Injunction to Stop the Stupid

Your love is like a cd that skips



Checking the online sales pages reminds me that I want a Bluetooth wireless speaker. The thing is, I don't know why I want one. I don't think I've ever had a use for it. I just want one. This gets me in enough trouble with guitar toys. I think it's hereditary; my dad used to get something in his head that he needed and would obsess over it hourly. Sometimes we'd buy it for him because it was the most painless way. When he passed, we inherited watch repair kits, books on hamster healing, and several vibrating things we couldn't identify that Mom (hopefully) didn't know about.

Know what else I want? I want to buy stuff that doesn't have a lower case 'i' in front of it. I saw an iPet, iHome, and iRhinocerous. I'd understand if it had something to do with an Apple device, but a desk vacuum doesn't. Even if it's a Bluetooth vacuum. Perhaps I should open a Not iStore, selling products without an 'i' in front of them. It would be approximately as successful as Ned Flanders' Leftorium, which I would gladly have visited. Go ahead- find a brick and mortar left hand store... I dare you. There used to be one on a pier in San Francisco. You could purchase everything from left handed bumper stickers ($20) to left handed rulers ($3 per inch), left handed measuring cups ($49.99), and left handed spiral notebooks ($99.95, 2 for $299.95). Eons ago, when I was in desktop support, I'd set up new computers with the mouse on the left side, just for fun. Then at night, my band would play and if the drummer was late, we'd set up his kit left handed. Someone always wanted to try out my guitar. Being very supportive of all musicians, I handed it right to them. The looks were priceless, because I handed my left handed guitar right to them, and they'd stand there, dumbfounded, trying to figure out what was wrong. And that is why I need a Bluetooth speaker.

• Just saw an article about people missing hugs during the quarantine. Do you know anyone like this? Do you also avoid them like rats and stinky cheese?

Today I identify as  my cousin Jean, the hippopotamus.

• Neandertal genes in people today may raise risk of severe COVID-19
• So stay away from some of your friends.... you know which ones...

Russian interference in the upcoming election continues, with the International Space Station air leak traced to the Russian Zvezda module.



The reactions to the Trumps' Flying AIDS diagnoses were swift:

• People: speedy recovery
• Liberals: YAY!!! HAHAHAHA! I hope it's fatal! Par-TAY*
• Government: Continuity of Government plans in effect
• News: he's ok, he's not ok, he's going to use this to postpone the election, what if he refuses to leave the White House?
• BLM: peaceful protest at the hospital, throwing bricks to break the windows
• Donald: I'm going to be fine. I have the best doctors- I love them
• Libertarians: does this mean we can finally get into the debates?
• Mike Pence: the Lord hath plans for me, a Theocracy!

Interesting to ponder the unfortunate instance of Trump not returning to office.
Many presidents of old successfully hid their serious health conditions, but you can't get away with that today. Pence would step in, but what would happen to the country? Politics would go on, of course, but I wonder about the reaction of the people. What would the non-political repercussions be?

 ---> Mike Pence's epitaph: At least I'm not LBJ




New social media policies:

• *Twitter: you may not say you wish Trump dies from the Flying AIDS
• Faceyspaces: it's ok to say Trump should die, but not if you link him to the post

AI Oopsies

Twitter's image cropping AI

There are times where it will pick someone with darker skin over a lighter-skinned person, though generally, it seems to prefer women’s chests and lighter skin.

and the problem is?

• In brief AI software designed to monitor students via webcam as they take their tests – to detect any attempts at cheating – sometimes fails to identify the students due to their skin color.

If only there were a way that a human could monitor the students....

• Pope Francis Says Covid-19 Pandemic Shows Limits to Market Economics, Coronavirus reminds humanity it is ‘all in the same boat,’
• can we throw the child molesters out of the boat? 

Dear lefty

• Tonight is my first date with this girl I really like. Any tips?
• never confuse tease and taze

Russian interference in the upcoming election continues. It would have remained under the radar, but when you register 5,000 voters in Chicago, you're not supposed to register them republican.





Hey, remember Debbie Does Dallas?
[looking around for wife] ummmm.... no.
Remember the famous scene? Sure you do. The one where they're in the car and she decides to give him some oral gratification? The one where she reaches over, fishes around for her prize, then leans over? When she gets all twisted up and her right leg winds up out the driver's side window? You know, she has that wicked smile on her face and keeps going, even when she gets her head stuck in the steering wheel? Where she really gets into high gear after accidentally impaling herself on the gearshift?
Oh, that one, yeah, that was hot. What about it?
What kind of car was it?




Happys

Steve Miller - he's a joker, he's a smoker..
Brian Connolly - The Sweet
Brian Johnson - AC/DC

BYEs

Ben Orr - Cars
Mike Gibbins - Badfinger's (lefty) drummer. There are now no band members touring that played on the first album. The single touring member, Joey Molland, joined after the recording. The rest died, with the possible exception of the first guitar player, who quit before the first tour.





It's been 50 years since we lost Janis Joplin - one of my favorite singers.
We don't have a ton of ladies stepping up to the plate, unfortunately.
There's Beth Hart, and my absolute favorite, Sass Jordan (she tweeted to my dog on Twitter - don't ask).




SJW Suckage

In addition to the cry to remove tech terms blacklist/whitelist and master/slave, the latest demand is to get rid of database queries.  Ok, I made that up, but it's plausible.

we all start here. most of us never stop.

Who Ate Taylor Swift?

Technically speaking, I don't know or care (with the possible exception of John Mayer, a very talented guitar player).

But that is not important now.

Aside from a few cardboard cutouts and ads, I had no idea who Taylor Swift was. I noticed she had big hair, which is always a good thing with me. But as we know, I don't judge a singer by her hair (ok, it's still a 'nice to have').

Months ago, my Colleagues in Song Parody came up with a parody involving a Swift song. They started playing the song for me and my first thought was "this person must have a young following" because it sounded beyond bubblegum. I was thinking up to about age fifteen, max. My second thought was more of an action: "please turn that off. Eww." That was my first exposure to Taylor Swift.

Every now and then someone will expose me to a Swift song or I'll see her on television. My opinion hasn't changed in any way. Yet adults go to her concerts (and not necessarily the ones dragged by their children).

The thing is, I keep feeling I should like her. I have no idea why but I should like her. She's certainly not hard on the eyes but she does nothing for me.  I like really good female singers but she's not one. I like music but age-appropriate music. She seems to be a good person who does nice things.

Maybe it's because her output is just product. Maybe she has some sort of Swift Ray that permeates press and causes one to fall over her.  Since I'm semi-immune to commercials, it probably just keeps me wondering why I am not fond of her.

My recommendation? Turn that stuff off and listen to some serious women. No ear candy here:
Sass Jordan
Janis Joplin
Joan Osborne (bonus - large, curly hair)
Linda Rondstadt
Heart - Ann Wilson (sometimes Nancy Wilson)
Bonnie Raitt



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We wish good journeys to Wicked Wanda, 96, wherever it is that she's gone.

The Best Laid Plans.... Don't Get Laid

We have food trucks at work. That is about the most positive thing I can say about them. One of them featured Jamaican 'food'. One of my coworkers was talking to another, saying she didn't eat the curried goat because it's too spicy. To be honest, I don't eat the curried goat because it's goat.

Because my wife tithes to Dunkin Donuts, I noticed their new HUGE banner for bacon guacamole flatbread. I'd like to order a bacon guacamole flatbread - hold the guacamole and the flatbread.

Speaking of which, we recently discovered that, in addition to water ice, the dog loves banana splits. To be specific, he loves splits, without banana in them. He's a chip off the old block. Have you ever seen a dog eat an ice cream cone? I always wonder what's going through his head..... hmmm... this ice cream isn't water ice but it's really good. Since it's harder than water, I guess I should bite it - as he takes a bite out of my wife's ice cream. She's flabbergasted but not flabbergasted enough to stop him from trying to eat the actual cone. He liked the cone too. 

Don't get me wrong - the only people food he gets is whatever lands on the floor before we can pick it up, just like the cat. Funny, both of them sit at my wife's feet while she's eating.


THE WAR

Speaking of work, I've apparently entered the War Between Workers. Nobody officially declared war or even bothered to tell me that we have wars, yet here I am.  The shame of it all is that it's a silent war - The War of the Trashcan.

Every day I launch things into the trashcan under my desk.  It's quite a functional trashcan, black, and protected from my every day abuse by the ubiquitous clear baggie-looking-thing.  Every morning I arrive and the aforementioned trashcan has moved out from underneath my desk to right by my cube's opening. This creates quite the issue when I stumble into work and attempt to throw a bit of trash into the can under my desk, totally and completely missing the can.

So my only obvious conclusion is that I'm in a silent war. My opponent is not only laughing at me because my morning trash winds up on the floor, but also because even when I aim it at its new (temporary) location, I still miss the can. This is why I don't play sports. This and the memories of childhood friends, screaming, "HEY LEFTY - YOU'RE RUNNING THE WRONG WAY!"

I'm not typically a warlike guy, especially with coworkers (even the one who sighs wearily, snores and curses every ten minutes, driving me up the wall of my cube and onto the ceiling).... I sought a middle ground. I literally put the can halfway between the desk and the cube exit. And every morning, it's back in its other spot, as if some sort of Facilities Deity has declared it so.

Or it's just some sort of idiotic incentive (probably from my wife) to get me to move a little. Or at all.


SPEAKING OF CANS...

I live across the street from the House That Ate the Neighborhood.  It used to be a nice house that blended into the neighborhood in a pleasant way.  Then came the first add-on, a porch.  Then an additional two-car garage.  Then a porch that surrounded the house and the two-car garage. Then a third floor.  The neighbors have been busy pulling plans and permits at the township - it turns out he has an underground swimming pool, three levels under the house, plus a Very Deep Level, where he keeps his armaments, food stores, and surveillance equipment. My wife is jealous, as she tends to use the Manual Surveillance Mode, whereupon she sits on the front steps and watches the comings and goings of the denizens. "Hey, Patricia's home early from work."

So there's another house down the street which has had its porch under construction for a year. Mind you, this is not the type of porch that can be mistaken for an addition or another bedroom. It's a standard porch - the kind that should be populated with some rocking chairs, a swing, plus an occasional toothless relative. Two weeks ago, out of the blue, the porch had been completed. No idea whether it completed itself or had outside assistance.

Two days later we drove by to see that someone had started a large-ish extension on the side of the house.

Uh-oh.
It's (as they say) ON.

The sensors across the street at the first house set off the alarm. Without declaring anything, the Silent War starts. It starts with an extension. Then House #1 counters with a patio. A screened patio. House #2 parries with a heated sun room. The stakes rise when House #1 annexes the house next door, like Hitler took Poland. House #2, not one to be upstaged, calls in the township, which has laws about Stuff Like This.  In addition to not being allowed to run Slinkys across your back yard, you also can't annex a neighboring house (Hitler notwithstanding).  Pretty soon they'll be lobbing wheelbarrows and dump trucks at each other. The collateral damage will be horrendous.

This is not going to end well. Or soon.

[UPDATE]
I thought we might have seen it all but I was seriously mistaken. There is yet a THIRD house undergoing major reconstruction. Neighborhood War I will be upon us in short order.


AND NOW, THE MUSIC

Today's musical gem is features Sass Jordan. She's one of my favorite female vocalists. Very few know that Sass was invited to spend some time at the Van Halen compound when they were looking for a new singer. I think VH made a terrible mistake in not hiring her. Gary Cherone?

Forgetting for a moment her model-like looks, the woman can just plain sing. She can do slow, she can do fast, she can Janis it out. She also has a great range. While she's more popular in her home of Canada, she needs to be heard round the world. I saw a video of her band recently, where she walked up to the mic with a beer and belched right into it.  Who can NOT love a woman like this?

Make You a Believer is some straight ahead rock, starting with its main riff and going all the way through to its church-like refrain, 'I will make you a believer' at the end.

If you'd lke to hear her softer side, check out You Don't Have to Remind Me. This lady has balls.