One year ago today: May 31, 2019, Murfreesboro, TN.
Five years ago today: May 31, 2015, but only once.
Nine years ago today: May 31, 2011, circular definition, courtesy MicroSoft.
Random years ago today: May 31, 2017, just don’t chance it.
Today we lost the red scooter, the one just finished paying for last month. Stolen because I have not fully learned the lesson to never enter into any arrangement where by I would suffer it the other party doesn’t meet their word. Some of this is repeat, but since it is the foremost event of the day, let’s look at some details. First, a lot of people around this county owe me favors. Not much, a boost, a ten-dollar loan, a lift into town, you get the idea. But not one of them could reciprocate with a ride 15 miles to my car, parked near Lake Wales. Every last one of them had some ready-made excuse (my car’s overheating or I gotta pick up my cousin at the airport this type of shit). So, I went over and woke up Agt. R at 9:00AM. Yes, the same Agt. R, who if I had not gone to bat for him three years ago, would not have a door to answer.
I got a flat tire six miles east of town. Worse, the tire separated from the rim so I could not push it. I leaned in against a closed farm gate and hitched into town, arriving at 1:00PM. No Agt. R, no phone call. Here’s my mistake. I could not believe a man whose house I saved would not show up or not call. I waited an hour. At 2:00PM, I had no choice but to start walking the six miles back. I was half-way there when he pulled up beside me on the road. We sped to the spot, but the scooter had been stolen a few minutes earlier. The truck tracks were still fresh on the grass.
Yes, Agt. R is aware how badly I needed that scooter and that I just finished paying for it last week. He offered no excuse for being two hours late except that he had tried to call me. You decide, I was sitting with his lady friend on the patio when she texted him that I was right there, waiting. So I suspect we’ll never know the true story. This has serious financial consequences for me, I would never have left that scooter parked if I’d even suspected he would be two hours late. My gas budget just leaped from $16 per month to $130. And everyone knows I tore the heart out of my car driving to Nashville, so driving it around for groceries now is just asking for more trouble. This last picture of the scooter was taken at 10:30AM today.
I know, no backup plan. If I’d known he wasn’t there, I would have flagged down a truck and paid him to haul the whole scooter to town. It only weighs 160 pounds. And when he was not there, I should not have waited the hour, I should have started walking back immediately, cursing him every step of the way. I understand he “left his phone in the truck”, but when you are two hours late for your own commitments, you walk out to the truck and make a call. I’m understandably pissed, so let’s see how much of this report makes it past the censors in the morning.
Four minutes hard work in DC.
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The SpaceX craft has docked in orbit. I’ve no time to review the reports but these are still routine events which, I think anyway, should have been automated by now. The process is called berthing, which I don’t like. Why not the landing inside a chamber like the movies. Too expensive? Fire some of the dead weight over at NASA, use that money. And what’s this, Zuckerberg saying he’s “struggling” with Trump comments. The man who walked over the privacy of a hundred million people is now trying to pretend he has humanistic concerns. Start by getting rid of that haircut that looks like it is glued on string cheese, does he have some kind of scalp condition? I’ve seen better haircuts on statues of Julius Ceasar.
I estimate it will require $1,600 to replace the scooter and another $300 to get it on the road. And the replacement will be some crappy model.
