It's a Sign!

It was early in the morning, my body still in a state of shock from being awakened to go to work, when I saw the article: "Boston Red Sox Caught Using Technology to Steal Signs".

Like any decent geek, I asked myself what the hell the Boston Red Sox would need with signs? Would they put them in the parking lot? Make a Sign Museum? Put them on the field to confuse the opposing team?

OH - hand signs between the catcher and the pitcher. Cameras all over the place watch players, figure out the signs, then relay them to the coach via an Apple watch or Fitbit.

Kids- if you ever wonder about the effects of growing up without a father (and being smart but kinda dim), here it is.

• They broke the mold after me. By popular request.

There was an insane amount of football chatter all over the place the other day. By this I divined that there was a lot of football, and the Great Unwashed Sheep were at it again, this time distracted by a ridiculous controversy over sitting, standing, taking someone's knee, or masturbating while the national anthem is playing.

We have real problems in the country and the world, yet we fall for this Divide and Conquer nonsense every time. Bread and circuses.

• Where will you spend eternity? Here's one idea. Mine would be a huge guitar or booby. 

It pains me to say this, but if you have an iDevice, hold off on iOS11. No. wait, it doesn't pain me.. what's that other thing? It amuses the hell out of me. There is an issue if you use the operating system with Outlook 365 that won't allow you to get your mail. Just for fun, the other issue is that the battery drains at twice the normal rate. Aside from that, it's perfectly ok.

• This is a winner: Muslim nurses in the UK refuse to wash hands before medical operations, say it 'compromises religious beliefs'. I wonder if they would prohibit the surgeon operating on them from washing his hands. Oops, sorry, my religious beliefs demand infections. As if that weren't good enough, administrators have granted them an exception. Don't offend them by asking them to wash their hands!

So you're on one of twenty ships in the Black Sea, and your ship seems to be in the sea, then at an airport, then back in the sea, you've probably been the victim of GPS spoofing. Or the Philadelphia Experiment is happening, in which case it's advisable to stay away from walls and hover over the deck. Assuming spoofing, there was a demonstration a number of years ago, in which a briefcase with about $1,000 of equipment performed this experiment, this time it's Real Life<tm>.

In 2015, the US Naval Academy, aware of this spoofing, opted to reinstate instruction in celestial navigation. You know - navigating by the stars, like sailors have been doing since the beginning of time. Of course it's only a matter of time til the Russians hack the stars...

• HEALTH WARNING: Swedish Fish have been known to pull crowns out. That is all.

A thirteen year old Brooklyn boy suffered ruptured testicles after exiting a train via the window and surfing on top of it.  No one could have seen this coming. It's only a matter of days until his parents sue, blaming the train for not having signs that say WARNING: DO NOT EXIT VIA WINDOW AND JUMP ON ROOF. But ruptured testicles.....

• A man accused of robbing a Fresno, CA Starbucks is suing the man who stopped the robbery for 'excessive force.' The thief's mommy said that the man who wrested the knife away didn't have to stab her son so many times to subdue him.  Furthermore, the man is suing the police for calling him a bad name and hurting his feelings. Since this is California, he probably has a chance at a win.

I'm looking for it.

If I find it, I'll let you know.

I've heard the process is more important than finding it.

I have no idea.

The Unemployment Follies (#5)

Well, it's been a real whirlwind since I last wrote.  And when I say a whirlwind, I mean that much effort has been put forth for absolutely nothing of any consequence in terms of gain.  Oh sure, I've been solicited for jobs halfway across the state, in the next state over, the state on the other side, up north of the next state over; for security guard, software engineer, governance manager (?), relationship director, project manager, and of course, my monthly offer for insurance sales.

I even had a call from a recruiter who was excited about a position, wanted to send my resume and references right over, set up a lunch for us, and never called back or responded to emails.  I specifically avoided references to his mother or family members and farm animals, as I'm told this could be considered offensive by some people.

As I type this, I just discovered that my Linked-In picture was taken down for violation of their terms. When you consider that the picture is of my pets, I fail to get this alleged violation.  Let's face it, a large number of Linked-In pictures are not pictures of the account owner.

HOUSE

My wife has gone on a house cleaning spree. This came as a shock to both of us, causing me to join her.   We've taken untold amounts of bags to the curb, freeing untold amounts of space inside the house. I even discovered there is carpet next to my bed.  While I will cop to being a slob, I'm not claiming responsibility for this, instead preferring to blame it on the dog.  I tidied and arranged all reading material on the side of the bed. The dog proceeded to untidy every single page, in addition to tearing the trash apart on a nightly basis.  After two or three times, I gave up and let him rearrange things to his liking.  Even after we got a flip-top trash can, he still goes there first, every single evening, to see if there is any more tasty trash that needs to be shredded (all over the bed).

With all of this wonderful new-found space, the items in my house are having a difficult time adjusting.  In fact, they're having such a difficult time, they're acting out.  I just watched my wife carry some wash downstairs and a vacuum randomly put itself in her way and got knocked over as a result.  Whenver I reach for something on a clean table, something else falls off.  It's only a matter of time until things start leaping about the house on their own.  One guest swore a cup hurled itself at her.  She was probably correct.


CAR

You know what's coming, right?

It's been quite a few weeks.

Our insurer has missed us.

Yes, someone hit the car. Again.  In fact, I stopped counting a while ago.  Guitar players can't count past four anyway (and I know my limitations.. 1-2-3-4!).  I can only estimate and I refuse to estimate, as it would make me sad(der).  We didn't even report the last time it happened.

This time, some idiot stopped short, caused my wife to stop short, causing the brand new black Mercedes behind her to slam right into her. He tried to avoid the car, managing to only ruin one rear corner of the Target Hyundai.  This being Philthydelphia, they had to wait two hours for the police. I suppose she was lucky, as the Philthy cops don't usually respond to anything that doesn't involve a gun. Did I mention that the idiot who caused the accident drove away?

This morning I am yanked out of bed at some horrid hour (before noon) because someone's coming over.  Why should I care?  Because something happened and the bank account needs money or we won't be able to pick up a rental car.  So someone's coming over with money, bless them.

I am horrified.

I got into the car for the first time, post-accident, this morning.  As we're driving down the street, I hear a really bad rubbing of some sort.  Turning to the wife with that look, she explained that she told me about this.

Huh?

Yeah, it's ok.

Huh?  The horrible rubbing noise is ok?

Yeah, the guy(?) said it was ok.

What guy?

The guy from the accident.

Ah.

So I'm driving, my heart (and wallet) pounding due to the rubbing noise (that's ok). When we parked, I took a look for the root of the rubbing.  No problem, I said... it's only the broken, very hot exhaust pipe, sitting against a rear tire.  No, it's ok.

Is your skull coming apart at the seams yet?  Mine is.

Finally we managed to obtain a rental car.  It's a lot nicer than our car, even if we're just talking about the extreme lack of dents and parts hanging off it.  Since it's black, the polar opposite of white, our luck will be much better with this one.  And I say this because the last rental we got when the last bit of body work had to be done after the last accident, had to have its mirror replaced after someone hit that.  The cost of the Mirror Operation exceeded the amount I paid for each of my first three cars.

Following the wife to the dealer, I pulled in behind her. This was made more difficult by the random parking arrangements of the existing cars.  But all of this was no matter, as this was the wrong location. The correct body shop location was a few blocks down the road (it's all the same dealership).

After locating the correct body shop, we somehow managed to park (this place had the same Parking IQ as the last one).   Some lady, with an 'I just sucked on a lemon' look, came past me and drove our car to the garages.   A few minutes later my wife comes up to me and says we may have to cancel the entire operation, as they won't look at the car for a few weeks if it's driveable.  I point out that it's not driveable, given the rubbing (that's ok).  Lemon Face brought a mechanic out, pointing out the correct area of damage (differentiating it from the other areas of damage).  Mechanic agree with me.  As it turned out, the rubbing noise (that's ok) turned out to be not ok.

Wife explained that Lemon Face was agitated and didn't want to admit the car for repair. Regardless, the repair would take two to three weeks.  For some reason, business is good for the humongous dealer's body shop (with twenty bays or more).  And I thought it was just us....


GIMPY

I casually asked my wife why her walking was worse than normal.  She casually answered that her knee had been bothering her since the accident.

DING!

I didn't want to overstep my boundaries or appear parental but I suggested that she stop cleaning for a few moments and if her knee hurt, maybe, perhaps, she should get it looked at professionally.

I didn't want to bother you.

DING!



I want my wife back.

And my car.

And my typing, which has gotten extremely dyslexic lately.


Meanwhile, the dealer, body shop, car rental place and insurance person all know us on a first-name basis.