Hot and humid. Of course. It was in the 90s yesterday and hotter in the sun. It must have been slightly less humid though as it didn’t feel quite so hot in the afternoon. I will say that sweat was dripping off my abdomen when I was bent over the generator around noon, and I was in the shade…
Speaking of generators, I was starting it because we lost power around 4am. A limb fell on our supply line and took out the fuse for our pole. Just us and 8 of our neighbors… the utility’s outage tracker had it, and the limited extent. That told me it would be some time before it got fixed. The crews are still working on tickets from the storm and 9 customers is way down the priority list. I’m glad I started the gennies, as it was 5pm before our power was back up.
Working around the outage, I did some more organizing and cleanup. This time it was mostly books and library sorting, as I’ve stacked them all over the office, and am out of shelf space. I need to separate some duplicates or similar subjects to send to the BOL, decide if I want the “rebuild society library” here or there, and see if I can get rid of some volumes. Do I really need 5 versions of “Intro to electricity” textbooks? It’s not JUST a contingency measure. I have actually used some of the reference books. I’ve written about the ditches and culverts engineering book I read to figure out stuff at the BOL, I refer to the electrical construction books, and the surveying books helped when I first surveyed the BOL lot.
I like books. I like that they are readable by humans 100 years later. I started accumulating reference books as a deep prep, for a very unlikely scenario, but now I think it’s a bit less unlikely than when I started. You have to have power and connectivity to keep the technological knowledge base up, and having recently seen how fragile those are, I’m more inclined than ever to stack books. It may be that someone ends up using my books for firestarter in the ruins of western civilization, but even that is useful if it keeps them alive…
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Today will be finishing the book sorting (or at least getting the sorted piles out of the hallway) continuing the office and home cleanup, and doing a pickup or two of auction stuff. I scored another Renology flexible solar panel for 1/3 retail. I hope they can “find” it this time. The auction has a pattern of not being able to find high dollar items that sell crazy cheap… but I keep doing business with them despite the irregularities, because of the “crazy cheap” part… and the panel is “cheap” but not CRAZY cheap…
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Stacks ran the A/C yesterday, and kept my food cold… they help me repair stuff when it breaks, and they feed me and my family. Stacks of preparations are a good thing. Build your own stacks, build your own resiliency.
nick
Bang Bang!
Today’s Tyler Durden cowardice. At least she spies for an ally and not Mainland China.
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/ex-cia-wife-wapos-spy-hunter-max-boot-indicted-foreign-spy
Oh, Sue Mi, wife of Max Boot.
Sue Mi Boot?
Hilarious.
After plugs’ COVID diagnosis, his walk down AF1 looks like it is right out of “Weekend At Bernies.” He is so feeble looking, even Stretch is calling for him to step down. “Long” COVID gives POTATUS the perfect excuse to step down. It is reputed Chuckie Schemer met with spongey: “step down.”
It is probably too late to replace plugs. I think the Puppet Masters will keep plugs on life support to finish his term since they don’t want The Kamel to be President, even for a day. She can’t win against tRump, so why disgrace the Dumbos even more. plugs can retire to his beach house for the next six months and let his staff run the country.
I still believe that Big Mike is coming but OUTRAGE! is a hard sell following what happened to the White Devils’ Orange King on Saturday.
72F and light rain this am. The break in temp fooled me but my prediction of humidity was maxed!
Coffee is brewing. I’m on my second or third 3# bag of Kirkland French Roast, whole bean. It’s been selling here for about $3.50 a pound, which is pretty much the cheapest in Costco. If you like a strong dark roast it’s more than adequate, even good, especially for the price. It’s good enough I still go “ummmm, that’s good” when I take that first sip. (I just checked online and it is more online.)
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pizza had me asleep in my chair last night, when I woke up it was early this morning, hence my very late comment yesterday. Love carbs but they wipe me out.
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the gentle rain is a nice break, especially with the lower temps. Hard rain? Strong winds? No. Gentle cooling rain? Yes please.
n
I had an auctioneer in the UK do that to me – they were selling two NOS gubs (ribles) that were somewhat off the beaten track, both brand and calibre-wise, and I had an inkling that no-one much would be biting.
As I was indeed the only bidder, I won the no-reserve auctions for both at ridiculously cheap prices, but they reneged on the second of the two, claiming it didn’t exist, and that the same rible had in fact been listed twice in error. They were too stupid to realise they had had photos of both gubs in the catalogue, with the different serial numbers visible. How to lose a customer.
It looks like somebody just threw a banana peel under Plugs’ foot. Perhaps DOCTOR Jill Biden (after promised $$). They’ll live comfortably and even have the SS around to let plugs believe he is still President.
I still believe that Big Mike is coming but OUTRAGE! is a hard sell following what happened to the White Devils’ Orange King on Saturday.
I still believe that black men will not vote for Big Mike. That will be a strong “Oh Hell No !” from most black men. They can get that nonsense at home from momma or the wife. Or the girlfriend.
>>Dougie had it recently and he was with FJB on the 4th watching the fireworks.
Dougie?
The Second Gentleman.
J.D. Vance and Meemaw’s Guns
Go Grannie!
“EXCLUSIVE J.D. Vance’s height: Trump campaign slaps back at Google suggesting he is 5ft 7in… and shows how tall he really stands”
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13640575/jd-vance-height-donald-trump-vice-president.html
JD Vance is at least 6’2″. Google is up to its tricks again.
Good summary of why a Dumbo steal won’t work with plugs as the nominee:
KNEW It! Could THIS Be the Real Reason Nancy Pelosi and Other Democrats Want Biden Out Because Just WOW
I think plugs will announce he is not running NLT Monday. It will take his closest peeps to convince him due to his dementia. He has the time at the beach mansion to decide.
“Lessons learned from Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in 2005”
https://bayourenaissanceman.blogspot.com/2008/08/lessons-learned-from-hurricanes-katrina.html
“In a comment to my previous post, Pappy asked: “Peter, how about a post about what you do to prepare for a hurricane, and also for the influx of “visitors” running from the storm.””
“Funny thing you should ask that, Pappy. In 2005, following Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, I posted a number of “lessons learned” to an online forum and an e-mail list to which I belong.”
“For the benefit of those who may be interested, I’ll post all four of them below. I’d be pleased to have readers’ feedback, and I hope they’re of help to you.”
“Remember that the four posts below date from 2005 – not today!”
In a WW3 scenario, rural people are going to get swarmed by the surviving suburban people.
Of note, Peter’s 30 day of supplies lasted 2 days. The 30+ people showed up with no food, no cash, no fuel, and very hungry.
“US to Restrict Some Chinese Software in Cars Next Month”
https://www.pcmag.com/news/us-to-restrict-some-chinese-software-in-cars-next-month
“The Commerce Department may soon limit Chinese software in ‘connected vehicles’ in the US, requiring car manufacturers to use firms in ‘allied’ countries for data storage instead.”
Chinesium ain’t just bad steel.
“As Beryl’s mosquito bounty victimizes Houston, we watch for more damp weather this morning and beyond”
https://spacecityweather.com/as-beryls-mosquito-bounty-victimizes-houston-we-watch-for-more-damp-weather-this-morning-and-beyond/
“Speaking of that. A number of you have commented regarding the plague of mosquitoes we have seen that started about a week after Beryl hit. I can confirm myself that these are not your typical mosquitoes; these suckers are the size of Volkswagens and mean business. I had my assumptions, but I reached out to the Harris County Public Health Department to inquire how Beryl played a role. Dr. Max Vigilant, Director of the Mosquito & Vector Control Division gave me some answers. Here were my questions and Dr. Vigilant’s complete answers.”
The mosquitoes are HUGE and aggressive.
FIFY
An amazing photo, however:
Looks Like ‘Photoganda’: Time Changes Cover to Remove Iconic Image of Defiant Donald Trump
A photo that will be in the history books forever.
tRump, tho.
The dirty secret of Time Magazine is that it is now a tech billionare’s mouthpiece.
Time belongs to Mark Beinoff, co-founder/CEO of Salesforce.com and noted Prog.
R.I.P. Mr. Newhart.
“Game of Thrones’ George RR Martin falls foul of Glasgow sci-fi event’s strict rules”
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/article/2024/jul/17/game-of-thrones-writers-dismay-as-he-is-frozen-out-of-glasgow-sci-fi-event-worldcon
“Author’s efforts to take part apparently stymied by application protocol, but he still plans to attend Worldcon”
My prediction is that this Worldcon will be … boring.
Lou Dobbs too.
Dobbs was yet another financial journalist who had a money management package which I remember being on the shelf at the Egghead Ponzi.
We had Quicken, Microsoft Money, Andrew Tobias MYM, Dobbs’ software, and an obscure pair of applications called BankMate and MoneyMate, both of which were produced by a company with ties to the Church of Scientology.
All hail Xenu.
When I still read Tobias, up until about a decade ago, he would occasionally mention that people still ask about technical support for Managing Your Money. I assume he is still fielding questions.
The Duck is acting weird this afternoon. Searches are either returning a technical error or clocking.
If you have a problem with Andrew Tobais’ MYM:
https://andrewtobias.com/mym-emergency/
It isn’t Tobias politics that got to me reading the site as much as his enthusiastic support for Jim Cramer.
Cramer should be in prison IMHO.
Outstanding information. Thanks for re-posting that.
Or charging stations for the EV.
The Loves outside George West had every Supercharger space filled when we drove by the Sunday before the hurricane, but I didn’t see a line for each space like on the Friday before SxSW/Spring Break started last year.
I haven’t seen another Supercharger station between Corpus Christi and San Antonio on I-37.
The gas stations were crazy, but that always seems to be the case on I-37 on weekends.
Outstanding information. Thanks for re-posting that.
You are welcome. The scariest item from that might be that Peter invited two families and then ten families showed up, all without food, gas, and cash. And only two of them had guns. That would be a freaking disaster.
I remember the time well. The family across the street from us in Sugar Land had her sister and her family move in with them for at least six months. Her sister had built a two story house behind the Mississippi river levee in New Orleans and got 20+ feet of water in the house for months. Insane, total bulldozer party. They had flood insurance but that barely paid off their mortgage.
I’m predicting long lines at Knott’s Berry Farm this weekend.
https://www.ocregister.com/2024/07/17/disneyland-union-protesters-chant-shut-it-down-ahead-of-strike-vote/
Hmmm, are chunks of the intarwebs down?
I’m having issues with some major sites.
n
or maybe it’s just cloudflare?
The Duck is a front for Bing so the earlier technical issues with the site mean that Microsoft is affected.
Can I mention that I hate software certificates ? I had to buy a new software signing certificate from Sectigo (Comodo) and they no longer give out the private key for the software certificate. Now I have to enter the password each time I sign something. And when I release a patch or maintenance release of our software, I sign all DLLs and EXEs. Plus the setup.exe file. Painful so I am trying to get around this. And Sectigo support does not have a clue. Or maybe I do not have a clue.
Lotta people losing money when their auctions can’t complete.
n
someone screwed up.
n
You get a private key and the signed cert from the vendor?
Is the cert file a standard PKCS12 container? The private key should be accessible with OpenSSL.
Store everything in The Cloud.
Who needs developers when you can get the DevOps guys to chain together Node.js scripts in clusters of containers.
Sure, no one understands exactly how it all works anymore, but Hot Skillz!
You get a private key and the signed cert from the vendor?
Is the cert file a standard PKCS12 container? The private key should be accessible with OpenSSL.
Nope, no private key. I cannot convert the .cer file into a .pfx file so I have to have the USB token loaded and SafeNet running. It is a pain in the buttocks.
Or charging stations for the EV.
The Loves outside George West had every Supercharger space filled when we drove by the Sunday before the hurricane, but I didn’t see a line for each space like on the Friday before SxSW/Spring Break started last year.
I haven’t seen another Supercharger station between Corpus Christi and San Antonio on I-37.
My cousin says that when the Tesla starts screaming at you that it will not make it to the next Supercharger, you had better listen. When he was driving down to Mom and Dads, he skipped the Supercharger in Temple, TX thinking that he could make it to Victoria, TX. Knowing him, he was flying which is an electric eater in the Teslas and screwed up the distance calc. His Model 3 sent him across country to Sealy, TX and then back to Victoria to TX 87 down to Port Lavaca.
Yeah, once the batteries get fixed in the EVs then we need about 10X more chargers. Ans some way to keep people from stealing the copper wires. Of course, with Pete ButtRanger in charge, I figure that at a billion dollars each, he will get about 5 chargers built before he is kicked out of DC.
Fighting with hobby site.
Template menu widget thing doesn’t work now that the real url is deployed. FFS, it worked in staging, and with the temp url. And IE doesn’t render the header and footer at all (where the navigation menu is). So far I can’t find anything about where the translation between the “slug” in the nav menu and the “link” name on a page is stored. I HATE automagic stuff. It fails and there isn’t any recourse.
And now cloudflare can’t reach the site anyway so I’m going to bed.
n
German Radio news is reporting massive interruptions of IT services, causing cancellations of air and train transport, with worldwide effects.
Is it Putin’s pals, or has SkyNet awakened?
Bad deployment by CloudFlare.