75F and wet. Yuck.
Had a weird coughing fit last night. Woke me up and got me out of bed for an hour or more. I feel like I’ve been beaten with sticks this am.
Some meatspace obligations today, that would be better without rain. Don’t know yet if I’ll just have to suck it up, maybe it will dry out like yesterday.
Oh well, kids need breakfast. The demands of others are the rhythm of my life.
n
Bah. How hard is it to throw a poptart at them? Hell, be generous and give them one each. If they complain, tell them that when you were their age you had to make your own breakfast by slaughtering a pig and cutting the belly out and curing the meat and slicing the bacon and then cooking it yourself. And it was uphill both ways!
Check for sticks under your wife’s side of the bed. Just sayin’.
A hundred years ago the world was hit with a major pandemic.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2018/09/28/flu-pandemic-100-years-ago-50-million-died-could-happen-again/1423955002/
We are not prepared for another. Are you?
I’d guess that about half the words in total on the CDC’s website are about pandemic. They are sure we are going to have one, and soon.
Hence my recommendation that everyone be able to stay isolated in their home for at least 45 days. That is enough for ebola to burn itself out, and feels like enough to outlast most other stuff too.
The indonesians are acting quickly to avoid mass infections–
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2018-09-30/tsunami-death-toll-climbs-800-mass-burials-begin-many-remote-areas-still-cut
Look at the map of their bay. It looks like it’s just collapsing further and further in from the coast. On a geological scale, I’d bet that the bay is miles longer in time….
n
The world could do with a good pandemic, one that reduces the population by 80%+.
Of course, it would just be another time loop, like “Cause and Effect” (Star Trek):
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cause_and_Effect_(Star_Trek:_The_Next_Generation)
“Groundhog Day”:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Groundhog_Day_(film)
and many more:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_films_featuring_time_loops
We are all in some sick Gods (yes plural) games.
As soon as the “stupid” gene is identified, I’ll modify my mad cow whooping ebola to attack only people carrying that gene. A conservative estimate is that well over 80% of the species is stupid, thus meeting your criterion.
“A conservative estimate is that well over 80% of the species is stupid”
You know what they say: consider how dumb the average person is. Then remember that half are dumber than that.
Just now watching a program on BBC, of people saying “we can’t afford to buy our homes, so the government needs to buy them for us. And not just any home – they need to do it right.”
Um…no. What do they bring to the table? Why do they think they get to impose conditions on what is, in the end, charity?
Well there’s your mistake right there.
I feel the same way when I watch PBS or listen to NPR. I know the bias is there. I shake my head often. I just can’t not listen. I want to know what they’re saying, and I want the other point of view.
Of course, the “We want it” crowd will never get any sympathy from me. You MUST have skin in the game to have any weight.
From yesterday:
My cousin squired us to the game in style in his new Tesla model S in electric blue. He got the awd (two electric motors), 310 mile battery, and panoramic roof. Amazingly fast, 0 to 60 mph in 3.5 sec. $68K with tax, title, and license. Still on the first charge, he got it last night. One hour to supercharge or 5 hours on his 230 volt charger in the garage.
Note, that is a Tesla model 3, not a model S. A high end model 3 with two electric motors and the panoramic roof. My cousin think that the operating cost is about 20% that of a gasoline vehicle. Plus his employer has installed 20 chargers at his office and he thinks that he can get most of his electricity for free, lowering that cost to 10% or so.
So is the vehicle cost of $68K worth it versus $40K for a new V6 Camry or Avalon ? Of course not. But it is an interesting experiment of how to build and operate electric car appliances.
One concern that I had is the 17 inch monitor in the center of the dash. There are no instruments or dash controls whatsoever. Everything, and I mean everything, is controlled by that 17 inch monitor in the dash. Speed gauge, a/c control, radio control, etc, etc, etc. The only exceptions are the standard controls of accelerator, brake, steering, PRND, windshield wipers. You can literally command this vehicle to drive to meet you if it was legal and the autonomous software was good enough. But you can be screwing around with the monitor while you are suppose to be driving. Very distracting.
Had a weird coughing fit last night. Woke me up and got me out of bed for an hour or more. I feel like I’ve been beaten with sticks this am.
There is a respiratory disease, cold or flu, floating around Dallas. Takes 2 or 3 weeks to get over. I hope that it does not come down here.
So is the vehicle cost of $68K worth it versus $40K for a new V6 Camry or Avalon ? Of course not. But it is an interesting experiment of how to build and operate electric car appliances.
I don’t have a problem with Tesla as much as the tax subsidies and CA carbon credit stupidity which allowed the ponzi to achieve critical mass. The 2025 CAFE mandates were also critical to Tesla gaining traction, but Trump stopped that stupidity temporarily.
If Congress had any balls, they would pass a law taking CAFE out of the hands of the EPA, but as we saw this week, Congress has been emasculated.
Experiment indeed. Whenever I used to see one around Austin with CA plates, I wondered about the logistics of driving one across country, but then I learned about the car hauling companies and advance reservation covered parking spots at Austin-Bergstrom catering to the 1% — not exactly enviro-friendly, but with that crowd it is always “do as we say, not as we do”.
Camry. Try comparing to a new loaded Corolla. The back seat has more leg room than a Camry or an Accord IIRC. Compare that to the back seat of a Tesla.
Won’t be long now before Fremont is building Corollas again. 🙂
BTW, if your wife gets a new Toyota, make sure to have the “delivery” nerd turn off the Lane Departure Assist (LDA) before you leave the dealer lot. Oh, God, is that “feature” awful. Fortunately, LDA along with the collision avoidance “enhancement” of cruise control are optional … for now.
And be aware that turning everything off in the LDA setup menu is not the same as turning off LDA. Make sure you and your wife both know which dash icon indicates it is active and which button on the steering wheel truly turns LDA off.
Beyond the tech annoyances, I dig the new vehicle. Sadly, it still only has 70 miles on the odometer since I have to work at the company’s test range in Taylor through the end of next week. The experience of the last few weeks out there has me cleaning up my resume tonight.
There is a respiratory disease, cold or flu, floating around Dallas. Takes 2 or 3 weeks to get over. I hope that it does not come down here.
One of the guys in my group keeps calling in sick or working from home.
I’m not sure if he’s really sick or interviewing. The way things have been going at work lately, the latter is definitely possible.
Meatspace baby…. or at least some civic engagement. AKA board meeting to vote for the new board and answer some questions at the Rec Assn. Followed by some work there on one of my many projects.
And guess what jumped the queue? Wife’s van wouldn’t start. I moved it from the driveway and it was slow to turn over, but I thought I was imagining that. SHE tried to move it back and it wouldn’t start. 3yo battery and no start = Costco run. New battery is purchased and installed. Old battery is honda, only 39 months on a 100 month battery. Hopefully we can get something out of honda for the failure, but I couldn’t wait for the dealer to be open. Mama has to get to work in the morning.
My grocery run was delayed this week so I had to go out for basics. Turns out Tbone steaks were on sale for $4.74 / lb. 15 pounds jumped into my cart. Pork butt was $1 so 10 pounds of sausage meat jumped in too. Weirdo cookies were in the clearance bin, so … yup, and they are really tasty!
Jeez, now I won’t have anything to talk about tomorrow…..
n
Tomorrow you can talk about the belly ache after the cookies jumped into your daughters’ stomachs.
Finished painting the front porch columns today. Started yesterday. Got them cleaned up, then masked off after drying. Lowe’s paint did not match the paint sample. Not even close. This was the second time returning a miscolored paint.
Took a piece of trim off the house and took it to the local Sherwin Williams store. Matched it perfectly. Put that on the columns this morning, and then cleaned up. Pain in the neck, but the end result is worth it. Only other thing that’s needs paining is the two back porch doors. May hit those next weekend.
Every project take twice as long as you think. And the older I get, they take even longer…
By weirdo cookies, I mean, Hatch chili and sweet lime…. the kids won’t eat ‘spicy’ foods at all. They think mashed potatoes are spicy.
n
Ah. I thought you meant strange shapes or “funny” icing patterns that weren’t popular.
-eyes rolling- Tell me about it. My chili, curry stir-fry, some breads*, and some other foods have been annoying mild for the past seven years or so. Not all the time, but my daughter greatly prefers my cooking to her mother’s or grandmother’s and I hate to cook something she’d otherwise eat but is too spicy for her. And adding the spice to my portion afterward doesn’t come out the same. And I’m far too lazy to make a small, mild batch for her and a large, spicy batch for myself. (And on the rare occasion when I overcome the laziness, the containers get mixed up** with the result that there’s a little girl running through the house, screaming and crying and flapping her arms.)
* eg, a loaf of mostly white bread with shredded coconut, raisins, and curry powder. Or another style which uses creamed corn, cilantro, and diced jalepeno.
** By the thousand-year-old granny. It happened only once, but it resulted in a very upset kid. And no videos or even pictures that we could put on the internet.
Babies are poop factories and little girls are noise factories. For something so small, they have an oversized audibility factor!
n
Old battery is honda, only 39 months on a 100 month battery. Hopefully we can get something out of honda for the failure, but I couldn’t wait for the dealer to be open. Mama has to get to work in the morning.
I’ve never seen a sealed “maintenance free” car battery in the South last more than three years. Like clockwork. I just keep tools in my car, ready to go, waiting for when that first slow start happens.
If you bought the Honda new, they might do something for you, but batteries are a consumable. Pro rated refund is the best you can hope for; I’d like to be wrong.
Honda had a lot of transmission issues related to early 00s cars, including Acuras, and they kept a lid on the publicity by taking care of loyal new buyers. Even used buyers got parts covered in a lot of cases. Squeaky wheel.
Wheel see….
n
WARNING: (Semi)Nudity!
Nick Scipio doubles-down from yesterday
Wonder why the comments are closed? 🙂
Nick Scipio suffers from penis envy and doesn’t want anyone pointing out that he obviously comes up short. His overcompensation for his desire but inability to rape women is pathetic to behold, as is his desire for taxpayer-funded elective medical care — there’s no way he can pay for surgery to get up to a full two inches, so he needs everyone else to pay for him.
the demand for a free good is infinite…. unless it’s sausage rides.
n
Those boobs are so fake and the bod too skinny. I like a little cushion.