crash and burn in more ways than one

11:30 a.m. on May 31st, 2020 because I slept the last 16 hours or so

This is like shooting swamp rats back home in the canyon (Stay on Target!!),

Last evening was crash and burn night in more ways than one. As many American cities were being set on fire and were burning, I went off to take a nap about 4p.m. or so and the next thing I remember is this morning at about 6:30 a.m., After I sat up for about 2 cups of coffee and then went into the bedroom to get dressed, I woke up again about an hour ago. I finally got showered and dressed and here we are.

That's what happens when you barely sleep at all. Usually, I sleep somewhere between 3-5 hours a night and sometimes dramatically less, then about 2 o'clock in the afternoon I am ready for another nap until my wife gets home from work and we chat for a bit, she eats dinner and then we go to bed again. Lather, rinse, repeat until at some point I run totally out of gas and it eventually catches up with me and I crash into the brick wall and you couldn't wake me up with a shotgun blast. Have you ever experienced that weird feeling where you wake up and look at the light coming in the window, and it is sort of like daylight, so you look at the clock to see what time it is except you don't really know if it is telling you that it is morning or it's evening? Yeah, that was me this morning. While I was asleep last evening, riots were happening all across America.

So it is my understanding that police departments all across America got totally re-trained on-the-fly the last few days using practical OJT training, sponsored by the same good people who are complaining about the legacy being left to them by the last few generations. I guess living among burning embers and burned out apartments is preferable to standard housing but what do I know? Over 30+ (I don't know the exact number) of cities experienced rioting, demonstrating, and major clashes with the police all across the country last night. It is tough to write about this being about our so-called advanced societies like we are supposed to be.

I'll bet Canada regrets signing that lease they have above that crazy-ass meth lab now huh?

Allegedly, supposedly, purportedly, this was all set off by the actions of one corrupt patrolman cop in the town Minneapolis in the State of Minnesota in the US. The actions of one man killing another one-man are what some of the media says is the cause of these disruptions to life and these clashes with authority. If you buy that one I have a little swampland and a bridge I want you to take a look at, low money down, move in right away, free financing.

The actual cause of this goes a long way back in our society and we add to that cause like adding a match head to a tinderbox of dry grass and twigs every time we tolerate this nasty racist attitude that is so deep-seated in our society. We like to say that we are a tolerant society except for the HELL we are. If we were a tolerant society for whom there is a prevalent attitude of forgiveness and love and respect, we wouldn't have places like Chinatown (NYC has 8 of them), or schools that are more than 95% black students or neighborhoods all across this country that are segregated into color and race by choice and those that are not. If we were tolerant we would not tolerate singers of any color using racial words in their music. Because we are not tolerant we have abdicated our responsibilities to each other and to society and abandoned our morality by ceding the use of certain race and class words as "belonging" to one race or the other. If we were actually anywhere close to tolerant there would be no prison gangs run by color and race, and no need to even think about this as we classify and assign new inmates to wing and bunk assignments as they enter prison life.

The national security adviser doesn't agree with me. No systemic racism in Police departments

If we're really interested in changing our society for the better, we would have figured out long ago that to tolerate this way of thinking is to extend it not to extinguish it. We instead turn our head and let it flourish. We feed it by celebrating white supremacy and we celebrate it by allowing it. We allow it by glorifying drug use and gang life in our TV shows and movies, we give it a soul by lifting up our biggest stars for whom gangs were a way of life as they became famous and for whom recognition if not active participation has made them platinum artists and filthy rich millionaires. We feed this toleration of separate and unequal by laughing at old men for whom integration was a stain on their memories. We tolerate this type of society by not demanding that our police departments lead the way in racial and gender harmony and in racial and gender equality. We give this incipient bigotry an underlying place to fester and to live by allowing our defenders of law and truth and justice to only be so inclined when it doesn't involve one of their own.

When it involves one of their own, well, it's an us against them attitude and then we worry about protecting and defending and all that other crap it says on the outside of the cars. Make no mistake, I  am NOT saying that this is every cop and every department and certainly it is not in every case, however it is prevalent enough and it happens enough and exists enough so that everyone knows it exists and no one takes any action to grind it out of existence. In my opinion, this is the first thing that must change if we want George Floyd to be the last time a person of color dies because no one was strong enough or thought it was right enough to make that asshole get off of his neck. All it would have taken was one of those cops to say "Get off of the man's neck", and then pulled him off if he wouldn't move and Mr. Floyd would still be alive. It's funny how in God, Beans, Butter, and Bullets land in small-town America everywhere there were no riots or rioters huh?

That's because there are also almost no people of color there either. 

1. Space-X put two American astronauts into orbit yesterday. It didn't blow up either. Yay!!
   Full coverage here---> Space-X launch to docking with the ISS
   
   
2. In the age of social media and instant messaging just about anything anymore is fair game. Today in the News out of the good ole boy network in Thomaston Georgia, a Police Officer from that city has been terminated (for poor judgment), for sharing a picture of a Latino police officer wearing a black beauty masking product next to a blonde white woman and the caption read "I date a Black Man."
   
   Long Live the Dinosaurs!
   
   
3. The US Supreme Court has decided that the religious objections filed against orders and restrictions placed on church services are invalid and have allowed the restrictions to remain in place. These were obviously restrictions ordered by the government concerning social distancing and the like in response to the COVID-19 outbreak.
   
   The ruling was 5-4, Chief Justice John Roberts and the courts 4 liberals voted in favor.
   
   
4. Denzel Washington was spotted earlier this week putting his hand where his heart is. He was seen helping a distraught homeless man who was in the street back to the curb and he stuck around when police showed up and helped the man remain calm. Video and pictures show him holding the man's hand and encouraging him. This happened in West Hollywood CA, according to bystanders he was unaware of the filming until it was basically over. It was amazing how calm it stayed and the man was not detained after they determined he was not a danger to himself or others.
   
   I love feel-good stories.
   
   
5. It turns out however that the white ex-fired ass cop who knelt on Mr. Floy'd neck and killed him (I'm never saying the assholes name ever), worked together with Mr. Flotd as a security guard at the same Latin night club as recently as last year. The club's owner says this cop has a background of racist and over the top reactions.
   
   Imagine that. Maybe that will come out at trial.
   
   
   "Your Honor, our next ten witnesses are folks arrested by the defendant who all have broken legs, knees, fingers, or knuckles and the like from the defendant. Their police reports all say "They fell down".
   
   BigMike

Get rid of the Dinosaurs

Last day in May of 2020 on the 30th at about 4:30 a.m. who needs sleep anyway

Sleep is overrated, its all you ever you do, once you're dead,

So like any other web site, I track visits or what is called hits. Specifically, I look at a couple of things, one is how many people made it as far as to open the blog and look at it, however brief that may be and the other is the referring URL, that is the basis of the visit, where was the link from that sent them here. I also look at other stuff but only because its there, things like what country are they from, what part of the USA referred them, etc.

Overwhelmingly, almost 100% of my visitors come from my Facebook feed on my personal page saying there is a blog post to go look at. About 50% of my readers use a mobile device and almost all of them that are mobile devices are using iPhones. I have occasional visitors from all over but for the high majority of them they are American, and within the 48 states, except for one person whom I know that looks at it that comes from Alaska. That's pretty cool, and so is she (wink, wink). One thing I found odd is that my Facebook friends in Canada don't seem to care for my blog? Oh well. Nothing I can do about that. It's not like I am selling books trying to appeal to a worldwide audience huh?

I haven't been able to sleep much in the past 48-72 hours. A few hours here and there but mostly I've been pondering the same questions in my mind that I know there are no answers to. Things like what in the hell where they thinking (the cop). What in hell were the other cops thinking? Why does it seem like Minnesota is always right in the middle of this stupid shit? Is it the cold weather in the winter? Do they have to many Somalian area refugees and it has made them all crazy dealing with "foreigners"? Why did those dumbass cops think it was a good idea to arrest a CNN news crew live on air? What did they think that was going to get them? I can't imagine a conversation going on in somebody's head saying "Man. I'm gonna be famous tonight! I locked up a news crew!" Did anybody call their boss and say "Hey Boss, we're locking up a CNN reporter of color right now and his crew, you got a problem with that?"  I'm guessing there was a police commander blowing his stack yelling "Have you idiots been paying attention to what's been going on at all for the past couple of days?.

It is pretty tough for me to stay completely out of the politics of all this. I want to bash somebody so bad, but know it would only inflame and do no good at all (and I'm not talking about the Orange Tornado). No politics though, whew!

I wonder if there is a tape, is there a 911 call where the boss is on record right now just absolutely losing his shit because they had to let them go and the Governor apologized for them? Can you imagine how much ass-kissing and ass-covering is going on right now in Minnesota? Do any of these questions seem to be ones that would have been good training scenario questions?  How long are good cops gonna keep covering up for bad cops like THAT jackass in keeping with the famous tradition of protecting their brothers and keeping a strong thin blue line? Does that make any sense to you at all? I'd pay money to hear that 911 tape though, I'll bet it's under lock and key with a quickness.

I think All that was missing this week was snarling dogs, rubber truncheons and a good old water cannon. That would have helped I'm sure.

You know, in the last 20 years we have spent literally millions and millions of dollars militarizing our police departments and doing idiotic shit like sending Hunmees and flak jackets and stormtrooper gear to all these cities in this so-called fight against terrorism. I believe they should come and take it all back. Calhoun Ga doesn't need military-style police gear, but we have a Humvee. We should take every piece of military supplied gear back. Then to replace it they should give the cities and the states the money to hire cops and then require that they actually train them. I mean real training, not this bunch of wink, wink, grab your nuts, and tell war stories training they are famous for. I'm not talking about a bunch of times on the range either.

We have enough square-jawed iron pumper crew cut wearing gung ho cops everywhere you look already. I don't really think we need any more of them. Do some rigorous Navy seal style weed out the nonhackers who can't make good decisions kind of training, and then do what? I'll tell you what, Do what our Sherrif Mitch Ralston in Gordon County Ga did and Go through the ranks and throw out every idiot you have that is wearing a badge and do not tolerate this shit in your departments, not one minute longer, police union or no police union. Enough is enough is enough is enough.

On a more introspective note, do you think any of the peaceful protesters, did any of them have any problem with an Auto Zone being burned to the ground? I saw a bunch of stories about how they were out picking up the trash left behind in the streets by the looters. and I believe that's pretty cool. Did burning the Auto Zone down somehow advance their cause of "George Floyd, I can't breathe, I need brakes for a '99 Chevy?" Did that help at all? Participating in your protest and wearing the same clothes, the same masks later on captured on surveillance video and news cameras and also rioting, did that do any damn good at all?

Several newscasters showed pictures of some young guys who I guess couldn't resist but to participate in both sides of the melee. One series of shots show these two guys protesting and when the sun went down it shows the same two guys apparently, knocking the crap out of a police SUV. What does the community of color gain when Ferguson or Atlanta or LA or Minneapolis is set on fire? I asked that question out loud and someone said "Black people are tired of being treated like shit on the bottom of the white man's shoe".  OK, well that begs a further inquisition? I am a curious kind of guy so please answer me this. I'm begging you for a serious answer, anyone, anyone at all, please explain to me how making an absolute mess of your own community,  of your own communities businesses, the place where you live and eat and do business, of leaving burning streets and cars and buildings and mountains of trash and flaming debris and then fighting for 2 or 3 nights with the police until the damn National Guard is called in promote your cause?

How in the hell does this help?, I'd sure like to know because I have not the first clue how this does any good. Just how do you think the politicians are going to react in this age of cameras and DNA and forensics and investigatory prowess? Do you think they will just roll over and give up? Oh well, nothing we can do, Ya THINK?

Do you think any politician in his or her right mind could stay in office for very long by advocating a policy of retreat and surrender? I am watching countless videos of mostly black but not all black and lots of dark-skinned protesters with very very few white folks (factually stated just look at the videos) fighting with police and burning things to the ground and looting and wondering how this gets justified this time, that somehow this is more "White Privilege", that absolutely stupid and infuriating phrase coined by some sociology professor who went back to his neat and tidy house in the gated community after the interview. I only heard one other worse piece of Garbage catchphrase, the one that thinks one skin color matters more than all the others.

And Don't say the N-word but you know we can, JUST get a grip.

Does any protester seriously think that a police officer in his right mind is going to approach a situation like this with anything other than the intention to stop it by the force that is necessary? Are you going to protest tomorrow when several people get shot and killed by police in running gun battles with other people and with the police? Do you seriously think the police are just going to stop enforcing the law because you are mad? Protests have erupted in at least 20 major US cities overnight. How many people are going to hospitalized or injured before you have a big enough TV and that is justification enough?

As dozens of people are arrested in Minneapolis for various nonprotest related crimes like burglary, arson, looting, and other acts of stupidity the Governor has activated over 1700 National Guard troops to come to town and restore order. Make no mistake, the military will restore order if they have to kill your ass to do it. Anybody remember the Rambo story? That was a movie and a made-up story, however, those kinds of actions actually happened.

Kent State actually happened. Soldiers are not cops.

When it gets this bad that the politicians hand over the fighting to the military, people usually die, its what they do. It's what we train them to do. Is this really what all of you idiots want? And for the record, Bob, I'm glad you were not there because I know you would have stopped that cop and you would have gone to jail yelling at his stupid ass the whole way. I would have bailed you out and even though you would have hated every second of it I would have turned your case into a national cause and had the ACLU defending your ass too. Like I said Bob, I'm glad you were not there. You know who you are. I love you too much to see you rot in Jail.

My favorite phrase, Jesus H. Katy Christ on a Crutch this is so freaking stupid.

1. 1700 National Guard deployed in Minneapolis. These are citizen soldiers. I hope someone has locked up the ammo. More than 2500 officers from everywhere are helping to keep the peace. This is the largest deployment in Minnesota history.
   
   The kneeling Numbnuts bail is set at $500,000 and his wife has filed for divorce. I didn't know you could get bail for murder. I'm gonna have to ask Lucas Davenport about that. After all the BCA arrested him.
   
   Welcome to the club Minnesota. Your people are stupid too.
   
   
2. The city of Portland Oregon has declared a riot underway and has ordered protesters to go home. The friggin tree huggin liberals are rioting for crying out loud!
   
   Their shootings and at least one death in Detroit, oh and riots too, but they are used to it. Hell Detroit has been on fire since about 1987 I think.
   
   Denver has been hit by unrest and the National Guard has been deployed in Atlanta as well. Governor Kemp has declared a state of emergency and has ordered everyone to leave the area and all businesses to close. I'll bet he had to ask somebody how to do all of that too. About 80 miles from me give or take a couple of miles with at least a bunch of broken windows, 2 cops hurt, burning stuff and LOTS AND LOTS of stupid on Patrol.
   
   Dallas says their protests have been mostly peaceful and they have the support of the mayor and the police.  And so forth and so on, I'm sure you get the drift here.
   
   
3. LA has declared a curfew and ordered everyone to go home or face arrest. A few have been arrested, blocking the highway and breaking windows is discouraged in Hollywood. What a bunch of idiots. The impact would have been much bigger without the looting and the violence.
   
   
4. Lost in all of this was the story that one of Space-X's other toys, the SN4 a so-called Starship, blew u on the pad today. It was a major explosion. From an article about it "SpaceX had just conducted yet another static fire test of the Raptor engine in its Starship SN4 prototype launch vehicle on Friday when the test vehicle exploded on the test stand in Boca Chica, Texas. This was the fourth static fire test of this engine on this prototype, so it’s unclear what went wrong versus other static fire attempts.
   
   StarShip Blows Up VIDEO LINK
5. In local news from the carpet capital of the world dalton Ga, the headline is "Unemployment rate in Dalton, Georgia, jumps above 20% in record job losses during April", This is right here around here where I live so this is news to us. 20.5% Unemployment is a big Fat Hairy deal.
   
   
   - From The website - The coronavirus pulled the rug out from the Carpet Capital last month, pushing unemployment in metropolitan Dalton to a record high rate of 20.5%. The Georgia Department of Labor and Workforce Development said Thursday that employers in Whitfield and Murray counties shed 1,657 jobs during April following major job cuts in March. Over the past 12 months, employment in the Dalton area fell by 13.8%, or 8,569 jobs, as carpet mills, restaurants, and other major employers furloughed workers due to government-ordered shutdowns and lower sales.
   Read the whole article here ---> Dalton Unemployment 20.50%
   
   
   Crap is occurring, keep your head down.
   High-Speed defecation is being impacted by whirling spreader devices.
   
   - BigMike
   
   

The Criminology edition

05/29/2020 on a Friday morning at about 6:00 a.m. damn the birds are noisy today

I don't have a snappy opening today sorry, I am just too brained in my brain,

You know it seemed like when I was a little kid that we had national tragedies that were much differently defined than the kinds we have today. I'm not saying one or the other is better I'm just noting for the record that when I look back at my childhood years it seemed like the big stuff going on was really big stuff. I now know that it was just the events of the day being blanketed over by the ugly undertones of what was to come. We had the four major assassinations in the '60s, with Dr. King, JFK, Bobby Kennedy, and Malcolm X all being shot and killed with about 5 years of each other.

We had an ugly war that cost us over 58,000 American soldiers and we really didn't achieve that much once it was all said and done, except maybe the development of a few new weapon systems. We had a civil rights movement that made major strides towards achieving racial equality and took definitive steps towards racial equity. We had a national discussion that thought long and hard about the role of women in our society and moved us toward an era where we are more equal than not. That's not all to be sure, I'm not trying to write a definitive treatise on any subject. It just felt like as a society we were trying to work out our differences.

I thought maybe we were on the right track.

In the world of today, we have anxiety so bad that seventh-graders take huge handguns and rifles to school and shoot up the school and kill their classmates. We have embraced divisiveness so deep that we talk the language of war when speaking of others with who we disagree. For really the first time that I can remember, there is open talk of insurrection and civil disobedience so strong that it smacks of a society that seeks to conquer itself. We have had open talks about movements within states in our union that seek to form separate countries of their own.

Like never before in our society has the lack of a national voice been so strong. In the past 20 years, there have been at least 25 incidents of deaths at the hands of authorities. There have been at least 10 deaths of police officers that I know of (and maybe more) where they were murdered in cold blood in the line of duty, where the criminals that shot them just walked up and pulled the trigger, while they were sitting at a stoplight, while they were pumping gas, while they were eating a meal in a restaurant, or while they were sitting somewhere at the end of their shift completing the paperwork necessary to end their day. It has happened so often that it is sad to say, it is no longer shocking and it damn well should be.

Now another death and another uprising that eventually will be quelled hopefully without the use of military force. Peace will finally be restored in Minnesota and elsewhere but I am not so naive as to think that will be the end of it. We had Rodney King and the LA riots some time ago and did that change anything?

There are lessons to be learned here I am sure, however, I'm also sure that as we speak there are forces gathering that see a conspiracy in every move. That sees an underlying agenda being directed from an unknown force being applied to push the population is a certain direction.

Sadly, that will not end unless and until we have a reason to act as one united people.

1. The riots in Minnesota are NOT understandable but are somewhat of a given because of the gravity of the situation at hand there. What is not understandable is the connection being made between the man's death (George Floyd) and the people that are looting the Target at the mall, the young fellas who burned down the Auto Zone, or who were seen on cameras stealing TV's and electronics.
   
   The peaceful and angry protests underway are good people doing what they think is right. Protesting tyranny is a given right enshrined in our deepest principles, much as is the freedom of speech. This part is democracy in action. We must accept the right to protest if we also accept the right of rule of law.  You cannot have one without the other, because you really can't please everybody, all the time.  Protesting is one of our deepest most closely held philosophies as a country.
   
   I do not see the right to burn down an apartment building or smash windows in a beauty salon the same way. Nowhere in any of our founding documents does it say "When you are pissed off go steal liquor from the corner liquor store and when you have emptied it, burn it down to the ground."
   
   Protesting is legal and protected free speech and should be.
   Rioting and looting is felony criminal activity and those caught doing so belong in jail.
   
   
2. Every cop page I have seen on social media ( and there are a few) have decried the actions of the kneeling cop in Minnesota, who murdered George Floyd. And yes I said Murder because even if were deemed to be legal, it was still a murder by definition. When you cause the death of another that person has been murdered. Every Police officer I know (and I know several) has came out very strongly against what happened and has decried the actions taken by that officer as illegal and wrong. Not one Cop I have seen quoted has supported him. They are 100% against his tactics. Every one of them says he should be held accountable. Every single one of them has come out against what happened.
   
   I am happy to see that and fully support their right to express their opinion about the matter. The saddest part for them is that now ALL of them know this and all of them must wear the stain of this death on their badges every time they strap on their weapons. Every time they dress for work, they know that every person who looks at them will wonder if they are like THAT guy.
   
   There are a ton of good cops behind their badges on duty in America every day. I know a few of them. I respect them for the sacrifice they make every day, for the dangers they face, and am saddened by the CRAP they will now have to put up with because of cops like THAT guy.
   
   See? This is the problem with the so-called "thin blue line", in protecting their "brother officers", they sometimes end up protecting a creep like this lousy piece of crap of a human being who could care less about whether someone he is arresting lives or dies. I guarantee there are stories out there (if you could get them to be told) of other excesses committed by this guy. I'm also sure there are stories about where other cops just stood there and felt like they could do nothing, because there is a culture in place almost everywhere that protects that kind of behavior.
   
   Nobody wants to be the cop who calls for help and won't get any because the other cops know he stood up against a "fellow officer".
   
   See? That's the problem, they are protecting the wrong guy.
   
   
3. A Mexican drug lord named Rafael Caro-Quintero has filed a plea argument in Federal District court in Mexico (Not here, we would laugh his ass out of the room) where he is claiming that he is too poor and too old and lacks a pension and he has no income and therefore because of that he should be "excused" from extradition to the US. He is wanted for drug trafficking and his involvement in the death of DEA agent Kiki Carmena.
   
   I have never seen someone claim they were too broke to be prosecuted or too old to go to jail (he is 60 years old). He was "mistakenly" let out of prison in Mexico and remains at large where he is hiding out in the mountains with his large drug cartel involved family. It's funny how these guys in Mexico keep getting "accidentally" released from prison huh?
   
   
4. There are reportedly hundreds of tunnels along the US-Mexican border used by drug traffickers to smuggle all kinds of drugs and other contraband across the border. Everything from weed to sex slaves has been intercepted in these tunnels. There are so many of them that they call it the "Cocaine Alleyway", and dozens of them have been found and closed in recent years.
   
   I have a novel idea. Let us use some of that spy gear stuff we have to locate every one of these tunnels of love and get rid of them all at once. We could put sensors in the ground all along the border and listen for digging and use some of those fancy-ass satellites to see the ground with ground-penetrating radar or some such high tech stuff and identify every one of those tunnels. Once we have identified them we tell Mexico to get every one of their citizens at least a mile away from the places where those tunnels are. We buy or condemn all the surrounding property and keep our folks away too and then guess what?
   
   Carpet bomb that shit with about 10 million dollars of bunker-busting precision munitions from an overhead B-52 and then keep bombing that shit until we are sure we have collapsed every single tunnel. Quit playing cops and robbers with this stuff. If its a war on drugs, then by god, let's have a war.
   
   I'll bet they stop using tunnels.
   
   
5. Since April 1st of this year, the US Navy and the US Coast Guard have been working together to stop narco drug trafficking on the open seas. Just in the last 6 weeks or so, they have reported stopping 3 Narco subs (not actually subs as they can't submerge completely), and have seized over 9,100 lbs of pure cocaine. I say step it up, guys, let's have a real war and go after where they build the subs in South America too. Use the same strategy as in my previous point.
   
   I'm sick of this crap. Quit fooling around and get to it.
   
   BigMike

Buy your Icees on Amazon

05:30 a.m. on a great big drippy Thursday morning full of clouds and more rain YAY!!

In the grand scheme of things we are but wee bits of dust floating through time,

You know, I'm not exactly what you would call an early adopter of anything. Cars, clothes, trends, technology, you name it and I usually wait until they have it figured out before I change what I'm doing. On some things, I may never change because I'm convinced that a lot of the time the reasons you hear for changing are not really valid in the first place. I find that if you just wait a little bit the marketing hype is usually exposed and the real reasons are brought to light. I'm not so naive that I think I am always right about this kind of thing, however, I've been proven right time after time. By the time I am ready to get something or change what I'm using or doing, it's either going to be declared obsolete in a few days or replaced with the newer model, and mine will be no longer sold or supported by the place I bought it from though.

That's the downside of not jumping on the new product bandwagon, you sometimes get left behind. I still play an original Xbox and have two Xbox 360's in two different places in my house. I have no little kids so I see no need to get any kind of upgrade for a video game system and in the future, I'm not sure I will see a need then either. My daughter and son both bought this handheld system called a Switch made by Nintendo. Its a nifty little thing and has a great display and all but I don't see myself playing it. I hardly play what I have. It would just sit around and gather dust in the pile Of the stuff I can't find time to use. It seems to be pretty cool, but I don't see me playing it.

I still use a Windows XP computer every day for some odd chores. I also have a netbook running XP that is on 24 hours a day and displays the network view of my security system in my bedroom. I have two other computers in daily use that are running Windows 7 and my wife is using a Windows 7 laptop as well. I'm typing this blog post on a laptop running Windows 10 and my in-home file server actually is a Windows 2000 Compaq Web Server. They all do the job we need them to do and they do them just fine. They are secure and are protected in various ways so I really don't see the need to rush out and believe the hype that the world is gonna crash if we don't update everything to Windows 10 and throw all that useless "insecure obsolete junk" away. A long time ago I bought a Microsoft Zune media player because I was convinced It was the next big thing after mp3 players hit the market. At the time even though I had a healthy distrust of Microsoft over their policies of releasing unfinished crap and calling it software, I thought the 32 Gb version of the Zune had staying power and would power the music revolution. Shows you what I know huh? They dropped the damn thing about 3 months after I bought into the hype. The thing is though, it still works perfectly to this day.

So now that we have determined that I'm no Oracle of wisdom, I would like to point out some interesting things. I have a healthy distrust of hype in general so when they started saying we had to switch away from Windows XP because it was so "Insecure, full of holes, out of date" and so forth all I heard was "We need to sell you new stuff". It turns out I was as close to right as you can be in this situation because of what happened next. Right after Windows XP, we were led to believe that Vista was the savior and it would fix everything. Except that no one liked Vista and it had a curious problem. It crashed. A lot. So they rolled out a Service Pack to fix it. Except for one thing. It broke more than it fixed. It made networking home computers impossible and made consumers very very mad. So they rolled out another Service Pack, except they rebranded it and renamed Windows Vista too, wait for it, tada tada, Windows 7, which they then started selling as a stand-alone operating system.

Several months passed and in the lifecycle development of Operating systems also called sales year over last year began to lag and what happened next was no surprise. All of a sudden Windows 7 was "Insecure, and full of holes and couldn't be trusted" to keep your computer and data safe any longer because of the ever-evolving threats from the internet. You just had to get Windows 8 in order to be safe. Except for one very tiny problem. A really very small problem that almost went by unnoticed happened to consumers who believed the hype that Microsoft wouldn't "support" their systems any longer. They changed everything to a new kind of interface with controls and buttons in all-new places and EVERYONE  and I mean  EVERYONE hated it. The backlash they faced over the switch they made with Windows 8 got people in Redmond Wa. fired because they told the bosses that everyone would love it and it was seamless change and the transition would be smooth. Ha! No one liked it at all and most people either spent money downloading software that made their machines look like the other versions they had or they downloaded the instructions to do it themselves. A small percentage hated it so much they deleted it and started over with the last version. Then came Windows 10 which is a combined version of both Windows 8 and 10 and tried to make everybody happy. Most home users still don't like it unless this is what they used in school and got used to this somewhere else. Anyone old enough to remember Vista hates Windows 10, I'm convinced of that.

Did you notice that there was no Windows 9? Well, there actually was but no one knew it. They sent out one of their famous Service Packs as they updated Windows 8 which was an almost complete re-write of the operating system but it took so long and they almost had the next versions ready to ship so they just decided to skip the Windows 9 nameplate because it would have confused everyone and made them look dumber than they already did. Bill gates had already left the company by this point with his Billions so he didn't give two craps anyway.

Before you get on me about my so-called love of Windows XP however let me let you in on a little secret. First, it has a bigger share of the overall market than the original Windows 8, the Chrome OS, and Vista. It's also much bigger individually than any version of Linux or the MAC OSX system.
You can see for yourself at OP system Market Share,  Keep in mind that this does not include any of the embedded versions of XP that are running every machine in almost every factory around the world and in every restaurant system that uses multiple display systems. It's also still used in almost every major banking system ATM machines. That's right boys and Girls, the insecure and useless version of Windows that Microsoft hyped as so bad for us is what you trust to safeguard your money. There are also millions of versions of this system embedded on chips in everything from gas pumps to freight trains to ticketing systems to air traffic control systems around the world. the last time I saw a cost analysis they said it would take expenditures in the hundreds of billions of dollars to upgrade this to newer systems and there would probably be ZERO payback for doing so. Do you feel lied to yet?

So anyway, to make a long story long, I'm not an early adopter of anything however I finally replaced my iPhone 5s with an iPhone 11 the other day. It's nice and everything but I resent the fact that I had to get new charging cables for it. Although this wireless charging thing is pretty cool so I'll give it that. I'm sure since I just got it that any day now they will announce it is obsolete and needs to be replaced.

Now boarding on track 9, Chattanooga, Kansas City, and Cucamonga! All aboard!!

1. This cop situation in Minneapolis is disheartening, to say the least. Another man dies for no good reason. If the video of the man basically dying under the knee of the cop doesn't bother you then really, you need professional help. I love cops and count a couple as friends. I would not want to live in a society without them. There is no spin and no way to support what this man did, however. He should be arrested and tried for whatever level of murder is appropriate. A thousand miles away, Chattanooga Police Chief David Roddy is making his voice heard, telling fellow law enforcement officers they should turn in their badges if they don't have an issue with the officers' actions.
   
   
   Chattanooga Police Chief Quote
   
   
   I'm not a prosecutor and am not an attorney so I will leave it to them to argue the circumstances, however it is my opinion that this man, the policeman, belongs in jail for what he did. I don't know any other person, policeman, or not who would have done what he did.  It is so sad and so unnecessary, That doesn't excuse the looting and the fires being set and the rioting, however. They are just using this provocation as an excuse to be wild and crazy and to rob and burn. It will change nothing to throw bottles of lit gasoline into Auto Parts stores.
   
   
2. The weather has delayed the Space-X launch of the astronauts into space until this Saturday. I hope they get it right.
   
   
3. Animals that are used to dealing regularly with humans such as your own pets and the ones in petting zoos and animal water parks are displaying some pretty strange behaviors. There are stories of Dolphins bring gifts to people walking along the shore. Other stories and videos on Youtube purport to show wild animals taking strolls into city spaces they normally wouldn't come anywhere near. Experts say that it would take multiple years of lockdowns to really change a species behavior around us, but the evidence to the contrary is everywhere especially online.
   
   
4. An active-duty soldier assigned to Fort Leavenworth intervened in and stopped an active-shooter situation yesterday near his base. Apparently, the nut job (they haven't released any names yet) was shooting indiscriminately at people with a long rifle and a handgun and the soldier ran him over with his car. Good for him. People are calling him a hero, Police say he undoubtedly saved countless lives. Good for him. They better not charge him with anything.
   
   
5. Shoppers' buying habits are changing rapidly and appear to be going to stay that way according to industry analysts. They say as more of the workforce becomes online shoppers for consumer goods and as the older population starts to embrace new technologies, this trend will probably grow and never reverse. Early evidence suggests a shift in buying habits is accelerating, that consumers are buying more products for health and hygiene, and are increasingly more cost-conscious as well. A lot is unknown but it is clear that lifestyle shifts and trends in spending patterns are going to outlast social distancing measures. Some large online retailers have seen gains of as much as 30% in online shopping, with Proctor and Gamble reporting an upward push of 35%. Something to think about kids.
   
   
   I already have stopped buying Icees at Kroger.
   I can get them cheaper and all year long from Amazon !!
   
   BigMike

School with PJ

on May 27th, 2020 at about 6:25 a.m. I started writing today's blog entry

It was a bright summer night, dark and nasty weather, overcast with brilliant sunshine everywhere,

This morning I want to take a minute and report a success story. Not mine, god no but two of the little rug rats that I have semi adopted as pseudo grandchildren. These two little curtain climbing yard apes I'm talking about are underage so I won't mention their names, so let's just call them X and L. Both of them had to go to Grandma's house for further education and sessions in practical life counseling when school was canceled after the coronavirus pandemic started. Both of them had no option, and had to attend the "Grandmas School of Combat Math and Physical History". Neither one of them is particularly interested in school, I mean they are NOT bad kids, however, they can be a handful to get focused and directed towards the goals you have for them. Neither one of them knew exactly what to expect, however, they loved their MawMaw (is that how you spell it?) so they trusted her to do the right thing.

Both immediately leaned two real basics. One was it wouldn't work to say they "didn't like" a subject or a task given to complete because at MawMaws house there was no 3 o'clock bell and the second one was this teacher don't take any shit from people that are 3 feet tall. Both tried the old "My teacher says blah blah blah" and "That's not how we do it in my class." Both tried to argue fundamental facts until they were blue in the face but to no avail. 9 X 7 is not 63? Well let's write that down a hundred times after we figure it out to see if you can remember it and remember it's not a real smart idea to stand and argue with the teacher about things you don't actually understand. And you didn't like something? Well, that's just too damn bad because like it or not, attitude or not, tantrum or not, foot stomp or not, it was still going to be there when they got done with the display and they still had to do it and now it took longer than it would have because MawMaw doesn't play. Get a pencil.

So anyway to make a long story long, as the spring progressed and they found a rhythm with each other and with MawMaw the teacher, they figured out that she isn't an old fuddy-duddy dumbass and My God! MawMaw actually knows what in the hell she is talking about. Their poor regular teachers next year are going to get blasted every day with "Un-uh, that's not what MawMaw says" especially with the dumbass common core math stuff. They may as well dump that strategy in the trash because I am sure that parents all over the nation did within the first week of homeschooling because that stuff doesn't teach children math, it just confuses them and interrupts their thinking.

Pretty soon, within a week or two both of them started to be able to complete assignments at the right pace, they both learned how to fix MawMaw's coffee, they both learned other skills like sewing and shooting (PawPaw was involved too when he could be, cause he had to work for a bunch), and both of them started to enjoy learning (but would never admit it) at MawMaws house. When the time finally came at the end of 6 or 7 weeks of learning, they both had to take their online tests to see if they would score high enough to pass onto the next grade. Something surprising happened! Both of them not only surprised themselves by scoring higher than usual but X was even awarded a Merit Award for all A's and B's, and that I think is a historic event. I am sure L did very well also but I haven't heard details about hers yet.

It goes without saying that we are all very proud of them, and are very proud of their individual efforts. I know that it seemed very hard for them at first but near the end of the school year and after only 5 or 6 weeks a curious thing sorta happened. They stopped fighting with the teacher and more importantly stopped fighting with themselves. They found out it just wasted time, didn't make anyone feel sympathetic, and didn't work to get what they wanted anyway. Knuckling down and doing the work got it done quickly and they had more playtime. They sorta figured this out all on their own. I just think it's funny how they both were able to perform when the teacher was not afraid to get in their ass and call them on their nonsense.

Maybe the school teachers should attend a couple of weeks of school with PJ too?

Tiger Woods teamed up with Peyton Manning and played a for charity golf match against Phil Mickelson (whom I like) teamed up with Tom Brady (Mr. I'm a Buc now!) in a live broadcast event. That's how desperate America is for sports right now, Golf matches and Korean Baseball along with championship Cornhole tournaments and 40 years ago world series. Like I said, I like Phil Mickelson so I will not bash him, however, it sure was good to see Tom Brady get beat by Peyton again at something. It could have been darts or checkers and I would have liked seeing Brady getting his ass beat at something, anything.

Ken Jennings won something like 74 games on his amazing streak. I missed all of them.

1. I really enjoyed watching Jeopardy when James Holzhauer was winning all those games. He won 32 games in a row and was only about $60,000 behind Ken Jennings when he finally lost. The guy is funny and charming and smart and easy to like.
2. The number of available ICU beds keeps declining at a steady pace nationwide. They open up in one area like NYC only to decline in others like Alabama. This morning Alabama says they have no effective beds available and are backing up people who need ICU beds into their Emergency Departments. For the first time ever doctors nationwide are openly expressing frustration with having no effective treatments available except for support and palliative care. Predictably those states that opened up early or had a very weak stay at home order, to begin with are seeing the second round of Coronavirus cases peak at higher levels. I talked about that a week or two ago and guess where one of those places is? Right here all around me in good old boy country in Georgia.
3. Nasa and Elon Musks company Space-X are launching astronauts into space to visit the International Space station today. This marks the beginning of US-originated manned space flights that feature a public-private partnership leading the way. If they launch today, and maybe not because of bad weather, this will be the first time a rocket with American astronauts has launched into space from American soil since the shuttle program was canceled in 2011. Good luck and GodSpeed fellas.
4. Really I will never understand how people like this guy ever rose to a position of power in the first place. It is disgusting to think this guy was making decisions about people's lives. It seems like it takes up years to figure out that a pig is a pig.
   
   The State Supreme Court of New Jersey has removed State Supreme Court judge John Russo Jr., from the bench and has precluded him from ever presiding over a state courtroom ever again. He was found to have violated the NJ Code of Judicial conduct on several occasions (at least 4 times) and specifically when he asked a rape survivor in open court among other stupid things "Why didn't she attempt to stop the rape from occurring by closing her legs", intimating that because she was an exotic dancer she must have had more practical experience than many would have and should have known better.
   
   Jesus Katy H. Christ on a crutch what a flaming dipshit!
5. My county yesterday had a for-real episode of S.W.A.T. play out in one of the local "dollarwaller" hot sheet motels yesterday. Three total people were arrested from the motel, two males and one female when the police were called on the male subject for displaying some kind of behavior that got him noticed. The woman and one man was taken into custody without incident however the man showed officers a gun and went inside the room and had to be smoked out with tear gas.
   
   He was then arrested, naked wrapped in a sheet.
   
   Stupidity abounds in Gordon county Georgia.
   
   
   Toga, toga, toga
   
   BigMike

Sleep tight, you know the rest

May 26, 2020, on Tuesday morning at about 5:30 a.m. or so

Got er did fer today at least, what follers is what er did,

I noticed that ESPN followed up their Michael Jordan documentary "The Last Dance" with one about Lance Armstrong annoyingly titled "Lance" or something like that. Aside from the maybe obvious issues with the choice of subject following one about Michael Jordan, I  have one silly stupid question concerning the choice of topic. That question to put it delicately is "Does anyone in their right mind give a flying fart about Lance Armstrong?"  I know I couldn't care any less about that guy and even though we share the same name and I do like him the only reason I watched most of the Jordan episodes is that I found the subject matter interesting and compelling. I don't really care what the uber millionaire ex-teammates had to say about him and only later, in the show was it interesting in any context. I don't care what Mrs. Pippen thinks and I could care less what Isiah Thomas had to say about Jordan or the Bulls mostly because he was a big phony at the time and is a braggart and a sore loser with an insufferable mouth and a huge ego now. The one person who I sort of understood in his reaction was Bill Laimbeer, the bad boy of Pistons fame and he didn't say all that much. Pretty much he said, "I lived it, and crap, It's TV man.". That I understand.

Being in a self-imposed quarantine and then watching the news and other reports about people packing the beaches and other resorts without regard to the deadliness of this virus are sort of surreal. It's like no we are not in the middle of a pandemic, No we are not in the realm of 100,000 dead and more dying every day. No over ten thousand health care workers have not died from this thing, No blacks, and poor folks and old folks are not dying at a rate higher than anyone else. Forget all of that, the water is warm, the waves are kicking, the sand is inviting, come on in baby!!

To listen to all the folks on Facebook and other social media talk there is no virus, people wearing masks are idiots, the CDC and every other doctor has no idea what they are talking about because they are obviously stupid and a bunch of liberals, this is all a hoax to make us get chipped so "they" can control us and can reduce the population. It doesn't matter that there isn't a "chip" that can carry its own power source to constantly report your location for any significant length of time and that what they are describing is actually the damn cell phone in their own pocket, that that technology is not available to track 350 million people via this mysterious "chip".

It doesn't matter that there is no actual vaccine or cure for this available and it just does not seem to matter that facts do not matter. Memes matter, pictures matter even if they are photoshopped and you can prove it, being outraged about proven science doesn't matter and the more outrageous the better or so it seems. I am confused and think any day now they are going to announce that Gatorade is going to be used for plant irrigation. Damn the torpedos and full steam ahead**!!

I'm hooked on those shows that are about the Zoos. Between them and the Veterinarian shows I have learned a bunch about animals and their conservancy that I never knew before I started watching. I especially like the ones that come from the Bronx zoo where Dr. Jim Breheny is the director. He just has a way about him that explains the subject matter in a simple way even if the matter being discussed is complex and pretty serious. It gives you a whole new level of respect for individuals that choose to be workers and zookeepers in the individual parks.

My daughter and one of her oldest friends went last weekend in the Zoo in Jacksonville Fl. They have been around each other since the virus started because her friend just moved from another state and she has been helping her pack and unpack and so forth. At the end of the move in experience, they went to the Zoo. She was telling me about hand-feeding the Giraffes. It didn't really become real until she showed me a picture one of them took in the tower they use to interact with the giraffes. It looks sort of like a treehouse and is probably 20-25 feet up in the air. Looking at her in the picture, knowing what her size is and then mentally comparing it to the Giraffe that was standing flat-footed sticking its head in the treehouse really brings the size and scale of this animal into focus. Man, this thing had to be 20 feet tall. It was amazing. She had a great time and now I hate that skittle commercial where the guy is milking a giraffe even more than I did before.

Yesterday I had to admit out loud that I really didn't know what the definition of the Millenial generation was because once my wife told me what it was, It was apparent that none of my kids are anywhere near it. I feel sorry for parents that didn't know they were raising their children to be like that. The fact that they did it with the participation trophies and the instant gratification and all that? Yeah, that's all on them, I didn't do it. My kids paid for their own cell phones by being on a pay as you go plan until they understood it. They had to put a large portion of their paychecks into savings every payday to make sure they understood the value of money. They had to pay for their own things unless it was something special because I didn't want a bunch of entitled brats following me around asking for money until they were 40. They had to balance their bank accounts each month until they were 18 to prove they could handle their own money. Yeah, sounds like I'm clueless and mean huh?

I don't care, they can all take care of themselves now because the objective the whole time was not to raise kids. It was to raise adults. Actually, we all laugh at Millenials as they are shown on TV now.

I'll take English Literature of the 1500s for $800 Alex (barf)

1. Did you know that Rachel Welch and Jayne Mansfield both were discussed for the role of Ginger on Gilligans Island? Apparently, Jayne's husband didn't want her to take the role because he thought it was beneath her and Ms. Welch wasn't "The Girl next door" type enough for the producers. Man they are nuts.
   
   
2. Three big industries are going to undergo major revisions and changes in how they do business once we are in better shape from the quarantine due to the pandemic. The changes will probably be radical and immediate.
   
   First to change will be the airline industry where meals and amenities will drastically change. On some flights where the accommodations can't be made fast enough, meals will probably be eliminated. You won't be able to get a pillow or a blanket on a lot of flights either. Also according to experts, you will see unprofitable planes, associations, routes and some smaller airlines will just not recover, They will just fade out and die.
   
   Next look at the Rental Car industry. Cars will change, pick up and drop off will change and also experts say that more locations that are independent of airports will emerge as a way to hedge their bet against this kind of stoppage again. Also, changes will probably be made to the type of cars offered as the luxury car was hit hardest in this segment and more average vehicles will be offered instead.
   
   Lastly and by no means is this a complete list as hundreds of industries will change, but restaurants are already undergoing a radical shift and a contraction not seen since the last recession. Locations are closing, some highly leveraged cash-poor locations have already closed and you will see hundreds of restaurants massively change in the way they do business. There will be more reliance on moving car traffic and less on the dine-in patron. Less glossy menus and more single-use disposable items will be seen as well. A lot of fan-favorite but expensive SKU's are being eliminated industry-wide, and I say that was a long time coming.
   
   
3. Tesla is deploying a new cheaper battery strategy in China this year. They have filed the necessary paperwork with the Chinese government to allow them to make and sell cars with Lithium Iron Phosphate batteries instead of the usual Lithium-Ion batteries of the past. An advantage of using this battery style is that it is a cheaper alternative and it doesn't use cobalt its construction. Cobalt is a rare earth metal and is very expensive. The one disadvantage is that the newer style of battery is less energy-dense, however, Tesla has said they are as productive as their current battery and are relatively safer to use because they do not ignite as easily nor burn as fast as Lithium-Ion batteries do.
   
   
4. The UFC is experimenting with a change in its cage size, decreasing the cage from 30' to 25'. Some analysts say this will lead to fights that push fighters together faster meaning they will have a higher percentage chance of a finish to the fight rather than to a decision. Stay tunes.
   
   
5. One industry I am in favor of seeing big changes in the way it is structured is AirBnB. That has been a business segment that is rife with tales of corruption and scammed travelers and people losing money all over the world. The idea was pretty fanciful, but the way it was implemented was an invitation to over-regulation and corruption.
   
   In my view it is just too big of a risk, is too dangerous, too many people have been scammed or ripped off altogether, there is too much ability to run bait and switch operations and there are just too many problems presented in doing business on the fly while trusting people to police themselves in a so-called self-regulated market. The biggest issue is there aren't any industry-wide standards like there are in the hotel industry, which invites public discussion and overreaction and regulation. What standards there are, get so loosely enforced that it is laughable. In some countries and even in some areas in the US, the authorities that regulate such things don't even know they exist.
   
   I'm not actually in favor of government regulation but somebody should be looking for bedbugs occasionally.
   
   Sleep tight, You know the rest,
   BigMike

That guy from India can quit calling now

4:00 a.m. on Monday, May 25, 2020, and that to me seems to be impossible

By the way, I have a star named after me and I own one square inch of Irish soil so I am a Lord of the Emerald Isle. You may call me your Lordship. Greetings from the interior of my cerebellum (and a weird and very strange place that it is),

The best thing I've ever done while attempting to write is to get a great writing aid and spell checker. You should too. It's called Grammarly and it is free to bums like me and probably you too. You can get it 100% for free at Grammarly dot com (They are paying me ZERO to endorse it).

I've had a bunch of hobbies in my life. My problem is that when I stop doing one thing to pick up another I never get rid of the stuff that went with the first hobby. My thinking is that someday I will come back to it and I might need it. Also there is always some expense involved so who wants to throw away all that money you already threw away once?

Some hobbies I have had out of necessity, like learning auto mechanics. I could never afford and still can't really pay an auto mechanic to do things I can do myself. Between my Dad and Uncles and my older brothers, I've learned how to do a bunch of things over the years. Sometimes I've been able to pass what I have learned on to a few friends and other times it was just stuff I had to do to my own automobiles. I haven't taken a car in to have the brakes done ever. Other things like changing the oil, I hate doing and make sure someone else has that mess to deal with. When I was a younger man, I would tackle engine repairs with gusto, now I tackle engine repairs with a tow truck.

It was interesting learning about torque and then learning also about how to get a broken screw out of the hole and then also learning to use a tap and die set. One always followed the other when you followed Dad's advice of "one more turn ought to do it, SNAP". I have really never owned a garage so I had a blast laying on the wet ground and changing a starter because I was too stubborn and probably too cheap if the truth is told, to pay someone else to install it. I learned to patch my own holes in my tires of every kind for the same reason. It was easy and cheaper for me to do it myself and I didn't have to wait, I could just do it. I would tackle just about anything and did that for a long time. Then something changed.

One day I woke up and thought to myself that the prospect of lifting that transmission into place and the chance that I would get oil or transmission fluid in my hair one more time was more than I could bear. I started to see the value in finding a trained mechanic and paying the price to have some things done for me. The last big project I attempted was in my wife's car. It took three of us and a good session with "The Google" to figure out how to take the alternator off and replace it on my wife's 2006 Ford shitbox Fusion car. That damn thing was crammed in sideways on a transversely mounted front wheel drive engine. You almost had to take the entire front end off the thing to get to it. You had to remove all of the shrouds under the car, that's about 20 screws right there. It just went on and on and truthfully if my good friend PJ had not come, marshaled the project and lent a very needed hand I would have probably shot that car right where it was parked. We got it fixed and I traded that bastard in on a vehicle with a warranty. That guy from India can quit calling now. I got it covered, I learned that lesson finally.

I shied away from working with wood for the longest time because I could never cut two pieces of wood to be the size I wanted. Then my buddy Rich, who is a terrific carpenter, took me under his wing and showed me the ways of the mysterious wood. I've never looked back although I have to admit, I still have fairly rudimentary tools and I build pretty simple things. I can't really do big stuff anymore, because I can't handle the big sheets of plywood anymore, so I work on projects I can build with smaller pieces. It's more fun anyway. Oh and by the way, the secret? Don't forget to take into account the width of the saw blade and know which side of the line you just marked that you should cut on. That was an eye-opener right there. You wouldn't believe the difference that made in my projects. Square stuff, all of a sudden was square, stuff didn't rock anymore, doors actually closed, I mean my god, It was Magical.

Thankx Rich!

I learned to operate machinery in high school when I started to become a machinist and those abilities have transferred over pretty nicely. Using power tools, in general, has always been my thing and I have quite the collection of stuff I've only used once. Of course I thought I would use it every day when I bought my scroll saw, but who knew? Because of the crossover skills involved in machinery operation and repair along with carpentry I have taught my self a great deal about home repair too. The best lesson I ever learned about home repair is If you cannot do it, get a professional. Especially if you are doing anything with electricity, do it right the first time because doing it wrong can kill your whole family.

I taught myself all about computers through books, hands-on learning, and a few classes over time. I don't compile code like Windows source code but neither does anybody else. I can, however, take any computer apart, figure out what is wrong with it, fix or replace the bad part down to soldering the new part in place on the motherboard and reassemble the beast and it will run. I used to work on a lot of cell phones replacing parts, screens and speakers, and the like. Then apple made taking their phones apart potentially fatal to a circuit if you forgot to unplug the battery. So I retired my phone skills after the iPhone 5. Too much of a headache and too expensive. No one can fix dead hard drives but I've brought a few into the light from the brink of death. I've made laptops sing like they were brand new and have breathed new life into old machines so often that it is second nature. The translation is,  I have a lot of computer junk laying around. At least three closets full. Yeah, I'm a hoarder.

I taught myself to write code and to write programs in three different computer languages. How you say? By screwing up a lot. I started in the '90s working with these cartridge and cassette tape driven machines called TI-994a's all the way through today. I learned to write old BASIC line code and would go by the Radio Shack in the mall and fiddle with their demonstration machines, inputting line codes that would ask questions at breakpoints, and it would drive the poor salesmen mad trying to get my crap off the screen and their demo programs to run once they noticed it. It was a diversion and quite fun for a while. Then they wouldn't let people play with the machines anymore. Oh well. I learned to write Visual Basic and vb. net stuff to satisfy problems I ran into. I once created a series of personal software programs that then took to work and ran on a back-office computer in a restaurant that replaced and consolidated all the paperwork we had to do into ones that were based on date. Pick a date and print whatever form you wanted. Of course, it took me a while to do it, but everyone loved it because you could always see the data, and a day or a week or a month was just a matter of picking dates and voila! --> report! It wasn't but a couple of years after that when they instituted their own back-office systems that did the same thing and allowed the numbers to be transmitted to the office on-demand as well. It was fun though.

I remember I once thought that in order to schmooze with the big boys that I had to learn to play golf. It turned out the big boys didn't want to schmooze with me and although they played golf, they thought any of their underlings that played had too much time on their hands and didn't have enough to do. Ah! You only have to hit me with a brick one time and I get it. So I took a few golf lessons and started to play with friends and my older brother whenever we could. It turns out the best golf lesson I ever got was in a softball dugout. I asked a man I knew named Ollie how he held a golf club and he showed me his grip. You know, I used that grip right up until I had to stop playing because of this disability crap that has just about flattened me.

I never said it but thankx Ollie!

And now, here is something that I hope you will really like!

1. Man there is a lot and I mean a lot of misinformation floating around about this Covid-19 virus. I have seen things that don't make any sense at all multiply at such a rapid rate that even though I am pretty sure I have a grip on reality, I'm not so sure about the majority of us.  People are talking about chips being implemented to track us, how there have been no cases of flu this year, about how masks are an infringement of their freedom and oh by the way, about how they do absolutely no good, they are mixing in their chemtrails and Coronavirus stories, talking about how it is a hox, about how the CDC has said a ton of stuff (that they haven't said) and literally hundreds of other things all the way down to how the government is paying hospitals and other healthcare concerns a ton of money to misreport deaths as being caused by the virus. The same government that says Ketchup packets is a vegetable suddenly has the wherewithal and the ability to track 350 million people? On top of all that? Go back to work people, open the bars, go see the beach, but stay 6 feet away from each other. Uh-huh.
   
   I do not think that anyone is really all that interested in my opinion on the subject because of the amount of time they have invested in their own "5G causes Covid-19" theory, however, if you are interested even a little bit there is a ton of information available on Wikipedia. The reason I am promoting it there, is that I happen to know that everything that is posted on Wikipedia about the virus is curated by the scientists involved in battling it and there is no political input.
   
   Unlike every other section of it, you actually have to be an approved editor to post or edit in this section. Deride it if you like but at least this is a consistent source, without regard to what your college professor said about it or how much the media doesn't like it.
   
   Check it out (If you want, no pressure)---> Misinformation about COVID-19
   
   
2. I was looking around yesterday and found out that an Apple watch is over $500. A used one is right up there in the stratosphere too. Are we really paying this kind of money for phones and watches at a big enough clip that it makes sense to keep upgrading them into a market that doesn't seem to have a top-end? I am not an early adopter and have never been but this seems ludicrous to me.
   
   
3. Here is something nobody saw coming. In NYC and other places that have been plagued by rats in recent years, the closing of restaurants has had a deleterious side effect. Starving rats have become desperate and downright dangerous in their quest to find enough food to stay alive. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is now warning that “some jurisdictions have reported an increase in rodent activity as rodents search for new sources of food.” In this case, an increase in rodent activity doesn’t mean that they are starting GoFundMe pages or ordering food online. It means that rats and mice are going where no rodents have gone before and even exhibiting “unusual or aggressive” behavior.
   
   Tip your waiter please and oh, remember to feed the rat.
   
   
4. Several companies are thinking this new normal is going to include a lot of work from home and some may do it permanently, at least that's the trend being seen as businesses come back online after a couple of months of shutdown. Both Twitter and Facebook have announced long term plans to allow as much as 50% of their workforce to remain work from home employees forever. Square, Shopify, and Box all have plans to follow this trend in some fashion. A lot of industries have seen cost reductions without any loss in productivity so the trend will continue to be examined and clarified as long as corporate egos are kept in check.
   
   
5. Yay! Finally some good news from the world of science. It's about time. Scientists who study the human genome say they may have discovered a "skinny gene". You know the type of person who has it, that woman or man who can eat all they want, never go to the gym and never gain weight? I'm not going to be Mr. Science dude and post the overly complicated details, however, if, on the very slight chance you may be interested, you can read about this discovery and the story that describes it here --> The Skinny Gene story
   
   
   Well, and that's usually a deep subject, have a great day and stay out of traffic,
   Aloha,
   BigMike

Are you a Google Grokker

Sunday 5:00 a.m. on 05/24/2020

A three-hour tour, a three-hour tour,

That show was the weirdest but best half-hour show on Television at the time. Week after week they could not get off the island they were stuck on, but they could be visited every week by one after another of Hollywood's biggest stars, and NOT ONE PERSON EVER went back to the mainland and said a word about them to anybody to get them rescued.

Like I said, weird.

I spend a lot of energy bitching about advertising I'm sure. It probably bores the crap outta folks to read about it. It may be the reason a few people do not follow or read what I write in the first place but I can't seem to help myself. So much of what I see is just DRIVEL! I mean it's gobstoppingly stupid and annoying and hard to fathom as to why it made it out of review meeting, to begin with. I just cannot understand why more people don't complain and get the crap off the airwaves or out of print. I am an extremist about this, I know.

They have developed more and more ways to present it to you as well. It's on the handles of shopping carts, on the walls of the urinals in the men's rooms. It dangles from the ceilings and is being blown by the air conditioner. You cannot stand in line at Wal-Mart or pump the gas into your tank without being assaulted by a mini TV playing commercials while you are captured in place. I became stalwart friends with the mute button on my remote control years ago because of it and have been known to switch the channel and watch something else entirely if the TV ad was too annoying. Sometimes it gets so bad that I start yelling at the TV, giving them my opinion of their content. I'm sure the dogs, my wife, and daughter have all determined by now that I love yelling at inanimate objects and I am just a weird old starking raving mad lunatic at this point.

This is not by any means recent and has been happening for years (the lunacy and the advertising), however, something else about this I absolutely hate is targeted advertising while you are using your PC. If you are a curious person like me, then you might spend a little time searching for some pretty uncommon things, with the goal of understanding them a tiny bit better. You also might be a "Google Grokker" which is a person who flits from web page to web page using links provided either on a search page such as google or takes what they can find and goes from one page to another using links from one page to get to another without a clear destination in mind. Trust me its a real thing.

Click here to read more -->Google Grokking

I was looking the other day to see what the options were for having a bidet, that thought having been developed by the stories about the lack of toilet paper availability because of stupid people hoarding it when I thought what would you do if you couldn't get your hands on toilet paper? So after discarding the option of grabbing a handful of leaves from the outside like my Buddy Jack told me to do, (because you know I would grab Poison Ivy), I started reading about how to install a bidet, and all the different kinds of options there were to do so. I knew I probably would never get one, I just wanted to learn about it.

I don't know if it started happening on that day or if it sort of came on gradually, however at the end of the list of stories, I started seeing this one series of ads over and over. It was something like "Doctors tell how to empty your Bowels completely, click here" or there was another one that said "Doctors amazed at this toilet paper alternative". There were several more in the list of so-called stories and so on. I never click on the clickbait, by the way, I just saw it there. Stupid as I am, Trust me I do know better than to click on the bait.

Look I get it. Technology contributes to this mess and my own computer is leaking my search terms out or being sold to advertisers or whatever, and somewhere on my machine, there is a cookie or a saved search term (an SEO id), or some such tiny piece of information that allows advertisers or more precisely advertising agencies to "target" ads to my machine based on the terms I've used in my searches. If I used Google's Gmail more (or at all) online or used its app at all, it would be able to also read my emails and determine how to target me based on search terms developed from my email traffic. I do not rely on online email for just this reason among many however. It's bad enough they can do this with my searching, I don't want to contribute with my emails too. I know I could use an Incognito page setting, do more anonymized browsing or disallow targeted ads altogether or I could use a totally different browser that doesn't track me at all like DuckDuckGo, but I am way too lazy to make that big of an effort.

Besides if I did all that, what would I have left to bitch about?
It would take all the fun away from me.

How rich and famous do you have to be, to be above the reach of the law?

1. It is said that today in new stories published today,  that Prince "Pedo" Andrew of the British monarchy faces fresh humiliation over his involvement in the Jefferey Epstein (Didn't kill himself) scandal. Apparently, there is an eyewitness to his groping of an obvious underage girl. She was by all accounts between 12-14 at the time and he was observed groping her topless chest,  while he was staying on the private island of Mr. (Didn't kill himself) Epstein. The royal response has been to say "No he didn't, you're wrong, besides he is a ROYAL", so he couldn't have done it.
   
   Look, If this pervert had intimate contact, made illegal overtures, or had sex with underage children, then they should prosecute his ass, royal member of the British household or not. The Queen should turn his ass over to the authorities and submit him to the rule of law. So what if he is a Royal? If he is a Pedophile then no draconian punishment is too much for him. I know it would never happen, especially in the USA or in England, but I think pedophiles should be executed. I can't see where they serve any useful purpose if they are guilty of that and I'm convinced they have no redeeming qualities that absolve them of that behavior. Being a Royal may have prevented prosecution in the year 1250, but in today's society we and he should know that none is above the law. He also should and did know better I am certain of that.
   
   Throw his ass under the jail. I don't care. Neither should you.
   
   
2. Tesla has made a tiny change and renamed the Model S for this purpose and has resubmitted it to the EPA for retesting to bump up its official range estimates. Tesla has claimed in the past that the model they submitted last year had a 400-mile range and said the agency made a mistake while testing it last year when they came up with a 391-mile range estimate on the official test.
   
   It's all about bragging rights as no one has been able to crack the 400-mile barrier so far. Elon Musk and Tesla said the EPA left a door open with the key in the ignition overnight while testing their car last year, which allowed the car to use a tiny bit more energy than it should have. The EPA has denied doing so but Tesla says they have the data to prove it.
   
   
3. We have apparently extradited a leader of a drug cartel from somewhere in South America to the USA for prosecution. The guys name is Geraldo Gonzales Valencia and he is known by three or four other short nicknames that I forgot to write down and don't care about anyway. he has been indicted on charges of Conspiracy to distribute Narcotics for purposes of importing to sell. I hope he gets found guilty and gets 500 years in prison.
   
   The part of this story I have never understood is why we allow these guys to operate at all. They are declaring war on the USA, they sell some of the most horrific shit to our citizens. It kills hundreds of people every year. We basically know where they are, who they are, who works for them, how many of them there are, and a lot more. We have the capability to see what happens in certain areas as small as baseballs and we have demonstrated we can read license plates from outer space for crying out loud. If there actually is a war on drugs and we know so much about it, and can know more, why don't we treat this as a war?
   
   Why don't we go after the sicarios, the mules, the cartel soldiers, the facilities, and so forth. Who really gives two craps what Mexico would say if we put a cruise missile into a drug factory? Why don't we burn the heroin producing poppy fields in Afghanistan to a scorched plateau? There are known cocaine locations in South America we just tolerate because of a policy that says it should be handled locally. I agree, but when they don't we should. That's all I'm saying. Anywhere drugs come from should be under attack. Even China would get the message and start doing something about it if we gave them an ultimatum about a specific location and then acted when they wouldn't.
   
   Yeah, I know. World War 3, we are pussies, blah blah blah. It pisses me off is all.
   
   
4. The Headline says that Netflix has the fewest technical glitches of any streaming service. I would agree and would go on to say the worst has to be the programming on The Dish's Hopper. It sucks. I have rarely had an issue with Netflix and the service, usually, my issue is with the stale and worn-out content.
   
   
5. Drive-In theatres are making a come back in a huge way according to the Wall Street journal. According to the story I read the restrictions of social distancing and so forth caused by the Covid-19 virus are the cause. I see taco trucks and Movie nights in our future.
   
   Who wants to pay $15 for a bucket of yesterday's popcorn anyway?
   BigMike

Yes my wife is a Genius

6:45 a.m. on a Saturday, I'm late because I watched the news. 05/23/2020

When I was just a little baby boy, 
My momma used to tell me these crazy things, (Get it?)

"I had an argument with my wife the other night. She told me to go take out the garbage!. I told her, You cooked it, you take it out". - Rodney Dangerfield, Comic Genius
Rodney Quotes and Funny jokes

Speaking of wives, my wife sat down the other day, after ordering some elastic, and made us all face masks to wear in public. Then she made some different ones and put the elastic on all of them. I am always going on and on about how she is able to take hunks of cloth and turn it into stuff. A few pins here and there, some banging away at it with a sewing machine and presto chango, ...masks.

I am always impressed by how she gets the lines straight and somehow doesn't sew her fingers together. If I were making them they would have the prettiest little blood splatters all over them, because how in the heck can you use all those pins and needles and not stick yourself a thousand times? For real. I get that it is practice and all, however to watch it occur in real-time is impressive. Anyone that can do this is an artist I think even if you are following a pattern. It is not a paint by the numbers set, so not anybody can do it even if you follow the instructions. And have you ever tried to read one of those patterns? It's like having bad Chinese translated into even worse English and that's not the worst part. The worst part is they expect that you will cut out the size that you chose and get them all the same size.

She's a miracle worker if you ask me.

I love to watch Veterinarian TV shows. Right now there is a bunch of them on TV, and between watching what is on at it's regular time and on-demand I could, If I so desired to watch nothing but them or mostly them for most of the time I watch Television. I generally spend little time watching television, to begin with so between them and Science shows with a tiny bit of Jeopardy and military programming, I drive my wife out of her mind. She watches Law and Order, NCIS (all of them),  and Forensic Files and other police procedurals like the show The First 48 nonstop.

I think maybe she is trying to figure out the perfect crime. I just hope it is not about trying to figure out what to do with the body.

I found out something quite by accident however. I found out that a lot of Vets, don't care for Dr. Pol or his practice/methodology. They think he gives Vets a bad name, practices animal medicine like it was still the 1960's and is a neanderthal in his methodology. They criticize his methods for setting broken legs, for sanitation, for pain control (or lack of it), and the fact that he uses commercial cleaners and paper towels to clean up after treatments. They say he should modernize or stop providing in-clinic care for small animals. They are in the minority however as his clients appreciate the cost savings measures he undertakes on their behalf. It gets the job done and cuts cost to the bone. I think that is the real problem.

For example, using pieces of a bushel basket has been roundly criticized for making a splint for juvenile farm animals. They say he should be using only modern-day devices made from approved substances, thereby producing a predictable result at a consistent cost. His explanation makes sense to me. He says what difference does it make what the support structure is in a splint that is totally covered by cotton, gauze, and tape? It does the job, heals the animal, and costs his clients zero dollars.

He didn't exactly say it, but he intimated that the reason behind the complaints, is the fact that it takes away the ability to charge for it plus a healthy markup from the complaining Vets. I'm not a Vet but I suspect he may be right and I tend to agree with him. He should maybe update his in-surgery standards and wear better protective gear, however, I don't think the way he practices, makes him a bad Vet. He is a man in his late 70's who works as hard or harder than people half his age, who still wrangles large animals every day and gets the job done.

It's hard to argue with success.

The difference between me and you is that I make this "stuff" look good.

1. Just as I thought we were going to be treated to another juicy celebrity court battle, I was disappointed to learn they had filed plea bargains and are going to plead out. Celebrity actress Lori Laughlin from Full House fame and her husband what's his name have pled guilty in a plea bargain filed with the court in a deal reached with the prosecutors in the College Admission scandal of the last year. I'm not going to describe it again. Look it up.
   
   She will spend 2 months behind bars somewhere, pay a $150,000 fine, spend 2 years on probation, and perform at least 100 hours of community service. He will spend 5 months behind bars, pay a $250,000 fine, also be put on 2 years of probation, and perform 250 hours of community service.
   
   I don't know if the sentences are appropriate or are enough but they are going to plead guilty and they are paying a ton of money. Maybe that will be enough to deter others. Who knows.
2. Did you actually know that the Clock Icon on your iPhone keeps time and the hands move as time marches forward?
3. Hertz Rent a Car has filed for bankruptcy. They do not intend to go out of business however. In a statement from their Board of Directors they said " Blah the Blah, finances, Blah the blah moving forward..." and some other crap I could not be bothered to listen to because it's just more corporate doublespeak that says the market is crap, we can't pay our bills and defecation occurs. More Companies in a long string of companies are going to follow them and others into the hole.
4. I am from Indianapolis Indiana. It just doesn't seem like May to me this year because there have been no festivities or news about the Indy 500 at all, beyond saying it has been postponed, with really no word about when they are going to have it if it happens at all. It's sad but completely necessary I think.
5. There is an honest to goodness real effort underway to recruit and pay people to live in a mission to Mars simulator for 8 months. NASA is conducting a search for people who can go to Russia, are healthy, between ages 30-55, have professional STEM experience, and be proficient in both Russian and English.
   
   No word on how much they are paying.
   
   
   Dosvedanya comrades,
   
   El Grande` Miguel

Bean counters count beans

Friday May 22, 2020 at 06:15 a.m.

Poor planning on your part does not constitute an Emergency on my part,

Here's a pretty great story that seems wonderful until you consider the facts and look at the details and then it's like being served a bowl of melted ice cream. Yeah, it's ice cream all right, but who the hell wants this crap?

A team of scientists has discovered that apparently, Cannabis can help to prevent and also treat the coronavirus. In the details, they say the strain used to treat the virus, must be a particularly strong strain of cannabis. For potheads this sounds like very good news huh? But wait, there's more. So far the best results thus far have been obtained in Cannabis that tested very high in the anti-inflammatory aspects of CBD, but also very low in THC, which is the part that gets you high. You win some and you lose some I guess. Smoking anything and putting it into your lungs is a very bad idea anyway, although the prospect of going into a convenience store and asking for a pack of "Marlboro Toker 100's" does sound appealing, in a weird way.

Cue the music "No stems and No seeds that you don't need, Toker 100's is some badass weed !"

In Yesterday's Rant, I talked a little bit about basketball and what the game has turned into over the years. I spoke of the evolution of the game and what has happened, briefly, in the past 30 or so years focusing mostly on the types of players that are now considered to be great players. In doing so I totally skipped one class of player that has come on so strong that they are better now than they have ever been.  I'm talking of course of the pure shooter and players like Steph Curry. His long bomb 3 points clutch scoring game has touched off a revival of sorts in the importance of the scorer/shooter in today's game. Kobi Bryant was a player like this, although he didn't rely on the long bomb jump shot as much as Curry does, he was however able to score, at will, from almost anywhere on the court.

My point is not to focus on one aspect of the game or to hype one individual player or team over another however. My ultimate goal here was just to say that I firmly believe that talent and skill overall has been corrupted by the glamor of the long bomb. It's been misappropriated by the banging and bumping style that has taken over the league, that started on the playgrounds and has thrived in the NBA. In the description of any discussion of the subject "What is basketball", someone will supply an answer that attempts to say that it is a non-contact sport. This is what I really object to as there are elbows flying and intentional fouls being committed at a pace that stops the game so often that a game stoppage is more common than extended play. It has done what I thought impossible and made it pretty boring. Who wants to watch one free throw after another all night long?

Contents are sold by weight, not by volume. Some settling may occur during shipping.

1. A 56-year-old grown-ass adult man has been arrested and has 125 misdemeanor charges lodged against him for hunting and killing animals outside the law and outside the season of legitimate hunting as well. He also has several Federal charges and other state charges pending the completion of an ongoing 18-month investigation. Several more people are also going to be charged in accordance with state law. He is charged among other things with killing 18 Wolves, at least 3 Bald Eagles, some deer, beavers, bears, and bobcats. He allegedly told officers he killed them because "He likes it."
   
   
2. Elon Mush says that once the A.I. is finished for his Tesla automobiles that it will add over $100,000 to the value of any Tesla it is installed in. Oh, and he was dead serious too.
   
   
3. If you have ever been to Hong Kong or you have ever thought about going or ever even thought of it as a cruise destination, forget it. Hong Kong will be dead by this time next year. At least it will be according to several China experts that say as soon as China institutes several strategic security initiatives designed to eliminate the challenges to the rule of Chinese law that were seen last year. Strict new security laws implemented by China will effectively end life in Hong Kong as know it today. The autonomy they have enjoyed as a part of everyday life in Hong Kong will end as they become fully integrated into and are taken over by the Chinese government. Chine fears a return to the democracy protests that plunged Hong Kong into turmoil last year.
   
   
4. I'm a big Ben Shapiro fan. He is a brilliantly smart, funny guy, I do not always agree with his point of view but don't think I have to agree with him 100% of the time, to enjoy his commentary. Even though your teachers in High School and your College Professors said they aren't a real resource, learn more about Ben on Wikipedia right here: Wikipedia: Ben Shapiro
   
   
5. Here is another long-winded but short story to add to the boring BigMike collection of "What is that idiot talking about now collection." It used to be not so long ago that when the new CEO, or COO, or really anybody in the position of running an organization at an operational level, you could usually look at that person's resume and see the relevant experience which would make you go, "Hmmm ok." Or at least it seemed that way to me. I could be totally wrong.
   
   Back when Banking, for example, was a middle income, mid manager type of job, and wasn't seen as a way to get a house in the Hampton's, companies and their boards of directors looked for top officers to have the experience that could be translated into profit, based on a proven track record of results. Hense the old say "Past Performance dictates future results." It doesn't seem that way anymore, and I might add it has been coming that way for a long time.
   
   Boards and others have become convinced that the leaders they must have in order to be successful should have Masters Degrees and more often than not, the degree and relevant experience should be from an accounting background. The theory is that you can teach an accountant how to operate pretty easily. The problem and one that will probably never be addressed is how they see the business from the top.
   
   Accountants see every item under Sales (Or Revenue if you will) is that they always see cost as something that has to be reduced and ultimately if possible, to be eliminated altogether. That's pretty much why we move businesses to offshore locations like Vietnam or China or Mexico. They think they are saving money by eliminating costs and they are focused on the short term share price and the bonus program they are paid under, instead of the long term health of their employees, who are the ones that built the organization to the level it is at. If you ask them why they moved operations to say, Mexico that will tell you it was their Fiduciary duty to maximize profits or some such nonsense. Its why you cannot speak to someone in America about a problem you have unless you insist on it.
   
   I think its time we turned this thinking around and put Operators back in charge where they belong. Bankers and accounting-based executives are support functions and always have been, they always should be as well. Just my humble opinion.
   
   
   Bean counters count beans, that's their job.
   
   BigMike