Yesterday ended up nice with a strong breeze and overcast after 10am. Never did get the forecast rain, which made me happy.
Today is supposed to be clear. I guess we’ll see.
And I’ll see how late the kids and my back will let me sleep. Standing on concrete all day is hard on knees and back. I ached last night. I expect to ache today.
Getting old is not for the weak.
n
Awake and gimping around. 64F.
One foot and one knee are hurting like crazy. Back is sore too.
Dang.
n
Another side effect, since I spent the day talking, and calling out like a carnival barker, today my voice is abnormally deep. I’m singing the Grinch song to the kids, possibly lower than the original. Today, I have the voice for FM radio….
n
(and the face)
lets not forget the flooding in the central US
From FEMA:
Flooding – Central U.S.
Current Situation
Flooding concerns continue for the Missouri River basin. Portions of the Upper Mississippi
River and Missouri River will continue to crest in some areas and recede in others.
Lifeline Impacts
Safety and Security:
• Many federal levees have overtopped or breached along 200 miles of river from Omaha,
NE to Leavenworth, KS; mostly agricultural land
• 8 levees have overtopped or breached; 3 levees were forecast to overtop, 8 levees are
projected to have less than 2 feet of freeboard; mostly agricultural land with minimal
impacts to homes and businesses except for MRLS 471-460 which could affect the cities
of Elwood and Wathena, Highway 36, and Rosecrans airport north of Elwood, KS
(USACE NWD; Region VII Incident Report)
Food, Water, and Sheltering:
• IA: Mandatory and voluntary evacuations continue for portions of Freemont, Iowa, Mills,
Pottawattamie, Sioux, and Woodbury counties (combined pop. 268k, but number of
evacuated residents is unknown)
• Portions of St. Joseph, MO, Elwood, KS, and Wathena, KS along the Missouri River
under voluntary evacuations (combined pop. 79k)
• Shelters:
o KS: 1 open with 20 occupants
o NE: 8 open with 268 (-49) occupants
o IA: 4 open with 41 (-1) occupants
o MO: 2 open with 18 (+6) occupants (Region VII SLB)
Communications:
• NE: U.S. Cellular tower in Dannebrog site is down; 4 AT&T cell towers are offline by the
Missouri River; all 911 call centers are operational
Transportation:
• Multiple roads and bridges are closed; detours in place
• US-50 closed at KS/MO state line, alternate routes available
• NE: 81 highways affected, 15 bridges significantly damaged; total of 2,041 miles
impacted, over 1,500 miles re-opened, 381 miles of state highways still closed
This is a regional and for some very personal disaster.
n
John Wilder, who had become one of my favorite new blog voices, sums it up tidily in this post.
https://wilderwealthywise.com/how-the-constitution-dies/
He captures and distills thoughts I’ve had and puts them both plainly and compellingly.
RTWT
n
This crystallizes some of the ideas too, although you might want to avoid the comments…
emph added
n
Hamfest netted out at about $1000 profit. Long day but moved a bunch of stuff and made money.
Not ‘send the kids to USC’ money, but money is money and that will more than pay for the radios I’m keeping.
Oh, on Friday I took 210 pounds of assorted scrap to the dealer for $33 so that paid for gas and got rid of more stuff.
n
Made a raised garden bed this weekend. 12’x4’x15”. All cedar and lined with weed blocker fabric. Took a few trips to Lowe’s to haul the bags of dirt and compost/manure to fill it. Luckily Lowe’s is 4 miles away. The wife is the Gardner, and this doubles her current production area. I have room to build another if it comes to that. This summer I will probably build a compost bin. I had one at our previous house, and eight the bigger garden, we will have enough organic waste to make it worth the effort now.
“Does Windows 10’s Security Boost Make Antivirus Obsolete?”
https://www.pcmag.com/article/356835/does-windows-10s-security-boost-make-antivirus-obsolete
“Microsoft Windows Defender Security Center gets new features with the Fall Creators Update, but the best third-party antivirus tools are still better.”
Windows security got to be ‘good enough’ for me years ago. The performance hit from AV/malware/site checker 3rd party got to be too high, vs the integrated and stable MS defender service.
n
“Does Windows 10’s Security Boost Make Antivirus Obsolete?”
Don’t surf porn or illegal movie/software downloads and you’ll be fine with the built in antivirus and firewall. Use Linux if you’re going to mess with that stuff, and wipe/reinstall the hard drive frequently.
I saw Cory Doctorow speak before heading out for the airport today. He thinks deeper than most Progs and made a number of good points, but he name dropped the Green New Deal so I’ll put him in the camp of lefties who want to have sex with Ocasio-Cortez until I hear otherwise.
Got signed copies of “Makers” and “Down And Out In The Magic Kingdom” yesterday. I don’t have a problem separating the art from the politics of the artist. Both are downloadable from Doctorow’s web site, craphound.com. Highly recommended, especially if you are a Disney fan.
(Doctorow talked about working for Disney while he signed my books.)
Ironically, Doctorow confirmed plans to visit Vantucky this week. To those unfamiliar with the area, I always describe the I-5 corridor between Portland and Seattle as a near future dystopia out of a Stephenson or Doctorow book.
Got signed copies of “Makers” and “Down And Out In The Magic Kingdom” yesterday. I don’t have a problem separating the art from the politics of the artist. Both are downloadable from Doctorow’s web site, http://www.craphound.com. Highly recommended, especially if you are a Disney fan.
(Doctorow talked about working for Disney while he signed my books.)
Doctorow worked for Disney while he wrote “Makers” ??? No freaking way ! That is such a dystopic view of the USA with Disney as a horrible corporation.
https://www.amazon.com/Makers-Cory-Doctorow/dp/0765312816/?tag=ttgnet-20
Here is my 4 out of 5 star review of “Makers”: “A singular book, no prequel, no sequel. I read the very nice trade paperback version. The cover is most unique with a picture of thousands of used computer keyboards with dollar bills sprinkled throughout.”
“After the second blowout of the dotcoms and the bankruptcy of Walmart, a couple of guys start the New Work movement repurposing old electronics such as the Linux / Atom powered Boogie Woogie Elmo dolls.”
“I cannot decide if this is a dystopian novel or not. I believe that it is but, only a small portion of society is presented to the reader. Doctorow has special criticisms for many segments of society such as the TSA, Disney, and the fatkins people.”
“You can read the book for free online as Cory Doctorow believes that everything should be free also.”
http://www.craphound.com/makers/download/
Doctorow worked for Disney while he wrote “Makers” ??? No freaking way ! That is such a dystopic view of the USA with Disney as a horrible corporation.
He claimed that he worked for Disney Imagineering at some time in the past. Time frame was nebulous.
“MAXINE MELTDOWN: ‘This is not the end of anything!’”
http://www.theamericanmirror.com/maxine-meltdown-this-is-not-the-end-of-anything/
TDS (Trump Derangement Syndrome) to the max. She needs to talk with somebody who can help her mental issues.
Hat tip to:
https://drudgereport.com/
Just back from softball. Coach made a comment at the end of his closing chat with the kids about ‘pretend you are going to the white house.’ on of the 8yo girls said “Ewww, I don’t want to go to the White House, I hate Donald Trump.” Both coaches chuckled, one of the other little girls says ‘yeah, he’s a racist’. Which got more smiles and chuckles. This is one of the guys who thinks spending $800 on a 10 yo kid’s sports equipment is the minimum he could do. Probably thinks he’ll be running things in the socialist worker’s paradise. If it wouldn’t be taken as a threat, I’d have pointed out to him that there are guys training every weekend with live ammo to be sure that won’t happen.
n
Hmmm, I can legitimately claim to have worked FOR Disney Imagineering in the past too. They hired us to mock up a dark ride. Doesn’t mean I was an Imagineer. I don’t claim it that way because it feels like stolen valor….
For that matter, I’ve got LOTS of work FOR Disney on my resume’. It’s all just thru other companies. You can see my work in Disney Stores, at Disneyland, and in other places where it might still be around too.
n
added- lots of decor at Legoland in Cali, and a whole stage show at Universal Studios in LA too.
MAGA!
tRump 2020! “a Rooskie in every pot”
Hmmm, I can legitimately claim to have worked FOR Disney Imagineering in the past too.
I’ll let it slide. I’m just glad that we didn’t have the Trump news prior to 10:45 this morning when Doctorow took the stage.
He has to go to Vantucky this week and pretend to like the place. I wouldn’t wish that on anyone.
he might have done all kinds of things and be legit, but if he’s cagey about it, it’s probably not as much as he implies.
Don’t think I’ve ever read him, although I’m familiar with him as a tech culture figure.
n
Well, most of the symptoms of my cold have receded. Yesterday was fine all day. One nostril is clear. Occasionally blowing produces 2 or 3 kleenex worth of really sticky mess. Brain fog is mostly clear. Occasional productive coughing. I really think the airborne works. Don’t particularly care about the mechanism, as long as the nastiness abates in a few fewer days.
n
he might have done all kinds of things and be legit, but if he’s cagey about it, it’s probably not as much as he implies.
Don’t think I’ve ever read him, although I’m familiar with him as a tech culture figure.
Doctorow is involved with EFF. Among other issues discussed this morning, he supports breaking up Facecrack, separating WhatsApp and Instagram, arguing that the acquisitions never should have been allowed in the first place.
Where he kinda went off the rails on that one with me was pinning the blame for Facebook’s dysfunction on Zuckerberg’s venality and nothing for the “Lean In” twit.
“Lean In” is another off limits lefty woman, immune from criticism. Disney dodged a bullet; Sandberg would have ruined the company.
Free speech, like almost all idealized Western credos, is racial in provenance.
Hmmm…I disagree. My experience with well-integrated individuals is that there is no difference. It’s culture. People of different races who have been born and raised here, with families having arrived at least 2 generations back – they/we all share the same Western values, as far as I can tell.
My objection to mass immigration is that we are importing not only a bunch of individual people, but also their culture. And their culture is, almost by definition, incompatible with Western values – else they wouldn’t be so desperate to come here. Take too many immigrants, and they will form a subculture that will fail to integrate. If 71% of Silicon Valley tech workers are foreign born, that’s far, far too many.
– – – – –
Don’t surf porn or illegal movie/software downloads and you’ll be fine with the built in antivirus and firewall. Use Linux if you’re going to mess with that stuff, and wipe/reinstall the hard drive frequently.
Use Linux, and – if only for one’s own sanity – install uBlock Origin *and* Ghostery. The lack of obnoxious ads and trackers makes life ever so much more pleasant.
Since Steam’s support for games on Linux is now so good, my last excuse for using Windows pretty much evaporated. The only other reason I can imagine are PDF forms that really require Adobe Reader – but I haven’t run into one of those in a while…
– – – – –
Glad to see that the Mueller report is finally done. And that it turned out to be much ado about nothing, as anyone with a couple of working neurons should have expected.
I do hope they will release the whole enchilada, and not just the summary?