Month: July 2023

Posted on

One of those nights…

I’m tired but not able to sleep.

I was sorting some of his music and there’s something about seeing his handwritten notes in books that he played from every week that makes me feel blue.

I’ve been packing up things that I won’t be needing. DVD’s CD’s and their players since all the movies are streamable as is the music. I’ve been considering packing up the ethernet switch and relying on WiFi only. The switch handles all the CAT-6 cable connections throughout the house. Removing it would disable all the wall sockets.

The new computer, and iPad have the latest WiFi radios and provide more than acceptable speeds wirelessly.

The goal is to have all the tech that can or will be shipped boxed. There are a couple of items of tech that I’ll be transporting with me, so that I have them ready to use when I get wherever I’m going.

The same is true of kitchen appliances / utensils / glasses and dishes. I might not be actually taking these things with me, but I don’t have to have them occupying space, especially if I’ve got little need to use them.

I hope to have both the cubbies in the dining room empty by the weekend. It’s hard going through all the materials.

Some of the paperwork is more than 7 years old and once I’ve figured out the date, I’m pretty quick to put stuff on the shred pile. The trouble is that old and new are mixed in a jumble and that jumble isn’t sorted in any way. I’ve been sorting in a gross way. “Banking”, “Utilities”, “Paystubs”, and “Other” if the paperwork passes the initial date check. Doing a subsort of each major category is easier and provides a little crosscheck. For example, all the utilities end up sorted by provider and date.

I see some banker’s boxes in my future where all of this stuff can be filed and properly stored.

This all sounds like it’s a tedious time consuming mess. It is. However it must be done because there are still taxes to be filed and paid.

Just because you’re dead doesn’t mean the fucking government isn’t making your shit someone else’s troubles.

I really do hate the government. State and Federal, they’re parasites of the worst kind.

The dog has gone to bed. I’ve poured myself a second drink. I’ve become very much aware that my writing has suffered over the past year. I was reviewing some of the blog posts I’d written going back a couple of years.

It wasn’t advanced narcissism, I was looking for a piece I’d written a while ago. I haven’t found the piece, but I did notice a distinct difference in my writing. The time at the shithole company in San Diego, plus my concern about the other half, and all the other stresses in my life are visible in my style, choice of words, and even subject matter.

I need to write my way through the darkness. I need to get back to the quick turn of phrase and making my point.

For someone who has hated politics all my life, I’ve dedicated considerable keyboard time to it. I’m honestly not sure what that is about. I’d like to think I have something of interest to say, but I don’t think that’s entirely true.

The more likely truth is that I reached an age where I was able to compare the political system that I grew up understanding and being taught, with the system as it is today. In that comparison, either I’ve discovered significant differences or lost my naïveté.

I’m not sure which, if either is true. I only know that there are serious differences. Those differences have caused a dissonance that I’m having a hard time resolving.

I don’t think of my sudden interest in politics as fear, or white nationalism, or whatever else the SPLC might come up with. I’ve always believed there was a certain low level corruption in the political system and that corruption was held in check by there being more honest people in politics than dishonest ones. But now I’m faced with corruption that I can’t ignore and questions that are not being answered despite investigations and inquiries.

As a citizen, I believe that I deserve answers. Moreover, I deserve to see these bad actors perp walked out of the halls of power and into the halls of prison.

I’ve also come to believe that it’s a very good thing I’m not holding my breath.

I found a printout of a series of messages that the other half had with an artist friend of ours. Time flies! The other half was inviting our friend over to have a three way. I remember the night well and blogged about it too.

This is the first time I’ve seen the messages that led up to the three way. It appears that the other half had absolute faith that I could handle both of them. It was his overselling of my skills that led to me being somewhat annoyed at the other half because there is only so much sexual gymnastic magic I can perform in a night.

Nonetheless, reading the message thread and remembering that night put a smile on my face.

I could use a little human tough right about now, but I’m not into being with complete strangers. I really want to get to know someone before we’re having sex.

It was a really good night!

I suppose in the near term I’ll have to be content with the large selection of X-rated movies. It is extremely unlikely that I’ll find anyone close at hand who would like to develop a friendship prior to getting naked.

It’s time to go to bed.

I hope you’ve had a better night’s sleep than I have.

Posted on

Changed the header photo

I thought it was time for a change, I’d been looking for something to represent all four seasons, but hadn’t settled on anything beside Winter Snow and Autumn leaves. Now I have a Spring / Summer photo with some of the local flowers blooming.

The photo was taken on a nice day walking the dog. He ended up on the cutting room floor because he managed to have only his tail in the photo.

Here is another photo of him from that day. I was a good walk and a good day for both of us. We hadn’t been walking around this particular area for a while. Part of it burned a couple of years ago. I’d stopped doing our walks down there, because I didn’t want to think about a mostly white dog running around in a mostly black charred mess. I’d have gone broke in groomer fees. (OMG! I just used a term that’s banned on some platforms!)

This is the problem with redefinition of words and subsequent censorship of those words.

I digress…

I like this photo for its contrast and it also provides commentary on the county’s efforts to rehabilitate what they did to the wash behind the house.

This is the wash after the county spent 10 years working on it. The gash is 20 to 30 feet deep. Straight as an arrow and looks a lot more like a log flume than a flood control project. It was supposed to prevent erosion and manage occasional floods. In the distance you can see a bridge. For Years, the county resisted putting that bridge in. Building the bridge was the county admitting they were wrong.

There had been a bridge built over this wash in the 1930’s or ‘40s. It had washed out in a particularly nasty spring thaw/rain event. The county, instead of putting the bridge back, decided to dig a log flume. Then they decided to simply have the road surface drive through the wash bed.

In an effort to slow the water down they built a series of concrete and rock steps into the wash and subjected the residential area along the wash to 2 years of living in a construction zone.

The subsequent 10 years the neighborhood was a heavy equipment / construction zone for 3 to 5 months out of the year. An added bonus was that the roadway washed out pretty reliably, closing the road to town.

After a decade, the county redid the math and figured out if they put a bridge across the wash it would save them money. DUH!

The residents had been telling the county this from the beginning and because we were a bunch of rubes who knew nothing, the county ignored us entirely!

This is what the wash looked like before the county started messing about. There was water in it much of the year. The dogs and I would hike up the wash about 3/4 of a mile and play in the pools of cold clear water. We’d be dry by the time we’d walked back home but we’d all be happy. In late Summer there were wild blackberries to eat along the wash bank. It was rugged, natural, beautiful and ever changing.

Yes, rocks moved around through the years but usually not very far. This was due to natural erosion. That being said, the erosion was minimal and honestly seemed to be flattening the wash bed out, so the water was slowing down naturally. The wash bed was also meandering more so the water wasn’t rushing quite as much.

There was also a lot of wildlife that used the wash as a highway, water hole, and hunting ground. One of the reasons I liked this neighborhood and specifically this house was the proximity of the forest and the wildlife.

For years before the county’s destruction of the wash and its surrounding habitat there was a coyote that I could set my watch by. We called her the 6 am coyote and If I saw her, I was running late for work.

The lone California Poppy growing on what looks like the surface of the moon is my reminder to never trust a government agency.

San Bernardino County Flood Control promised that they were going to restore the wash to its natural state.

Originally the wash was lined with trees. There were some pine, some mountain oak, there were even a few aspen like trees. There was also a really nice trail that meandered through the trees. All of this was literally 1000 ft from the back of my home. I loved it, the dogs loved it, and hearing the owls hooting at night was comforting. My home was an oasis from the insanity of LA

All of that was destroyed by people who did not live in the area, who KNEW better than everyone actually living here. People who didn’t ask questions, and who didn’t consult history.

People who used the phrase, “We’re from the government and we’re here to help.”

They gave us more heat, more dust, a scar in the ground that looks like the surface of the moon, and a single California poppy.

Posted on

I know it seems like I pick on the Democratic Party a lot…

But DAMN! They’re such easy targets!

Most people only step on a rake in the yard once!

The Democrats have a habit of dancing around like old cartoon characters did.

There are some of you who will not get that reference because many of those old cartoons have been deemed politically incorrect, or too violent, or racist, or, or, or, or, or….

Just ask Whoopie Goldberg as she appears before the actual cartoons on my Looney Tunes DVD boxed set.

Someone in Hollywood thought it necessary to explain that animated line drawings, some of which were produced as war propaganda were violent, and depicted other people or races in a negative light. Believe me, the last thing I want or need is a social justice lesson when all I want to watch is unrealistic mayhem to put a smile on my face.

Hell! I learned basic physics from Wile E Coyote.

You youngsters never had a chance to see cause and effect and consequences presented to you in the phosphorescent glow of a massive CRT over your bowl of Fruit Loops, on a Saturday morning.

As an aside, if you sat in daddy’s chair with a photographic plate behind you, you could also get free chest X-rays. 

Take that Obamacare!

This is part of the reason that people of a certain age, a.k.a. old as dirt look at the Democrat party follies with a mixture of outright amusement and almost blinding horror.

I honestly don’t remember any political party, or any Presidential administration in my lifetime that was capable of as many self inflicted wounds as Wile E. Coyote.

Maybe Nixon? Clinton?

Clinton just couldn’t keep it in his pants. Although I still chuckle thinking about Yasser Arafat roasting his ass during a humid hot east coast summer day in the Rose garden while Clinton was diddling an intern in the Oval Office. That shit cracks me up!

Clinton did teach the American People the art of lying by redefining a word or group of words in plain view, on national television. That was fucking magical to watch.

I’m still unclear about what sex is. Flash forward to now, and I’m also unclear about what a woman is, so I suppose the question of sex is moot.

By comparison to Biden, Nixon and Clinton were Choir Boys.

The Democratic Party, at this point would make Wile cringe, and Bugs Bunny would show compassion and mercy, by just walking away.

Bugs would say, “Well Folks, there’s nothing I could do that tops what they do to themselves. Enjoy the show.”

Don’t get me wrong, I left the Republican Party too. They were missing the point and continue to do so. I’m sure that in due time, they’ll be the objects of my ire and ridicule. Simply because they’re no different than the Democrats. The like to tout that they have the moral and fiscal high ground but they’re just as likely to fund Billion Dollar boondoggles as the Democrats, if those billions go into the pockets of RNC donors.

As much as I hate the Biden Administration, I do almost feel sorry for Joe. I strongly believe that Obama is the power behind the throne. The way things are going, Obama will get to dance away with his Reputation intact and it will be Joe who’s left holding the bag. He’ll be labeled the worst President ever and all the ills of the Democratic Party will be left at his door.

I fully expect for the Democratic Party to abandon Joe. Then they’ll hold him up as a poster child depicting everything that is wrong with “The Patriarchy,” and “White People in power,” Which will usher in a Black Female candidate and they’ll sell that as the way forward to Democratic voters. It won’t be Kamala, she is so thoroughly unlikeable that most folks don’t even see her unless she cackles. 

No it will be someone slick. I could see it being Michelle Obama and that would result in Barry having a significant hand in five Presidential terms. 

The sad thing is that the Republican Party will never see it coming. After 20 some odd years of Obama’s idea of hope and change, the corruption and gamesmanship between the parties will be firmly and permanently entrenched. There will be no coming back from that, I rather suspect we’ll have some weird combination of Idiocracy, Escape from New York, and Escape from LA, with maybe just a touch of Mad Max beyond Thunderdome.

That’s so long as China doesn’t keep playing with biological weapons, yeah I totally believe that COVID was a bioweapon that escaped before it was actually as deadly or infectious as it was supposed to be. I think Fauci believed he was funding legitimate albeit banned in America predictive disease research. The CCP saw it as an opportunity to advance their research into potential bioweapons.

Let’s face it, a disease that kills your enemy that you are also immune to makes conquest a lot easier and preserves the existing infrastructure. We can extrapolate the effectiveness of such conquest by looking at history. Blankets laden with smallpox given to the Native Americans or Hawaiians for example… Granted, the settlers didn’t know what they were doing at the time but the result was the same.

 If China is allowed to keep playing with chimeric viruses then I think the whole situation will look more like Resident Evil and Idiocracy.

Yeah, maybe me having dreams I remember isn’t such a good thing. I woke up with this weird post in my head this morning.

I suppose on the up side, my brain is doing garbage collection… On the down side my brain is doing garbage collection and purging a bunch of disjointed bit & pieces of wrecked trains of thought, and you’re going to get to read them.

My God have mercy on your soul!