The Wannabe Gods

 The cold front that is slowly moving through Central PA is still slowly moving through Central PA.  Our current temp is 31 (F) and we're going to climb a full 1 degree to 32 (F) to reach our high for the day.  According to Accuweather, our temps will not return to the 40s (F) until sometime around December 20.  After that, our daily highs will be considered seasonably warm.

Yesterday was kind of a mixed day.  I did get my workout done in the morning, though I will admit to not being at my best.  Part of the problems was not sleeping well Tuesday night.  And then yesterday afternoon I had lunch with friends.  That was fun.  We get together every 3 months.  This works out well.  Since we're all retired, I think if we met more often our conversations would soon tend to veer into repetitiveness, or worse, the dreaded ailment of the month category.

One thing that did make me laugh was the suggestion that I might want to build a dumbbell stand.  Right now they are lined up along the wall on the floor.  That would entail using a drill, and measuring, and building and... well, let me be perfectly honest.  I am not a constructo type person.  Not in the least.  As such, the dumbbells will stay where they are.

And the new piece of workout equipment is arriving today.  This means I'll be taking a personal day away from the flooring desk since I don't want the boxes sitting out on my front porch until I get home this evening.  This also means I'll start putting the thing together.  Notice, I can assemble, I simply can't build.

And here's a pic of my Christmas cactus which is blooming again.

And evidently we've become a pirate nation now, mostly because of big Oil.  If anybody had any doubts why Orangie's administration was so interested in Venezuela, the truth came out yesterday.  For those of you among the uninformed, Venezuela is sitting on approximately 18% of the world's oil reserves.  Wowza!  This has nothing to do about drugs, or sinking drug boats and everything to do with simply, unadulterated greed.  Big Oil can never, ever be rich enough.  And those billionaires at top?  They truly do believe themselves to be gods.  These people simply refuse to understand the way of the world.  They do not look at history, which constantly reminds us that those on top always fall, because, being mere mortals and not gods, they over extend themselves in so many, many ways.  They will never learn because they always believe themselves to be smarter than those failures who came before them.  They are not.  The only difference between our current crop of wannabe gods and those of the past is that when this group fails, those failures will be spectacular.  

Cancel Disney

 If you live in Central PA and believe today is going to be cool, you're wrong.  Even though our outside temp is a comfortable 61 (F), weather forecasters are predicting that your thermometers will end up in the mid to upper 80s (F).  Knowing how frequently the weather forecasters have actually under predicted our temps, I'm betting we will probably be hitting the low 90s (F).  We shall have to wait and see.

I got my first workout in yesterday and I was pleased.  The sequence of doing the exercises is dissimilar to what I've done all of my life, and that caught me off guard.  Instead of doing three sets of, say hammer curls, and then three sets of squats, before moving onto the next exercise, you do one set of each.  This sequence is then repeated three times with a 25 second rest between each exercise.  The workout is designed around different segments: strength, core, and then stretching.  You end with a yoga pose.  I found it a really good alternative to what I'm used to doing.  Today I ride bike!

In the afternoon I had lunch with my friends Tami and Ann.  I've known them for decades.  There is a good thing to have friendships that last for many years.  They add stability as we age.  In these disruptive times it's nice to have anchors of regularity we can rely on.   Of course, I ate too much.  But this is fine.  We laughed a lot, and, as some of you might expect, shared our negative opinions of the bloviating shitbag in the White House.

This also happened yesterday.

Last night I did cancel my subscription to Disney.  So what were the Kimmel's comments about Kirk that the FCC found so offensive?  Nothing.  It seems the FCC is tying itself up in knots because Kimmel went so far as to say that MAGA cultists were deliberately going out of the their way to prove Robinson, the suspected shooter, was anything but a Republican.  Wow!  Being honest, that's far from the most inflammatory thing I've heard since Kirk was assassinated.  This makes one wonder if there just might be an ulterior motive.... (Can you hear me laughing?)  Of course there is a completely different reason than the one given.  You see Nextstar, which owns a number of small market TV stations across the country, wants to by Tegen, a company that owns a number of middle market TV stations for $6.2 billion.  For that deal to go through, Nextstar needs FCC approval, and to get the go ahead on that deal, they're canceling Kimmel.  This is basically the same thing that happened to Stephen Colbert, canceling a comedian who's critical of the Orange Anus to get a deal approved by the FCC. Kimmel's getting canceled doesn't have a damned thing to do with Kirk.  In a sad way it's rather appropriate that Kirk, who, after spreading racial hatred for so many years, is now nothing more than a tool.  Now Disney is dealing with canceled subscriptions which, is not good for Nextstar which  means their revenue will fall.

54

 Well, the weather outside is soon to be drizzly.  The skies are overcast without so much as a hint of sunrise.  With the rain, which is supposed to be on and off showers that will sometimes be mini-soakers, comes a drop in the temps.  This coming week is made for sweatshirts and sweatpants, which will be the house fashion for the next five months or so.

I did work yesterday and it was slow.  Pre-Covid, we used to say that people were waiting for the deals of Black Friday.  The massive orange retailer I work for, however, has pretty much obliterated Black Friday in its search for sales revenue.  They will advertise some super duper sales on Black Friday, but most of our big sales are already on display, and those sales?  They are not going to be the bargains most people are expecting.

On Matthew Perry's death?  I feel bad.  I'm not a sitcom kind of guy, so I rarely watched Friends and didn't build up the attachment so many did to his character.  I can remember friends saying they simply had to be home in order to watch the latest episode.  In many people's minds, no matter what was happening in his personal life, he was and still is Chandler Bing.  54 is such a terribly young age to die.

Here's a pic of my algae eater cleaning of the thermometer in the smaller tank.

And, stunning as it may seem to some, Mike Pence has ended his campaign for president.  Stop laughing!  Perhaps if he had demonstrated ethics, and values, and been toady to the most corrupt president in American history he might have had a chance.... Nah.  Mikey's campaign was cooked before he even threw his hat into the ring.  He was a non-entity before he became Vice President, and is back doing what he does best: disappearing into the woodwork.

When life is wonderful

Just some quick words this AM - I have a physical scheduled for 0800 at the VA Clinic, at their new location.  Before they moved my appointment would have been fine, now it's right in the middle of commute hell. 
Yesterday... the world laughed at the Idiot Jerk in the White House.  That's sad.  We used to be admired for our caring, and understanding, and compassion.  Now we're a joke.
Rumor has it Rosenstein is staying... but only because the GOP is scared shitless over the midterms.
Now, for something nice.
Yesterday afternoon a customer came up to me asked about buying some a strip of roll carpet.  She was house training her little dog.  And as she talked, I thought, hhhmm she looks very familiar.  So, I asked her "is your name Sue?"  She paused for a few seconds, and then said "yes."  At that point I knew who I was talking to.  When she told me her last name, I said "I used to work with you a long, long time ago."  She didn't recognize me at first, I suspect because I was wearing my Milburn Drysdale glasses.  When I told her my name she said "from Marriott," and nodded.  And then she had to cry a little bit as she gave me a hug. 
When I graduated from college, I got a job with the Marriott in Harrisburg, in the accounting department.  For 11 years she sat at the desk next to mine.  She was then, and is still, a very, very nice lady.  Here's my friend, Sue.

And for those of you who are wondering... she's 87 years old.  Life is wonderful sometimes, isn't it?

Facebook goes to Hell

Hey, remember when Facebook was nice?  Not the puppy dog, kitty cat nice, but nice meaning free from hard core commercialism?  Back then you actually had to look for something to 'like.'  You know, your favorite musical group?  TV show?  Movie?  And once you did choose to 'like' it, nothing really seemed to change much.  Boy, those days are shot to shit, aren't they.  No matter where you go on the Internet these days, you are being asked to "like us on Facebook."  This is because everybody and his fricking brother is selling Ad space and the only way to generate revenue is to have you and all of your friends start clicking on their ad.  As you all know by now, every time one of your friends likes someone, everybody on his friend list finds out.  What's really funny is sometimes I look at these 'likes' and can't help but wonder what in hell is going through my friend's head.  And then I wonder, should I really have this guy as a friend?  I mean, look at what he likes!  Yikes!!

And it isn't only your 'friends' who are making recommendations.  Hell no.  Facebook does it.  You see they have this monster computer buried away under a giant mountain which is constantly reviewing your profile.  Constantly.  You see Facebook wants to make a lot of money selling Ad space too, so every time this giant computer infers even the most vaguest of links between your profile and some commercial venture willing to pay them big bucks, Facebook will suggest you 'like' a page.  Do I ever click on their recommendations?  Hell no.  Let's be perfectly honest, my profile is rather vague, so no matter what they suggest it's most likely not going to pique my interest.  Will they every stop sending me recommendations?  Hell no.  You see I have  pudding head friends who click first and think later.