One year ago today: October 15, 2019, on hard work.
Five years ago today: October 15, 2015, I’m not sitting beside . . .
Nine years ago today: October 15, 2011, somewhat below $10,000.
Random years ago today: October 15, 2009, Pudding the Tat.
A team of alleged academics have ruled the COBOL is bad because it is outdated. If that’s the best they can come up with, that’s about as un-academic as it gets. Such thinking reminds me of the recent stories about farmers seeking out older equipment rather than deal with the baloney computer modules the millennial class has crammed on them, or bull-donkey protection plans that read like a cell phone contract. I’m for the farmers on that one. Not everything has a computer solution—particularly when you factor in the caliber of the coders. Reverting back to simple gear that works could have the benefit of letting the OOPs brand of programmers self-destruct.
The new shed window is trimmed, at least as much as it will be. This is the first real window I’ve built from scratch, as in not a repair job. These two panes are unequal in size, as the window is actually only the opening on the left. The right side is reinforced in anticipation of an A/C. Look closely and there is the security screen, bolted and screwed down on the inside with 24 2-inch fasteners. This is what the neighbor will see when he’s over to chat. I still wonder how he can be so amazed with small projects like this.
Talk about satisfaction, this window represents a solid week of work in the new shed. The effect was immediate, in that I’ve begun to take on projects that I’ve put off for a year because of not wanting to do the work inside the house. Plus, inside every project had to be finished in one setting, before the space was needed again. It’s great to be able to leave stuff overnight, I’ve nothing so show you yet, but this has made a terrific difference in small jobs.
As the year end approaches, I’ve reviewed my budget. I’m operating at a deficit, but with a reminder that means [only that] I’m spending more money than allocated, not more than I have. Unlike the government, it does not mean I borrowed extra money to cover things up, only that (the way I like to put it) I had to spend my own money. Ever since late 2018 there is a new statistic, called zero days. Not caring whose lifestyle that affronts, it means days where I did not spend any pocket money. This rose from 12 in 2017 to 29 in 2018. Heck, I could have been sick that often. But in 2018 we have a surge to 54 and this year 84 so far. It’s not the virus, which has had no impact other than inconvenience. Now because of you-know-who, there is no such thing as a truly zero day, they make sure of it with items like property tax and auto insurance.
One explanation is Tennessee, where it does not make sense to go out. That's a real savings. Lately, it is more due to the new shed. In the past week, I’ve worked out there until past 9:30PM. I’m unlikely to go out or even drive after dark. Let’s find some other statistics. Thanks to Internet service, my home office expenses have leapt from $57 per month to $132 per month, but an overall saving since my coffee expense has fallen from $137 to $19, most of it in Tennessee. My best gig netted me $165, an item I rarely record. Organic food has increased my grocery budget 214% and gasoline has remained steady at around $166 per month since I got the car.
El Chalten, Argentina.
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This is the inside view, showing a fan in the A/C cutout. The screen is more evident and for now, that fan alone keeps the whole shed temperate. So much so that I did not connect the wiring to the receptacle put in y’day. There are enough extension cables to take care of everything and I’m considering adding on to the wiring now that have this workspace, might as well make it comfy. It already beats the four sheds over at Agt. R’s as he can’t turn around inside any of them. None are lit, none have power or light. He has a tarp to work under but you know it is not the same.
Radio was so political, I connected up the weather alert radio and listened to that for a few hours. Wow, this Kamala is going bonkers over this court appointment, saying it will undo decades of progress. Yes, lady, decades of leftist treason and sabotage of the capitalist system, which isn’t perfect, but it’s the best in history. Leave it alone. Some people can’t handle money and being poor in America is already fantastically wealthy by world standards. She has also over-used what she clearly sees as her best tactic, that is, dragging in all kinds of side issues not related to the question or answer at hand. I never liked her to start with. She is a horrible example of the worst that can happens when Canadian style socialism finds an open society like America. Like weeds in a fertile garden.
I listened to them grill this new court appointee and it was a disgusting display. The Democrats have had years of micro-focusing on obscure details. There is no way a newcomer could have an answer for every baiting question they threw at her. It was like the White House press briefings, the Democrats are not out for facts, they just want to trip up the speaker. Now they are making big issue that the new lady refused to go along with it. Stick to your guns ACB, don’t play their sucker game. Another annoying Democrate practice is to ask questions in a manner that assumes they alone are right on matters like climate change. My opinion on climate change is personal, not political.
Or how about that piggish fat woman who asked if ACB had ever sexually abused anyone. I would have asked back if she had ever murdered anyone. As long as we’re making implications, why not? Call it what you want, but I am not a fan of hearing unattractive people ask or talk about sex. It makes a lot of people uncomfortable since you never know where these people are going when they are talking about something they themselves can only have by force, coercion, or paying for it. And I finally saw a newspaper photo of this Feinstein. What a fossil, she sounds in every conversation like she is thanking the deejay for taking her call, but . . . .
The economy is working again at street level. Obama’s “shovel-ready” jobs and previous federal programs made no real difference. This time, you see the jobs and people working. It’s a bit different in America because in other countries people will work at any job but they generally won’t invest their life savings (or borrow money) to do it. In America, somebody will dig deep and build a factory, since the confidence is there. What Trump did that helped the most was turn off the tap of sending free money to foreign countries to enable them to compete with us. I lost my job to the Philippines so this is more than armchair economics.
Starting with NAFTA, I’ve never understood why the government shipped jobs away and seemed bent on lowering America to the level of other countries. Even though Trump has reshaped the Republican party, there are still embarrassing hold-outs. What’s happening is the cancellation of the bad trade deals and tariffs have stemmed the outflow of cash, possibly just in time. That is, in time to stop the wipe-out of the real people who make America. America has a resource with unfathomable potential, a huge middle class. For all their credit cards and shortcomings, they still represent a layer of skilled, literate, experienced, investment-minded, motivated, and forward-thinking people who are now fully aware of what was going on. They don’t like taxes, freeloaders, welfare, and raising other people’s kids, they don’t like foreign aid, wars, and entitlements. Just like people everywhere, they just want to go to work and be left alone.
As Elliott, the Brit, points out, the demographic is changing as thousands of students with liberal-dictated mindsets are now entering voting age, they are still no majority. Trump has shown them it is okay to be patriotic and he’s wisely instituting some anti-libtard rules in the schools. This upsets decades of Democrat-fed indoctrination. Elliott says the hidden vote, all the suburban housewives, may band together and vote Trump out. Not now that there is food on the table.
I wonder if I should just call him “the Brit” because once he’s reached a conclusion, he will defend it even if wrong.
We regularly have discussions that end nowhere, the most recent is the polls. He says when they are wrong, it is usually not by much, and they show Biden as ahead. I say that does not matter, because they chose sides in the last election and deliberately made false statements. Even when exit polls showed a Trump victory, they screamed that Hillary was in. This has nothing to do with the error margins to which Elliott alludes. The pollsters got away with this stunt last time without vilification from the press, and they are pulling the same stunt again. So our discussion ended with him saying their margin for being wrong is tiny and my saying their intention doing wrong is huge.
ADDENDUM
I was up late rehearsing three tunes with the chorus pedal. That’s another independently derived innovation, I strum through the instrumental breaks with the pedal, but since I came up with that one twenty years ago, I have since seen others do it. Working with the pedal is a severe distraction for me. I remind myself of what’s that guy, the old guy who half-played every song over on Hollywood Beach. I send him an e-mail once a year to see if he’s still alive. Hopefully somebody will do that for me one day. I used to giggle a bit at his renditions, but he could outplay me on guitar any time.
That’s where I see myself. He was 71 when I first saw him, so he’s 80 by now anyway. This is the way of life I planned my old age. He says he just one day decided he was not going to take all nothingness thrown at seniors, and grabbed a guitar. I believe it, I’ve heard him. Like so many who play the Florida circuit, he had limited audience interaction. My stage presence reflects a lifetime of responding to the people. I’m gambling that will help me this time. It took me ten minutes to half play a Bm chord with three fingers. This is more serious than it would seem. It’s a case of now or never. I’m at the pinnacle of my bass playing and there’s nobody to team up with locally.
