Flibberjibbit

Are you checking your store of explosives and coming up short? Need to refresh the stock?  Oil company Allied-Horizontal Wireline Services kinda screwed up the setup on one of their storage devices, exposing locations where it keeps its explosives.

• If you have just the right model Epson printer, you probably can't print at this moment. Epson shipped some new firmware (instructions that reside in the device permanently) and it requires an internet connection to Google. Oddly enough, if you turn off internet, it works. They are working on the problem. I'm sure they have their Best People on it. Different people than the ones who didn't test the firmware before it got sent out.

I have some equipment that sends me an alert when something happens that it doesn't like. So I go to the equipment to see what it's telling me and it refuses to tell me anything. There is no entry for the item that the equipment alerted me of. The equipment makes me wait 20-30 minutes before it will tell me what it didn't like. I have concluded that the machine is female.

• Do you have an I-Que Intelligent Robot or My Friend Cayla doll? It sends your child's personal information to the manufacturer and a company that contracts with military and intelligence agencies. Privacy groups have filed a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission. Unfortunately, the FTC shares all its information with with non-intelligence agencies. All information is stored on the contractor's services and possibly Google's.  It's probably a good idea not to give these dolls to your kids or leave them on the table when the FBI calls to goad you into performing some terrorist act or other so they can 'catch' you at it.

A perennial favorite of mine and candidate for vice-wife, Sofia Vergara, is being sued by her frozen embryos, Emma and Isabella. Ex-fiancee Nick Leob has already sued in California because they are being deprived of their inheritance (already in a trust fund) by not being born. But wait - it gets better (I am waaaay too amused by this): the new suit was filed in Louisiana, which offers special protections to frozen embryos (really? California only offers special protections to easily-triggered snowflakes). The legal paperwork stated that both parties had to agree not to use the embryos without the other's consent. The paperwork, however, did not stipulate what to do if the partners split.  Hey - leggo my embryo! This shit is hysterical and could not simply be made up by uber-amused  bloggers or headline-happy gossip rags.  

"Hey Honey - let's make some embryos, name them, freeze them, provide for them, then file suit over them. Let's think about the legal ramifications for a moment, shall we? Since the embryos have legal standing and are being deprived of inheritance, we can say that they are also being abused horribly by being frozen, thus the parents are dually liable (don't you love playing lawyer?). Where it gets murky is not having language in the contract for the marriage dissolving. Let's throw the case out without bias (meaning it can be brought again with proper information) or perhaps without prejudice or llamas. Or have the legal system remind these overprivileged whiners to just have the damn child or children just like the rest of the world does: by swapping underwear and squatting in the fields. Why DID they freeze embryos? Because Sofia didn't want to ruin her figure. I volunteered to ruin her figure a long time ago but her legal representatives contacted me and mentioned that it would not be a good idea to come within 500 feet of her or communicate with her ever again.

Or we could just take the lefty Approach and encourage them not to reproduce. Do we really want another generation of these people on the planet? I expected this from Mariah Carey - in fact, I don't think we're done with her for a good long time.

• Somewhere the butts of the fellows from Monty Python are twitching horribly. A man from England opened up a British Shop, featuring all British goods. Complaints were swift, accusing him of going against the 'international nature' of England. Threatened were boycotts and protests. The complaints are not coming from foreigners, who love the shop. They are coming from neighbors. One stated that calling the shop Really British somehow implied that the other stores weren't. The shop's owner referred to the fracas as being like banning pizzas in Italy. While these people will eventually eat themselves, it is not happening quickly enough.
• Speaking of Limeys, the producers of a nature show called Planet Earth II are defending themselves against criticism that the scenes are too brutal. And we thought politics was ugly...
• Not to be outdone by the sheer stupidity of American universities, 32 British schools have banned tabloid newspapers. Read it again... banned.. newspapers. In every disaster area, there is at least one pocket of resistance, this being a school which just voted to ban orange juice with 'bits' in it because it's "hateful" and students cannot be trusted to consume it. Also banned: Robin Thicke's "Blurred Lines" and Mexican hats.

During Career Day at school, they probably neglected to include the noble profession of Bluetooth antenna design for adult toys. Apparently this is not only a job, but a very difficult one. Where the hell do you put the antenna? Another job they overlooked is the testing lab for adult toys.

• No matter what I really love, and there are two or three things in this category,  I will never be a fanboy of it. Fanboy reeks of a cape and/or high heels, neither of which I pull off well.

Trumpie is coming under scrutiny again (really?), this time over his insistence on using his android phone, instead of a specially-built Blackberry, like Obama was forced to use. Making Android Great Again. But seriously, Donald, you have to be as secure as possible - take my word for it. I'm surprised that the team hasn't reached out to me for the CIO position. Can you imagine?

• Keira Knightly (UK) revealed that her daughter said "F..." when Trump won the election. This is yet another reason I don't have children, yet this time it's pure stupidity on the part of the parent. How many of us are politically aware at 19 months? She didn't just invent that word - she had to hear it somewhere.  From the stories my parents told me, there was not a single one involving my expletives when (Margaret Thatcher?) won in the UK.

Greg Lake, 69, of Emerson Lake & Palmer and King Crimson, has passed from cancer. 2016 has not been kind to us.

• Sir Michael (Mick) Jagger has become a father for the eighth time. We all strive to be like Mick, only with the potential, not the realization.

Heart disease and dementia deaths contribute to the first drop in US life expectancy for 20 years. Somehow this will be Trump's fault.

• The US Surgeon General has stated that e-cigarettes are a public threat to young people. Not to old people? One in six high school students stated they used an e-cig in the past month. Is that not an important statistic? I was all for punishing the tobacco companies for lying but it's no longer a secret that tobacco is bad for you. Why do children pick this up?

Jared's Folly

You think because I referenced Subway that I'm going to have a whack at Jared and the allegations of kiddie porn. Or a poke at Subway for the quality of their sandwiches. Or even the old bit about twelve inches not being twelve inches. But noooooo....

Every week I go to lunch with a friend at Subway. Exactly every two weeks, a large, loud African-American woman starts SCREAMING AT THE TOP OF HER LUNGS at the poor Indian guys behind the counter. The specific topic doesn't seem to matter, but it generally revolves around a feeling of being owed something. The volume will start loud and then go through the roof. The entire (alleged) restaurant goes quiet, as the woman ratchets up in temper and volume. She badgers the hell out of an employee across the counter. This is made more interesting by the two-way language difficulties.

Eventually somebody will threaten to call the police. One arguer kept telling the employee to 'GO AHEAD -CALL THE POLICE', as she backed out the front door. Another encouraged calling in a tone that shook the building, as her girlfriend/partner got up to the cash register and yelled even louder.

An African-American couple looked at each other uncomfortably and left without finishing their food.

Finally one of the employees decided to end the play by giving the bellowing monster what she wanted. I'm going to guess this was to end the noise (our ears were bleeding) or because if he called the police, he'd be retired long before they arrived. In Philly, the police cannot be bothered to show up unless you specifically say GUN.

After it was over, I stood up on my chair and yelled `YOU... I'M GOING TO STAND HERE AND SCREAM AT THE TOP OF MY LUNGS UNTIL YOU GIVE ME WHAT I WANT.'  The restaurant laughed and applauded. My job there was done.

As we walked out, we noticed six policemen approaching, obviously by accident. I wanted to suggest they come back in two weeks.....

• What in the multiverse is up these days?  When I read the news, I often wonder when we officially switched to 1984 or some other science fiction novel set in some black, ugly future. The nonsense was piled upon us a piece at a time, so most of use didn't notice (the Kardashians were on). Every time I read a story about immigration, my head spins. Let me see if I understand this correctly:

1. We are allowing hundreds of thousands of (mostly) Mexicans to stream across the border, due to it being largely porous. If we're that concerned about 'terrorism', why are we allowing this?
2. Our border with Canada is sealed tight, as are the international airports.
3. The occupant of the White House and his accomplices welcome the illegals, referring to them as undocumented.
4. The illegals are treated to healthcare, education and drivers licenses, on our dime. We, who can't afford our own insurance, are forced to subsudize insurance for people who can't be bothered to follow the immigration laws of our country.
5. An administration that won't enforce its own immigration laws.
6. An administration that fails to deport illegals in most cases, even after they commit serious crimes and sneak back repeatedly.
7. DC wants to give illegal aliens the right to vote.

• So tell me - what's going on here? Am I completely missing the point? Am I so turned around that I'm abnormal(moreso) and this situation is perfectly ok?

Speaking of insurance, I had a real Insurance Experience the other day. My wife went to pick up some meds and was told the insurance refused to pay for them because they needed a precertification.  Mrs. leftystrat has been on this medicine for five years and it's cheap and generic; no reason not to pay (other than the fact that insurers don't want to pay any claim). The pharmacy faxed a form to her doctor for precertification.

A week later(!), she called her doctor to see where the process was. As it turned out, the process wasn't. No record of request or action so they said they'd call the next day.  I should mention that it's a good thing we had a backup supply: if this were an antidepressant, she'd be shooting from the roof or in schoolyards by now.

The next day the doc's office told her it should be waiting for her at the pharmacy. A little later she the office called back to say that the pills weren't entirely waiting for her at the pharmacy. The insurer called the pharmacist but he was being uncooperative [no way this could be true- they're like family]. 

The wife gave up and paid cash for the meds. This was NOT alright with me. I got on the phone with the drug coverage people, who wanted the prescription number. There is no prescription number, so I cursed a bit and hung up. Then I called the main number, waited whilst being told how valuable I am, eventually arriving at an actual human. SHE explained that there's a medical coverage I.D. and a drug coverage I.D. The insurer approved the medicine under the medical I.D. and whenever the pharmacist tried to put it through, it got rejected. This person grasped the situation immediately (she'll be fired next week) and said all we had to do was move the precert from one number to the other (I almost fell out of my chair). 

You know what's coming, right?

She couldn't transfer the precert - she had to connect me with the Precert Department (aaaaaaaaaargh!).

The Precert Department did not tell me how valuable I was, which was a harbinger of things to come. Earl answered the phone and I explained (slowly and patiently) the situation. He was much more interested in the dosage and amount of the medicine than actually fixing the problem. Then he stated he could fax a form to the doctor to get the process started. I kept telling him (slowly and patiently) that the process was already started: all he had to do was move the precert. He kept telling me (slowly and patiently) that he would fax a form to the doctor to get the process started. Once again I explained to Earl how easily it could be fixed. Once again Earl said we'd have to start the process over.

It was at about this point that I decided it would be best to dispense with slowly and patiently. I raised my volume and lowered my pitch, explaining to Earl that I needed them to pay for this medicine TONIGHT and how was he going to make that happen?

At this point I heard a higher-pitched YAAAAAY! The pharmacy called my wife and said it finally went through... there was celebrating (and we ate Robin's minstrels). I bid Earl a fond adieu, only to discover that the insurance company only covered half the cost of the pills.  Ain't insurance grand?

• Speaking of insurance (and we were), I found an article stating that insurers are asking for twenty to fifty four percent cost increases next year.  HUH?  It seems that because more people are insured (thanks, Obama), the insurance companies (who wrote the laws) aren't making money on the deal. What was Obama's response? Call the state regulators and tell them to examine the rate increases carefully. Why is it that he and the rest of the criminals aren't run out of office hastily? We got screwed last year and now they're adding another helping of Screwed Soup. 
• Everybody who voted for Obama, raise your hand.  Good - YOU pay for my insurance. It's YOUR fault. 
• And don't go voting for Hillary, you kool-aid drinking socialist New World Order sycophants.

So there are three children whose parents are going through a nasty divorce. They refuse to see their father so a judge, full of good intentions, sentenced them all to Juvenile Detention for the entire summer. It came down to a pissing match between three recalcitrant children and a judge. In these cases, the judge always has the bigger member, even if female, as is the case here.  Aparently the kids really don't want to visit Dad, as all of them chose detention over visitation. This would be funny if it weren't so serious. Who are we kidding - it's funny now.

• Portland, Oregon, has taken on a very controversial Neighborhood Beautification Program. When I was young, it was common to throw your old sneakers over the power lines. I have no idea why. In Portland, they are doing the same thing, only with dildos. Just like sneakers, they are going up in pairs, in beautiful white and bright orange. Bright orange? I didn't know they came in bright orange. Excuse me.... I have to run an errand......

A divorced couple is fighting over frozen embryos. The female half wants to insert them into a surrogate, which isn't going over well with the male half.  Hey - leggo my embryos!

A Moment of Music

These guys have been slagged off unfairly, as a copycat band and as a grunge band. Stone Temple Pilots are a refreshing surprise of musicianship, writing, versatility and heroin abuse.  Their hits, and there have been many, are typically loud and raucous. I appreciate some of their more complex songs, which they can't play live, as they're overdubbed and there are too few musicians to reproduce them.

The DeLeo brothers, Dean and Robert, play guitar and bass, respectively. Robert doesn't get recognized for his contributions, which are solid yet busy and sound like James Jamerson (Motown). Dean plays many instrument flavors and tones, making things very interesting to the ear.  Eric Kretz is a drummer in the pounding style of John Bonham (Led Zeppelin). Scott Weiland is a very talented singer with a lot of baggage. Twice, after appearances on the Howard Stern Show, he went back on heroin.  Scott is bipolar, which probably drives this behavior. He's a great frontman, a real chameleon. He was let go and replaced by Chester Bennington, of Linkin Park. Personally I'm not thrilled but he's certainly decent.

Daisy is a rare instrumental. One of Dean's secret talents is slide guitar. He sets his tone beautifully and really uses his slide lyrically, instead of the 'normal' slide routine.

One of STP's surprises is their variety. You can listen to five songs and not know it's the same band. One of my favorite STP tunes is Atlanta. Listen to this and tell me you don't hear the Doors.  Hello It's Late is another change of style. Does this sound like their hit Plush? One of my wife's favorites is Bipolar Bear. Note the acoustic going into the faster chaotic electric section. Like Jimmy Page, DeLeo is a master of layering and many tones. There are all sorts of things going on here that can't be accurately played live, although they manage to pull it off.

These guys play to serve the song - no heroics, except for the whole.  Listen and love.