Challenged

Three more days until my weekend!  I was going to take off today because the new coffeemaker is being delivered... but decided I didn't want to waste the personal time.  I like to have a  certain number of days on the books, just in case, if you know what I mean.  Last winter I endured a bad sore throat and used 2 days, as an example.  Unexpected things happen.
No cycling tonight, I rode the Charlie Baker Time Trial last night.  I cut almost 3 minutes off my last time but was still almost a minute longer than my fastest time.  You can blame it on the Bobster... Yep, that's his name, who ever that is.  He was a mile and a half ahead of me on the course and I didn't really want to catch up to him so I kept my pace slower than normal.  At one point he was only 1.3 miles ahead of me and so I slacked off.
I guess the Idiot Jerk in the White House went on a little tirade yesterday.  He once again said Jews were disloyal because they didn't bow to him, and repeated how 'nasty' the Prime Minister of Denmark was for calling his obsession with buying Greenland 'absurd.'  This man is getting angrier by the day.  Tough Shit.  He said he was the "chosen one" to go after China.... chosen one?  Hell, if that wasn't directed at his Crazy Christian base.  Being challenged on all sides is not what he is used to; in the past he's hired attorneys to shut them up.  Farmer's are beginning to threaten the USDA because of his tariffs and he can't fire them.  This is all very bad news for his re-election campaign.  Now, ain't that a good thing.
Jay Inslee has decided to drop out of the race of the Democratic Nomination.  That's another good thing.  In the end, I suspect it will boil down to Biden, Sanders, Warren, Harris and Booker.
And finally, I was sitting in the living room on my day off and looked out to see Lily sitting on the futon looking at me.  She is such a cutie.  I took a snap.

Of course, I call it "Lily on the Futon."  She looks so tiny, doesn't she?
And another 'oh.'  In case you didn't hear Hickenlooper is going to run for the Senate in Colorado.  This is one of those challenges which terrifies the Republicans, because he's going to win and they will lose a seat in the Senate.

As with all good things

Tis Friday... the last day of my Staycation.  Starting tomorrow I have to work for 2 whole days before having off for another 2 days.  Next week is my last 32 hour work week - then it's back to 40 (can you hear me gnashing my teeth?) hour works until my anniversary date 9/4, at which point another 3 weeks of vacation rolls into my account.
I had my annual physical yesterday.  I'm in great shape... well, my glucose is 111.  My PSA, that little number aging men take into consideration is 2.48 which is what you'd normally see in a 40 - 50 year old man.  My triglycerides are at 88 and my total cholesterol is... (are you sitting down?) 132.  Blame it on my cycling.  Oh, and don't forget... I drink whole milk - sometimes by the glass.
I took a ride in Eistobel yesterday, which is in Bavaria which has some nice hills.

A few of those Bavarian Hills

The green bar at the top shows the terrain.  This is the first half of a 17 mile ride.  The 2nd half has even steeper climbs.  I may give it a shot this afternoon.  This is one of those rides I need to complete to increase my ranking in Rouvy.
Today I'm also going to be getting rid of the box spring on my bed in order to reduce the height.  I might end up buying one of those memory foam mattresses, or something like that.  I was pricing them the other day.  They're rather affordable and I'm most likely going to have to buy at least one more mattress.
And finally, yesterday, as I was sitting in the waiting room I started thinking about the heat wave in Alaska... and in Europe... and the one we just had, and how people are shrieking about Climate Change.  The Crazy Christians are in a terrible state of denial in order to keep reality from blasting major holes in their philosophy.  Sorry, but even bad things need to come to an end.  As a cognizant species, we have not been around that long... a couple million years.  Whether you understand this or not, we are still in our infancy.  The dinosaurs were around for what?  Sixty million years until that silly asteroid wiped them out?  Climate change will lead to adaptation.  I know some find that scary, but it will happen.  Climate Change will move us out into space - there's no climate change on the moon.  However, living there will induce other adaptations.  In two million years there may be nine or ten different variants of the human species.  This is what we have to look forward to... and it ain't bad.  As with all good things adaptation and evolution are necessary for survival.

All about my snake... and other things.

Well, I get to go back to work today... for today and tomorrow, then I'm off for 2 more days.  A permanent schedule like this would be wonderful...
Anyway, I'm going to spend a few moments here bragging about my snake.  Now, I don't want anybody getting jealous, but my snake is big... real long, probably longer than most of imagine.  Oh, and he's black, of course I don't really know if I have the gender right since I didn't roll him over to see if he has a little snakey penis.  So, you ask, how long is my snake?  Well, I'd say he's easily over 5 feet long with about a 2 inch diameter.  He's very quiet, in fact I was quite surprised to find out he was living here.  Yesterday morning was the first time I actually saw him.  I looked out the back door window and there he was, casually snaking his way across the sidewalk.  That's how I know how big he is, the sidewalk is 4 feet wide at that point.  Now I know why my chipmunk population has been on the decline.  A friend asked me what I was going to do about him and I said "nothing."  Hopefully he will take care of my mouse problem and mousetraps will be unnecessary this fall.

The picture above is stock since I had neither my phone nor my camera with me.  The truth is I may never see him again.  Black snakes are nocturnal.  They hunt at night.  In case you're wondering, the dogs didn't see him.  I kept them in the house.  They would have killed the poor thing.
We're a year and a half from the 2020 election and polls are revealing things that are not too surprising, in other words this is what most Americans suspected.  Evidently only 38% of female voters are planning on voting for the Idiot Jerk, that's your Crazy Christian crowd and your Crazy Conservative crowd, and a small percentage of non-thinkers.  In case you didn't know, women are one of the largest voting blocks in the United States and everything the Idiot Jerk does to please his Crazy Christian base goes against the grain of 62% of that voting block.  This man is dumb as a brick.  He relies on Crazy Christian sycophants who tell him he was chosen by God to give them what they want.  They are depraved.  I can only wonder what they're going to do when he gets voted out of office. 

Out with the Old, In with the New

Well, it's Labor Day.  This is a National Holiday here in the United States.  Supposedly a day to celebrate the accomplishments of Americans, most just see this as a paid holiday.  For the first time in almost 10 years, I don't have to work, which is nice.  That doesn't mean I haven't been doing anything.  Rather, the opposite has been happening.  Besides my normal household chores, I have myself a little project: remove and replace the silicone caulk in my walk-in shower.  I used a tool (which we sell), and a spray on solution (which we also sell.)  Well, the tool, which is plastic, broke, and the spray on solution?  Way too thick to actually spray.  I poured it into a small Tupperware container and used an old toothbrush as an applicator.  The softening process took much longer than the instructions implied.  Removal also required much more elbow grease than was suggested.  In the end, however, all of the old caulk is gone, replaced by new, longer lasting caulk.
As I was laying in bed this morning, I heard on the news that the DeSantis campaign is outraged that a white supremacist group was making robocalls on his behalf.  Can you hear me laughing.  Checking on line, I saw that 'all white' Faux News was coming to his defense...  Can you hear me laughing?  Kelly Wright, their only black anchor is suing them for racial discrimination.  Oh, wait, is he still with Faux News?  There is also Harris Faulkner.  She has a show called Outnumbered.  She's married to this dude Tony Berlin.  At one time he worked for Good Morning America.  He is one of those Crazy Christians, which makes me suspect they are both paddling around in the same canoe.
That gives us two black people.  Don't even try and compare Faux News to any of the other cable news networks, you'll end up breaking a gut laughing.  Faux News is desperately clinging to a history that is disappearing through evolution.  As if we didn't know that already.
The temps outside are supposed to be stinky hot.  Right now the plan is to stay inside when I can enjoy the air conditioned comfort.

Now, I'll be the idea of getting to see an old Ronald Reagan movie will some of you so hot you'll need to pull out your fans.

Stemin'

Today is September 1.  We have what? 21 days of summer left?  Is everybody ready for the Autumnal Equinox?  I am.  They are forecasting a heat wave next week.  Ninety degree temps are coming back, not that they really left us.  There was an interesting article in the NYT this AM.  By 2060 the number of 90 (F) days for people living in Richmond, VA will double.  I probably will not be around.  I couldn't help but chuckle.  You see, if it's that bad in Virginia, imagine how bad it will be in those Crazy Christian states farther to the south.  Those people down in Georgia, and South Carolina, and Alabama?  They're going to think they've died and gone to hell.  Maybe this is how Judgment works.  They aren't too keen on science.  In fact, a lot of them do as much as humanly possible to keep science out of their schools.  Perhaps if science didn't quickly begin to dismantle their core beliefs this wouldn't be the case.  Unfortunately science answers questions their faith tells them to ignore.  Like the age of the Earth.  Or why aren't their dinosaurs mentioned in the Bible?  And these people want to run the country.  Holy Shit!
An associate of mine keeps telling me I should get Twitter just to read the Idiot Jerk's Tweets.  He reads them aloud.  I will have to admit, many of them are hysterical as hell.  He makes as much sense as one of those Crazy Christians... maybe that's why they like him so much.  What are even funnier are the retorts he gets.  Reading his Twitter account gives you a really good idea how much people really hate this guy.  I mean, they really do.  They are constantly calling him names.  "Liar" pops up so often you know he doesn't read his responses.  His ego lives for sensationalism.  Turning him off is a little stake in his heart...  Just think what would happen if everybody disconnected at once.  Buildings might topple at the sound of his deafening shriek of pain.  Only then will he realize how much he is hated.  He'd be suffering through steam heat without any love...  Oh, and don't worry, it won't be long before we'd get to see him dance.... of course, ankle chains pretty much only let you shuffle.

After today I have a 3 day weekend.  That will be so nice.  Of course, it is going to be stinkin' hot.