One year ago today: April 25, 2024, not your buddies.
Five years ago today: April 25, 2020, my spoiled birds.
Nine years ago today: April 25, 2016, an instant trillionaire.
Random years ago today: April 25, 2004, that lady lawyer.
Those who like birdies don’t need a rooster in the morning. They know cardinals and woodpecker will let you know it is feeding time. Friday, my traditional day off when there are not gigs, is open for anything today. We still have this and last months travel budget, so how much fun can be had today for $142? No, hold on, the other $71 is from two months ago, but no big deal, I just like to keep the books straight. I would like to go somewhere new, just like my old motorcycle days, and just to say I’ve been there. You know, I’ve never really been in St. Petersburg. I really should be setting up my new planer in the shed. It is still in the box.
Since 2004 we’ve seen those “you wouldn’t steal a car” anti-piracy ads on DVD. Seems they stole the font. Comcast bemoans losing 183,000 customers in the last quarter due to “lack of transparency” in their pricing. That, and people who try to get out of those contracts say it takes months. Surveys show the majority of people associate retirement with travel. The next largest group choose leisure. I’m in the smallest group (that does not regard continuing to work as an option) by associating it with freedom.
So here is my plan. A hearty breakfast, then sleep in until 9:00AM or 10:00AM. Say, that reminds me I never wrote why I became cook at scout camp, which I had no idea would become so influential in my life. You see, this morning I receive a report of my recent tests. Flying colors, which I at least partially attribute to good diet. These are pretty comprehensive tests, I see here one for vitamin deficiencies. That seemed unusual but it is under the heading of a variety of diabetes tests, a condition I believe I would have had I the standard American diet. (I am in the range of being pre-diabetic, I did not know this could change back over time.)
I have not been in St. Petersburg since Trent & I had coffee in the geodesic dome. I scanned for other things but the only good offering is a children’s science museum and I don’t care much for screaming brats just now. Cancel all Indian (feather, not dot), African, or Asian exhibits, I not in the mood for hype today, either. The Segway tour is overpriced at $120 (the old double-occupancy trick again) and the cart tour goes ballistic to avoid mentioning whether or not they have free parking. Never assume that just because Florida has 60,000 square miles of flat empty land that any of the cities are designed with adequate parking. We have more “dual citizens” than any other State.
You see where this is headed. Save the money and buy something I always wanted. Build a router table, maybe. All six pairs of birds have been in my yard since pre-dawn and I should spend more retirement days doing nothing, not that I’ll ever get used to that. Trivia. Why are all humanoid robots made of white plastic? Because of racial implications, manufactures don’t dare make them black.
There’s more trouble with locally appointed political judges blocking federal laws. This is possible because of hundreds of small “nothing” laws slipped into place over the past 60 years. Now, Republican Presidents need approval from district “nobody” judges. This is hardly a random situation. I don’t see but one way this can end. How about soldiers who refused the jab getting reinstated with back pay. Now hold on, I also refused, where’s my handout? But, but, that’s different. Is it now?
89’98 butterfly.
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Caltier is not only a month late, it will be the first since inception they have missed a monthly disbursement. The worst part is the silence. I suspect people have, after a year, begun to pull money out. The last two payouts of $12 bucks showed there was at least some spark left. But to pay nothing and say nothing is a staggering hit on their reputation. It is understood the SEC has required some reorganization, but it has been a year. My money is secured by the properties, which are supposed to be managed in a way that produces enough income for a profit every month. And that profit is required by law to be paid out.
Caltier offered an Income and an REIT fund (both regulation A). But they are no longer listed on the portfolio page. This could mean anything as the totals are listed in my account [as viewed on their web site]. The holding account [my bank] has continued for the whole time so there is several thousand uninvested dollars sitting there. A decision is pending as their average payout is nearing what I could get with no-risk CDs. They must clean up their act, and a plain-English explanation could still save matters.
Regulation A. What is it? After the funny stuff preceding the Great Depression, 1933 saw a host of requirements needed for anyone to raise capital. Investing in new startups, called IPOs, requires a mountain of paperwork. Regulation A allows smaller companies to raise money without the massive full registration process, but the amount they can raise (and lose) is limited to two “tiers”, one at $20 million, the other at $75 million. Caltier Fund 1, in focus here, is a $50 million fund. That’s the two tiers in Caltier, that is, Calculated Tiers of Income.
This finally explains why the fund is so touchy about the income declaration. SEC says nobody can invest more than 10% of their annual income. Reg A shares also carry a host of selling restrictions, which includes inheritance, gifting, and that includes pledging or even giving the shares away. However, I am prepared to lose the invested money without crying over it, but that would not make me happy. This is why I am capping Caltier at half what I first intended. You can sell Reg A shares any time, but who wants shares that miss disbursements, kind of thing?
How goes the new band member? He is doing fine, partially because he does not know he’s entered a structured atmosphere. For example, he wondered why we rehearse with the Prez if he won’t be in the band? Easy, the new guy will always argue about the superiority of his own song list unless there are at least two people in the existing group. Then, he’ll go along as a team member. It’s not a big deal with Roberto because this is all new territory to him, but at least he now knows exactly what to shoot for—presentation over performance. Just not by too much.
I had occasion to read some BASIC code, the language the world would be using today if MicroSoft had not interfered. Program using natural language (plain English) had immense potential, but MicroSoft schemed to change programming into coding, which is more similar to machine language. For no improvement in quality, coding became a university course and prices went up. There is no mystery to coding, as I’ve said, all languages use the same original seven commands invented in the 1950s. You already know most of them. Arithmetic, if-then-else, loops, counters, and memory manipulation.
If you broach this topic with coders, they will launch into excuses that BASIC is primitive, needs a compiler, is limited, blah-blah. Back in the early 90s, my question was not on any of those points, but why they did not adopt the simple and self-documenting command structures. BASIC was already moving in that direction, as it had already gone from a compiled language to an interpreted language—already a step in the right direction. That is where Microsoft began pushing C+ was better for commercial software, halting the evolution of BASIC. Why was C+ better you ask? Because MicroSoft said so. Seven commands morphed into the unmaintainable mess today known as C++, Python, Ruby, Rust, Java, PERL, and VisualBasic.
All of which share the same major defect—to be maintained or modified, you pretty much have to find a coder who has the same head-space as the first guy. Consider that impossible. Another major defect is the use of punctuation marks as delimiters and code. Why is this done? I find no other justification other than job preservation. Most programming can be done by children, but coding requires crazy attention to detail. Remember how the ancient Chinese said all government advancement was open to anybody who could read and write? They then made it so complicated only the rich had the years required to master it.
And it did not take long for this hat to appear. Figuring this blog needed some routine maintenance, I spent the evening purging certain small details that changes in social media have made obsolete or simply material that millennials have proven incapable of properly interpreting. Like yes, I used to walk out on dates who flirted with other men on my time. It’s just something I won’t tolerate after I learned it was not natural behavior as some women tried to make me believe. It was also safer in the early days to use real names, but those have long been purged where it makes any difference.
ADDENDUM
Scout camp cook. There were aspects like the cook did not have to gather firewood or take the useless army hikes or (especially), have to wash dishes. But what let up to me being cook? I did not apply but had been assigned the duty when it was my turn. I rapidly discovered two items. First, I did not mind some chores the other scouts detested, like peeling potatoes. Myself, however, did not see this peeling as work any more than, say, making good coffee. You find the guy who does the best job of it and make him do it all the time.
This is where I learned how the aroma of coffee and frying onions winkled these types out. Another consideration was that cooking was considered “sissy” by the others, but I was never subjected to such name-calling. Because it was well-known that I was the only scout in camp who had ever been “caught” with a girl. How does this connect with today? See the picture? It is chopped meat and onions in butter (in camp we had margarine) with salt and pepper. I had learned the art of making enough in the morning to have leftovers for all day. Peel 25 pounds of spuds in the morning and you’ll get no bitching and moaning all day like the troops that served Kraft dinner.
This photo is from around 45 minutes ago. Served on spuds, it is a classic around here The spuds [at camp] progessed from pan-fried in the morning, boiled at noon, and mashed for supper. Mix these with mashed and gravy and you can’t go wrong.
