes to all threatened by damaging weather.
You would still need the same procedure and cleanout if any polyps were encountered. The cleanout wasn’t too difficult. No food the day before or the day of until the procedure was over. No liquids, including water, from 5 hours before the procedure. The stuff they use now for anesthesia is really good.
Freeport, TX reported wind at 97 mph. Hobby airport at 84 mph. Bush Airport 83 mph.
https://spacecityweather.com/beryls-impressive-wind-and-rain-beginning-to-slowly-exit-the-houston-area-from-south-to-north/
I am so glad that I had my two 60+ foot tall oak trees severely trimmed last year. My buddy charged me $2,000 to do the work and well worth it. The cypress tree has several branches off it with one branch over 20 foot long.
@EdH, we have black widows here, and take the usual precautions. We also have giant desert hairy scorpions. They are not usually aggressive, and their sting is said to be similar to a bee sting, so not life threatening. However, I recently learned that we occasionally have Arizona bark scorpions. These are usually only an inch long, and can be aggressive. Their venom is not often life threatening, but does cause a lot of tissue necrosis. They are mostly encountered underground while digging, making them a very unpleasant surprise. A contractor friend showed me his scar, and described his several days of malaise.
Of course, we have snakes. Most are shy, beautiful, and fairly harmless, but the common rattlesnake can strike if provoked. The sidewinder can be aggressive, but its venom is treatable if medical help is less than four hours away. Finally we have the commonly named Mojave green rattlesnake. These are often aggressive, and their venom is very bad. Professional medical help is definitely needed. They are to be avoided.
You probably have all of the above, so caution is advised, especially if hiking alone in a remote area. Never a good idea.
Preemptive power shutoff?
So when I go outside, I get to hear the song of the generators. About 2/3rds of my neighbors have generators and they are all singing. Mostly the lawnmowers in the box, air cooled, so they are noisy. Mine is liquid cooled, quiet.
Preemptive power shutoff?
It automatically starts in about ten seconds with grid down. It will go into cool down mode and shut down after five minutes when the grid comes back up.
In San Antonio, we didn’t even get any clouds from Beryl. Hazy sunshine here now.
Insurance companies will vary on covering the virtual colonoscopy in lieu of the traditional procedure.
Most will only cover the virtual colonoscopy if you do not have a family history of colon cancer.
The same goes for Cologard, the “mail in” screening process.
I’m sure that wasn’t the UPS man’s idea.
>>Did they talk to you about the genetic test to determine whether you would want to consider proactive removal of the colon?
So this is different from the ColoGuard?
>>The stuff they use now for anesthesia is really good.
Said Mr Jackson.
I looked on someone’s PC at his Big River account. He /had/ $85 there. I put a few hundred in there a few years ago so he could just click to buy a book on his Kindle. He seems to have bought a lot of books.
The boxed sets of movies I’m watching through, well, I found six more sets. Is it a series or just “unified packaging”? No matter, they are on the way. About $148 with shipping and taxes. It works out to $2.46 per movie. I used up his Big River balance and some of his CC Rewards Point to pay the rest.
It was a puzzle to get the total price down. I’ve bought “used” DVDs that are new, just shopworn packaging. I started with a total of almost $185. Ok, swap out this used copy for a new copy. Swap this new copy for used. Just juggle it to get free shipping from Big River. I had the time to make it work.
Yeah. I’m weird. I’m saving up to be eccentric.
And I know why. I have had the stuff administered twice.
That indicates a future goal. I think you passed that. 🙂
Amazon has a lot of new MGM discs which they got stuck with after buying the studio just as streaming took off and, at least for now, crushed demand for physical media. Some of the deals being offered are quite good.
Nothing is wrong with the discs beyond Amazon not having the packaging to sell as “new”.
Oooh, I will steal that. 😉
@Lynn, I meant Preemptive grid shutoff.
Yeah I just wish the doctor hadn’t been leaning against the counter smoking a cig when I came to.
I got the recall notice on my truck for the sudden downshift. I called the Ford dealership where I bought the truck to have the recall applied. The fix is to install new firmware in the PCM to resolve an issue with the Onboard Speed Sensor (OSS).
They are sending a technician to my house to apply the recall. No trip to the dealership required. It is nothing more than flashing new firmware to the computer system and looking for DTCs (Diagnostic Trouble Codes) in the computer system. If any codes are present then some more work will be required and will require a trip to the dealership. I believe a rental vehicle is provided if the repair is longer than a day at the dealership.
If the doctor was female, you may have had a better time than I did.
I want the discs. Once I have the actual media in my grubby hands, I own it and all I need is a supply of hardware to play it. It can’t be “re-mastered” or made to disappear. For instance, WB Loony Toons. Bugs Bunny fighting Nips?
Same for books.
Yes, my wISP speed is (to me) smoking at 95 to 85 down and usually 40 to 60 up. I have a Roku.
I could pay and pay and pay every month to stream movies. But it is a pain the back side. I have to deal with the Roku menus to get to, for example, Sling, and then I have to figure out that menu system. I’m just not that interested.
It’s just easier to have the discs and use the blu-ray or LD player.
No internet connection needed.
Middle aged Indian man – but a hell of a nice guy.
All kidding aside he was – The colonoscopy was pretty easy and I was awake the whole time. Even got to watch the TV on the other side of me. So was my surgeon. Found one polyp that was deemed cancerous. It was 10 years ago last month I had a resection surgery. Week in the hospital and a month of easy recovery at home. Post op biopsy was completely clean so no chemo or radiation. Makes one wonder if the first diag biopsy was right. No luck in making me less of an ass as some had hoped.
4 years later another look. This time I was out because the assembly line had a backup and I was in preop 1.5 extra, so an extra dose of sleepy medicine.
Haven’t had another because I add full scans ordered by the urologist after prostate biopsy. Those aren’t too much fun as they use the backdoor, a probe with a ball on the end and a ‘grabber’ to cut samples.
Brave independent press awakes from enchanted sleep, eagerly questions walking dead president’s kewpie doll:
https://townhall.com/tipsheet/katiepavlich/2024/07/08/kjp-gets-heated-with-the-press-after-hiding-bidens-health-status-n2641555
Uh oh.
I decided to do a couple of personal projects, and re-learn C++ along the way.
First of all, I remember why I dislike C++ so much. I hate to say it, but C# and VB.Net both make more sense. At least, the bar to entry is easier, and you can start producing useful code quicker.
But more importantly, I accidentally ran across this thing called Project Euler. It’s basically 888 (and counting) math nerd problems, the majority of which people solve using programs. The Computer Science nerd in me thinks it’s cheating to use code when you could use analysis and theory instead, but the code junkie in me says “Let’s do this!”.
I’m up to problem #8. If I’d used C instead of C++, I’d be a bit further along. Pascal, even better.
Of course, all progress on my personal projects has been frozen. OTOH, my comfort with C++ has risen a bit.
@Lynn, I meant Preemptive grid shutoff.
Gotcha. Nope, I had to SWAG the genny start time. My neighbor just told me the power went off at around 530 am so that is when the genny started.
This is a pain. I would really like to have a genny at the office too but the wife says no to the $35K.
First of all, I remember why I dislike C++ so much. I hate to say it, but C# and VB.Net both make more sense. At least, the bar to entry is easier, and you can start producing useful code quicker.
You got a C++ expert (Greg) and user (me) on here. Of course, Stackoverflow is an awesome place.
Thanks for staying from Fortran. I keep on telling people that Fortran is changing from a serious application development language to a hobbyist language. You would not believe the hate and discontent that I get. Simply amazing at the denial of reality.
How much money in the bank do I need?
The thing is, since I’m not paid for it, I don’t really want to learn the arcane, abstruse, and questionable corners of the language. Like templates. I could throw in “ephemeral”, since apparently the language has changed considerably since I first learned it in grad school in the 90’s. My IDE gives me lots of helpful hints of the form “That feature only available in C++20 or later.”
I was really only after portability between Windows and Linux in the first place. The code is only a means to an end, not a work of art or the end in itself. I would probably have been happy enough with plain old C or Pascal except I wanted to be able to find good working examples so I opted for a more modern yet not vendor specific language.
I’m only here to whine. In case you hadn’t figured that out.
Can we get you some cheese to go with that “whine.”
It varies by job market and changes over time, but around here Java is king at the moment.
I’d brush up COBOL if I had a good reason.
C++ probably not.
Just plain sad.
https://www.tmj4.com/news/republican-national-convention/everything-rnc-heres-what-you-need-to-know-as-the-convention-comes-to-milwaukee
https://city.milwaukee.gov/RNC/FAQ#SandM
What items are not allowed in the RNC security footprint?
Within all public areas of the security footprint, possession of the following items is prohibited during the dates of the RNC:
We’re repeating ourselves.
Leave your colostomy bag at home!
I know enough to be dangerous, and I haven’t been active with C++ since the tolling company.
Get a copy of Jusuttis’ “The C++ Standard Library”, preferably the second edition covering C++11.
Forget learning from Stroustrup’s book unless you are a masochist. His is the definitive reference, but it isn’t very useful as a tutorial.
I can’t think of a major compiler which won’t do C++11 at this point. You’ll also want to explore Boost.
You can get by with C++03, but closures and shared/unique pointers in C++11 and later are worth the time to learn how to use effectively.
My last three jobs have effectively been Stupid Libcurl Tricks which mostly take place in C — only an exhbition, not a competition, and, please, no wagering.
>> https://townhall.com/tipsheet/katiepavlich/2024/07/08/kjp-gets-heated-with-the-press-after-hiding-bidens-health-status-n2641555
And there was this from last week – https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/04/us/politics/biden-election-campaign.html
The problem with lying is that the more lies you tell, the more “details” you have to remember if/when you have to retell the same lies.
The latest OHB VP short list:
https://nypost.com/2024/07/08/us-news/trump-set-to-announce-vp-candidate-next-week-and-here-are-the-frontrunners/
Bah. Multitasking. I’ve been behind all day since I was offline most of last week.
Absent any updates from our host, hoping I’m wrong, but possibly he’s busy spinning up gennies and stringing extension cords.
No mention if he had been ‘jabbed.’
https://nypost.com/2024/07/08/business/real-estate-mogul-husband-of-mama-and-tata-influencer-dead-at-43/
Interesting assessment of what’s wrong with FJB … no need for his physician to include “yeah, he’s old” in his medical report…
https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2024/07/biden-age-fluid-intelligence-octogenarian/678916/
(prefix the address with 12ft.io/ if you get paywalled)
>>25. Any tennis balls or other similarly sized balls.
Looks like we’re on for the beer pong tourney!
Heh.
Never had to use it for a real project, but going through the various tutorials over the years always made my skin crawl.
I have heard that D is a pretty decent alternative, tho I have never tried it.
Strategee: Trump shoud tell Biden to leave so he will stay in
https://townhall.com/tipsheet/guybenson/2024/07/08/how-trump-could-meddle-in-democrats-biden-nightmare-with-one-short-statement-n2641491
Dangled carrot: A Trump promise to pardon Hunter.
Trump should also remind him that it’s not his fault that he’s senile.
I saw a Tesla CyberTruck on Sunday morning, btw. A nice light leaf green.
Went by me at about 75-80mph in a 55mph construction zone, brakelights on as it passed, slowing down to 55 as it came up on people doing the speed limit. With a little impatient potty-step back and forth at being forced to associate with the hoi-polloi.
A lot of these items have been used by Antifa & friends.
In particular I seem to recall there was a teacher from my old junior college who used a bikelock to concuss multiple people at multiple Trump events. He was given a handslap by the courts.
That said, a 40 square block deprivation of civil rights seems excessive.
Heh. I can imagine solving some number theory problems in COBOL.
“What is the sum of all prime numbers below 2 million?”
Funny thing is, as I typed this, I started visualizing the COBOL code.
PERFORM FIND-AND-SUM-PRIMES VARYING A FROM 3 BY 2
UNTIL A > 2000000
https://nypost.com/2024/07/08/us-news/trump-set-to-announce-vp-candidate-next-week-and-here-are-the-frontrunners/
Dr. Ben Carson
The thing is, since I’m not paid for it, I don’t really want to learn the arcane, abstruse, and questionable corners of the language. Like templates. I could throw in “ephemeral”, since apparently the language has changed considerably since I first learned it in grad school in the 90’s. My IDE gives me lots of helpful hints of the form “That feature only available in C++20 or later.”
I was really only after portability between Windows and Linux in the first place. The code is only a means to an end, not a work of art or the end in itself. I would probably have been happy enough with plain old C or Pascal except I wanted to be able to find good working examples so I opted for a more modern yet not vendor specific language.
Whose IDE are you using ?
Forget about writing your own templates. They are incredibly hard to write with all of nuances. Just use the Standard Template Library: std::string, std::wstring, std::vector, std::map, etc.
I like Ben Carson, but I think he’d be more valuable as Surgeon General than as VP.
And I want a young fighter like JD Vance for VP. Or Rand Paul; he’d be EXCELLENT.
I was really only after portability between Windows and Linux in the first place. The code is only a means to an end, not a work of art or the end in itself. I would probably have been happy enough with plain old C or Pascal except I wanted to be able to find good working examples so I opted for a more modern yet not vendor specific language.
The only real problem with C / C++ is the lack of a common user interface toolkit and graphics library. We use MFC right now but I would like to use something like wxwidgets instead.
https://www.wxwidgets.org/
And I want a young fighter like JD Vance for VP. Or Rand Paul; he’d be EXCELLENT.
Too white.
https://redstate.com/sister-toldjah/2024/07/08/the-open-secret-about-kamala-harris-that-is-fueling-the-anybody-but-kamala-chatter-n2176542
Delete three “s” from “she” and your talking about FJB.
The difference is that Biden was always going to be a puppet and the puppeteers were fixed. To that same group, Harris is not controllable and hence must go if Biden quits the campaign.
Too white.
OK; Rep. Byron Donalds.
Can you imagine what would happen if Trump’s administration proposed this?
https://thefederalist.com/2024/07/08/biden-admin-plans-to-kill-hundreds-of-thousands-of-owls-in-the-name-of-conservation/
David Burge?
Well I finally got networking back up and stable power for the moment so I’m going to get The Lappy out and do an update.
AT&T has had issues all day with cell svc.
N
There are apparently 2.26 million meters out of service with Centerpoint’s 3 million meters. Centerpoint has brought in 10,000 linemen and they are shooting for restoring power to 1 million meters by Wednesday.
This was not a Cat 1 hurricane. It punched much harder than Cat 1.
I am posting from my wife’s tmobile phone. My Verizon phone is down. My infinity cable internet is down since the repeater on the pole behind my house ran out of battery.
Our generator is cranking away. Half of my neighbors have generators in their driveways. Noisy !
Ok I spoke too soon.
When I moved inside the UPS on the rack died. It won’t charge from the generac 4800 I use for the house. I moved it to the honda inverter, with good clean power.
NOW I have power and networking.
—————-
Started the day with no cell svc. and no power. We lost power around 730am. Used the moka pot and camp stove to make coffee and breakfast, then went to work. Kinda. Since it was still storming. And just to make the point, the tree dropped a huge limb right across the doorway between me coming and and turning around to go back out.
Street was fully flooded over the curbs so W went and unblocked the storm drains.
Her verizon was up so we waited for a bit until the storm had mostly passed us, then it was chainsaws and stacking. I had a huge branch down across my neighbor’s driveway, just missed her car. Cleared that. Another neighbor helped. We were getting very light misty drizzle and gusting winds.
Spent the rest of the day cutting and stacking debris, for me and neighbors. Then I trimmed the big old tree back from the roof (which I usually do at the start of hurricane season.)
In between I fired up the old gas generac and got it connected to the house. Took some adjustment of the new carb and the load throttle system. Poked at it for an hour before I got something usable and stable. A meter with volts and frequency is very useful when working with generators.
Fought the honda 3000 inverter. It just didn’t want to start. First there was water in the propane regulator. Then I finally noticed an oil light. It was almost full, but topping up didn’t do it. I saw that it was very dark so I changed the oil, and readjusted the regulator, and viola, it started. No more oil light. Added two A/C units, one small window and one smallish roll around.
Freezers and fridge are cooling.
Now my networking is all on the honda, and working. I’m going to refuel before bed and run thru the night.
One block away streetlights taunt me….
———————
Power went out at the BOL late morning, so if my buddy doesn’t update me I will probably head up there Tues afternoon. Gotta get the freezers and fridge on a gennie.
W will have to baby sit the gennies here.
Joy.
———————-
Some of my neighbors don’t yet have a temporary gennie. A couple are in the last stages of installing whole house gennies. Sucks to have it on the pad and tested but not connected when the power goes out. (my situation too).
———————-
Love the pole saw for limbing downed branches. It’s so much safer and less scary to be able to cut from outside the branch pile and not risk being trapped if the whole thing moves.
Big chainsaw got some use on the thicker parts of the downed branches. BTW, city had still not picked up the heavy trash and tree waste from the LAST event, so now I’ve got three piles going…
Time for a shower and bed soon…
n
@Craig_in_TX, thanks for the report, please feel free to share any lessons learned when we wrap this up. Even small wins or losses can be useful or start a good conversation.
n
@nick, good to hear you/family are safe. Sounds like preps did as needed. Get some sleep, Beryl didn’t do much to the usual levels of insanity, political and otherwise, so those await…
Oooh, I will steal that.
Me too. Maybe the funniest thing I have seen all year.
BTW, one of the things that I really like about C++ is compile time object linking. I wrote a lot of Smalltalk over ten years and I found the run time object linking to be very slow and very imprecise. I hated a user getting the dreaded object not found message in the wild when the object had not been created yet.
Refueled the generac, and swapped bottles on the honda. Shut it off, move the little regulator and hose to the new bottle, open bottle valve, turn key – and it started right up. After all the trouble I had dialing it in, that was a huge relief.
Wife watched, a bit disbelieving after her trouble trying to start it on her own last time.
She might not have to do it tomorrow anyway, as our surrounding areas keep getting lit up, and even at the BOL the power is back on. The IOT thermostat phoned home to tell us it was back online. If the power stays up, I’ll stay here.
NOW it’s time to sluice the grime from my body and retire for the night….
n
For some fun and to keep the old brain cell ticking over I’m playing around with a language called Frink
https://frinklang.org/
Frink is a practical calculating tool and programming language designed to make physical calculations simple, to help ensure that answers come out right, and to make a tool that’s really useful in the real world. It tracks units of measure (feet, meters, kilograms, watts, etc.) through all calculations, allowing you to mix units of measure transparently, and helps you easily verify that your answers make sense. It also contains a large data file of physical quantities, freeing you from having to look them up, and freeing you to make effortless calculations without getting bogged down in the mechanics.
Syntax is javalike, it’s a great general purpose language.