Glibertarians.com 2018 Archive

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  • I’m a little Preocupied: The Horoscope for the Week of September 2

     

    Goodbye Leo, it was fun, but now it’s Virgo’s time to shine.

    There’s a BARCO alignment of the Earth with Venus and Jupiter.  These are really great planets to be aligned with, what with peace, love, joviality, strength, power, majesty and whatnot, but the alignment is of really poor quality.  So the vector direction is great, the magnitude is crap.  There will be a nudge towards everything working out, but don’t expect it to overcome any significant obstacles.

    Even though Leo no longer has the Sun, there is still Mercury spinning around up there, indicating great change coming.  I wonder how the stars knew I’m supposed to close this week?

    Venus spends her last week in Libra, enjoy the peace while you can.  I can only hope that this means the the closing and subsequent moving will go smoothly.

    Mars in Capricorn.  See, this is exactly what you don’t want to see when you’re moving.  Stubbornness and violence?  The movers are going to be dicks?  My shit’s going to get broken?

    Jupiter in Scorpio.  This influence has been pretty solid for weeks now, so independently it just means status quo.  When combined with the current alignment, it indicates successful endeavors in pest control.  Surely I don’t need to worry about exterminators yet?

    Saturn (retrograde) in Capricorn.  Now this one is tricky.  It indicates a loss of money, which is pretty much going to be happening if the wire transfer for my closing costs actually goes through (how the fuck do you put a typo in your own goddamn routing number, bank who shall remain nameless?  The next transfer time is all of three hours before my closing time, so surely that’s nothing to worry about).  But Saturn also goes station direct on Wednesday (the day I’m moving) so inasmuch as Saturn can ever be a good sign, this is it.  It is a great day for making endings, so “see you later” rental unit!

    And lastly, the moon is in Taurus.  So we’ve got change matched with strength and patience.  Be strong, be flexible, things will work out.  It often seems like astrologers speak in clichéd platitudes.  But you need to remember, the stars spoke first, and the platitude makers ripped them off.

     

     

  • Sunday Morning Links It Is

    I wish I’d been at the McCain funeral yesterday. Putting aside the now-usual and expected politicization of EVERYTHING, I mainly wanted to make sure the fucker really was dead. Instead, I had to hear the pissing and moaning on the radio as if his death were something tragic and momentous rather than just one more opportunity to put TDS on display. I don’t often agree with Trump, but this time I do. And speaking of display, the Aretha Franklin funeral was equally newsworthy, not just for the predictable TDS, but the spectacle of leering aged horndogs Bill Clinton and Jesse Jackson discussing the details of Ariana Grande’s ass. Sadly, they were upstaged by some pastor who managed a sideboob grope.

    Ah well. Unlike yesterday, there were some notable birthdays and anniversaries today. For example, it’s the birthday of jazz greats Horace Silver and Clifford Jordan. Also microchip pioneer and business guru Andy Grove, the most delightfully named baseball player Drungo Hazewood, and the spectacularly titted actress Cynthia Watros.

    On to the news.

     

    For whatever reason (maybe the grant cycle?) there’s been a sudden rush of global warming panic articles. Of all of them yesterday, this one was my favorite.

    “If we allow climate change to go unchecked, the vegetation of this planet is going to look completely different than it does today, and that means a huge risk to the diversity of the planet,” Jonathan Overpeck, dean of the School for Environment and Sustainability at the University of Michigan and co-author of the new study, said in a statement. “We’re talking about global landscape change that is ubiquitous and dramatic. We’re already starting to see it in the United States, as well as around the globe.”

    Way to pack in every FUD buzzword you can. I’m sure that “more research is needed.”

    If emissions continue to rise unabated, the scientists concluded, the probably of large-scale vegetative changes is greater than 60 percent. If nations succeed in meeting their 2015 Paris Agreement greenhouse gas mitigation pledges, the probability of large-scale ecological transformations is less than 45 percent.

    “According to my preeeecise calculations, it’s all about a meaningless treaty. And of course, putting our guys in charge.”

     

    In sports news, yesterday was the big cutdown day in the NFL. And just as Sloopy is obsessed with some Little League team or other, I am similarly so with the Baltimore Ravens, who finally gave up on Breshad Perriman (“He has has 4.2 speed and 5.6 hands.”) to the delight of the city. More interestingly, their rookie kicker found out the downside of playing for the Ravens- you have to be in Baltimore.

    Ravens rookie kicker Kaare Vedvik suffered injuries in an assault and robbery that required him to be hospitalized. The Baltimore Sun reports that Vedvik was being treated at Maryland Shock Trauma Center. “We are aware that Kaare is being treated for head wounds and we are monitoring the situation,” the Ravens said in a statement.

    When I worked at Johns Hopkins Medical School, one of things we were shown in orientation was a map of the area with a red line showing borders that one must not cross if life and limb are important. Apparently, this was not part of the Ravens’ orientation for players unfamiliar with the area.

     

    Man, it has to be embarrassing to be a Catholic these days. Besides the constant stream of priest-fucks-boy scandals, there’s a pope who ignores the famous advice of St. Augustine and enthusiastically declaims on issues where he is totally ignorant but where there’s prog points to be scored.

    “Sadly, all too often many efforts fail due to the lack of effective regulation and means of control, particularly with regard to the protection of marine areas beyond national confines,” the pope wrote. “We cannot allow our seas and oceans to be littered by endless fields of floating plastic,” Francis said. “Here, too, our active commitment is needed to confront this emergency.”

    He also denounced as “unacceptable” the privatization of water resources at the expense of the “human right to have access to this good.”

    You tell ’em, Frankie. More regulation, that’s what we need.

     

    Keep it classy, Chicago. After a tragic fire on the West Side that killed ten kids (living in a somewhat, ahhhh, sketchy situation), their funeral was a massive and public spectacle. And in the finest Chicago tradition, it was dignified and solemn. Or maybe not.

    Dozens of mourners spilled out of the front of the church onto Cermak Road, WBBM Newsradio’s Bob Roberts reported from the scene. The crowds gathered around the corner and half a block down Whipple Street before police came screaming in to restore order.

    Mourners had already been seen flashing gang signs outside the church.

    Not that this is an isolated thing, mind you. It’s a Chicago thing.

     

    Old Guy Music yet again! And continuing the theme of old Jethro Tull in preparation for the dinosaur concert tomorrow, this song was of course an inevitable choice. If SP weren’t asleep, I’d give in to my itchy urge to grab my flute and play along. I love this tune.

  • Coming Attractions & Saturday Night Open Post

    Happy long weekend to those of you who have one. I unaccountably have a paper due tomorrow. (Who assigns a research paper to be turned in on the Sunday of Labor Day weekend?!)

    However, here on the site, we have another full slate of great articles in the coming week. We are really on a roll. Keep the submissions coming! (No, Creosote Achilles, SUBMISSIONS, not submission. No, Q, SUBMISSIONS, not emission.)

    Coming up we have posts from: Not Adahn; westernsloper; trshmnstr; Yusef Drives a Kia; wchipperdove; Florida Man; CPRM; A Leap at the Wheel; Bob Boberson; and Animal. Web Dom’s vegan School is out for recess on Labor Day, but we hope to have a post from SugarFree in his usual spot on Wednesday. And, of course, your regularly scheduled opportunities to ignore the links.

    I know, I know, “Stop talking and let us get on with the Saturday Night Open Post!”

  • STEVE SMITH LONG WEEKEND SATURDAY NIGHT LINKS

     

    STEVE SMITH GOOD AT STICK HIT BALL GAME!

    STEVE SMITH GLAD LONG WEEKEND HERE. HAD LARGE GROUP TOURISTS STOP BY WOODS. STEVE SMITH HAD TO GREET THEM. BY GREET, MEAN RAPE. BUT NOW MADE MONTHLY QUOTA AND CAN RELAX! BUT THAT NO MEAN STEVE SMITH FORGET ABOUT FUNNY GLIBERTARIAN PEOPLE. LINKS STILL NEED MAKING! HERE ARE:

    1. THIS CONFUSE STEVE SMITH. HIM THOUGHT PISSING IN PARIS STREET WAS FRENCHIE TRADITION? STEVE SMITH LUCKY HIM LIVE IN WOODS. ALL WORLD IS TOILET!
    2. THIS SEEM LIKE CHANGE IN WAY THINGS GO. STEVE SMITH THOUGHT WAY TO GET RID OF WAS DIOXIN IN SOUP, OR JAB WITH RADIOACTIVITY STUFF?
    3. IF THIS CAUSE “HORROR“, STEVE SMITH SUGGEST FAMILY STAY OUT OF HIM WOODS…
    4. YOU HELP STEVE SMITH? HIM NO UNDERSTAND BALLOON THING. FIRST, HAT AND HAIR HOST. NOW MAYOR. WHY THIS KEEP HAPPENING?

    STEVE SMITH HOPE FUNNY GLIBERTARIAN PEOPLE GET ENJOY TIME OFF.

    FREE CASCADIA!

  • Milch ist Eine Schlechte Wahl!

    One of the problems I find with my preferences is that it is simply too damn hot for me to be drinking the type of beer that I normally go for. When it’s 110 degrees outside, the last thing I want to drink is milk. I hate the stuff. The way it coats your mouth, the full feeling, probably sourced from a few dozen Holsteins… On a hot day it’s a bad choice and let’s be real—I get a lot of hot days. A close second is an IPA but given my purchasing habits no longer revolve around what I want to drink and what serves a sufficient writing prompt, I have to choke that down from time to time. But imperial stout? I could but it’s just not refreshing, and quite frankly I am drinking copious amounts of beer because I am thirsty.

    This is my review of Colbitz Heide-Braurer Schwartzbier.  Cue the Space Balls-related puns.

    This beer reminds me of a friend of mine who got into Black Lager about ten years ago during college. We would take advantage of the $0.50 wings Tuesdays on Buffalo Wild Wings and get a bunch of wings. Until that one day it occurred to me I got a free T-Shirt if I did the Blazing Wing challenge. The challenge was only to eat 24 within their time constraint of an hour. Later they made it more difficult where you had to eat fewer of them, but had to do it in a few minutes.

    So…um…would ya?

    So I did it, and had a Sam Adams Black Lager or two along with it.

    Word to the wise–do not do this to yourself. You might think it’s a good idea to eat 24 ghost pepper wings, with the capsicum burning your lips the entire time. The pH balance in your stomach altering ever so slightly that you feel like your insides are digesting themselves. The mild acid reflux, the stench of fried chili grease oozing from your pores. Then there’s the morning after…. I was in ROTC at the time and had PT at 0600 the morning after. They accepted my stupidity as an excuse for missing it, because they were laughing too hard to stay serious enough to admonish me at the time.

    By the way, I didn’t get a free t-shirt.

    Eventually we made it a weekly thing. I didn’t do the challenge again, because as it turns out I am not that much a glutton for punishment, but the Black Lager thing continued.

    What is Schwartzbier anyways? You may not know it, but it is apparently one of the oldest styles around.

    Schwarzbier, literally “black beer,” is probably the longest continuously brewed beer style in the world, with its known ancestors close to three millennia in age and with definitive origins in the modern brewing cradle.

    Today’s schwarzbier combines Old World rusticity with the graceful smoothness of lagerbier, and a clean roasted edge with German malt complexity. It’s deep, ruby-black color and modest strength makes schwarzbier the lager equivalent of basic stout.

    The origin of schwarzbier lies in what perhaps the most significant historical brewing region in the world: southeastern Germany, including some of Bavaria, and portions of the former Bohemia, now the Czech Republic. The most famous, and arguably the most important, development from there was the invention of pilsner beer less than 200 years ago in Plzen, Bohemia. But the true gems from the region are the ancient, but modernly polished styles: schwarzbier and the smoky rauchbier.

    There is concrete evidence that crude schwarzbier was being brewed there as long ago as the ninth century B.C. (and undoubtedly, well before). This proof comes from an 1935 archaeological discovery seven miles west of Kulmbach in Northern Bavaria. The venture unearthed an Iron Age Celtic tomb that dated to about 800 B.C. That grave held an amphora with some residual brewing material and the charred crumbs of partially baked wheat bread, known to be the raw material for Celtic and Germanic brews of the time. Since this discovery places the oldest evidence of brewing in Central Europe in Kulmbach, and that beer was black, we can deduce that the world’s oldest, and still-produced, style of beer was schwarzbier.

    The result is something that has the dark roasted complexity of a stout (minus the lactose) combined with the refreshing nature of lager.

    Serve it cold, in tall mugs with a group of friends. This one in particular was actually pretty inexpensive for a six pack of pint cans and like all German beer is made in compliance with the Reinheitsgebot, assuming that means anything to you at all. Colbitz Heide-Braurer Schwartzbier 3.5/5

  • Saturday Morning Induced Labor Links

    Yesterday, SP received a couple of bushels of New Mexico green chiles for roasting, so of course they were prominently featured for dinner last night. And since she got two varieties (hot and extra-hot), I am paying the price this morning. So if the links seem a bit spicy, that’s why. Yes, I am typing this from the bathroom. Wash your hands after commenting.

     

    Global Warming- is there anything it can’t do? 

    Wheat, corn and rice crops will all be damaged — to the tune of 10 percent to 25 percent for every 1 degree Celsius (1.8 degrees F) that average global temperatures rise, according to the report. “Crop losses will be most acute in areas where warming increases both population growth and metabolic rates of insects,” they wrote. “These conditions are centered primarily in temperate regions, where most grain is produced.”

    There is no doubt that the global climate is warming and no real debate about one big cause: human activity. The effects are already being seen with heat waves, droughts, floods and stronger storms as ocean currents and atmospheric patterns are disrupted.

    I’m delighted at the reporters’ objectivity. NO DOUBT, NO REAL DEBATE.

    “Increased pesticide applications, the use of GMOs, and agronomic practices such as crop rotations will help control losses from insects,” Naylor said in a statement. “But it still appears that under virtually all climate change scenarios, pest populations will be the winners, particularly in highly productive temperate regions, causing real food prices to rise and food-insecure families to suffer.”

    Well, clearly we need to give Naylor more funding; think of the food-insecure children! Ignore that we’re breaking food production records left and right, it’s all gonna fall apart any day now.

     

    Despite my proximity to Alinea, I’m not a fan of molecular cuisine, though I can certainly admire some of the creativity that goes into it.

    A recent trend has taken hold in parts of the country where cereal or cheese puffs are covered in liquid nitrogen and “emit a misty or smoke-like vapor.” Shortly after eating the treats, people blow smoke out of their noses and mouths to look like a dragon. The treats, often called dragon’s breath, heaven’s breath or nitro puff, are popular at state fairs, carnivals, mall kiosks and some ice cream parlors…

    Well, that sounds fun! Until the FDA scolds descend.

    “Although liquid nitrogen is nontoxic and is currently used in medical settings and as an ingredient to prepare some food products, liquid nitrogen can freeze foods resulting in extremely low temperatures. This temperature can present risk of injury to consumers. Further, applying liquid nitrogen immediately prior to consumption increases the risk of accidental ingestion or direct contact with liquid nitrogen because it does not provide enough time for the liquid nitrogen to fully evaporate.” People who believe they may have suffered an injury from eating food with liquid nitrogen are encouraged to report injuries to the FDA.

    What we need is common sense cheese curd control. And what I need is a family-size order of cheese curds from Culver’s. Hold the liquid nitrogen.

     

    The UN is horrifically corrupt. I know, that’s not news. The UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) is horrifically corrupt by UN standards. Which is quite an achievement. The Hitler Trump Administration has decided that it will no longer shovel American taxpayers’ money at it.

    “The administration has carefully reviewed the issue and determined that the United States will not make additional contributions to UNRWA,” the State Department said in a statement. “Beyond the budget gap itself and failure to mobilize adequate and appropriate burden sharing, the fundamental business model and fiscal practices that have marked UNRWA for years– tied to UNRWA’s endlessly and exponentially expanding community of entitled beneficiaries– is simply unsustainable and has been in crisis mode for many years,” it continued. “The United States will no longer commit further funding to this irredeemably flawed operation.”

    About fucking time.

    A spokesman for Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas called the US decision a “flagrant assault” against the Palestinian people, and a “defiance of UN resolutions.”

    “Such a punishment will not succeed to change the fact that the United States no longer has a role in the region and that it is not a part of the solution.”

    No, we’re not. Now go fuck yourself. And if Hitler Trump stops sending money and military to all the other foreign countries where we have no declared wars (23 of them at last count), I might even hold my nose and vote for him next time around. Big “if.”

     

    This is exactly the sort of story that will have legs with the Glibertariat. Beautiful legs, flailing and entangled…

    …sources tell FTVLive that two Anchors from WSAZ in Charleston, WV, got into a real fist throwing fight. Word is that Anchor Erica Bivens (top) and Weather Anchor Chelsea Ambriz (bottom) got into a fight at a local bar.

    The two anchor the 4PM newscast on the station and sources say that they attended an event to help end domestic violence against women called “Girls Night Out”!

    Witnesses tell FTVLive that the fight started with Ambriz acting “inappropriately” towards Bivens husband.

    I’ll be in my bunk.

     

    Remember the days when Team Red would hypocritically claim to be the party of limited government and free markets? I suppose it’s an improvement that they don’t even bother to lie about that any more.

    A Utah senator has written a formal letter to the Federal Trade Commission asking it to “reconsider the competitive effects of Google’s conduct in search and digital advertising.” In a two-page document released Thursday, Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) noted that, when the FTC closed its previous investigation into the search giant in 2010, it partly based its decision on the expectation that Apple would become a “strong mobile advertising network.” This did not pan out.

    So clearly since the markets didn’t immediately give the result desired by Top Men, we have to step in and kill a bunch of shareholder value. We can only pray for Hatch to be the next to get fatal brain cancer.

     

    Old Man Music for y’all to complain about. One of the nice things about my out-of-the-mainstream tastes is that I often get to know the musicians whose work I love. After a show last year, I struck up a conversation with the flute player, and it turned out that he lived maybe two blocks from me. So we’ve hung out from time to time. He was over our house a couple weeks ago and mentioned that he’d bought two tickets to Jethro Tull’s 50th Anniversary tour, but his wife ended up not being able to make it. “Do you want to come to the show with me?” Now, I’m not big on dinosaur tours, but JT was probably my favorite rock band as a teenager, I still think their first three albums were superb, and it’s been close to 50 years since the first time I saw them live. And this flute player is a super nice and talented fellow, perfect to go to a show with. So that’s how I’ll be spending Labor Day. And in honor of a generous friend, one of my absolute favorite Jethro Tull songs, here done live but with two oddities: Ian Anderson playing Martin Barre’s Les Paul and John Evan being carefully hidden away.

  • ZARDOZ TELLS DEAR ABBY, “STAY DOWN. YOU LOSE”

    ONCE AGAIN…

    ZARDOZ SPEAKS TO YOU, HIS CHOSEN ONES. APPARENTLY MANY NEWSPAPERS AND ONLINE PUBLICATIONS HAVE FAILED TO LEARN THAT ZARDOZ GIVES BETTER ADVICE THAN THE BRUTAL “DEAR ABBY“. ZARDOZ WILL ONCE AGAIN DEMONSTRATE THIS.

    Q: I have reached a crossroads with my career. I used to love my job. I play an important role at my company, and I’m good at what I do. Long term, it provides job security. However, the pay is subpar, and my recent request for a raise was denied. I haven’t received a raise in several years. I couldn’t get a straight answer about the denial. I was told it wasn’t my work performance.

    I have started looking elsewhere, and I have several interviews scheduled. All of them will give me a $15,000-per-year salary increase over what I currently make for doing what I do. I wasn’t asking that much for a raise, not even close.

    But what makes this difficult is my co-workers. They are devastated at the thought of me leaving. One of them, someone I’m fairly close to, was so angry he went to our boss himself without my knowledge. I don’t know what he said, but he got me a raise, albeit a very small one.

    However, my heart is set on leaving. While I appreciate his going out on a limb for me, I now feel “obligated” to stay. Abby, I’m having a hard time with this. Can you help? — MOVING ON IN THE EAST

    A: WELL, IF ZARDOZ ISN’T COMPLETELY SURPRISED BY A WEAK AND PULING BRUTAL. HAD YOU SIMPLY TAKEN COMMAND OF YOUR OWN SITUATION IN THE FIRST PLACE, YOU WOULD HAVE LEFT, AND BECOME SOMETHING…LIKE A BRUTAL ENFORCER, FOR EXAMPLE.

    NOT SNIVELING FOR A “RAISE”

    YOU HAVE TWO CHOICES, AS ZARDOZ SEES IT. SCORN THE WEAKLINGS THAT REMAIN BEHIND AT YOUR FORMER PLACE OF ENSLAVEMENT, AS YOU LEAVE…

    EXIT INTERVIEW

    OR YOU CAN REMAIN AND DEGENERATE INTO A GRAIN SLAVE.

    RAISE DENIED.

    ZARDOZ HAS SPOKEN.

    Q: My wife and I know a couple whose daughter has been our daughter’s playmate since they were 3 months old. They are pleasant and welcoming. We all get along well and have gone to dinner, ball games and musicals together. However, when we go to their home for a gathering, the father will slip off with a few of his old friends and smoke pot on the back porch while the kids are playing inside. It’s their home, and marijuana is legal in our state.

    Their daughter’s 4th birthday party took place last weekend, and once again, with numerous children running around, they slipped out for a toke before the cake was served. This may seem prudish, but I don’t want my daughter in a situation where she might be exposed to this, or think that we think smoking marijuana is perfectly normal.

    I enjoy spending time with this family, but I don’t think I want to visit their home if this is what I can expect. What should we do? — MYSTIFIED IN MASSACHUSETTS

    A: ZARDOZ HAS RESEARCHED THE ARCHIVES OF THE TABERNACLE. IT APPEARS YOU FEAR YOUR BRUTAL OFFSPRING WILL BECOME:

    BRUTALS CANNOT RESIST IT!

    ZARDOZ HAS A PLANT BASED SOLUTION TO THIS PROBLEM. YOU, YOUR OFFSPRING AND YOUR FRIENDS WILL BE COLLECTED TO CULTIVATE…GRAIN FOR THE VORTEX. THERE, YOU HAVE AVOIDED THE DREADED GANJA WEED! ZARDOZ HAS SPOKEN.

     

    Q: My husband and I are happily married, but have one serious problem. Our sleeping habits are incompatible. I am an extremely light sleeper; he is a horrendous snorer.

    He sees a snoring specialist and tried several medical treatments, none of which worked. The only solution is a minor surgical procedure. He doesn’t want to have the surgery. He insists he “sleeps fine,” and says I’m the one with the problem.

    I have tried earplugs, white noise machines, sleep medications and more, but I cannot get a decent sleep with the obnoxious snoring. He stays up much later than I do, and I enjoy sleeping in our master bedroom until he comes to bed. I usually get driven out of the room by the noise.

    We agree we don’t want to sleep in separate rooms and lose the intimacy, but it’s the only option for me to sleep well. Neither of us wants to give up the master bedroom because it’s the only one with an attached bathroom.

    Am I wrong for asking him to have surgery so we can share a bed? And if he won’t, who should get the master bedroom? — SLEEPLESS IN LOUISIANA

    A: ZARDOZ WONDERS, BRUTAL, WHY YOU SIMPLY HAVEN’T TAKEN MATTERS INTO YOUR OWN MISERABLE HANDS? MINOR SURGERY IS MERELY A FEW CUTS, YES?

    THIS MAY STING A LITTLE…

    GIVE YOUR BRUTAL HUSBAND A SHINY OBJECT TO DISTRACT HIM AND…CUT-CUT-STAB-STAB. IF YOUR SELF ADMINISTERED SURGERY FAILS AND YOUR BRUTAL HUSBAND PERISHES, JUST THINK…”NOW IT WILL BE QUIET EVERY NIGHT!” IT APPEARS ZARDOZ MUST DO ALL THE THINKING AROUND HERE…ZARDOZ HAS SPOKEN.

  • Friday Afternoon Long Weekend Links

    I assume all you Glibertarian capitalist running-dog shitlords have the long weekend? I don’t. I have work that needs to be done Tuesday when the client gets back. Adding to the fun is that my company — because they are idiots — require that you take PTO on certain holidays, and furthermore my boss’s boss would have to approve me working on such a holiday. Labor Day being one. So I am not working Monday. At least I get one day off this long weekend. OTOH, college football is back! Tomorrow at noon I get to see if strip club fan Tom Herman — whose wife is totally cool with him going to strip clubs — can whip my beloved, benighted Longhorns into shape against a program that ran a player to death in conditioning drills. And then Monday night, the place I actually matriculated from is bring back the blackout uniforms to help the new (black) coach take on VaTech. Also, I will be rooting for Sloopy’s nemesis because fuck Notre Dame.

    Never call the cops — celebrity edition. I love the writing: “Officers spoke to the woman for more than an hour and at one point she became combative.” Like, the point where they shot her?

    I can’t wait to terrorize coworkers with a tele-presence robot. “Hey! Everyone else has coffee? Why don’t I get coffee?”

    The Man is keeping an enterprising Florida Man down! “Police said the couple transformed a kitchen window into a drive-thru window because it didn’t want to draw attention by having customers regularly entering and exiting the home.” Genius!

    Now that’s a good husband. “Metcalf later allegedly told authorities he had made the weapons over the course of four years because his wife was fearful of the government’s collapsing, according to KNXV.” 40 pipebombs. Outstanding, Marine!

    Here’s a work song for the weekend.

  • What Are We Reading – August 2018

    Riven

     

    mexican sharpshooter

    I decided to pick up a book from one of those “Intellectual Dark Web”…people.  Since pretty much everyone here is familiar with Jordan Peterson I picked something different.  Enlightenment Now by Steven Pinker is what I picked, and ordered here.  I finished it while traveling home last weekend from Kansas City.  What interested me was his interview on Joe Rogan (leave me alone) where he came across as a soft-spoken, somewhat bumbling professor type which more or less is his persona.  The podcast left me thinking he was a left-wing professor that happens to stick his head out of his bubble every now and then and honestly reports what he sees.  He does have a lot of good musings over individual rights, free markets, and authoritarian governments.  His overall message is to look at the history, look at the data and be smart about how you form your opinions because where many fall short is their opinions are not backed up by objective fact.  Where he will probably fall short around here are his arguments against libertarianism, a good rundown of his arguments in his book are located at this link here.  One thing that I kept noticing is while he recognizes where the rights for the individual have led to positive impacts, he still advocates for actions on certain issues that some here will find antithetical to his message.

    Otherwise, his premises are explained clearly, cited thoroughly, and he shows them visually (there are 75 graphs and 40 pages of notes).  If there is any interest I can do a more thorough review.

    Brett L

    As part of our hate-reads, SF dared Jesse and I to read Happy Doomsday. This is the worst professionally written book I have ever read. Seriously. There is nothing good about it. Two too many of the characters survive the apocalypse. Do not read it. No, no. Don’t get curious about how bad it can be. DO NOT READ IT. SF did make it up to me by passing on to me Hardwired by Walter John Williams. This is 80s Mirrorshade Cyberpunk at its most fun. Aside from an irrational hatred of Texans common to many border-staters, it is great. Cyborgs jacked directly into hovercrafts, street samurai with cybernetic snakes implanted in their throats, a monomaniacal corporate titan who thinks he’s plugged into the heart of the silicon. I loved it. I also read Nathan Lowell’s latest two books in the Solar Clipper series. Suicide Run and Home Run. I really like the original story line. You just have to believe me when I say that he makes working the mess deck on merchant marine in space seem interesting. It gets more interesting from there, but somehow getting the coffee out on time seems like a worthy challenge.

    jesse.in.mb

    Erotic Stories for Punjabi Widows by Balli Kaur Jaswal. Not gonna lie, I was grabbed by the name and the first third of the story felt interminably slow. The main character was a wee bit too SJW and the person we assume is her antagonist a little too self-satisfied and traditional. There were erotic short stories embedded throughout, which I suppose I should’ve expected, but was a little scandalized by. Once the story starts rolling it’s engaging and endearing and you’re satisfied with the ending even if it’s a bit fairy-tale perfect.

    The World of Null-A by A. E. van Vogt. I had to keep reminding myself that this was classic sci-fi…and that the copy I purchased on Amazon still managed to be a shittily transcribed/scanned version. It was a jaunty read and the [scifi jargon] + [household item] formula was charming in an old-timey way.

    All New Square Foot Gardening (2nd Edition) by Mel Batholomew. One of these days I’ll get my ass in gear and at least grow tomatoes again. This book is pure garden-project pornography. One disappointment is that the book seems better suited for people who have a winter, and while they make occasional mention of plants that’ll grow in more temperate climates, instructions about harvesting after the first light frost but before the first hard frost are…unhelpful in climate zone 10b.

    Happy Doomsday: A Novel by David Sosnowski. Someone’s mother (not mine, obviously) always used to say “if you can’t say anything nice about a book, don’t say anything at all.” I did not prefer the characters in this book, which made it difficult to finish. I blame SugarFree’s enthusiasm for “this will be so bad it’s good” which he then abandoned in favor of “it’s so bad I refuse to continue” leaving Brett and me to struggle through. SP wisely chose a different Kindle First Reads book and mocked Brett and me for our “suicide pact.” I notice Brett has recommended that you not read it, but he’s just being a little theatrical, I’ll point out that it’ll continue being free to Prime members until the end of the month.

    While engaging in some Happy Doomsday avoidance I listened to the first (and second) novel in the Whiskey Business series, which SP is also listening to. It’s a fun light mystery with a built-in explainer for making and drinking whiskey. I also listened to Andrea Vernon and the Corporation for UltraHuman Protection, which could’ve been written by one of you. I don’t know that it’d hit everyone’s funnybones the way it hit mine, but I would recommend it if you’re looking for a very light superhero caper in a world where superheroes are privatized and an uplifted lady-rhinoceros with an assault rifle discusses her masturbatory habits during a mandatory sexual harassment training.

    JW

    Chelsea Clinton – She Persisted

    SP

    I have nothing interesting to report as my reading time has been taken up by a pharmacology textbook. Not exactly a bedtime page-turner.

    Oh, I am also listening to this book’s Audible version this week while working out, cleaning, and folding laundry. (It’s a full life.) The story itself is OK, but the female narrator sometimes loses me between the heavily-Scots-and-English-accented male characters, making me have to hit the 10-second rewind button, which annoys me when I am wearing nitrile gloves.

    SugarFree

    Great Googly-Moogly, Happy Apocalypse was terrible. I made it 15% in and had to stop. Just bad. Bad, bad, bad. I could only read about 500 words at a time before I had to put it down. In-between the pain, I read James Tiptree Jr.‘s Her Smoke Rose Up Forever story collection. Tiptree is the most celebrated act of literary transvestitism in science fiction, being the nom de plume for Alice Sheldon. It was a fairly open secret that Tiptree was a woman, and I have a hard time believing that anyone of any sophistication who read more than a couple of stories by her couldn’t have figured it out.

    Still not able to shake trying to read Crappy Apocalypse, I turned to intellectual comfort food and re-read the first Uplift Trilogy, by David Brin. Despite Brin’s turn to loathsome politics,* my dozenth pass through his universe of plucky humans, adorable neo-Dolphins, and courageous artificially-evolved Chimpanzees is like a meaty, starchy, filling plate of Thanksgiving food. (The 2nd Trilogy sort of disappears up its own ass in striving for cosmic apotheosis, and I can’t recommend it.)

    *Brin has deleted his call for “climate justice” tribunals, so I’ve linked to an H&R thread where I posted some of his deranged screed. Brin used to write for Reason, by the way, before the madness settled in.

    Old Man With Candy

    There were two authors from my childhood who set me on my life-path to become a scientist. One was Roy Chapman Andrews (truly one of the most interesting humans to ever walk the Earth). The other was Arthur C. Clarke. When I was about 8 years old, my father handed me a copy of Profiles of the Future, which totally captivated me. It was an overview of common futuristic tropes of the sort that would fascinate an 8 year old science geek (invisibility, giants and Lilliputians, alien intelligence, matter replication, interstellar exploration) with some technical analysis of what was possible and what was sheer fantasy, and why. I read and re-read it so many times that it eventually fell apart. So I was determined to give this to my son as well, and found out that there was an updated edition from about 2000. I bought it for him and… well… let’s just say he’s more of a YouTube guy than a reader. It languished on our bookshelves for some years until I picked it up and dusted it off last week, then put it in the Room of Honor. Re-reading it, I can see why it grabbed my attention. Much of it hasn’t aged well, but much of it is frighteningly prescient. And of course, it’s Clarke, which means superbly clear and absorbing writing. I had the chance to meet Clarke once (as a college student) and was not disappointed, other than him avoiding the question about what the Ramans looked like. I cannot be the only one who has told him that he was the one who made them choose a career in science, but he acted as if I had said something special. What a great person.

  • Friday Morning Links

    Djoker and Cilic move on. Venus and Serena will face off today, and the fields will continue to wilt in the heat in Flushing. A few college football games on the slate last night had Purdue (where Neil Armstrong, who to the consternation of Ryan Gosling and the other dickheads involved in a recent film, planted a US flag on the moon, went to college, lost to Northwestern in a hell of a good game. Some big games coming tomorrow and through the holiday weekend. And on the diamonds, the winners were: Milwaukee, Cleveland, Detroit, St Louis, Chicago (NL), Boston, Anaheim, Seattle, Arizona and San Diego.

    Damn! Look at all those names.

    This date’s birthdays include: Roman emperors Caligula and Commodus, the original schoolmarm Maria Montessori, comedian Buddy Hackett, actor James Coburn, frog sports legend Jean Beliveau,  baseball legend Frank Robinson, musician Bob Welch, music legend Van Morrison, (alleged) rodent-afficianado Richard Gere, rocker Rudolf Schenker, lousy prosecutor Marcia Clark, singer Glenn Tilbrook, once-adorable singer Debbie Gibson, and hilarious actor Chris Tucker.

    Its also the date when the following occurred: Jack The Ripper’s first victim was found, Thomas Edison patented the Kinetiscope, “The Threepenny Opera” hit the stage, the Young Plan was agreed upon, Foghorn Leghorn made his screen debut, Malaya gained her independence, the first solar-powered car debuted, Trinidad & Tobago gained her independence as well, The stupid Dept of HUD was established, a computer beat Garry Kasparov at chess, Sinn Fein declared a cease-fire in Northern Ireland, and (former) Princess Diana and boyfriend Dodi Fayed were killed in a car crash in Paris.

    OK, now on to…the links!

    This happened. In SAE too, metrictards.

    Just in case they were worried about large crowds flooding theaters, moviemakers ensure they piss off the largest audience for the film. Oh, and enjoy your metric system, rest of the world (yes, I know there are a couple of other exceptions). We will enjoy being the only nation to send men to the moon.

    Well it looks like NBC might have some explaining to do. I mean, sure, they had to dedicate a team of reporters to dig up such groundbreaking stories as what Trump had for dinner and how it causes mental illness in some lab animals. But you’d think they might support reporting on the biggest sex scandal this side of the Catholic Church.

    That boycott of In-N-Out isn’t exactly going as planned. Not surprising. They’re good burgers, their staff are friendly and efficient and they take good care of their employees.  Their fries still suck though.

    Now, drive me to the cemetery.

    Fuck John McCain. This is how you do a damn funeral.

    When teachers unions say their only focus is on the children, you might want to remain skeptical.  Good job though, kid. You can literally tell your kids how much harder you had it when you’re older.

    Chicago is a powder keg ahead of the Jason Van Dyke trial.  I, for one, predict shit going very, very bad regardless of what happens. And this being the crookedest city in the nation when it comes to cops getting special treatment, I’d bet on a not guilty verdict and some nasty riots.

    Duhhhhhh. Uhhhhhh. Duuuuuuhhhhhh.

    The Papa John’s shitshow continues.  You know, all of those dumbasses are gonna be out of work until they realize that airing your dirty laundry in public is a bad idea.

    Former Enron CEO Jeffrey Skilling is out of prison. Jeez, I wonder how many people are gonna be looking for that asshole to exact some revenge.

    Something for everybody today. The birthdays are just too plentiful to narrow it down to one person. Although if I had to give top billing, this would be it. But these guys had their shit together too. And if you don’t like this last one, then you just don’t get my generation.

    Go have a hell of a (long) weekend friends.  I’ll be spending part of it watching football and the rest with my son, as he departs Monday night for basic training.  Many tears will be shed.