Fuzzy Green Chairs

Know what a Stingray is? The one that isn't a Corvette.
A Stingray is a catch-all, as well as a brand name for IMSI catchers. Wasn't that helpful?
It's a device sold to law enforcement that gets put up as a fake cell tower, to catch and monitor your cell phone. You have no idea it's there; the phone operates normally.

One company found a bunch of them in DC. Nobody knows whose they are. The letter agencies are aware of them, but some claim not to know either. Very smart operation, guys.

So it wasn't enough that law enforcement spied on you, now it's all over the place in DC and no one is sure who is doing the spying. Or what's going to be done with, or about it.

Isn't that lovely?

• Panera Bread, Sears, and Best Buy have been hit by breaches. Check your accounts and act accordingly.

Question of the day: Does the color azure make anyone else manic?

The Faceyspaces Saga. On and on and on

• It's interesting to watch the Shitstorm facing Faceyspaces. Zuckerburg had a small point, telling people they ok'd the spying when they signed up. This is true; we know nobody reads the terms - they just hit OK.  Just the other day, I had to ok a license on my phone... rest assured I read the terms.
• And now, Zuckerburg is getting a lot of blowback over the privacy invasion that is the actual business of Faceyspaces. Yes, people, you are the product. Your data is being sold and not only do you lose your privacy, you're not making a cent on this. In case you didn't know, FB owns Instagram, so they have yet another data collector. While we're at it, Google owns YouTube.
• I want to emphasize that the Faceyspaces app on your phone has access to most of your data. It catalogs every phone call you make, as well as every text message. If you have friends that you might not tell your spouse about, FB knows. If you're texting with a 'special friend' that you might not tell your spouse about, FB knows. This is just the start of the info. At very least, uninstall the phone app and use a browser.
• Just because we're on this topic, Zuckerburg also mentioned that their reverse search function, where you enter an email or phone number to find a contact, was scraped, potentially exposing the data of two billion users (their total userbase).
• Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak is leaving Faceyspaces. Good move, Steve, but this isn't exactly new.
• What is new (aside from me warning everyone) is that FB has extensive profiles on people who aren't on FB, including a lawyer for the ACLU. This article is not for the faint of heart.
• Hot off the presses: Faceyspaces just suspended another firm for "non profit academic research", which translates to "we've got all your data too".
• Check to see if your data was shared with Cambridge Analytica.
• Annnnnnnnd once again, I'm not a conspiracy theorist - I'm a futurist. Or just a guy who's very concerned about privacy and safety. I TOLD YOU SO.

Twitter is again showing their colors by shadowbanning Ted Cruz's tweets. I'm not a Cruz fan, or a republican fan, or a democrat fan, but they are doing things and need to be called out on them. It's not that private corporations are required to play fair, but they're being very sneaky about it and people need to know. Nowhere does Twitter let people know that they actively discriminate and outright censor everybody to the right of Rob Reiner. I stick up for conservatives in this case because next time, they could decide to start throwing out libertarians. One account was terminated because the owner objected to a court decision. 

What is shadowbanning? Making an account much less visible. It's a discovered then admitted process.  Followers of the account don't see all the tweets.  What kind of 'trusted' platform does this in the dark?

The CEO of Twitter, the infamous @Jack, openly called for a war against republicans recently, on the national stage.  This is a small first step toward disclosure, but Twitter needs to admit its bias and make it put it in their terms. Let the people make their decisions by themselves.

Meanwhile, conservatives (and even 4 or 5 us libertarians) are moving to gab.ai, which absolutely does not discriminate against anyone. Free speech comes with speech you don't like, and this means I have to put up with a small amount of antisemites and what look like nazis. They're ugly, and the scum of the earth, but  deserve free speech as much as anyone else. Like Twitter, you can block or not follow people you don't like.

Speaking of @Jack, an article, quoting anonymous internal sources, alleges that the initial checkmark removals and alt-right bans came directly from Jack.

• Best Buy and Kmart say they're victims of the same third party breach that affected Delta and Sears.

One day we're sitting on the couch, snacking and doing what people do when sitting on the couch (no, not fighting). All of the sudden I hear STOP IT. Huh?  Stop making that noise. What noise? That noise.... you're not doing it right. Huh? You have to take a bunch out at one time and eat them. You can't reach in and get them one at a time. That noise drives me crazy.  

Oh.

Notice my contribution to the discussion largely consisted of Huh?

So I'm minding my own business, as I do, when the wife goes by, on the way to a different floor. Minutes later, I hear the dog shrieking to come in. Wife let him out. The longer he waits, the higher the pitch and frequency of the shrieking. The neighbors probably think he's being abused. My question to you: is my wife being passive aggressive by making me go get the dog?

Because if it is, I need to eat some snacks.

• I just heard about free range eggs. Do they allow the eggs to roam? What does that look like? Do the neighborhood teens wonder if they got more for their drug money?

Overheard: 

I'm out of bullets.

How did that happen?

I shot them all.

• A sex robot inventor said his creations helped save his marriage. He would turn to the robot when his wife wasn't in the mood. This is almost like my concept of Vice Wife; the woman who would take over when the Wife was not able to perform the duties of her office.
• Ever clever, my wife said perhaps she should get a Vice Husband. I'm a fair guy - go ahead. The only duties of office I fail at are mowing and trash.
• I predict the inventor's next disagreement will involve who cleans the doll when he's done.

I don't have much to say about the Cosby trial, other than noticing he's in great shape at comedy gigs and bumbles and stumbles like an aged Hillary Clinton on the way into the courthouse. He was rushed the other day by a topless woman, protesting his actions. The woman was identified as an actor who appeared on his show a few times, whose character was named Roofie Johnson.

• A West Virginia woman was arrested for beheading her boyfriend before telling cops, “You have to take me back and let me get my heads,” as they drove her away from the bloody scene, authorities said. Her lawyer is complaining about the judge asking for a test of mental competence, stating that it tarred his client's good reputation and her impending run for public office.

A man who ate a Carolina Reaper, the hottest pepper known to man, experienced dry heaving, neck pain, and bad headaches, referred to as thunderclap headaches. Who could have imagined that a man eating the hottest pepper on the planet would experience any negative effects?

The next time someone expects sympathy for their migraine, poo poo the idea and tell them to come back when they have a real headache.

• Baltimore, a hell hole even bigger than Philly, is attempting to drive tourism in new and untested ways. A man was jogging nude through rush hour traffic. Note to Baltimore: you might want to try it with a woman. 

Even YouTube isn't immune to hackers. Someone got into YT and deleted all sorts of videos, including Shakira's Vero YT account.  In the spirit of international brotherhood, I have volunteered to sacrifice my time to comfort her on this tragic loss.

• Pro Tip: before you come in the house and yell "Nipple check on aisle three", make sure no one but the owner of said nipples can hear you.

Why is it always California?

A bill has been introduced in California, which would require state-sanctioned fact checkers to approve online content. It's a shame we can't mandate fact checkers for lawmakers.

• Proving that satire is dead, the mayor of London has enacted knife control.
• The UK spends a lot of time laughing at the US, but now it's our turn. The police can stop anyone they suspect of carrying a knife and search them.
• First the ubiquitous spy public cameras, then the ban on speech that hurts feelings, and now Stop And Search for knives. It sounds more like a police state than the great country it was.

After getting cut off in traffic, Texas' own Ryan McFaul did the only thing a reasonable man could do: pulled out his BB gun and shot at a church's windows. The BBs went through the outer pane of the dual pane glass and no one was hurt. McFaul is out on $5,000 bond, with the condition that he holds the gun backwards the next time he shoots.

• Security Theater: Next time you're getting groped by the TSA at the airport, you better have your snacks ready for inspection. In yet another bid to look relevant, the TSA is going to start screening snacks. By the end of the year, look for intense shoelace scrutiny. Inside sources also point to underwear checks.

Canada is Pissed

I take a decent amount of crap online because of my pro Second Amendment views. Also my pro First Amendment views. This is largely on Twitter, as one would guess. It's just a matter of time until tweeters are not allowed to mention the Second Amendment. The most shocking, shrieking rebuke came from a Canadian. This particular Canuckian is a nice lady and we've been online acquaintances for a while. After the Florida shooting, I attempted to explain the Second Amendment and she yelled, as best one can yell in text, that I have the blood of children on my hands. Canadians generally live up to the stereotype of being nice people. Even the border guards are unfailingly polite.

In an email exchange with another Canuckian who is so level, you almost need to check for a pulse, she mentioned she doesn't like our president or our guns. I asked for some specifics and could feel the volume going up and the seething start. I guess I found the pulse.

I (used to) love hearing American jokes and what other countries thought of us. The main object of their laughter was that Americans only know one language. In a complete verification of the joke, Americans will not see the problem with that. 

Now all I hear is hatred for Trump and gun ownership. I really don't want to be lectured about my country and its Constitution by people not living under it (and roughly 50% of the people who do). They seem to think we're all armed to the teeth and the act of walking down the street puts one's life at risk. Please. They advocate gun control, in the form of not having them at all. They think this will stop the mass shootings. Oops - it seems the criminals are performing the majority of crimes, so gun confiscation will do nothing but harm law-abiding people. Here's another mini fact: all school shootings have occurred in gun-free zones.

I'm not sure outside folks are getting our culture or our Constitution. Ironically, they seem quite ok with the First Amendment.

Agoraphobic Mall Trips

Not frequently, but every now and then, a family member pisses me off. When my brother bought his first house, an older lady, whose thinking functions were fading, sold it to him. The house hadn't been redecorated in a while, resulting in what I referred to as 'The Trip Room'. The room came complete with silver mylar wallpaper, which was enough by itself, but also this unimaginable fuzzy green chair. I asked him to preserve just this one room, as some weird sort of tribute, perhaps to the seventies. He, or someone he happened to be married to, rejected the idea with great speed and efficiency.

Now, I hear the kitchen is being remodeled. The kitchen features some quiet but bizarre wallpaper, with tiny pineapples on it. It became a running joke, then I heard it was coming down. Again I asked one small favor... if you're not going to leave the wallpaper, at least leave a few square inches of it on a hidden space somewhere. Again I received an immediate answer in the negative.

My relatively new motto is "I ask for very little. And that's exactly what I get."  But I asked, because if you don't ask, you don't receive. And I'm feeling some kinda way about this. It's not like I asked for $50,000 or to live with them. Or for one of them to mow my lawn. Just a chair or a tiny piece of wallpaper. But nooooooooo.

If he had asked me to keep one small thing because it amused him, I'd do it in a heartbeat. Unless he asked me to clean... that's not going to happen.

• Life is funny. When I was a little boy, Mom would throw her munchkins in the car and take them to the mall. The other day I piled my parents in the car and took them to a mall and dinner.  It's the least I could do.

I'm still working diligently on my agoraphobic certificate. 

As you may remember, agoraphobes stay in their house and are afraid to leave. I can't get the full official certificate, as I still have to work. There are no exceptions. It also happens that whenever I do make it out of the house, I wish I had stayed home. So right now I shall retain my amateur status. Or maybe part-time agoraphobia.. I'll have to ask a professional.

That aside, as is bound to happen once every month or so, I left the house, not on a work mission. Remember mission, as this is another one of those Literary Devices I throw around now and again. I'm not a writer, but I know two or three terms, so I'm throwing them around.

We decided to take my reasonably near-sane parents out to a mall and dinner. They're always delighted to see us, possibly just because it means leaving the house, but I suspect they actually like us or something.

We went to a mall, so the ladies could look at Stuff. My wife has a favorite department store. My wife has many favorite stores, physical and virtual. This particular store is such a favorite that we frequently don't get out into the mall proper, because she's spent so much time there. We were determined, however.

After only two or three bags, weighing thirty pounds each, were purchased, I was unanimously elected to take them to the car or drag them through the mall. This is like choosing between chin-ups and running in the cold for (NOOOO) exercise. The car was pretty far away, so I dragged.

Why was the car far away? Every time we go to this mall, we park right up front. That day everyone and their extended family was at this store, perhaps because it was sunny outside. Yes, they couldn't wait to leave their houses because it was nice outside, so they could go to the enclosed mall. Logic is not our strong suit.

Just as it was last time, the area was heavy with Brow Options. There was a store called Brow Bar. I'm not entirely sure what went on there, but no one was being serviced. It didn't appear they were selling brows and I didn't notice a Brow License anywhere, so we were stymied.

Mom and Wife went into Victoria's Secret. Most people don't bother to find out, but I know Victoria's Secret: it's how they get women to spend so much on so little. Even little girls have little (fully covering) clothes. Now teenagers feel the need to look pretty under their clothes. We're a weird planet.

The menfolk discovered seats in the mall area and took full advantage of them. Twenty minutes later, Dad starts to get a little itchy, as the womenfolk hadn't returned.  I didn't understand the commotion; they would find us when (if) they were done shopping. This could eventually be to my detriment because the more I'm not with her, the more time she has to shop, and by shop, I mean spend. Dad got more and more itchy and probably failed to understand my calm. He called both of them on their phones, neither of which could hear them ringing. This is unlike my wife's phone at home, in which buried people, dead for a hundred years, can hear clearly. So Dad paced while I checked for the one piece of email I get every day or so.

We eventually found them. They had snuck behind us, across the mall to a different store. A store that has the same clothes, shoes, and jewelry in ten sections, displayed by color. Women understand this. Men, as usual, don't have a clue or a chance. It's not like my wife is there a lot, but they greet her by name.

The mall used to be a small affair; two anchor stores with some other stores sandwiched between. At some point they decided to add more stores. Unlike other malls that run east to west or north to south, this one added a cluster of stores outside this exit and six restaurants out back, not connected to the mall. It looked like some sort of tree branch, after the nuclear holocaust. As a manly man and a damn-near considerate person, I offered to retrieve the car so no one (else) had to do more walking. I showed everyone the exit I'd meet them at and asked them to stand there.

Because of the hodgepodge layout, one simply does not drive around the mall, like some sort of Indianapolis speedway at two hundred miles per hour; one drives around a ninety degree side, then out and around a bank that mysteriously popped up out of the ground, obscuring mall traffic. Then past the first mall entrance (or the last mall entrance, depending on where you entered) and around what looked like some sort of truck receiving area, but what in fact was a place for some unnamed Italian outfit to store bodies before they go out for processing.  Attached to the crematorium was a huge parking garage. This is a mall, mind you. The parking garage obscured it. At this point the phone rang. The phone does not ring at home, nor while I'm out doing something; it only rings when I don't want to hear it or I'm doing something that precludes me from answering it. At this point I was in the middle of a U-turn, fortunately with no one else coming. I went to get the phone from its holder and, as always, was completely blocked by the seatbelt. I hate seatbelts. Their only use is to hold your dead body in the seat after the accident. They get in the way of the phone, the radio, the wallet, and any of my wife's parts I wish to touch while we're both in the car.

Wife informs me they're waiting by Jeans House, John's Snotty Upscale Market, Half Foods, and Chicosan's Boutique. These are all stores I never heard of nor visited in the mall, so this wasn't helping me. This was also not where I told them to meet me. I asked a simple question: why didn't you meet me where I asked? We couldn't. You couldn't exit at the mall exit? No, we couldn't get out the doors. I decided to let that pass because if I took any time at all to think about it, it would produce massive headaches and possibly homicidal behavior. She said it was a bit down and brown outside. Oh, the brown section! Down by the thing. Yes, those were directions alright... just not directions for anyone who wasn't standing next to her at that moment. I promised I'd look and guaranteed I'd see her by dinner tomorrow.

Eventually I found the Brown Section, with yet another clump of stores not attached to the mall, requiring circling the outside of the drive and yet another U-turn, fortunately sans ringing phone. Some fellow got out of his car right before I drove up the lane and proceeded to walk, verrrrrry slowly, in the general direction of the store clumpage. I do not drive an electric car, so it makes six cylinders of noise. Noise this fellow apparently did not recognize as a car, so he continued moseying on down the lane, as I prepared to turn onto the main road. He outsmarted me by also turning, ever so slightly as to slow down my turn too. Talk about homicidal urges... this behavior should be punishable by a fine not to exceed five thousand dollars, plus wearing a sign outside the store for a year that says "I'm a slow walking car blocker".

It was all I had left not to zoom past the lot of them and take myself home, where Marshall was impatiently waiting, but in some countries it is considered rude to leave your elderly parents standing outside a mall for a few days (not your wife, though). No matter, I thought, at least we were off to our favorite barbecue place for our favorite barbecue. They even have a vanilla ice cream machine with tiny little cones for dessert and you get to pull the lever yourself. It's the little things....

We drove there, parked the car, got out, walked two steps, and discovered our favorite barbecue place had closed permanently. Not a sound from four people. We stared, mute. BUT OUR FAVORITE BARBECUE PLACE!!! It's not there. It's closed. We cannot purchase barbecue here anymore. No loaded potatoes, fried oprah, pulled this and that.. and no ice cream.  If we were but a few years younger, we would have stood there, crying, and proceeding to have an absolute FIT in the parking lot. No one was around, but I wouldn't let that stop me if I were going to throw a Serious Tantrum. I threw a Medium Tantrum when my wife dropped a candle and smashed five pounds of glass in her store. That day she was having a very serious problem with gravity. Sometimes it works much more heavily on her than the rest of us. So many things dropped and lept out of the cart that I took to calling her My Little Disaster Area. Romantic, no?

So there we stood, on the verge of Serious Tantrum, when my wife came up with  what she thought was the perfect solution: going next door and shopping at the strangely upscale second hand store, where one can purchase pocketbooks no man has heard of at obscenely low prices. What is truly obscene is what the pieces of imitation ugly leather cost when they were new. Hundreds and hundreds of dollars for an exceedingly ugly thing to carry around their shoulders. And I'm not talking fuzzy green ugly, I'm talking brown and brown with strange symbols ugly. It's like some huge joke on the part of the pocketbook industry: hey, let's design some absolutely hideous THING, charge $800 for it, then give a few away to a Kardashian. No matter how ugly or expensive, they will fly off the shelves. And sure enough, the internal plumbing crowd of the world stepped right up and snapped them up wherever they could find them. Some of these bags have individual serial numbers. I have guitars that don't have individual serial numbers. They were less expensive than these pocketbooks too.

Needless to say, at least two of us, probably the ones with external plumbing, were less than thrilled. As there was no Manly Section of the store, we assumed Manly Position, which is standing, arms crossed, heavily frowning, eyes front and staring out into a universe that included sitting and eating barbecue. Finally the ladies released us from torment and we struggled out to the car. It's amazing what not getting out much followed by carrying sixty pounds of purchased goodies around a mall will do to you. The back part of my feet hurt. I've never had a pain there in all my life. There is obviously some serious blame to be laid on this topic.

In a rather ironic moment, I drove down the street to our second favorite barbecue place, Mission BBQ (see, I got mission in there, like an almost professional writer). Mission is a chain that has just entered the area, founded upon respect for all armed forces and police. Vets eat free or reduced price. The food is good and the people are so nice, they had to import them from the South, or wherever else people are nice. Certainly not my area. The sad part of all this, aside from our favorite place closing, is that my friends from Texas laugh hysterically when I tell them we had bbq from a chain restaurant. Apparently every corner down there has a different bbq place, each better than the other one. Note to self: bad form to salivate on keyboard. Well, it's all we've got up north, so we have to call it good. Piss off, you hat-wearin', hornswagglin', sweet tea drinkin', hurricane tornado havin' rodeo state. And gitcher dang old horses offa the main streets before they leap on a twelve cylinder convertible Caddilac with steer horns on the front and a horn that plays Dixie.

You can't pay for vitriolic area-specific insults like that, but I put them before you, out of the goodness of my heart, because I like attention and because we're up to ten readers now. If we all work together, I know we can hit fifteen by Christmas (2020).

Art Bell

We're forced to say goodbye to another legend, long before his time.
King of the paranormal nighttime airwaves, Art Bell, left us on Friday the 13th. He was 72 and the cause of death is unknown; an autopsy will be performed.

Art created the nighttime show Coast to Coast AM, which aired on hundreds of stations across American and Canada. Who is on the road at strange hours of the morning? Truckers. Art became a favorite of truckers and anyone else up overnight. He had a very balanced view on most topics, including whatever his guests brought with them, but he was always fair.

Art was a ham (amateur radio operator, W6OBB) and could be heard now and then on 80meters, chatting with others. There's a recording, possibly on YouTube, of Art 'broadcasting', which consists largely of loud snoring. He fell asleep at the transmitter.

His main foil and partner was his wife, Ramona, who would pop on air now and then, but mainly was stuff of legend. She passed around 2006. Art met Airyn in the Philippines and eventually married her, staying there for a while until returning home to Pahrump, NV, near Area 51. They have a daughter.

Wikipedia lists cause of death as complications from Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disorder. This might make sense, in light of his chronic obstructive smoking. Even publicity pics featured a cigarette. Ramona Bell died from asthma, I believe.
--
Art featured it all: from local wiccans to conspiracies to a pilot calling from a small plane, venturing into Area 51's no fly zone (probably a hoax but great listening). Another famous story was Mel's Hole, featuring (oddly enough) Mel, who discovered a hole on his property. He'd throw significant things down the hole and never hear anything to indicate it hit. After he went away for a few days, guys in uniform without patches suggested he did not want to live there anymore and he was kicked off his own land.

Mad Man Markum was a handy guy. He bought, stole, and cobbled together something he called a time machine. Judging from what he used to build it, I'd worry less about time travel than serious electrocution. He used transformers that power companies use.

Jonathan Reed took his dog out for a walk, when he came upon something that had landed. His dog went nuts on a thing walking around the landed object and the thing killed the dog. Reed shot the thing, brought it back to his house, and put it in his freezer. This was the start of all sorts of intrigue, involving all sorts of unmarked vans, aliens waking up in a freezer and banging to get out, unnamed agencies, and lots of guns.

You can read about all of these events and decide for yourself if any happened or were hoaxes. They were certainly good listening.

Father Malachi Martin, an Irish priest who might've been an exorcist, was a frequent guest, and a very interesting one. One night he talked about multiple personalities being a real disorder and not being caused by demons. You have to respect a man like that. He was very intelligent and fun to listen to.

Art had a series of odd events happening, usually around retiring and returning to radio. One involved a lawsuit around his son. He stayed permanently retired from Coast to Coast AM, where George Noory resides (who has a phenomenal Indian rug). George, to put it politely, isn't as exciting or endearing as Art.

Finally Art decided to go his own way and start broadcasting from home, over shortwave and internet, hoping to build up another network of stations. In the evening, due to atmospheric conditions, high power AM stations can travel hundreds of miles. I listened to a Boston station in Maryland clearly. This can help popularize shows. Within a very short time, there were gunshots outside of his house and the police were called. I don't know if it was ever solved, but Art did not want to put his family in jeopardy, so he left, continuing to advise and record promos.

There were other suspicious happenings on the air. Whole transmission lines would go down during interesting guests. Segments of the show would magically disappear. One might expect that certain people or agencies would be upset with him, but if you stop and think about it, he wasn't bringing Top Secret Stuff out. Yet this interference persisted.

Thrust into the hot seat was Heather Wade, the former producer of the show. Heather has an incredible on-air voice, is very pleasant, asks good questions, and seems to be well liked. Just days ago she said she purchased Art's guest house and moved from what I believe was the Northwest. She has the ThermionicEmissions seal of approval (yippee for her). I listen most nights. For info, go to Midnightinthedesert.com

Art won the Snuffed Candle Award from the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry's Council for Media Integrity, for propagating bullshit. If you piss CSI off, you're doing a great job. They consist of Michael "don't bother me when I've made my mind up" Shermer and Seth "I'm completely scientific when I say it doesn't exist" Shostak, head of SETI.


We bid the king farewell and thanks for all those nights. We hope he has the answers now. And that they allow smoking wherever he is.

Will the Last Person Please Turn Out The Lights

I've bemoaned the terrestrial radio situation before, but today it got worse.
We have one rock station, and one classic rock station, which plays the same songs by the same artists, over and over and over and over.... Then there's NPR, but I don't need to hear why Trump is wrong about everything or four hours on plants, until most of the listeners commit suicide.

So we're in the car, which is the only time we listen to the radio, as the cd player broke. We put on the rock station and hear..... hockey.

There used to be another rock station that was a hair more listenable. Naturally that couldn't be left alone, so one day they went sports talk. A talk station on FM. Why? Do we need color commentary to come to us with full fidelity? Can't we just listen to our teams lose on AM?

After much searching, I managed to locate the email address of the rock station's program director and sent him an email to share my feelings. Because the world seems to operate on feelings these days. Before you shudder at my feelings, sharing them, or what else I might say to the person, I want you to know I kept it very level. At no point did I threaten his family's well-being or even his genitalia. I made no comments about his predilection for crossdressing or cruising certain neighborhoods after dark. I didn't even complain that the morning team seems to be more of a Morning Mob, with much input from people who sound like they were picked up off the streets in South Philadelphia and told to put in their two cents whenever they felt like it. I simply stated that we have many choices for sports, but they're the only rock station, and how about playing some rock?  Not unreasonable.

I feel much better having done that. Maybe tomorrow I'll send an email to the classic rock station, suggesting they play something different from the 12 artists they play. I know it's what I'd like to hear.

I have got to invest in a new car radio. With AUX IN. It doesn't even have to have AM or FM. Just Bluetooth or a USB stick with music.


Will the last person listening to terrestrial radio please turn out the lights when you're done?


P.S. I received a response from the program director, explaining that they were contractually bound to carry the hockey game, due to some other station carrying football. Or basketball. Or water polo... probably water polo.

Guitar-Related: read at your own peril

Because I like to be told "no", it was time for another trip to Guitar Center. I like to go every now and then to see what's new and if there's anything I desperately need at that moment. They used to have new stuff. Now they have... blah. In large quantities. The place has shrunken down, both in space and inventory. In terms of lefties, it was a good trip: one used Strat, one cheap Strat, and one midline Tele. It used to be better, but stopped. The chain in is financial trouble, much like Gibson guitars. They were bought by Bain Capital, Mitt "Sue" Romney's firm, which squeezes out all profits, then discards.

The new Fenders, as widely publicized after the music show in January (NAMM) were nowhere to be found. Funny, they appear for sale all over the internet. So I asked, only to be told that NAMM is a giant tease, and no one will see the actual guitars til May. This bears checking out.

There was one guitar that caught my eye. It was backwards, but still.. I could probably order it. In fact, it caught everyone's eye because they could not help but see it. Then it burned out their retinas. It was rather unbelievably yellow, in a way that could provide light for a hemisphere of the planet at very least. It might've had a tinge of green, just to make it more.... violently ugly. It was a Charvel and they introduced some wild, LOUD colors recently. Unfortunately Charvel is a metal guitar, therefore I wouldn't like it if it were lefty. Bloody necks that are wide and flat. But it was so wonderfully blinding that I could almost see myself playing it, next to my other incredibly ugly Strat. You know - if I ever played out anywhere.

There were two employees visible, both of whom were very nice and customer-service oriented. The store was dead, but I guess Easter Sunday/April Fools Day is not known as the best time to shop for guitars. I kinda liked it. I went in with money, ready to spend, and failed. I do this a lot, which says something about me.


Will the last person shopping at Guitar Center please turn out the lights?

Makeup

We took a trip to the makeup store too. My wife does not get off on being told no, and it works out spectacularly for her. Or, as we say around Christmas, What do you get the girl who wants everything?

I'm a relatively decent husband, in that I take an interest in things she likes. I don't mind shoe shopping or makeup shopping. Except today. When guys go shopping, they stroll in purposefully, eventually get the thing they want, even if it means looking at a list with one thing on it, and get their ass out of the store. Women are different (no, really?). Every aisle. Everything on every shelf required either a comment (got that, got that, don't have that, got that, don't want that) or physically handling the item. Sometimes this came with an explanation. Normally I can do this with no difficulty. Today was different. I was sweating. My good humor and geniality started to fade quickly (yeah, geniality.... very funny).

These stores are incredible. It's a license to print money. Guys, if you've never followed your lady into a makeup store, you owe yourself a look. Take one of those muscle relaxers first, or a stiff drink (or both) and follow her in. There are all sorts of things in this store, each costing a lot of money. And women and girls flock to these places to be beautiful.

There is makeup in all colors. Want blue sparkly lips? Gotcha covered. Purple eyes? Check. Foundation? Name the shade. Concealer? It will make you invisible. Spackle and trowels? Aisle 3. Want to know why she is short on cash?  Because her lipstick is $19.99, and most everything else starts at $8 and rockets upwards. I was going to surprise her with some perfume, which was only $70, but a better bargain at $99 for a slightly larger size. I buy guitar stuff that doesn't cost me this much.

The focus at this point seems to be eyebrows. Don't ask me, I have no idea and no way to comprehend any of it. Maybe if we find a woman, we can ask. I've been noticing eyebrows lately, because you can't possibly miss them on social media, with the interminable selfies. Just as I was thankful that they stopped doing stupid things with their lips and stopped looking like they slipped across their eyelids and onto the side of their face with mascara, we are now faced with eyebrows. My limited understanding is that ladies used to pluck their eyebrows. Now they can be permanently installed, done professionally, tweezed, hot waxed, drawn under, drawn instead of, and threaded. I understand this process uses thread but have no desire to watch or even have it explained to me.

My eyebrows are strategically located in the traditional spot (right above my left buttock). They largely sit there, occasionally falling out or growing. That's pretty much it. They require no real maintenance, color, marker, or threading (I don't think). No matter.. consult a woman and she'll tell you that you probably could use some cosmetic sharpening of the old above-eye growth. Thanks but no thanks - I've got to wash my hair that night.

Why do women do this?
To make themselves beautiful. After all, if you buy this lipstick, it will give you larger breasts. And if you use that blush, you'll look just like that adorable model on the cover. That eye shadow will make you look like Cindy Crawford, while that perfume will turn you into Julia Roberts, complete with that smile and her perfect-size bum.

How do they know this?
How should I know. It's probably genetic. They walk into a makeup store, find just the right concealer, foundation, and bath salts (not the ones that make you eat the face off people) and go home, safe in the knowledge that they can operate the makeup like they were born with it. If you put the purple stuff on your face, it makes the craters less visible. The green stuff hides pimples and redness. The pink stuff is good for bruises, after you 'fell down the steps' again. The brown stuff... well.... it makes your skin browner. We even saw something that, according to the model, gives you a gap between your front teeth. Some of that stuff gives you big blonde hair! My wife is hip to this scam. She learned a long time ago that you will not look like the model, nor will the stuff work anywhere near as advertised. Smart woman. Only took 13 years to figure this out. You laugh - many women still haven't figured it out.

I spied another poor guy, across the aisle, pretending to be interested in what his lady was showing him. Smart fella. It got me to wonderin'... with all this space, maybe they should either put in a men's section with products, or put in some benches and a tv. Internet access. Cinnabons, my god. Expensive coffee drinks! This is another money-making opportunity for these folks, even if the markup is better on makeup than $7.50 coffee with whipped cream, a few squirts of this and that, a half pump of watermelon, and some soy whipped cream because Muffy is lactose intolerant and we don't want to be following her down the aisles, if you know what I mean.... I need to suggest this to the chain, because I'm incapable of keeping my bright(?) ideas to myself.

The owners of this place have to be wiping their bottoms with hundred dollar bills. With the exception of the Metro group, guys don't do this stuff. But women flock to these places, handing over lots of their hard-earned cash for essence of this and foundation of that.

At the cashier, we stood in line because there was only a cashier. There were others, but they were doing homework for their Looking Busy class. Good job, I tell you. Cashier, a customer too, asked if we found everything ok. STOP. Hold the really bad overhead music. Keep the commentary down. What does that MEAN? We definitely found the things we brought to the counter ok. After having combed the entire store, aisle by aisle, there is very little we didn't find. Did she mean finding the experience ok? No, it was too hot and nary a product for a straight male, except maybe some $29 shampoo.

Better yet, just experience it vicariously through me. I'm here for you.

But That's Not All...

No sir. There's another place one must see a few times in one's lifetime. I won't mention the name, but it rhymes with Head, Laugh, and Be Gone.  I'm not sure our parents imagined a world that included a store carrying beds, coffee, coffee machines, coffee containers, coffee grinders, linens that resist coffee, pillows, towels, kitchen gadgets and makeup. Yes, more makeup.

I don't think it was unreasonable of me, upon her insistence at looking at even more makeup, that I politely told her I forgot something in the car, perhaps a life, and I'd be waiting for her there.

But seriously, folks... all of their stores take up mega-space. They all have room for that weird size brush with the curved handle that allows you to clean the bottom of those 18" tall spaghetti containers. Not the lasagna containers- that's a different tool entirely. And they have this tool in a few colors, plus left-handed for me. If you can afford the retail space for these items, you're doing well.

I have never seen so much coffee in my life, in the form of Keurig pods. They're everywhere, including the bedsheet section.  Let me give you a hint, if you're serious about your coffee: don't buy this crap. Stick with what you know. Especially the stuff with the big V on it. We wasted money on a large box of french roast V coffee and had to throw it out. I like strong, manly coffee, with seven tablespoons of sugar and a half pint of fancy creamer, in a girly way. None of this stuff measures up to Peet's. If you don't mind nicely flavored hot water type beverage, by all means, pick up some pods. There's an infinite variety. Donut Shop (actually reminds you of Dunkin, watered down), Cinnabon (absolutely not - real thing only), Italian roast (tries to sleep with your wife), and Green Mountain. Even people who drink from the toilet should avoid Green Mountain. They're owned by Keurig or vice-versa, and produce coffee-colored, mildly flavored water.

One of my most amusing finds was a creme brulee(?) set, with some bowls and what looked like a mini flamethrower. The first thing I thought, after realizing that I needed a mini flamethrower to go with the large one, is that they couldn't sell this in England. You're not allowed to carry a knife over 3" or generic cutting tools or a hammer, because they're used for breaking in. One guy was barely allowed to keep his carpet knife, because he used it at work to cut carpet. Can you imagine the look on the face of the cop who sees the mini flamethrower? They might have to ring the fire brigade, bomb squad, armed response unit, and an ambulance for the first cop, who had an aneurysm after he saw it.

The store must have a generous Screwing Off policy, as we watched one employee, clearly not on her break, sit on a stool and check her cell phone. Probably forgot to post an important selfie.

The As Seen on TV crowd will have an orgasm over this stock. Pillows, flat hoses, hose extenders, vibrating things, and some sort of flower sponge that sings. I walked away quickly.

I'm secure enough in my manhood to hold my wife's pocketbook, but frequently don't have the shoulder strength. The only thing worse is being stranded by the entrance while she goes to the ladies'. A caring employee finally came up and asked if she could help me find anything. I teared up and told her my wife walked away and I couldn't find her, so this is where we agreed to meet if one of us got lost. There's a reason I don't go out much.

I found a saying recently.... "Every time I go out, I remember why I don't like to go out."

• Students at the University of Colorado earn up to 3 points for attending the annual White Privilege Conference.
• Where do I get me some of this white privilege?
• How many points do I receive for attending the Jewish and Black Privilege Conferences? Will they be combined again this year? What do you get when you combine.... sorry... I said I wouldn't do that again.

Hey, if you're ever in Ukraine (economic problems forced them to change from The Ukraine), I've got the accommodations for you! It's a brand new S&M hotel.  You can get the Dungeon Room, complete with dominatrix (150 pounds/hour). You can even rent by the hour (3 hrs min). There's only one hotel rule: don't appear drunk. You can get out the belt and beat your partner til they're bleeding. Strangle them for pleasure during sex.  Spank them til they can't sit down for the second quarter of 2018. Make them wear WWI gas masks. Just don't appear drunk.

• Back in 2011, a photographer got a picture of Mark Zuckerberg picking up dog poop. Security 'escorted' him to Faceyspaces HQ.
• I think it's great that he cleans up after his dog.
• However, he's a slimy hypocrite who believes it's ok to mine everyone else's data but not his.
• Sorry, bud... if you're on the sidewalk, it's no longer private property.
• There's something wrong when you have your own security force that's not beholden to local laws.

For all of you End of Days folks, a rabbi said he sees Trump rebuilding the temple. I know that has some sort of significance - maybe the messiah? Or something from Life of Brian. He's not the messiah: he's a very naughty boy.

• Comment while watching British tv: hey, she's not ugly!
• Line from British tv show: She's not a foreigner, she's Welsh.

Due to the brewing trade war with China, they said America would learn a "painful lesson" by tangling with them. They have threatened to close all of their restaurants.

• London's death toll has bested New York. That is an accomplishment. The deaths are attributed to knife violence. The first hullabaloo was a demand for the mayor to speak. When he did eventually speak, he said, "Let me clear - there is no reason to carry a knife ... they will be caught and will feel the full force of the law.  Apparently not, Mr. Mayor.
• I think you guys need to sit down and have a common sense talk about knife control. This is when parody writes itself.

A couple of weeks ago, a Tesla driver crashed and died in California. Another one almost met the same fate while on autopilot, at the same location. The theory is that the line paint had faded and the camera could not make it out. However, there were no warnings about crashing into the divider.  Tesla advises its customers to keep their hands on the wheels, and to pay attention. This seems to negate the point of autopilot.

Regardless, this highlights my apprehension over self-driving vehicles. I don't like the way they seemed to appear so quickly. I'm not against them, but I don't think they're ready for prime time. I take a lot of heat for this.

Backwards World

There are over 1,500 people headed through Mexico to the US, aided by Mexico. They have released DEMANDS of President Trump.

“We demand of the Mexico and the United States: that they respect our rights as refugees and our right to dignified work to be able to support our families,” the statements reads.

The second demand is “that they open the borders to us because we are as much citizens as the people of the countries where we are and/or travel.” 

They're not even in America and they're already more entitled than college students.


Speaking of college students, George Washington University is holding a diversity workshop that teaches that Christians, especially white ones, "receive unmerited perks from institutions and systems all across our country."

Christian Privilege. Betcha didn't see that coming.

In case you fear where this is going, I'll add more workshops offered: “heteroesexual privilege,” “cisgender privilege,” “abled-bodied privilege,” “socio-economic privilege,” “unconscious bias,” and more. Don't forget right-handed privilege. white privilege, and male privilege.

Homework: count the number of your privileges.

The Derbyshire Constabulary mens choir is rather upset (British understatement) because they were told they have to admit women. Or at least anyone identifying as a woman.

More than one million illegal aliens have received driver's licenses in California, according to their Department of Motor Vehicles.  Send them to Syria and have them demand licenses.

Parents Being Parents

• Gimme that old time religion: An Arizona mother got her child up for church on Easter Sunday by tazing him. She was promptly arrested for some reason. I think she should be commended for parenting skills.
• Her two children are on probation and the sixteen year old tazee has an ankle bracelet. All she was doing was enforcing discipline. Let's face it - they'll never do that again. Nor will she.

• An Ingram, PA, couple ran a brothel out of their house, where three young children were living. Child endangerment charges have been filed.
• Another responsible parent, teaching her children the value of a second career option. Survival. Business skills. 
• The 18 month old might be a little young, but is it ever really too early to start?

Remember the Defense Department giving out armed forces equipment and vehicles to police departments? Some Wisconsin police are returning mine-resistant vehicles and replacing them with smaller, armored emergency vehicles, due to citizen complaints. Having no bearing on the decision is the fact that they're large, heavy, and difficult to maintain.

What's wrong with mine-resistant vehicles for combat against your own people? How much will the new vehicles cost and who's paying for them?
You know that the rest of the cities and states will follow suit.  Just kidding.

Florida, We Missed You

• It's been a day or two since we heard from Florida, but they've taken a chunk out of the news cycle: a Volusia teen has been accused of biting the head off a live chicken. It's going to be about five minutes until someone's lawyer blames Ozzy Osbourne. Aren't you supposed to wait til they're cooked first?

• So it's Easter, and in Altamonte Springs, some folks are having a nice Easter dinner. Shivon Perez asked a guest, her ex-boyfriend, to fix a pipe. While he was fixing said pipe, she sprayed him with gasoline and set him on fire.
• If he doesn't do the dishes, your next step should probably not be setting him alight. Hit him with a pan, maybe.

Marshall

How is Marshall coming along?
He had his first doggie acupuncture appointment the other day.
Yes, there is a doggie acupuncturist. Or at least that's what she said she was.
She had a degree on the wall from School of Modern Doggie Acupuncture and a white coat with her name on it, so we felt it was safe to go ahead.

The staff fawned over him for a while. We initially put this down to the amount they were charging us wherever we went. It seems to be pretty genuine, and he seems to lap it right up. He's not tremendously social, like his parents, but he does well. He sat there for his treatment, not moving around and not anxious (dogs pant and move their tongues in and out when anxious). The doc was most impressed with his appearance and health for his age and his condition.

These folks are using Eastern medicine. Know what that is? It's what people used before Big Pharma. Natural remedies. Stuff we should all be using. We were advised to modify his diet. I didn't get all the details but one phrase stuck in my mind: "there's a big difference between farm raised and fresh caught salmon." And give him some mushrooms (I thought they were almost inert fungus). So the dog will eat much better than we will, even when we buy expensive food. They said they'll stop the cancer at very least, and they've had success at driving it back some. I believe them. People have had all sorts of ailments cured via acupuncture. So why not my little monster?

Oh Atlanta

The city of Atlanta got hit with ransomware a few days back. FBI, Microsoft, and Cisco are investigating. Mayor Keisha Bottoms (good God, no!) announced that the breach had been ransomware.  There is no word on whether the ransom will be paid, as Mayor Bottoms (I'm going to keep typing this name for months) did not elaborate. As we all remember, if you keep good backups, you should be ok. And don't click on anything. Anything. Just don't.

• It is with great surprise that I congratulate my area's snow removal personnel. Before the very large storm was over, the streets were clear. Including mine, which tends to be toward the back of the line. With a day or two of sun, there was precious little to shovel. Remember: shoveling is the major cause of heart attacks. Don't shovel.

Many many people marched over the weekend to protest the recent shootings. Or rather, they marched for gun control. Thousands and thousands of people marched against their own rights. 

Now, the disclaimers: 

* the marchers have every right to march - it's their First Amendment right, which I support wholeheartedly. 

* what happened in Parkland (and every other location) was unconscionable. Beyond tragedy. My heart goes out to those left behind. There was no reason for any of it.

* is there really any surprise that the shooter had issues, after the police were called to the house approximately 30 times?

* the sheriff and other law enforcement people failed to enter the school while the shooting was in progress. Police response time was 20 minutes.

* had the school taught the kids about the Constitution, perhaps they'd think twice about leaving class to protest it. But we don't seem to have any investment in teaching our children anything useful. I continue to not use algebra.

* one of the marchers in New York was Sir Paul McCartney. I don't know what Sir Paul's country of residence is, but I am getting tired of being lectured by people outside the country, who do not understand our laws and Constitution. It's bad enough our own people don't understand. Sometimes I feel like I'm the only musician who isn't a liberal (or conservative).

* I don't want to lose one life, under any circumstances; child or adult. I truly wish I had a solution. Gutting the Second Amendment is not the answer.

* No word on the senseless tragedy from Atlanta's mayor, Keisha Bottoms (told you so).

In the past day, I discovered that permits were applied for two months in advance of the parade.

• My friends at the Wall Street Journal (I lied - they don't return my calls) tell us that a Vanderbilt University researcher claims that hospital data breaches lead to patient deaths. 2100 patient deaths each year, according to the study. After a breach, quality of care goes down for some reason. This is a great article to read first thing. I love the smell of doom in the morning. 

The other day at the airport, beepers started going off. They were plentiful, and they were shrill.  Lots of serious-looking men in uniform, with guns, started arriving and waving these odd wallet-size devices around. They would emit their own screeching, varying in pitch. Eventually they located a woman and turned their beepers off. There are radiation sensors all over the place and the devices were portable detectors.  What triggered them? A woman who had a medical procedure involving low level radiation, five days prior.  I read about this happening at a border crossing a few years back, again from a prior medical procedure. Well, it's a good thing people aren't carrying dirty nukes through the airport, I guess. You can decide if your tax dollars are well-spent.

• The encryption mechanism in Firefox and Thunderbird's "Master Password" feature was found vulnerable.  If you use either, they will be upgraded. In the "I told you so" department, do not store passwords in your browser, please. Use a password manager.

The Coworker Chats

Monday morning...

ME: I've got training today from 1-2 and tomorrow from 3-4.

Tuesday morning...

HIM: I'm a little confused. Do you have training today?

ME: Yes, 3-4.

HIM: ok, thank you. I got my handbook today. Did you?

ME: I didn't order the print version.

HIM: So you received the download?

ME: no.

HIM: you don't need the handbook?

ME: I haven't received it.

HIM:  but we all got an email from them, asking us which we wanted.

ME: Please do not talk to me in the morning. Or afternoon.

-----------------------------------------------------------

ME: that training on helpdesk I took was a mess
HIM: the service desk or ???

ME: one of us needs to take a remedial English class. Guess which? The other one of us needs to start drinking,.

My old boss suggested pills, "because drinking takes too long to get good at".

------------------------------------------------------------

Speaking of old bosses, yesterday I flashed back to an old job. I was driving into work, when I got a call from my boss, who had gone missing for a week or two. He wanted me to be impressed because he admitted that he was an addict.

I pride myself on not overreacting to bizarre and sometimes tragic information, so I was able to drive while listening. I humored him (that's great, man, going away for 28 days?). He subsequently disappeared for another week, called to say hello, then disappeared completely.

Since that was the morning for phone calls, I got another, from a coworker. He got pulled over by the police, who found rather serious drugs, for some reason, and he was 'going away' for a bit.

So, aside from losing a substantial portion of our department, it was a pretty good day.

Epilogue:
I ran for boss. Coworker said he'd pray for me (he was serious). I became boss. Did good work. Drug Person went away for a while (we threw him a going away party). A year or two later, we were horrified to learn Boss died. Now I work for a place where gravity is more than a suggestion.

• The Federal Trade Commission announced it is launching an investigation into Faceyspaces' data privacy practices. Where have these people been for the last ten years?
• Rob Sherman is the deputy chief privacy officer at Faceyspaces, who said “We remain strongly committed to protecting people’s information. We appreciate the opportunity to answer questions the FTC may have.”
• In other news, Faceyspaces has a deputy chief privacy officer.  I hear the NSA has a deputy chief privacy officer too. Can you imagine that job? The main task is checking to see that your salary was electronically deposited on time. Perhaps the two of them play golf. Tiddlywinks? A second career in porn?
• Zuckerberg's take on your lack of privacy? You signed up for it.
• Atlanta mayor Keisha Bottoms has not announced whether she will appoint a chief privacy officer for Atlanta. Judging by the ransomware attack, the answer is no (I could go all day with this).

Dan Schneider and Nickelodon have parted ways.
Opted to end their longtime partnership.
Agreed to not extend the current deal.
Pursue other opportunities and projects.

Dan is responsible for The Amanda Show, What I Like About You, Drake & Josh, Zoey 101, iCarly, Victorious, Sam & Cat and more.

What this mealy-mouthed, extended litany of bull excrement translates to is: Hey Dan... the poop is hitting the whirling device's blades. The stories of your pedophilia are coming fast and furious. We cannot call you a pedophile, at least according to our legal department, so we'll agree to voluntarily separate.

Hollywood is a cesspool, although not the only industry we will hear from on this topic.

After thinking about this for a while, I finally remembered where I saw him.... he's Ricky from Better off Dead!

Dan Schneider

Ricky - Better off Dead

RIP David Ogden Steirs - Better off Dead (and M*A*S*H)

If you have not seen Better off Dead, stop what you're doing and find a copy. Rent or buy, if necessary. The movie stars a very young John Cusack, as the kind of guy that life likes to take a dump on every now and then. I cannot accurately describe it but it's hilarious and suitable for all ages (I think). If you have seen it, isn't it time to watch it again?

• This fella found out what kind of information Faceyspaces had on him...
• If you have finally decided to extract Zuckerberg's nose from your life, here are a bunch of URLs to add to your HOSTS file, along with its location.

Just the facts: Bishop Amvrosios (real name Athanassios Lenis, of course) is about to be retried. He labelled gay people the "dregs of society".  What kind of people are they hiring over there? Should Catholics be happy that he's not a pedophile (not yet accused)? Maybe he's just mad about the gay orgy held near the Vatican, with male escorts and all the trimmings. Yeah, that's it.

• Everybody loses stuff; we're just particularly good at it. Last week, somebody lost dinner. Ok, leftovers in a container, but still... 
• Somebody once said that we keep our landlines for the purpose of calling our cell phones to see where they are. 
• Yesterday, someone lost a case of dog food. Dog food. Can you imagine the talent involved in losing an entire case of dog food?
• Right before a job interview, I heard the famous phrase, "How does someone lose an entire suit?

Best Headline

Was Arianna Huffington involved in sex cult depicted in NETFLIX series?

• Not all news out of San Francisco is bad or involves Nanci Pelosi. An Uber car got stuck after accidentally driving down stairs. The driver was a senior citizen. He said he doesn't normally encounter this problem when driving off tall buildings.
• You know what's next, right? Uber car plows through convenience store. Senior citizen driver says, "I went to step on the brake and hit the gas instead."
• Mr Uber President? United Airlines is on line 2. They want to know if you want the name of their public relations firm.

A man near Seattle was arrested, suspected of sending suspicious packages to multiple military facilities in DC.  Police say his motive was not immediately clear, but [you know what's coming - sing along with lefty] there was no immediate connection to terrorism. And before you ask, I was nowhere near Seattle recently.

In unrelated news, a (non-elderly) man drove his car into the FBI building. In the moments after the crash, as they were hauling Muhammed bin Boom from his car, the FBI guys said that the crash had absolutely nothing to do with terrorism.

Today in Legal News

• New York, which has thus far saved its citizens from the scourge of drinking too much soda, as well as from people who are smoking while walking, has proposed making it illegal for employees to access work-related email outside their regular work schedules.
• Usually one must live in California to find this kind of outrageous silliness.

Something happens on the Supreme Court. Maybe it's the food. Maybe it's the atmosphere. Maybe stupid multiplies in proximity to other stupid, but in the interests of the country, someone had better find out.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg has been pictured falling asleep. She also said she would leave the country if Donald Trump got elected. And now former Justice John Paul Stevens says the recent demonstrators should demand a repeal of the Second Amendment. 

I am not a legal scholar - far from it. I am hoping that Stevens is, but it's dubious. The Second Amendment was to protect ourselves from tyranny, locally and governmentally, yet he sees no more use for it.  Somebody's been drinking the Kool Aid, Justice Stevens. You should be ashamed.

It was inevitable, but this is pretty quick

• In the news, yet another attractive high school teacher is up on charges, this time for performing repeated acts of oral sex upon an early teen boy. She will go to jail. The boy will get a wing of the school named after him, as well as straight A's and more pats on the back than all of the sports teams combined.
• Today brings us the news that more nursing assistants have been arrested for sex with patients. This is the second bunch to be charged, out of an Iowa care facility. 
• I don't know what you think, but before they are sentenced, can we have a study on this particular healing modality? At very least, sex releases endorphins, which are the body's own painkillers. That alone should qualify as therapy, so long as they don't try to bill it to the insurance company. What is more uplifting than sex with a 20-something nursing assistant? Except sex with the 44 year old assistant, who knows a few tricks the 20-somethings don't.
• The women were charged with sexual exploitation by counselor, therapist, or school employee.  Let's have a non-legal, non-medical, non-expert discussion of these charges. Sexual exploitation... let's ask the patients if they felt exploited. It's not like they were forced (unless they asked to be forced). The CNAs are not counselors, therapists, or school employees - there is no doubt or wiggle room there. Marshall the cocker could verify this.
• Stop for a moment. Think about baseball. Now, let's ponder sex with patients... I fully expect Weird Stuff to happen in any industry. We'd hear about it from time to time. But this particular Weird Stuff has happened at one facility. Do they do STD testing of employees? Do they hire from the horny pool? Is there something about new employee orientation that sets them upon the patients? What kind of weirdness would cause this to happen at one site? Something in the water? Depression caused by living in Iowa?
• If you, faithful readers, and I got together, we could solve many of the world's pressing problems. Meanwhile, I'm feeling ill. Perhaps a stay in Iowa would do me good.

Continuing the legal beat, a woman in Ohio was arrested for making lewd comments to the Easter bunny, while having her picture taken with it/him/her. Technically she was arrested for drunkenness, because, as we all know, it's not illegal to make lewd comments to the Easter bunny (unless you're in England and hurt Bunny's feelings).

• In-N-Out Burger in California (you think we'd get this far without a California story?) is filing suit against a prankster pretending to be their CEO. The prankster is a YouTube video-maker, and the chain wants damages of more than $25,000. Because pranksters on YouTube make that kinda money.
• In other news, employees of In-N-Out Burger in California have voted to keep a prankster claiming to be their CEO, as their CEO. An employee in their Van Nuys store said, on the condition of anonymity, "He's much nicer than the real CEO, so we're going with him."
• "This kind of thing would never happen here," said Atlanta Mayor Keisha Bottoms.

Seriously, people, you need to get control of these drones. I'm not kidding when I say lives are at stake. Down There in New Zealand, a drone came so close to a plane that the crew worried it would get sucked into an engine. Although planes are designed to operate on one less engine, you don't want to test the theory, right? The Boeing 777-200 was coming in for landing. 

In related news, New Zealand has planes? 777-200s?

Philly has planes too. And three-deep parking in the No Parking zone.

South Philly has double and triple parking in front of row homes. If you tell someone they cannot do that, they get up from their pasta and meatballs, come out their front door, and put a .45 right between your eyes.

• The dog just barked at a trash truck. Not that I mind him defending us from trash trucks, but this is Dog Behavior. It always freaks me out when he does something normal dogs do. I'd expect that he'd be guarding his mommy, in bed, at this hour of the morning.

Back to the Parkland shooting for a moment... there was a drill on that day.
Just like 9-11 and countless others. Note to everyone: if there's a drill scheduled for anything, take the day off sane. Or sick.

• I don't care how old you are; going from Bangkok to Phuket is funny.

Way back around 2000, I found an interesting online group, spending a lot of time chatting with them. I noticed some kind of common knowledge of an event, not related to the topic of the group. Finally I asked why it was a good idea not to be in New York around that time. And would I be in the path of whatever happened.... they indicated that I'd probably be ok but didn't know much more, other than a large, dangerous event.

Years later I recalled this and realized they were talking about 9-11-2001.

People and organizations are studying all sorts of odd things. At different places across the world, there are electronic coin-flippers, all connected to the internet. As we know, the odds of odd/even coming out on a coin toss is 50-50, more or less. The online flippers bear this out. Approximately a day before 9-11, they went widely out of pattern. Some people report dreams of burning buildings. Just information for you - do with it what you want.

Absolutely - Your Data is Safe With Us

Today's IT fact: Healthcare is now the most vulnerable industry to data breaches, with 328 breaches in 2017 alone (accounting for 60% percent of all breaches last year). The total estimated cost of these breaches reached $1.2 billion.

Remember this when your doctor talks about Electronic Health Records and offers you a URL to look at your records and talk to his office online. 

• The trash truck just left. Before it got to the next house, the Crazy Lady's cans were taken back to their resting place. This is weekly and for some reason, fascinates me. The thing is, the Crazy Lady has nothing to do with it. She has somehow managed to coordinate this dance with neighbors and whatever creatures Crazy Ladies socialize with. She has them all fooled, looking like she's having trouble getting around, when the fact is she's only 439 years old, which is midlife for her species (whatever that is).
• One day I discovered a neighbor working on her patio roof. I suggested concealing a bowling ball up there, with a trapdoor. He knows I'm sometimes odd, but he looked at me with questions on his face. Turns out he has no idea how evil she is and is doing work for her because he's a genuinely nice guy who helps people. This also gives her plenty of time to call the city and complain about some imaginary violation on my property. After which she'll leave us some fresh tomatoes from her garden.
• I need to start limping a bit. Then maybe the neighbors will take my trash to the curb precisely at the earliest time allowed, the day before the truck comes, then take them back to the house the moment the trucks leave. Snow plowing would also be good, as well as mowing the lawn. I try not to be unreasonable.

Speaking of neighbors, I have to remember not to cheat on my wife.

This is not really a difficult thing to remember, but I've already had an illustration of what would happen if I went insane and tried.

I'd get caught.

I  say this because every time I'm with a female in an honest circumstance, someone I know happens to pass by. I kid you not. One day I didn't have a ride home, so I asked a female coworker and offered pizza in exchange. As we're eating, my sister-in-law walks into the shop. I introduced them, being perfectly honest. Because it sounds perfectly honest to say 'she's my coworker'. Mrs leftystrat is friends with this coworker and refers to her as my Work Wife, so no harm done.

Another time I'm in the same pizzeria with another person who did me a favor (of a non-sexual nature) and Wife's niece walks in. Niece lives forty minutes away but loves this pizza.

Second niece, who lives around the corner, occasionally carpools with me. We're at a red light and there's a knock on the window. A gentleman is telling Niece that her left rear tire is really low and she could use some air. I looked up and the gentleman was the neighbor who worked on Crazy Lady's porch because he's genuinely a good person. We said hello and I explained that the very attractive young lady was Wife's niece.

So if I were theoretically ever so stupid as to want to cheat on my poor, long-suffering wife, I'd have to move to another state to try (at which point my parents will be visiting that state and staying at the same motel).

• Headline: Morbidly obese couple have sex for the FIRST time in their 11-year relationship - after losing almost half of their combined 1,256lb weight.
• No. Just no.

Sometimes you read an article so ridiculous that you check to make sure it's not dated 4/1. Unfortunately, this is not April Fools Day:

Microsoft is cracking down on what people say while using their services online. According to a new services agreement written by the company, the tech giant is planning to ban accounts that use “offensive language” and will go through your private data to “investigate” users.

Read the sickening article. 
We know of my great love for all things Microsoft; this is a great example of why, especially awful on the heels of the Faceyspaces privacy debacle.
This will not affect me, but if you use Office, Xbox, Skype, or certain others, you will be affected. I'd advise you to curtail your use of these services, even if you don't produce content that will trigger an alert.

I know that you're not putting anything in your documents involving obscenity or bestiality, but this is the first step to dictating what you can say and how they own your data. Remember lefty's law #2: if you can't touch your data, you no longer own your data.

One does not have to be looking for conspiracies to see what's going on here - it's happening in real time.  You will look back on this and realize how this was a major step that pushed us across the line to censorship and official corporate monitoring of your data. And you agreed to it. Think about it now, while you still have the option.

Things is getting weird and concerning.

• Speaking of movies, don't forget to see Bedazzled. The original, not the Liz Hurley remake (although Liz Hurley...). The dialogue is unbelievably funny and beyond merely witty. Check out some quotes. I'm told this is a spoof on Faust, but I'm a Philistine and don't know anyone called Faust.

My wife is watching some movie about Jewish gangsters of yore. Yes, I know they existed but never stopped to think about them.

Jewish gangsters.

Time for a little stereotyping.....

You owe me a favor. If you don't complete it, I'll sue you raw.

What do you mean you can't pay? I'll beat you with 3 day old bagels.

Oy, dis interest is meshugga. I shall cut it down to 99%, for you.

You know Moishe, right? Moishe the tailor. He forgot his protection money and got audited.

• If you're giving a PowerPoint presentation to several departments at work, remember to close your porn. Trust me.

I've read some winners lately. I really enjoyed the complaints that gun control was too white. Ladies and gentlemen, if we manage to surpass this, we can be 100% positive that the rest of the universe is laughing at us (as opposed to mostly certain).

Holy Cross Theology Professor Says Jesus Was a ‘Drag King’ with ‘Queer Desires’

Go ahead. Try to beat that.
And while you're beating that, perhaps you can define 'Drag King'. A woman who dresses up like a man? Will we all be watching Rachel Maddow's Drag Race on tv?

Saint John’s constant references to Jesus wanting water, giving water, and leaking water “speak to Jesus’ gender indeterminacy and hence his cross-dressing and other queer desires,” Liew contends.

Well, that's certainly an original interpretation of the New Testament. I don't want to come off as a biblical know-it-all, but I'm beating my brains, trying to figure how the actual expert got from water to queer. We're obviously out of our depth. Maybe the guy's subconscious has been writing up these theories.

• There's a very interesting article in California's Mercury News about deportation of illegal aliens. In short, ICE is deciding on whether or not to deport an illegal who has been deported three times and has a drunk driving conviction. His wife and children, US citizens, want to pack up and move to Canada if Dad gets deported.
• The path to Canada is fraught with hills and valleys (mostly hills). Canada will accept refugees from terror in their home country. Since it's difficult to prove this in Mexico, they've got a problem getting in. They want to apply for permanent citizenship.
• What the tens of thousands of people streaming into Canada don't know is that they need to prove they have skills that would benefit Canada and that they won't be a drain on the system.
• For some strange reason, the article is reasonably balanced. Recommended reading.

While we're in California, a San Francisco policeman pulled over a self-driving car and gave it a ticket, for driving too close to a pedestrian. How do you pull over a self-driving car? Who gets the ticket? Can I bring my emotional support elephant?

• Headline: 'World's worst' super-gonorrhea befuddles doctors...
• Yes, it's super-gonorrhea.. faster than a teenage virgin. More powerful than all antibiotics. Able to leap tall condoms in a single bound!

Last weekend, hackers got to Baltimore's 911 system.
I'm not all that fond of hacking websites, but this is different: it could cost lives. How would you feel if you needed an ambulance for a serious issue, and the system was offline or backed up because it got hacked?

• Good news for the stragglers who have not abandoned Faceyspaces: Firefox has an extension called Facebook Container Extension, which prevents FB from tracking you across the web.

Walmart made a 'business decision' to pull Cosmopolitan magazine from their checkout areas. It might not have been entirely a business decision, as Walmart recently heard from the National Center on Sexual Exploitation (NCOSE), which had launched a campaign to pull Cosmo from checkout areas in an effort to make them more “family-friendly and sexploitation-free.” They claim the magazine "regularly promote pornography, sexting, BDSM, group sex, anal sex, and more.."

Isn't it wonderful that we have somebody looking out for us, to make sure we don't see things they don't want us to see?  Like the women who stood behind the alcohol prohibition of the early 1900s?  Women are actually campaigning against consensual sex. That's shooting yourself in the vagina, isn't it?

• Our friend and neighbor, the schizophrenic, is a really nice guy. When he was able, he'd plow our sidewalk when it snowed. It doesn't take a professional to understand he's paranoid, but we all have our issues (especially in our house). Yesterday, Mrs leftystrat pet-sat for him, so he could get some stuff accomplished, as he doesn't get out much. The guy, a vet, barely makes enough to get by. 
• When he returned from his trip, he had purchased lunch for both of us. You can't tell him no. Solid guy. There's some good in the world (contrary to the stuff I put here).

Sister Wives

Is this four times the fun? Looks more like four times the trouble. 

Avoid.

• Need some ideas about how to see if an email is legit? Check this out.

Just remember that if you're unlocking an iOS device with the fingerprints of a dead person, it only works with the recently dead, so jump on that corpse ASAP.

Really Deep Thoughts - Really

Really, what's the point of life?

Everybody has asked this at one time or another: it's my turn.

What becomes of you when you're gone? While we all have our ideas of where we 'go' after our time has passed, what of our space on Earth? What did we leave, if anything? Do we have to leave anything?  Does it matter?

When we go, we leave some sort of impression. Do we truly live on when people remember us?

What of our Stuff?

Like most grandparents, mine kept a shoebox with all of my accomplishments over the years. They were very enthusiastic about this, so it was more like the size of a 1971 Cadillac. 

As I mentioned, my grandmother died years back. As I saw some of her furniture and whatnot come into her children's houses, I stood, stunned, when I thought of my shoebox. It opened this whole quasi-existential dilemma. This is not about me (ok, it is), and not really about the shoebox.  

The box was no doubt a source of pride and love. It fulfilled its mission in their lives. But now the box is an orphan; it floats in space and time. A possession of paper, with emotion attached to it. But now the emotion has no owner.

My parents have a box like this. It is now time to change the topic.

Which brings me to Me.

For some reason, I feel I need to leave something. Why? Is this common?

I have done many things of which I am not proud. When I'm feeling down, they come visit, and dance in my head. On the other hand, I will certainly leave a lasting impression, mostly in a positive way. I've made a difference in a lot of lives, mostly people around multiple personality disorder. I keep a virtual shoebox of emails from people asking questions and getting information they needed. Sometimes I look inside the shoebox... it has emotion attached to it and makes me feel really good to have helped a little. note: this is not bragging or virtue signalling.. it's just inventory. Mostly (hopefully), I've left laughter and entertainment (intentional or otherwise).  I guess that's a decent legacy. I guess it only has to matter to me, because it will be nothing in one generation. Dust.

I'm kind of attached to my Stuff.

While all the other kids were buying nice cars and spending money on dating, I bought guitars and amps and related things. When people rented apartments and bought houses, if there was spare money, it went to guitars. When I went on vacation, I had already scoped out where the music stores were. The result of this is apparently quite an enviable collection. It's interesting and frightening that the 'dog' guitars I bought are now considered vintage and desirable. I also paid frightening amounts, just like everyone else, for a house.

When I'm done here, what happens?
I can't leave anything to Marshall, as the actuarial tables have him predeceasing me. Mrs. lefty obviously gets everything. The equipment that I loved and poured everything into becomes orphaned. It will eventually find new homes, via one of those 'collector died' sales. The house will probably make the news and local legend, as one of those 'crazy old couple' stories.

I think I'm going to leave everything to the SPCA. Or establish lefty's Home for Wayward Women. Damn, I was dead sober serious up until the last paragraph.

What will I think then?
The atheists say I'll be rotting in a box.
The Buddhists say I'll be coming back.
My mom says if there's any justice, I'll come back as a parent with a child like me.
The Judeo-Christians say I'll be one of two places. At least one lets me observe. I'll be with my loved ones; and most importantly, my pets.
Others say I'll join my 'higher self' or the Universe, perhaps coming back, perhaps 'moving on', depending on what I need to learn.

If I don't know I'm dead, I could haunt a place forever. You don't want that, trust me. The moment I figure out I can 'do stuff', there will be no end to the merriment. I'll have found my Eternal Gig. One wonders if this isn't heaven...