One year ago today: August 21, 2015, stupidity is no barrier.
Five years ago today: August 21, 2011, on Fort Knox.
Nine years ago today: August 21, 2007, my popular courses.
Random years ago today: August 21, 2012, justice for Ryan Craig!
MORNING
This is the ice cream cooler at the Magnolia. I’m pointing to the Rocky Road. This is the only place I’ve had a milkshake in the past five years, that should tell you something. They also sell blueberries if you can afford them. Blueberries, the new Florida fruit. Introduced pests have killed everything else and you know how well Florida learns a lesson.
But having no other option, I went through the shed. And found it. A full box and no excuses, that was my handwriting on the label. I screwed up, don’t ask how that came about. I plead temporary insanity or some total babe walked past while I had the felt pen in hand. Both situations are identical, psychology-wise. Say, not meaning to distract you, but did you read that article “Your Brain on Physics”? (No link, check recent Scientific American.)
It relates to a discovery that the learning process affects the same portions of the brain in all humans. Ha! So it’s an unintentional dig at all the azz-clowns who claim they weren’t born smart. Lame excuse guys. The study shows, for example, the portion of the brain is identical for anybody learning dancing, or typing or music because that part of the brain has to do with rhythm. So there, all you bastards were lying all along—turns out stupid is something you have to work at learning after all. I always thought so. Double ha!
And how about those airlines starting to charge customers for unsuccessful complaints. We always knew it was a core group doing most of the bitching. Take note, other bureaucracies. You only need tromp on the loudmouths to get most of your quiet back. It would also quell legitimate complaints, but so what? The chronics don’t want to be satisfied. Remember our hero who finally spit on the old lady. Sure, he lost the job, but she shut up, didn’t she?
Flaming June.
NOON
Here’s the promised shot of the rafters on the house up the road, the one Agt. M should buy. At this point, nobody even knows who owns the place. It may be a knock-down, since five years in bad condition can really deteriorate an interior. You can see light showing through a few ports where it shouldn’t. This picture has been artificially lightened so you can see the roof trusses are a few generations newer than the lathe and plaster walls.
It would be a rent to own or owner-finance purchase, and far too many people think that is easier than bank loans. No, and you can lose your entire equity in a wink. Until you pay that final penny on time, the other guy holds title no matter what else you may have in the sales contract. It’s like saving money, in that everybody thinks they can knuckle down and do it. Bull. One man in a thousand can actually save meaningful amounts. And meaningful these days is $40,000. Anything less and you are running in place.
It further takes a massive mental transformation to save. Too many fail because they cut corners, which always swings back the other direction and wipes out any temporary gains. A close second reason for failure is telling people about it. That’s how you lose friends. It is only time until one “friend” desperately needs exactly the amount you’ve saved and will turn on you if you refuse to lend it. And accuse you of becoming a hard-hearted miser. Right, Rob?
This ability to save must be custom learned by each individual in his own lifetime. Daddy can point the way, but even most rich kids never learn. I can tell right away who has acquired the ability and I have not yet met anyone like that in Florida. I’m not being hard on the place, I’m saying that in my 17 years in this town, I have not ever met even one person who could lend me say, $5,000 right now. This applies to the rich and poor, because the ability to save up and say, buy a house, is independent of one’s income.
AFTERNOON
We made the run back to Ft. Lauderdale between 1:30PM and 4:40PM, including a stop in Clewiston for coffee. Yep, that’s fast, but Agt. M is a habitual poor driver who takes chances and speeds. He can even manage to weave between traffic on a nearly-deserted four lane freeway. It was my choice to ride, so it’s not like I was too worried. It is not bad driving, the adjective I used was “poor”. Even if you do nothing outright dangerous, it is never a wise idea to draw attention to yourself on the roadways. Aggressive driving does that. And at 80 mph, it is roughly a three-hour trip. Nice to know.
Listening to the news, I see yet another shameless turn in the media. The very people who were initially so hard on Trump in the early days are switching sides. Not because they’ve come to realize Trump is right, but they realize he’s winning and don’t want to be left in the cold. Last year they tried every establishment dirty trick aimed not at journalistic truth, but at trying to sabotage Trump’s meteoric rise. Now that Trump is has neither lost ground or compromised, they are now using the tactics on the other candidates. “See how fair we are, we’re now ripping at Hillary.” Yeah, but only after it is obvious she is a basket case.
Same with the hold-outs in the Republican party. I know nothing about the party, but I see that the old-timers thought they could bend Trump to their hidden agendas by withholding full support. Especially that low-brow Rand person, who is going to get his stupid ass kicked for what he’s been doing. He is not responding to the facts—the American people want Trump. He has never quit trying to pollute that fact with all the foul goings-on that people are now sure the party faithful want to preserve.
NIGHT
I’m actually going to miss the trailer court, I think. I was afraid I’d get too used to living here. Yet you’d have to be blind to not see that the Miami rot is heading straight this way. The quality of living is declining every passing year, that encroaching Latinization and ghetto-ization relentlessly makes life harder on everyone without any of the so-called “benefits” you hear about. But don’t care about when your bicycle gets stolen.
There is also the issue of prices rising with slowly eroding my lifestyle. I’m the last one to tell you that I’m experiencing all the classic trials of a fixed income. I knew it would happen forty years ago and anyone my age who says they are surprised is an ignoramus or a liar. It’s just no any easier when the increases come along for things that don’t deserve any, but are parasitic charges gnawing away constantly in the background. Bank fees, transit levies on your electric bill, 911 charges on your cell phone. Shit like that.
And before you know it, they are zapping you for another $50 per month that you would not willingly give them if their lives depended on it. I would stoop to help a dog or put an injured worm out of its misery, but I would not assist a tax collector. I’m serious about that, if you are a tax collector or anything of the kind, it is best to not mention it around me. No, it is not just another job.
ADDENDUM
Okay, you’ve been patient so here are the reports on Book Eight and Book Nine. Book Eight can be ignored, it is concerned mainly with the life and times of Charles as he publishes minor works meant to be read at campus meetings and bug enthusiasts. It continues on with his married life, I think the purposes is to show that in the long run, Darwin is easily side-tracked, but knows his theory of evolution will be an upset.
He travels around, goes to various society functions, has children and buys a house. And like all rich kids, convinces himself he is working hard but in reality has never put in a real day’s labor for a wage in his life. There are interesting sidelines of how England is changing in his time, but no more so than in another era.
Book Nine is where things start to catch up on old Charlie. The plot continues to follow his health and domestic life. And keep the reader informed that he is related to the Wedgewoods of pottery fame and a great father, to boot. Sick children, new cooks, his own father dies and leaves them something like £40,000 pounds sterling. Let me see if I can valuate that. It isn’t easy because debased currency is one of the stats government are intensely motivated to lie about. (The Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, for instance, claims an 1850 dollar is $28 today—a blatant and absurd lie.)
Using a UK consumer price index, that [the inheritence] works out to a more realistic £183,000,000 pounds, which is around $250,000,000 or a quarter billion dollars. It's probably a lot more because back then the money was backed by silver. Now you know why Chuck can sit around his country estate writing bug books that never sell.
Anyway, the book drags things a little so you’ll know Darwin fought with his idea and also that dozens of other authors were proposing competing ideas of how evolution took place. For instance, there was a concept that life existed on isolated islands because they had once been connected to a continent. Another noted that no species ever became extinct without another similar species taking its place.
In short, old Chas. had better publish fast or somebody is going to steal his thunder.
Last Laugh
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