malada

Just let me say that with the crazy election, crazy holiday plans and incompetence in some of the people I work with, I've fallen behind in some essential paperwork that I use for work.

We do a lot of Google sheets and Google docs and I haven't been keeping an accurate track on line of things. I've been getting my job done... it's just not been clearly documented.

When my boss found serious discrepancies in the report she was really, really upset and I thought she was going to chew me out for falling behind. Instead, she reaffirmed her faith in my work and was mostly concerned that if something happened to me, she'd be unable to track what I had done.

It's been like drinking from a fire hose at work. I've had to put in overtime and weekend hours just to keep up. And the rampaging virus isn't helping either. My housemate is now afraid to go out to the grocery store so before work today I did a big run to help plump up our stock.

It's good to see we have extra food stashed away.

We'll be hitting the wall soon, with those infected during Thanksgiving just showing up. Then there will be Christmas and New Years infections because... people are idiots and really just want to party like it's 1999.

It ain't. Come January the fertilizer will be hitting the air mover ... big time. I'm pretty sure we'll have enough food and other goods to hunker down through January although I'm sure I'll be doing another early morning shopping trip in the next week or two.


-m

I am thankful that I could sleep in. I've slept very poorly the past week and I was glad not to have to get up at 6:30 in the darkness.

My sister in law is visiting my mother and law (and taking care of the dear woman) and mentioned missing her bicycle.

We have a bicycle.

It's forty years old, but not a lot of miles on it. However, I never got around to putting it back together after buying new tires for it *mumblety mumble* years ago.

So I finally got around to pumping up the tires and ... how does this thing go back together? I had in issue with the derailer and the back brakes - but I got it figured out. Yah 3 in 1 oil! Got out the old bike helmet and did a short hop around the block.

Starting off down hill, I remembered how much fun this used to be. Then I checked the brakes...the front brakes are okay if noisy but had I loosened the back brakes to get the rear wheel back on - the back brakes didn't work at all! The derailer still worked but the cables have stretched so it's hard to properly shift gears. Top that off with my balance being rather iffy nowadays I only dumped myself twice! Fortunately, it was when I had slowed down to almost a stop.

My sister in law will not be using this bike.

I'm sure with new cables, brake pads, fresh grease and a proper adjustment of the cables it'll be fine. Maybe in the spring I'll take it to a shop and let a professional do that. Could use some new reflectors too. However, I think my bike riding days are over.

Didn't do anything for dinner but we've got some canned sweet potato, a jar of turkey gravy and stove top stuffing. We might pick up a chicken tomorrow, depending on how mad the grocery stores are, and have a Thanksgiving supper a day late.

-m

Another press conference by the legal clown car that is Trump's lawyer team has melted down with references of CONSPIRACY! HUGO CHAVEZ (isn't he dead?) SECRET SERVERS IN GERMANY! GEORGE SOROS! - all without a shred of evidence.

Even with Guliani's hair dye streaming off his head I'm not laughing.

I laughed when Trump rode down the golden escalator when he began is run for presidency.

I laughed when the Republicans were in complete disarray with third rate candidates *who couldn't lay a glove* on the buffoon that was Trump.

I stopped laughing when nearly half of America voted that lying, racist, tax cheating sociopath into office.

No matter how crazy, how pathetic, now *utterly insane* the antics of the Trump administration have gotten I haven't been laughing.

Because they're serious. Deadly serious.

They don't care about facts, they don't care about science, they don't even care about their supporters - they only want to wield power: power over people, the world, even reality itself... as long as they don't have to pay the consequences. And historically, they haven't. Grifters rarely do.

It may be comical but it's not funny. They only care about fooling enough people to shake down as many people as they can and run.

-m

It's the Saturday after election day and they're still counting. I'm nervous and on edge still... but I'm okay with waiting a little while longer.

Count every vote.

If Biden has won, make damn sure of it by counting every, single, vote.

Even if he has won, there is still the toxic dump that is the racist, sexist, elitist, science-denying, fascist scum that needs to be scrubbed from the minds of the possibly brain-washed masses that voted for Trump.

The true believers... the Vanilla ISIL gangs... let the FBI deal with the domestic terrorists.

Personally, I think the best thing that could happen is Biden/Harris waits until all the votes are counted... either later today or tomorrow... then wait until the Monday news cycle to hit to make the Big Announcement. That will seriously troll Trump.

I've heard that Big Baby Donnie has declared that he'll only leave the White House being dragged, kicking and screaming. I'd watch the live stream of that. However, I'd make sure he doesn't try to steal the artwork, the china and the silverware before he exits. And yeah, I totally believe he'd try to do that.

And bring in the steam cleaners and the CIA to search out the bugs that might have been planted. Trump seems to be the type to punch holes in the walls* and steal the light bulbs before he goes.

-m

*except he's too weak to do that. Maybe he'll have Donnie Junior do that

Bastille Day

Music: Geddy Lee and Alex Lifeson
Lyrics: Neil Peart

There’s no bread let them eat cake
There’s no end to what they’ll take
Flaunt the fruits of noble birth
Wash the salt into the earth

But they’re marching to Bastille Day
La guillotine will claim her bloody prize
Free the dungeons of the innocent
The king will kneel, and let his kingdom rise

Bloodstained velvet, dirty lace
Naked fear on every face
See them bow their heads to die
As we would bow as they rode by

And we’re marching to Bastille Day
La guillotine will claim her bloody prize
Sing, o choirs of cacophony
The king has kneeled, to let his kingdom rise.

Lessons taught, but never learned
All around us anger burns
Guide the future by the past
Long ago the mould was cast

For they marched up to Bastille Day
La guillotine – claimed her bloody prize
Hear the echoes of the centuries
Power isn’t all that money buys

Usually when people talk about 'Randian Hell' they refer to when those people who call them Randians, or Objectivists: basically those that follow the 'philosophy' of Ayn Rand - take power in a society. It is when her 'heroes' take control and move us into a selfish, dog eat dog, money grubbing, sociopathic society.

In Trump's case, the Randian Hell comes from somewhat of the opposite - the Randian villains are charge.

In her novels Ayn Rand portraits her straw man villains as socialist, hyper-emotional, irrational, science denying parasites who suck off the goods produced by the elite, rational, productive people. In truth, the Randian villains aren't socialist or communist at all - they're just riding the socialist train to suck off the government teat. They're narcissistic, elitist con artists who've found a great way to grift off the system.

Make no mistake about it Rand's antagonists are not socialists at all. They believe in government: a government that enforces *their* rules, line *their* pockets, promotes *their* causes - not for the good of the society as a whole, but for themselves only. "Socialism for ME - Austerity for YOU." It's quite the opposite of any kind of socialism.

Rand cloaks her villains in the guise of communists or socialist - the bugaboos of the day - but they're really only evidence denying, money grubbing grifters who'll gladly burn down individuals and whole societies to line their pockets and remain in power.

Yes, the Randian hell is when her *villains* are in charge. Like they are now.

-m

No COVID here... just a mild cold.

We were 99 percent sure it was just a cold but we had to make sure.

Relief.

So Trump is out of the hospital. Of course he got immediate tests, immediate treatment (unless he was stalling after he tested positive) and of course top notch care. Must be nice.

However... from what I know about COVID 19 and it's treatment, he was treated very aggressively and got out of the hospital far too quickly. Maybe he really does have an impressive constitution and was able (with aggressive treatment) to shrug off the virus - but I ain't buying it.

We'll see.

"The New York Times has obtained tax-return data extending over more than two decades for Mr. Trump and the hundreds of companies that make up his business organization, including detailed information from his first two years in office."

I think this calls for the jumbo sized popcorn tub. With extra butter.

-m

In one of our neighbor's back yard is a butternut tree. The fruit if the tree has a green, fleshy outside with a hard nut on the inside. The inside the nut has a small amount of very sweet material. You need a pick to get it out so it's not commercially viable although it was harvested in previous centuries by the Native Americans.

Squirrels love the stuff. From the activity I've seen lately we've had a bumper crop of the furry maniacs. I've seen them in groups of four hanging out on front lawns like a gang hyped up on meth - except instead of fighting they run away. We've also had an extra large dropping of butternut fruit.

The squirrels peel away the fruit which rots and stains everything to a dark brown, then leave the hard husks everywhere.

Then last night I was closing a downstairs window - the old crank out type - and the window got stuck open.

Some furry f*cker and stashed a whole fruit on the window sill.

I think this is the year I collect all the fruit that ends up on my lawn and throw it back onto our neighbor's yard. Their tree... they can deal with the fruit.

-m

Ted Cruz: If these guys win, we’re going to wake up in January with Elizabeth Warren as Treasury Secretary

Me: I can't wait.

-m