We're Going to Need Something Else to PANIC About

Making the worst of a horrible situation

Talking to friends, I realized what kind of shape we're in: financially, without hope, and looking for some tiny bit of... something... to make life tolerable.
In a nod to positivity, we've said the following:

• The car overheated. It only cost $250 to fix!!!
• The dog got sick. The vet bill was only $375 WITH blood work!
• I opened the curtain and there was only 95% cloud coverage. There was even a tiny spot on the sidewalk that looked like it might start drying...
• I put my frozen dinner in the microwave. Yes, it came out black, but I finally figured out how to set the power level!
• Only 4 of my friends died of coronavirus!
• My retirement account only lost 25% during the Great Coronavirus Panic of 2020!
• the dog only got half of the thanksgiving turkey!

It's kinda sad when this is what we're excited about.

Although it does speak to the resilience of the human spirit...

Please comment with yours.

• Things that are certain in life: death, taxes, and rain on the night the trash has to go out and/or when the bins have to come back. I kid you not.

We continue with news of The Great Coronavirus PANIC of 2020
Today's report is brought to you by Mrs lefty, woman on the street:
It's really dead out there.
Thank you, Mrs lefty.

A brief call to several local businesses had entire malls closed and entire malls open. Restaurants were open, but I wasn't allowed to go outside to visit them. Every website had the same disclaimer:

UPDATE ON COVID-19

We apologize for coronavirus and for being a business and for being open, because our families have to eat too. We want you to know we have taken every precaution to keep our customers and employees safe. If an employee feels sick or has vomited up his intestines, he can get a note from his doctor and miss work that day. He won't be paid, though.

We have engaged the services of the best cleaners in the entire state. They show up in a nuclear green pretty serious-looking truck. They all wear hazmat suits and carry bottles that have 'Coronavirus Eradicator' written on them, in crayon.

I'm not kidding... they all say something to this effect. Ok, they don't say nuclear green - that was.... what's that thing called? Poetic license.

Wait, we have a bulletin from Mrs lefty:
Mrs lefty, I understand you were out checking on your mother in law today.
Yes, lefty, I was.
And how was she.
Well, lefty, she was in a panic.
Why is that?
She didn't have any bottled water.
A quick check on her yesterday revealed 6 one gallon jugs of water under the sink.
Exactly, lefty, but that's not enough for her. She drinks water, you know.
6 gallons?
No, but she wants to have it there just in case.
Good thing she doesn't need any toilet paper.
Heh heh heh, lefty. Back to you in the studio...



All of the past and current democratic primary candidates released a statement, blaming President Trump for the virus.

They were going to blame Hillary Clinton, but changed their plans when they started to disappear, one at a time. The coroner reported that they all committed suicide while handcuffed, shooting themselves twice in the back of the head, then hiding the gun.

• Know who's suffering the worst from The Virus?
• Hypochondriacs - the people who always think they're sick. They're feeling left out (and sick, of course) and are jamming emergency rooms across the country.
• The National Guard has been mobilized, and have been authorized to shoot these people

Governor Andrew Cuomo (D-Uranus) is pleading with the president to mobilize the military to fight coronavirus. Do you want to explain it to him or should I?

In an attempt to stop a Hawaiian lava flow, the army bombed it in 1935.
WTF is wrong with us? We also bombed the Moon. There are other options... we don't have to bomb everything we see.

• Everybody could use a little more cash. Since I don't make anything from blogging, I do what I can. I stand out on a corner, selling toilet paper and hand sanitizer. Mrs lefty ho's me out and calls me 'her main bitch,' whatever that means. She said if I do over $5,500, I get my own corner. If I do under $5,500, I take a beatin'.

A spokesman for Hollywood said that they are losing $20 billion, more or less, each weekend. As a result, Meryl Streep, Robert DeNiro, and Rob Reiner have released a statement, blaming Trump personally for the virus.



Things are pretty good at the lefty mansion.
Mrs lefty lets me out every 6-8 weeks (whether I want to or not).
But now that she's keeping me indoors because of the Flying AIDS, I suddenly want to go out. Why is that?  Maybe if I get her to tell me we're going out, I will calm down and go back to sleep in the basement.

• What do you have when you find an open pie container, with most of the pie hollowed out but not the crust, and a spoon in the middle?
• Kids

Israel takes step toward monitoring phones of virus patients.
Monitoring? We call that spying when the CIA/FBI/NSA does it.
Now is the time to watch carefully. See what goes on with restrictions and official reactions. Don't let it bog you down - just notice it.
Israel has some technology - they also use it to spy on us.

In his address, Netanyahu acknowledged the technology had never been used on civilians. But he said the unprecedented health threat posed by the virus justified its use. 

In the US, this would be largely the same, except it would be 'for the children.'




Today I identify as  Dolly Parton



List of Free Software and Services During Coronavirus Outbreak

• Creepiest headline: What is a smart diaper and how does it work

In case you slipped and clicked the MS Edge browser icon...it's also sending serious data back to MS. Win 10 wasn't enough...

• Apple bans COVID-19 games.
• what an odd little company

Next time you complain about your period, remember MRKH Syndrome: the girl that was born without a vagina. Not kidding and not giggling.

• Data of millions of eBay and Amazon shoppers exposed
• Haven't we had enough of this? It's the same cause every time..

If you've got a few million to burn, check out McClaren's ELVA - it has no windshield.   For that price, it should sexually gratify you too.

• Now that we're all working from home, let me give you my first tip
• turn off... ummmm... anything you might be watching... when the boss calls.

Please use birth control - you don't want your kids to be known as coronavirus babies

Luscious Pole Licking in Summer

Our good friend, AOC, says facial recognition is nasty.
You cannot argue with the truth.
And even a broken clock is right twice a day

The many faces of AOC

I'm sorry - sometimes the intra-cranial pressure builds up...

if Trump doesn't win in 2020, I'll have nothing to do!

let me guess - I left home without my makeup again. 

this is my lovey-dovey face, for my honey.

Don't tell them I'm only a little pissed today.

if I have to tell you one more time....

Hillary taught me to eat babies. Do you really want that on your conscience?

They caught me smiling. I'm ruined! They cannot know I'm actually pretty.

you take-uh da cheese, you put it onna capicola - capeesh?

I will not smile. I will not smile...

I see you taking this picture and I will kill you in your sleep

They're not watching.. I can rest my face now...

Good morning, people. I love you all.

• It's 23 outside. With the Wind Chill Factor, it's 15.
• Yearly rant: WTF is this - a new method of making you feel worse in the winter? 23 isn't cold enough, no sir, it's 15.  In Alaska, when it's zero degrees, the Wind Chill Factor says it's -40. 
• And they're wrong most of the time.

Remember the GirlsDoPorn scandal I wrote about a week back?
The website just went offline.
The owner fled to New Zealand and is still there.
He's also charged with child porn, after flying a 16 year old to California.

Today's item to ponder: is child porn with a 16 year old the same as child porn with a 5 year old? They're both illegal, as they should be, but is it the same thing?

• Ya know those beeps in astronaut audio? They're there for a reason.

Remember that Major League Baseball regulations prohibit the use of electronic equipment... ??

This only applies to you. They can and are using it against you.

• Dear Ebay: when I do a search for lefty guitars, "other things you might be interested in" probably shouldn't include righty guitars. Just a thought.

"Richard Nixon got kicked out of Washington for tapping one hotel suite. Today we're tapping every American citizen in the country, and no one has been put on trial for it or even investigated. We don't even have an inquiry into it." - Edward Snowden

• US Congresswoman reveals alopecia diagnosis
• That brave, courageous woman, telling the world she has hair loss.
• I told everybody about Male Pattern Baldness years ago.

IT NEWS
I'm (almost) sorry about including IT news today, but it's relevant to all readers.

With a spare 3 minutes, I decided to have a computer race: Win 10 laptop against linux laptop. It wasn't exactly fair... the Win laptop was brand new, with 16G RAM and current i7 snappy processor; the linux laptop was well over 6 years old, with 8G RAM and an obviously much slower processor. They would both boot from power off.

Off the line, linux in first, entering the first turn. Win10 coming up on the left. Coming up to the 2nd turn, we have definite activity, with the brand new Win10 machine having something on the screen. Turn 3 and we've selected which boot system we'd like on linux. Ladies and gentlemen, at the finish line, it's linux, reading its email, while the Win10 machine has yet to even put up one of its goofy pictures or a login prompt. Linux is drinking its coffee, when it's interrupted by a Win10 login prompt. This is exactly how it happened, except I drank the coffee, not the laptop.

New facial database used by the police. It's beyond creepy and disgusting.


Google and Microsoft weigh in on facial recognition technology and laws concerning it. Strangely enough, Google is finally on the right side of something. Microsoft, naturally, is on the wrong side.

• Apple is genuinely concerned about your privacy. Except if the FBI asks.

Over 1,000 devices went missing from London councils last year.
Now for some Real News<tm>: prosecutions of people who say 'fuck' and use 'racial language' are up! Prosecutions of people who say bad things online are also up. 1,337 people a week are thrown in the pokey, the most ever, for saying, "Not tea - I'll have coffee, please."


The final Win 7 update includes black wallpaper on some systems.
Good thing I'm not at my last job... I'd have the entire team spending the entire day changing backgrounds. The ticket system would die from volume alone. You'd think the entire company had gone down. The FBI would be brought in to investigate this cyberhack.

• Why Win 7 users should switch to linux
• they list some good reasons...
• Win 10 should have started a stampede to other OSes

Above is a positive.
Now here's my negative: the announcement that Xubuntu 20.04 will include a dark theme. Absent actual vision problems, this is what we have as an announcement? Not 'it's faster and safer?'  We, as people, are way too focused on looks and blinky lights. In the earlier days of cell phones, there was great excitement over the ability to put a different startup automation on your phone.

Related: watch car commercials (like you have a choice). Very little about the actual car. Very much about the colors, On-Star or similar systems, how many cameras in it, and how you can make the driver's side door open with just your genitals. This bothers me (like most things).


Small Business Matters: Boeing seeks $10 billion in loans as 737 MAX crisis continues.  Good thing they have those huge military contracts....

But WAIT!  If you lend now, you get up to the minute news of 737 MAX issues, of which they just found another....



Today's Game: you're running for president. Your slogan is [name] 2020: [last thing you said to your dog]. I'll start..

lefty 2020: Ok, stay in bed with your mommy


It's 7am. Mrs lefty is in the bathroom, Penny is demonstrating her "I HAVE TO GO OUTSIDE" dance. Then she tries it on me. Being a dog, she's not entirely talkative, but she jumps up a lot when she wants something. No problem, I'll take her out. Penny, let's go outside.  PENNY - OUTSIDE (both of us). Finally get her to the door and she turns and runs. Apparently I don't take her out well enough. Mom leaves the house. An hour later, Penny appears, telling me she wants something. Yes, she wants to go outside. This time I'll be sufficient to let her out. An hour after we first asked.

I get my validation from the dog.


Speaking of dog, when her mommy got back home, she went out back to smoke. Penny did her traditional thing: came running to me, insistent on me taking her to find mommy. Penny fails completely in the recognition that I might be doing something. So she walks in on me and sits down, waiting for me to say something. Whoever had her before us (she was a stray) must've gone over manners with her.. if I don't see her, she hops up and gently touches my leg with her nose. Then she does it 4 more times until I do what she wants. She sits there, looking at me with those huge, sad brown eyes, deliberately being a spaniel.

When mom comes back and goes into the bathroom, she stands at the bathroom door and whines. But she whines softly.  It's definitely the house - she wasn't like that when she first got here. The house turns cockers neurotic. Yeah, that's it - it's the house.



People can be identified by the way they dance.
Kill me now.
Mood, level of empathy, how extroverted or neurotic can point to identification.

Every election cycle I get asked to participate in “get out the vote” public service announcements. But I figure if a TV game show host has to convince people to vote, they probably shouldn’t.   - Pat Sajak

Heroes of the Stupid

• PornHub sued by deaf man over lack of closed captioning in videos
• Woman: ooooh. yeah. baby.  Man: mrnmmmmph  Woman: ooooh. yeah. baby.  Man: I'm gonna explode   Woman: ooooh. yeah. baby.

SJW Symptoms  

Trinity College removes ad for 'Campus Reform Early Responder'
They wanted someone to monitor a 'right wing' website. Job ad pulled.





I saw this absolutely bizarre, hysterical show on public television. I was glued.
Some guy was standing there in a dress, and some other guy was on his knees, looking up the dress.

The dress was a kilt.
The show was Monty Python's Flying Circus.
I was young.
I was hooked.
Every week I had to wait for the night Python was on.
It was the Most Important Thing Ever, for most of my life. It completely corrupted my sense of humor, rendering me an honorary Brit and forcing me to seek out other British comedy.
I met other, similarly smitten, people who agreed: Life is Python - Python is life. No, we weren't deranged fanboys - we just noticed how inappropriate they were and used Python Quotes a lot. To this day, I still speak in Python. We all saw the movies when they came out. We bought anything Python. I have a t-shirt from the final live appearance at the 02 Center in England. We saw John Cleese a few months back.

We were sad when Graham Chapman died.
We are now sad that Terry Jones (77) died (of a rare dementia that first took his speech). The other Pythons are more worried than a parrot going to a pet shop in Ipswitch.

There is some bad footage of Graham Chapman's funeral that's really funny - an appropriate sendoff. Maybe there will be some Terry Jones footage too.

This dying stuff has to stop.

The 2020 Prolapse Awards Are Here!

There are way too many videos online.
Most of them are ill-advised.
You can talk at them and tell them and advise them, but POOF - up they go.
Learn from these misguided ballfaces.
Ask yourself one question: "Will I be proud of this when I'm somebody's grandparent?"

So, kids, take your penis out of that woman (or man), put it back in your pants, and sing or something. That will be a lot less difficult to explain to the grandkids than sodomy. If you don't care, wait 5 years and ask yourself again.


Bob: Bill! Howya doin?
Bill: Oh great, man. How are you?
Bob: Couldn't be better. How's the family?
Bill: Well, Susan's fine. You remember my daughter, Wendy?
Bob: Sure - how's she?
Bill: Great. She's an escort.
Bob: You must be very proud.

And they say *I* have no filters....



It took the better part of a year to figure out the dog's smarter than me.
Penny - wanna go outside?  POOF - to the door.
Penny - let's go nite nite.  POOF - up the steps, into bed.
Penny - wanna go for a ride in the car?  POOF - to the door.
Penny - take out the trash, please - [dumb look]



Oldest material on Earth discovered
Unrelated: Nancy Pelosi strongly objects to her baby rattle on display.

• Cut undersea cable plunges Yemen into days-long internet outage
• Last time there were 2 cut, a letter agency's ships were in the area

The military is building long-range facial recognition that works in the dark.
Of course they are.



Google plans to drop tracking cookie support by 2022.
Since this amounts to shooting themself in the foot, wait for the other shoe to drop.

Verizon offers no-tracking search engine - promises to protect your privacy.
Kick the ball, Charlie Brown.


Want to try linux? Check out Linux Lite  
Should you use linux?

Microsoft's new Edge browser released - what you need to know
Don't use it.



US may subsidize Huawei alternatives with $1.25 billion fund
Oh look - reps and dems came together and it's going to cost you. Every time they come together it's going to cost you. Like the recent budget bill....



European lawmakers want all phones to have same charger
Apple wet its pants laughing.


Bose is closing all of its retail stores in North America, Europe, Japan, and Australia
Requires closing 8 countries and a special adapter for full fidelity




I'm at work, on a conference call. The audio is LOUD, and the volume control won't turn it down. *$(#ing Windows 10, I say to myself. After some examination, I figure it out: Bluetooth managed to connect one machine's audio to another machine's speakers. By itself.



Today I identify as   large crud cottage cheese with anchovies



Alex Winter (Bill and Ted's Great Adventure) has finally finished his documentary on Frank Zappa. Alex had unprecedented access to all the music, interviews, and family documents. This was a labor of love and backed by fans (I contributed to the Kickstarter). It will premiere at the South by Southwest Festival in Austin, Texas. I won't exactly be able to fly there, but can't wait for it to go national.

Speaking of the great Frank Zappa, he often cited Edgar Varese as an influence. I listened to some Varese recently, and there's absolutely no doubt about his influence. This is not the influence that made it to Catholic Girls or Titties and Beer; it's the one that led to what I've heard called 'cartoon music'. Orchestral music plus binging and bonging and percussion. Give him a listen if you like the Zappa stuff.

• Google researchers used neural networks to make weather forecasts
• They had to be more accurate than the guys on tv

The president wants Apple to unlock the phone of a shooter.
Meh- it's only the Constitution.

Dating and fertility apps among those snitching to 'out of control' ad tech

• Text alerts: Time to Fuck!
• Text alerts: Call her, dammit
• ads from diaper companies
• ads for pregnancy tests
• ads for maternity bras
• ads for lacy bras

DING: text message
Welcome to Bob's Health System appointment reminders.

DING: reality
Why yes, I have an appointment, but my welcome did not remind me of it.

• A Komodo dragon destroyed a BBC camera by trying to have sex with it
• You know you're doing it right when your partner can no longer move!

How digital sleuths unravelled the mystery of Iran's plane crash.
Iran had to admit they shot it down. "In error".

• Parasite that makes mice unafraid of cats may quash other fears. 
• Dentist?

Heroes of the Stupid

"Nasal Ranger" nasal smell-amplifier to crack down on marijuana
I keep looking for the April Fools date.  
The war on drugs is a dismal failure. The only people who benefit are the people hired for it, plus the contracts, like above.




SJW Snottiness

Associate dean at University of Illinois came out in defense of mandatory diversity statements in university hiring practices... because "traditional markers of mathematical excellence" get in the way of diversity."

In other words, smart people are disrupting the cause of diversity.

National Women's Underwear Day

Yes, that's right - you heard right - it's National Women's Underwear Day!
Everyone put on some women's underwear and wear it with pride.
C'mon guys - who can honestly say they don't wear women's underwear?

Oh.
Never mind.



If you have an Idevice XS or XR battery case, you could be due a free replacement from Apple.

I broke Giant's handheld scanner system by only buying 2 things.
Never mind the title... it's an app for your phone, that scans items for checkout. This is another privacy nightmare. It connects to store wifi, meaning you're at risk for whatever's going on there. It's on your phone, so it probably accesses things it shouldn't. If nothing else, your purchasing is delightfully passed to the store, not to mention whoever else, like the author of the program and various ad agencies. Look beyond the headline.

Ready to start trying out a different operating system? Tired of Win 10 sending all your information to Microsoft?  Here are the 5 best linux distributions for Win 7 users. They mention Ubuntu, which is my choice. However, I recommend Xubuntu, which is Ubuntu with a more customizeable desktop. With this, you can make your desktop look any way you want, including just like Windows, so you're already familiar with it. All linuxes are the same, with different visual components and updating.

• Mrs lefty is calling her doctor and getting a busy signal. Penny comes in from the back yard, steps on REDIAL, and the doctor's office answers.
• I need to have her around when I have to call someone.

Mrs lefty tunes around tv a lot. Last night she watched The Office.
I was sitting next to her, surfing, and caught parts of it.
To call it cringy is to give it more credit than it deserves. It's smarmy, stupid, unfunny, and so bad, I want to run from the room and hide in the attic during a thunderstorm. Nah - didn't like it.



In national social media news, Cardio B, who just said she's getting citizenship in a different country, is considering US politics. I'm trying to decide if she'd do any better than the installed buggers. Meanwhile, here's a random thought from Cardio:

Artificial Intelligence gains traction because Native Intelligence is scarce.

Dear lefty

• Am I better off going into network security or vertical markets?
• Ask the penguins - they're usually pretty good with advice.

Scientists use stem cells from frogs to build first living robots.
Ok, guys, hop to it!

"I have often wondered why the sounds of the beating drums do not make the marching soldiers shoot their officers and go home." - Albert J. Nock

• How to be anonymous in the age of surveillance
• Warning: contains the word 'Juggalo', but not in a bad way

My 70s progressive rock station played a little gem I haven't heard before. This isn't odd at all, except for this particular little ditty. It isn't often I have to check to make sure I'm not hearing 2 stations at the same time, playing the same song, 1/10 of a second apart. Using the power of multiplicative reasoning, I deduced that the vocals were ok - it was just the music that was completely f'd up. I listened, stunned.

The artist's name is Kevin Ayers. The song is called Lady Rachel.
The title sounds all medieval, about some mythical damsel, locked away in a castle, in a closet, of ancient England's budding first serial killer. It was romantic.

Continuing to be stunned, I listened through the last 30 minutes of the song (I kid - it was only 25 minutes). Counting my blessings that my radio app lists the artist and song, I went off to play Stump YouTube. That failed; there were several different listings for the song, of which I chose the live one.

To say the song is bad is to elevate it to heights it could never dream of attaining. I have to mention that the fellow playing the left handed SG is Ollie Halsall, a formidable player. Kevin is apparently a Big Man on the English music scene. Unfortunately he died in 2013, after which I believe they filmed this clip.

This isn't the exact version I heard, but it will serve to help you understand my distress and question your life choices. As a musician, I wouldn't want anyone to crap on my creation, but as a satirist (or whatever I am), this is a huge red blinking target. The bio states he was a Big Deal, but Wikipedia lets anyone put anything they like into it.

This looked like a band rehearsal. The kids were in 6th grade and their parents were so proud. Kevin had even written his own song(!) and they were practicing it for the Big Show in the school auditorium. Excitement filled the air, as most of them left the basement and ate the cookies that Mom just put out. When they got back to their instruments, they noodled around, as musicians do, each playing some little piece of something they played all the time, guaranteed to piss off the rest of the band. This went on for 20 minutes, after which Mom yelled down the steps, "You boys sound great! Was that the new song?"  I don't know whether they recorded it on Mom's brand new 8 track console stereo or they went into the studio later, but it has that rough quality that really makes them sound serious (I'm lying through my teeth).

So when you look at the video, it's not actually a performance - it's a bunch of kids noodling around. The only one involved in the song is little Kevin; the rest of them are off somewhere else. It's a good thing, too, as Jimmy, the drummer, is mentally playing with the band down the street. Watch them wander about, as Kevin emotes. Every now and then, Ollie makes a supporting noise or two, just to upset Kevin, who ordered him not to make supporting noises.  Kevin apparently just got a new guitar, and the salesman promised to tune it for him to make the sale. Salesmen being what they are, he never tuned it, so Kevin went onstage with an untuned guitar, only he didn't know it (the audience did). Kevin was Dead Serious about his new song. The keyboard player was a guy who asked if he could join the band. They said yes (keyboardists are impossible to find) and threw him right onstage. Unfortunately he had to sit there, waiting for a key or a cue, because he had never heard any of Kevin's songs. This worked out to the audience's benefit, as he played very little. He brought his nifty little echo box, that looked like a little tape player, but it was new and he had no idea how to work it.

The 'experimental' section was added as they went onstage, only Kevin forgot to tell the rest of the band about it. So they continued to wander around, lost, while Kevin took on the experimental section all by himself... plinking.. tapping.. playing with knobs, and plinking again. The band continued to do what it did best, largely standing around and playing random stuff til it was time to actually play a song. They decided on Jumping Jack Flash, but the joke was on them: they knew it in 2 different keys, which they played it in at once. The audience's collective jaws were on the floor, as if they had just witnessed a baby stabbing its kitty and wearing its entrails.

The band kept looking over, expectantly, at Kevin, waiting for him to break the sad news that the experimental section was finally done, like children of alcoholics, coming out from behind the sofa because Mommy and Daddy had stopped screaming and throwing things. Unfortunately the throwing and screaming continued because Kevin was In The Zone. The band was losing patience, so they wandered around the stage, lighting cigarettes and doing their math homework, except little Jimmy, the drummer. He was still playing with the imaginary band down the street. Kevin later told Jimmy his performance was above and beyond. Kevin and the band continued on, undaunted. This, unfortunately, daunted the audience (all the band members' families and their captive classmates).

After they finished the song, the band made sure to watch Kevin so they knew they were all finished with the song. Their families clapped, their classmates made a noise intended to mimic certain bodily functions.

This was played on a progressive 70s rock station. I still don't know why.
It also mirrors most of my band experience, only my bands didn't get to play on stage a lot. Let's say we were intimately familiar with various band members' basements.

RIP Kevin, 2013, died in his sleep.

• As the Oscars 2020 nominations are all lined up, the hard work begins: writing out your 10 minute social screed no one wants to hear.

Another idiot 'professional', telling us that Dissociative Identity Disorder (multiple personality disorder) 'doesn't exist'. I don't have enough time to refute this person's ideas one-by-one. Suffice it to say he's wrong across the board. I don't know where these alleged professionals get their concepts from (cereal box?), but anyone familiar with the topic can refute everything he says, line by line. Our suggestion is that he live with someone with the disorder that doesn't exist for a month or so. He's likely to change his mind. Professionals who spout this nonsense are frequently put up to it by large organizations that would prefer to have you think they're not doing what they're doing. You know - the people Jeffrey Epstein was about to expose....  Don't forget - Mrs lefty has DID.




Warning:   POLITICS

Sam Robb is a libertarian, running for president. Check out his site, specifically "Issues" - see if any of it speaks to you.
He is *a* libertarian, but not the only libertarian, and I am not endorsing anybody.



Today I identify as   rubber

• Music copyright lawsuits are scaring away new hits, argues Rolling Stone.
• Rolling Stone is right twice a decade, and I don't think this is one of them.
• The thing that is scaring away new hits is listening to the radio.

I don't normally post anything about movies, largely as I don't see a lot of movies. And when I seen them, it's usually years after they've come out. If you haven't seen it already, see Yesterday. Without giving anything away, a guy finds himself in a different reality, where the Beatles never existed. It's well written and well acted, featuring the music of Jimi Hendrix.  No, wait......     Also of interest was his staunch supporter/manager. I was kinda smitten the moment I saw her. Mrs lefty said she was kinda normal. This was a great improvement over what she normally says ("She looks like a porn star"). I don't like anything, so if I give a recommendation, it's probably pretty good. Either that, or you know to avoid it.



There are at least 2 cities whose names require changing: Terre Haute and Puget Sound. Terre Haute sounds like something someone borrowed from another language and they forgot to translate it. Puget Sound sounds like something your cat hacks up. It also has nothing to do with sound. It's those weird people in the Northeast, with more money than they can actually count (although they have people to count money for them).

Battleships Confide in Me and Tell Me Where You Are

Don't blame me... it's a Yes lyric, from Yours is no Disgrace.

• Airbnb claims its AI can predict whether guests are psychopaths.
• I can't speak for the technology, but it would explain why there's never an available reservation for me.
• Among other things, it mines your social media posts. Think abut that for a moment.

5 steps to protect your privacy in 2020, courtesy of Duckduckgo.com and Spreadprivacy.com

• I hate like hell to do this, but I try to be helpful... you can still downgrade to Win 10. Here's the method. No idea how long this will last.
• If you've decided to join the stampede to a different operating system, ANY operating system, there's always MAC and linux. Neither has a huge learning curve, they're both more stable, they're not advertising platforms, and no one spies on you (that's an assumption with MAC). You can try linux out without altering your system in any way, using a USB stick. You can also dual-boot Win and lin. Ask if you have questions or need tips.

Since I'm ranting anyway, and since I'm a glutton for punishment, we went out for breakfast the other day. Things have been much better since the days when my order would be forgotten or messed up. No one asks me to sit at a different table so their order will come out. We went to Ihop. There's an Ihop right around the corner, so we drive to the one 20 minutes away. The local one has incompetent waitresses and clientele better suited for a schoolyard, except for the guns (I hope).

I figured 2pm was good for breakfast, plus it wouldn't be crowded.
I was wrong.
Apparently church lets out and most of the parishioners go to Ihop after. That's ok, at least they're well-behaved (and color-coordinated).
SURPRISE! We got seated next to a child who was being LOUD.
When I say seated next to, I mean 3' away. The only way I could've been closer to him was to be seated at his table. He continued to explode into fits of Loud, at odd intervals, causing the other rug rats at the table to sound off too. He looked old enough to know better. I did hear his mom explain this was not acceptable (her words), but the child apparently thought it was perfectly acceptable. I would never hurt a child, so I suggested slapping the parents. We had made the cardinal mistake of eating out: eating out. We had also forgotten to ask for the No Screaming Children Section. The waitress heartily agreed. And you know, for a fact, that this little noisemaker was at the table for the entirety of our meal, until 5 minutes before we left.

I don't want to be That Guy<tm>, or sound like some cantankerous Old Dude<tm>, who eats dinner at 4pm and complains about everything. We don't eat out a lot, so it would be nice not to be disturbed when we do. The last time it was a screaming infant all the way across the restaurant (aspiring opera diva), plus 4 extremely chatty, very annoying early teens, who all talked at the same time, even when their table threatened to disintegrate from the noise and vibration produced by their flapping lips. Mrs lefty is trying to calm me down, so I didn't make an even larger spectacle, like last time, when I got hold of the soda hoses and sprayed down the entire noisemaking table, then swing around the room like Tarzan, reveling in the applause from the rest of the diners. I have no idea what Mrs lefty's problem is, but some of the church ladies said they'd pray for her.

I told Mrs lefty that this level of noise was unacceptable, unless there was a small nuclear event. When I pointed out that when we were kids, we were well-behaved, she said times have changed. This is true, but not screeching and disturbing the entire restaurant has never gone out of style.

Dear Abbie Ann:
We need help (desperately). Whenever we go out, there are children screaming and many restaurants don't have screaming children-free seating. What is the polite thing to do in this circumstance?
Puzzled in Pittsburgh.

Dear Putzled:
From the list of things you tried, I would highly recommend avoiding the ones involving hoses, bananas, body parts that aren't typically exposed, and service elephants with pet anvils.  Instead, I would have the waitress use hoses, bananas, body parts that aren't typically exposed, and service elephants with pet anvils. One must always do the right thing in the right way.
-Abbie Ann

• Samsung is coming out with a 43" display that automatically rotates for vertical content. If you think that's neat, you should see what it does for dance videos.

AT&T et al are fighting against higher upload speeds.
Other countries continue laughing at us.

• Our good friends at Faceyspaces are introducing a privacy tool at the 2020 CES show. 
• Because they were hauled in front of Congress, this tool completely ignores the items Congress addressed.
• A privacy tool. From Faceyspaces. This is like a tax-saving tool from the government.

New drinking game: set out your beverage of choice. Turn on the tv. Take a shot every time you hear "game changer."  Warning: You could be dead within an hour.

• New York is proposing a statewide virtual currency.
• You will only be able to spend 16 virtual dollars at once, because spending 32 is unhealthy and the state will protect them from it.

I have an idea.  [uh-oh]
No, it's barely even weird.
I think we should all have a Live Funeral.
A funeral is held for you, but you're there to watch it. You hear what people really think of you. I think we'd be pleasantly surprised.

Nobody was surprised to find me missing at important family gatherings. They all say, "That lefty - he's his own man."  That's some of what I think I'll hear at my live funeral. I want everyone to tell their best lefty story - the funniest thing they saw me do or the most awkward thing they saw me do. My funeral will have people rolling in the aisles.


Speaking of saying nice things, my old boss accepted a job in another state and we held a going away party for him. My responsibility was always a roast of whoever was leaving. He came up to me later and said it was the most uncomfortable few minutes of his life. I had done my job.

I'm sorry.
No, I'm not.
What you see is what you get. I'm like this on paper and in person.
Sometimes *I* can't believe some of the stuff I say... it just kinda comes out (did I really say that? oof!). They say I have no filters. I bought one last year, so at least I don't say FUCK too much in public. Well, I don't say FUCK near as much as I used to in public. I've cut it out almost totally at work. Almost.



Mahdokht Shaibani at Monash University in Melbourne, Australia, developed a lithium-sulphur battery with a capacity 5x higher than lithium-ion. It could keep a phone charged for 5 days. By the end of the day, she will have the test results on flame resistance.

• Gay Grindr date murders man, forgets to disclose he's a cannibal.

The city of Oakland, California, is creating the Department of Violence Prevention to help crack down on violence.

Well, let's see. There are laws. Then there's the Department of Violence Punishment, aka The Police. What is violence prevention - pre crime? Going to schools and telling the children not to steal? Just say no to shooting?

• Some people aren't people people.

Linksys routers, already able to sense movement, will soon be able to monitor your breathing.  I feel queasy.  Naturally this means they will sell millions to well-meaning idiots, who will then complain when their health info gets into the hands of the insurance industry and hackers.

• Faceyspaces has banned deepfake videos. 
• If they can identify them.

The FBI can't unlock the Pensacola gunman's 2 iPhones, so they want Apple to.
Damn you, America.... if there were a backdoor, like the govt wants, this wouldn't be an issue. Stupid privacy people.




Today I identify as   pork.

• You cannot have a happy ending to an unhappy journey.
• Uh-oh.

Heroes of the Stupid

Florida woman threatened to rob McDonalds if she didn't get enough dipping sauce.




SJW Stuff

This summer, you'll be able to buy Trans salmon.
Ok, transgenic salmon, with spliced genes to make it grow faster indoors.
The trans salmon must be at least 25% of your total salmon purchase and demands you use its preferred pronouns: it, that, and wtf.

The Case of the Materializing Hair

I found a hair.

Woody Allen starts his hysterical routine about a moose this way: 
"I shot a moose."


I carried my laptop from the office to the living room. A few minutes later, there was a hair on it. Normally this wouldn't be an issue, as the people and the (former) pets had lots of it. There are no more pets but there is obviously still hair. Also, I cannot rule out that an elephant has been through the place, dropping off one small hair on my laptop, just because I didn't see it.

Upon examination, the hair was not human in origin. How do I know this? Technically I don't, but I've seen enough hair (usually in the vacuum) to tell the difference. As yet, I haven't been called to testify in court as an Expert Hair Witness. This is a shame, as they get the Big Bucks.

How does one describe a hair? I might as well sing an aria about avoiding super glue as a lubricant to a deaf person.

Ok, maybe not that bad....
Human hair is round, more or less. This was flat. Very flat. Calista Flockhart flat. It also had a pointed tip, like a sword, in case its owner needed to defend himself with a pointed hair. Down at the bottom, it had a lot of little 'spikes' or feathering. It was stiff. On this basis, I assume it isn't human. As it is not currently attached to its former owner, I'm at a bit of a loss. I'm also at a bit of a loss as to how it got there. It doesn't look particularly aerodynamic and seems like it wouldn't be blown around like a human hair. I've never seen one before, and hair doesn't usually materialize on my laptop unless it comes directly from me. If this came from me, it wasn't there when I moved the laptop.

Since this is a completely minor and bizarre matter, I needed to follow it up post haste, using all of my attention (such as it is) and whatever resources I could bring to bear on the matter. I got my top people on it, with emails going right out to The President's Committee on Hair Identification, as well as England's Ministry of Hair That Feathers a Bit Near the Bottom. While I waited for inspiration and emails, I did what most humans on the planet do: no, not nap.. I went to the internet.

What kind of query do you put into a search engine for hair? The results are not going to be pretty regardless. I used "hair identification," which provided 1,237 links to finding out what type of hair you have on your head, so you can style and care for it properly. Later today, I'll start seeing ads for hair care products while I surf, and wonder why.

One interesting link was how to figure out whether it's human or animal.
This turned out to be a scholarly discussion on putting the found hair next to a known people or animal hair and seeing if it looks the same. If I say I already thought about this, will I be eligible for a Nobel Prize?

The next link had some real promise: it was from the FBI's Forensic Science Communications, entitled Microscopy of Hair Part II: A Practical Guide and Manual for Animal Hairs. You can tell this is reliable information because it has a lot of words in the title, even though the largest word only has four syllables. They start by examining hairs under a microscope, noting cells, and comparing. Nowhere does it mention shape or deal with the hair outside the cells. This is Real Science<tm> and I'm excited that I'll find an answer, even if the Ministry of Hair That Feathers a Bit Near the Bottom fails to get back to me.

Astute observers will astutely observe that I do not have a microscope. I have a telescope, which is close, right? Same basic principle... it makes things bigger... Since the telescope will require the assistance of a Telescope Detector and a dump truck to find, I continued on. There's a small bit on what could be feathering, but naturally is called coronal scales or spinous scales. I think this is a dead end, as the picture of the Free-Tailed Bat hair didn't bear any resemblance.  Nor did mink, ginger, or ovoid bodies in cattle/human/canine hair. Fortunately the next section, "Animal Versus Human Hairs" held promise.

Animal hairs are grouped into three different types (guard, wool, tactile, and nose) but all any pet owner knows is the type that fouls the vacuum, requiring small scissors and an intricate surgery that run 37 minutes.

I'm going to seriously foul up Real Science<tm> here and assume that it did not belong to the groups covered, those being Deer Family and Antelope, White Tailed and Mule deer, Caribou, and Woody Allen's Moose. Also out were rabbit, seal, mink, muskrat, chinchilla, raccoon, and red fox (although I loved him in Sanford and Son). To be honest, the closest I saw was beaver. There are no beaver in the area because Beaver College had to change its name. When you went to look it up online, 'beaver' produced all kinds of interesting results. Ruling out these results contaminates the science. Who says a giraffe didn't walk past the laptop and deposit the hair in question? It's a possibility, as the living room ceiling is higher than the office.

The article concludes with three items, which I will paraphrase:

1. if the questionable hair looks like a known hair, you can conclude that it looks like your known hair
2. If the questionable hair doesn't look like a known hair, you can't say it's the same species as the known hair (unless it came from a Kardashian).
3. if the questionable hair looks like a known hair in some places but doesn't in other places, it can possibly be from Kanye, which is as close to a Kardashian as you'd ever care to be.

To no one's surprise, the FBI was of no help at all.

I did learn that it's best not to blow dry my type of hair and that you can wholesale human hair from China. Body parts too, as I hear it.

An article called Alopecia: Types of Hair Loss and How to Identify Them was also of no assistance. Just change the name to MY FUCKING HAIR'S FALLING OUT!!!  

Not sure How to tell if Brazilian hair is real is helpful either, but I'll check with my Portuguese friend (Brazil speaks Portuguese, so their hair is related).

What have we learned?

1. Nothing
2. some investigations should not be performed at work
3. when Mom drops off some fresh chocolate buttercream icing, it's best to wait until it gets close to room temperature before shoveling the entire vat into my mouth
4. I shouldn't display such enthusiasm for bizarre events
5. for the sake of my readers, I shouldn't write about my enthusiasm.
6. Whether it's animal hair or those little bugs you found on your mattress, do the same thing: put it in a sealed container for the professionals to identify. You don't have time in your life for this shit.

• Rushing to take control, under pretext of censorship, the British banned internet porn for children. Yeah, right.. it turns out that millions of porn videos are exempt via their own regulations. But let's face it - this isn't just about porn. They're keeping the UK safe. From what, we're not sure... why not terrorism? If people see porn, the terrorists win.

The amount of cell phone tracking is draconian - we can all agree. Google and Apple, bless them, will let you know what they know about you. For Google, log into your account. For Apple, go to their 'privacy portal'. They got their naming conventions from DC (Patriot Act anyone?).

• This week's best headline: "What if Hitler had Access to my Facebook Data"

A recent Supreme Court case may have serious implications for Google, Twitter, YouTube, and other social media.  The case will decide if a private operator of a public access network can be government-regulated.

I'm no Constitutional scholar, but that never stopped me before...

Although the case is more intricate, this could get ugly. For example, the First Amendment states that the government may not regulate speech or establish religion.... it does not apply to private businesses. As it stands, Faceyspaces, Google, etc, are not government businesses - they're private, hence are not subject to this amendment. That's how it is, according to #1A. The case wants to allow regulation by declaring these companies 'state actors'. In other words, they want to add (these) private companies to their loophole. Tricky.

Speaking not as a libertarian, I'd love to see these companies forced to eat their own crap. Let's face it: if I say things these companies don't agree with, I'm out the door too, although not as fast as the right. To be clear, censorship shouldn't travel in any direction. But according to the Constitution, they can't be controlled right now, so that's the way we have to go. Using the courts to decide is also the way to go (provided they agree with my interpretation).

• Need to make some quick cash?  Tell Justin Bieber you'll give $1,000 to his favorite charity every time he says "I dig chicks with green hair." Then bet the National Star Enquirer five million that you can turn tens of thousands of kids' hair green overnight, without saying or doing a single thing (plus a signed Bieber 8x10 to their favorite charity).

New Yorkers: you're famous for your rulers (NYPD) obtaining serious technology to use on you. proposed is the POST Act, which will force transparency. Keep in mind that right now, shotgun microphones, video surveillance, face recognition and automatic license plate readers are in place (and that's the stuff we know about). Do you feel protected now? Do you feel surveilled everywhere but your shower? Get with your reps and urge them to support POST. Naturally the act has no teeth, but it's a start.

You Suffer for My Art

If you have an iDevice, you can install Whiplr, which describes itself as "Messenger with kinks," or messenger for people with less than mainstream sexual practices. They ask for your password in unencrypted email. Oops. Just to make their users feel better, Whiplr stores all this information in plain text, for any hacker or employee who cares to have a peek. So unless you want those pictures of you in the rubber outfit with the gas mask and the miniature horse to become public, you should delete your account and messenge somewhere else.

• I have no idea how this was determined, but 1 in 5 employees share their email passwords with coworkers. Don't do this. Ever. Ask your IT department for another way to do whatever you're trying to do.

The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine have honored me by agreeing with my point that the US needs to go back to paper ballots. It took long enough, but we're finally in agreement.

• My good friends at Microsoft has decided they will offer support for Windows 7 for another three years, to help slow-moving corporations downgrade to Windows 10. And it's going to cost. For some unknown reason, my IP address has been blacklisted.

I just saw a show that introduced Randy Cramer, who claims he was recruited for a US Secret Space Program. If nothing else, this is interesting short science fiction, especially the depiction of our presence on Mars. I make no claims other than it's fun reading.

• Smart Outlets, no, really. One specific brand has a fault that will allow hackers to assume control of it and sneak into your network. Smart is Dumb.
• Artificial Intelligence will officially be here when your smart stove communicates with your smart microwave and both go on strike for higher voltage.

The times, they are a-changing. We live in the future! 

Someone just invented a Bluetooth salt shaker (although no one knows why). It 'enhances' your dining experience. Sorry, I just eat.. I don't have experiences. What could a Bluetooth salt shaker (the Smalt) do?  Play music from your phone, a color changing ring of lights, and.... get ready... it contains actual salt! Yes, we live in the future. If only the people who marveled at the tv wristwatch were alive to see this.

• The Planet of California, rapidly taking over for France in the World Derision Sweepstakes, has introduced the first legislation on connected devices. Although weak, it is the first of its kind in the US. It mandates information security and eliminates default passwords.
• Congress has proposed two bills on IoT devices, both designed to put together studies on devices. Yes, we're going to make everything safe for you, by putting together a select panel of people, who have absolutely no clue about the internet or IoT, to study the matter. Rapid Response, courtesy of your elected representatives (of the War State).

The European Court of Human Rights ruled that bulk interception of communications data and the obtaining of data from comms service providers violated Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights: the right to respect for private and family life/communications.

This is wonderful support for rights.
Meanwhile, the GCHQ and NSA are laughing so hard, there are tears in their eyes. I received confirmed information that at least two of them peed in their pants. Please do not repeat this.

• It's not often I find myself on Apple's side, but they have been harshly criticized for designing iPhones too big for women's hands. Campaigners were 'furious' over Apple discontinuing the SE; the smallest phone. 
• The average woman's hand is an inch narrower than an average man's hand. The campaigners have a lawsuit pending against God, claiming sexism, but as of this point, they have been unable to locate the defendant to serve the summons.
• The campaigners are fighting a war on several fronts, also with Women of Size, who are ok with the new phones; and Women of Sense, who think women are absolutely equal in every way and oppose special accommodations.

6G, the phone protocol so new, people don't even speak its name, will provide terabits per second speeds. Meanwhile, we wait for 5G, which promises faster speeds, but runs at the same shitty 4G and 3G speeds, depending upon which foot you're standing on with the most pressure.

• You know me - equality. So there's this washing machine detergent commercial featuring the dad talking about how dirty his daughter's princess dress gets and how he washes it. I don't really care that stay at home dads are represented.. I just can't help but think of all sorts of names for this guy, none of which you can say on tv.

Not An Original Thought Left in Hollywood, Part 453

There is a remake of Overboard, the Goldie Hawn-Kurt Russell movie, where she develops amnesia and he hoodwinks her into being a mom and wife. The world was crying out for a remake and Hollywood delivered! The new movie, cleverly called Overboard, features a man with amnesia this time (see - they're original) and blonde Anna Faris as the hoodwinker. Can't we stop this before we're up to third generation remakes?

Men are demanding parity, seeking a remake of The Sound of Music, with a man in the role of Julie Andrews.

Grocery Shopping

I used to joke about things being personal, like rain. Most of it stopped, but it looks like the grocery store never got the memo. Last week, nothing I put on the list was available or reachable: bagels, fresh cookies, Bit O'Plague, bullets...

Wife just returned from the store. Did you know you can't purchase yogurt with fat? Everything's low fat, low sugar, low taste, low actual yogurt. My fresh chocolate chip cookies were the only container left, buried under 400 pumpkin spice containers. Later this week, CostCo is having a sale on pumpkin spice tires.  They stopped carrying my coffee creamer entirely. WTF is salted caramel? Whose brilliant idea was it to salt caramel? Isn't salt bad for you? Let's add anthrax to chocolate, shall we? Do they not understand how sacred our coffee is? Maybe blueberry cream is delicious - I don't care and I'm not letting it get within 3 miles of my coffee cup.

Some Things Suck More Than Other Things

Former President Barack Obama has reportedly asked Jay-Z to encourage other hip hop artists not to meet with Donald Trump following the firestorm of publicity over Kanye West. I cannot verify this, but it's a good one.

If I were Obama, I'd call and ask Jay-Z to encourage other hip hop artists to attempt real music, if at all possible.

• A South Carolina NAACP leader accused the police of racial profiling when they pulled him over. He told his passengers not to move because the officer looked like he was going to shoot them. He claimed that the police accused him of having drugs in the car and what was he doing in that neighborhood.  
• Bodycam footage shows the officer not shooting anybody, not accusing him of having drugs in the car, and not asking what he was doing in that neighborhood.
• The man was not racially profiled - he failed to use his turn signal.
• Uh-oh, NAACP. The Race Card<tm> seems to have failed you.

Arizona is planning for INCOMING in case California has an earthquake.

Plans include portable Starbucks, smog trucked in from Los Angeles plastic surgeons to do emergent nose and breast jobs, individual tent mansions, indoor parking for Mercedes and up, and a stage for Berkeley to protest anything and everything, 24 hours a day. And no paper bags - only plastic.

Arizona is counting its blessings, already having way more than their share of illegal aliens, but hasn't yet figured out what to do to make the Californians comfortable around guns, which everybody owns. Because of their inflexibility on this issue, California has passed a resolution condemning Arizona's effort to help them and stating that they will boycott the state, preferring to take their personal environmentally green aircraft to a more friendly, socially conscious state, like... well.... they'll get back to us on this.

• Starbucks has ordered all locations to allow anyone to sit or use the rest room, regardless of whether or not they're customers.  Starbucks' regulars are worried about the place looking like a homeless camp. The only people pleased by this are the people who don't go to Starbucks. They're laughing so hard they see spots.

In a welcomed event for all airlines, today's headlines involve a passenger. Sort of.  Some old guy verbally and physically assaulted two women and touched one sleeping female passenger and later asked another woman about her sexual and marital life. Ok, here's the part where the airline could have done a bit better: they moved his seat, whereupon he urinated on the seat in front of him. He was arrested upon landing, then offered a movie deal by Adam Sandler.

• Speaking of Adam Sandler, a bunch of masked students recently ran into a school with water guns and firecrackers. I love me some black humor but there are some things even I won't do. High School Me is laughing and applauding.

In yet another giant step backwards for England, it is now going to protect its citizens from the 'wild west of the internet' by enacting new laws on social media. Those wacky Brits are heading down a dangerous path at record speeds. No knives over 3", no vegetable peelers or carpet knives, no swearing in public, continued refusal to drive on the correct side of the road, and jail time for insulting people online. What will they protect their citizens from next week? And are the citizens awake enough to notice this, no less do something about it?

• Oh God no - please... I just discovered a show called Paris Hilton - My New BFF. It was the last minute of the show, thankfully, as I was already pulling my hair out and losing the contents of my stomach from the last week. Have we truly reached End Times? Can they possibly come up with anything more inane, self-absorbed, or totally without redeeming content? I'll bet they can.

My hell is your entertainment, hopefully.

Let me start by saying that every f-ing time I try to order something online, I miss shopping in-person. And when I shop in-person, I miss online convenience.

Having said that, Amazon is cancer.

Just for fun, let's add two people who tend to be alpha in certain situations.

Don't use my account - I can't do it now, create your own.

Ok, I created it. It will only give me 2 day delivery if I do a trial of Amazon Prime.

Ok, do it.

No, we already have Prime. It's attached to your account.

Ok, fine, I'll do it on my phone. Write down what you want.

Write down? With a PEN? I can't do that. You don't want to see that.

[2 minutes later]

Is this what you wanted?

No.

I don't see it then.

So I create my own account and am ready to hit GO, when I realize they're going to charge me TAX. Originally tax was only charged if the seller was in the same state. I am not aware of an Amazon here, so I'm thinking the thieving bastards in the State capitol legislated their hands into our pockets. Again. To make matters more interesting, the shipping is taxed too.

Perhaps it would be helpful if Amazon used a little-known retail trick called Model Number. Sssshhhhhhh - it's a secret.  Think about this... we have two different computers with two similar searches and two different results. In fact, the item I'm looking to spend money on can not be brought up on her search at all, in any way.

We're doing our best, but the Strangle Urge is surfacing in both of us. Since Amazon is not physically present, it gets directed at each other [marriage counselors take note].

There are reviews, you know.

These headphones are almost the quality of my $300 Bose headphones.

These headphones suck.

These headphones are too tight.

Ignore the other reviews, the headphones are plenty large.

People tell me I sound like I was in a fishbowl.

The sound is crystal clear over the phone.

and these are the products with near 5 star ratings.

Finally I gave up and had her order something that looked similar with similar features. Both of us are alive and relatively unscathed. The dog is hiding upstairs, terrified of his parents. The police just left, but it's taking the SWAT team a while to get out of their vests and pack up the Armored Personnel Carrier the army gave them.

• It's been the saddest time in my car's life. Actually our life. Ever since the CD changer broke, we've had nothing but broadcast radio to listen to. Have you experienced the horror?  So I have to procure a new one.
• I know everybody has new stereos, with all sorts of whiz-bang features, but this is all new to me. I really like the Bluetooth compatibility. This will allow people in the back seat to play music, even if somebody in the front seat is already playing music.  It's a veritable bonanza of fun. Some units come with a remote control. WTF do you need a remote control for?  Again, the back seat people are laughing hysterically, playing with the controls. And they get all this fun at no cost to themselves!  If only they could Bluetooth the car for unplanned acceleration, help with the turn signals, and rolling up the window when the policeman is talking to the driver.
• I distinctly remember replacing the stereos in my very old cars. In fact, I wake up crying, screaming, and cursing precisely at 4am, so I will never forget. In fact, crying, screaming, and cursing is precisely what was required to get the box into the dash. Crutchfield makes it look so easy, with the adapters and recommendations and wire harnesses and B&D gear. It's their job to make it look easy, because they're total bastards and just like to make people suffer. At no extra charge.
• It's not that I'm old, but I don't trust any stereo that doesn't have knobs on both sides of the display.

Ever wonder what information Apple has on you?

Most of it is metadata, such as your IP and the IP you're going to, but not the content. You might want to have a look (I would, if I used any of their products). As harmless as this might look, any information can be combined with certain other information or details to come up with information you don't want anyone to have.

• So, just because the most hated entities in every category, cable providers, haven't been in the news in the past three days or so, Comcast has what's technically referred to as a Biggie. Your account and password has been exposed to the known universe. 
• Once again, a business entity has blamed 'a bug' for what is just Stupid Lack of Security and Human Error.
• Armed with an address and account number, anyone could get your login and password. Isn't that spiffy? The answer will come to you in plain text, as opposed to encrypted.
• Comcast removed the 'bug' and spoke thusly:

• "There's nothing more important than our customers' security," said a Comcast spokesperson. "Within hours of learning of this issue, we shut it down. We are conducting a thorough investigation and will take all necessary steps to ensure that this doesn't happen again."
• Translated: "There's nothing more important than not getting caught," said a Comcast spokesperson. "Within hours of learning of this issue, we shut it down. We are conducting a thorough investigation and will take all necessary steps to ensure that we won't get caught again." 

Speaking of cars, BMW has made security its top priority after learning that many cars can be accessed with a few dollars of parts. Let's face it - nobody wants anybody to steal or mess with their car.  BMW is terrified of the possibility that a hacker will re-enable the long dormant turn signals.

• a New York high school will use CCTV and facial recognition to enforce discipline. This is the beginning of the slide. "It's for the children" was the cry for anything against the Fourth Amendment after 9-11. Now it's school shooters and discipline. The system will watch everything and identify the student 'after their picture is uploaded to the system'. Big Brother is now in school. Then of course it will be the little children, because we have to 'keep them safe'.

MIXED BLESSINGS

The ACLU sent a letter to Amazon, demanding they not provide their AI facial recognition system, Rekognition, to the government.  I like this.

The system can track people in crowds and identify them. You know governments everywhere will want it.   I don't like this.

The ACLU's letter includes: 

"...the company’s product is primed for abuse in the hands of governments, poses a grave threat to communities already unjustly targeted in the current political climate, and undermines public trust in Amazon"  We do not like the president and he spies on people.

"Particularly in the current political climate, we need to stop supercharged surveillance before it is used to track protesters, target immigrants, and spy on entire neighborhoods. We’re blowing the whistle before it’s too late.”  We really do not like the president, it has serious 4th Amendment concerns, and we really like illegal aliens."

“We already know that facial recognition algorithms discriminate against Black faces, and are being used to violate the human rights of immigrants,”  Racism! We like to think illegal aliens have rights as non-citizens of this country. We have completely lost our focus as a group.

• Securus, the previously mentioned company that gives law enforcement your phone tracking information, got hacked. 2,800 logins and passwords were stolen. The irony is thick.

NOT THE ONION
Our good friends over at Faceyspaces (UK, US, Canada) are asking you to send them your intimate photos to stop revenge porn.

No, really.

"..photos will only be seen by "a very small group of about five specially trained reviewers"

Sure they will. Because everybody respects privacy, especially at Faceyspaces. Just send us your naked pictures and we promise not to look at them.

we shall never see another and we are the worse for it