When you hit middle age you really only have two choices: you can get fat and lazy until you roll over and die, or you can can get off your ass and do something, like maybe ride a bike.
Bluntness
I've also been told I have little tact, so if this offends you simply ride on.
How's your Friday going? Mine is drizzly and rainy. Yepper! We have a real soaking weekend heading our way with a possible 3.5 inches of rain in the forecast. In fact, we're under a bit of a flood watch until tomorrow afternoon. Heavy rain on a Saturday is not good for our garden department.
I had my monthly 'one on one' review yesterday with Specialty management. As always, they want us to push credit, and, as always, everything they said went in one ear and out the other. In fact, almost everything they say does that.
My Cannondale X6 cyclocross bike sold at the World Cup and Ski bike sale and swap. If you remember, Dave G. (one of the managers) suggested $300 as an asking price, well, some fine customer paid $350. I'm happy. I was never going to ride that bike again, and that sale will cover the $250 deductible I need to pay for my car repair.
There is a planned karaoke section planned for my next book in which something inopportune might... well, occur. Will good and bad juxtapose each other? Hhhmmm, I'll never tell. Anyway, I'm seriously considering this little ditty. And who might sing it? Perhaps a character with some serious coordination issues on the dance floor?
I saw that the Democrats are going to have a vote on codifying the Women's Health Act in order to get Republicans to vote against it. The leak of the Supreme Court's anti-abortion manifesto (and if you look at Alito's warped logic, it is a manifesto) has put that extreme wing of the Republican Party in a bad place. How did they get here? Probably because Trump lost in 2020. You see, usually the party whose presidential candidate loses picks up seats in the House and the Senate in the next mid-term election. Conservative logic would have been that this is a good time to overturn Roe v Wade because we're going to take back control in 2022. Hence the leak, or test balloon as I like to think. The truth Conservatives will never understand is that their base does not represent a majority. Trump's little shit show on January 6 cost them a lot of Centrist / Independent voters, a fact they fail to comprehend. They also believe there is a silent majority of conservatives in America. They believe this lie because of Reagan's landslide win. They see and hear Trump's loud, shrieking MAGA base as representing a majority of crazy Americans.
Wrong. And their biggest problem is that they believe American voters are both stupid and gullible. We are not. And so, they have an extremely bad problem which will continually compound itself in the run-up to the midterm elections. American voters are going to slap the shit out of them this November, which is a very good thing. They need to be seriously slapped, and quite often.
Yesterday was cold and breezy. That being said, I'm pleased with my accomplishments.
I took the Cannondale X6 into the bike shop for their 'trade and sale' event. At this point in my life, there isn't even a bad reason for me to own 2 bikes. While old, the bike is in pristine condition, but again, it is old, so I figured try to get $150 to $200. I was more than a little surprised when they asked if I'd set the top price at $300. Of course, I said "sure," but was even more surprised when, after the owner took the bike back into the shop, to have him hand me a receipt putting the top price at $375. Even though that would be very nice, I doubt if it will sell for that much. Still, the surprise was nice.
Laundry was done, I put in 2 miles on the treadmill, plus some rearranging and cleaning of the exercise/computer room. Even though Microsoft provides good security, I was thinking about getting some additional free virus support for the new PC. Avast has good reviews, so I downloaded the free version. However, when I went to try out a game I'd downloaded from Microsoft's Game Pass, Avast blocked it. We're talking Microsoft's Game Pass here, not some hole in the wall software company, so Avast was uninstalled rapidly. I also had to uninstall the game and redownload it because when Avast blocked it, it blocked it permanently.
And how about the Conservative attacks on Disney? Their hypocrisy is coming straight from Hell.
Republicans had no problem with Disney as long as campaign donations flowed into their coffers, however, once that started changing Conservatives turned rabid. Truthfully, social conservatives have long had a problem with Disney's stand on diversity. You see, they want Disney to hate the same way they hate, the same way Jesus tells them to hate... oh... wait a minute. Jesus doesn't tell them to hate. It's one of the other guys, one of the disciples, perhaps Saul, who changed his name to Paul because Saul sounded way too Jewish. Social conservatives want you to turn off Disney. Cut the cord! They want you to believe you'll be damned if you watch the next season of The Mandalorian. Can you hear me laughing at them?
So, I slept in this morning. It's the first of my 4 days off in a row, 2 of which are vacation days. I have a lot of chores planned. There are black tulips down the side of the house which have stopped blooming. They are going to be replaced by gladiolas, what's called the pastel collection (purples, whites and pinks). Of course, I have rosebuds galore. I'm now using a mixture of water and very fine sulfur in a pump sprayer to keep the dreaded 'black spot' at bay. The same mixture will be used on the peach and nectarine trees. I also want to get in a bike ride. Today's will be inside, but I'm planning on taking the X6 off the wall, pumping up the tires, and taking it out on the road now while traffic is still thin.
Me holding the X6 about 14 years ago
I saw where tribes in South Dakota are standing up the their Republican governor. She wants them to stop the checkpoints they've set up leading into their reservations. She doesn't give a shit if they live or die, but then she's a Republican, so what else is new? We need to vote her out of office and maybe put her in jail for 'Crimes against Humanity.'
Billy Barr's dismissal of the charges against Mike Flynn has a lot of voices up in arms, Democrat and Republican. Remember, he's going to do everything the Idiot Jerk in the White House wants, no matter how bad it looks. That's why he got the job. At this point, a major majority of Americans realize his ethics were superficial at best. The bitter truth for him will be when he finds out he's been worshiping a minority president who will throw him to the wolves the minute things turn bad... which is going to be any minute now.
And I saw where the Idiot Jerk in the White House again cut short a briefing yesterday because he didn't like the questions. I do not doubt that as time goes on, he will rely more and more on the Cracker Jack Conservative media outlets to get his message to his base. The body counts keeps rising, they're talking about a 2nd wave much sooner than later, and his message is that 'we prevailed.' His radicalized base believes him. They have no clue that the first wave took out the most vulnerable, the 2nd wave is aiming for those who don't wear masks, who don't practices Social Distancing, who think brandishing a gun is going to scare Covid - 19. They don't understand this virus is smarter than they are... and viruses don't have brains.
