When is a Holiday not a Holiday?

 Maybe we here in Central PA should all start singing Stormy Weather since yesterday was a replay of the day before, in fact, our weather patterns seem to be stuck in reruns.  The same pattern is predicted to happen today: a rise in humidity followed by storms, some of which are accompanied by thunder and lightning.  Keep in mind, we are getting lots of much needed rain.  My lawn is green!

I had to deal with a customer yesterday who is... was not too wise.  She has dogs who pee on the floor, so she had her carpet removed and had cheap laminate installed.  How cheap, just a smidgen above the crap we won't install because it's simply too cheap.  The product she chose is so cheap our measurement service refused to build a quote, so I had them build a quote with one product and then substituted the correct product.  She sat by the flooring desk and played games on her phone while I rebuilt her quote.  She can afford better, but she's one of those people who thinks cost doesn't matter, that the same quality is there no matter how inexpensive the product.  Within a year, because her dogs will be peeing on that flooring, it will warp and soak in the dog pee, and it will start to stink, and she'll have to replace it.  She is going to get what she paid for.

So, today is a holiday that isn't a holiday.  For some, this will be the official paid holiday, for others it will be tomorrow.  Some business will be closed today so their employees can have 3 or 4 day weekends, others will not.  Today they will be grilling hamburgers, hot dogs, and chicken at the store, tomorrow they will not... at least nothing's in the plans so far for tomorrow.  Since I work today, I won't have to take a lunch.  Since I'm off tomorrow, I don't really care.  So, if you're scheduled off today and get holiday pay, have a Happy Fourth (Pt 1).

And because this is a holiday weekend, the political news has been rather quiet, possibly because all Hell is going to be let loose.  There are rumors swirling that the Orange Turds attorneys have received notification of more indictments coming from Atlanta.  There are also whispers about additional indictments coming from the Mar a Lago document case.  People are asking if Rudy G. is going to voluntarily flip...  that shouldn't even be a question.  For all the loyalty Trump demands, he never, ever gives any in return.  Then he gets pissed when people turn on him.  Those fools who stay loyal to him will never get a holiday, unless they're like Rudy and flip to save their own selfish ass.

Violence: The New Normal

 Now tell me, wasn't that the shitiest Fourth of July this country has had ever?

I worked.  Gained 1.6 pounds.  Sold a flooring installation and a blind measurement, all the time checking for news updates on the shooting in Highland Park, Illinois.  I've been to Highland Park.  Affluent is a nice way of describing the suburb.   Six dead.  Oh, and there was another mass shooting in Philadelphia, where two died.  I believe there were others, but those are the 2 that come to mind.  Thanks to the 2nd amendment cultists, this is the new normal.

Locally, a domestic disturbance near the Walnut Street bridge in Harrisburg led to a panic.  People took to social media shrieking, "no shooting! no shooting!"  

My nephew and his wife were at a parade in Mechanicsburg where someone set off fireworks, which led to a panic with people knocking people over as they ran to safety.    This is the new normal.  How do I know it's the new normal?  She posted some asinine comment on Facebook that they went for ice cream afterwards to calm their nerves.  Yep, the new normal.  Ice cream fixes everything... well, maybe not in Highland Park.

Everyone will be touched by this violence.

Here's a current pic of my dahlias, more are preparing to open, and the marigolds are finally beginning to fill in.

Another example of the New Normal is Darren Bailey, a Trump backed candidate for Governor in Illinois.   In the first video message he released after the shoot, Bailey said that we need to pray for the victims, and the police, and then basically 'move on.'  He's another one Conservative asshole who has yet to realize all of their prayers have remained unanswered.  Nope, not a one.  God has evidently turned a deaf ear towards those prayers.  Anyway, someone must have told Bailey he sounded like a stupid sack of shit, so he released another video in which he said he didn't mean to sound like a crass, failed human being.  You're too late, Darren.  People already know you accept these shootings as the New Normal, and people just need to move on when they happen.

Trickle Down

 Okay, so this is the 4th of July weekend.  Last night one of my neighbors fired off a single firecracker.  Someone is a little overanxious.  I like fireworks, I just hate dealing with the traffic in order to get to a place where I can see them.  Oddly enough, I can kind of see them from my attic window, of course that would mean standing in a unairconditioned storage room where the temp can be 20 to 30 higher than outside.  While I enjoy fireworks, I don't enjoy them that much.  

Yesterday was hot.  Forecasters were predicting a likelihood of rain.  Didn't happen.  Today's they say we have a 55% chance of experiencing some form of precipitation.  I'm going to water the garden because that % is really nothing more than a medium good guess.   Temps are fine.  90 (F) is not bad.  We are in summer.  I'd rather have that then temps in the triple digits.  

I froze another 4 quarts of peaches yesterday. This is yummy, tasty stored away for the winter.

One of the things that amazes me about people is that so many seem to have long term memory problems.  I always thought there were little gray cells which specialized in documenting and possibly even categorizing things that happened for future reference.  Here's an example.  When I hear people say that Trump is responsible for the greatest economy the country has ever seen, I wonder how they could have so easily forgotten that the Republicans, under George W, also voted for big tax breaks for corporations, aka Trickle Down economics.  The economy flourished.  The stock market boomed.  Because Wall Street was going like gangbusters, the GOP started throwing out suggestions on how Americans could be moved from Social Security to something similar to a national 401K program.  There was talk, not only about how this was going to be managed, but who might manage the accounts, surely not a government agency; no one would make any money if that happened.  People don't remember this.  They do, however, remember Bush's version of Trickle Down economics failing.  Corporations began laying off people who had gotten mortgages they couldn't afford, mostly those without a fixed interest rate, and the housing market began collapsing, leading to the Great Recession.   Based on Trickle Down economics, Trump's great economy was doomed from the start.  Perhaps a more important question might be: did he know this, and is that why he wanted people to die from Covid to brace up an economy that had failure written all over it?

Day One

Today is Saturday, a day off for me.  I requested off because of... Kid's Workshop.  Even though this is a really great thing, having 300 plus kids banging away with little hammers less than 100 feet away is not conducive to good sales.  You can't hear your customers talk, and they can't hear you.

A way more important reason for taking off was today is

The First Day of The Tour de France!

This is the reason why I have a subscription to NBC Sports Gold Cycling.  I can watch it live... commercial free.  The first stage this year is Live... From Belgium.  In fact, the first 2 stages take place in Belgium.  Tomorrow is the first Team Time Trial... and hell, I have to work.  Today's state is 194 km (120 miles) long.  Right now their average speed is 44 km per hour (27 mph).  That's fast.  My average speed is between 15 and 16 miles per hour.  Since I'm not in Brussels, I took some snaps from my big screen TV.

I wrote about the colors and the crowds in The Body in the Tower.  I also wrote about those cameramen on motorcycles.

The jobs report came out yesterday for June.  It was good... and the stock market went down.  Investors would rather have a bad report in order for the Fed to drop interest rates because Americans at work have less appeal to them then the % they're going to have to pay in interest (88% of thee investors are foreign). 
Two days after the 4th and many Americans have decided they weren't impressed with the Idiot Jerk's ego parade in Washington.  What ever happened to the America being the land of Opportunity?  Don't ask foreign investors, you won't like their response.

Ride This

I don't have to work today... I'm having my blood work done this AM for my yearly physical.  That means I've been drinking my coffee black...  They have to check for diabetes.  Last time I ate breakfast before they drew those 5 stinkin' viles of blood and my doctor said "oh, I see you failed to 'fast.'  I'm very possessive of my blood, in case you didn't know.  I like to keep it flowing where it does the most good, in my veins.
When I got home from work last night I rode a little over 8 miles - the total ride is over 27 miles.

What I find amusing about this ride is that running right through the center of the route is the Reagan Memorial Tollway... which means you must pay tolls..  The highway directly to the north, Route 38, is the Lincoln Highway... and it's free.  No tolls.  What better way is there to remember a not so good president then to charge you to drive on a road named after him?  They must really love him in Dekalb County.  Or is this is just one more example of those damn Republicans gouging the average American paycheck?
And I guess the Idiot Jerk wants there to be tanks in the Washington Mall on the Fourth.  And fly overs by Navy Jets... maybe.  Some of the planned events are being kept... secret, because the Moral Degenerate wants to be another PT Barnum, albeit one from the 'dark side.'  I can hear Melanoma complaining now "D'is is goink to give him a leetle boner ent he's goink to vant sex."  I mean, that's what this is really all about.  Not America, but the Idiot Jerk.  His ego demands it.  He needs to brag about it.  And you can bet a number of failed Evangelicals will show up to praise him.  I'm surprised at how easily they bow their heads.

Happy Birthday America

Happy Birthday America!
Well, kind of.
We are living in a time very few of us ever though would happen.  We have an Idiot Jerk in the White House who has no comprehension of what America stands for, let alone any idea of how Democracy is defined.  A bobblehead has more sense.  Pride in our country is on the decline.  His trade policies are well on their way to binding the EU with China.  The world order is changing.  He seems more preoccupied with a private meeting with Russia's Putin and anything else.  He loves his dictators.  He also loves his rallies.  They let him openly lie.  He loves firing up his base.  Their cheers feed his ego.  He is the heart and soul of the Republican Party.
Happy Birthday America!
The Blue Tide is rising!
The Russians worked to get this Idiot Jerk into the White House.  Even Faux News grudgingly admits this.  They did this, not because they believed he would be more sympathetic, which he is, but rather they understood that his inability to govern would be far more damaging to Democracy.  He is their bobblehead.  Now he will get his 'private meeting' with his Vlad.  And Putin?  He will unabashedly pet the Idiot Jerk's ego, all the while sowing more seeds of disruption.  The Idiot Jerk will bob his head up and down as he walks deeper into his garden of insanity.
Happy Birthday America!
We outnumber his supporters!
We are stronger than their aging, decrepit bones.
I don't find it surprising that a majority of those who support him are older and whiter, less educated, and, on the surface, at least, far more religious than the rest of Americans.  These people from the sixties, who once advocated change, now find the new terrifying.  They long for the old days.  They hate the new.  Evolution has passed them by.
Happy Birthday America!!
This darkness will pass.
Difficult to believe, but on our 242nd birthday we are still experiencing growing pains.  We will always be growing, never reach maturity.  We will never hit those Golden Years.  Change is constant.  Evolution continuous.  There will be easier paths ahead, and also roads just as rocky.  We will always be walking towards Utopia, coming close, but never quite reaching that paradise.
Happy Birthday America!!
We are the spark that will light the Universe!

A broken crank... and the Greenbrier

That's right, and I'm to blame.  Stripped it, I did, the result of impatience.  You know what I mean?  There are times when it's just too difficult to take it slowly.  Anyway, it's stripped.  I did it while changing pedals for an ride on the roads.  In too much of a hurry, I used an allen wrench instead of carefully threading in the pedal.  Cranks are made of aluminum. Pedals are made of steel.  The hardness of steel will carve away the softer crank threads if care is not taken.  And I was in a rush and careless.  As a result, the left pedal wobbles.  This is not a good thing, a broken crank and a wobbling pedal.  Later this morning I'll call World Cycle & Ski and have them rethread the crank.  Believe me, I will only let the best touch my crank.
And I was reading that a majority of Americans want a Supreme Court Justice picked before the mid-terms.  This, I suspect, has more to do with the way the Republicans shit around with the last justice.  This puts them in a bind, however.  If they vote in an individual who doesn't match Kennedy's middle of the road viewpoint, they will get voted out of office.  As I've said before, their biggest fear is losing their job.  The last thing any Senator wants is to be fired by the American voter.  Such a termination means that a majority of people think them unfit to do their job.  Of course, the Idiot Jerk in the White House is dumb as a fucking brick.  He has so much hateful disdain for those who mock him and treat him like the turd, choosing an ultra conservative candidate would let him stab a majority of those Americans in the back.
Speaking of the Idiot Jerk, I see where he's going to be spending his holiday at the Greenbrier.  Some of you may be familiar with the resort as it gained quite a bit of notoriety when word got out that it sits above a massive underground bunker.  You know?  The kind of place the president is supposed to hide in during a nuclear event.

He's not staying in Washington to watch the fireworks over the Mall.  Nope, he's going to the Greenbrier.  Could he be scared that something bad might happen on our most honorable holiday?  The day we celebrate the birth of our nation?  Or is he just a dumbshit?