Dry This

 Well, it's cold outside.  I've been up for 2 hours and the temp is still frozen at 27 (F).  For those of you with Celsius, that's below zero.  The weather forecasters are rumoring that the high temp today will actually be in the upper 30s (F).  I'm going to wait and see on that one.

Any my Friday, the day after Thanksgiving, was pretty much nondescript. This doesn't mean that I did nothing.  In other words, I didn't lull around, passing the hours by scrolling social media on my phone.  Nope.  The big tank got a good cleaning, including one of the Greek statues which had growing rather bearded with all the algae.  Now he's mostly bright, clean, and white, with just a little algae providing the needed chiaroscuro. 

Of course, I wrote.  I'm approaching the denouement for The Body in History.  I needed a way to get from point A to point C, and while thinking of what's considered one of the greatest films ever made, Alfred Hitchcock's Vertigo, I came up with transition point B.  Suddenly, everything is like... Wow.  That's makes perfect sense.  When writing, you should always begin with the ending.  Thinking of everything that goes between the first word and the last chapter is all the fun, or as some writers might tell you, all of the work, though for me, because I always have a resolution chapter, it's always the 2nd last chapter.

I ordered a food hydrator yesterday, so I suppose you could call that my big Black Friday purchase.  Why?  I have this feeling certain food stuffs are going to be getting pricy, and this is one of the ways I can prepare.  Instead of pay rather exorbitant prices for fresh fruit and veggies, I'm going to be drying some while produce is still what we'll one day consider inexpensive.  It's a Cosori, the same company that manufactured my air fryer.

I see Trudeau flew down to Mar a Lago to talk to the Orange Anus about tariffs.  That was yesterday and so far Orangy had not posted any lies on social media about how the Canadian Prime Minister has caved to his demands.  Perhaps everything depends upon whether or not Musk is in the room during these chats.  I'm suspecting he will be since he owns the new phony president's ass.  For those who were lucky enough to have missed them, there were several videos of Thanksgiving down at the Swamp Resort with Elonia seated besides the dementiated Trump clapping and singing along to YMCA.  I saw 2 versions and thought they both looked more than a little stagey: no chairs or place setting on 1/3 of the table so as not to block the view for everyone wanting to get a video.  It was almost as though people knew they needed to put on a happy face for the cameras.  Anyway, if Musk was by Orangy's side for that, I'm betting he's next to him in every meeting Musk might consider consequential.  So, the longer we go without a Trump lie on social media, the implications are it's not going the way Musk had it planned.

Is Ronnie Gone, Gone, Gone?

Well, my Accuweather app isn't working.  We're under something called a Heavy Yellow Rain Advisory.  I Googled that since I didn't know what it was; ready for the definition?  In inches it means we should be getting anywhere between .25 inches to .5 inches of rain per hour (7.5 mm - 15 mm).   There is no time limit as to how long the heavy yellow is going to be falling.  We're also under a snow advisory with less than an inch in the forecast.  I do think we have a sloppy weekend ahead of us here in Central PA.  This is a bit of a foreboding sky, isn't it?

My replacement Cosori air fryer arrived yesterday.  I used it last night to make hamburgers.  Delicious.  The idea of purchasing a gas barbecue grill has occurred to me from time to time since I do enjoy a good hamburger, but the air fryer might just keep that expense at bay for the foreseeable future.

The kitchen ceiling finally got it's first primer coat yesterday afternoon.  Painting doesn't take long, I just need to get my butt motivated.  Because I had the ladder out, I also took some links out of the hanging kitchen light so it's higher.  When I initially installed it, I suspended the fixture rather low.  Even though it was not that low, people still ducked their heads when they walked beneath it.  That problem has now been fixed.

I saw this on Twitter yesterday and just had to share.  This is Ronnie DeSantis in all of his glory.

I understand Ronnie wants to put together his own army down in Florida.  The Florida State Guard is what he's calling it.  Right.  This would be a force he would control, with no ties to the Federal Government.  Supposedly they work in conjunction with the National Guard, but also be available to help out whenever Ronnie feels they are needed.  Besides sounding like he wants to put together his own private army, this militia would also create a rather large expense he would no doubt slough onto the middle - class tax payer.  Of course, those rich, conservative retirees living down in The Villages don't think about this.  If there are no ties to the Federal government, there are no supporting funds coming into the state to cover the expense of uniforms, and vehicles, and equipment... guns.  Perhaps this militia group will have to provide their own weapons and ammunition.  Wow!  Have you any idea what the price of bullets is today?  They make eggs look cheap.  The state would need to raise taxes in order for any reimbursement to take place.  Sounds like a plan that fills every rich, conservative's needs.

 

The Hippocampus and I

Well lets say a sunny 'hello' to March.  It is bright and sunny here in Central PA.  The temps are supposed to climb into the high 50s (F).  Spring is definitely on it's way... that is until Friday arrives, bringing up to 3 inches of snow.  Of course, they've called for snow a few other times this winter and we got none.

Cosori sent me an email regarding my replacement air-fryer.  They'll be sending me a tracking number.  Sounds good, right?  That's what I thought until I read that it can take 6 - 8 weeks for replacements to arrive.  That's not too good.  Over 2 million units are being recalled, so I guess they're shipping them out as fast as they can make them.

I stayed up late to watch the end of Invasion on Apple TV.  The series started off good but episode after episode it became more and more predictable.  That was just one of several problems.  Another was likeability.  You need to root for the heroes.  Of all the leads, only epileptic Casper was likeable, however when it turned out his epilepsy tuned him into the alien subconscious (?) I couldn't help but say "been there, done that."  

The Washington Post had a interesting article about the aging brain, something I find fascinating because mine is aging.  I do wish they would have delved into creativity a little more.  I have seen that doctors now believe we can go through several spurts of creativity as we age, a really big one when we're young adults, and then another one when we hit our 50s.  I'm no longer in my mid 50s, so I wonder if I might be just a little late on that one.  Another interesting bit was how playing video games seems to stimulate the hippocampus.  I don't know about you, but I had no idea just what the hippocampus does, so I did a little research.

What is the main function of the function of the hippocampus:

The hippocampus is a complex brain structure embedded deep into the temporal lobe.  It has a major role in learning and memory.  It is connected with the amygdala that controls emotional memory recalling and regulation (Schumacher et al., 2018)

I saw where stupid Keven McCarthy is coming under fire for giving that January6 footage to Tucker Carlson.  He claiming it's an exclusive.  Stop laughing.  Fox is, as Bob has said, a Republican propaganda machine.  Old Rupert's political ambitions are restricted in his native Australia, so he takes his ambition abroad.  He has no loyalty to America.  He doesn't care if Americans get hurt, or die, he just wants to tell Americans how to live their lives.  In Trump, he found a useful tool.  However, that tool's no longer giving Rupert the results his dirty, old heart desires.  In fact, that tool broke so badly, Rupert's been injured.  Let's all hope and pray that things turn out for the worst for old Rupert.

Hippocampus is a complex brain structure embedded deep into temporal lobe. It has a major role in learning and memory. It is a plastic and vulnerable structure that gets damaged by a variety of stimuliThat's your bit of science for today.

Stupid as Elon

 Well, we didn't quite get as toasty as they were predicting yesterday.  Our temps decided to hang out at around 73 (F).  Don't get me wrong, that's still a very nice temperature and the day was simply lovely.  I wore shorts outside, of course, since I've been wearing shorts on and off for most of the winter that's not too special.

I spent some time chatting with a tech from Adobe yesterday learning how to size a PDf to satisfy Barnes & Noble's requirements for cover art.  The changes need to be done in what's called the Preflight tool.  I was so happy when I submitted the cover and it was accepted... until I got an error.  They were having a problem converting the PDF/x-1a.  Well, son of a bitch!  I've sent them an email for an explanation.  So far there's been no response.  My patience is running out.  I'm almost to the point where I'll only sell the ebook through them.

Last yesterday afternoon I received an email from Amazon.  My Cosori air fryer was being recalled.  There's a problem with some of the wiring; it might catch fire.  I saw that 2 million are being recalled.  That's a lot of faulty wiring.  They'll replace it for free, so I started the process, cut the cord and sent the pictures.  

Today's the one year anniversary of Russia's invasion of the Ukraine.  Things are not going well for Trump's Blo Bro Vlad.  Will wannabe authoritarian dictators learn their lesson?  Absolutely not.  They may temper their ambition for a short time, but that will pass.  One of the reasons they will never change is billionaires.  Money talks.  While Russian oligarchs have been financially injured by the war, those injuries are minor, scratches and nicks that will heal.  They may actually replace Vlad because he screwed things up so badly.  Unfortunately, they will most likely put another incompetent in power.  Money talks, but it doesn't make you smart.  Look at Elon Musk, if you want a good example.  That man is stupid.