With A Melon?

Snowmageddon 2017 is underway!
True to forecast, the snow started at 8-10pm, then at 9-11pm, as forecast. We were to see 2-4" by the morning, which appears to be optimistic, but there's so much sleet, it looks like an ice skating rink. There aren't even tracks in the street, so I'm hoping the smart people (and everyone else) stayed in. Schools in PA and NY were closed as of yesterday, long before it started. The majority of damage is supposed to occur today, so we'll check in later with our team of intrepid people who occasionally look out the window.

UPDATE from the People Who Occasionally Look Out the Window:
The Great Blizzard turned into The Fizzling Blizzard. Our 6-10" then 8-12" rapidly died at 2-4" of snow, with a nice sheen of sleet on top. I still wouldn't drive* but this was a bit of a break. You have to give credit to a high number of meteorologists, who completely screwed up the forecast, in a rather serious way.  The governor of Maryland declared a state of emergency yesterday, before the snow started. This happened last year too.. no amount of egg on their faces will improve their accuracy (although I understand it's not easy).

Further update: the responsible entities have done a pretty good job of clearing the streets. Except perhaps our street, which still has a snowy/icy coating. My street does not look significantly different from surrounding streets, which are clear, hence my confusion.

But when I say clear, I'm referring to the snow on roads. The roads themselves are clogged by trucks going to stores to refill supplies of bread and milk.

• Headline of the week: IT Workers Expect Industrial Internet of Things Attacks to Rise.  Also expect taxes to rise and weather to be unpredictable.

Our buddies in the House GOP have been busy behind our backs, as is normal. This time it's a little heard of bill that would allow employers to require employees to undergo genetic testing or risk paying a penalty of thousands of dollars and would let employers see the genetic and other health information. Although this is prohibited by prior legislation, the new law allows it as part of a "workplace wellness" program.

We're from the government and we're here to help you.

Hey, didn't they just announce a replacement for Obamacare? Any doubt you'll still get screwed? The cardinal rule for figuring out why things happen is Who Benefits?  It sure as hell isn't We the People. This is somewhat confusing as the president promised a repeal of Obamacare and a better replacement. From what I can tell, neither occurred. 

• Rescue workers in Napa, California, had to remove part of a wall to pull a naked man out of a sandwich shop, where he spent the night inside a narrow passageway. Oh c'mon - who among us hasn't spend a night naked, trapped in a sandwich shop?

A buttload [technical term] of Twitter accounts were hijacked yesterday to send nasty Nazi slogans, primarily to Turkey. Twitter was not hacked - it was a third party service that people attached to their Twitter accounts. The next time you give a program access to one of your accounts or sign in with Faceyspaces or LinkedIn, remember this. Use only the login for that page-do not link to a different service.

• An obviously well-meaning father forced his daughter to have sex with men at a truck stop. You can tell he was well-meaning because this was her punishment for having sex. She'll obviously never do one of those things again...

A while back, videos started to appear featuring cats having wild reactions to cucumbers. No, really. Watch this video, preferably with the sound down, and be prepared to howl with laughter. Experts claim the response is due to their fear of snakes. This kills me, even as an animal lover and owner of two former cats.

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*When I say I still wouldn't drive, I mean because the streets are really slick and not cleared well. There's another reason....

My wife was looking at the aftermath and started to scream. Somebody was shoveling snow onto our car.  She started vibrating while screaming, then bouncing up and down between the floor and ceiling. 

I'm conflict-averse so I generally don't get involved but I stood at the window and watched this debacle. All of my conflict avoidance went out the (closed) window and I wandered up the street. 'Neighbors' were taking snow out of their private driveway and piling it in front of and in back of my car. I politely asked who was going to plow my car out. She didn't know. I suggested, politely, that she do it, as she boxed it in. She impolitely said I should do it myself - they needed to clear their drive. And if I didn't want my car snowed in, I should park in a local lot. My car, on a public street. My fault because I parked it there. Unbelievable. This occurs in bad areas of the city, not here. I told them I'd put the snow back in their driveway for them, which they encouraged.

I fully understand that one cannot kill one's neighbors, even if there's no real chance of getting caught. I do not want to call the police, as this is really petty (but will affect my back when I have to fix it). If I give them their snow back, the police will arrive. If I give them yellow snow, with little brown doggie dots, the police will eventually arrive. If their house developed smoke, the firemen will arrive, with the police a bit behind them. This is new. This is rude. And it will go on, as these people seem to believe that public accommodations exist purely for them. You'd think they owned a BMW.

Snowmageddon! (March Edition)

Well, it's that time again. Having skirted snow and had many days where a light jacket was ok, it's March and we're through the hard part of winter. Oops, maybe not.  One (very) loyal reader alerted me that my area was about to get some weather. My local forecast said a number of thirty-two degree days, so I said thanks. It took another twenty-four hours until I actually looked at the forecast (I'm pretty quick) and noticed we were in for a little snow (and when I say little, I mean 6-12" or more).

The Philadelphia area is populated, like many cities, by complete idiots, forecasters who cannot forecast, and services that grind to a shrieking halt the moment 1/4" of snow is forecast, no less falls. In recent memory was the day the entire school system was closed and it didn't even bother to snow. Naturally, with the 1/4" of snow is the requisite PANIC!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Bread and milk disappear from every shelf. Sidewalk salt, shovels, snowblowers, and snails (maybe not) are in short supply. And if history is any indication, Philly will still be digging out next March. This will be mirrored in quite a lot of cities, as this one is supposed to be a whopper. Of course there are a bunch of cities that know how to deal with snow, but they're no fun to write about. This dance is repeated each time it snows, with absolutely nothing learned from any time in the past.

• According to something I read on the internet, world's largest and most factual source of information, Aerosmith is no more. Among reasons mentioned was health, as guitarists Joe Perry had a heart attack onstage with his side band (no word on what effect that had on his playing, but best of health to him). Tony Iommi, lefty guitarist for Black Sabbath, who played the final date of their final tour last week, said it's very bad for one's health to be touring at his age.
• WTF has happened to rock and roll? (it has aged, apparently) - rock stars used to overdose on drugs - now they die of cancer. I hope I die before I get old is now I better cash in on yet another (high quality farewell/comeback) tour. And now bands are calling it quits because they're getting old? Hell, Alice Cooper dyes his hair black and is always in motion. Steven Tyler is unlikely to sit down (ever) and goes to show you what happens to the ADHD kid who can't keep still in class. Jeff Beck is better and busier than ever, in his seventies. Bands are doing comeback tours, with damn near some of the original members. Where was I going with this?

Our good friends at the FBI are dropping all charges* in a child-porn case rather than release the details of how they hacked Tor to get the information. Think about this one for a bit...  *the case is being dismissed without prejudice, meaning they can take it up again later. Meanwhile they can continue to use this hack against anyone, criminal or innocent person.

• Malware was just discovered (pre-installed) on a bunch of android cell phones. What's different here is that the malware was not part of the software sent by the manufacturers. It was installed later. Any guesses? Check the article's list of affected phones. If yours is on the list, scan with a very good scanner (I like Malwarebytes, available free from the Play Store- set it to run weekly). 
• There are also lists of infected files to look for. My phone is listed but passes the scan and doesn't have the infected files. Two of the pieces of malware steal information, display illegitimate ads, and lock all your files for a ransom. 
• The problem here is what to do if you find malware. The article is laughingly free of details as to what to do, just mentioning scanning. My initial recommendation is that if your phone is over a few years old, scrap it and get a new one. If it's more recent, normal humans don't have a lot of remedies, short of contacting the carrier/manufacturer and asking what they're going to do about it.  The more tech-oriented of us can root the device and remove the files. As it is, the phones contain operating and other files that a normal user cannot touch/modify/erase. Root gives you Ultimate User privileges and will allow you a full reign of terror to do what you wish, including possibly turning your phone into a very expensive paperweight. If you're interested in rooting, the best guides are at Android Forums.
• How does anybody at all get hold of phones between the manufacturer and retailers and install malware with root privileges? We know it has already happened before with laptops and networking hardware.

Let me say something nice about Samsung on a very large carrier. Umm... it has a decent coverage area? My wife's phone is a mess, and I say that politely. It started with the contacts getting foobed beyond belief. It scrambled like eggs, mismatching first and last names; I came up as lefty Smith, Smith being one of her doctors. Shortly thereafter, my contact picture came up as that of a third person. So when the phone rings, she's not sure whether it's the person in the picture, the first name, or the last name.  As if Scrambled Contacts is not bad enough, it continues to modify and confuse, in a less than exciting way. 

Not to be outdone, the text messaging sends all texts into the ether, requiring up to three hours to arrive at my phone. This has caused all sorts of 'amusing' situations. A trip to the carrier fixed Something, but Something was a problem that had nothing to do with the carrier. I hate to say it, but either the phone needs to be replaced (the 2nd one so far) or has to be blown out and reset to factory original specs. This will (further) screw up the contacts, requiring a complete descrambling - hours of work. 

• A bill has been introduced to make porn-viewing illegal for federal government workers, because it's a waste of time. Not addressed were the three thousand other ways federal workers waste time. This is an example of knee-jerk piss poor legislation, pandering to a certain population. Isn't it already wrong to waste time, regardless of how?

Words of widsom: if you're having trouble standing, you might want to sit.

• Carleton University (Canada) has removed a weight scale from gym after students call it "triggering". Next up: banning tight outfits, as it makes the fat kids uncomfortable.

Anal Probing by Illegal Aliens

Australia has many scenic views and an endless supply of deadly fauna. Australia also has female traffic light signals. Not to be outdone, London's Trafalgar Square has gay marriage-celebrating signals. Because the government has already cured cancer and has some time on its hands. But it gets better - Australia's Minister for Women said that it would make public space more inclusive of women. Because women felt they couldn't cross the street before this?

• Many police departments across the country are maintaining their own DNA databases.  The ACLU is suing San Diego over warrantless collection of DNA of a minor without parental consent. Apparently this process allows police to skirt state and federal laws about who they can collect from and how long the samples can be retained. Loopholes are magnificent, aren't they?

Stop what you are doing this very minute and watch Star Trek - Libertarian Edition.

• Just in case you were bored today, the latest Wikileaks is most interesting. It concerns the CIA and its spying/hacking army. Among other things, how malware can turn androids, iDevices, Windows computers, smart cars, and smart TVs into listening devices. Yeah, I'm tinfoil hat. Yeah, I made it all up and this release is just coincidental fiction.

If there's one thing I learned in my life so far, it's that I'm not that good at mornings.

• Faceyspaces has a program to report and remove images of child abuse (that haven't already been removed). Journalist reports child abuse images. Faceyspaces reports him to the police. Don't. Use. Faceyspaces.
• In other news, Faceyspaces plans to update its algorithms to "listen" for people who are in danger of suicide (warning - FB.com link). This is a refreshing change from listening for people who are in danger of not being accurately marketed to in a targeted fashion. No word yet on who this data will be sold to.

On International Women's Day, we celebrate women and their contributions. We also note that women are taking off work to celebrate and march in parades; thus nullifying their input for the day. This is akin to everyone taking off work on Labor Day. We also eagerly anticipate International Left-Handers' Day.

• Reaction to the Wikileaks CIA spying story has been swift for cell phone OSes. Based upon vpn use, antivirus manufacturer F-Secure has stated that 80% of iDevice users have the latest OS; they tend to update quickly. The outlook is not so good for android users, because phone manufacturers are slow to distribute OS updates. While the Nordics (F-secure area) have a high percentage of android 6 and 7, most of the world still uses 4 and 5. Android users: bug your phone manufacturer and make sure you're current. Check your OS version in Settings.
• The nice folks who wrote the Notepad++ program have fixed a .dll file process by which the CIA could hack the program and monitor what goes on in the background. While this is by no means foolproof, it will prevent the program from loading anything other than the proper .dll file. This will not prevent problems if the hackers are already there or if the notepad++.exe file is replaced. Credit where credit is due.
• Meanwhile the CIA says Americans should be deeply troubled by Wikileaks' latest leak. I think most of us would tend to agree, just not for for the reason the CIA states ("jeopardizing personnel and operations"). Nowhere does the CIA address jeopardizing citizens' rights and privacy.
• Curious about what the CIA thinks of your antivirus?

Confide, a secure messaging application very popular with White House aides, has been discovered to have "multiple security vulnerabilities of varying severities", proving that DC cannot even hide questionable thoughts or misdeeds correctly.

• A while back I reported on the US government trying to get records from an Amazon Echo's spying to help their murder case. The Echo is Amazon's version of Google's Alexa, that sits there and processes requests (what is the weather, set reminder to call Mom, how late is Costco open?). At question is anything Echo might have recorded during a murder. The trick here is that Echo (and Alexa) isn't supposed to record anything that isn't preceded by  "Echo" (or "Alexa"). Amazon decided not to fight the subpoena and submitted to demands for the recordings because the defendant said he didn't mind the recordings being submitted to prosecutors. Amazon could have and should have fought this on privacy principles. Next time it could be your data.

Things are always more interesting at Walmart. The St Augustine, FL, police were called to Walmart, due to the 4-5' shark found in the parking lot. Yes, it was a whale of a sale.

Not to be outdone, Vilano Beach, FL, found a shark in a driveway. Sorry, Charlie.

• Yes is to be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame this year. Asked why it took so long, a spokesman said it was because Donna Summer, Green Day, Joan Jett, Michael Jackson, NWA, Public Enemy, RUN-DMC, and Tupak needed room.

Happy International Women's Day!
I am a dead man

Pushing (and Licking) the Envelope

I don't know if you were affected by this, but a huge Amazon outage this week rendered large chunks of the internet inaccessible. Without getting ridiculously technical (and because I have no idea what I'm talking about), this Amazon service is The Cloud, or cloud storage. Engineers went to take a small number of billing servers offline and managed to enter an incorrect item, taking down 'a larger set of servers.' In non-technical terms, they screwed up royally and took a shitload of servers down. The downed servers controlled a lot of other servers and pretty soon, there were huge holes all over the internet. To make things that much more interesting, the servers hadn't been rebooted in quite a while, so bringing them up took longer because they had more work to do because there was much more data to count.

Ok, everyone goofs. Sometimes the goof is spectacular in a very public way, like this one. I had a coworker who discovered he could remotely reboot people's computers, largely by remotely rebooting people's computers. We had to take his toy away when people started complaining. That aside, this incident underscores  the fact that a lot of required planning and safety checks were flushed down the old British loo.

People get all excited about The Cloud. The salespeople from Amazon come in and promise you the Moon, stars, and the internet. Life on this very planet will benefit greatly from their cloud services. The uptime of their systems is guaranteed to be in the ridiculously high 99th percentile. And now someone makes a mistake and wipes large amounts of vital and silly services from the internet. Mistake aside, this is a huge failure of Amazon services, which should have all this stuff backed up and paralleled so well that the switchover would be imperceptible.  The fact that it didn't work illustrates what we call Single Point of Failure - where one item failing can take down the entire house of cards. You do not design any important system with a SPOF. This is also a failure of the customers because not only don't they have a Plan B, they trusted Amazon.

• I read the news today, oh boy... about the governor of Maryland declaring a state of emergency. I don't remember flooding or rioting, so I read further. The mayor has declared a state of emergency over heroin and opioid deaths. At least he wasn't grandstanding.

I read one of those Heartwarming Stories the other day. Some lady jogger in Bumfukt was lady jogging when she got all hot and thirsty, having drank the water she brought. A guy pulling into his driveway saw her and offered her some water. She was stunned and gratefully accepted. Every day thereafter, there was a cold water bottle waiting for her outside his house. This went on over a year, during which time they got to chat and meet her husband, both of whom were really surprised and forever grateful. The good samaritan, discovering she was married, killed the husband and kept the jogger in his basement dungeon, eventually killing and eating her. The friendship kept up and the jogger left him presents on holidays. It continues to this day. Don't you just hate this kind of thing?

• The Breach of the Day is brought to you by Coachella. Coachella, the huge (alleged) music festival in southern California, announced that its website had been breached, potentially compromising 950,000 accounts containing the personal details of ticket purchasers and people who registered for online forums. So you can not only be tres trendy at the show, your details can be all over the net and for sale in black market forums. No word on how the breach occurred. Do not reuse passwords. Do not give any personal details - make them up if necessary. Sign up for forums anonymously.

My 7yo nephew asked me for some advice the other day. It seems he's having problems with girls.. they won't leave him alone. Ever the helpful uncle, I asked him what it was like.

• A notorious spam company misconfigured their backups, revealing all sorts of information about how they operate. If you're curious about spam, read the article.

Want a beautiful place to crash in New York City? Bring up Airbnb and for $300-$450 per day, you can get a magnificent apartment in Trump Tower. A woman who has owned the apartment since 1998 is renting it out. The apartment was available since before the election and has garnered five stars on the service, but Airbnb just pulled the listing. Well, this is a bit of an issue, wouldn't you say? Yes, the renter would pass through Secret Service, but...

• Internet of Things fans: that Amazon outage? For three hours, all sorts of websites and services went down, meaning, among other things, that you couldn't control your internet-connected lightbulbs and other devices.

I was watching one of those border patrol shows the other day and they were demonstrating these boffo new infrared cameras. I swear they were using a gaming controller to manipulate it. Video games: the gateway to border patrol and drone-piloting.

• Barbara Streisand says Trump is making her gain weight. This would be less of a problem if she moved to Canada, like she promised, if Trump won the election. Hypocrite.

STATS: In case you care, here's a little information on visits to this blog...

Browsers: Firefox leads the pack, with 55%. Chrome follows, with 31%

Operating Systems: Overwhelmingly Windows, at 73%, followed by Macintosh, at 10%. Linux makes up all of 6%. I should further shoot myself in the foot by disabling access for Mac and Windows users (I cannot do this).

Total Traffic: I am so embarrassed that I don't want to reveal this number. Let's say totals of about 20 visits daily. Please tell your friends. Do not send money.

ThermionicEmissions would especially like to thank the French, who are the second highest viewers, right after the US. I have no idea why but am grateful.

Finally, I'd like to thank the people who come here after visiting porn sites. Not only am I happy they choose to read this blog, they provide new and interesting places to visit when I'm bored.

Breathing is Overrated

A Philadelphia Jewish cemetery was vandalized the other day. Because, you know, there's nothing more dangerous than a dead Jew.

• Subway chicken has been revealed to be only 50% chicken - the other 50% is soy filler. Semi-vegetarian chicken!

On today's news: guitar strap pocketbooks. As a guitar player, I have to go and shoot myself now.

• My coworker, who uses very complex equipment, just requested training on the Windows Snipper (screenshot) program. Oh, my head...

I often recommend keeping your passwords in password keepers. Popular password keepers have just been found to be leaking personal information. Read it and weep.  I recommend Keepass, which wasn't studied.

• I don't often touch Hollywood, except for the funniest and most egregious nonsense, but this one really bowls me over: Kaley Cuoco and Big Bang Theory co-stars 'offer to take $100,000 per episode pay cuts so actresses Mayim Bialik and Melissa Rauch can get raises.' 
• Meanwhile, Mrs lefty is annoyed over Kaley's constant calls to me since she got divorced.

Unless someone is doing a monumental job of trolling, there is now a connected CampStove that provides real time data about the strength of your fire. And now, Chinese hackers will be the first to know you've hit 200 degrees! Folks, this will only get more stupid...

• Today is World Book Day. Books were incredibly important to me as a child, as I preferred their company to people. They allowed me to escape whatever I thought my life was and I'd stay up til all hours of the morning escaping. Here are a few favorites:
• Douglas Adams; Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, a 5 book trilogy of hilarious, abstract humor, from a master of the language. Also read his 2 book series, Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency (there is currently a tv show on BBC America). Douglas (RIP) is my absolute favorite and I'd pay to watch him pace around a stage, saying whatever came to mind.
• Robert A Heinlein: I think I've read every one of his Future History series (with Lazarus Long), as well as everything else science fiction-y that wasn't oriented toward dragons. This man's writing and worlds truly kept me up til strange hours, instead of doing homework or trivial things like sleeping. He had a remarkable sense of the future and a very enlightened attitude towards sex for his time.
• Samuel Shem: House of God is an informative and hilarious story about residents in a New York hospital and their guru. It's difficult to make this sound funny, but read it. There was a sequel and a movie too, although I've never seen them.
• How many of these 20 classics have you read? It's British and I don't agree with every book listed, but I (embarrassingly) come up with two. You?

 Both fascinating and terrifying is a nondeterministic universal Turing machine using DNA molecules, as candidates for future organic computers. They will use DNA instead of silicon. The DNA can replicate itself to perform more calculations as needed.  Mark this date... SkyNet is becoming reality.

• despite Microsoft's touting of its latest OS as its "most secure," Windows 10 had the highest proportion of vulnerabilities of any OS (395), a 46 percent jump from Windows 8 and Windows 8.1 (265 each).

My wife just brought home a package of table grapes. I didn't know these existed and am a little scared to try one.  If possible, I'd prefer couch grapes, as they're much better-suited to my lifestyle.

YAHOO!!!!!

Yahoo, the company to watch for routine security breaches of up to hundreds of  millions of users, in an SEC filing, blamed the 2014 - 500 million account breach on unnamed senior executives and its legal team for failing to properly investigate. This was a state-sponsored attack (in the current climate, we blame Russia for everything, but I'm thinking not). "...certain senior executives did not properly comprehend or investigate...". Further, Security discovered that the attacker had taken copies of the user database backup files with personal data of Yahoo users. This same attacker was busy again in 2015 and 2016 but this was not investigated, resulting in 32 million accounts being exposed.

At this point, if I were a Yahoo user, I'd be screaming, closing accounts, and ceasing all use of Yahoo products. If I were a shareholder, I'd be screaming for the heads of everyone on the board. Speaking of which, the counsel is leaving without severance and the CEO will not receive a cash bonus for 2016 and will forego her 2017 annual equity award (more than $10m). There are 43 consumer class action lawsuits, with possibly more to come.

These guys are truly The Gang That Couldn't Shoot Straight. You will notice that the senior executives went unnamed and they managed to insert some uncertainty by claiming executives did not understand, slightly tinging the Security team. Other reports indicate the board simply ignored Security.

Hey Dum Dums... security is everybody's business. Companies need to lead in top-down manner, where everybody up TOP practices good security and it gets reflected down, making it part of corporate culture. So long as those up top don't understand and/or care, this is going to be a problem for all companies. Apparently Yahoo is too dim to learn from their multiplicity of mistakes.

Once again, close any Yahoo accounts you have and don't use any of their other products

Sexism in Hockey

A student activist group at the University of Michigan is demanding a 'No Whites Allowed' space.  Gee, this sounds an awful lot like... hmmm... what's that word? Oh yeah, racism. Martin Luther King is spinning...

• Very interesting article on three types of propaganda (Russia, China, and Milo) and how to counter them.

Someone (I can't get to the link) thinks white men should pay 5% more taxes because of their white privilege. I think we've reached Peak Stupidity. Or at least I hope we have. Personally, I gave up on this when I couldn't get a right-handed privilege tax enacted.

• Cool program alert: Privazer. This runs under Windows (boo) and cleans up a lot of garbage, from the Recycle Bin to temp files to Win and IE history. There is also a portable version, which doesn't technically install, for PCs you don't have install rights to (of course we never do this).

Over 820,000 user accounts were exposed, as well as potentially every voice communication recorded by a breach at CloudPets. Why?  An unsecured (no password!) database was discovered. The company was alerted multiple times from December 2016 onwards and did nothing.

Hmmm... what happens when you connect something (for children) to the internet and ok it recording everything you say? It records everything you say and sends it up to a server, which gets hacked, whether from gross incompetence (like not passwording your database) or general hacking.

I. Told. You. So.
It gives me no joy to say that.
Who am I kidding... there's nothing quite like an 'I told you so'.

Whether it's kids' toys, Alexa/Echo/Siri/Google stuff you put on your table or in your house or your cell phone to talk to.. this is what is going to happen. Also, every bit of data will be mined and used 'to make advertising more relevant'. And possibly mined by 'other' companies.

• What's next on the Fail Parade?  Air France, with its login password being 4-6 characters, NOT to include special characters. 4-6 character passwords? That's a Nope, Captain.

Ack - FURRIES!

It is not ours to judge.

It is ours to point and laugh hysterically.

• Congrats are in order for Carlos Santana and Joe Walsh, who won Vintage Guitar Magazine's User Award.

Actor Bill Paxton passed, from complications of an operation.

• A car plowed into a Mardi Gras parade in Gulf Shores, Alabama, sending eleven children from the marching band to the hospital (3 critical). I am not fond of marching bands either, but I just don't watch them. It never occurred to me to mow them down.

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I'm relating this strictly for amusement. All will be well:

It's been a highly interesting few weeks/months. With all the drama surrounding my mom and the Furry One, it's been a whirlwind.

• Marshall has had ear issues for months. We finally got him to the Doggie Dermatologist, who scheduled a procedure under anesthesia. Marshall went under and his O2 sat dropped (technical thingie meaning Something Bad Happened). They brought him back up, having barely started on an ear. Now he needs diagnostic work from the regular vet to figure out why this happened, then back to surgery again. He has pain medicine, which works well.
• The hole in the large pipe in the basement was patched in short order and remains solid.
• Car #1 went for inspection, will take a week, cost half what we expected.
• Car #2 waits for inspection, runs flawlessly
• We now have an 'interesting' leak in the roof. Insurance will take care of it.
• Mom is a bit fragile, but nowhere near as batshit as before.

What doesn't kill you probably makes you hurt a lot.

It's All About the Turtles

No matter what happens in the next few years, you're going to have to start protecting your toaster from hackers. Isn't that a good thought?

• My poor, long-suffering wife does the shopping, which is a wonderful, appreciated task. The other night we had to stop for something so I got dragged in. It took only minutes til I got frustrated with being there, so, like the child I am, I picked a nice, crowded aisle and asked, "Do you know what you haven't had in a long time? A nice SPANKING." Although only one person heard, I don't think I'll be shopping again any time soon.

Curious about the difference between porn watching habits of men and women? Read on. Hint: gang bangs.

• The head of Iceland has moved to make pineapple illegal on pizza. If only our elected thieves representatives could tackle so important a matter...

Because You Asked For It (did I?): there's an internet-connected mousetrap that signals when one has been caught. It will just upload the mouse to The Cloud. The next update will allow it to email all your friends to let them know you have mice.

• Researchers in Australia discover that smoke alarms tend not to wake children. On the bright side, it's the smoke that kills people, not the fire.

Ladies-look no further. Your ideal mate is here and waiting for you. WARNING: have a container of eye bleach handy.

• Hey, you know those US oil and gas industries? According to a new study, 68% of them have suffered a major security breach in the past year. But it's ok because 41% have continuous monitoring in place.  Think about this for a second. Less than half effectively monitor their networks. Yeah, we're in trouble.
• 7.3 billion Internet of Things devices are predicted by 2020. Their alleged security will be much worse than the oil and gas industries. We can watch the world burn, safe in the knowledge that we saw it coming, and we can laugh and say we told you so.

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Recently removed from the Statue of Liberty: Welcome to the US, where The Kardashians is the pinnacle of entertainment.

Welcome to Philadelphia: we have a statue of a fictional boxer.

I'm tired - I think I need to start going to bed later. No, really - the less sleep I get, the easier it is to get out of bed.

For no other reason that it's on again, via some horrid tv station, I salute Fred Sanford: Esther, I'm gonna put your face in some dough and make gorilla cookies.

)))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))

I have an adversarial relationship with seat belts. I understand they were not always standard equipment on cars and were not always mandatory.  I have, as you'd expect, an issue with them being mandatory, especially in a state that does not require motorcycle helmets (it's our choice to spill our brains). I think they exist to hold your dead body in the car. My chiropractor had bad things to say about them too.

Lately things have gotten weird(er). The belts don't always retract, getting stuck and preventing the doors from shutting completely. People have gotten in the car and started cursing at the belt, which is usually my job. It seems they can't find the receptacle to plug the belt in. I looked at them all like they were nuts for yelling at a seat belt, then I went to take my turn.. no connection. I tried again... no go. I think the receptacles have figured this routine out and have started moving and hiding themselves. And it has happened on two different cars. The seat belts are out to get us!  It's probably the Russians.

Nursing Home Roulette

In sad news, teen idol David Cassidy (The Partridge Family) is suffering from dementia.

• Everybody set for the Oscars? No? It can't be because you're not completely invested in the very important political views of the actors and actresses, could it?

A couple in London are in court, which isn't that odd. What they're in court for is a doozy... the lady and gentlemen registered for a civil partnership, which, unfortunately, was not valid the moment they signed for it. In the UK (except Northern Ireland), civil partnerships are for couples of the same sex. The court, as courts do, ruled against the couple. The three judges agreed that the couple is being treated differently because of their sexual orientation, but felt the government needed a little more time to make a decision. The couple has opened a Gofundme page for the 25,000lbs they need to take the case to the Supreme Court.

Why civil partnership, you ask?
Good question. The only difference I could find is that partnership ceremonies can be performed in private, where marriages must be in public and conducted by clergy. By clergy?

• Yeah, I do go on about security, but it's for good reason. How to encrypt your entire life in less than an hour is a great, simple tutorial on how to make security happen in your electronic life. It's not difficult and it's part of how we do things here at ThermionicEmissions.

I went into a Staples the other day and asked the nice young lady standing in the printer aisle where I could find an all-in-one laser printer. She stood there, looked quizzically at me, thought about it for a second or two, then advised me that all their printers were in this row.

This may indicate why their prices are so ridiculously high: they need to make up the lost income from people storming out the door.  I'm advanced enough to find and compare without the able assistance of employees but not everybody is. When I mentioned this on Twitter, a Staples representative made a text noise that indicated banging her head on her desk, apologized, then asked what I was looking for in a printer. This is good customer service and is indicative of many brands that have a Twitter presence. After all, you don't want to be slagged off in front of the entirety of Twitter. In the store, I was mentally composing this paragraph, because life is like that.

• I'm not sure what it means but Kid Rock is running for office and Ted Nugent is looking to in 2018. MGAA - Make Government Amusing Again? Ted has the distinction of being the only bipolar who is 100% manic.

The barista in Starbucks asked if he could help me. I asked for directions to Dunkin Donuts.

• My siblings and I are irresistible, if for nothing other than our nose hair.

I campaigned on the MAHA ticket (Make America Horny Again). I see that my work here is done.

• We were so poor, my parents couldn't afford bipolar disorder. All I got was unipolar depression.

Cleaning continues at the house. When I say it continues, I mean it happens in spurts between crises like the dog, bursting pipes, brakes, inspections, and bipolar disorder. While bipolar disorder is a very handy weight loss program (you can't eat when you can't get out of bed), it absolutely sucks eggs for a cleaning program. You'd think mania would be good for cleaning, as you'd get more done, but not so fast... yes, more appears to get done, but it's completely haphazard, with many areas being 'cleaned' at once and nothing completed.

So there is a small window in which cleaning can be accomplished. This window can vary from three microseconds to three hours, unless you take the time away from sleep, which helps clean, but causes lack of sleep problems on the back end.

My wife pulled off a spectacular feat of cleaning. I wondered about this as I woke for work, with no wife in the bed and no dog on my pillow. There were also no elephants on my pillow, which worked out wonderfully for all concerned.

PTSD from Something That Never Happened

Remember the Grammys? I don't, largely because I don't watch them. It's been way too frustrating for a long long time... have you heard what wins them? Apparently Adele won something over Beyonce. CNN and others have said this is due to racism.

Racism.

The sheer stupidity of this is immeasurable.

But then again, when you think of it, they might have a point.

After all, Jimi Hendrix is dead. If that doesn't prove racism, nothing does.

• In a move no one saw coming, Greatest Leader Kim Jong-un's half-brother, Kim Jong-nam (no relation to Viet-nam), heir apparent to the throne, has died. Or rather, had help dying, in Malaysia. He upset South Korea a few times in the past and Kim Jong-un apparently hasn't forgotten. The dude is hardcore - assassinating his own brother.

If you tap the buttons too fast on a Volkswagen's touchscreen, you can crash the display. This was a cut-and-paste error that fell into place when they put in the program that 'hid' the small emissions cheat that cost them more than the collective salaries of small countries. Or something.

• I experienced several of the most frustrating days ever at my workplace this week. I don't know how to accurately describe it, so here's a timeline:
• DAY 1
• a device was installed and misconfigured.
• I was called to reconfigure it
• Office 1 ordered the job for Office 2 (mine)
• spent an entire day trying to get adapters and cables for the job, ultimately failing, due to lack of hardware and inability to install software because the computer is rightfully locked down for security reasons.
• Office 1 overnights the correct adapter, which should exist everywhere.
• Day 2
• I wait for the adapter to be delivered
• [11:30] adapter delivered
• [11:35] adapter plugged in
• [11:40] located driver software for adapter (that I am not allowed to install)
• [11:45] open chat window with Helpdesk Dude to install software. He's not at his desk.
• [12:15] open chat window with second Helpdesk Dude, who is also not at his desk. I firmly believe that Helpdesk Dudes have a special program that tells everyone they're not at their desk or busy when they call, by default, so no one will ask them to do anything or yell at them because they can't do their work until they get some assistance.
• [1:00] Helpdesk Dude 1 is back at his desk and ignoring me, per departmental mandate
• [1:15] Helpdesk Dude 2 is back at his desk, but whoops... he's away again
• [2:00] I emailed Office 1 to let them know I'm still sitting there, waiting for help. He does something very interesting (and possibly illegal) to Helpdesk Dude 1, who is suddenly very anxious to help me out and apologizes for not getting to me hours earlier.
• [2:03] adapter is ready to go
• [2:05] configure software: the directions for idiots is made for different idiots and covers the wrong version of the software. I have to feel my way around to configure it.
• [2:15] Long trek to the device to be configured. Plug in - connect first time! Fail to log in. Fail to log in again. Call Office 1 - oops.. they changed the password. No, they can't tell me - they have to email. And I have to run back to the desk to get the email.
• [2:25] Log into device. Fail again. Call Office 1 again - they suggest capitalizing some letters and changing some numbers. POOF - I'm in [cue angels singing over heavenly music].
• [2:27] Device configured and tested! The entire operation was for these two minutes. That's it.
• [2:30] Get call from Office 1: did I configure it correctly - they can't see it. Why yes, I did. And I tested it. Guess I'll have to go back to it again.
• [2:35] Device remains configured properly. Call Office 1, who says to check with someone/anyone to make sure settings he gave me are correct. I stand up and my shoelace spontaneously unties itself, like a tiny explosion at my foot.
• [2:40] Find someone/anyone, who indicates everything is correct.
• [2:45] Back at device, look carefully and discover that the device was never correctly plugged into the network. Someone/anyone indicates he needs correct paperwork to get the device plugged in correctly.
• [2:50] Office 1 indicates that the paperwork was submitted a while ago and to forward this information to someone/anyone. Emailed this information, with a request to let me know when it's correctly plugged in.
• [One day later] I have not received confirmation that the device was plugged in correctly, per yesterday's email. My eyeballs start looking at each other and my stomach sends out Morse Code to Office 1.
• This is Work. This happens every time I need to get something done. It's like the Army, but worse. It's a small wonder I don't develop symptoms of Postal Worker Rage and mow down my coworkers. Due to the sounds of silence and snoring, most might not realize it.

Japanese game arcades now feature gamified urinals. Isn't that nice? You don't have to give up on that stream of endorphins and adrenaline when you are forced to leave your seat to pee. This is why the Japanese won the war...

• Wow.. a guy in a Tesla observed a Volkswagen Passat swerving all over the place on the Autobahn. After the car bounced off the guardrail a few times, he noticed the driver was unconscious. He pulls his Tesla in front of the Passat, allows the VW to tap his bumper, and manages to pull both cars to a stop. This man defines "hero".
• Elon Musk, Tesla inventor, steps up to say that all repairs on the Tesla will be free and expedited. It was a good day all around. Hopefully the Passat driver is ok.

Don't Be An iHole

Yes, Virginia, there is a MacBook-scented candle. It smells like Smug, costs three times more than other candles, and you have to wait in a long line for it.

• the Open Observatory of Network Interference has release an app to let you test internet surveillance and network performance. It's available for android and the iThing and tells you if a site is blocked by a number of techniques. It will also measure the speed and performance of your network, testing for possible throttling. Peruse the article and install the app. I am.

Mayor Jim Kenney, of the Great Hole of Philadelphia, home of the Sanctuary City, is delighting in Trump's court battle over immigration, saying that he isn't above the courts. This is the same mayor who refuses to change the city's status of Sanctuary City, thus flouting the law. I wonder if the good mayor would defend residents if they didn't pay taxes.. would they have sanctuary?

• It appears that the White House's Chief Information Security Officer, an Obama appointee, no longer has that position. No further information is available. In a completely unbiased article, Gizmodo said "It's also unclear if President Trump knows what that job title means."

In a rare good move, Google has given the apps in their store til March to post a privacy policy or be pushed toward the bottom of the listings or purged entirely. It doesn't have to be a good privacy policy but it has to be a privacy policy.

• My mother (see the Dementia section above) is having trouble with her words sometimes, which is referred to as speech aphasia. For a few years, we've noticed that the objects of our own sentences have started to disappear. Maybe it's age...I don't know... I've never been this age before.
• I'll think of Hendrix, then start to say something about him.. "Yeah, I really like.... umm...." and in that second, Hendrix has completely left my mind and it will take a while to bring him back or I'll give up completely. I'm not saying it's a clinical diagnosis, but it's frustrating as hell and my brothers do it too.
• I just found out my mom hates rosemary. Now I know where I got it from.

Know what I hate?
Everything.
Today the thing that really bothers me is that it's still getting dark too early, in addition to the omnipresent gray. This is my day of rest, I've only been awake for a few hours, and the sun is going down. The natural conclusion would be to stop sleeping til noon, then walking downstairs and realizing I need a nap. It's weird, but some people have told me it's not normal to get going by 3pm on weekends.

• Hey, remember how those CDs you purchased starting in the 80s, that would last forever? Guess what - they don't. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, we now have a new term to bandy about: Disc Rot. Some of this was discovered in batches. There was a hotline for one bad batch that was open for years. In essence, you're screwed. Look for obvious 'rotlike' discolorations, white spots, or bronzing. This also applies to software. One fella opened unplayed manufacturer game discs to find them rotting. In some cases, it won't affect the material, but regardless, I'd get them copied off to something else NOW. Recordables are more susceptible. 

A new app has become popular in Washington, DC: it's called Confide. Like Signal (which we should all be using for encrypted text and voice) in its encryption, Confide only shows a line when you 'wipe across' and deletes the message when you tell it or after ten minutes.  Neat app, right? Aside from my Security Spider Sense, which tells me someone will discover the messages aren't exactly deleted securely (or at all), we have politicians communicating secretly. Stop and think about that.

• Everybody's favorite Real Imitation Roast Beef fast food joint, Arby's, suffered a payment card breach, affecting up to 1,100 locations. Up to 355,000 cards were affected. Arby's has declined to state whether is has notified customers but said customers should look for unauthorized activity on their payment cards. Sweet of them, don't you think?

A lot of websites are powered by WordPress software. Fortunately this blog isn't because I wouldn't wish WordPress on an enemy. The patches flow frequently, and this is because the software has more holes than Internet Explorer. Well, almost. While updates can be automatic, some folks don't use this option. Because of this, over one million WordPress sites were defaced.

• Here's a short page on why privacy is important - even though you have nothing to hide.

&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&

I make no secret of the fact that I don't like sports, but always forget that there is one sport I enjoy the hell out of: Los Angeles Police Chases. Police chases are weeks away from being designated the Official Sport of California. This is not at all strange, coming from a state that gives drivers licenses to illegal aliens. There's a station out of Phoenix that usually carries the races live, complete with helicopters vying for the best angle. Part of the fun is watching the spectators vying for the best camera angle and waving madly. Even getting hit by the suspect's car would be a golden opportunity for them, death aside.  Today's adventure was made even more amusing by the suspect messing with the police. He'd stop in the middle of the street, when police in four cars jumped out, guns pointed, squatting behind their car doors. Thirty seconds later, he'd take off. It was amusing each of the four times he did it.

I think, with a few small improvements, California could have a World Class Sport and eventually be admitted to the Olympics. Perhaps they could define a route and put up barriers, so bystanders don't get hurt (or perhaps bystanders getting hurt would add to the merriment). Extra points would be awarded for creative routing outside of the course. Cameras could be installed for better angles as well as views into the car itself. If people are anticipating leading a car chase, they can install a car camera so everyone in the audience can watch their expressions as they try to evade the police (which no one ever does, even in California).

In these days of ridiculous spending causing ridiculous deficits, this can be another source of revenue. Proceeds could go to the LAPD Children's Fund. There's absolutely no downside to this brilliant idea of mine. I will only take a small fee, per chase, for the idea.

note: updates to the Dementia page have been made

Vizio Must Go

Our good friends over at Vizio, who make approximately 1 of 5 tvs, just got fined a few million by the FTC over information collection. Enabled by default, the tv would send information on everything you watched, including IP address, to identify you, then sell the data to aggregators for a profit. In normal information theft (make no mistake, that's what this is), only non-identifiable information is sold - nothing that can tell anybody who you are. In this case, everything possible was sent up the line. The 'feature' was hidden in the tv's menu, behind some innocuous setting.  Under the terms of the settlement, Vizio admits no wrongdoing and states that permission should be obtained first, before collection, as if they thought of it first.

I have a box with a Vizio tv in it, alleged to be a Dumb TV, so this shouldn't apply. It will be interesting if I ever decide to open it. This kind of screwing should be dealt with most harshly.

• A German Shepherd/Akita mix recently escaped the shelter to locate a woman who fed him treats. If this isn't a match made in heaven, I don't know what is.

If it's Tuesday, it's gray and rainy. Actually if it's most days ending in -day, it's gray and rainy. What does this mean? It means Business as Usual for most. For us, it means the Loud Family is now using a power saw to cut through what sounds like metal. Outside. In the rain. And they won't even have the good grace to electrocute themselves.

• IRONY: Social media phishing attacks are up 500%. How do I know? Social media told me.

A fellow was using his drone for work purposes (no, really) when it, instead of performing a loop, performed an unauthorized software update. After the update, it did not fly so much as plummet. Plug that into your self-driving car.

• The University of Sydney (read this with an Australian accent) has announced a $30k scholarship for men from rural areas who intend to work in rural veterinary science.  Even though 90% of the field is female, reaction was predictable: "It seems they care more about money than they do about my being a woman and getting equal opportunities."
• I'm against these kinds of tests for any position. I want the best candidate regardless of gender, color, or planet of origin. Would you want less than the best vet working on your pet or livestock? Would you want less than the best police person protecting you?
• What hath feminism wrought? We demand preferential treatment: it's ok to make concessions, so long as it's to women.

Did you ever have one of those days?
I know I have. Plenty of those days.
You know, those days when stuff falls?

I walked into the house and placed the mail on the table. The top envelope slid right to the floor, behind the table, in a place that was ridiculously difficult to access. While trying to access it, a ceramic key holder also left the table. This was not the way I had intended to spend my time at home and I loudly proclaimed this, at which point three more things fell behind the table.

On my way to the kitchen, I swear I heard something leap to the floor behind me.
In the kitchen, a cup launched itself into the sink, free from my assistance. At this point I snickered, realizing what was happening. I had created what scientists refer to as an Extra-Heavy Gravitic Field (EHGF). Scientists have absolutely no idea how I manage to create this but at least they have a name for it. Names make people feel so much better, even about car crashes and earthquakes.

Having realized what was going on, I was less upset and even jovial as I watched  various kitchen implements leap from the counter and items on the drying rack plummet to the ground. It looked like a comedy in the vein of The Exorcist.  After placing something in the rack, something else rocketed to the floor, I completely lost it and started assisting the Extra-Heavy Gravitic Field by means of throwing stuff at the walls and the ground. Whoever makes those silver juice packets should have used this as a commercial - no matter whether it jumps from the counter or gets launched at the wall with extreme prejudice, the package does not break.

• Need to make a few bucks? Want to expand your notoriety and maybe get a personal nasty tweet from the president? Porn site XHamster is holding auditions for a Trump look-a-like. Do not underestimate the industry that brought you "Who's Nailin Palin?"

It's Sick Time at the lefty house.
A week ago, Wife had what looked like the sniffles, which abated in a day. Over the last few days, I had some truly odd symptoms, which led to a fever. Yes, my wife got me sick on purpose.

Fast forward a day and Wife is now sick again/still.
I think I figured this one out: there existed only one day that I was sick and she wasn't. Her Evil Plan was to get me sick, then minimize the time she'd have to play nurse by getting sick herself. Truly evil. And this is not the first time, sympathy be damned. It's not that I'm looking for anything, but a cup of soup would be nice.

Wife gets sick pretty well. It usually goes right to her throat, cutting off speech. Do you have any idea how bad it must be for someone who talks at least 20 hours per day to lose their voice? The result is a lot of people trying to 'speak' via some sort of poorly modified hand gestures combined with a pad and pen. All I can do is nod my head and hope no one required an answer. Come to think of it, this idea isn't different from when she can speak.

This becomes even more complex for the poor dog, who does not understand poorly modified hand gestures combined with a pad and pen. Not that he couldn't pick it up in a week or two, but holding your hands out wide and shaking them does not register as MOVE to him.

Meanwhile, he has taken advantage of his mom's bed rest by whining pitifully for a second breakfast, as I have no idea whether he was fed already. Again, smart dog.

Hello, It's Time to Go

Say you want to set your house on fire and you happen to have a pacemaker. The police come by and arrest you for arson and insurance fraud. They demand the information from your pacemaker to show you couldn't have escaped the fire with your belongings because your heart rate stayed the same-no extra effort shown. And to make matters worse, you killed your cat in the fire.

Yes, now your own pacemaker can incriminate you, regardless of that pesky old Fifth Amendment. Every piece of data works against you. I wonder if we have to encrypt pacemaker data...

• I feel really bad about this StupidBowl. Didn't know about it til last week and didn't get a chance to get my party planned (good food, the wife, the dog, and 4 hours of Monty Python).
• The local morning show spent quite a while on the Lady Gaga halftime performance, even bringing an 'expert' in to help analyze it. We are doomed.

Are you familiar with Google image search? You can upload an image and Google will search for similar images. Hold onto your underwear - there's now a porn image search. Yes, you can take a porn star and figure out who she is (female-only at this point) with this website. Of course this is academic - none of us would use this. Of course.

• If you use any kind of voice controls for your android phone (if you talk to it, and I don't mean cursing), you can check out what Google has recorded here. Yes, Google records everything you say to it, as does Apple. You can allegedly delete whatever's there, but my feeling is that if it's there, it's already mined for information. Needless to say, I don't use it. 

I'm not certain of the manufacturer but I read a story recently on some poor lady having trouble updating the firmware in her breast pump.  I'm not entirely sure why her breast pump required a firmware update or why it required the update over the internet.

• Like Alexa, the Amazon product that you put on your table, talk to, and it gives you information, Google has the Google Home. This device was set off by Google's commercial during the Super Bowl. This will not be the last we hear of this. Alexa already recommends changing the device's name to something else. My friend suggests Hal.

If you ever thought bus riding was boring, you've obviously never been to Macon, Georgia. A female bus driver was going along her route, when a drunk passenger lit a cigarette. She told him to put it out, at which point he 'took exception.' She pulled over and told him to stop smoking or get out. He grabbed her keys, scratched her with them, pulled out his lighter and set her hair on fire, then proceeded to lead police on a 95mph chase through two counties. He even rode over spike strips, which flattened a tire. When the police finally got the vehicle pulled over, the drunk wouldn't open the door and bit the EMTs. This is only his seventh DUI.

• The Santa Clara University student senate has rejected the petition of a conservative group to form a chapter because because it's presence would make them feel "unsafe". Boy, the world is going to look really nasty if these kids ever make it out into reality. "Boss - he disagrees with me. You need to fire him."

We all know I'm tinfoil hat security and privacy but let me present the other half of the coin: my buddy. He has one of those X-Boxes with the always-on mic that listens to everything you say. It's plugged into a smart tv, which monitors everything you say and watch and do, sending the data back to the manufacturer (he had to agree to this when he first turned the tv on). Then there's the voice-controlled remote control on his cable system: I don't know much about it, but I'm relatively certain that cable company records every command. This in addition to monitoring everything the family watches and records. The house is alarmed, which can be enabled and disabled through a cell phone app. He also has Alexa, which is an Amazon product that you can talk to and get information from. Of course this device listens, even though you have to say Alexa first, before it will do anything. 

His cell phone is voice-operated, and we know that everything said to a cell phone is kept on a server 'to improve voice recognition.'

His cars are wired, so they transmit all location data, plus the On-Star system, that can listen to everything that happens in the car. All of this data has been used by the police in criminal cases. Then there's the E-Pay system for turnpike tolls - a perfect system for tracking and figuring out how fast he was going between toll points. 

So my buddy is at the beginning of the Connected Life. Regardless of security and privacy concerns, this is pretty neat... it's what science fiction writers have been writing about all these years. The man goes to work and doesn't have to stop to pay a toll. He asks his phone for directions to a different site. When he gets home, the house alarm is shut off via his phone, which can be used virtually anywhere. He asks Alexa and the phone to set up a reminder that he's going out with friends for dinner, then asks what time the restaurant is open til. He tells the tv remote what he wants to watch and it goes there. After a while, Alexa and the phone remind him that he's going out for dinner with friends, at this restaurant. In the car, the phone gives him directions. If the phone acts up, the car will plot the route. If he wants, he can hook the phone into the car to play music.

Pretty neat.

On the other hand there's my family. You may remember my last outing, in which a cell phone and a Garmin device, with which I have a very contentious relationship, both tried to take us to the wrong state, largely through a body of water. Yesterday my poor wife, possibly in a scientific effort to prove that it was only me having the Garmin Issue, used it to get to a destination. The Garmin won, of course, by 'forgetting' to tell her to take an exit ramp before making that left onto Main Street. Perhaps the device would perform better if everyone employed by Garmin was forced to use it on a daily basis.

Happy Monday is an Oxymoron

Why is our president and some of his staff still using a private email server? Or are they? Trump and some of his staff still have accounts on a RNC server that may or may not have been hacked, depending on what day of the week this is. Oddly enough, this is the same server used by the Bush administration to communicate during the Iraq war (let us pray... that it has been upgraded since then). Professional liar and former and present CIA head James Comey claims there was limited access to a non-used server.

Security experts are also worried about the president's use of an Android phone. The reason given is that he could be a target on insecure wifi. Yes, any of us can be a target - that's why no one should use any old wifi at any old coffee shop or at the airport. Use a VPN if you absolutely must access these services. Trump's own staff would like him to turn in the phone, especially as concerns Twitter.

Speaking as an alleged Security Dude, these people have a point. Virtually no one bothers to secure their phone, including alleged Security Professionals. Even the previous president had a custom-secured cell phone. Is the device encrypted so no one can get into it? Is there a password or PIN code that automatically locks the device? Is it accessing a secure system? Is there any actual secure information on the phone in the first place?  I'd prefer, as you would expect, the device be locked down to hell and back.. you know.... like mine. Even if there's nothing interesting there, less to attack is always better.

• Over in Iraq, the Islamic State's chief executioner, who has beheaded more than 100 people, has been knifed to death. I believe this is what they call irony. Or just desserts.

Google found and quarantined some brand new malware on a customer's android phone. Yay, they caught the malware!  Now stop for a second and think about this.... Google remotely accessed the phone to quarantine the malware. While this capability isn't news to some of us, it should be news to everybody. iDevice users, don't get all smug - your phone can be remote-accessed by Apple too. In fact at one point, programs 'disappeared'. E-books have also gone bye-bye. It's a PITA, but possible to disconnect from Google (it's beyond the scope of this paragraph). The other message here is to be very careful what you download from Google Play. Since there's very little to tell you whether the program is clean, avoid programs with few reviews, few downloads, non-English or broken English text or reviews, and authors you don't know. Stick with the majors. Also stay away from cleaners/memory boosters/speed boosters; they're not needed on android anymore.

• Ransomware knocked seventy percent of the Washington, DC, spy surveillance cameras ahead of the inauguration. Some cameras had more than one piece of malware. The ransomware was introduced via a spam email that some high-functioning, security-minded government worker opened. This affected a server with all sorts of documents. The fix to ransomware is to have good, frequent backups, of which it appears there are none. Perhaps we will be spared some aspects of the Security State by its own incompetence.

Cocker Spaniels are notorious for separation anxiety, or at least the three rescue cockers we adopted have been. Marshall prefers his people around the house at all times. I had to go somewhere today and he saw me put on my coat. He sat down and gave me this look. They have big, expressive eyes to begin with, and when they're upset, you know it. Marshall was upset. Small wonder I don't like to leave the house... poor little guy. When I got home, he was anchored to me.

Speaking of Marshall, the little darling continued his weekly visit with the vet for his ear infection, which has been going on forever. Healthy all his life, he has had problems since his cat died (grief-related illnesses?). Cockers are prone to ear problems due to their flaps and closed ear canals. The current diagnosis is antibiotic-resistant bacteria. They referred us to a Doggie Dermatologist. This little diversion cost $200, plus the new consultation. Even his parents have never seen a dermatologist.

guess who...

• How do you know when the driver in front of you is going to make a turn? His turn signal is not on.

Pasta: Yes, there's an app for that! I can't make the pasta until I charge my phone!

• Netgear routers have yet another flaw that would allow hackers to get into it remotely. Check to see if yours is listed. Disable remote administration regardless.

A popular new joke is that the Statue of Liberty is going to be deported. I suggest whoever gets it has to take the UN too.

• Yesterday we had sun, gloom, snow, and sun in the span of about an hour. This is not normal, even for here.

John Wetton, bassist and vocalist for King Crimson and Asia, lost his battle with cancer. He was 67.

• As if you didn't think I was totally tin foil hat, this should do it for you. You can be ultrasonically tracked while using cell phones, to build up a profile of you across devices. There is an android and a Chrome patch to disable it. My feeling is that if people can't hear the sound, the speaker in the phone can't put that high a frequency out. Apparently my feeling is incorrect. Further, I believe one can avoid this via turning off javascript, but time will tell.

Hey, I think I need some Magnums.

Magnum ice cream bars or Magnum large condoms?

I'm buying both to make it an extra special weekend.

• The People's Republic of Berkeley had to cancel a talk by a gay Jew who likes black guys the other night, due to rioting on campus. Yes, the tolerant students for free speech (only when it agrees with them), demanded the event be canceled. One of the ringleaders was ok with the violence and said it was 'self-defense'. So the people calling the speaker a nazi are themselves behaving like nazis. Students need to be protected from words. Remember when students protested war? Non-violently?
• Make no mistake, the students had every right to protest. Violence, however, is illegal and not the way to make one's point.
• The Associated Press and USA Today's coverage consisted of peaceful people marching with signs. There were fires, assaults with pipes, two groups protesting, an ATM smashing, cars damaged, and a live band.
• These Students of Public Relations who are essentially protesting Trump are doing a wonderful job of keeping him in office.
• The Berkeley Police ordered the students to disperse several times. They were extremely helpful in keeping order. Other police departments move in to restore order and stop further crimes. Why didn't this department?

A recent small study has revealed that black humor a sign of high intelligence. Finally-vindication!