what she said

Without hope, you've got nothing
-- my wife

Every little thing is gonna be all right

Monday. Insert a sigh, a harrumph, a pondering chin rub and frown. I stare at the blinking cursor a few moments. I take a swig from my nearly empty mug of coffee. I can find no inspiration outside my office window, just the bare branches of the big willow swinging slightly in the cold February breeze. It is that shadowing time, not long after daybreak. It is cloudy, so everything has an almost black and white feel, as if a blue filter has been placed over the camera lenses of life.

I refill my coffee cup. I stare some more at the blinking cursor. I fart. Of course it does not stink. On the radio they are talking about the big Award Show screw-up last night. I did not watch. I can not think of many activities more boring than watching award shows. If you dig them, I am good with that. That is how I roll. I am not about imposing my will on others. The world would be a better place if I were a Universal Arbiter of Taste and All Things Good and Proper. Even then, I would be a guiding hand, not an authoritative fist. I would be a benevolent leader, not a strict driver wielding a harsh whip. Well, except I would decree that none of the Clinton or Bush families would be allowed to run for public office ever again for the next seven generations.

I have important stuff to do this morning. You will have to be happy with a fair amount of empty words in my entry this morning. That too is how I roll sometimes. We will both survive.

This is Bullsh*%t

It was 73 outside yesterday.

It is snowing as I type this.  It is 31 degrees. The wind chill temperature is 20F. What the heck Mother Nature? Honest, there is no need to go all crazy on me. I bought real butter.

What, you in the back with your hand up? What do you mean you don't get that reference? OK, Step back to 1974 for a half minute:

The previous post today was written weeks ago.

For reasons I won't get into I was day-tripping back through my archives this morning. Boy, not only did I write a lot, I was pretty opinionated back in the old days. Not like now...

What? One thing remains constant -- I was pretty much right then too.

Enjoy your Saturday.

When Caesar crossed the Rubican River in 49 BCE it meant...

I dig me some trivia. I have stuffed my head with arcane nonsense that only comes in useful when shouting along with Jeopardy, or playing trivial pursuit. No one in my family will play trivia games with me. I often know the answers. If not I can bluff my way through. If that fails I will filibuster until I get my way. I suspect trivia game time of any sort is unpleasant if I am a participant. Why do I suspect this? I have been told it is true.

My wife is used to my stories and boring fact-filled anecdotes. She has developed, in many decades of practice, the ability to look like she is paying attention while her eyes say "I just don't care". She pretends because she loves me. I prattle on because that is what I do.

Almost through a sixth sense I can feel when I have wandered too deep into the trivial. Sometimes even that knowledge fails to stop me from delving too deep into the facts and historical nonsequitors. I do it a lot here at the old blog. I write monologues on the mundane. I can sense you first reading, then skimming, then skipping whole sentences. Then you just click and move on. Hah! You just almost just did right now!

A few times lately I have been talking to my wife about...whatever, and I sense she is only pretending to pay attention. I stop, sometimes mid sentence and ask her "You don't care do you?". She will laugh and tell me no.

You don't care about this, do you?

The old lady who swallowed a fly is a life lesson for science

I am a steadfast believer that things happen for a reason. I believe events work out as they are supposed to, as ordained by a higher power. No, not the trivial like picking up that split on the bowling alley, or winning a ball game, or hitting five successive green lights; random life chance plays a significant role in events. I think the Supreme Being guides us to his will. This may not fit with your creed. I'm good with that. I am firm in my religious beliefs and really have a strong libertarian outlook when it comes to religion. You can worship, or not, as you please as long as it does not impinge on my rights. I have never been comfortable with the proselytizing aspect of religion. But religion is not the topic of the day.

I have always liked science. I'm just not too good at it. I will blame it on math and leave it at that. Biology, chemistry, physics -- I like the concepts, but I get lost in the details. I was fortunate enough to study the sciences in the course of my classical liberal arts education, and learned just enough to be dangerous. I understand what goes on in the circulatory system or the chemical changes at the molecular level when steel is heat treated. My office is living proof of the third law of thermodynamics.

What do the preceding paragraphs have to do with each other? Simply stated, the efforts to clone long-extinct species is a very bad idea. Jurassic Park is a fun movie, but a terrible idea. Cloning a wooly mammoth falls into the same category. These animals are extinct for a reason. Humans might have wiped out the passenger pigeon, but maybe Nature wanted the skies cleansed of the immense herds of these poop machines. Imagine the ecological damage a thousands-strong flock of birds could do. Perhaps the mammoth was so terrifying that it was a good thing our ancestors killed them off?

One of the great unintended consequences was the absolute destruction wrought upon the indigenous peoples of the Americas by European diseases. It never occurred to the best scientists of the time that could happen. You may argue that we are much advanced scientifically in the modern times, but it was not so long ago the best scientists thought you treated a cut by smearing it with horse dung or that bleeding cured just about anything. Is there reason to believe future scientific minds will not look back on our own era and marvel at how crude, how inept, how wrong we are today? Species are extinct for a reason. Let's leave it that way.

Half post

The big willow in back is breaking out in leaves. I have tulips about an inch above ground. Continual warm temperatures will do that. Boy, are the plants going to be surprised when winter returns this weekend.

I wish I had something more of interest to offer you this morning.

I didn't win the giant lottery jackpot last night. The fact that I did not buy a ticket might have something to do with it.

This is the first car I ever drove. The first car I owned was a 1966 Chevy pickup with a 3 speed manual transmission with a column shift. What was your first car?

Humpity humping on hump day

Yeah, a nonsense title to an unremarkable post. Yeah, I am pretty sure I can make that prediction without fear. Oh, I could talk about the wonderful warm temperatures. I could remark upon the drastic change in that weather coming ahead. We are expecting highs of 70+ on Friday and high temps in the 30s on Saturday. I expect there will be ugly aspects to such a drastic temperature swing. I suspect there is weather of some sort at your location. Since my weather has no relevance to you, there is not much point in dwelling on it. Except that I have done so in the preceding sentences.

I could ramble on about the continued response from the losers of the last election. I read of a woman who divorced her husband of 22 years because he voted for Trump. Either she is bat-shit crazy or there were some major issues in that relationship long before last November. He is probably better off without sharing a bed with that intolerant harridan.

I could talk about work. I won't.

I could just leave off right here and get a coffee refill.

Now that sounds like a plan.

High 67. low of 50

The great weather continues. I am certainly not complaining about afternoon highs 30 degrees above normal. I am concerned this bout of spring-like weather will be followed by more winter. That will be depressing. It just goes to show that groundhogs are damned liars. I have always found porcupines to be far more credible.

You deserve a break today

In the 1953 movie The Wild One Mildred asks Johnny what he is rebelling against. He replied "Wadda you got?". That pretty much sums up leftist politics for the past month. Every time I turn on the news I see a group of people protesting about something. Generally, it seems all they have is that they are angry they lost the election.

I see people are protesting because they got fired for losing their jobs last week because they did not show up for work -- so they could protest. Who is at fault here? The boss said if you don't show up for work Thursday don't come back. You skipped work. You lost your job. This isn't on the boss.

Today there are protests planned for "not my President" on President's Day. Give me a break. How is it possible to be so angry all of the time? Isn't it exhausting? I complain about politics quite a bit around here. It is my vent. It also ends pretty much right here on these pages. I cannot imagine being angry 24-7. Hug your kid. Take a walk in the park. Play fetch with a dog. Eat some nachos. Watch a ball game. View a few cat videos. Throw away that vagina costume you wore to a Washington a few weeks ago. You look stupid calling for "rights" you cannot articulate and already have. The costume is stupid too. Trust me, future you is not going to want to show that picture to your grandkids. They will not be proud of you.

Cute little grandchild: Why were you dressed like that grandma?

Grandma, cringing over her graphic vagina costume: I was protesting for rights.

CLG: You were trying to get the right to vote? You were trying to allow women to work?

G: No, the guy who won the election said some women will let a celebrity do anything, even grab their crotch.

CLG: Is that true. Will some women do that?

G: Yes.

CLG: And that is why you dressed up like a giant vagina to make women aware of their actions?

G: No, I wanted the other political party to win the election. I was mad we lost.

G:  ?????

Take a day off from the protests. We will all feel better. You might find out life is pretty much the same as it was last February 20th.

Boy, you have a bad attitude today

I probably over-did my morning constitutional yesterday. Bored with walking the same old route through my subdivision I ventured across redacted to another subdivision. I ended up traipsing about four miles while smoking a fine stogie. I came home and watched a couple of episodes of the old TV series Kung Fu because Kung fu. No more needs to be explained. Next, I suppose you are going to ask why I would watch a John Wayne movie or one of those Clint Eastwood orangutan comedies. You might as well ask why is there air.

In the afternoon I helped the wife straighten up the house. By late afternoon my legs were mildly sore. Last night we joined some friends for dinner. It was his birthday celebration. We came back to the house and played some euchre. In all, it was a pretty good day.

And you don't care a whit about any of this. No, no, don't protest. I know that glazed-over look in your eyes. I see it in my fair wife's hazel eyes often enough. I'm a little disappointed. I thought your day, indeed, your very happiness, hinged upon my insight, my punditry, my humor, my very existence in the blogosphere. Now I find out you stop by out of habit. It is quite possible you stopped reading some time ago. In that case you are going to miss this: the secret word is shillelagh. 

Since you have developed such a bad attitude on this gorgeous Sunday morning I'm not going to describe the weather, per my custom. That will show you.

Good day.

I said good day, sir.

whole lotta nuthin'

I watched my neighbor back into her garbage can Tuesday. The trash service had picked up earlier in the morning and I guess she forgot the can was curbside in her driveway. She moved it up by the garage. It blew over in the wind. It is still lying in her driveway on its side. She parks right beside it.

I took the wife's car for an oil change yesterday. In the late afternoon we walked the granddaughter down to the park. She played ball and bubbles outside when we got home until her daddy came to pick her up.

The weather woman says we can expect temperatures in the sixties through next Friday. I can live with that. It is February! I estimate we have received about two inches of snow all winter. Why do I think we are going to get a heavy spring snow storm? I actually have some green shoots coming up n the flower beds!

Where are you GOC?

Enjoy your Saturday.

Can you dig it?

It is a sunny 64 degrees here on a February Friday afternoon. The patio door is open and fresh air is flushing the stale winter air from the house.

It puts me in the mood for some Friday music. I know, you have been waiting so long for a return of this feature.  You have, dang it!

How about an old classic?

I hope your Friday is going great

Who am I meeting and what are we discussing?

I am a salesman. Semi-public speaking and giving presentations is an integral part of the job. I don't show up at a customer and read from a script. My approach is generally extemporaneous. That doesn't mean I do not prepare. While I rarely work from notes or an outline, I use them in preparation. I develop what I want to say, and try to imagine every possible question, concern, or comment from my customer. I learned long ago that BS and bluster hurts my credibility.

I'm not sure how the Trumpster has been successful in business. He seems unprepared and dives into his press conferences looking ready to speak straight off the cuff. It makes him look uninformed, unprepared and he responds to hard questions with the very BS and bluster that I find totally ineffective.

There is little difference in what I try to do and a Presidential presser on the surface. Trump is trying to sell his administration's policies. It is embarrassing when the President shows up and it seems as if he learned the material sitting in the parking lot 15 minutes before the meeting. It takes away from the message and gives his enemies ample ammunition. Obama was overly scripted, often using a TelePrompTer at a press conference. He did keep on message. Trump just wings it. There needs to be a happy medium.

WTH MLB?

Last week Major League Baseball said they were going to experiment with a rule change at the lower levels of baseball that automatically put a runner at second base at the beginning of any extra inning. My response was not just a firm "no", but a resounding "Hell no". As pointed out elsewhere, those marathon 15-plus inning games where position players take the mound are rare. More to the point, they are fun as heck. When I told my wife this plan, even she said the idea was bad. Her first response was she liked to see those games.

Now this week MLB is trotting out a trial balloon about changing the games to 8 inning affairs.

Get rid of the designated hitter. Fewer hits equals shorter innings and shorter games. Raise the mound back up to pre-Bob Gibson levels. What did you say MLB? You want more offense? Then that equals longer games. Cutting a 3 hour game to 2:45 is not going to bring in the young fans.

Baseball is never going to be king of the sports world again. Revenues are up. Fans are happy. Leave the sport alone.

There is no immigration right

If someone can give you a thing, it is not a right. If it can be bought or sold it is not a right. A right is a natural ability to pursue a given path: a divine mandate if you prefer. You cannot purchase the right to worship the deity of your choice. No one can grant you the privilege of your political beliefs or speech. You have the natural and divine right to protect yourself and your family. You have the right to pursue happiness (this happiness is not guaranteed, you have the right to strive for it).

There can be no right to health insurance. Nor is there a divine or natural mandate for free housing or food. Thomas Paine was correct when he argued that if a right is given by a government, then it can be taken away by that same government. Then that thing is not a right, but a mere charter.

Let's try this a different way. Say you were transported into a strange land or world. The leaders of the place told you that since you are now in Liberaltopia you must pray five times a day to a can of Campbell's Cream of Mushroom soup. There is no violence, just a firm insistence on prayer to a can of soup. Do you readily start paying homage to the red and white label merely  because your new neighbors suggested you do so or do you continue with your current religious belief (or non-belief)? No one can force you to adopt their religion. You may go through the outward motions, but your true inner beliefs will not change. This is because religion is a right.

If the same citizens said that it was their custom that you be beaten with a cane every morning after morning prayers, would you bare your back readily and willingly? Would you resist? The right to protect yourself is a natural right.

If the Liberaltopians set you up in a dwelling made of straw and you shared it with the family raccoon you might find it more comfortable to live in a brick house with a pool, but you would insist on living under a bridge unless you got your way? That is how you know it is not a right.

People from Liberaltopia have no natural right to come to Florida, or Texas, Ohio, or Indiana. They have no right for you to provide food or housing or a job. There is no right to free medical care or minimum wages. Those things are nice. They are generous gifts bestowed by society, the state or fellow citizens, but there is no right to have them. You may not come unbidden into my house, my city, my country. That is a privilege I may grant you, but you have no natural right to my stuff or my society.

Spend some time with the works of Locke, Hume, Jefferson, and Paine before you start lecturing me on immigration rights, or the right to not hear speech you disagree with, or whatever the right du jour might be. True rights can never be given nor taken away.

741 weeks on the charts

You don't come here for a weather report. Too bad. That is the one bit of content I manage to consistently include. It is a lame, tired, and effective conversation starter. Sometimes the subject is interesting. If a big storm were in the offing that would be news. The expected seasonable temperature with occasional snow flurries in today's forecast is not noteworthy. That this normal mid-February weather day is sandwiched between some great warm days may be of note. Last weekend saw the temperatures hit he low sixties. Yesterday we approached fifty. This coming weekend may see the temperature hit above seventy --in February! Bring it on. My only fear is that the wife will see such spring-like weather as a good opportunity for me to get out and work in the back yard cleaning up the fallen branches and limbs from the big willow and the mass of leaves that did not drop from the three Bradford pears until about Christmas. I'm going to want to laze in the sun, grasshopper-style. She is going to want to get the work done while we have the opportunity. That is what happens when someone who likes to relax marries someone who cannot relax. 

Happy Hallmark Day

It is the day of love. Tell your significant other you love them.

Remember when you used to make card holders in school from old cereal boxes or milk jugs? Then there would be a party and all the kids passed out cards and ate cookies?  I could never wield scissors with the skill to cut out a heart that didn't look lopsided and hacked up.

I would not go back to those days for anything

Identity Theft is a Crime

If you use a Social Security Number that belongs to someone else to get a job, perhaps open a bank account, or even get a loan, that is classic identity theft. It is a crime. Even if you are an immigrant trying to make a better life for your family, it is a crime. Even if you have been doing it for 22 years, it is stealing. It is theft and a crime and should be punished. You are not a martyr, you have not been wronged. You are a criminal.

As always, I welcome and encourage counterpoints in the comment section.

Stuff I have seen

I carry a cell phone. It is an iPhone and it has a camera built right in. Too often I forget I have it when I see a potential perfect picture. I get the snapshot in my head, but far too often I miss out on saving the scene digitally.

A case in point came up earlier this week. I was at the Kroger down the street. I saw an Indian (dot, not feather) pushing around one of those little carts they have for kids to push beside mom. She was all hunched over trying to push it. She was loading it with produce. I laughed out loud. Only later did it occur to me to take a picture. But it was funny as heck.

Sorry I can't show it to you. You would laugh too.

Palm tree dreams

My view of the green comet was obscured by clouds. The ever-present light pollution did not help. I love living here in suburbia, but as I have said before, I miss seeing the night sky filed with stars. These days Jupiter and an occasional glimpse of Venus are all that is visible behind the haze of city light.

I didn't get up on purpose in an attempt to see celestial phenomenon. I thought I would take a look since I was awake anyway. Sigh. Insomnia used to be an occasional issue. Now it is a regular feature of my life. I once prided myself on my ability to relax. Now I am unable to shut off my brain. I suspect it has something to do with lack of nookie. That's my theory anyway. I trotted my thesis past the wife. She disagreed with the premise.  She claimed that is my theory of everything. I volunteered to put the principle through a vigorous test cycle. She pretended not to hear me.

The snow from earlier in the week melted for the most part yesterday. It is already 50 this morning. Rain is slated to move in most of the day. This has been as mild a winter as any I can remember. That does not mean I'm not ready for spring. Boy, was that a poorly constructed sentence. Let me try again; I am ready for spring. I'm ready for baseball. I'm ready for cold beer and smooth cigars on my patio,

No, what I really want is to be sitting on a beach under a warm sun drinking piña coladas or maybe watching the ocean roll by from the deck of a cruise ship while I sip a rum-infused umbrella drink. I suspect that would be an even better medicine than a little nookie for what ails me. I'm willing to try both cures, just in case.