One year ago today: July 28, 2018, impersonal, like the weather.
Five years ago today: July 28, 2014, mattress, my eye.
Nine years ago today: July 28, 2010, clientele of lizard-men.
Random years ago today: July 28, 2008, remember my new sign?
Boss Hogg has kept their Sunday format, so let’s get things done. They have a huge audience because they don’t play gospel during that slot. Same as at Xmas, they don’t do the usual music. I don’t want to run power tools this time of morning, so let’s see about that deck around back. Here’s your food picture. Mixed red and white potato chunks baked in a melted oleo and coconut oil glaze laced with every harmonious spice ever sold at the Dollar Tree. That’s Memphie-Two giving his approval. Oh, and tomato bits. Later, sprinkle with that buttermilk based popcorn topping.
I’ve got the foundation blocks sunk and leveled. I could have got away with four pylons, but I chose five since I’ve not gone wrong on this place yet by allowing extra for what arises later. The blocks are four feet from the wall, allowing for a one foot overhang. The deck is planned to be fourteen feet long, though the canopy may cover only the appliances and water heater. This picture does not do justice for the amount of work required. It took a grueling hour just to clear away the roots and matted debris. Then Alaine called.
We agreed to postpone the trip until the fall. The gals drive to Sarasota once a month for brunch. I’ve proposed we use one of those occasions to find the right place without committing to go to it same day. Advertising needs to be regulated in America. While most people would curb it, nobody wants legislation that might inhibit their own methods. Advertising has become so degenerate, we couldn’t find a 66-acre park. So degenerate that while it is illegal to scam people, it is not illegal to advertise the scam. On any given radio hour, you’ll hear the following swindles:
• male enhancement
• oil well investments
• buyer’s clubs
• work-at-home
Best French rock band.
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It’s mid afternoon and have you ever really worked a shovel when it is 90+ humidity and 90+ F in the shade? It’s siesta but the hard part of laying the foundation is done. I need four fourteen foot 2x6 planks and 8 joists. The dirt on the shady side is more advanced to real soil than the sandy grit of the rest of the yard. I’ve salvaged as much of the real dirt as I can. I’m reminded of Water World and [the island of] Malta, where even a cupful of garden soil is precious.
Malta. You know what I would have done in 1942? We’ve been indoctrinated to think the British had some right to rule the world’s oceans and occupy the Suez Canal. Some right to exclude who could use the open seas. They didn’t have any such right, but we are taught not to question it. We are told how the evil U-boats were sinking the food of mothers and babies, but not how the British blockade was doing the exact same thing to German civilians.
Whoever controlled Malta could stop trade between Gibraltar and Suez, necessitating a long voyage around Africa. As far as I know, that meant British trade and nobody else gave a shit. I would have stationed all 23 available U-boats in the area a mined the single harbor on the island, then sent a single panzer corps to kick the British off the island. The Brits would have been forced to attack, and I would pick off the majority of the British navy as it tried to enter Valencia. The truth of the big defense of Malta is that it was a sideshow. The Germans never intended to fight Britain or to fight a naval war. That part, like saying Germany wanted to conquer the world, is hogwash. Germany did not even start mass producing tanks until 1943.
There is enough soil back there for a garden plot if it is done right. Who remembers that communal garden back on Loquat? That was an impressive operation on limited soil. They had a series of built up boxes, estimated 4 foot by 8 foot. The plan was it make it easy to walk around to weed and water. The growing season here is 12 months and I’m curious what could be done in that spot around the back yard. Even if it turns out only potatoes.
Tampa radio, the only show that arrives after dark that isn’t shigga-booga subsidized monkey-talk, has a group of uneducated comedians who fancy themselves newscasters. You have to hear it, since it normally takes a half-hour before you realize they are journalism graduates. They haven’t the brain cells to find anything interesting to report, so they make something up. This time they are going on about the threat of Iran. This recurring theme has been on the books since before the Romans. The fact of the matter is that country has failed to create a viable economy in thousands of years. Even their one-time empire was based on invading and exploiting their neighbors.
Economic sanctions are enough to return that hotbed of terrorism to the Stone Ages. For crying out loud, in 2,000 years they’ve barely learned to grow figs and lemons. They have squandered the zillions of dollars from their oil sales on wars that incur the wrath of the west, who will never let Saudi Arabia be threatened. The world knows the Saudis have only half the population they claim and are totally dependent on the west to protect them from their rapacious cousins. Another fact is the west has enough oil to last a century. But they are not going to touch it for strategic purposes. America is banking on using Saudi oil as long as the Saudis reciprocate by buying American goods, and in the case of jets and tanks, American bads. The money is circulating back, it’s one big happy bum-feck.
What’s more, the Saudis are smarter than the others. They are building for an oil-less future because they know they are one invention away from losing everything. At least they use their money to build something more than ornamental oasis cities that could be as empty as the Chinese shopping malls in a winkling. The Saudis did not lower oil prices in the 70s and 80s to be friends with America. They hate the west mainly because of envy, because like the rest of the world with their “superior cultures” they failed to achieve prosperity on their own. But they knew if they kept charging too much, the west would find alternatives to oil and they’d be back to herding goats in the sand.
Eighty dollars please.
When you are done admiring today’s progress on the bathroom wall, here’s something new that isn’t on the market yet. The discovery by stem cell researchers that it can cure baldness—watch that sucker get approved by Congress now. I’m curious how this will be sold. My guess is it will become another Viagra, with tons of copycat sites all claiming to be the cheapest. If this method works, it will be an instant success. From what info is available, they can grow the hair follicles from stem cells, which would still have to be individually implanted in the scalp. But, that is existing technology, so I’d keep an eye on it. This picture shows the progress on the bathroom wall as of 9:00PM tonight. The cutouts are for the medicine cabinets.
Old Bernie Sanders is still going for the booby prize. Some libtard made a comment about kids in dirty diapers at a border detention center, like it was inhumane, duh. Now he wants the US government changing immigrant diapers? Trump, who cannot be stifled by the left’s political correctness nonsense, tweets the guy a is liar and a goof who never gave a damn about conditions at the border until it was all about publicity. Result? Liberals can dish it out, but they can’t take it. They start mewling like babies and Bernie gets on the microphone bleating that what Trump said was inappropriate. Okay Bernie, why was it inappropriate? Bernie declares, “Because [the politician] is a friend of mine.”
So, Bernie-boy, let me get this straight . . .
ADDENDUM
The neighbor’s newest acquisition, something very few people remember. A Wheel Horse tractor. This is a 1972 model, that is not a wonderful paint job. It is solid rust on every exposed metal part. Shown here as a mower, it was often used as a donkey engine at rail yards, carnivals, and such. The reason is because it had a real gear box and that engine is a cast iron Briggs & Stratton. You can see it. Such quality is unaffordable today. This one was used to pull kids around in wagons at the county fairs. Normally, there were huge iron weights on the front to prevent wheelies.
In reality, guitar players who pick lead breaks are supremely reliant on what they call their “backup band”. All I ’m doing is reminding them of that in a way they cannot reasonably cry over. Later, I conclude with that song, any extra effort is wasted. I’ll just play a few extra fills behind the lead and dead spots. Well, maybe a few “bass harmonics” to see who notices and in case Tay is in the crowd.
Here’s a statistic for you. In the long run, if you play in a band, how much on average is the actual pay for each song you perform on stage? I have the numbers, but hang on. This is the gross pay, before expenses, based on playing 40 years out of the last 54. This does not count rehearsal time, just stage time. There are two numbers. The total songs played (an estimate, but a close one) and the total pay, which I have to the penny. This does not include tips, just the house pay. Here we go. It’s 68¢. That’s it, your pay per song is 68.116 cents. Less than people plug in the juke box.
My highest paying three years averaged $14,000 each. Then I retired. When I was younger, I did a Willie Loman and used that $14,000 as my benchmark It wasn’t, financially it was my peak, never to be repeated. Those were the days of my house gigs at the longshoreman’s pub and the Met. That’s where I learned to despise guitar players. Five or six of them in three years, mainly fired for egomania, personality conflicts, and not doing the job.
