Hmmm, I really did wake up at 6:00 AM. Probably a wise move, since the police put on a show, er, I mean, shot and killed some people between here and where I had to be. My point of view is that the police undoubtedly knew in advance, it’s kind of a prerequisite for this brand of sniping before dawn. If they knew in advance, why did they wait until actual crime took place to do anything? Make the charges more serious?
Why don’t they handle it like they do the rest of us? ID you through credit files and just wait until the next time you get pulled over for a cracked windshield. No need for shootouts at all, and 99% of Americans will never suspect it is a coverup for illegal record searches as forbidden by the Constitution. There were still cops all over the place at noon. Cops in shorts, all being casual about the potential for air time. Hairy, bulging muscles and muscular thighs and you should have seen the men.
Speaking of dolts, that cola machine is still there today. Typical Florida mentality, no provision to act or make a decision, just collect your paycheck and go for lunch. Wait for it to get referred up the chain. It is posing a danger, so I will wait to see how long before they act, even if it hurts somebody – it is the only way Florida ever learns a lesson. You watch, they will claim nobody told them. (Like, where are the meter maids?)
I was over at JC Toys. This is the place that sells the life-like dolls. It is a bit like walking into a nursery. Four hours later, the circuit worked, and thus I have completed my first project with National Telecom, the outfit we first heard from in August. It works like so on paper. They run in a fast cable. Another person wires their vault. Another person wires their network. In the end, nothing works. Electronics follows the Law of Anti-Synergy. Have I just minted a shiny new term? Anyway, the total is less than the sum of the parts. This sadly happens too often and the client is left in the lurch.
I could have run in one 25 foot cable and charged him $75 as I left. Instead, I explained to him in detail what had to happen and that although he was on his own I would stick with it until things got running. We kind of have one super-happy customer now that distrusts everybody except us. It was fun, since I intentionally let him navigate all the menus and find the correct fields. He was aware of this. I contacted National four or five times, and while helpful, they stated twice that they were not responsible to get the guy into service (the CPE was from other manufacturers). That is the last nonsense a frustrated customer needs to hear, so I kept at it. Now he’s happy and if this continues with National, I must raise my prices.
After work, I biked over to Publix. On the way, I snapped this statue near Young Circle. Soon, I’ll put it on the net, saying how beautiful and elegant the lines and form are, the simplicity and power. Then complain that they put some ugly white thing just in front of it. If you look closely, it could pass for a bust of Carmen Miranda.
Later, I went over to JP’s dad’s place for a lesson. It was fast paced and MJ was not there, apparently she got called away to California. Also, the Doc is left-handed and I was unaware of that when I showed him how to use the mouse. He reached for it with his right and I usually take it from there. However, Joe, his son, got to him about the computer. He does seem to think that since Joe is giving him another “better” computer, that he can return this one. I had to inform him it does not work that way. It is not my computer he bought. Joe seems to have told him that since I was not taking the computer back, I had to work off the price by giving free lessons!
Wait until Alayne hears that. She called me today and was already furious that Joe had interfered in this manner. The word is that he’s been a jerk about these things before. I hope no hard feelings arise over this matter, but I had to leave it with JP to put the house in order. Next lesson is scheduled for Tuesday. Wait and see.
In minor news, my average biking speed has increased slightly to 9.4 mph and I’ve covered around 150 miles in two weeks. The distance has a wide daily standard deviation. It has put a strong dent in my weight loss, actually causing me to show a gain on days when I must be running at a [caloric] deficit. I may bike over to Barry U tomorrow. Oh, I called Julie over at the old job, but she didn’t seem at all enthused about the call. Jobs do that to you. No word from the G yet.
Here’s a little tin doggie that caught my interest. I was going to watch some detective dramas tonight, but I’ll cancel that and read another few pages of Elizabeth. Talk about fluffy language. It often gets in the way of understanding. Let me go get you a sample. Okay, I’m back. This one sentence on page 57:
“The idea of any other love, except filial love, was so new to her, that she could scarcely comprehend it ; perhaps it would have appeared to her less strange, if there had been room in her heart to receive it, perhaps if she had seen her parents happy, Smoloff might have been loved ; and, if they should some day become so, perhaps she may love him still ; but so long as they are in misfortune, she will remain faithful to her pious passion : to contain two such, the human heart, vast as it is, is not sufficiently capacious.
The extra space around the semi-colons etc is in the original. You’ll have to translate it yourself. Filial? What is filial? Time for the BIG dictionary. Filial is Middle English for son or daughter. Then I noticed “fenestral”, which means a small window. That must be the root word of “defenestrate”. MS spellchecker flags it [fenestral, I didn’t look up the other].
What? Well, you can look it up yourself. Quotes over three sentences don’t have a closing quotation marks, I’m serious. For the record, those 97 words are not the longest sentence I’ve ever read. That still goes to the opening of Don Quixote or something by Cervantes that I counted to 145 words and promptly put down for much later in life.
