Flying Toothsayer - or - Forced Vacation, Day 14?

 Isn't it amazing, with this vast pool of intelligence and creativity, or just creativity, that I can't keep track of days?

The gremlins are still doing their best in my wisdom tooth and the drilling continues in my head. I suggested a softer-sounding drill, but they laughed at me. That's ok, I've been laughed at most of my life.. it no longer carries the punch it used to. Even if performed by gremlins. Why is it called a wisdom tooth? It seems to contain no more wisdom than any of the other teeth. I secretly prefer the canines, just because I love dogs. The dog is next to me, having built a cozy pillow. She is a real champ at napping. I can only wish for that kind of technique and frequency. Even with my amateur standing, I just cannot nap like her.

With the tooth pain, I made a discovery: I can load in all the ice cream possible, to anesthetize the area. Like I needed an excuse. My favorite ice cream used to be Any. Now it's Ben&Jerry's Karmal Sutra. But you have to keep your hands and feet away from me when I get hold of it. Only recently have I eaten less than one container. Just once. I don't suspect it will ever happen again.

Bless her, Mrs. lefty found me some mouth lozenges. For one night, I soothed my mouth with a pleasing cherry flavor. The next morning they were gone. No one knows where they went. I checked the dog for pleasing cherry flavored breath, but nothing. They. Just. Went. Away.

Anybody got any sage?

It's miserable outside. Again. Still. Weather modification is out in the open now; I can only assume somebody wants the east coast in misery. I think out of most of my vacation, I've had two sunny days. People with Seasonal Affective Disorder are more depressed than normal, and are hiding under sun lamps the size of stadiums (DINSDALE..).

Even with all this lovely weather, chances of me leaving the house are looking up today (he says, while the Universe falls over laughing). It might actually happen, for once in months....  but it's still a shopping trip. What a bittersweet experience. I will be dragged into Lowes (oh, the humanity). Feeling less than optimal, I will not react well to Supply Channel Issues, but moreso Employee Channel Issues. So if you check the news and hear of a customer going batshit and launching tractors, you might know him. Last time I launched hoes and brooms. The only reason I didn't get kicked out was that I did more restocking  work than the employees and was offered a job. Can you imagine my obvious charm and grace when dealing with actual people?

Do you know where the hammers are?

Lady, no one knows where the hammers are. We're supposed to have them but no one has ever seen them. I think the NSA is taking them. Would you like some paint instead?

How do I fix this plumbing problem? 

I don't know - what are you asking ME? I still have sinks you have to turn with pliers.

Where are the dryers? 

Definitely somewhere. Why is everybody asking me questions today? They're bloody huge - you people can't find your hands in front of your faces. Oh, wait.... they're next to the washers. Have a nice day.

My first job was in retail. Nine of the longest months of my life. 

They never proved it was me.

• Alexa tells 10-year-old girl to touch live plug with penny
• apparently Bezos is trying to weed some of us out too. The device actually told her to put a penny across a partially plugged in electric cord.
• Do your kids misbehave? Get them an Alexa.

China has stripped a gear, this time taking it out on Mercedes, for using Asian models in their commercials. They claim the models reflect American stereotypes of Asia, like slanted eyes. Although we haven't seen the commercials, we hear the models also have dark hair.

Not one to suffer quietly, Norway has hopped on the bandwagon, accusing Mercedes of using blonde-haired women in its ads.

Oh, wait, I just got an update on the Out of the House Situation: No stores had anything, per Mrs. lefty, so it looks like I'll be staying in, for a change. And I was so looking forward to Lowes. The gremlins asked me to pick up a few new bits for the drilling in my head.

I haven't been to Guitar Center since right before the Flying AIDS hit. Not for lack of trying.

If things don't improve, I'm donating next year's vacation time. 

To the SPCA.

Please donate some money/blankets/food/time to the SPCA. They have to clean up after people.

I found the missing cherry throat lozenges. It was my stupidity: I didn't look in the air filter of the car.

Johnny, Keep That Away from Your Sister's Rectum - or- Forced Vacation, Day 6

 My days are getting mixed up - especially the numbers.

I was up at 5am!!!

Strictly because I was going to bed.

So naturally I'm up at 9.

• Your love is like  giving birth to a baby, while having kidney stones

Since we've been locked in the house, we naturally have to go out for dog food. I'm getting ready, with chainsaws, machetes, and the old reliable flamethrower. And that's just to get in the car. There should be a Dog Food Lane at the store. Last time through, they only had 50lb (20oz Canadian) bags. Supply Chain Issues, of course. Penny weighs less than half that. Hopefully they have the smaller ones, or we'll have to fire up the heli-motor and visit different stores. I don't know what it's called, but I installed those hubcap accessories. You know what I'm talking about... the ones that sprout knives to shred tires of cars that get too close. People too, but don't tell anybody. I'd visit Guitar Center, but we can't keep the heli in the air that long, and it's bad form to crash your car into a house, especially from above.

The other problem with this trip is that it's messing up Mrs. lefty's coping strategy for me being home. Her coping strategy is to be on twelve hour opposite shifts from me. When I come down in the afternoon, she's just going to bed. When I go to bed, she's just coming down. This makes shopping together nigh impossible, which is actually great for me - I like shopping like SJWs like guns. Her strategy is quite similar through the year too. This is the secret to our (very) long marriage. So today we'll have to collaborate, which should be interesting. Meanwhile, the dog likes kielbasa, cornbread, and burgers.

She wants to go to Lowes. I said no's. To begin with, there are two state numbered streets required to get there. These streets were parking lots earlier in the week. The only chance we have is to wait til later, which suits me fine. She chimes in that everything will be closed then. Precisely.

Even if we survive the two streets, we'd have to survive Lowes. Even before the holiday season, they were beset by Supply Chain issues. Did you know supply chain issues also apply to staff? There's one poor, stupid, brand new employee running the place. She has to check people out, run to the back to check inventory, answer the phone, and talk on her phone to her girlfriend. 

Whatcha doin?

Sucks. I gotta work.

No, right now. There are 37 people in my lane. I'm going slow so I get it right. Accuracy is important.

No. You're kidding me. Really? But I thought she wasn't allowed to own broom handles over ten feet.

The other employee comes in in a few hours. She keeps asking the customers how to operate the cash register and does anybody have the key. Meanwhile, the customers are left to help each other, which is a recipe for disaster, especially close to the holidays. Most are too busy in armed fights for the last toilet plunger to assist anybody. The lone employee gets on the p.a. system and tells everybody there's a six percent discount if you can help anybody find anything. This sometimes stops the gunfights and makes people downright pleasant.

Customer 1: Gee, those rat traps are huge. And expensive. There's only one - you take it.

Customer 2: You're too kind. But you were here first - you take it.

But only for so long...

Customer 1: I SAID YOU TAKE IT, YOU BASTARD

Then the guns come out again.

So we compromised: we're not going to Lowes today.

I'm starting to get pissed at my laptop. I had to replace the keyboard. Now I noticed that the buttons under the trackpad aren't even. As in the left button is halfway pushed down. The moment it becomes all the way down, I will send it back to the manufacturer with some dead shrimp inside. Note: this method of complaint is much more effective in the summer. It's bleedin one year old. The last one was over eight.

There is a special new organic deodorant out. It can also be used 'down there.'

Please tell me why we need a deodorant for Down There?

Oh, it has a name. One that I've completely forgotten.

I think it needs a more memorable name....

• Twat Fresh
• Bootylicious
• Dick Delightful
• Vag-a-Sweet
• Penis Proud
• Aromatic Asshole
• Crotch Corrector

If I can't get canceled, maybe I can get sued.

Minds work funny. Some funnier than others. Some more neurotic than others.

Being on forced vacation, I just noticed I passed Week 1, having accomplished more or less, just about, approximately nothing. So I'm getting nervous that I only have one more week left. Are you with me here? See, I can be neurotic just like normal people!

At least I'll be able to get out of the house next week (he says, as the Universe laughs, heartily but soundlessly). 

As of last week, the dog got two mice.

And when I say got, I mean he scared the shit out of them and they ran right into the trap.

Dog 2, Mice 0.

Then Wife saw two mice crossing the sidewalk.

Then Wife watched an episode of a show that was called The Mouse.

What is someone trying to tell us?

The neighbors get them too., until summer, when it's Ant Time.

I can't wait for Snow Leopard Saturdays!

You know your date is going south when....

• You discover hers is bigger than yours
• She wants you to sit on her lap so she can feed you because she's much bigger
• She will wrestle you for the check
• She wants to move in. After the first date.00000000000
• She keeps saying you'd look really good with nipple clamps
• She wants to talk to you about white male privilege
• She threw out your old clothes and bought you things 'you'd look much better in'
• You have to keep her for life because every time you try to break up, she threatens to slit her wrists

That got ugly quickly....

Captivity - Day 88 You Can't Hang Yourself with the Curtains

Mrs lefty took advantage of the sun and good temperature and went shopping.
Fortunately the shoe stores aren't open yet.
Lowes looks like the aftermath of forecast snow. Shelves were almost picked clean of garden tools and the only bird feed they had was in 40lb bags, all of which were ripped open. You can't buy a shovel.

Speaking of helium, you can't find it. You can find balloons. The one place that had helium, had no balloons. And now the place with the balloons doesn't have balloons. It's the Helium Conspiracy, you know.  A theory hasn't been formed yet. Maybe the Illuminati are hoarding helium. They want to build an H bomb.

On the way out of Lowes, she saw a BMW with an elderly gentleman in the passenger seat. The car wasn't running, the windows weren't rolled down, and the temp had risen significantly. She went over and gestured 'can I open the door?' The poor old guy was uncomfortably hot. She asked if he'd like the windows down or the air conditioning on. The guy said he leaves it alone because his son's car is new and he doesn't know how to operate it. Mrs lefty would have none of this, especially as the ding dong who owns it left the keys in the ignition. She turned on the a/c, the gent was happy, and now he has a story he can tell.

We are told not to leave pets in the car with the windows up. Do we really have to warn people not to leave old persons in the car with the windows up? Wife's brother got a BMW. She asked him how long it will take til he drives like an asshole.


In other news, the Boeing 737 MAX continues to not be fixed.
Flying is aiming yourself at the ground and missing. The 737 fails to miss.
I think we've begun the age of the machines. AI is slowly getting rid of us. The 737 plummets, Teslas crash into things, and the Internet of insecure stuff is wide open for the hacking. Skynet has gone online.


BEST headline:  Man who shot himself in penis gets hard sentence


If you go to a protest or mass gathering, turn location OFF on your phone.  The BLM protests are being monitored, collecting your info for political parties or Flying AIDS monitoring. Or turn off your phone. There are no laws around this.


The FDA has canceled emergency use of Hydroxychloroquine, as unlikely to produce an antiviral effect. Again - they have NO. IDEA. What they're talking about.


Are we aghast about Seattle, where BLM/Antifa took over a few blocks and issued DEMANDS before they would leave? If their parents were there, they'd say, "If you're going to behave like an animal, you belong in a zoo."

We have a funny way of dealing with illegal activity.

We can all agree that the Floyd killing was completely unjustified and morally wrong. It appears the response to the rioting wasn't all that great. So far, nobody has said what IS a good response. Letting people illegally occupy multi-block neighborhoods seems less than optimal. I suspect this won't end well. At this point, the police are handicapped from above, and the illegal occupants are quite nasty and prepared for a skirmish.

In Philly, we deal with things differently: we bomb the house (and most of the block)


Walmart wants to get rid of all cashiers, instead using self-service lanes. Good old Walton family... squeezing every penny out of their employees and customers. Of course it's their right, as a business, but it's ugly. They can put the savings into more surveillance. You're already on tape at the checkout... maybe some drones to follow you around.  Time to not show up at Walmart. This disease is starting to affect other stores too.


SHOCKING:  More than 7 in 10 people won't use contact-tracing apps. We're starting to slowly understand privacy!

Captivity -- Day 85 My Boobies Lie Over the Ocean

The humidity went into hiding today.
Nobody missed it.



In November 1963, a popular young president drove into an ambush.
Various unstolen video and pictures show the crowd running toward the grassy knoll after the shooter.

Can you imagine, heaven forbid, if that happened today?
The crowd wouldn't move because the shooting came from the crowd. Antifa would be high fiving each other, half the crowd would cheer, and the limo couldn't get to the hospital because BLM was peacefully laying in the street (reloading). All video from every angle would be on YouTube before the FBI could confiscate a single phone. The newspapers would say the fatal shot came from a killer satellite over Australia, which bounced off Russia first. In spite of YouTube's policy of not glorifying violence, they left the footage up because it was 'uplifting.'



Today's best had to be the little kid asking his mom why that lady's pocketbook said FUCK on it. Because he was looking at Mrs lefty's FUCK keychain. Mrs lefty apologized, the mom would have no apologizing, and they laughed. If the kids ever go back to school, I give him 2 days before suspension.

Speaking of which, the police appeared at the home of an 11 year old boy, in a  virtual classroom. A teacher spotted the child's bb rifle on the wall and called the police. The police asked for Mom's permission to SEARCH the house, then they turned up the bb rifle. Of course there were no charges, because there was nothing illegal. They should have charged the teacher for causing a panic. The child was terrorized.



They let me out today.
After checking with the doctors, Mrs lefty was told ok, but not for too long, and to get me home immediately if I started to look stressed. How could anybody be stressed while picking up a pizza from our favorite place?

Even though it was never a problem before, all of the sudden they required masks.
Uh oh.
Mrs lefty took one look at me and suggested we go home. NOW.
She says I tend to look more homicidal than normal when we go out.

Trying out a few new things the doctors taught me, I figured I'd get into the restaurant. With a mask.

By way of explanation, even though I'm perfectly correct, I don't have to wear a mask in the house, except when Mrs lefty's feeling kinky. So I don't feel like wearing one when occasionally permitted outside.

NO. NO. No. N. No mask.
I don't NEED a mask.
I didn't have to wear one 2 weeks ago - why now?
They're foul. They're wrong. They make my nose sweat. And they stink.

So I got a gold star from Mom, who loved the pizza. Mrs lefty said I was allowed to remain alive (at least til the evening).

The small strip mall with Lowes has NO parking left. Hundreds and hundreds of spots, all full. A large store - all empty. I'm starting to shake, moreso. Breathing deeply, I agree to go to Bob's, where they always have the stuff we're looking for.

Except this time, when Bob's is completely sold out of everything we need. Never mind, we run into someone we haven't seen in years. In the next aisle, we run into someone we haven't seen in months. I wanted to leave before we ran into Mom, who we saw a few hours earlier. All of them came from Lowes, where they couldn't park.



I did my weekly check on visiting my favorite places. Both restaurants still don't deliver to tables, although one does in 3 stores in PA, all on the other side of the state. Idiot Governor thinks the Flying AIDS leaves the state from west to east.

I'm so desperate, I want to visit Guitar Center.
I pulled up their site, where half the screen announced BLACK LIVES MATTER.
Ok, good to see another corporation spouting the required rhetoric.
Currently there is only curb service. I have absolutely no idea how you try out a guitar at the curb, but who am I to question the wisdom.
Their plan for opening was that they would keep everything clean. They won't TUNE the guitars, but they'll clean them.

The customers and staff will wear masks (a grave improvement in looks) and the staff would help the customers at an appropriate distance. YES SIR - THAT'S A STRATOCASTER. IT'S A DAMN FINE GUITAR. WHAT? YES, I HAVE 2 AT HOME. CRANK IT UP! WHAT? I CAN'T TURN THE AMP ON BECAUSE YOU'RE STANDING TOO CLOSE TO IT.

Perhaps I'll wait.

The end of the day was picking up the medicine the doctors gave me.
We got to the pharmacy on time. But they require masks too.
Life is cruel.

Does A Brexiteer Wear Mouse Ears?

Florida News

A daycare worker was caught on camera throwing toddlers.
This is now a problem?

Florida man detains burglar by holding his iPhone like a gun until police arrived.
Thieves, like politicians, always send their best and brightest...



India plans to launch a lunar mission in July.
Yes, they're going to be the first fourth nation on the moon!
They're looking for water and other goodies, like all lunar visitors. And, according to Apu Nehasapetapetaloma, to open the moon's first Kwickie Mart.


CERN, the Large Hadron Collision people, just had their academic credentials from Microsoft revoked, causing a tenfold increase in license fees. As a result, CERN has a new effort called MAlt - Microsoft Alternatives. They're looking for open source software.

Let's see.... open source...  hmmmmm.... get rid of Windows and other MS software... hmmm.... I wonder what could possibly work for them....

In completely unrelated news, I upgraded to the latest version of Xubuntu linux (19.04) the other day and things are running better and faster.



Dear lefty:

• If Boris Johnson wins the election, will his 'hairstyle' become popular in the UK?
• No, but his teeth will.
• in North Korea, Kim ding Dong's hairstyle is all the rage (among people who wish to remain alive).

Ever since Obama, there have been charges of America sending billions of dollars to Iraq. Trump mentioned it too. I have a memory of the money being a return of money frozen by a previous administration. Anyone have a reading on this?

Speaking of Iraq, the warhawks are beating the drums again. We just sent a Rather Large Ship to that neighborhood. Whatever happened, we need to remain out of it. History shows the Powers That Be cause a False Flag event as a pretext to war (Weapons of Mass Destruction, 9-11).

• Toronto won its first basketball championship. No one knows how. It's the Jamaican Bobsled Team all over again. It wasn't easy -  they had to build stadiums and import black people.

According to the BBC, the countries using the Euro have agreed to have a common budget. What? Now explain how the conspiracy theorists are nuts because they refer to the coming New (one) World Order.

Shopping Time

My luck has been good lately, which was probably just setting me up for yesterday. Mrs. lefty had lots of shopping to do....

WALMART
Her: Could you tell me where the milk is? I can't find any.
Them: I'm sorry, we don't have any.
Her: Milk?
Them: Milk.

How could the largest vendor in the country not have milk?
It's like Monty Python's Cheese Shop sketch....

Well, we don't carry milk here.
You don't carry milk? It's the single most popular shopping item in the world.
Not much call for it around here, Sir.

Her: How about yogurt?
Them: We have this yummy probiotic stuff.
Her: It tastes like particularly bad dog excrement. What else?
Them: Oh, nothing.
Her: You have a huge food department.
Them: Yes we do. Largest in the area.
Her: and all I'm asking for is normal yogurt.
Them: I'm sorry, we don't carry normal foods.

Her: Dare I ask about potato bread? It takes much longer to turn blue and fuzzy than white bread.
Them: Since you asked, we will no longer carry it.

Her: Snapple's on sale.
Them: Yes, but we don't have the flavor you want.


LOWES
Her: I just spent a long time trying to find a 3/8" ratchet.
Them: that's because we don't carry them separately. You have to purchase the complete kit.
Her: But I already have doubles of all the sockets.
Them: Now you'll have triples!
Her: You bought the name Craftsman from Sears, which stocked everything. Why don't you?
Them: Because we don't have to. Now STFU and go buy the complete kit.


This is why Mrs. lefty doesn't allow me to shop.

Decorating?

Didja ever walk into a house and marvel at the decor or style?

My parents' place is antiseptic, yet warm. Mom got it from her mom, who scrubbed the bathroom tile with a toothbrush.

The rest of the family has it all together, with different styles and lots of space.

Then there's our house.

There is no style. There is no decor. There's barely any space. At least the walls are painted. Our method is buy something and stick it Over There. Or put the groceries on the floor.  Nice poster, let's thumbtack it to the wall. Has anyone seen the dog?

We are two decor-impaired people. And one who is directionally-impaired.

But let me say something positive: The show Hoarders rejected our application because we have clear paths and the piles of stuff don't come past our knees.

We sit there and look around, trying to imagine how one would 'design' a room. The closest I've gotten is a fake lisp and imitation of one of those home design 'experts' from tv. Don't let the LGBTQrstuv lobby tell you they have no representation on tv: straights have no representation on home improvement shows. If any straight guys happen to wander onto screen, they look gay.

Let's say we like southwest decor. The closest we'd get is painting one wall salmon and another wall turquoise. Maybe putting out a token figurine skeleton that says, "It's not the heat, it's the humidity". Viola - Instant Decor.  

We are horrible examples. It's sad. Maybe we can start a GoFundMe to get us some decorating lessons. Let's face it - even with lessons, we'd find a way to make it ugly. I was thinking about having a person with decorating skills move in, but Mrs lefty says no. I'm sure it had nothing to do with her being stunningly attractive. The bonus would be someone to babysit me when Mrs lefty visits family out of town. But noooooo......

So until we somehow acquire skills, the house will remain Decor by Tornado.

The president recently celebrated a birthday.
In case you're curious what he got from other countries....


Kim ding Dong, Supreme Haircut, North Korea, sent a hand-delivered note.

Teresa May (RIP) sent the Trump Balloon
Boris Johnson said he couldn't make it.
The Queen said, "We ARE amused."

Mohammed Somethingorother, Lord High Poobah, Iran, issued a press release stating the door was closed for birthday wishes and he had a much better hat than MAGA.

Vladimir Putin, King for Life, Russia, said that Trump's birthday was adequate, but Soviets have much better birthdays and he could kick Trump's ass in any sport.

China, asked for comment, said, "Who Tlump?"
"China has the advantage on America because Chinese food is really McDonalds and Burger King. Suggest Tlump stuff egg rolls..."

Australia sent a card that said "Good on ya, Don," but the postal kangaroo died and the card never made it.

Justin Trudeau, Prime Minister of Acceptance, Canada, sent an autographed picture of himself in his newest minidress. Melania was horrified. Donald hung the picture in the Oval Office, proclaiming Justin the best Canadian ever, after the other 40 million. The other 40 million spat in a hat then refused to send it because Americans have guns.


It's a sad day when North Korea sends the best gift.

A.J. Nipplepunisher

I now wish to be addressed as AJ Nipplepunisher.
It's spelled AJ Nipplepunisher but pronounced "You Sweet Thing".


So I'm on a late conference call, listening intently.
As this was planned, everybody knew not to bother me.
Well, almost everybody.

Five seconds before the first word was spoken, the air conditioner turned on.
The wife announced, loudly, she was going to lay down because her head hurt.
As the conference starts, The Loud Family begins entertaining the neighborhood with its rendition of Power Saw Samba #9, dedicated to my wife's headache.
Then the Russian guy starts talking. His English is flawless (until he tries to speak). I can feel the sound of 50 participants' eyeballs rolling.
But wait... the sound of screeching. Of someone horribly mistreating an animal.
Oh. The dog is outside and wants to come in. It's a shame nobody told me he was outside.
If my coworkers had any idea of the things I do while on conferences, they'd all quit. After sterilizing the phones.
Back to sitting quietly and listening.
The Loud Family, having just finished their rendition of Moby Dick for Explosives and 12 Gauge Shotgun, wasted no time on going into their next song: Blue Danube for Two Lawnmowers. The interplay was spectacular, but we missed out on the stereo separation because we weren't out in the street.

Someone yelled ENCORE and they've been out there tuning their circular saws for 30 minutes.

• CORRECTION: I'm a big man and not afraid to admit my mistake. Last issue featured my wife telling me to heat Marshall's chicken breast before giving it to him. I asked which spices he preferred and should I offer him a nice cabernet with it. I have since been corrected, by my entire family, that one does not drink cabernet with chicken: it would be proper to offer something called Rose-A. Lest you think I ain't got no cultchur.
• UPDATE: the WhatsApp caution that a specially formatted message could destroy your phone was incorrect. The worst it can do is cause you to have to reboot the phone. All reports of the phone exploding and burning down your house were grossly exaggerated.

Good Day: your boss tells you his dad worked for the CIA
Not So Good Day: you say, "Your dad was a spook?" to the black man
Better Day: your boss says yes.

Since I have more traffic from Russia these days, I'll try to translate this for former citizens of the USSR:

Good Day: your boss tells you his dad worked for evil capitalist spy agency, bent on spreading warped ideology to other countries by destabilizing people's government
Not So Good Day: you say, "Your dad was filthy spy?" to the criminally oppressed minority in country where everybody isn't equal
Better Day: your boss says da, silently pointing to the mic in the flowers on his desk

• Part of the ThermionicEmissions Quality Control program is spell-checking my rantings before they go out. This is a little difficult because Google's spellcheck (Blogspot is Google) doesn't have certain unimportant words, like internet, blowjob, tv, McDonalds, or gauge.

I see a lot of press being given to people who insist Artificial Intelligence is going to kill us all. I used to laugh it off, like everyone laughs off most of what I say, but if you think about it, it has already started. I'm talking about that poor lady mowed down in Arizona, while walking her bike across the street. It was a self-driven Uber, with a test driver who happened to be looking down.

Police say the car didn't try to avoid hitting the woman.

See, I told you so.

The official explanation from Uber is that they discovered a bug in their software that separates Stuff floating across the road from Stuff you shouldn't hit. Apparently the car failed to see the woman as something that should not be mowed down. I'll go along with this premise, but this is not a 'bug' - it's programming. They built the sensors to 'see' her but had to program them to figure out if it was ok to mow her down. As it turns out, even I don't mow people down with my car, no matter how much they deserve it. Thus the beginning of Artificial Intelligence killing us all. Our first martyr.

Apparently there's a tradeoff between a car that's jerky because it keeps hitting the brakes and a smooth car, which just might mow down an object it considers harmless. Do you see where this is going? Harmless? Random human?

As a result, a number of states and car companies have stopped testing their software on pedestrians... I mean stopped testing their cars on public streets.

Fast fact: the codename for the car's software is Manson.

Regardless of whether it was horrible programming or the vehicle's decision to reduce the population by one, we come back to the same result: I told you so.

I told you these things were Not Ready for Prime Time. To test them on public streets is to test them on the public. In this case, it's tantamount to murder. There's absolutely nothing wrong with testing them out for years and years. This is a product you don't want running around mowing people down. I guess the lawyers sent opinions and the bean counters counted their liability beans, deciding it was time to set the murdering machines loose upon the public.

I'm not particularly proud of it (I told you so) but I wanted to make the point that maybe I have a point and deserve a little consideration. Usually I told you so is reserved for computer security matters and conspiracy theories that turn out to be quite true. So next time I warn you about something and you ignore it; when it comes true, at least say he told us so.

• There's a critical bug in 7zip, the archiver. Download the latest version. Now.
• There is a bug in PGP, Pretty Good Privacy. A Big Deal was made but it turns out the world will not end. The recommendation was to turn off HTML email (IF you use PGP). Fortunately most, if not all, of my readers won't have to worry about it. Because if they did, they'd lose all of those wonderful backgrounds and emojis (HORROR of HORRORS).

I don't have the heart to summarize this, but this entry has some very important information about credit freezes. It's depressing, demoralizing, and disheartening. And it shows you whose hand is in what, as credit goes.

• I read an opinion in the New York Times, so it must be vetted first, that Trump's choice for CIA head ran a black detention site in Thailand, where people were tortured at the behest of the CIA. Most of the previous words are abhorrent to me.
• Yes, one could argue that she has experience at all levels and toes the company line, but....

Donald Trump's Twitter Account Hacked!

Well, we're not entirely sure, but this morning's tweet was relatively short, full of facts, and contained no Trump-isms. So we think the account was hijacked. When asked what they were doing to protect the president, the Secret Service asked, "What's a tweet?"

• a police car pulls over a vehicle that has just turned into McDonalds...
• UK police would see the car into a spot and confiscate any plastic knives.
• Australian police would allow the car to place an order first, then see it in the parking lot.
• US police would pull the guy out of his car and beat the shit out of him. "Rubber hoses leave no marks"

Weather Modification

As humans, we are only beginning to discover things we can do. For instance, did you know we can control the weather?

We can cause it to rain by washing the car. 

We can also cause a 30 degree drop in temperature by installing window screens.

Who knows what else we'll find as time goes on...

• So we're heading out shortly and I'm checking the weather forecast. WXnation says 57 with an 80% chance of showers. Weather.com says 73 with a 20% chance of rain. Obviously they're both correct because 80% plus 20% equals 100%, right? Right? The forecast on my computer is for showers every day. Normal people would find this suspicious. People around here know you can't go wrong predicting rain and clouds every day.

Word of advice: when your mom asks you to shoot her if she's acting like her mom, don't.





Lowes Blows

My wife needed hardware. Not that kind, smartass.

She has a love/love relationship with Lowes. Or so I think, because she spends a lot of time there. Normally it's the man who visits Valhalla, but I'm weird.

We have this thing she calls a lopper. Women don't always know the names of things, so I helped by referring to it as 'that long red thing for cutting branches you can't reach'.

None of this would be an issue if it weren't for my dad. He's gotten a little 'itchy' since he retired, and insists on coming over to help me. We suspect he's gotten a little tired of Mom, so he insists on coming over to help me. As it turns out, we may be wrong, because he brings her along too. Mom has also gotten a little 'itchy' since Dad retired, and insists on coming over to help the dog. No, really. She does some sort of energy work on him, which seems to help. She can tell where he's hurting. Mom was always tuned into different frequencies... when I was a teen and my friends came over, if one of them did so much as pulled a cigarette out of a pack, Mom would yell, from two floors up, "Is anybody smoking?" She could also tell when someone was pregnant, long before they announced it or looked pregnant. Boy was I shocked when a girlfriend turned out to be preggers (I had no part in it, so to speak).

One of Dad's projects was my tree. The tree sits out there, mocking me and annoying much of the neighborhood. Do I look like I care?  It stays there because in the fall, it drops leaves by the ton on the Crazy Lady's lawn. That's a blessing to me. Anything I can do to 'inadvertently' make her life (more) miserable, I'm doing it. She turns 440 this year and doesn't look a day over 125.

In any case, the tree has been a bit of a problem recently. It started throwing limbs at the ground. I don't mind limb throwing, but only at the Crazy Lady.. it's a waste of a perfectly good projectile. If it didn't grow leaves, I'd think it was dead. One particular branch was getting cozy with a power line, so we called the Tree Guy.  Tree Guy quoted us $600, because anything he does starts at $600 and rises rapidly. The following year it looked like another branch was loose, so we called Tree Guy, who charged us...... wait for it.... $600 to remove it. We're not all that quick, so it took a few years to figure out the guy was taking down the entire tree, but doing it one branch at a time, at $600 per branch. At those rates, you'd think he was a plumber.

Dad decided this was going to be his job. He picked up the lopper and started sawing. He got so busy that it wasn't safe to walk near my house, lest you get pierced by falling bits of tree. He too was taking the tree down by attrition, but he wasn't charging. Two hours later, he asked where the blade was, because it wasn't there, like me. Wife had no idea. Apparently the hardware loosened, jettisoning the blade and itself. Speaking of hardware, my wife is juggling chainsaws, and Dad calls at two hour intervals, wanting to know if she got the hardware yet. Dad's tenacious, if not short.

After telling Dad that she got the hardware, to make him stop calling (it didn't work), she decided it would be a good idea to actually get the hardware, so he wouldn't be without his hobby when he arrived. This is where it gets weird, as if it wasn't weird enough already...

Lowes is Lowes. A huge home-improvement warehouse. Wife asked where she could find the replacement blade: "Over there."  Ok, then... over there she went. Through some managerial mistake, she found the blade. You know what's coming next, right? It didn't have the hardware. So she wandered around, looking for a Helpful Employee. Due to corporate budget cuts, they no longer hire Helpful Employees. Instead, she looked for a Very Busy Helpful-looking Employee.

Did you know it's not against the law to dance naked in any aisle at Lowes? All you do is stand there and look for help. You are now guaranteed that nobody who works there will come down the aisle, and can start the striptease.  After she got done dancing, she found someone, purely by mistake, as he was just about to go on Hiding Duty. He said to go to the hardware aisle and he'd send someone over. This is a phrase they teach employees and sounds extremely helpful and hopeful. In reality, it means "I'm not allowed to say GO AWAY so I'm sending you to an aisle where no one will ever find you".

She waited fifteen minutes at the aisle, when a different employee approached, looking all hardware-like. Three feet down the aisle, he acquired fourteen people, with fifteen questions, preventing him from helping her any time in the next millennium. Wife gave up, nearly decapitating several hangers-on with one throw of the blade.

Off to the register with blade, but without hardware. This cashier came directly from McDonalds. Or maybe a shoe store on a strange planet, here on a student visa, to study how much bad customer service you can throw at customers before they simply leave the store. His name was Taniesha and his short fro featured two very yellow stripes and sparkles simply everywhere. Before Wife could even get out a greeting, Taniesha started regaling her with tales of his day, how nobody would let him get his work done. Does this mean coworkers stopped him from pushing keys on the register or did somebody hide his stockings? He continued the monologue by mentioning he was there at 5am and hadn't even gotten a break and nobody appreciates him.

Now this is where it gets weird:

He says, "Oh, snap." 

Complete with hand gesture.

And that, Your Honor, is when his head just came off and rolled down the aisle.

So now we have a replacement blade, but no one has the heart to tell Dad there's no hardware to secure it. I can hear the phone ringing already.....

I'm not moralizing - make your own decisions

The State of Gardening in 2011

I have said it before and I will never stop saying it: I hate grass.   More specifically I hate mowing the grass.  I don't really have anything against grass per se, I would just prefer that it stay at a predetermined height and spectacularly fail to grow.

I have even gone so far as to research replacing the green bits with concrete, but alas, the county has certain silly rules about drainage and flood planes.   Since I am the reason my county has an anti-Slinky ordinance*, I dare not tempt fate.

I have a long history with mowers.  Somewhere in the bowels of my shed, there's a push mower.  Just knowing it's there annoys me, although I can't ever remember using it.  Eventually an electric mower showed up (don't ask me how).  It lasted a few weeks, being the anemic piece of attempted machinery it was.

So we had no choice but to go to gas.  It lasted the better part of a season and died.  Mower Number Four was also gas-powered and ran like a top.  Well, it ran like a top right up until it stopped running.  I observed that it seemed to be a fuel issue, so I had no choice but to disassemble the carburetor/fuel system.

In retrospect, I'm not entirely sure why I felt I had the expertise to deal with a carburetor.  Perhaps it was because all of my cars had carburetors.  Perhaps because a friend rebuilt my carburetor on the dining room table once and it looked cool.  Perhaps I just figured that if I could build computers, I could certainly fix internal combustion engines.  Regardless of the reason, I was completely and accurately incorrect: I could not, in fact, do much more than put gas in the tank.  And with the cost of gas lately, even that was in doubt.

Oddly enough, I was correct, in that the cylinder wasn't getting fuel.  I was just incorrect about my ability to repair the issue.

Flash forward to the current mower: Mower Number Five.  We purchased a Craftsmen because they make great tools, so we just made the bizarre leap of logic that the mowers would be every bit as good.  To be fair, it ran flawlessly over a few  years, always starting pretty quickly (long before my back started telling me to stop pulling that ripcord, asshole).

Things being what they are, I brought out Mower Number Five at the beginning of the season, expecting to start the on the first pull.  And I suspect it might even have started on that first pull, had the ripcord not broken as soon as I started to pull it.  Why did it break?  Because it was made from stranded metal cable that was exposed to the elements and it rusted.

Not to be outdone (by yet another mower) my wife sprang into action.  She seems to like Lowes in much the same way she likes shoe stores, by which I mean to say expensively and fatally.  She managed to locate something called a Universal Choke Replacement Cable, which seemed perfect for the part.

And when I say perfect for the part, I mean it looked perfect right up until I tried to install it.  My wife is as fond of instructions as I am of all things Mac, so I am in charge of all assembly.  As it turned out, the cable was somewhat less universal than its billing.  So there sat Mower Number Five, having beaten two full-grown adults into submission.  My wife's idea for getting even was to take it for repairs.  I swear I heard it laughing at her as soon as her back was turned.  I simply gave up.

Giving up allowed me the luxury of not mowing.  It also meant constant `reminders' from the wife about the size of the grass.  I can only assume the construction hat with the flashlight duct taped to it and references to going out to locate the dog was her way of telling me the grass was getting rather tall.  Having given up, I simply pretended not to notice.

Then it happened.

I'm not entirely certain what happened or where it came from.  All of the sudden I remembered that I used to really like cars, taking them apart, and fixing things in general.  I used to be able to rig things so they'd work.  And there I was, beaten by a simple broken choke cable.

I got up off my well-padded posterior, grabbed some heavy wire, and rigged the ($*#ing mower so it would start on the first pull.   Since this is me we're talking about, it started on the third pull but who's arguing?  Just for fun I told the wife I refused to mow the lawn ever again so she'd get mad at me then walk out back to discover I had mowed anyway (we have that kind of marriage).

She was most appreciative and I felt like a Real Man<tm> for the first time in years (antidepressants be damned).

But speaking of gardening....
(that wins Segue of the Century)

My wife decided to exercise her green thumb this year.  Again.  Normally, this means that she goes to Lowes and purchases huge bags of dirt and moss, which sit on the front lawn until the following year when it's time to go back and purchase more dirt and moss (presumably because the previous year's dirt expired?).  This year there were actual plants, flowers, and real genuine vegetables.  The last time she planted vegetables, we became inundated with a plague of yellow squash the size of watermelons.  We couldn't give it away fast enough.

This year there was careful consideration given to which vegetables she would grow, including which side of the house on which to plant.  There were these huge tomato triangular cages that looked like medieval torture devices (but I won't make any reference to them not being similar to the medieval torture devices in the bedroom, as this is no doubt being read by children as well as adults without a strong constitution).

I saw genuine excitement on my wife's face as things started to bloom and grow.  This was quickly followed by crushing disappointment, as every $*#@ing thing she planted got eaten by various fauna.

Apparently it started with the bunnies (as it always does).  The bunnies came by and ate some of the vegetables.  Then the badgers, raccoons, and foxes came along to eat the bunnies.  As previously described, we had nightly 11:15pm skunkings for no apparent reason.

We are fairly normal suburbanites, living in a fairly normal suburb.  We don't live near the woods.  We don't live near animal sanctuaries.  So why is it that almost every species of herbivore known to the mid-atlantic portion of the US stopped by to munch on our vegetables?  My friends out in the boonies don't have this kind of variety (although the mother-in-law has bears, but that's a different story entirely).

My wife simply gave up.  I would have heartily applauded her but I was too busy pretending to ignore the entire affair, having given up on the outdoors long before moving into this house.

To add insult to near-fatal injury, while I was mowing the lawn, I unknowingly plowed the rest of the garden.  Fortunately my wife had already given up, so she was able to note this with some degree of dark humor (we have that kind of marriage).

Ah, the great indoors....

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* I once heard that Slinkys make so-so antennas for shortwave radios.  So I strung four of them together and ran them from an upstairs window to a shed.  The neighbors, who already thought I was a few pennies short of a nickel, just stood and stared.   As it turned out, they were right: the antennas were so-so at best, so the Slinkys were just there for `decoration'.