So I Saw My First Trump 2016 Bumper Sticker
So I saw my first Trump 2016 bumper sticker yesterday (kind of odd considering this is Arizona after all). It was on a massive, jacked-up 4×4 truck (of course), and my first thought was, "Nice to let the entire world know you're a racist, misogynistic, homophobic, mouth-breathing, knuckle-dragging asshole…and you have a tiny penis!"
It's Amazing What You Can Find On The Interwebs
Even when you're not looking for it. And this should touch a soft spot in many a boomer's heart…
I didn't even know there was a soundtrack…
I'll Just Throw This Out There
Quote of the Day
A thoughtful, reasoned response to the Republican cray-cray that seems to be spewing from a fire hose lately…
"At the risk of taking Gingrich's nonsense seriously, just imagine for a moment what translating his proposal into action would mean. The government would round up 3.3 million American Muslims, then "test" them to see "if they believe in Sharia," a notion about which Gingrich doesn't have the remotest clue. Sharia is the Arabic word for "law"; there's no guidebook of official Sharia, and Islamic scholars have a multitude of ideas about how Koranic ideas could or should be translated into civil rules. But even if there were, Gingrich is literally proposing to prosecute thought crimes, as well as jettisoning the First Amendment to throw people in jail for visiting certain web sites. And where is he going to "deport" the Americans whom he decides believe in Sharia to?
Frankly, I think we need to ask just how Newt Gingrich got radicalized, and what caused him to reject the values of the country that gave him so much. Was it some radical cleric who did this to him? Is there a church somewhere in Georgia we need to be monitoring?" ~ Paul Waldman, The Washington Post
Go read the whole thing. It's worth your time.
With Trump's Announcement of His Running Mate…
…after only hours before asking his staff how he could get out of choosing Pence, his candidacy (and by extension, the entire upcoming Republican Convention) isn't a dumpster fire as some have called it. It's much, much worse.
Someone's Been Studying Classic Giorgio Moroder
When I first heard this, I thought it was Giorgio!
Oh James…
This almost makes me want to start watching Zoo again. Almost. But no. There's only so much belief I can suspend. Maybe with the sound down?
Dat 'Stache!
And he's British, too.
Talk dirty to me, baby.
Quote of the Day
"The romance of vinyl is that it's more textural, tangible. All CDs have that plastic cover, and they basically all look the same. CDs are like sex with a condom." ~ Bill Inglot, from Vinyl Junkies Adventures in Record Collecting
Some days…
…I feel like so much hate-based gasoline has been poured over this country planet that all it's going to take is one small match to set the entire thing blaze.
Maybe that is the reason we haven't been contacted by—or have heard transmissions from—any alien civilizations. Perhaps they all reach the point in their development that humanity currently finds itself, achieving an unprecedented degree of scientific enlightenment and standing at the brink of leaving their planetary cradle, only to have the technology spawned by that enlightenment allow bronze-age prejudices and hatreds—long simmering under the surface—to finally spew forth in all their base ugliness, causing the entire civilization to self-immolate.
I know that in the vastness of the universe, that couldn't have happened to every civilization, but I'm beginning to think it happens often enough that space-faring civilizations are very rare indeed and all their explorations reveal are the burnt-out husks of once-great societies littering the galaxies.
It Is Like Riding a Bicycle!
Ben and I are hooked on home improvement shows. You name it, we've probably watched it at least once. We have dreams of someday buying the place we're renting from our landlords—as ridiculous as that sounds—and we've lived here long enough that we've come up with some ideas about what we'd do to the place if we owned it and had a large, untapped bank account.
There don't appear to be any glaring structural issues other than one long crack that runs through the concrete floor in the den. The bigger issue is the age of the house (built 1948) and all that date implies: knob and tube wiring, lead paint, asbestos-laden plaster, ancient plumbing lines, and asbestos insulation in the roof are the four that immediately come to mind—all of which would require a complete gutting-to-the-studs to (as Mike Holmes would say)—make it right.
Then there is the physical layout of the house. That is where the fun really starts. We've got so many ideas floating around that I knew I had to get them down in architectural form—even if nothing ever comes of it. (It's important to dream, after all.)
So I fired up AutoCAD and began the task of drawing our little house as it is and how we'd like it to be. Yeah, I'm a little rusty at it, and the latest version of the program does some things quite differently from how I remember it working back in the day, but on the whole I haven't forgotten nearly as much as I thought I had. Of course I haven't gotten into the really technical stuff like dimensioning and cross-hatching and whatnot, and I need to wipe some cobwebs from my basic architectural construction knowledge, but I'm sure it will all come back. If not, I still have my AutoCAD "bible" from years ago that got me out of many a "How do I?" jam even then.
And y'know, it feels damn good to be doing something creative. I didn't realize how much I missed that.
One Year
As of today, we've been back in Phoenix exactly one year.
I wish I could say my employment situation has improved since leaving Denver, but as we all know, it hasn't. I remain optimistic. It usually takes me two or three false starts each time I change cities to get situated somewhere that I like and that lasts for more than a few months, so we're coming due here pretty quick.
Other than the employment thing, life has been good over this past year. I love the house we're renting, I love the ease of getting around Phoenix, and though I learned over during the four years we lived in Colorado that I prefer being cold and dry to being hot and dry, I still love being back in warm weather.
And while photos like this…
…get me feeling a little nostalgic and make me realize how little of the state we actually saw during the time we lived there—all I have to do is think of the cost of living, driving in the snow, getting stuck while driving in the snow, working at DISH, and the appalling insanity of Denver drivers, and I'm cured of any nascent longing instantly.
I Have My Towel Ready
Monday
♫ Red Copper Kettles And Warm Woolen Mittens ♫ (NSFW)
You Know, He Does Have a Point…
Werk It
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I Hate When That Happens
Nope!
Well That Explains It
Mirror Mirror On The Wall (NSFW)
See The Universe
Travel to exotic worlds! Visit alien civilizations! Be the first to die!
Drift Away
One of my all-time favorites. Drift away with me for 20 minutes…
Vintage Audio Porn
A couple of those "Holy Grail" pieces…
Day-um!
I don't remember Barney ever looking this good (although I do confess that between he and Fred he was always the one who got me all tingly).
Back Into The Meat Grinder
My supervisor came in this morning and said, "Bad news. July 22nd."
I knew what he was talking about even before the conversation continued. After six months, my contract at my current place of employment is finally coming to an end. We both knew this was coming, so it wasn't a complete surprise. We both just thought—hoped—it would end up going a bit longer. The project iself has been a clusterfuck since long before I came on board, and it seemed that every day the scope and direction was changing, but we rolled with the punches and managed to meet all the deadlines. My initial contract was supposed to be for 90 days, but I've now been here six months, and in spite of upper management's best efforts, the project is wrapping up.
On one hand, I'm disappointed because both my boss and I were hoping that he'd be able to keep me around at least through the end of September— or long enough for a permanent opening to come available in the department because I genuinely like it here. On the other hand, it's been a struggle for me to get by on the amount of money I've been earning (less than I was making fifteen years ago), something that going perm would definitely take care of.
So yeah.
After our chat, I let my recruiter know what was going on. He said he was working on a position in a different department at the organization. (This is the same department I interviewed with twice last fall and was summarily rejected by both times. The difference now is that I have a glowing internal recommendation behind me, so perhaps this will turn into something good after all.)
In any case, I'm overdue for landing in a job where I end up staying for more than a couple years (or, as it seems since our return to Phoenix, a couple months). At this point, if I could find an Abrazo or an H&M (two places I worked for nearly a decade each), I could conceivably retire from the place…
Friday
Hypocrisy, Thy Name is Republican
How about investigating those emails with as much vigor as you're expending on Hillary's?
Yeah, I didn't think so.
And Once Again…
iTunes has scrambled all the music on my phone.
Apple, FIX YOUR GODDAMNED SHIT!
The latest is duplicate playlists…but not exact duplicates.
I noticed this evening that I had "iTunes Sync" and "iTunes Sync 1" on both the phone and in iTunes. Where the fuck did iTunes Sync 1 come from?! Looking at each list, it was obvious they were not identical; one had several dozen songs that were not present on the other list.
I tried manually deleting the duplicate list, but with each sync it returned. But then for some reason the last time I deleted it, not only did iTunes Sync 1 delete, but it also cleared out the contents (but not the playlist itself) of iTunes Sync!
Apple, FIX YOUR GODDAMNED SHIT!
Thankfully I had a paper copy of what was in that playlist, so it was just a matter of dragging and dropping it back into place, but to be sure the glitch was gone I elected to wipe the phone and reinstall from scratch.
This shouldn't be happening. Remember Apple? It Just Works.
Yeah, I can no longer say that to people with a straight face.
I realized the other day that it all started going to hell the minute they started playing in the cloud. Prior to iCloud, everything did (for the most part) just work.