Cool and wet. That was how yesterday played out, and how today will likely go too. The rain dropped the temps, and the wet made every joint hurt. And it will probably be the same today.
I did get stuff done. The rain was patchy, and there were long enough periods between the squalls. I got almost all the trim installed in the dockhouse. I forgot my hammer drill at home, and I need it to install the baseboard on one wall. That will have to wait until next time. I got the chair rail in, and all the window stools.
Got the truck mostly unloaded. Did some small things in the garage. W cooked a prime rib roast with the new sou vide thing, and I finished it by searing on cast iron. The combo worked great, except I need to move a kitchen exhaust fan up the list… Saute’d mushrooms and onion, and fresh green beans rounded out the menu with store bought pumpkin pie for dessert.
Played pool with my wife, had a fire and s’mores with the kid and her friend. Talked about music. The rain had mostly cleared out by dusk and we had a nice sunset. Later it was still drippy wet, but I managed to get the fire going WITHOUT accelerants. I had some lamp oil standing by though.
I’ll keep working the list today. The cold and damp isn’t fun with the cumulative damage to my body, but I can still move and work, so I can’t b!tch too much.
Haven’t seen my buddy yet, which probably means he’s wiped out from the radiation and chemo, and the stress of the holidays. That’s got me worried and also thinking about my absent friends. Without the dark, we wouldn’t know the light. But it still sucks sometimes.
Stack time with friends and family. Tis the season.
nick
Great margins for NVIDIA. Thin for everyone downstream
How stupid is the VA? (Yeh, redundant). The exam I have to attend is to determine if the VA correctly rated my disability back in 2017. Seriously? How is an exam today going to determine how I felt in 2017? A lot has changed since then. My back has gotten worse over time. Will the VA consider that in their decision by stating my back was 25% better back 6.5 years?
I still don’t where I stand with TDIU. It has not been denied, yet. If I get TDIU there should be some back pay to March 2024 and I will quit pursuing additional claims with the VA. There would be nothing further to be gained in compensation as TDIU is paid at the 100% rate. But I will still pursue the back pay for 6.5 years. It may be like mud wrestling with a pig. You both get dirty but the pig likes it. At some point my sanity, stress, aggravation, etc. may not be worth getting the money.
As some wise sage said, the appeals ain’t done until the veteran quits.
54 F and totally overcast at 9 am. Church is not until 10 am today using a combined acapella church service to make us old people happy.
Oh gosh, I am now the old people at church.
Coffee is awesome ! C8H10N4O2 is a really cool substance.
I wonder when our nanny state will try to ban it.
I was talking with a guy a church who is a veteran. He was in the army and worked with heavy artillery almost his entire career. He has been diagnosed with hearing damage and claims tinnitus. The VA is saying that he cannot prove that his hearing loss was due to his time in the service. His hearing test when he was discharged showed no damage. Yeh, right, big booms don’t damage hearing. Such damage can manifest itself years later.
I told him to get a letter from an Ear, Nose and Throat doctor, pay for it himself, and a letter from his primary care physician that states his hearing loss was more likely than not due to the time in the service. Those are the key words. The ENT can never say for certain the cause, nor can a general practitioner.
I had to do the same thing before the VA would consider my hearing loss as service connected. Those loud computer rooms, in which I spent hours, multiple days at a time, really took a toll on my hearing. Especially those high speed impact printers that I leaned over watching the print out with the covers opened.
I talked with another veteran whom the VA has given him hearing loss but has rated him at 0%. In other words, the hearing loss is service connected (he was a pilot in the USAF, full bird) but the VA does not consider it significant. He currently is a pilot for Delta flying cargo. His wife has told him that he needs hearing aids. (Don’t most wives?)
My wife’s nephew is exploring ways to get 100% disability so he can resign his Army commission before 20 years and get full health benefits for the rest of his life.
We’ve caught hints lately he’s going to go for a psych reason.
The disturbing part is that someone is advising him about how to approach this situation.
Not until you have lived 5/5/55, 6/6/66, 7/7/77, 8/8/88, 9/9/99 and beyond.
Buc-ee’s is working on eliminating Diet Coke from their fountains. Newer stores do not have it, and the older stores are typically down to one dispenser.
Even though the Clintons had the taps installed at the White House, Diet Coke is associated with Trump.
There is a lot of coaching available on how to respond in a VA examination, how to write the letters, and for what to apply.
A 100% rating is tough. It has to be proven to be service connected. Sleep apnea is one such rating as that can be life threatening. Asthma is one other such item that can be pursued. I don’t know much about mental exams and getting the VA to recognize that condition. The issue in any item is connecting the condition with something that happened while in the service or the working conditions in the service.
All he needs to get that is to have a rating of 30% or higher and register with the VA healthcare system. I have that but I still have Medicare and supplemental insurance. Dealing with the VA healthcare system is difficult. Supposedly I could drop the Medicare part B and the supplemental insurance.
If I lived in a town with a VA hospital I would. Supposedly I can use the ER at the local hospital and the VA will pay at Medicare rates. But I have heard too many horror stories of the hospital not accepting the VA insurance and billing the patient at the hospital’s maximum rate.
Wasn’t it Ronald Regan that had jelly beans in his office and Jelly Belly sent him bags every month?
The two Buc-ee’s closest to me (about 30 miles east or west) still had diet drinks the last time I was there (about 4 days ago). They do have drinks that marked as containing real sugar and not this fructose stuff.
Coke gets enough complaints they may have to have a little talk with Bucee’s. And wait for the first internet billboard that says “We have gas AND Diet Coke”
If I stop by Sam’s Club in the middle of errands I sometimes get their hot dog and drink special. I’ve noticed that their fountain runs consistently weak. Chiselers. I’m tempted to work up some standards, take samples, and write a report, sending the results to Sam’s, their vendor, and the state AG and inspectors.
At just over 50, I realized this the other day at work. When did this happen?
At least three of the guys on my team are older than me (and one is retiring in March). Which reminds me – if anyone knows a Linux admin who wants to move to North Alabama, send them my way. I’ve interviewed at least a dozen the past year, and only one actually knew what the heck he was talking about. I made him an offer, but he used us to get more money from his current employer. To be fair, he was honest about it. I asked why he was looking to leave his current employer. His answer was his area got new upper management and everyone was being made to interview for their jobs. He had been there for 13 years, starting out as an intern. He said “heck, if I’m being made to interview I might as well see what’s out there”. I agreed.
All the other potential candidates had decent resumes, but in real life most were just executors of tasks developed by other people. They have a list with steps to execute and they don’t stray from that.
College Profs Denounce Western Culture, Move to Caves
https://iowahawk.typepad.com/iowahawk/2005/03/college_profs_d.html
A reprint, but still funny.
Remember making artificial reefs out of old tires–and now used turbine blades?
If we build artificial caves, will we get more college profs moving into them? And what kind of artificially created natural feature analog would we need to draw PLT’s?
https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2024/12/beyond-the-cusp.php
U.S. government sues the Chinese government in U.S. courts. They are found guilty. Cash awards to 100 million ATT wireless customers–no attorney fees. Awards are paid from a tariff fund levied with a sliding percentage designed to pay all awards within 12 months. Rinse and repeat.
A Real MAGA Civil War or Sabotage?
https://sashastone.substack.com/p/a-real-maga-civil-war-or-sabotage
The issue isn’t diet drinks. It is about Diet Coke.
Yeah, caffeine. Trump tho.
I recently heard upper management in a nearby cube running the triage process on a group of individuals in the division who turned in notice, and decisions had to be made about making counter offers to retain institutional knowledge.
Often, turning in notice is the only way to get a raise/promotion in a large company anymore. The link to our internal postings has been missing from the HR page since Thanksgiving, and something tells me it isn’t coming back soon.
Someone turning in notice to go to work for direct competitors like IBM, HP, or Apple (especially Apple) gets an immediate escort to the door and two weeks severance. Others are more carefully considered.
Ah, I see. A specific target.
We did that at the bank. Anyone turning in a notice, regardless of the date of their desired departure, was escorted out the door with two weeks full pay and benefits. Unless their notice date was less than two weeks, then they got nothing.
Security was the big issue and avoiding the possibility of money fraud. Several times I had to run special programs to provide a list of all online activity of an employee that was terminated, resigned, or quit. I had to occasionally run the same reports on the CEO, CFO and other high ranking individuals. I even had to run the report on myself as I had access to the ATM’s software, Teller software, and the System software.
I once told an auditor they can look for a few dollars and would never find it as I am not risking my career over a few dollars. If I was going to commit fraud the bank would open on Monday morning shy several million dollars. The auditor did not laugh and wrote me up as someone that needs closer supervision and auditing.
While I don’t think the practice works, a lot of DevOps guys get fast promotions to roles as system architects these days because of desirable Hot Skillz on the resume and coders who sweat the details being regarded as “on the spectrum”.
North Alabama would be tough to recruit. Leaving a major metro for a lower cost of living area is a one way trip for a lot of households anymore, and it will only get worse as interest rates revert to historical norms.
If the cap is not left in place, the big companies will go all H1B as the monkey trick driving current capital spending runs out of gas. China does not lack for people who dream of owning a few Ghost Houses in California and sending their kids to Stanford. India is not short on wealthy families desiring to establish a base in Texas, Austin preferably, but they will settle for the west side of Houston.
After tech, next up to be gutted by H1B will be medicine. Like the Cylons, the AMA has a plan, and I can direct you to one future on-shore MBBS school right now.
Buc-ee’s locations always attract competitors who are typically just as busy.
Believe it or not, a lot of people are meh about Buc-ee’s, even in Texas.
Also, Buc-ee’s is usually a sign of a local government willing to deal serious tax concessions.
I am becoming that way. Generally only stopping to use the bathroom, maybe getting a cheap drink, might get gas. The rest of the stuff is too expensive. The BBQ sandwiches are good but too expensive, same for the burritos.
Costco has cheaper gas but the lines are generally a 10-minute wait as Granny Goldfarb cannot figure out how to use the pay function.
A Real MAGA Civil War or Sabotage?
https://sashastone.substack.com/p/a-real-maga-civil-war-or-sabotage
I’m 100% behind Ramaswamy as far as his description of the deterioration of American society has gone, but we need to change the culture and stop importing foreigners. The USA smartened up post-Sputnik, and we can do it again.
Finally up and moving.
Back hurt in a specific and really painful way last night and it was keeping me up. I medicated and went back to bed, and slept past noon. I never do that. Guess I know the effects better now. Usually if the pill says eight hours, I get seven. This time I got nine.
—-
Currently 60F, was 58F one hour ago. Light overcast and still.
—–
Fountain drink providers are not supposed to mess with ratios. The bottlers are picky about the product tasting right. You can jigger it by how much ice you put in the cup and how the ice is shaped. If it melts quickly it can wash out the flavor. Some sellers put a lot of ice in to hold back some syrup.
—-
Pot roast is in the slow cooker.
I may have a hot shower before getting started today. I’ll be doing a little bit of extra stretching too.
Getting old is tough.
n
Half a century ago when I worked in a donut shop and had to do all the syrup bottle swapping for the fountains there were no adjustable controls for the mix.
The vendor servicing the fountain could adjust things, but there was a lock and security tape making sure that the employees could not. I suppose if you had access to the key and same kind of security tape you could go in and tweak things.
My wife’s nephew is exploring ways to get 100% disability so he can resign his Army commission before 20 years and get full health benefits for the rest of his life.
We’ve caught hints lately he’s going to go for a psych reason.
The disturbing part is that someone is advising him about how to approach this situation.
This is incredibly sad.
Took the wife to Golden Corral in Rosenberg for Sunday lunch after church. Now that is a mix of the melting pot that is the USA. Quite a few kids too.
The manager was cooking steaks and chicken on the huge grill. I visited him three times. No chicken for me, I am red meat to the max.
The Geico Gecko has Buc-ee’s in his sights with the now-completed acquisition of Pilot/Flying-J. Some interesting tests are ahead for the Beaver as he attempts to expand nationwide.
“‘Unprecedented’: Will Chuck Grassley Really Become U.S. President if There’s No House Speaker to Certify Trump Victory?”
https://americafirstreport.com/unprecedented-will-chuck-grassley-really-become-u-s-president-if-theres-no-house-speaker-to-certify-trump-victory/
“(WND)—Despite Donald Trump’s landslide victory over Kamala Harris in November, it’s possible he may not become president on Jan. 20 if there’ still no speaker of the House who has certified the election results.”
“That alarm is being sounded on national TV as Mike Johnson, the current speaker of the House, is facing the threat of not being voted as speaker again this Friday.”
““But as you know, we have five Republicans that won’t commit to voting for Mike Johnson, and he can only lose one or two votes. So I sure hope we don’t repeat this, and I’m strongly encouraging my colleagues and go ahead and elect Mike Johnson, and let’s get started on passing President Trump’s agenda.””
2025 is going to be a contentious year.
Hat tip to:
https://thelibertydaily.com/
RIP Jimmy Carter.
Pilot is headquartered in Knoxville. I applied there for a job many years ago. I did not get hired which may have been a good thing. One of the big news stories was the FBI raiding the place because of some funny business with kickbacks to fleet companies. Some heads rolled over that event.
Jim Haslam founded the company and eventually bought Flying-J. They got involved in politics with the founder’s son, Bill Haslam became governor of TN. I don’t remember him doing anything worthwhile while he was in office.
Pilot distributed all the fuel in the area and was very much controlling prices. They had a large tank farm in the area that stored hundreds of thousands of gallons of fuel. Haslam was really gouging the area on gas prices. If a person got outside of the Haslam influence on fuel prices the price was many times $0.10 to $0.20 a gallon cheaper.
The family did donate money to all the Knoxville high schools to put in artificial turf. Schools outside of Knoxville got nothing.
“Is Matt Mullenweg the Mad King of WordPress?”
https://www.inc.com/dfreedman/matt-mullenweg-wordpress-wp-engine/90994969
“Mullenweg’s open-source empire dominates the web. But his attack on competitor WP Engine may be putting it all at risk.”
I suspect that Mullenweg cannot get out of the barrel since he put himself in there.
The Gecko bought out the remainder of the Haslam family’s stake last year.
The general assumption was that Buffett would start a serious overhaul of the chain with various retail subsidiaries involved in Texas first and then go national, but market conditions have changed, especially in the EV charging market.
“The manager was cooking steaks and chicken on the huge grill. I visited him three times. No chicken for me, I am red meat to the max.”
One of the local grocery store delis does a very good chicken cashew salad. This weekend they got to the end of the tray and put the last two pounds in two containers and marked it down. They looked like they had nearly twice the cashews and I grabbed them both. They also had huge chunks of white meat chicken. Good score.
No rest for the wicked. JEC is largely responsible for the mess in the Middle East, including the fall of several moderate western-leaning countries, the deaths of many thousands, and the misery of millions more. After his humiliation in 1980 he traveled the globe certifying rigged elections for dictators and interfering in democracies.
Send your extra coal to hell–they need it to stoke the furnaces to welcome him.
While in Fredericksburg, TX yesterday, we stopped at Opa’s for a few packages of bratwurst only to find that the factory store didn’t have any in stock.
The store manager told us that Opa’s could not get veal for the bratwurst from either one of the two (!) veal farms that supply the entire US market and that they had no idea as to when the supply situation would be resolved.
>> There is a lot of coaching available on how to respond in a VA examination, how to write the letters, and for what to apply.
Similarly for those seeking SSDI.
“Deep State Shill Leana Wen Calls for Regime to Launch Bird Flu Jabs Before Trump Gets In”
https://thelibertydaily.com/deep-state-shill-leana-wen-calls-regime-launch/
“Leana Wen’s career path has been a spectacle to say the least. She moved to America from Communist China when she was 8. Her first known appearance in the public eye was as a witness to the Boston Marathon Bombing. She became Baltimore Health Commissioner, then President of Planned Parenthood, then Covid mask- and vaxx-nanny.”
“Now, in the early stages of Bird Flu Pandemic Panic Theater 2.0, she’s taking to the airwaves to sell a ludicrous idea to the American people. She wants the Biden regime to start administering Bird Flu “vaccines” to the public before President Donald J. Trump takes office.”
You ain’t gonna jab this redneck. Better bring a lot of fbi guys.
Same here. No more Covid jabs and most certainly not bird flu. Want to bet she has stock in the vaccine maker or the syringe companies. A lot of people made money with Covid supplies.
Bang Bang!
“You will take your medicine Round Eye and you will like it.
Where I come from, we know about putting people like you into camps.”
Leana Wen succeeded Cecile Richards as head of Planned Parenthood.
Cecile Richards is “Ma” Richards daughter.
“Ma” Richards was the last Dem Governor of Texas.
check stock before action:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m6veyAyz2So
They Are at It Again. Prominent ‘Public Health’ Voices Lay the Groundwork for a New Pandemic for Trump
“Farmers need to say NO, get off my property. Do not comply. ”
https://redstate.com/streiff/2024/12/29/they-are-at-it-again-prominent-public-health-voices-lay-the-groundwork-for-a-new-pandemic-for-trump-n2183721
Target center of scarf.
The only round eye they will see is when I bend over. I may even wink at them.
ah, I lost my long comment.
Carter was lousy as Prez. Might have been a decent man, or his later charity work could be penance for his sins. I don’t know, and can’t find any passion to care.
Had a nice day, and nice night. Movie night was “Better Off Dead” which I think everyone but extra child had seen. So many great lines. The big surprise for me was seeing Terri Nunn singing in the band during the high school dance scene. I know her as the lead singer of Berlin… wiki says she appeared in a lot of other things too, including Penthouse magazine. I loved her voice in Berlin, didn’t know about the rest.
Fire was too smokey tonight. The wood was punky and too damp. Still nice to sit by the fire with the radio…
And now I”m going to try for an early bedtime.
n
And I meant to say that I really didn’t need that image Ray, although I second the sentiment…
n
>> The only round eye they will see is when I bend over. I may even wink at them.
“America’s Got Talent” is always looking for new talent…
“2024 Will End With A Black Moon, A Rare Event You’ve Never Seen”
https://www.iflscience.com/2024-will-end-with-a-black-moon-a-rare-event-youve-never-seen-77403
“The rare astronomical event is similar to a Blue Moon but for a different phase in the lunar cycle.”
“This year will see (kind of) another rare astronomical event taking place across the night sky. On December 30-31, we will have a rare Black Moon to see out 2024.”
When I can do the complete “The Bridge on the River Kwai” then we can talk. Right now I am limited to only a few notes.