The Ice Cream Diet - now for the Lactose Intolerant

Your love is like   the lady who keeps her dead pets around

• You tell me: Hollywood's best rug - Chuck Norris or Ben Aflac  ?

Today I identify as  I sure picked a bad week to identify as Elon Musk

I still haven't figured out which vacation days I'm taking by the end of the year. Last year I wound up taking  off most of December, which produced the Forced Vacation series of blogs. I'd really like to avoid that this year. I don't want to be an ass to my coworkers (or my readers). Come to think of it, they don't always treat me so well (the coworkers, mostly). Although I do remember coming to work and discovering a large cucumber on my desk. It was definitely the first time that happened. Fortunately it hasn't happened since, as I work from home. I'm not sure I'd like what Wife was trying to tell me if it did.

I know you're reading this because you're incredibly curious about my laptop situation.

The first laptop developed a bad display connection and a bad delay when anything is typed or clicked.

The backup laptop, a 10 year old Cadillac that still runs great, has been a pleasure to use. Until I remembered why I needed a new one: it got hot, the display freaked out, and the laptop froze, requiring a reboot. This put a real damper on doing anything, because I never knew when the laptop would seize. While this would be an actual blessing for work, I kinda needed it to stay powered up.

Now I'm getting desperate. There's an android tablet somewhere. The charge barely lasts long enough to sit and surf. Oh wait... there's an even older laptop. It works, which is the best thing I can say about it. I am afraid to boot it up because the display will break within an hour. I seem to have this effect on displays. If I could get paid for this, I'd be rich! But it seems about as useful a talent as being able to destroy trashcans. Now if I could stop ear hair from growing...

The thing I forgot about the last laptop is that it's a 32 bit processor. All current processors are 64 bits. I am as far as I can go with the operating system (a few years ago) and many browsers won't run on it. At least the display isn't broken (yet).

A Chromebook is inevitable. I might as well give Google the rest of the information they don't have about me, if there is any. Maybe my tiny android phone. Or 2 semi-broken tablets. I should use 1 of them for work - it tries to boot, fails, then goes into a loop. A long time ago, I used to be able to destroy hard drives by simply using them. My buddy suggested a custom plate for my car  NOMO HD. My skill went into hibernation for 30 years and morphed into Display Destruction. NOMO VID?

“You can’t win an unwinnable war. DEA knows this and the agents know this,” Irizarry said. “There’s so much dope leaving Colombia. And there’s so much money. We know we’re not making a difference.”

“The drug war is a game. ... It was a very fun game that we were playing.”

--Jose Irizarry - the DEA's most corrupt agent

It's a great article, but the above is a perfect summary of the drug war.



Enjoying the hell out of half of our weather. One day it's over 70, the next it's under 50, with a frost warning for the evening. This is somewhat aggravated by the industrial size fan in the bedroom. One of us, I can't say which but she has boobs, has to have fresh air, so the fan runs. Even in sub-Arctic temperatures. I suggested she sleep next to an open window, but she said "No - it's cold outside."

Speaking of sleeping, the dog's getting clingier. This morning we were back to back.  I'm not sure how I feel about that. I know I'm upset because I didn't notice it when it was happening. She has also taken to licking my pillow. Nobody knows why, but she's a cocker and that's perfectly normal. She also tried to drink all my coffee this morning. That's 4 cockers who loved coffee.  Mrs. lefty, bless her, tries to keep Dog from bothering me when they get into bed after me. It fails 100% of the time, but she tries. First the dog has to jump on me and lick my forehead. Only mine, no one else's. Then squiggle around for a few minutes. Then lick my face. Then lick my pillow. Wife apparently doesn't understand these are things Dog must do. I am told one of them would stand on my chest, turn around a few times, then lay down and go to sleep. I was completely unaware of this and continued sleeping. This makes me wonder what else goes on while I'm sleeping... I used to wake up with a sore.... never mind.

Aqara’s new smart feeder can give your pet control of its bowl

Because nobody knows when they want to eat better than your pet.

Except the kid who hacked your IoT network. 

It's not that I really like these sweet potato chips, but if your fingers get close to the bag, they might not come back whole. It's even worse with the sweet potato tater tots. It's like dessert with dinner.

• There is simply nothing for breakfast like coffee, Mt Dew, and bacon pizza.

Starbucks store-bought caramel macchiato creamer is better than Starbucks anywhere-bought coffee.  It's only $17.99 at CostCo, the only creamer in the entire store. Shit is gettin' real out there, people.

The first cubesat to fly and operate at the Moon has successfully arrived

"That is a huge, huge step for the agency."

• NASA wishes to apologize for the press release. One of their more dyslexic people in Marketing thought it said NASA, when it actually said NSA. 

The actual NSA press release said:

"That is a huge, huge step for the agency. With this multi-billion dollar small piece of hardware, we can be assured that nothing happens on the Moon without our knowledge. It's our Moon - nobody else's. Nyah nyah. Suck it, China."

 

• In completely unrelated news, one of NASA's marketing team has been promoted to CEO.

It's quiet in the house.

This might be due to my spending a few quiet hours with the computers, trying to do simple things.

The neighbors have called in their Rottweilers. There are no children out within 3 blocks. My wife, who has spent over 20 years perfecting the art of ignoring me, has taken the dog and gone to bed. This is all out of SHEER TERROR. Because normal people can do things and they get done and work perfectly. But I'm not normal. No sir. The art of getting email on a backup laptop that used to get email anyway, is such a fine balance that young children can do it with their eyes closed. I am not a young child. In fact, I am an advanced child. Of course I know every step and credential. It just won't work. Before you look at me like an idiot (I prefer you to look at me as a very sarcastic, yet entertaining, occasional smart guy), I copied each email account line by line, password by password and it WILL NOT WORK.

I'm beginning to think this has something to do with my not drinking. 

I have to admit, we're giving it our best try, but it never occurs to us to drink mid-day or at work. 

Perhaps if I got smashed, I wouldn't have any of the grief I encounter, almost as if it were perfectly normal. I gotta say, the idea of going through days just fine, without trouble, appeals to me greatly. Being able to add email accounts to laptops, with the same passwords and it Just Works. It might be worth my liver for that.

It was going kinda fine until the mail arrived. The state wants to extort $500+ from me over the car situation, only we're not sure why, because we already paid an exorbitant amount for the ransom. The DMV was set up by criminals in order to funnel private money to the state. There is NO reason to register your car. There is no reason to get tickets because you forgot to put your insurance card in the car. It's legalized robbery. This is another reason I'm a libertarian. This large bit of extortion made me start to think that practicing drinking should start earlier in the day.

THEN I figured why not put email on the last laptop functioning, as I could look right at a previously-functioning laptop to make things easier. This was my first error. And my second one. 

Email Acct 1

put in password

server says NFW, ha!

Website lets me log in and before going to email, tells me I have a ridiculous balance owed and they're charging me FEES on top of it. Hang on a minute, dingbats... if you have my payment information and the account is set to auto-pay, WHOSE fault it is you don't have the money?

Put password in.

server actually laughs.

Gmail account

put in password

server says NO.

I retype password

server says NO, you fool, then takes me to the web page.

I sign in and it tells me I don't have cookies enabled.

That's correct: the cookies are in the other room and don't start til after dinner.

But I figure I'll play - I used another browser, with cookies.

Gmail said UH-UH, don't even THINK about it.

Have you ever had to go through a sophisticated multi-account email program to find how to turn cookies on? Ok, so maybe you have.

Once again it took me to Gmail's login page, and I approved myself.

As I sign out, the error message stated 'error logging in.' Of COURSE there was an error after the page told me everything was ok. 

Email acct 3

Enter same password as on other machines.

Server say NO, I'm not going to make it that easy on you.

Oh. Perhaps drinking IS the answer.

It's a very long password, which I kept having to copy from another screen. Repeatedly.

Server still say NO.

Alrighty, then. Three email accounts, ZERO of which I've gotten working on the old machine.

Honestly, I ran very large, very expensive networks, and kept them free of intruders. No problem.

Try setting up laptop email? Problem.

Then I started figuring stuff out.

Account 1 requires you to go to their web page, login, and tell it that it's ok to get your mail.

Account 2 requires you to go to their web page, login, and do a short dance. Being bereft of rhythm, this is the most difficult part of email.

Account 3 requires you to find the people running the server, login, then shove all the not-working laptops so far up their backsides, they cough megabytes.

The last little trick was discovered by mistake, like all those neat explosive things. When you put your password into the email program, do NOT tell it to remember the passwords. This is stupid, counterintuitive, wrong, and the final strike against remaining sober for the day. And in the end, none of it was my fault, so I feel a little less mentally-impaired.

The funny thing is that my typing improves as I drink.