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Betcha didn't know GPT could write this flawlessly. Or this flaw-ful.

Pennsylvanians, your government workers are now powered by ChatGPT

This experiment will fail, miserably and expensively, when they discover they can't train it to be lazy, incompetent, and rude.

 

Wimbledon: Electric double-decker bus catches fire during rush hour

Betcha didn't know Tesla made buses...

 

'A mouse for your mouth': New device allows users to scroll with their tongues

If you see an attractive person, your tongue rolls and deletes the entire page. And who could possibly argue with a transmitter that sits on your tongue. Tongue cancer, anyone? 

 

Plastic is everywhere, including in our food and bottled water

hmmmm..... 2 dogs with cancer. We couldn't possibly be causing our own problems, could we? Cancer, Alzheimer's, whatever else.....

 

US verges on vaccination tipping point, faces thousands of needless deaths: FDA

Isn't that interesting. The FDA complains about what it hath wrought...

 

Julia Roberts says she has made the choice not to do nude scenes

I know nothing about movie-making, but I don't believe Julia has to make declarations like this. She's high enough up the food chain that she either won't be asked, or can just laugh it away. Now we'll have to count on deepfakes....

President Giveaway struck again, with $632 million for electric vehicle charging. When asked for comment, Biden said, "My only regret is that I cannot give them more."

Dear taxpayers: you should feel good, deep in your heart, that you have done your American duty to help the auto manufacturers, banks, electric vehicle manufacturers, cable companies, chip companies, Big Pharma, IRS, and most everybody else who asked for it. Except you. If the government took less of our money, we wouldn't have to bail ourselves out...

It's great to no longer be sick. Nothing is blurry and nothing floats around when I look at it. Aside from a tendency to trip (fairly normal), I feel good. No fever, no seeing things, no strange desire to watch sports.

Speaking of sports, we got our invite to a Superbowl party. Now I have to figure out when that is. This year I thought of bringing a tablet and watching tv or reading. Apparently I'm not the only one who feels this way; many also don't watch the game. Football's the one with the horses, right? Last year I suggested Dancing Girls, but the host's wife has no sense of humor. I bet if I suggested Dancing Guys, she'd be all for it. I know his neighbors better than I know mine. And no kids.

Speaking of no kids, that's why our 'hood works out so well. I'm not sure if there are any children under 13. No noise, except the constant racket of construction when I have a conference. Anyway... our newest nextdoor neighbor has gone on the 9 Month Rapid Weight Gain diet. Yes, she got knocked up. One day she was moving in, the next she was the size of her Toyota. And even I know it's not polite to ask the large woman if she's expecting. Or if she's just FAT. Anyway, I'm pretty sure this means an infant. Infants make noise. That will spoil the entire fung shwing of the neighborhood. Unless they have one of those joyful quiet infants that turn into joyful quiet children. Since there are no others, they'll have to leave the hood to find more bouncing bundles of joy [NOTE: they do NOT bounce. Don't ask]. 

Of course we'll have to provide a present. This is pretty far our of my wheelhouse; fortunately Wife likes children. I suggested one of those things you put in their mouth to keep them quiet, but with some glue so it won't come out. A Johnny Automatic Weapon kit for when the little bugger gets older. Bag-O-Blades, a Harley, the Pill for his mommy (and daddy), and maybe a needlepoint that says, "Welcome to the end of sleep as you know it. For 18 years." Ain't it a good thing I don't have kids? There are several groups of concerned citizens which are actively interested in me not reproducing. My contraception was always free (and encouraged). I'd be out on a date, things were getting hot and heavy, then some complete stranger would pop up and hand me a condom. It was the strangest thing....

Speaking of sick, I got into bed the other night and immediately smelled something FOUL. It smelled like one of the other bed occupants (Wife, dog) threw up. But they're both pretty good about cleaning it up (oof). I tried to ignore it, but I couldn't stand it anymore. I moved the covers and boom - a piece of Wife's XXX Provolone fell on me. Well, that explains the smell....  both Wife and dog eat it. I always seem to be downwind from it.

Nobody saw it coming: George Carlin has been brought back to life by AI. The new special is called I'm Glad I'm Dead. Nobody was more surprised than George, except possibly his daughter, Kelly, who is shocked and outraged. One of the people responsible, Will Sasso, says it's an impersonation of his voice and material. I think Will's funny, but this is not. Kelly suggests that if anybody wants to see George, there are many existing specials all over the place. I tend to agree.

George was an American treasure, who worked diligently on his art, from when tv was black and white. He was hysterical. Back when records were popular (the first time), we'd gather and listen to his records. To this day we quote him.

State of the Blog Address

Blah blah blah.
Blah blah God blah blah family blah blah.
Blah blah blah Make Blog Great Again blah blah.

• One of the many benefits of living in my house is that it's never boring. No matter what time of day or night, what part of the house, or who's involved, there's no shortage of Sheer Fun. This morning I found a wife busily scrubbing a dark brown substance from the couch.
• Uh-oh.
• Apparently it all started with a 32oz cup of chocolate milk. The dog decided to 'help' by leaping up, causing the entire 32oz to do an experiment on the science of chocolate milk's suitability for flight.
• The results were so spectacular that we will be cleaning chocolate milk from a twenty foot radius of Ground Zero for days. Equipment across the room got splattered. Fortunately, at no point did Hawaii issue an incoming chocolate milk alert.
• The only thing that got spared was the dog, who just sat there and licked his paws.  [chocolate can be fatal for dogs]

I bitch a lot about the weather. I bitch a lot, period.

According to this morning's Weather for Idiots, it's much colder here than Minneapolis. Plus the Minnesotans are making fun of our accent.

I'm not kidding about Weather for Idiots: you get the temperature, but it's almost irrelevant: you are given the weather quality on a one-to-ten scale (the Eagles Forecast). Then there is a two dimensional character called Bus Stop Buddy, who shows up dressed in weather-appropriate clothing, standing at the bus stop. Even the dog complains that this is beneath his level.

Then there's Bother. Every news team has a Bother... the one member who instantly annoys everyone who watches. You wonder how this person is still employed until you come to the logical conclusion that they have pictures of Rupert Murdoch with midget donkeys and cream cheese. At least I hope that's cream cheese.

Bother makes people leap off their couches with the urge to kill him or her. Even people walking by the television. Neighbors. Cousins who don't even watch the news.  Our particular Bother is one of the aforementioned midgets, only this particular height-impaired human is also one of the Ritalin Children, who never outgrew (or medicated) his A.D.H.D.  He bounces around like a pinball, talking at top speed and top volume, torquing off 90% of the viewers. Unfortunately, he also has pictures of them with Rupert Murdoch (the donkeys refused). 

As if this weren't enough, two people appeared on the show with German Shepherd heads and two actual German Shepherds, dressed in Iggles t-shirts. I'm hoping the SPCA raids the set and arrests them for animal cruelty. That would be Must See TV.

There is some parlor in Philly giving out free Iggles tattoos.

The wife's Instant Analysis was that the lunacy hasn't begun - it's just ramping up exponentially. Win or lose, the city is going to have to do more than grease the light poles this time.


And the city managed to get through it with only a few fires, store windows smashed, and turning-over of cars, sometimes onto other cars. It just goes to show that Los Angeles and Chicago aren't the only places that can throw a good riot.

• Everyone's celebrating Dem Iggles winning the Superbowl in their own way.  One man, exemplifying Philly, bent down and scooped up some horse manure. Instead of hurling it into the crowd or setting it on fire, he ate it. The crowd cheered. His wife got an emergency restraining order and is reportedly looking for a 'good Philly lawyer' for her divorce.
• The Ritz-Carlton's awning collapsed because people were standing on it.
• Macy's and TMobile's windows were smashed. Nothing was taken. When asked for comment, a bystander (who swears he had NOTHING to do with the windows) was quite  offended at the suggestion that Philadelphians loot. "In Philly," he said, "we do not loot. We set our own cars, or someone's cars, on fire and flip them onto other cars."
• The police were out on horseback, but were unable to trample and of the revelers. Their parents would be ashamed, if they weren't helping them turn the cars over.
• To show they were good sports and there were no hard feelings, the crowd chanted FUCK TOM BRADY!
• Although the light poles were greased (11 knocked down), those unstoppable fans managed to get up there anyway. The Army has representatives in Philly today to study how hard a head has to be to ignore grease. "It's amazing none of them demonstrated the ability to hover," said Sergeant Stedenko. 
• The city's top cop took a bottle to the back of his head. He said he was proud to get stitches because the Phillies made it to England.
• Quote from New York Post: Philadelphia was on fire, in some cases literally...
• There will be a parade.  This will not end well.  I will be the only one at work.
• Philadelphia schools, public and parochial, will be closed, so they can see the historical parade. Gee, wouldn't it be nice if Philly could get anything else organized as quickly as this? And if schools taught something useful, instead of sports? 

• In case you don't fully understand how America was screwed by Congress, which just authorized the NSA to collect all of our communications without a warrant, here's a very good explanation from security expert Bruce Schneier. In essence, the NSA is now legally allowed to do what they've been doing all along. Edward Snowden's head just exploded. Next time a member of Congress complains about something, remember what they authorized.

Best Headline, US Edition: One in 10 Americans think HTML is a sexually-transmitted disease, study finds. One in four think MP3 is a Star Wars robot. One in three think computer viruses are transmissible to humans.

• Today I learned: there is a person named Fetty Wop.
• This illustrates what's so good about America: anyone can name themselves whatever they want, no matter how stupid or certifiably insane. There is a Nordic country that must approve the baby's name first, proving my point.
• Unfortunately there is no such agency protecting pets from being named by their owners.

There is a killer whale who can speak! It can say hello, goodbye, count to three, and say the name of its trainer, Amy. In addition to the obvious reasons, this is remarkable because whales do not have the same vocal structure as humans. Already, Ellen has invited him on her show, although we suspect it's just to get to Amy.  Republicans and democrats are worried: after a few more weeks of training, the whale will beat them in the midterm elections.

• The Trade is a new docu-series focused on the stories of addicts, their families and the law enforcement officials trying to curb the epidemic that kills 91 Americans a day. 'It needs to make you uncomfortable': the opioid documentary set to shock America
• What the documentary will fail to show is the person in the long dark coat, forcing the addicts to shove the needle in their arm. Or buy the pills for recreational use.  Oh wait.. there's no one forcing them to do this?
• This will only hurt the people who need opioids to help control their chronic pain.

Good God, they're still after me.
I went to see the young one performing with the school's orchestra. They closed with the Eagles fight song. Unfortunately it wasn't the Joe Walsh Eagles. As I was reminded, it would probably be a bad thing to smash a few violins on the conductor's head and about her person.

• On sale, tickets for Paul Rodgers (Bad Company), Ann Wilson (Heart), and Jeff Beck (Jeff Beck). This is going to be a real treat for everyone. Two great rock voices and arguably the world's greatest guitar player. My wife, who doesn't play an instrument, goes to every Jeff Beck concert. Highly recommended.

Speaking of concerts, I found something odd about this one: the conductors announced the song, then spoke about the composer and the song, sometimes including the song structure. Although I've been a musician for many many years, I don't 'get' classical music, nor does most of the audience, I'm willing to bet. How, then, does explaining it to the Great Unwashed help?

"This next piece, Rhapsody in Puce, was written by Leopold Liberace, during his food poisoning period in France. It's interesting to note that Leopold, whose friends called him Ted, didn't start composing til shortly before he started decomposing. If you listen closely, you'll hear the composer's use of the chromatic didactic during the flourish. You'll also say to yourself, 'Hey - that's the song from the Tide Pod commercial!' "

I don't think the person sitting next to me appreciated my question about the concert so far, when I asked about the presence of the conductor's hair down there. It's ok, though... Mom's used to my outbursts.

So I'm sitting there, both amused and puzzled, mentally composing this entry. How would this look if it happened during a rock concert? To make the blog less of a chore to read, I'll go ahead and show you....

"Yo. Thank you, thank you. You guys here in [looks around, pauses] Delaware are the BEST!"
[audience cheers wildly, even though the concert is technically taking place in Nebraska]
"Thank you. This next tune... I'm serious, guys... this next tune is called 'The Plight of the Bumblebee in Relation to Vacuum Theory.' This one was written by Bob, our drummer, during his blackout phase in Utah, while coming to the realization that he should start considering one of those celebrity drunk tanks. The song features a standard rock structure, except during the break, when Bob inevitably f's up the third fill and misses the chorus, even though he wrote the goddamn song. Interesting story: at the end of the tour, if not sooner, Bob's going back to the clinic and we're replacing him with a drum machine. Don't tell him, ok?"


Bitching (speaking) about weather, the Five Day Forecast is gloom with precipitation and low temperatures. This is similar to last week's forecast. Perhaps you remember the order, but I expect it to rain toads, blood, and Brussels sprouts with rosemary. At the end of the street, some old dude is loading animals into a large homemade boat.

Punxatawny Phil, the rodential mascot for Punxatawny, Pennsylvania, is due to pop out of his abode, and if he sees his shadow, there will be six more weeks of movie stars complaining about the president. The joke's on us, as it's never sunny in PA, so he'll never see his shadow. This means we'll have three to seven more years of Hollywood complaining about the president and accusing Punxatawny Phil of sexual harassment.

But seriously, folks, the script changes this year. It seems that Phil has been diagnosed with Seasonal Affective Disorder. It's particularly bad at this time, because he hasn't seen the sun in three months. When he fails to see his shadow, he's going to get out his Groundhog Grenade, pull the pin, and swallow it.

In completely unrelated news, Punxatawny has announced a new mascot for next year. Due to pressure from social justice advocates, the new rodent is Punxatawny Philomena. Philomena is a female-identifying transgender trans-species animal, who identifies as a Sherman tank. She describes herself as a Jew and an antisemite, whose hobbies include deep connections with women's social justice causes and prostate cancer. If you misgender or microaggress her, she will pressure the mayor to send you to a country where stoning is not only allowed; it is encouraged.

• Wildlife Strikes Back: a Maryland hunter was airlifted to a trauma center, after a dead goose fell from the sky and landed on his head, causing head and facial injuries.

Here's a list of the twenty most hated companies in America. The results are pretty much what you'd expect, with a few surprises. Number one should be fined so heavily, it will go under.

• Immigration (ICE) raided 77 North California businesses, looking for illegals. There were no arrests. Probably because Governor Jerry Brown blocked the doors with his body.
• In the Cliche Department, ICE raided one hundred 7-11 stores last month, arresting 21 suspected illegals.

STING instigates violence: a couple was in the midst of a domestic dispute when one of them went to the bedroom and played Sting's "If You Love Someone, Set Them Free." At this point, the dispute went physical, according to police. Sergeant Smith stated that individuals should not, under any circumstances, play Sting songs.

• George Washington University was rocked by a picture on social media, featuring two students, one of which was holding a banana, with the caption "Izzy: I'm 1/16 black."
• This is unprecedented. It's an outrage. It's 2018! I have absolutely no idea why this is racist. If you can enlighten me, please leave a comment.

The Dow plunged 666 points this week.
I think it's a sign: the Dow is talking to me.
Do not doubt me - the Beatles talked to Charlie Manson...

Mollusks in my Molars

Just saw a book called A Practical Guide to Racism.
Couldn't you just take the ball and run across the country with it?


Does it guide you on how to practice racism?

• a black man asks if he can date your daughter. You tell him "not in muh house, colored person."
• LeRoy the drummer wants to join your band. You say no because he's black. The joke's on you because white people have no rhythm.
• see what I did there?

How to spot racism?

• Good morning, class. I'm from the Mayor's Commission on Racism. Since you're white, you're automatically racist.  [true story-Temple University]
• the guy in the white dunce cap and bedsheet, holding the rope? He's the racist.

How to use racism to shut down any argument?

• Trump building The Wall is racist.

It turns out that the name of the show is RuPaul's Drag Race, not RON Paul's. I know this now. In completely unrelated news, I will not be speaking at the libertarian convention after all.

• Before you take a ride on Lyft or Uber, or after, if applicable, you should probably know what they're up to with your data. Not only do they snoop on riders, the executives are spying on journalists who ask too many questions. This is in addition to your data that allows tracking, as well as a decent idea of where you've been going. Read and weep.

Plugging in a new USB device on a Windows 10 machine sends data to Windows, without encryption. Windows is a dumpster fire. A dumpster fire that positively EATS your privacy. This is something just discovered, in addition to the rest of the backdoors to Microsoft and the NSA. I am not making this up.

not that it really matters....

• I often rant about the IoT (Internet of Things): your toaster and Alexa, sending data up the line. Let me illustrate via the news: people are figuring out that there's something going on militarily. How? Some in the military are wearing Fitbits and their data is going upstream. People have looked at the data and figured out there's movement because the individuals are in places we don't know about or they shouldn't be. It's bad enough that data is leaving our house; now it's perfectly illustrated by possibly secret military data. A failure on the military's part, a failure on the public's part, and on the part of the manufacturer (who is profiting from the data).
• When we're done with this issue, don't take any time to think about military being in places they shouldn't be. Oops.
• All of the sudden, Strava, the manufacturer of the devices, is committed to safety.
• What a perfect time to take a public lesson on this activity. Considering it was just Data Privacy Day, I'm willing to bet it will be completely ignored.

So that Spectre/Meltdown issue with the CPUs... the first fix was recalled. When the real fix comes along, it could slow your computer significantly. Superbly bungled. However, the head of Intel says there will be a fix by the end of the year. A silicon fix (hardware/chip). For all future CPUs. Your CPU? Well, you're screwed. I'm full of righteous indignation today, aren't I?

• Let this serve as your periodic reminder that Tony Curtis' real name was Bernie Schwartz. Michael Landon used to be Eugene Orowitz. Furthermore, Steven Tyler is, in reality, Steven Tallarico. He must have changed it because it sounds too Jewish.

SNAPPLE - further

For those of you following along at home, as well as those of you who can bother to be bothered with Trivial Shit<tm>, I'm continuing on the Snapple path. After several months of attempting to purchase lemon Snapple, which is allegedly on sale, and failing miserably, I managed to procure two large bottles, much to my surprise.  Things were good.

But the Snapple Gods were not smiling down upon me. In fact, they were laughing hysterically. Upon opening, the first taste was weird. The second taste continued to be weird. Thinking maybe I ate chocolate or something that would throw the taste off, I tried later. I had my wife try it. I'd have had the dog try it, but he doesn't indicate on quality. He'd probably reject it anyway, on the basis of lemon. He'll eat almost anything but lemon.

It's odd... maybe too much lemon. I'm not exactly sure. Will have to open the second bottle. Who else do you know who has trouble procuring a decent bottle of Snapple? Things are a little... different.. in my house.

I don't mean to come off all negative. I can say conclusively that every bag of Peanut Butter M&Ms that has entered my house has been consistently delicious. There's never even a problem purchasing it. Or eating it.

UPDATE: Snapple and YooHoo, among others, were just purchased by Keurig Green Mountain. While Keurig is one of the greatest products ever invented, Green Mountain has spammed people relentlessly and their coffee is like light brown water, with all the taste of... light brown water.

• Speaking of getting out, I finally managed to get to the guitar store that was (intentionally) closed on New Years Day. With more than enough money for strings and picks, with a great collection of effects pedals, with about four lefty guitars, I could not find a thing I wanted. Nice employees, though.
• Fender has some interesting new guitars coming out; a new series called American something or other Series. Unfortunately it won't be in stock for a while. The positive news is that the existing series guitars will be blown out, hence a potential good deal. I love Fenders, even if they don't make much I like these days. I have older ones.
• Do you ever feel like feeling like you're old? Of course you do. When I was young, I got my first Fender. These Stratocasters were generally regarded as dogs. It was a bad time for Fender and their products suffered. Flash forward to modern day and the 'dogs' I bought are now considered 'vintage'. They command a lot more than they were purchased for. Dogs.
• Meanwhile, I want a real vintage guitar -  1950s.  I played a 1958 Strat once.. it was like butter.. it almost played itself, like something out of Spinal Tap. It would have cost me about $12,000. Today that same guitar would cost triple, quadruple, or more, depending on condition. Since we're rather fond of living in our house, I'll have to find an alternate funding source.

The self-replicating dirty dishes have taken on almost plague-like conditions. I leave a clean sink and the next morning it's full again. Remember, there are only two (alleged) adults plus a precocious spaniel in the house. For this occasion only, I feel safe saying it's not the dog's fault, as he cannot grasp dishes, due to that Lack of Opposable Thumb Thing. I haven't fully ruled out the wife, though, as things tend to happen when she's involved. Logically, all things considered (such as my physical well being), I have only one choice: to believe that the dirty dishes are self-replicating. 

• Interns at the Kansas Capitol must sign a confidentiality agreement. Some outside experts say this is to deter sexual harassment claims.  Imagine an employer so dirty that one has to sign an agreement not to talk about what goes on? Imagine that it's the government.
• Nope, sorry. The government is to remain transparent (Obama, the most transparent administration). They're always up to no good, and that's just the part we can see. Who allowed the Patriot Act to pass? Who just reauthorized unfettered spying? Congress.

Way down there in Mumbai, referred to by Lynyrd Skynyrd as Sweet Home Mumbai, a man died when he was sucked into an MRI machine.  My wife had an MRI and was terrified, so I went with her. Nobody told us what to expect. The machine started and I noticed the necklace I was wearing at the time seemed to be very eager to leap into the machine. We're talking about a piece of metal the size of a guitar pick.

So I'm wondering if maybe the guy was wearing a metal suit. No, as it turns out, the poor fellow was carrying an oxygen cylinder. A doctor and another person were arrested under Indian law for causing death due to negligence. This is one law you won't see in the US. Ever.  It is believed that the gentleman died from inhaling liquid oxygen, which cools the machine.  So remember, kids... breathe oxygen, don't drink it.

If I don't see the sun soon, all of the stories here will be like this.
I mention this because not only is it dreary, we have two days of Nuisance Snow this week. Although all snow is a nuisance, Nuisance Snow is up to one inch, which only serves to cause car accidents and panic buying of bread, milk, and those hats with the whirlygig on top.

• A Russian military jet came within five feet of a US Navy plane, out in international waters. 
• Asked for comment, Vladimir said, "That's a nice plane. It would be a shame if something were to happen to it."
• Navy experts said that it was an attempt by the Russians to show that their... fuselages... were bigger than ours.

Some historically black colleges are struggling with rock bottom graduation rates, some as low as twenty percent. Based strictly upon recent events, there are several ways to deal with this:

1. Lower standards for graduation. A city police force (Philly?), under orders to hire more black people, had to lower the test scores for hiring because not enough black people passed the test.
2. Bring in Other Than Black (OTB) students, on a scholarship, to hopefully raise graduation stats.

That should go over like the proverbial fart in church. Like a Black Sabbath concert for the pope. Like a sermon on bodily fluids.

• Thrillist’s Definitive and Final Ranking of All 50 States ranks Florida as the worst state in the nation.  California's governor Jerry Brown has passed a law, ignoring Florida's rating, and pledges to get his state ranked "right where it belongs."
• Stockton, California, has come out of the gate swinging. Bankrupt since 2012, Stockton's mayor is going to implement Universal Basic Income. For one year, several dozen families will get $500 per month, no strings attached.  In addition to tracking what the residents do with the money, they will be monitoring how a basic income affects things like self-esteem and identity.
• At this point, there is a one million dollar contribution to go towards funding this experiment. If implemented, there will be no donations: it will come right out of your pockets.
• Where did the crisis come from? Stockton racked up millions in debt in development projects in the past, among other things. But it's Magic Money!
• Seriously?

Never accuse ThermionicEmissions of failing to feature feel-good stories, chock full of good old fashioned family values. In fact, the Philadelphia Inquirer just ran a great, sensitive story about generations of families in jail together. It just [sniff..] tugs at your heartstrings. 

• The Indians baseball team is going to change their "Chief Wahoo" logo, deemed offensive to Indians. To avoid causing any further upset, the Indians' new logo will be a swastika.

I've been married a while, so naturally I got to thinking about marriage licenses. Sit a spell and think with me, please.

A couple must go to the city/state/locality and pay for a license to marry. 

Let's not get into the discussion over the state telling you who you can marry.

Why should the state have a say in your marriage? At most, perhaps they can act strictly as a registrar, keeping a record that you are married. Maybe.

This is one of the many reasons I'm a libertarian. We believe in small government. I'd go so far as to say we don't need car registrations. Some go further.

And then when you're done getting the state's permission to marry, you have to find someone to marry you (hopefully you already have a spouse picked out). Apparently this is considerably easier a process, in that just about anyone can marry you. Justice of the Peace, religious leaders, ministers of the church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster, pretty much anybody with the right piece of paper.

• Campus Reform took a trip to New York University to ask students what they thought about President Trump's State of the Union address. Students hated it. The only problem was that the address was a week away. Did the students get an advance copy? Did they somehow travel to the future and back? Ladies and gentlemen, the future of America.
• Next week, NYU will review the 2020 elections.

Ripped from the headlines: last night I read, wherever it was that I read it, that you might as well eat pizza for breakfast, especially if you normally eat cereal. The logic here is that they have the same amount of calories, but there's a chance that you'll get some protein from the pizza, as opposed to a bowl full of sugar from the cereal. Personally I find nothing wrong with either, although I prefer a bowl full of sugar in the morning and pizza for lunch and/or dinner. Also mentioned is the fact that the cereal sugar is full blast then burnout, while the pizza sugar takes longer, so you don't get the burnout. Not mentioned is whether you like your pizza from last night's box (or last week's), cold from the fridge, or frozen with maple syrup.

• The NSA literally deleted 'trust' and 'honesty' from its core values. At least they're straight about something. By the way, don't say anything when you're near the toaster, ok?

Canada has a C-16 bill, which makes it a criminal offense to 'misgender' people. In England, you cannot use racial slurs, in person or on the internet. The US is working on a law that would make it illegal to make fun of someone's nose hair. Which one of these laws is made up?

I submit that it's difficult to misgender or gender people if they don't tattoo it on their foreheads. Sometimes you see people and ask if they're.... 

And now, ThermionicEmissions is illegal in Canada AND England.

• Boy, am I sick of football. Mind you, I'm sick of football at all times, but it's worse lately. Because the Eagles (Dem Iggles) are going to the Superbowl, television is nonstop Eagles. The morning multi-hour news show is All Eagles, All the Time. The anchors are now in Minnesota (minus the comical accents). Fortunately, there's nothing going on in the country or the world at this moment to break into the 6 hour daily coverage of Dem Iggles, although they did a highly relevant news story about the Mall of America.
• It would be unspeakably rude of me to disallow sports, even though the idea constantly tugs at my being, like certain ideas do when watching Shakira. So watch your sports (after you pay attention to the local and world news, not instead of it). Just get it off the damn 24 hour news cycle.
• It's a good thing I don't watch broadcast television or this blog would be the headquarters of the AntiSports. Moreso.

As I lamented the extreme lack of music on MTV, I discovered an actual CLASSIC channel! Forgetting MTV's mandate, it became clear that Classic means the songs that were HOT fifteen minutes ago. You haven't lived til you hear your tunes on the oldies station.

• While it is possible that the dog sits under other people and gasses them into oblivion, I can only speak for myself. Last time it was so bad that I ran into the kitchen to see if the stove was on. I'm ordering a WWII gas mask  or some SCUBA gear.

Michael Moore, multi-millionaire filmmaker and celebrity*, says that America must be 'Cleansed' of white male privilege.  If he were really serious, he'd cleanse America of Michael Moore's white male privilege.

* I'm against personal attacks. If I weren't against personal attacks, I'd say something like, "...and Famous Fat Person,"

• Quincy Jones took a swing at Taylor Swift recently, saying we need f***ing songs, not hooks. 'A bad song can't be saved by the three best singers in  the world'.
• Go, Quincy! Although this is way late in coming, and probably should have been directed at a previous generation or two, it needed to be said. However, the blame ultimately lies with the record companies. They will only sign and put out garbage for the lowest common denominator. When it starts to sell, all you get is copycats, including the songs, which are written by only a few people. To be fair, Taylor writes her own songs.

Hey, remember that false alarm about the incoming missile in Hawaii?  

It would seem that we have the Original Excuses, and now we have a Report, just made public. For your reading pleasure, the Original Excuses are in blue and the Report Excuses are in red.

The employee hit the wrong button.

The employee misheard something during the drill and believed there was an incoming missile.

The employee made a mistake: we didn't fire him, we reassigned him.

The employee was fired last week.

He was a good employee.

He has been a source of concern to other staffers for over ten years.

We are fed such crap on a daily basis.  Mainstream media lies and/or makes things up routinely. Regardless, all news outlets are owned by six organizations and they print what they're told. When there's an emergency, Damage Control goes into action. Read it again. Boldface lies. Or, if you'd rather, what we heard that day was the truth and this report is full of lies. It's not like you can get the truth anyway.  Remember this next time something big happens. Write it down or record it, then watch the narrative 'evolve'.

• Glee star Mark Salling hanged himself after pleading guilty to child pornography charges. If only more would take the honorable way out.

In case you've booked tickets for that holiday in Poland, be aware that the government has limited Sunday shopping to benefit family life.  Hey, that's just as stupid as some country not allowing car.. or alcohol... ummm... sales.. on Sunday because of.... Blue Laws. Oh.

Special Flying Section

• Astronauts will soon recycle their waste into protein paste. Because you know what they say... Eat shit and fly.

Eighty five plumbers headed from Norway to Germany got unlucky when their plane was forced to return to Norway. Because of a broken toilet. 

I will now ruin the hilarity by telling you that the repair needed to be done outside the plane and no one would volunteer. Or the airline couldn't afford their rates.

• United Airlines, who shares Adolph Hitler's publicist, declined a woman's emotional support animal. She even purchased a second ticket, but United refused to let her emotional support peacock on the plane. In a statement, United said they explained this to the lady three times before they arrived at the airport.
• Something tells me they're really not going to like my emotional support elephant.

Best Headline: Dems panic over avalanche of good economic news...

• I hate it in PA. In the summer, you have to get the ice cream home before it melts. Tonight the ice cream was just fine, but the cereal froze.

Title Having Nothing To Do With Content

Who says we don't learn from the past?
Some wise organization in Philly decided to grease up signposts and traffic lights for the Eagles game. Sounds bizarre, right? Not in Philly, where last time, people were scaling the poles. One particularly brilliant fellow was lobbing glass bottles. So they're trying to avoid hilarity this time around.

But I have faith in Philly fans, who once upended a parked truck, in a celebration of something or other. I know they'll find a way to get past the grease and cause mass mayhem, landing them on national tv and being memorialized on YouTube. Maybe this year they'll blow something up. Or release a nerve agent. There's no underestimating Philly fans.

In an example of pure synchronicity, Mrs leftystrat said it's getting LOUD outside.  Apparently Them Iggles won, and the yahoos are already parading up and down the block, in a drunken (or normal) stupor, with small explosives.

Sure enough, at least two people managed to climb a greased pole. This is the kind of indomitable spirit shown by Philadelphians, when their team wins, and when trying to get out of a parking ticket.  Speaking of Philly Spirit, there was only one fire.

Philadelphia authorities are working on a large scale evacuation plan, should Dem Iggles win the Superbowl. This has the potential to be the worst mass casualty event since Three Mile Island.

• A 15 year old hacker impersonated the CIA director and other officials in massive data breach. 15 years old. This says a lot about CIA security and the 15 year old. Perhaps the CIA should hire the little bugger... he seems evil and smart enough for their mission.

This was actual advice given to people in the South...

It's a different world, south of the Mason Dixon line

• A large number of businesses in the UK have been rendered vulnerable to cyber crimes by employees who regularly access pornographic and gambling websites on their work computers. This is why we can't have nice things.

Just when you thought your country, whatever country your country is, was the most incompetent in the area of cyber security, along comes Norway, where a healthcare provider is investigating a breach that might affect half of the population.  This is impressive. They claim that there's no evidence that it has put patient treatment or safety at rsk... you know... except for the fact that the healthcare data on half the country has been compromised.

In completely unrelated news, Norway has just dropped off the Greatest Places to Live list.

• Speaking of Superbowels, I was invited to a Superbowl party. I need to gather some magazines and make sure there's plenty of internet available, so I have something to do while avoiding socializing (and football). There's plenty of room under the snack table, provided no one else thought to hide there.

Just when you thought it was safe to read social media:

For example, my wife should ask me if I'd date a trans woman. If I said no, she should divorce me. Makes perfect sense, if you ask me.

Texas judge Jack Robinson interrupted the jury, saying God told him the defendant is not guilty. The judge apologized to jurors for the interruption, but defended his actions by telling them “when God tells me I gotta do something, I gotta do it."  Before you could say "schizophrenics hear voices" or "this is disallowed by the First Amendment," Judge Robinson recused himself. A request for a mistrial was denied. Because his outburst couldn't have swayed the jury in any way. 

Although Florida wins the award for sheer number of weird stories hitting the news, everything's still bigger in Texas.

• For some reason, which has nothing at all to do with temper or banging on things, the 'i' on my laptop sometimes fails to work. Today, it's producing double letters. Now my work computer's 'i' is sticking. What kind of bizarre synchronicity is this? Will either or both keyboards leap up and tell me God told them not to work? Do keyboards talk? Will I have to have the meds adjusted (again)?

A frequent stowaway slipped past Chicago's O'Hare airport security and took a flight to London. Don't you feel secure now? Not to worry, our brothers in London have our backs: they caught the lawless traveler and sent her home. No word yet on Frequent Stowaway Miles. The TSA was unavailable for comment, as they were all in the back room, laughing at your naked xrays.

• It's not a conspiracy when you're watching it happening: In the past three months, five porn stars have died. Three of overdoses, one in her sleep, and one by suicide. This is a tragedy of major proportions. If you remember, Madeline Monroe also died of a drug overdose, otherwise known as 'suicided.' 
• Who feels so threatened by adult entertainers that they are to be terminated? As with any suspect event, you have to ask yourself Who Benefits?
• Well, our president is alleged to have had an affair with a porn star. Let's take a wild guess: he also had affairs with other porn stars. Ladies who can no longer be questioned over the matter.
• Dead. Who winds up dead? People who have angered the Clintons. Perhaps Hillary had affairs with the ladies in question. Or even Bill.
• Maybe the government has declared a War on Porn. No, wait, that would only increase the number of porn stars.
• Rest in peace, ladies.

America is really upset about healthcare, and rightly so.

One highly-touted solution is socialized medicine, like Britain's National Health.

Let's face it: the British are not a beautiful people, by and large. On that basis, I reject socialized medicine. 

That's what you get here: information and solutions.

• It's 2018. Everyone can order everything online. The brick and mortar businesses need to come up with something original and clever to stay in business. Enter 'Graham,' an enterprising English businessman, with a business that can't lose. Sure, you can buy a sex doll from any old sex doll store, online or in-person. But where can you try them out for fifty pounds for thirty minutes, after which you can purchase the doll. This man is obviously way ahead of the pack and should win some sort of business award. Graham denies, however, that he is running a sex doll brothel.
• With every idea comes a downside: the poor sod who has to clean the dolls if they're not purchased. And what is their official job title, for tax purposes? Automated Adult Services Restoration Engineer? 
• The only thing better than writing this blog is getting paid for writing this blog. It actually used to happen, in a universe far far back, with a different url. They warned me, if I didn't stop writing about Halloween Boobies, I'd cease to be listed. So I took my blog and went elsewhere. They told me I'd be missing the publicity and access their service afforded me. And still I left. And still, they were absolutely correct. But don't let anybody tell you I'm unprincipled: I'm just plain stupid.
• I'm betting that the remnants of the blog still there is generating more hits than this one. There's probably a small pot of gold there, waiting for me.
• Thanks for coming by and reading. Thanks for subscribing. Thanks for commenting. Thanks for going away in disgust, never to return. Thanks for going away in disgust and returning for more disgust. I get nothing concrete: just the hope that I've entertained and made you think about something or other.

The computer news daily features some obscene number of new ransomware varieties. Very briefly, it gets into your system, frequently by user error, encrypts your important files, then demands a ransom to decrypt them.

I want to present you with the Ultimate Super Secret Ransomware Mitigation Secret: backup your friggin computer. What could possibly feel better than thumbing your nose at some disgusting foreign hacker? Because you know you have backups to replace your encrypted files. Besides - there's no guarantee that paying the ransom will get your files back.

Backups not only protect against malware - they protect against fire, flood, hurricanes, tornadoes, most acts of God, hard drive failure, computer failure, and falling on your laptop during particularly interesting adult activities.

A backup can be as simple as a USB drive or external hard drive, onto which you copy the files you want to save. There is freeware for Windows that will help you automate the process. Linux folks can use the command line or open source software to accomplish this. MACs undoubtedly have some utility that sends your data into the past, so it's safe and you can restore it by bringing it into the present. If at all possible, encrypt your backups.... if the backup leaves your hands by mistake, you don't want anyone to know how much you paid for that sex doll. In pounds.

If, heaven forbid, this seems too complex, time consuming, or you're terminally lazy, you can use an ... I hate to say this... online service to automatically do your backups for you. You just have to select what gets backed up and how frequently, and off it goes, hopefully encrypted. This is The Cloud, which I don't like, because the moment your data leaves your hands, it's no longer your data.

You don't have to backup your operating system - that can easily be rebuilt. Just your data. If you use the USB or portable hard drive method, please put the device elsewhere, like a friend or relative's house. If anything bad happens to your home, your data is safe somewhere else. If the FBI pays you a visit and removes every computer in your house because they suspect you have certain files on them, you still have your backup, safe and offsite. Everybody will say how smart you are. More likely, you can tell everyone how smart you are because you have backups. Win/win.

• Why doesn't stuff work? Are we a nation wasting tons of time, waiting for or trying to get stuff working? For me, it's usually work stuff: Hey Boss, I can't log into the Garbanzo machine. 
• You need to get in touch with Babaloo, who owns the machine.
• Hey Babaloo, I can't get into the Garbanzo machine.
• Let me see.... yup - it works for me [click].
• Hey Reggie - the new guy doesn't have email. Who does he call?
• Oh, that would be the Email Department, but he's out for a week, someplace where the drinks have full size umbrellas in them.
• Doesn't he have a backup?
• Yes he does. He's back up in his house, on vacation too.
• Hey Boss, when I log into the work application, I see someone else's screen.
• Oh, you have to call Support.
• Support's hours are nine to five but they close at noon.
• Yeah, they're like that. Fill out a ticket and they'll get back to you some time next month... if they don't close your ticket and claim they already fixed it.

So, this DACA/immigration thing, that played a huge part in the government shutting down... I'm still at a loss for words. Screw it - I'm never at a loss for words.

I break with some of my libertarian brethren on immigration. They say unlimited. I say do it legally, the way it's supposed to be done. Letting a bunch of people in without the normal controls also negates the work that the real immigrants did to get their citizenship. They don't feel entitled, like the DACA crowd.

These people are illegal aliens, no matter what anybody tells you. 'Undocumented Immigrants' is wordplay, designed to take the sting out of illegal aliens. These people are criminals, having broken laws of the country in which they hope to live. In which some feel entitled to live. Many sanctuary cities and the entire state of California seem to be perfectly ok with lawbreakers, even encouraging them. California gives them drivers licenses and wants to automatically register them to vote with the license. This bus seems to be missing more than a few tires.

Allow me to introduce myself: I'm Mr leftystrat, and my heart goes out to people who have gone through red lights. I myself do not go through red lights, but the plight of those who do is a sad one, a heartbreaking one. Yes, they've broken the law. Yes, they may have caused a collision with a schoolbus full of children. That's not important. What's important is that we forgive these people. In my proud sanctuary city, we stand for the rights of everyone to drive, regardless of how. If necessary, we will break the law and stand between traffic police and our brothers and sisters, the red light violators. In fact, we do not approve of the harsh tone; rather, we refer to them as Traffic Firsters, because they're first on the importance scale. First before every other car on the road, regardless of lights, signs, and laws.

How stupid does this sound?

Imagine, breaking a law and having people tell you it's ok, just ignore the law.

Join us next week, when I take up the plight of a very misunderstood group - bank robbers. They did nothing wrong and we must accept them fully, including letting them marry our children.

• My house is still trying to match last night's temperature. In other words, it's cold. I walked outside to find I didn't need a coat! The sun is almost out. It's warm - almost 50. It's bikini season! It's a shame because I don't have my bikini body yet, plus I need a wax like you wouldn't believe.

So, if you're patching your Intel CPU against the Spectre/Meltdown bug, Intel says not to. If you have already, unpatch it. Announcement forthcoming. This company bungled everything, from design to mitigation. Also, note that after you patch it, your computer will slow down, to the tune of approximately twenty percent or more. This is what you paid for. I tend to use AMD processors, given the choice.

• If you've ever use the command line (cmd.exe) or PowerShell in Windows, you can already use the command line in linux.  Note that this is not mandatory to use linux. You can run it just like Windows, making it look just like Windows too.

I suspect my wife is trying to gaslight me. She is doing a lot of cleaning, which also encompasses reorganization.  What this means is that she's hiding everything from me. She knows exactly where everything is, but I have no idea. Men in general have a difficult time finding stuff, and this only makes it worse.  The other day I wanted peanut butter. That was my first mistake. It had moved to a different surface. Everyone knows you can't have peanut butter without some sort of chocolate, so I went looking for some chocolate Reese's spread. 

So where was it? How the hell should I know? She did a great job of hiding it. Perhaps this is an attempt to keep her around, because she knows where everything is. Meanwhile I keep her around because she tolerates me well, which is a very rare trait.

On my way to the counter, cursing her name, I spied the chocolate spread in the most logical place: on the floor, next to the fridge. Stupid me. I was about to check the second most logical place: in back of the washing machine in the basement. 

I need to use the ladder today.... I better look on the bed.

• After all this time and international intrigue, I remain unable to find a slur for Malaysians. If you know anyone who can help with this quest, please let me know. I have nothing against Malaysians.. I just want to know what the slur is. I am not looking for the generic slur.

People annoy me.

This might come as a surprise, but it is so.

Know what makes me happy? Dogs. My own, as well as others. When I see dogs on tv, I smile reflexively. This is easy to note, as I don't generally smile.

Airport sniffer dogs are born at special facilities and kept there til they're eight weeks old. Then a host family lives with the dog for a year and brings them back  for training. Can you imagine living with a puppy for a year, then having to say goodbye? You couldn't pry that dog from my hands, no matter how hard you tried.

Transvaginal Mesh

McDonalds salads have more calories than their Big Mac. What did I tell you about rabbit food?

• Coldplay is honored to play at the Superbowl but they 'know nothing about football'  Or music.

RIP Edgar Mitchell (85), Apollo 14, 6th man to walk on the moon. Lived a very interesting and productive life post-moon.

• A Temple University professor has stated that listing gender on official forms is nonsensical. I dunno - have you seen some of their students?

I just heard someone say 'Awesome Sauce'. When I'm president, that phrase will get you 6 years in jail.

• And speaking of the death penalty, if I hear the words Superbowl, Coldplay, Beyonce, halftime, or commercials....

Today in Upside Down World, a Chicago cop is suing the family of a teenager he fatally shot for $10 million, claiming emotional distress. You simply cannot make this shit up.

Continuing the theme, California has issued 605,000 drivers licenses to illegal aliens. Somebody has an agenda here but I'm not smart enough to figure out what it is.

In case you missed hearing about the University of Missouri, the VP of the students association is tired of the  First Amendment because it's creating a "hostile" and "unsafe" environment.

• A frozen lake used as a parking lot at the annual Winter Fest in Wisconsin melts, sending cars plunging into the water.  Hmmm.. parking on ice over a lake... weather forecast... who could have seen this coming?

Nanny State New York Mayor Bill de Blasio unveiled new regulations for crane safety in the wake of the recent crane collapse.  You know, try not to fall over and kill people. 

• Bored in London? Stop by Jimi Hendrix's apartment. The decor is a bit reconstructed by his former girlfriend, Kathy Etchingham, but it's history. Handel lived there too, sorta. There's a great story about Jimi giving tours to lovers of Handel. CORRECTION: Jimi died from sleeping pills, not the generic 'drug overdose'.

Gwyneth Paltrow is taking the stand in the case against her seventeen-year long stalker. He must not be much of a stalker if this has gone on for seventeen years. Perhaps prison will provide some remedial stalking lessons for him.

• HEADLINE OF THE WEEK: Mutant sperm-factories spread in men's testicles as they age to increase the risk of children with genetic diseases, researchers have shown.

A man has been arrested for lobbing a three foot alligator through a fast food drive-in window. He should not be punished-he should be rewarded. Every one of us, at some point, has wanted to throw a live alligator through a fast food window, haven't we?

Speaking of which, Chipotle will close their restaurant if anyone barfs. This will prove quite problematic should McDonalds adopt the same policy.

• A migrant headed to Spain managed to hide himself, strapped into a car's rear bumper. For some unknown reason, he got nabbed. That had to be a hell of a ride.

It's a very interesting time to be alive, at least for us Little People. The Powers That Be (PTB) have a more difficult time putting things over on us due to the near instant communication available these days. If it weren't a problem, countries wouldn't be rushing to censor or stop the Net. Anything large happening tends to appear online for monitoring.

There are a few mobile apps for monitoring police/fire scanners from all over the world, the best being Scanner Radio (free for android, not sure about others). From home, you can monitor all this at broadcastify.com (where the mobile feeds come from). Reddit (.com) has live feeds for large events. 

Twitter may be the fastest and most complete, yet overloading and frustrating. You can set up a search for whatever you want, in real time. Last night I monitored the situation with the group occupying the bird sanctuary in Oregon, on Twitter. So much info that I couldn't read it as it zipped by onscreen. Youtube carried audio being broadcast from inside the building on many different channels. The FBI had surrounded the building and was demanding their surrender, using all sorts of obvious tactics. I have no doubt that the situation would have turned out differently (READ: ugly) if they weren't livestreaming from inside the building.

This is a tremendous step up from days we relied upon mass media for our (quite biased) information (regardless of how we feel or the legality of the event). Perhaps the internet should get a Nobel Peace Prize, as opposed to warlike presidents.

• Regardless of how you feel about him, Bernie Sanders could potentially be the first Jewish president. Think of the implications... remember the shit-storm when Kennedy was the first Catholic?
• Hanukkah would be a national holiday with eight days off
• Only kosher hot dogs will be served at stadiums
• No more bacon cheeseburgers
• Two sets of dishes at the White House
• Weekly bombing of Iran.
• Anti Defamation League will make up his Cabinet (and drawers)
• Everyone entering the White House will have to wear a beanie, but we'll call it a Bernie
• All press conferences to begin with "Oy vay"
• Contracts will be negotiated for wholesale pricing only
• All disputes solved by using guilt

More than 100 schools have been closed in Bangalore due to sightings of leopards. And here in PA/US, schools close after a forecast of 1/2" snow.

• Noted without comment: How to file your 2015 taxes for free.

Sanpellegrino Grapefruit - the Editorial Issue

No, seriously. Sanpellegrino makes sparkling water and some really tasty flavored sparkling water. I am not particularly fond of grapefruit but when I tasted this, I was eating a grapefruit.  Unfortunately I get nothing for mentioning/endorsing this.


If you're planning to go to the Superbowl, you're going to get surveilled so closely that you'll feel like you're getting a colonoscopy.  Security Theater strikes again!  It's for the children.

• A child was kicked out of grade school because of his DNA. Really. Because of some health issues at birth, he had a DNA scan, which revealed the possibility of Cystic Fibrosis. The parents disclosed this to the school on the entrance form. Now the child has been bounced from school because of the potential illness, which would require him to be kept away from all sources of infection. Mind you, the child does not have Cystic Fibrosis. This is the opening shot of Genetic Discrimination. If you've had a DNA scan, you had better find a way to hide it. If your boss finds out you have a genetic disposition to alcoholism, you're outta there. Depression? Bye! 

In case the FDA approves it, you'll want to know that there are now vaginal marijuana suppositories for period pain relief. My mind boggles at the concept of getting a secondary high.

• Don't you hate it when this happens? Author Whitley Strieber was having some landscaping done when the entire crew quit and walked off. The foreman explained that "one of those aliens walked across your driveway." Even stranger, the crew would accept no money.

Hillary Duff's divorce was just finalized. I'm just warning my wife in case she starts calling again. The Vanessa Hudgens situation really got out of hand.

• Thank all that is holy - there will be a Fast and Furious 9 AND 10!

Hundreds of Missippi citizens received jury summons with instructions to call a sex hotline. I'll bet they never have trouble finding jurors.

• A cleaning lady in Mannheim confused an art installation with garbage and threw it in the trash. It's a fine line. You'd probably do it too.

The IRS had to shut down the E-File system due to a 'hardware failure'.  Libertarians: not even in office and already fulfilling their promises.



TECH CORNER

If you haven't been paying attention or slipped and used the Microsoft Edge browser, know that the InPrivate Mode isn't private. You don't even have to understand why... if you use inPrivate mode for privacy, USE ANOTHER BROWSER.

If you use Comodo browser, stop. It poses a security threat.

If you use Malwarebytes antivirus, it can take 3-4 weeks to fix flaws. Malwarebytes' free malware buster is not mentioned. I highly recommend it for weekly scans and getting rid of stubborn malware (on Windows machines).

If you purchased a Microsoft Surface Pro tablet, Surface Pro 2 or 3, your AC power cord is being recalled. Some small nuisance over fire and electrical shock.

Six ways linux is more welcoming than Windows for newcomers.

DO NOT PISS OFF THE INTERNET

Unless you've been hiding under a rock, you have seen the video of the Indian doctor abusing an Uber driver. She was placed on leave by the hospital where she works. But that's nothing compared to the figurative beating she has gotten for pissing off the internet. As the video went viral, people emailed her with all sorts of nasty suggestions, including 'strongly encouraging' suicide. As if this weren't enough, someone found her address and leaked it to the net, prompting people to send her things, including a package containing curry and a hijab. People left notes on her car. Others located the Florida Board of Medicine phone number and suggested people call to complain.

Granted, her behavior was reprehensible. No one should be treated like that, especially poor people providing a service. This was clearly a breach of personal responsibility. The internet has made her life a living hell, in spite of tearful apologies and what appears to be genuine remorse. Fear is probably a component too. That said, this has nothing to do with her medical abilities or practice. 

The internet has shown how ugly it can and will get. The power of incredible amounts of people with varied skills cannot be underestimated but they should probably self-moderate.

ThermionicEmissions would not be ThermionicEmissions if I didn't mention that someone dug up personal pics of her and she looks quite nice in a bikini.

THE TRUMP CARD

I would not presume to tell you how to vote (have I mentioned that Governor Gary Johnson is running on the Libertarian ticket?)  and that is all. You probably know who has my vote (have I mentioned that Governor Gary Johnson is running on the Libertarian ticket?) and I want to officially state that I would not vote for Donald Trump. However, no one could deny his effect on this election.  People, well, the ones who are awake, are pissed. The Donald tells them what they want to hear and a vote for him is a legitimate protest vote. In addition, no one owns Trump, which is a downright lovely thing; he's an outsider. [NOTE: I am not coming down on anyone who votes for him. I just find some of his positions to be dictator-like.]

If you've seen, read, or listened to anything approaching news, you know that Trump bowed out of the debate (offering to return at the last minute if Fox would donate $5 million to one of his charities). Trump has a problem with Megyn Kelly, at very least. 

Trump traded barbs with Kelly and Fox. Fox was grossly unprofessional in its responses. Megyn was one of the moderators of the debate and referred to Trump as an Elephant and other unprofessional hot air emissions. Is this a news outlet or a free-for-all?

ThermionicEmissions would not be Thermionic Emissions if I didn't mention that Kelly is a very attractive woman with long blond hair. She cut it for the debate and her looks vanished in a non-existent puff of smoke.

CRIMINAL

Here are a few words about Hillary Clinton.  Hillary is a lying, vicious career politician, defining hubris. Although the press and government departments desperately try to cover it up, her email situation should result in HILLARY FOR JAIL 2016. 

There is no question of above top secret emails. The Inspector General required a higher clearance just to read the emails to determine if classified information was on the server. Hillary changes her story every time new information comes out. None of this is a secret.

What is completely ignored is that every action after purchasing a server has been a serious security breach, if not downright illegal. If you or I got our work email diverted to a personal server in our bathroom, we would not be employed too much longer. Documents also show that the Russians had the server hacked within twenty minutes of it being powered up. Who knows about if or how far the Chinese got. Wouldn't you qualify a home server diverting above top secret email and effectively providing this information to other nations a pretty serious offense? The emails identify CIA-payrolled spies, whose lives are now in danger.

Lastly, the Top Secret Gov't Network is completely separated from the non-classified system, so someone had to open the classified emails and copy them to the non-classified system. BOOM-they knew. The rest is lies. Now all that remains is that her buddies in government let the indictment go through... uh-oh.

Mike Nesmith (The Monkees)-every day I come home to this - don't you?

Perfume. There?

It was a good morning. Both of us (and the pets) were almost awake, getting ready to go to work and other places. Lunch was packed and I was suddenly face-to-face with my wife and her beautiful new purple shirt. What made it more beautiful than other shirts, purple aside, was that it showed more chest than normal (no naughty bits, in spite of this blog's theme). So I gave her a nice, romantic kiss in that general area. We were impressed but the pets went about their business, non-plussed; one appearing starved and the other waiting for the starving one's food.

Fortunately it was time to go to work. When I say fortunately, I am fortunate to have a job. I am, however, still allowed to bitch about being up in the morning. When in the car, the wife ordered me to scrape the windshield. Of course I had to scrape the windshield.. I was already in the car.  This is a metaphor for our relationship.  It's also a direct statement about the weather here.  As we know, Pennsylvania's state bird is the cloud, and this lovely display of weather did nothing to dispel that fact: it was miserable, gray, and had frozen drops all over the car.  We know the sun exists, it's just that we wonder why it doesn't come round to visit now and again.  Anyone following the news will know that the Northeast has been threatened with snow for the past month. Lucky for us the weather forecasters are always wrong and we've barely gotten any snow.  Instead we've gotten frigid temperatures and bits of precipitation, almost constantly.  Last weekend we hit forty degrees and the bikinis were out all around.  Brian Williams saw his shadow and won't be on tv for six weeks.

So as I was finishing up the windshield, I detected a really horrible taste developing in my mouth.  It got worse and worse until I finally realized where it came from: my wife's chest.  Apparently women put perfume there. And I inadvertently ate some of it.  Off we went to Dunkin Donuts, for some coffee to get the taste out of my mouth. Other candidates were soda, windshield cleaner and lye.

I know I'm late to the party but I was/am so sick of the Stupidbowl that I almost can't describe it. But I shall anyway. In an unearthly first, I was invited to attend a party. In an even stranger first, I accepted, largely as this was my best friend and there were likely to be football-free zones.

There were, indeed, football-free zones, sorta, but there were still too many televisions (defined as more than zero or one).  I'm kinda like Charlie Brown and Lucy (or Homer Simpson) with televisions: I look at the motion, realize it's sports, look away, then see the motion again and look....

I don't care who Brady Bellechek is and don't want to hear his name anymore as long as I live.  It's not enough that there is a game.. I have to hear about it until I'm blue in the ears. I hear about it on the news station. I hear about it on the rock station.  I even hear about it on the public radio station, which I had hoped would be free of sports, at least after the first day.  The only thing worse than this is the item, and I use the term loosely, about deflated balls. I have no real idea what's going on here but I have been bombarded by it every moment of every day, no matter whether it's television, radio or the web.  The first time I heard anything of this, it came up on my alarm in the morning. I can be excused from incredulity (and sense) when something starts talking at me before seven in the morning.  As I grew further awake, I heard something about deflated balls and just assumed this was some kind of comedy routine. It became a really popular comedy routine when I noticed that the evening news and even Sunday's edition of Shoot the Press mentioned it.  If they have so much damn trouble with their balls, why don't they ask the cheerleaders to blow them back up and get on with the event? The politicians must be up to something when this is the lead story for days. You'd think that there was a Kardashian involved, for all the press coverage.

Yesterday in England was the first Visit the Mosque day.  This was a hastily conceived bit of press, thrown together after the Charlie Hello attacks, designed to invite outsiders into mosques to prove that Muslims are not all terrorists.  One Muslim lady complained about having to apologize all the time for the actions of the terrorists.  I suspect she should be having that conference with the terrorists, not the press.  The theme of the day was We'll Blow Up that Bridge When We Come to it. Seminars were offered too: Be Nice to Christians Day, Not Murdering Your Neighbors, and Improvised Explosive Devices.  All of the usual British suspects, with all of their comical British accents, ventured out from their quaint little towns to inspect the mosques. They were declared fit and now life can continue in England (at least until something blows up there).

NOTE: be careful reading this blog, as it may be booby-trapped. And boobie-trapped. Furthermore, it may explode.

Feline Aviation and Beyonce for the Win

We're fighting with the cat again.  Still.

To be honest, it's been a battle from the beginning.  I'm not what you'd call a cat person. This one, however, is at least quite personable.  Unfortunately this doesn't balance against his propensity for destruction, evil, and general bone-headedness.

Ren earned the nickname Satan when we first got him.  He would leap onto the stove, turning on the gas on the way up.  Apparently the little bugger was trying to blow up the house with himself in it.  We had to remove the knobs for a few months.

Then came xmas and xmas trees.  Satan disembowled every xmas tree we put up, year after year until we gave up.  He ruined many old, treasured ornaments by hurling them to the ground, where they smashed into pieces too small to repair.

He is not allowed to sleep in the bedroom because he claws the bed or my wife when he's hungry and won't stop until you feed him.  Note that the dog does not do this, preferring to sleep in with his people.  The worst thing Marshall does in bed is steal a pillow or blanket.

Cat Food Ballet<tm> is getting past the point of frustration in the house lately.  Ren gets fed in the kitchen, with the door closed, then Marshall gets fed in the living room.  Marshall doesn't care, instead spending all of his time in front of the kitchen door, waiting for the Cat Food Gods to open the door so he can lick the bowl clean.  There aren't even microbes of cat food after Marshall is done.

Meanwhile Ren then runs over to Marshall's food and starts eating it.  Ren was pretty much cured of diabetes and is not supposed to be eating dog food so we tell him to move.  MOVE.  I SAID MOVE, YOU LITTLE BASTARD.  He doesn't even look up.  You have to physically get up and make a move toward him before he takes off.

Five minutes later, he's back, as if we never said anything to him.  If I had a squirt gun, I'd let it loose on him.  Instead, I have to keep getting up.  Yesterday I threw a shirt at him, which moved him a bit and he was back a few minutes later.

If the kitchen door isn't shut correctly, Marshall will open it and force his way into Ren's food.  You have to physically remove him from the bowl, in the most spectacular case of Selective Hearing I've ever seen.  Neither of the little bastards listen, except when convenient.

Meanwhile, Ren has also taken to urinating randomly on the rug.  He has two litter boxes and it doesn't matter.  He is in perfect health so this is simply an attitude problem.  One of his new nicknames is Caboose because he's the last cat we will ever have.  My house should not smell like cat urine because the feline who lives there has a bad attitude.

Ren has also discovered the out of doors and apparently doesn't mind rain or snow.  He has spent several nights outside.  He has all his claws so we're not worried about him protecting himself.  In fact he reminds us about his claws on the furniture all the time.  No matter how much we express our dislike for this annoyance.

Just to even things up a bit, Marshall has discovered Catbox as Snackbox.  Suddenly dog kisses just aren't the same.

Marshall is also inordinately fond of trash.  When he's not cleaning the cat bowl, he's trolling the trash for interesting morsels.  Marshall is a very interesting test of housekeeping.  If you can't see or hear him, he's in trouble; which was caused by one of the humans not putting something away.  Or he took yet another package of popcorn off the dining room table and ate most of it.  He has a genuine love for kettle corn (and sweets in general, like his daddy).

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HEY EVERYONE - did you watch the Superbowl?

C'mon, you know I am the AntiSports.  It's only mid-day and already I'm sick over my head of hearing about the Superbowl from my coworkers and online.  Rome is burning and all we talk about is WOW -that halftime show!   Some of us are actually watching tv for the commercials.  Some of us are so vapid that we must spend all our time talking about how fantastic Beyonce was and how fabulous it was that her old group showed up and how about their outfits and dancing?

Bread and circuses indeed.

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For some unknown reason, my company was meeting with people from Apple.  Overheard at the meeting: We don't really listen to customer input.  We create the future and everybody can just catch up.

That fellow must be in charge of the Kool Aid.

In other news, I jailbroke my iPad.  Went smoothly, worked on linux, allows a lot more freedom.

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Apparently most of our newspapers have been hacked by the Chinese.  This is a very perplexing happenstance.   After thinking about it for a bit, I have decided that this is a non-story: even if the Chinese decided to take over our newspapers, they could not do a worse job than the existing ones.  It's win-win for everyone.