Both Old Dog and Uncle Ken made a pretty good case for home schooling, the only difference being that Uncle Ken is against it for some of the same reasons that I am for it. I don't think home schooled kids get to choose what subjects they study any more than kids in public school do. Uncle Ken may have home schooling confused with Montessori schools. Well, I suppose home school parents could use Montessori methods if they wanted to, but there are also bricks and mortar schools who do that.
I think the reason my niece usually finished her lessons by noon is that about half of the time in regular school is not spent learning, it's spent waiting. This isn't anybody's fault, it's just because there are so many other kids there. Most teachers will tell you that they could do a better job teaching if their class sizes were smaller. With home schooling, the class size is one, unless you have any siblings, and nobody has 20 or 30 siblings. Like I said, though, home schooling is not for everyone. For it to work, both the parents and the kids have to want to do it. According to my niece, though, a self motivated student only needs the parents' help until they learn to read. I don't know what grade level of reading is required, but I imagine that, if you can read a newspaper, you can read a teacher's lesson plan.
I heard something about that Scarramucci character on the TV news over the weekend and figured that was who Uncle Ken was talking about. I heard today that he turned in his resignation, so that's that. The more I think about it, the name Scarramucci sounds familiar. At first I thought he was one of the Three Musketeers but, upon further reflection, I think not. I don't think he's in the Bible, so he must be one of Shakespeare's characters. You know, a lot of those wise old sayings that people think are in the Bible really originated with Shakespeare.
Speaking of Shakespeare, I seem to remember that Old Dog is one of his fans. I just finished watching two episodes of Meeting of Minds that were all about Shakespeare. I never was a big fan before, but I got more out of those two episodes than I ever did out of studying Shakespeare in school. As near as I can tell, there are two seasons of Meeting of Minds on You Tube, 1976 and 1979. The ones I have been watching are 1979, and the last two episodes are the ones about Shakespeare. I don't know why I ended up watching 1979 first, but the 1976 season is next on the playlist. After I watch those I'll see if I can find more. It would be nice to have seen them all in order, but I'll take what I can get. I'm sure that I never saw them all when they were on TV because I was working the swing shift. Our local PBS station doesn't always buy a complete series anyway. I don't know how many years I watched The Red Green Show with multiple re-runs but, when I bought the complete series on DVD, I got many episodes that I'm sure I never saw before.
Monday, July 31, 2017
From Mooch to Moot, maybe mute
Does Old Dog recommend Buckaroo Banzai? And what is the reference? Is it wherever you go, there you are? It seems like I heard that phrase before 1984, but maybe not.
Yes, the reference is "wherever you go, there you are" but, much to my chagrin, I got the quote wrong. The correct movie quote is "No matter where you go, there you are." Very close, but no cigar. Either way, the quotes are close enough in meaning to have probably originated from the same source which, according to my initial research, is undetermined. It has been attributed to Confucius, Alcoholics Anonymous, Baba Ram Dass, and Jackie Mason, among others.
Although The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension is one of my favorite movies I cannot recommend it to Uncle Ken. It is too strange, the kind of movie he'll watch and proclaim "It's stupid, I don't get it!" (not to put any words in his mouth). It is low budget, with some special effects that can only be described as highly processed cheese, but other effects are okay. The story and characters are a complicated mess, but in a good way and the cast is stellar. The movie was released when the studio was going through an administration change and they had no idea how to market it; they couldn't determine who the audience was, something that occurs when a movie is too original. So it had a limited release and disappeared, yet more than thirty years later folks are still talking about it on the film forums. The IMDB has plenty of reviews (mostly positive) to give a potential viewer a sense of the movie. Check them out. I accept no responsibility for any wastes of time or assaults on sensibility.
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Home schooling isn't something I've given much thought to, so I had to go read up on it. The realities of home schooling aren't quite in line with Uncle Ken's suppositions; the home schooled outperform public school students on standardized tests by a whopping 37 percentile points. I recall some Spelling Bee winners being home schooled, likewise with some science fair winners. The Tribune had an article written by a skeptical college teacher that describes things more fully: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/commentary/ct-home-school-education-college-dupage-perspec-0219-jm-20160218-story.html
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Well, that was quick. In the space of ten days The Mooch gets hired, has a baby, gets served with divorce papers, and gets fired. The White House seems to be taking the point of view that "Nothing to see here, folks, Move along." And it's "The Mooch" or "Mooch." "Da Mooch" is some kind of musical entertainer who specializes in club/dance music, the kind of repetitive electronic stuff that you hear in dance club scenes in some modern movies. I can tolerate it if the dose is less than ten minutes in duration; it got my toes tapping, but I am the young pup of this group.
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Uncle Ken is lucky he saw Niagara Falls when he did. This past weekend had an episode of waste water discharge at the Falls, which I've read was quite pungent. Timing is everything.
Yes, the reference is "wherever you go, there you are" but, much to my chagrin, I got the quote wrong. The correct movie quote is "No matter where you go, there you are." Very close, but no cigar. Either way, the quotes are close enough in meaning to have probably originated from the same source which, according to my initial research, is undetermined. It has been attributed to Confucius, Alcoholics Anonymous, Baba Ram Dass, and Jackie Mason, among others.
Although The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension is one of my favorite movies I cannot recommend it to Uncle Ken. It is too strange, the kind of movie he'll watch and proclaim "It's stupid, I don't get it!" (not to put any words in his mouth). It is low budget, with some special effects that can only be described as highly processed cheese, but other effects are okay. The story and characters are a complicated mess, but in a good way and the cast is stellar. The movie was released when the studio was going through an administration change and they had no idea how to market it; they couldn't determine who the audience was, something that occurs when a movie is too original. So it had a limited release and disappeared, yet more than thirty years later folks are still talking about it on the film forums. The IMDB has plenty of reviews (mostly positive) to give a potential viewer a sense of the movie. Check them out. I accept no responsibility for any wastes of time or assaults on sensibility.
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Home schooling isn't something I've given much thought to, so I had to go read up on it. The realities of home schooling aren't quite in line with Uncle Ken's suppositions; the home schooled outperform public school students on standardized tests by a whopping 37 percentile points. I recall some Spelling Bee winners being home schooled, likewise with some science fair winners. The Tribune had an article written by a skeptical college teacher that describes things more fully: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/commentary/ct-home-school-education-college-dupage-perspec-0219-jm-20160218-story.html
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Well, that was quick. In the space of ten days The Mooch gets hired, has a baby, gets served with divorce papers, and gets fired. The White House seems to be taking the point of view that "Nothing to see here, folks, Move along." And it's "The Mooch" or "Mooch." "Da Mooch" is some kind of musical entertainer who specializes in club/dance music, the kind of repetitive electronic stuff that you hear in dance club scenes in some modern movies. I can tolerate it if the dose is less than ten minutes in duration; it got my toes tapping, but I am the young pup of this group.
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Uncle Ken is lucky he saw Niagara Falls when he did. This past weekend had an episode of waste water discharge at the Falls, which I've read was quite pungent. Timing is everything.
poetry hour
I'm kind of suspicious of home schooling. Maybe your niece did well and good with it, but I suspect a lot of kids and their parents just fuck off with it. And even if people do right by it the socialist in me doesn't like it. I like for everybody to have a common experience. And I don't know why people think public schools are so bad. I went to them, I substituted in them, kids learned, and kids socialized too. It was fine. How could Beagles have ever had the enlightening experience of The Blue Jeans Incident if he had not attended public schools? I guess religious schools are okay too, as long as they don't go too heavy on the religion. The important thing is to have a common experience with your peers.
Da Mooch is Scaramucci, Trump's new communications director, whatever that means, mostly it meant blowing off his mouth in a wild two day spree, but grown strangely silent of late. Sandy Hook is that school in the east where a nutty kid killed a bunch of little kids, and that guy, I remember his name now, Alex Jones, claimed that the whole thing was faked in order to give guns a bad name.
If Beagles isn't interested in the Russian investigations he doesn't have to watch them. I got the impression when he was speaking of them earlier he was saying they should stop them because they hadn't announced any findings lately.
Speaking again of home schooling another thing I don't like is maybe the home schooled or schooler will ignore certain subjects because they are not interested in them. One of the theories of education is that we live in a democracy and will be casting votes and thus have an obligation to be well informed.
I would never have studied poetry if they hadn't made me in college, but I'm glad they did, and I am even glad that they made me memorize poems which at the time I thought was oppressive. Perhaps the next time Old Dog attends a seminar he can hear me recite. Well it's a thought. I do indeed have a fondness for William Butler (Yates), allow me to recommend The Song of the Wandering Aengus, and the Lake Isle Innisfree.
Does Old Dog recommend Buckaroo Banzai? And what is the reference? Is it wherever you go, there you are? It seems like I heard that phrase before 1984, but maybe not.
Da Mooch is Scaramucci, Trump's new communications director, whatever that means, mostly it meant blowing off his mouth in a wild two day spree, but grown strangely silent of late. Sandy Hook is that school in the east where a nutty kid killed a bunch of little kids, and that guy, I remember his name now, Alex Jones, claimed that the whole thing was faked in order to give guns a bad name.
If Beagles isn't interested in the Russian investigations he doesn't have to watch them. I got the impression when he was speaking of them earlier he was saying they should stop them because they hadn't announced any findings lately.
Speaking again of home schooling another thing I don't like is maybe the home schooled or schooler will ignore certain subjects because they are not interested in them. One of the theories of education is that we live in a democracy and will be casting votes and thus have an obligation to be well informed.
I would never have studied poetry if they hadn't made me in college, but I'm glad they did, and I am even glad that they made me memorize poems which at the time I thought was oppressive. Perhaps the next time Old Dog attends a seminar he can hear me recite. Well it's a thought. I do indeed have a fondness for William Butler (Yates), allow me to recommend The Song of the Wandering Aengus, and the Lake Isle Innisfree.
Does Old Dog recommend Buckaroo Banzai? And what is the reference? Is it wherever you go, there you are? It seems like I heard that phrase before 1984, but maybe not.
Friday, July 28, 2017
Home Schooling
Uncle Ken doesn't seem to understand how home schooling works. Maybe they don't have it in Illinois, or maybe they call it something different. I understand that they're doing it online now, but the program my niece was in was all done with old fashioned papers and books. Her parents bought the materials and the lesson plans from some company and proceeded to teach their own kids. It's not for everybody, but some kids who don't thrive in a bricks and mortar school do quite well in a home school and have no trouble getting into the college of their choice. My niece was a self starter, while her parents had to give special attention to her younger brother who needed more help. After awhile, my niece just took responsibility for her own education. She would read the lesson plans and then complete the work on her own. The reason she quit at noon was that she had completed all the work assignments that had been designated for that day. Last I heard, she was attending college in Florida, but she has probably graduated by now. We don't have a lot of contact with that branch of the family. I don't think anybody's mad at anybody, they just move a lot and don't always inform us of their latest address.
Speaking of not understanding things, who the hell is Da Mooch and what the hell is Sandy Hook?
I'm not saying that they shouldn't conduct the investigation, I'm just saying that I'm not interested in following it like you guys do. I would be interested in any conclusions they come up with, but I don't have the patience to sit through all this "he said-she said".
Speaking of investigations, I read in our local paper that Hillary sent some 60,000 emails while she was Secretary of State. She has turned half of them over to the investigators, but claims to have deleted the other half because they were personal and had nothing to do with government business. It may be those 30,000 lost emails that Trump was trying to recover when he allegedly colluded with those Russian hackers, but that's just speculation at this point. My question is: How can anybody send 60,000 emails in the few years that Hillary was Secretary of State? I haven't done the math, but it seems like she wouldn't have had time to do anything else.
Speaking of not understanding things, who the hell is Da Mooch and what the hell is Sandy Hook?
I'm not saying that they shouldn't conduct the investigation, I'm just saying that I'm not interested in following it like you guys do. I would be interested in any conclusions they come up with, but I don't have the patience to sit through all this "he said-she said".
Speaking of investigations, I read in our local paper that Hillary sent some 60,000 emails while she was Secretary of State. She has turned half of them over to the investigators, but claims to have deleted the other half because they were personal and had nothing to do with government business. It may be those 30,000 lost emails that Trump was trying to recover when he allegedly colluded with those Russian hackers, but that's just speculation at this point. My question is: How can anybody send 60,000 emails in the few years that Hillary was Secretary of State? I haven't done the math, but it seems like she wouldn't have had time to do anything else.
Wherever you go, there you are
What rough beast, indeed? That phrase sounded familiar but I couldn't quite place it, so a little advanced searching was required. Well. Uncle Ken, with his reference to an early 20th century Irish poet has certainly elevated the discourse of the Institute, don't you think? His credentials as a pointy-headed (I joke, I joke) intellectual have already been established but this has taken it to a new level. Bravo!
There are other good lines in that poem (The Second Coming) and the ones I especially like are Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; and The best lack all conviction, while the worst Are full of passionate intensity. Good stuff.
But how do you pronounce that guy's name? It looks like it should be pronounced "Yeets" but I think it's supposed to be "Yates." And then there's that other guy, Keats, whose name is pronounced "Keets" and not "Kates" like Yeats. What a screwy language! Maybe I'm wrong and they're both pronounced the same but which is it? Uncle Ken, please advise.
And didn't anyone pick up on the reference to The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the Eighth Dimension that I made in a previous post? Hell of a low budget movie (and a favorite guilty pleasure of mine) with the best scenery chewing by John Lithgow you will ever see.
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I don't want to get bogged down in speculation about this week's White House antics but I've been watching some documentaries about Russia, WWII, Stalin, and Putin and I've come to the conclusion that it is really all about the money, money laundering in particular. Putin has, allegedly, been funneling a lot of dough out of Russia, some of it to the US via real estate transactions. The sanctions are screwing things up and there is a possibility that his assets can be seized by the Feds and the Trumpster can't do a thing about it. Vlad is finding out that Trump isn't quite the useful idiot that he planned on and the game may be over if certain tax records are revealed. We'll have to wait and see.
Uncle Ken noted that Fox News is backing off a little from their undying support of Trump, but so are Breitbart and Drudge. This does not bode well for Trump and his cronies. Again, we'll see.
A final word about the investigation...Mr. Beagles said it well, although inadvertently: You can't just go where you want to go, you have to go where the chase takes you, but that can be fun too because the chase often takes you to interesting places that you might not have found on your own.
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Pish Tosh, Mr. Beagles. I will see your "naked guy in Petoskey" story and raise with "Naked man cuts off penis and goes on rampage in Chicago." Another drug related incident, with lurid details available via a quick search. But what the hell kinds of drugs are these people taking? Something is very wrong. Don't folks normally take drugs to feel better? I don't get it, that's not the kind of buzz I'd be looking for.
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At least there is good news on the sex robot front. For less that $5K you can have one of your own, and some are quite alluring. In one Austrian brothel the robot is more popular than the real thing. Welcome to the 21st Century, guys, but I wonder how those beauties will be hacked, and to what effect. Ouch!
There are other good lines in that poem (The Second Coming) and the ones I especially like are Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; and The best lack all conviction, while the worst Are full of passionate intensity. Good stuff.
But how do you pronounce that guy's name? It looks like it should be pronounced "Yeets" but I think it's supposed to be "Yates." And then there's that other guy, Keats, whose name is pronounced "Keets" and not "Kates" like Yeats. What a screwy language! Maybe I'm wrong and they're both pronounced the same but which is it? Uncle Ken, please advise.
And didn't anyone pick up on the reference to The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the Eighth Dimension that I made in a previous post? Hell of a low budget movie (and a favorite guilty pleasure of mine) with the best scenery chewing by John Lithgow you will ever see.
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I don't want to get bogged down in speculation about this week's White House antics but I've been watching some documentaries about Russia, WWII, Stalin, and Putin and I've come to the conclusion that it is really all about the money, money laundering in particular. Putin has, allegedly, been funneling a lot of dough out of Russia, some of it to the US via real estate transactions. The sanctions are screwing things up and there is a possibility that his assets can be seized by the Feds and the Trumpster can't do a thing about it. Vlad is finding out that Trump isn't quite the useful idiot that he planned on and the game may be over if certain tax records are revealed. We'll have to wait and see.
Uncle Ken noted that Fox News is backing off a little from their undying support of Trump, but so are Breitbart and Drudge. This does not bode well for Trump and his cronies. Again, we'll see.
A final word about the investigation...Mr. Beagles said it well, although inadvertently: You can't just go where you want to go, you have to go where the chase takes you, but that can be fun too because the chase often takes you to interesting places that you might not have found on your own.
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Pish Tosh, Mr. Beagles. I will see your "naked guy in Petoskey" story and raise with "Naked man cuts off penis and goes on rampage in Chicago." Another drug related incident, with lurid details available via a quick search. But what the hell kinds of drugs are these people taking? Something is very wrong. Don't folks normally take drugs to feel better? I don't get it, that's not the kind of buzz I'd be looking for.
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At least there is good news on the sex robot front. For less that $5K you can have one of your own, and some are quite alluring. In one Austrian brothel the robot is more popular than the real thing. Welcome to the 21st Century, guys, but I wonder how those beauties will be hacked, and to what effect. Ouch!
and what rough beast, its hour come at last, slouches towards Washington to be born
Yar, I'm with Old Dog. If you stopped an investigation because they didn't find anything yet, no investigation would last longer than a day. And the idea that there is no smoke from this fire is (cough) ludicrous. Just now listening to an interview of some Trumpists on NPR, they have totally bought into the fake news thing and get their news only from Fox, Limbaugh and Laura Ingraham (always got her mixed up with the Little House on the Prairie woman) and that guy who claims that Sandy Hook was fake. And now they are abandoning Fox because it has become too liberal.
It's true, I've noticed it to my astonishment. A few of the Foxies have stepped out of the fog since Little Donnie got his teat caught in Boris and Natashska's wringer, and now they are openly saying, you know maybe there is something to this while their unreconstructed brethren shift uneasily in their chairs wondering are we allowed to say this. Fox, the new liberal media, what will take it's place? Why isn't there a Trump channel? Why are we allowed only fleeting tweets from the mouth of this great man?
And speaking of mouths, how about that Mooch? Holy Shit (did I say shit? I meant to say Holy sucking your own fucking cock cock blocking fucking shit piss ass cunt) I wonder if Trump used You Ain't Seen Nothing Yet as one of his strutting out onto the stage songs. That totally outrageous tweet about kicking the transgenders out of the army had just come through and the good liberal pundits and even some conservatives were settling down before their keyboards to express their outrage and then along slouches Da Mooch.
I've heard him described as a mini me, but maybe he is like a super me, he makes Donald seem mild and measured. Is this something Donald will like, or will he feel he is being upstaged? I'd say we shall have to wait and see, but I'm sure something unimaginable at this time will arise to sweep this matter into the dust and we will be shaking our heads and saying just yesterday we thought nothing could be more outrageous than Da Mother Fucking Cock Sucking Mooch. How young and naive we were then.
You know I've long thought that if you had some secret information you didn't want to get out that it would behoove you to put it in a standalone computer like Old Dog describes but I didn't think anybody did that, Who is that has this system?
I think sleep apnea and peanut allergies have been around forever. I did read that about sperm counts. I think a lot of Russkies are nuts about Putin, the way a lot of Americans are nuts about Trump. How come they get the relatively dignified prez?
I remember those aptitude tests. In one of them there was this little booklet where there would be pictures of some guy playing the trumpet, another one sawing a board, and another one cooking up a pot of spaghetti, and you chose which would you like the best, the next best, and least. I always liked the guy playing the trumpet or piano or drums and the recommendation was that I become a musician even though at the age of seven I had flunked out of piano accordion school.
I was on a jury once. It lasted several weeks and I was totally impressed with my fellow jurors. There were two or three layabouts who sulked in their seats waiting for the damned thing to be over, but the rest of us paid attention, argued logically, and never insulted each other. We were a Norman Rockwell painting in the Saturday Evening Post come to life. I wonder if that can still happen in these days of Trump.
If she was leaving at noon I wonder how much Beagles's niece ever learned in her home schooling. Sure once you learn to read you can read anything you like, but what if you don't like history or science so you never learn either? How can you become a good citizen if you don't know nothing? Oh, I forgot, this is the brave new world.
Speaking of which it's about time for the morning tweets, but anymore Trump's tweets are just weak beer compared to the white lightning of Da Mooch,
It's true, I've noticed it to my astonishment. A few of the Foxies have stepped out of the fog since Little Donnie got his teat caught in Boris and Natashska's wringer, and now they are openly saying, you know maybe there is something to this while their unreconstructed brethren shift uneasily in their chairs wondering are we allowed to say this. Fox, the new liberal media, what will take it's place? Why isn't there a Trump channel? Why are we allowed only fleeting tweets from the mouth of this great man?
And speaking of mouths, how about that Mooch? Holy Shit (did I say shit? I meant to say Holy sucking your own fucking cock cock blocking fucking shit piss ass cunt) I wonder if Trump used You Ain't Seen Nothing Yet as one of his strutting out onto the stage songs. That totally outrageous tweet about kicking the transgenders out of the army had just come through and the good liberal pundits and even some conservatives were settling down before their keyboards to express their outrage and then along slouches Da Mooch.
I've heard him described as a mini me, but maybe he is like a super me, he makes Donald seem mild and measured. Is this something Donald will like, or will he feel he is being upstaged? I'd say we shall have to wait and see, but I'm sure something unimaginable at this time will arise to sweep this matter into the dust and we will be shaking our heads and saying just yesterday we thought nothing could be more outrageous than Da Mother Fucking Cock Sucking Mooch. How young and naive we were then.
You know I've long thought that if you had some secret information you didn't want to get out that it would behoove you to put it in a standalone computer like Old Dog describes but I didn't think anybody did that, Who is that has this system?
I think sleep apnea and peanut allergies have been around forever. I did read that about sperm counts. I think a lot of Russkies are nuts about Putin, the way a lot of Americans are nuts about Trump. How come they get the relatively dignified prez?
I remember those aptitude tests. In one of them there was this little booklet where there would be pictures of some guy playing the trumpet, another one sawing a board, and another one cooking up a pot of spaghetti, and you chose which would you like the best, the next best, and least. I always liked the guy playing the trumpet or piano or drums and the recommendation was that I become a musician even though at the age of seven I had flunked out of piano accordion school.
I was on a jury once. It lasted several weeks and I was totally impressed with my fellow jurors. There were two or three layabouts who sulked in their seats waiting for the damned thing to be over, but the rest of us paid attention, argued logically, and never insulted each other. We were a Norman Rockwell painting in the Saturday Evening Post come to life. I wonder if that can still happen in these days of Trump.
If she was leaving at noon I wonder how much Beagles's niece ever learned in her home schooling. Sure once you learn to read you can read anything you like, but what if you don't like history or science so you never learn either? How can you become a good citizen if you don't know nothing? Oh, I forgot, this is the brave new world.
Speaking of which it's about time for the morning tweets, but anymore Trump's tweets are just weak beer compared to the white lightning of Da Mooch,
Thursday, July 27, 2017
Too Honest and Not Patient Enough
In our junior year of high school they gave us a bunch of aptitude tests to guide us in our career choices. When the counselor reviewed my test results with me, she said that, with my verbal skills, I would make a good lawyer and/or politician. I replied, somewhat in jest, that I was too honest for that. Without skipping a beat, she said, "Okay, what else are you interested in?" Truth be known, I have always had an interest in law and politics as well as music and some other things, but you need more than an interest in something to become professionally successful in the field. Many people would say that you need self discipline, which I can do if I really care about something. I think what I lack is patience.
I was on a jury once, and I'm here to tell you that it's not like in the movies or on TV, where they wrap up a case in a matter of minutes, or at least hours. That's because they only show you the interesting parts. If they showed the whole trial, few viewers would have the patience to sit through it. Our case dragged on for four days, and that was just the plaintiff's side. We never got to hear the defense arguments because the judge dismissed the case on procedural grounds, which was a good thing because I was tired of it after the first day. Meetings are like that too, whether they be corporate or governmental. I glad that I don't have to do that anymore because they don't even allow smoking in those meetings nowadays. It would have been easier to take if they had allowed drinking as well, but smoking was better than nothing.
If they had home schooling when I was a kid, I might have gone on to college. I always liked to learn stuff, what I didn't like was waiting to learn stuff. One of my nieces was home schooled. She told me that, once you learn how to read, you don't need a teacher anymore, you can teach yourself. The only thing she didn't like about it was that she would finish the day's lessons by noon, and had to find something else to do the rest of the day. I think what I would have done is do two day's lessons in one day, and then take the next day off to go hunting or fishing. If that got old, I would just keep doing double duty so I could graduate early.
You might wonder why a guy with little patience would become interested in hunting and fishing, but that's different. Of course it's more fun when you get something, but it's also fun just to be out there doing it. If you get tired of sitting in one place, you can relocate at will. Hunting with hounds is a little different. You can't just go where you want to go, you have to go where the chase takes you, but that can be fun too because the chase often takes you to interesting places that you might not have found on your own. With deer hunting, you get better results if you sit still than if you walk around making noise. The way I adapted to that was to build an enclosed blind with a comfortable chair and a propane heater in it. It's easy to fall asleep under those conditions, but you're more likely to see a deer while sleeping in the woods than while sleeping at home. I don't know how many deer have walked by me over the years, but I have woken up in time to shoot a few that way. I do see deer at home sometimes when I wake up and open the curtains in the morning, but my hypothetical wife won't let me shoot through the windows, even though I volunteered to take the screens out in the fall when we don't need them. It's probably just as well. I would still have to open the window before shooting, which would likely spook the deer before I could get a shot off. In the old cowboy shows, they always broke the window pane with their gun before shooting through it. I always wondered why they didn't just shoot it out with their first round. Neither option is attractive to me because I would have to replace the pane afterwards, which costs money and takes up time that would be better spent sleeping in my deer blind.
I was on a jury once, and I'm here to tell you that it's not like in the movies or on TV, where they wrap up a case in a matter of minutes, or at least hours. That's because they only show you the interesting parts. If they showed the whole trial, few viewers would have the patience to sit through it. Our case dragged on for four days, and that was just the plaintiff's side. We never got to hear the defense arguments because the judge dismissed the case on procedural grounds, which was a good thing because I was tired of it after the first day. Meetings are like that too, whether they be corporate or governmental. I glad that I don't have to do that anymore because they don't even allow smoking in those meetings nowadays. It would have been easier to take if they had allowed drinking as well, but smoking was better than nothing.
If they had home schooling when I was a kid, I might have gone on to college. I always liked to learn stuff, what I didn't like was waiting to learn stuff. One of my nieces was home schooled. She told me that, once you learn how to read, you don't need a teacher anymore, you can teach yourself. The only thing she didn't like about it was that she would finish the day's lessons by noon, and had to find something else to do the rest of the day. I think what I would have done is do two day's lessons in one day, and then take the next day off to go hunting or fishing. If that got old, I would just keep doing double duty so I could graduate early.
You might wonder why a guy with little patience would become interested in hunting and fishing, but that's different. Of course it's more fun when you get something, but it's also fun just to be out there doing it. If you get tired of sitting in one place, you can relocate at will. Hunting with hounds is a little different. You can't just go where you want to go, you have to go where the chase takes you, but that can be fun too because the chase often takes you to interesting places that you might not have found on your own. With deer hunting, you get better results if you sit still than if you walk around making noise. The way I adapted to that was to build an enclosed blind with a comfortable chair and a propane heater in it. It's easy to fall asleep under those conditions, but you're more likely to see a deer while sleeping in the woods than while sleeping at home. I don't know how many deer have walked by me over the years, but I have woken up in time to shoot a few that way. I do see deer at home sometimes when I wake up and open the curtains in the morning, but my hypothetical wife won't let me shoot through the windows, even though I volunteered to take the screens out in the fall when we don't need them. It's probably just as well. I would still have to open the window before shooting, which would likely spook the deer before I could get a shot off. In the old cowboy shows, they always broke the window pane with their gun before shooting through it. I always wondered why they didn't just shoot it out with their first round. Neither option is attractive to me because I would have to replace the pane afterwards, which costs money and takes up time that would be better spent sleeping in my deer blind.
The last dodo
Why is it so hard to understand what I said about the investigation accomplishing nothing substantial?
Be patient. It's a very tangled web of individuals and organizations and any investigation that includes US government officials and Russians with ties to Kremlin intelligence operations and organized crime is bound to produce something substantial. It may come to nothing (I doubt it) but I wonder why so much effort is made to impede such an investigation.
In this case, I think the original investigation into the Russian hacking of the past election has led to other things, other possibly criminal activities. Money laundering, espionage, who knows? But it is the responsibility of the investigators to follow those threads to see where they lead. Criminal acts beyond the original scope of the investigation can not, and should not, be ignored. But I am not a lawyer.
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It was my impression that any unauthorized intrusion into any computer system was illegal, even if only a simple invasion of privacy. I don't think that any secrets are posted on the internet but secrets can be accessed through the internet if network security is weak, which is why many secure systems have no internet access at all. No phone line connection, no WiFi, no nothing. If you want to access the system you have to plop your butt behind the keyboard and start typing. A real good system won't have removable media or accessible ports like USB or SD card readers, either.
If you're lucky you can send stuff to a printer, but a lot of modern printers can be tracked. They leave almost indistinguishable little dots in a pattern that will reveal the printer's serial number and the date and time of day the print was made. I think some copiers do the same thing, so be careful when you go to Kinko's to copy those secret plans you stole from Yoyodyne Propulsion Systems.
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A new product has been advertised lately, at least new to me, one of those CPAP gizmos. I had to look that one up, what the hell is CPAP? Well, it stands for "Continuous Positive Airway Pressure" and it is used to resolve problems with sleep apnea. Did sleep apnea always exist or is it like peanut allergies, something new? Our modern way of life seems to have a lot of problems. I've read that sperm counts are down 50% over the last thirty years, but that's only in Western nations. Folks in South America, Africa, and Asia are fine.
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A while back Mr. Beagles inquired about the nature of the Russian people and since then I read something interesting in a review of The Unwomanly Face Of War, a book that has accounts of Soviet women in WWII.
It can be hard for someone not born in the former Eastern Bloc to grasp the extent to which the memory of World War II seeped into every aspect of Soviet and post-Soviet life, or to fully understand the toxic effects of the heroic myth of capital-V Victory, which put the realities and unresolved traumas of wartime in a no-zone, akin to the irradiated woodland around Chernobyl.
Even after more than seventy years I don't think Russia has fully reconciled with Germany. And could Russian antagonism with the US stem from the fact that the US helped rebuild Germany (at least Western Germany) and ignored Russia because they were Godless Commies?
In discussion of the historical beefs in the Middle East I've forgotten about the other beefs in Europe, and I wonder how well matters are settled. There may still be issues that are neither forgiven nor forgotten.
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Useless fact of the day: The last widely accepted sighting of a dodo was in 1662.
Be patient. It's a very tangled web of individuals and organizations and any investigation that includes US government officials and Russians with ties to Kremlin intelligence operations and organized crime is bound to produce something substantial. It may come to nothing (I doubt it) but I wonder why so much effort is made to impede such an investigation.
In this case, I think the original investigation into the Russian hacking of the past election has led to other things, other possibly criminal activities. Money laundering, espionage, who knows? But it is the responsibility of the investigators to follow those threads to see where they lead. Criminal acts beyond the original scope of the investigation can not, and should not, be ignored. But I am not a lawyer.
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It was my impression that any unauthorized intrusion into any computer system was illegal, even if only a simple invasion of privacy. I don't think that any secrets are posted on the internet but secrets can be accessed through the internet if network security is weak, which is why many secure systems have no internet access at all. No phone line connection, no WiFi, no nothing. If you want to access the system you have to plop your butt behind the keyboard and start typing. A real good system won't have removable media or accessible ports like USB or SD card readers, either.
If you're lucky you can send stuff to a printer, but a lot of modern printers can be tracked. They leave almost indistinguishable little dots in a pattern that will reveal the printer's serial number and the date and time of day the print was made. I think some copiers do the same thing, so be careful when you go to Kinko's to copy those secret plans you stole from Yoyodyne Propulsion Systems.
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A new product has been advertised lately, at least new to me, one of those CPAP gizmos. I had to look that one up, what the hell is CPAP? Well, it stands for "Continuous Positive Airway Pressure" and it is used to resolve problems with sleep apnea. Did sleep apnea always exist or is it like peanut allergies, something new? Our modern way of life seems to have a lot of problems. I've read that sperm counts are down 50% over the last thirty years, but that's only in Western nations. Folks in South America, Africa, and Asia are fine.
-----
A while back Mr. Beagles inquired about the nature of the Russian people and since then I read something interesting in a review of The Unwomanly Face Of War, a book that has accounts of Soviet women in WWII.
It can be hard for someone not born in the former Eastern Bloc to grasp the extent to which the memory of World War II seeped into every aspect of Soviet and post-Soviet life, or to fully understand the toxic effects of the heroic myth of capital-V Victory, which put the realities and unresolved traumas of wartime in a no-zone, akin to the irradiated woodland around Chernobyl.
Even after more than seventy years I don't think Russia has fully reconciled with Germany. And could Russian antagonism with the US stem from the fact that the US helped rebuild Germany (at least Western Germany) and ignored Russia because they were Godless Commies?
In discussion of the historical beefs in the Middle East I've forgotten about the other beefs in Europe, and I wonder how well matters are settled. There may still be issues that are neither forgiven nor forgotten.
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Useless fact of the day: The last widely accepted sighting of a dodo was in 1662.
Tuesday, July 25, 2017
Much Ado About Nothing
Why is it so hard to understand what I said about the investigation accomplishing nothing substantial? To my knowledge, nobody has yet been arrested and charged with a crime, which seems to me should be the whole purpose of the investigation. If that's not it, then what precisely is the whole purpose of the investigation? Have they even determined that a crime has been committed? If it's a crime to try to influence an election or to post fake news on the internet, then there are a lot more people than the Russians or the Trumpists guilty of that. I suppose that computer hacking is a crime, but only if you do it for an illegal purpose like identity theft, or scamming people out of their money. It's probably illegal to access government or corporate secrets but, if they don't want their secrets hacked, then they shouldn't put them on the internet. Everybody knows that you can't keep anything a secret on the internet. The comparison I drew with Inverness Township's sewers is because, like this investigation, they wasted all their resources just studying the sewers instead of constructing them. They finally did install their sewers, but it took them several decades. I'm sure that some of the citizens who initially voted for the sewers did not live long enough to see them installed. I hate to say it, but the three of us are no spring chickens. If they hope to take any real action on this Russian thing in our lifetimes, they'd better get cracking.
Here's a little diversion to keep us occupied until that happens: A 22 year old Ann Arbor man was arrested Sunday for chasing sea gulls while naked on a public beach in nearby Petoskey. According to witnesses, the man also jumped onto a paved parking lot as if he were diving into water. After being treated for his injuries at a local hospital, the man was jailed for disorderly conduct, resisting police, and indecent exposure. Other charges might be pending because the police believe that the guy "may have consumed LSD earlier in the day". Now that's something worth investigating!
Here's a little diversion to keep us occupied until that happens: A 22 year old Ann Arbor man was arrested Sunday for chasing sea gulls while naked on a public beach in nearby Petoskey. According to witnesses, the man also jumped onto a paved parking lot as if he were diving into water. After being treated for his injuries at a local hospital, the man was jailed for disorderly conduct, resisting police, and indecent exposure. Other charges might be pending because the police believe that the guy "may have consumed LSD earlier in the day". Now that's something worth investigating!
Continuing drama
For reasons unknown, I've always thought that the hydroelectric stations would be located very close to Niagara Falls, if not at the Falls itself, but such is not the case. The stations themselves are located quite a distance downstream and the water is fed through underground tunnels. These tunnels supply reservoirs which then feed the turbines. It is a much more complex system than I thought and a lot of digging was involved.
The Niagara River moves a lot of water; it flows at 35 mph. But the waterfall that Uncle Ken saw last week was only about half of the actual volume of water from the river, the rest being diverted for generation of electricity. And they turn down the flow even further at night and during the winter so only about 25% of the river's flow makes it to the Falls. It's quite a system, but I hope they never have to turn off the Falls completely.
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I have no idea how the investigations into Russian involvement with our elections will turn out, or if the Trump campaign was actually involved. They may all have been, as the spymasters say, "useful idiots." If the game plan of the Russians was to disrupt our way of life, they have succeeded. Freedom of the press means very little when there is such a high degree of distrust.
Here's another thing that I learned from one of the Rachel Maddow broadcasts. I like her, she seems to be able to explain things well, at least to the extent that I can understand them. Anyhow, she was talking about leaked documents and that some of them may be phony. That top-secret NSA memo you received anonymously may not be the real deal, but of course you will never know because the NSA ain't gonna tell you one way or the other. And with all the lies and contradictions coming out of the White House we may never know what is actually happening. Confusion reigns, and the circus is becoming a melodramatic tragedy.
The pundits are claiming that Sessions is in the doghouse and on his way out. He is a stubborn coot and probably will not resign but if he gets fired there will be a shitstorm of epic proportion. His loyalty to Trump is being poorly rewarded, but sooner or later Trump will find someone willing to fire Mueller and end the investigations. But then what? The other day some former bigwig from the intelligence community mentioned the word "coup," which is a very scary notion. At this rate it won't take many steps for the US to become a full fledged banana republic, an idea which lacks appeal.
I can see it now, Trump resigns before the legal dogs chew him apart and Pence gives him a pardon for anything and everything. The newly appointed vice-president, Ivanka herself, goes on a goodwill tour to ensure that the brand is intact and all is well. But maybe not. It could be that Pence refuses any pardons and lets the whole circus get what they deserve. A sweet outcome, if not for Pence himself who may actually worse than what we have now. What a mess.
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Enjoy the ballgames, Uncle Ken. I see the Cubs are tied for first place in their division.
The Niagara River moves a lot of water; it flows at 35 mph. But the waterfall that Uncle Ken saw last week was only about half of the actual volume of water from the river, the rest being diverted for generation of electricity. And they turn down the flow even further at night and during the winter so only about 25% of the river's flow makes it to the Falls. It's quite a system, but I hope they never have to turn off the Falls completely.
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I have no idea how the investigations into Russian involvement with our elections will turn out, or if the Trump campaign was actually involved. They may all have been, as the spymasters say, "useful idiots." If the game plan of the Russians was to disrupt our way of life, they have succeeded. Freedom of the press means very little when there is such a high degree of distrust.
Here's another thing that I learned from one of the Rachel Maddow broadcasts. I like her, she seems to be able to explain things well, at least to the extent that I can understand them. Anyhow, she was talking about leaked documents and that some of them may be phony. That top-secret NSA memo you received anonymously may not be the real deal, but of course you will never know because the NSA ain't gonna tell you one way or the other. And with all the lies and contradictions coming out of the White House we may never know what is actually happening. Confusion reigns, and the circus is becoming a melodramatic tragedy.
The pundits are claiming that Sessions is in the doghouse and on his way out. He is a stubborn coot and probably will not resign but if he gets fired there will be a shitstorm of epic proportion. His loyalty to Trump is being poorly rewarded, but sooner or later Trump will find someone willing to fire Mueller and end the investigations. But then what? The other day some former bigwig from the intelligence community mentioned the word "coup," which is a very scary notion. At this rate it won't take many steps for the US to become a full fledged banana republic, an idea which lacks appeal.
I can see it now, Trump resigns before the legal dogs chew him apart and Pence gives him a pardon for anything and everything. The newly appointed vice-president, Ivanka herself, goes on a goodwill tour to ensure that the brand is intact and all is well. But maybe not. It could be that Pence refuses any pardons and lets the whole circus get what they deserve. A sweet outcome, if not for Pence himself who may actually worse than what we have now. What a mess.
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Enjoy the ballgames, Uncle Ken. I see the Cubs are tied for first place in their division.
loons and eels
There is a whole thing about the history of Niagara Falls and Buffalo that we didn't get around to exploring. In the war of 1812 the city of Niagara Falls and Buffalo exchanged hands with Buffalo maybe getting the worst of it. As I recall the Americans thought that if they invaded Canada the Canadians would be inspired and also throw off the British yoke.
I think there was another kerfuffle, though not an armed one when both Canada and the USA realized how much power they could generate. Somehow the Canadians ended up with the bigger falls, but I guess the American ones were sufficient enough to light up the whole town of Buffalo, the first city to be electrified.
There was indeed talk of generators, but now that I give it some thought, where are they? If they are upriver then there isn't going to be any more power than in any other river, and downriver the same. I was puzzled by Old Dog speaking of them being in the falls, but I guess they would have to be somewhere like that to capture the power of gravity, but how could they do that without marring the beauty of the falls, and come to think of it, how could they do that period? Oh wait Old Dog says that they moved the rivers. Maybe that's how they did it, building the generators somewhere and then diverting the falls to that precipice.
And what about the fish? They are just cruising around and then my isn't that current something and then they are going over the falls without even a barrel. There were gulls and loons downstream, seemingly having a joyous feast. Do the falls stun the fish so that they are stunned and easy picking? I'm not sure they are loons, but when I was in Aurora last week along the raging Fox River I saw this dark colored bird which instead of flying above and filching fish, seemed to be more like swimming and diving down for fish. My friend told me they were loons and they look like the birds I saw at Niagara falls.
You'll note also how flagrantly The Eel flatters Trump. The Donald cannot get enough high praise, probably why he pitches in and does so much of it himself. I tuned in last night to watch him deliver some speech to the boy scouts, the fucking boy scouts, and instead of talking about being Trustworthy, Loyal, Helpful, Friendly, Courteous, Kind, Obedient, Cheerful, Thrifty, Brave, Clean, and Reverent, stuff that the Donald knows little about, he was raving about crooked Hilary and how disloyal Sessions is..
I used to enjoy these speeches, making fun in my smug liberal way, what a fool he is making of himself, surely he will be seen through shortly, except for that 35 percent who are well, beyond the pale. They are irredeemable.
They, and the Donald, and now one of our colleagues continue to claim that nothing has been accomplished by the investigation, to which I just have to shake my head. Well certainly I expect it from Trump and the Trumpists, but I don't know how Beagles comes to that conclusion.
And I don't see what it has to do with sewers and sewer studies.
And now this morning begins with seven tweets. I guess I won't be posting again until Friday. Until then make some noise dawgs.
Sheesh, see what you get when you are too lazy to write out the boy scout oath and then it stains your post and everything that comes after,?
I think there was another kerfuffle, though not an armed one when both Canada and the USA realized how much power they could generate. Somehow the Canadians ended up with the bigger falls, but I guess the American ones were sufficient enough to light up the whole town of Buffalo, the first city to be electrified.
There was indeed talk of generators, but now that I give it some thought, where are they? If they are upriver then there isn't going to be any more power than in any other river, and downriver the same. I was puzzled by Old Dog speaking of them being in the falls, but I guess they would have to be somewhere like that to capture the power of gravity, but how could they do that without marring the beauty of the falls, and come to think of it, how could they do that period? Oh wait Old Dog says that they moved the rivers. Maybe that's how they did it, building the generators somewhere and then diverting the falls to that precipice.
And what about the fish? They are just cruising around and then my isn't that current something and then they are going over the falls without even a barrel. There were gulls and loons downstream, seemingly having a joyous feast. Do the falls stun the fish so that they are stunned and easy picking? I'm not sure they are loons, but when I was in Aurora last week along the raging Fox River I saw this dark colored bird which instead of flying above and filching fish, seemed to be more like swimming and diving down for fish. My friend told me they were loons and they look like the birds I saw at Niagara falls.
You'll note also how flagrantly The Eel flatters Trump. The Donald cannot get enough high praise, probably why he pitches in and does so much of it himself. I tuned in last night to watch him deliver some speech to the boy scouts, the fucking boy scouts, and instead of talking about being Trustworthy, Loyal, Helpful, Friendly, Courteous, Kind, Obedient, Cheerful, Thrifty, Brave, Clean, and Reverent, stuff that the Donald knows little about, he was raving about crooked Hilary and how disloyal Sessions is..
I used to enjoy these speeches, making fun in my smug liberal way, what a fool he is making of himself, surely he will be seen through shortly, except for that 35 percent who are well, beyond the pale. They are irredeemable.
They, and the Donald, and now one of our colleagues continue to claim that nothing has been accomplished by the investigation, to which I just have to shake my head. Well certainly I expect it from Trump and the Trumpists, but I don't know how Beagles comes to that conclusion.
And I don't see what it has to do with sewers and sewer studies.
And now this morning begins with seven tweets. I guess I won't be posting again until Friday. Until then make some noise dawgs.
Sheesh, see what you get when you are too lazy to write out the boy scout oath and then it stains your post and everything that comes after,?
Monday, July 24, 2017
All Talk and No Action
It seems that the investigation into that Russian thing is still grinding on, with nothing significant accomplished. I understand that Trump has been tweeting about possibly pardoning everyone involved, including himself. This has given rise to the question of whether or not a president can legally pardon himself. Somebody asked one of Trump's lawyers about it, and he said that there is no point in addressing that question, since nobody has yet been charged with anything, much less convicted, so there is nothing to pardon. I think there is a precedent for pardoning somebody before they are formally charged because that's what President Ford did for ex President Nixon back in the Watergate days, but I have never heard of a president or governor pardoning himself, before or after the fact.
This reminds me of the time Inverness Township, where we used to live, did a study of the need to install sewers. The study concluded that there indeed was a need for sewers, but only after using up all the money in the sewer fund just for the study. Another such study was done years later and, again, all the sewer money was used up just studying the matter. The third time was the charm. Although the study again used up all the money in the sewer fund, the township officials managed to weasel some additional money out of the fire protection fund, and the sewers were finally built. We had moved away by then, but it wouldn't have mattered since no sewers were installed on our street anyway. To my knowledge, the only street that actually got sewers was M-27 Highway, which is an extension of the City of Cheboygan's Main Street. The township sewers feed into the city's sewer system, and the city charges some kind of fee for processing the township's shit.
For several years now, there has been talk of building a Meijer Mega Mall in the township, since there is no tract of land in the city large enough to accommodate it. The company bought some land, and then decided that, in addition to sewers, they wanted to be hooked up to the city's municipal water supply. The city and the township have been negotiating with each other about this for some two years, and they are no closer to an agreement now than they were when they started. Both parties have given up on each other and, last I heard, were trying to by-pass each other and negotiate directly with Meijer. I have not heard what Meijer has to say about this, and I wouldn't be surprised if they have forgotten about the project by now.
I have watched four episodes of "Meeting of Minds" and they're all good. I thought there had been only six episodes made, but I have heard several references to previous episodes in the ones I have watched. After I watch the last two, I plan to search for any additional episodes that might be out there.
This reminds me of the time Inverness Township, where we used to live, did a study of the need to install sewers. The study concluded that there indeed was a need for sewers, but only after using up all the money in the sewer fund just for the study. Another such study was done years later and, again, all the sewer money was used up just studying the matter. The third time was the charm. Although the study again used up all the money in the sewer fund, the township officials managed to weasel some additional money out of the fire protection fund, and the sewers were finally built. We had moved away by then, but it wouldn't have mattered since no sewers were installed on our street anyway. To my knowledge, the only street that actually got sewers was M-27 Highway, which is an extension of the City of Cheboygan's Main Street. The township sewers feed into the city's sewer system, and the city charges some kind of fee for processing the township's shit.
For several years now, there has been talk of building a Meijer Mega Mall in the township, since there is no tract of land in the city large enough to accommodate it. The company bought some land, and then decided that, in addition to sewers, they wanted to be hooked up to the city's municipal water supply. The city and the township have been negotiating with each other about this for some two years, and they are no closer to an agreement now than they were when they started. Both parties have given up on each other and, last I heard, were trying to by-pass each other and negotiate directly with Meijer. I have not heard what Meijer has to say about this, and I wouldn't be surprised if they have forgotten about the project by now.
I have watched four episodes of "Meeting of Minds" and they're all good. I thought there had been only six episodes made, but I have heard several references to previous episodes in the ones I have watched. After I watch the last two, I plan to search for any additional episodes that might be out there.
Slowly I turn
Niagara Falls is mesmerizing, isn't it? I've seen it only once, back in the 70s, but didn't take the boat tour (Maid of the Mist?). The Falls are the kind of thing that you can stare at for hours...Jeez! That's a LOT of water. I wasn't expecting the sound, though, the constant roar was impressive and much louder than I thought it would be. No wonder it is such a popular honeymoon destination, particularly suited to obscure the nuptial squeals of delight.
I should dig up any written records by the European explorers when they first encountered the Falls. Imagine, schlepping through the woods and pausing when you first hear the majestic rumble. I wonder what went through their heads.
As I was looking at the Falls I remembered that there are generators in there someplace. It could not have been easy to install those suckers, what with re-routing the river and all. The first Tesla-Westinghouse hydroelectric plant was built in 1895, which was quite an engineering feat. Modern construction projects pale in comparison.
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Also, I've been watching those old episodes of "Meeting of Minds".
I'm not about to wade through all of them; are any of them particularly noteworthy, perhaps related to some of the topics we've discussed?
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I stumbled onto the first press conference by the new White House Communications Director last week, and it wasn't surprising. He's smooth! He's slippery! Ladies and Gentlemen, I present to you the pride of Long Island, New York, Tony "The Eel" Scaramucci!
I should dig up any written records by the European explorers when they first encountered the Falls. Imagine, schlepping through the woods and pausing when you first hear the majestic rumble. I wonder what went through their heads.
As I was looking at the Falls I remembered that there are generators in there someplace. It could not have been easy to install those suckers, what with re-routing the river and all. The first Tesla-Westinghouse hydroelectric plant was built in 1895, which was quite an engineering feat. Modern construction projects pale in comparison.
-----
Also, I've been watching those old episodes of "Meeting of Minds".
I'm not about to wade through all of them; are any of them particularly noteworthy, perhaps related to some of the topics we've discussed?
-----
I stumbled onto the first press conference by the new White House Communications Director last week, and it wasn't surprising. He's smooth! He's slippery! Ladies and Gentlemen, I present to you the pride of Long Island, New York, Tony "The Eel" Scaramucci!
shuffling back from Buffalo
Tuesday morning Ruby and I flew from Chicago to Buffalo. Even the flight was exciting. Seems like most every time I take to the skies I am headed southwest, some bungalows, some forest preserves, leafy suburbs, Joliet, like a movie I have seen a hundred times before. But this time of course we flew right over the lake, then another shore and we were over southern Michigan, the part of the state that Beagles is not too crazy about. Then if my calculations were correct we would be flying over Lake Erie, and surprisingly they were, and there was the lake and then we were circling around Buffalo. Couldn't see much though because our window was pitted and smeared. These magnificent airplanes and then they don't bother to have nice windows you can look out of. Go figure.
Our hotel was not far from the Guarantee Building and that was our first sight. Magnificent. Well restored, and a nice little museum in it with old photos and diagrams and text. Very nice. When we spoke with the Buffalo men and women on the street must of them weren't even aware of its existence. It's my experience that the locals generally know nothing of the city where they live, or not the stuff I am interested in anyway.
Wednesday we were off to Canada. Buffalo does not have a nice grid pattern like Chicago, and their bus lines don't go in straight lines like the Western Avenue or 55th Street bus, they zig and they zag in Brownian movements, but after tense moments trying to find the bus stop and following the unhelpful map on the back of the schedule we arrived at the Rainbow bridge. A long line at the border for the guy who looked at our passports and asked if we were smuggling anything in, Those falls they are something. Really. We rode in a boat that went up close to the falls. Couldn't see anything just mist and wind and the boat jammed with tourists wearing red rain ponchos blowing in the wind everybody getting wet and slipping and sliding on the wet floor and laughing. It was great. We went up and down the river where it plunged, in a community of tourists and everybody in high spirits. We had planned to penetrate deeper into the town and meet real Canadians eating poutine and saying "Eh," but we were worn out and shuffled back to Buffalo.
The next day we went to a couple art museums, and Friday we flew back. Had a good window this time we had a nice window but this time we flew south of the lake.
I had my super phone with me and I checked every now and then on the Beaglestonian, and you know what I saw? Almost nothing. You guys.
Tuesday a couple Hoosier pals of mine are coming to town and we will be going to a couple Cubs/Sox games, so I most likely won't be posting Wednesday or Thursday.
Our hotel was not far from the Guarantee Building and that was our first sight. Magnificent. Well restored, and a nice little museum in it with old photos and diagrams and text. Very nice. When we spoke with the Buffalo men and women on the street must of them weren't even aware of its existence. It's my experience that the locals generally know nothing of the city where they live, or not the stuff I am interested in anyway.
Wednesday we were off to Canada. Buffalo does not have a nice grid pattern like Chicago, and their bus lines don't go in straight lines like the Western Avenue or 55th Street bus, they zig and they zag in Brownian movements, but after tense moments trying to find the bus stop and following the unhelpful map on the back of the schedule we arrived at the Rainbow bridge. A long line at the border for the guy who looked at our passports and asked if we were smuggling anything in, Those falls they are something. Really. We rode in a boat that went up close to the falls. Couldn't see anything just mist and wind and the boat jammed with tourists wearing red rain ponchos blowing in the wind everybody getting wet and slipping and sliding on the wet floor and laughing. It was great. We went up and down the river where it plunged, in a community of tourists and everybody in high spirits. We had planned to penetrate deeper into the town and meet real Canadians eating poutine and saying "Eh," but we were worn out and shuffled back to Buffalo.
The next day we went to a couple art museums, and Friday we flew back. Had a good window this time we had a nice window but this time we flew south of the lake.
I had my super phone with me and I checked every now and then on the Beaglestonian, and you know what I saw? Almost nothing. You guys.
Tuesday a couple Hoosier pals of mine are coming to town and we will be going to a couple Cubs/Sox games, so I most likely won't be posting Wednesday or Thursday.
Sunday, July 23, 2017
I'm Fine
I'm fine, I just haven't had anything to say lately. Also, I've been watching those old episodes of "Meeting of Minds".
Wednesday, July 19, 2017
The bigger they are
Friedrich Trump, the presidential grandfather, emigrated from Germany and became a US citizen. He became wealthy from the restaurants and bordellos he operated in Alaska, among other places. There was talk that the family name was originally Drumpf but that has not been substantiated. Trump's mother was born in Scotland, so any Russian connection is strictly financial and not hereditary.
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Maybe that's just what Russians do, maybe it's part of their national character.
Mr. Beagles is on to something. Russian music and literature both seem to have a spirit of melancholy tinged with romantic yearnings, but I'm not familiar enough with either to be sure. Maybe I got it from the movies, with sad, vodka soaked Russians bemoaning the fate of their beloved Motherland.
While Europe was entering the Age of Enlightenment Russia was a very backwards country. Then Peter the Great came to power and, because of his exposure to the modern ways of Europe, brought Russia, kicking and screaming, into the modern era. Those old Cossacks weren't happy to be forcefully made to shave off their beards. Russian history is deep and dark, and memories are long.
Maintaining civil order in such a huge country probably requires a very heavy hand. It worked for Stalin and it seems to be working for Putin. I don't know how many ethnic groups make up modern day Russia but I do recall the term White Russian from the pre-Revolution days. And then there was Khrushchev, who was considered a rustic peasant and not worthy of leadership, according to the ruling party elite. Now there is a different, moneyed, elite commonly called oligarchs. I think those are the guys that the Trump folks are trying to be pals with. They sure buy a lot of Trump property and, apparently, invest a lot of their hard won (stolen?) money with the Trump organization. Or so I've read. I still think that any alleged collusion with the Russians is strictly about money and desperate attempts by the Trump Organization to prop up a shaky financial empire. Why else the refusal to disclose those tax returns?
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With the media focus on all the Russian shenanigans we don't hear much about Snowden, Assange, WikiLeaks, or the NSA prying into our private lives anymore. That stuff is still going on. Data is still being gathered and analyzed, if not by the government then it's by private businesses which will be happy to sell it to the feds or law enforcement. Privacy? Ha! Nobody is stealing it because we've already given it away, except for the select few old farts who still use cash.
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Maybe that's just what Russians do, maybe it's part of their national character.
Mr. Beagles is on to something. Russian music and literature both seem to have a spirit of melancholy tinged with romantic yearnings, but I'm not familiar enough with either to be sure. Maybe I got it from the movies, with sad, vodka soaked Russians bemoaning the fate of their beloved Motherland.
While Europe was entering the Age of Enlightenment Russia was a very backwards country. Then Peter the Great came to power and, because of his exposure to the modern ways of Europe, brought Russia, kicking and screaming, into the modern era. Those old Cossacks weren't happy to be forcefully made to shave off their beards. Russian history is deep and dark, and memories are long.
Maintaining civil order in such a huge country probably requires a very heavy hand. It worked for Stalin and it seems to be working for Putin. I don't know how many ethnic groups make up modern day Russia but I do recall the term White Russian from the pre-Revolution days. And then there was Khrushchev, who was considered a rustic peasant and not worthy of leadership, according to the ruling party elite. Now there is a different, moneyed, elite commonly called oligarchs. I think those are the guys that the Trump folks are trying to be pals with. They sure buy a lot of Trump property and, apparently, invest a lot of their hard won (stolen?) money with the Trump organization. Or so I've read. I still think that any alleged collusion with the Russians is strictly about money and desperate attempts by the Trump Organization to prop up a shaky financial empire. Why else the refusal to disclose those tax returns?
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With the media focus on all the Russian shenanigans we don't hear much about Snowden, Assange, WikiLeaks, or the NSA prying into our private lives anymore. That stuff is still going on. Data is still being gathered and analyzed, if not by the government then it's by private businesses which will be happy to sell it to the feds or law enforcement. Privacy? Ha! Nobody is stealing it because we've already given it away, except for the select few old farts who still use cash.
Monday, July 17, 2017
Bad Name People
"The United States Intelligence Community has concluded with high confidence that the Russian government interfered in the 2016 U.S. presidential election.[1] A January 2017 assessment by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) stated that Russian leadership preferred presidential candidate Donald Trump over Hillary Clinton, and that Russian President Vladimir Putin personally ordered an "influence campaign" to harm Clinton's electoral chances and "undermine public faith in the US democratic process."[2]:7 "
Wikipedia has big long article about that Russian thing, and this is the lead paragraph. The last quote is of particular interest. It appears that the Russians not only wanted Trump to win, they wanted to "undermine public faith in the U.S. democratic process". I suspected from the beginning that the reason Trump was running for president was to give somebody a bad name. At first I thought he was trying to give conservatives a bad name by pretending to be one and then acting like he does. After he got the nomination, I figured that he was trying to give the whole Republican Party a bad name, probably because he wanted to help Hillary win. Okay I was wrong about that one, maybe because I wasn't thinking big enough. Now that Trump is president, he's giving the whole country a bad name which, according to Wiki, is exactly what the Russians were trying to do by helping him get elected. The question remains whether or not Trump was in on the scheme. I have long held the opinion that, when somebody like the president does something that appears to be stupid, he probably did it on purpose, because you don't get to be President of the United States by being stupid.
You know, Communism is not that bad in theory, it's when it's put into practice on a national scale that it becomes bad. The first country to do that was Russia, which would have surprised Karl Marx, because he figured it would be an industrialized country like England or Germany. Back in the 50s, lots of people said bad things about the Russians. I used to correct then by saying the Russians aren't bad people, it's Communism that gives them a bad name. Well, maybe I was wrong about that too. Maybe it was the Russians that gave Communism a bad name. Think about it: The Russians were always trying to give us a bad name when they were Communists, which was to be expected. So why are they trying to give us a bad name now, 27 years after they renounced Communism? Maybe that's just what Russians do, maybe it's part of their national character. For all we know, the last Czar might have been a really nice guy, and the Russians just gave him a bad name.
This doesn't explain why Trump wants to give us a bad name. Trump doesn't sound like a Russian name, but maybe it has been Anglicized, or maybe he's a Russian on his mother's side. I find it hard to believe that the Russians hired Trump to do this because he has more money than they do. I would sooner believe that Trump hired the Russians, or that they were in it together, which still doesn't explain what Trump is getting out of this. Okay, he gets to be president for awhile, but it still appears that the only reason he wanted to become president was to give the country a bad name, not the other way around. One may hope that, with all the investigating going on, somebody will get to the bottom of this eventually.
I didn't know that possums ate ticks, but I knew that birds did. They'll never get them all, though. Too many ticks, not enough birds and possums.
Conventional opinion has long been that humans and dogs got together because they hunted the same game and probably scavenged each other's kills. At some point, people started adopting orphaned wolf cubs and kept the ones that were naturally more docile than the others, thus selectively breeding them for compatibility. I saw a thing on PBS some time ago that advanced the theory that the dogs might have selectively bred themselves, not on purpose of course. The wolves that followed the humans around likely ate better than the ones that kept their distance, leading to a higher survival rate. The Russians have been conducting an ongoing experiment for decades with captive wild foxes. The ones that seem to like humans are kept for breeding, which has generated a whole different kind of fox. They look different and even smell different than their wild counterparts, to the point that some of them have been adopted by staff instead of being sent off to the fur factory when the researchers are done with them. I don't know if anybody gets a bad name out of this, but you never know with those crafty Russians.
Wikipedia has big long article about that Russian thing, and this is the lead paragraph. The last quote is of particular interest. It appears that the Russians not only wanted Trump to win, they wanted to "undermine public faith in the U.S. democratic process". I suspected from the beginning that the reason Trump was running for president was to give somebody a bad name. At first I thought he was trying to give conservatives a bad name by pretending to be one and then acting like he does. After he got the nomination, I figured that he was trying to give the whole Republican Party a bad name, probably because he wanted to help Hillary win. Okay I was wrong about that one, maybe because I wasn't thinking big enough. Now that Trump is president, he's giving the whole country a bad name which, according to Wiki, is exactly what the Russians were trying to do by helping him get elected. The question remains whether or not Trump was in on the scheme. I have long held the opinion that, when somebody like the president does something that appears to be stupid, he probably did it on purpose, because you don't get to be President of the United States by being stupid.
You know, Communism is not that bad in theory, it's when it's put into practice on a national scale that it becomes bad. The first country to do that was Russia, which would have surprised Karl Marx, because he figured it would be an industrialized country like England or Germany. Back in the 50s, lots of people said bad things about the Russians. I used to correct then by saying the Russians aren't bad people, it's Communism that gives them a bad name. Well, maybe I was wrong about that too. Maybe it was the Russians that gave Communism a bad name. Think about it: The Russians were always trying to give us a bad name when they were Communists, which was to be expected. So why are they trying to give us a bad name now, 27 years after they renounced Communism? Maybe that's just what Russians do, maybe it's part of their national character. For all we know, the last Czar might have been a really nice guy, and the Russians just gave him a bad name.
This doesn't explain why Trump wants to give us a bad name. Trump doesn't sound like a Russian name, but maybe it has been Anglicized, or maybe he's a Russian on his mother's side. I find it hard to believe that the Russians hired Trump to do this because he has more money than they do. I would sooner believe that Trump hired the Russians, or that they were in it together, which still doesn't explain what Trump is getting out of this. Okay, he gets to be president for awhile, but it still appears that the only reason he wanted to become president was to give the country a bad name, not the other way around. One may hope that, with all the investigating going on, somebody will get to the bottom of this eventually.
I didn't know that possums ate ticks, but I knew that birds did. They'll never get them all, though. Too many ticks, not enough birds and possums.
Conventional opinion has long been that humans and dogs got together because they hunted the same game and probably scavenged each other's kills. At some point, people started adopting orphaned wolf cubs and kept the ones that were naturally more docile than the others, thus selectively breeding them for compatibility. I saw a thing on PBS some time ago that advanced the theory that the dogs might have selectively bred themselves, not on purpose of course. The wolves that followed the humans around likely ate better than the ones that kept their distance, leading to a higher survival rate. The Russians have been conducting an ongoing experiment for decades with captive wild foxes. The ones that seem to like humans are kept for breeding, which has generated a whole different kind of fox. They look different and even smell different than their wild counterparts, to the point that some of them have been adopted by staff instead of being sent off to the fur factory when the researchers are done with them. I don't know if anybody gets a bad name out of this, but you never know with those crafty Russians.
This & that
This could be a slow week for the Institute as Uncle Ken is engaged in another one of his Sullivan's travels, but I'd like to add add a few bits and pieces in the meantime, if I may.
Whenever I click on a link in one of the news aggregators I follow, I assume it's new "news" but that is not always the case. I found an article, about two years old now, that is tick related. If you want to rid your property of ticks you should get friendly with Mr. Possum. Because they are fastidious self groomers they eat a lot of ticks, between five and six thousand per week. Some critters find those nasty ticks are tasty morsels...who would've thunk it?
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I was not a big fan of history back in my school days but I find that as the years have gone by my interest in historical matters has increased greatly and I'm always learning something new. The curious tale of the Battle of Lake Tanganyika, led by Geoffrey Spicer-Simson, caught my eye.
During WWI, the British hauled some small gunboats from South Africa though the bush to the Belgian Congo in order to take out the German gunboats on Lake Tanganyika. Not a trivial journey; besides hundreds of natives they used steam powered tractors and it took months. It's a good story and you can see a documentary here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-osCkzoL53U
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Since Mr. Beagles reads The National Geographic he may already be familiar with this, but it could be news for Uncle Ken, the feline fancier. Unlike dogs, which have been bred by humans for domestication over thousands of years, the cats have domesticated themselves. I knew there was some reason I don't trust them, and the complete article is here: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2017/06/domesticated-cats-dna-genetics-pets-science/
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In closing, this is one of my favorite quotes from the good version of Moby Dick, as spoken by Captain Ahab: I do not give reasons, Mr. Stubbs. I give orders.
Whenever I click on a link in one of the news aggregators I follow, I assume it's new "news" but that is not always the case. I found an article, about two years old now, that is tick related. If you want to rid your property of ticks you should get friendly with Mr. Possum. Because they are fastidious self groomers they eat a lot of ticks, between five and six thousand per week. Some critters find those nasty ticks are tasty morsels...who would've thunk it?
-----
I was not a big fan of history back in my school days but I find that as the years have gone by my interest in historical matters has increased greatly and I'm always learning something new. The curious tale of the Battle of Lake Tanganyika, led by Geoffrey Spicer-Simson, caught my eye.
During WWI, the British hauled some small gunboats from South Africa though the bush to the Belgian Congo in order to take out the German gunboats on Lake Tanganyika. Not a trivial journey; besides hundreds of natives they used steam powered tractors and it took months. It's a good story and you can see a documentary here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-osCkzoL53U
-----
Since Mr. Beagles reads The National Geographic he may already be familiar with this, but it could be news for Uncle Ken, the feline fancier. Unlike dogs, which have been bred by humans for domestication over thousands of years, the cats have domesticated themselves. I knew there was some reason I don't trust them, and the complete article is here: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2017/06/domesticated-cats-dna-genetics-pets-science/
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In closing, this is one of my favorite quotes from the good version of Moby Dick, as spoken by Captain Ahab: I do not give reasons, Mr. Stubbs. I give orders.
Friday, July 14, 2017
Insecurity
Uncle Ken is correct on how files are deleted on your computer but I'm not sure how it works with email. I thought all email resides on the servers of the service provider and I don't know how long they keep it, even if you do delete it. Maybe the NSA knows.
You can delete incoming emails all day if you want, but if the sender keeps a copy, well, there's still a copy available. And if the sender sends a blind carbon copy to someone else you'll never know how many copies of any incriminating emails are hiding in the ether. Who do you trust? Just because an email shows up your inbox does not mean it's from a real human being; can't emails be faked?
I don't give emails much thought, but if I was involved in high level security issues I wouldn't use email or a cell phone . It's like sending a postcard instead of registered mail; one is more secure than the other.
As long as folks are carrying cameras, recording devices, and GPS locators in their pockets and purses it is no surprise that secrets can't be kept from eavesdroppers or prying eyes.
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When I read that China is building it's first military base on foreign soil in Djibouti, I thought, "Uh, oh!" Djibouti is in a very strategic location, across from the Arabian peninsula. But then I read that Japan, France, and the US already have military bases there, too. Must be getting crowded, but would be a good location for a few bars and restaurants to keep the off duty personnel from getting bored.
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Finished watching the complete good version of Moby Dick; what a fine movie. I could tell that some of the effects used miniatures but it wasn't distracting in the least. Very few films today are able to tell such a compelling story, so well.
When I read Moby Dick in high school I didn't like it very much. But about fifteen years later I read it again and was surprised how much I liked it. I've read it a couple of times since then, about every ten years or so. A well told tale is worth rereading.
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The most recent reference to Uncle Ken's out of state pal was last December, but she was named Ruby Doo. Did her name change to Ruby Dew? You need a passport to get into Canada now, unlike the old days, but I'm sure Uncle Ken is prepared. In addition to poutine he should check out the real Canadian classic, Tim Horton's.
You can delete incoming emails all day if you want, but if the sender keeps a copy, well, there's still a copy available. And if the sender sends a blind carbon copy to someone else you'll never know how many copies of any incriminating emails are hiding in the ether. Who do you trust? Just because an email shows up your inbox does not mean it's from a real human being; can't emails be faked?
I don't give emails much thought, but if I was involved in high level security issues I wouldn't use email or a cell phone . It's like sending a postcard instead of registered mail; one is more secure than the other.
As long as folks are carrying cameras, recording devices, and GPS locators in their pockets and purses it is no surprise that secrets can't be kept from eavesdroppers or prying eyes.
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When I read that China is building it's first military base on foreign soil in Djibouti, I thought, "Uh, oh!" Djibouti is in a very strategic location, across from the Arabian peninsula. But then I read that Japan, France, and the US already have military bases there, too. Must be getting crowded, but would be a good location for a few bars and restaurants to keep the off duty personnel from getting bored.
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Finished watching the complete good version of Moby Dick; what a fine movie. I could tell that some of the effects used miniatures but it wasn't distracting in the least. Very few films today are able to tell such a compelling story, so well.
When I read Moby Dick in high school I didn't like it very much. But about fifteen years later I read it again and was surprised how much I liked it. I've read it a couple of times since then, about every ten years or so. A well told tale is worth rereading.
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The most recent reference to Uncle Ken's out of state pal was last December, but she was named Ruby Doo. Did her name change to Ruby Dew? You need a passport to get into Canada now, unlike the old days, but I'm sure Uncle Ken is prepared. In addition to poutine he should check out the real Canadian classic, Tim Horton's.
shuffling off
With Netflix you can choose a program that involves discs, or a slightly more expensive one that involves streaming and an even more expensive one that involves both. I subscribe to the first program. I kind of like the whole mail thing and being able to hold my media in my hand. I was a regular watcher of Glow when it was on tv, all the goofiness of professional wrestling and scantily clad babes to boot, what not to like? I have read some reviews of the new series and it sounds good. And of course Bong-Joon-Ho is one of my favorite directors. That Okja movie I am not so sure about, but I'll have to see it of course. I don't understand how it is a Netflix production. Did they bankroll it? Are they marketing it?
This whole Russia/Trump thing is such a sprawling story with the steady drip of information punctuated by tweets and obfuscations that I am having a hard time trying to recall a specific incident that started it. I think there have always been suspicions about Trump's dealing with the Russkies, reinforced by his refusal to reveal his income taxes, but I think the trip wire was his people denying that they met with the Russkies and then it turned out that they had, and if they were just innocent little tea parties why did they lie about it? I think Flynn might have been the first domino to fall but i am not sure. I am eagerly awaiting the book.
You know I read a little bio about Don Jr. Apparently he was pissed when Trump dumped his mother and took to drink and shenanigans, but at some point he straightened up and flew right. I am reminded of the James Dean character in East of Eden who did some kind of war profiteering to impress his father. Could Junior's motivation for meeting with the Russkies be his way of trying to buy his father's affection? Well I doubt it. In the movie James Dean's dad refuses the blood money, hard to imagine Trump refusing the goods on the big girl.
When you delete something on a computer, what the computer does is lose the address where the data is on the hard drive, but the information is still there. Eventually the computer will overwrite that part of the drive, but in a sort of skipping pattern where some of it will still remain and some programs can read the drive byte by byte and reconstruct what is still on the drive. Also when you send the email and it goes through the tubes I think bits and pieces of it are left in server farms and can be recovered. I am not so sure of the last part, but I expect Old Dog knows more about that,
The story on Tricky Dick's tapes is that he put them in because he didn't trust anybody and wanted to have a record of what was said. He thought they would prove he was a great man. At some point, late in Watergate he must have known they would sink his ship, and he had a window where he could have burned them on the White House lawn, and it's always been a bit of a mystery why he didn't. He was notoriously clumsy in dealing with the tapes and I suspect he just didn't know how to destroy them.
We have had several incidents in Chicago where people have done horrendous things and been caught because they put them on facebook. As to why they did that I can only shrug my shoulders. As for those guys from Onaway (what a cool name for a town) the answer is the usual one whenever somebody does something unbelievably stupid: alcohol.
Ruby Dew is coming to town Monday and Tuesday we are shuffling off to Buffalo and not getting back until Thursday, and I probably won't be posting until Monday July 24th. I will have my super phone with me so I will be able to follow the blog, you guys carry on without me.
And you may be wondering why Buffalo. Well there is a Louis Sullivan skyscraper there, and all kinds of architecture and history. And there is Niagara Falls just up the river. Not that I am big on the falls, but I am kind of interested in going to Canada and tasting authentic poutine and not the Americanized pap they serve in local restaurants.
This whole Russia/Trump thing is such a sprawling story with the steady drip of information punctuated by tweets and obfuscations that I am having a hard time trying to recall a specific incident that started it. I think there have always been suspicions about Trump's dealing with the Russkies, reinforced by his refusal to reveal his income taxes, but I think the trip wire was his people denying that they met with the Russkies and then it turned out that they had, and if they were just innocent little tea parties why did they lie about it? I think Flynn might have been the first domino to fall but i am not sure. I am eagerly awaiting the book.
You know I read a little bio about Don Jr. Apparently he was pissed when Trump dumped his mother and took to drink and shenanigans, but at some point he straightened up and flew right. I am reminded of the James Dean character in East of Eden who did some kind of war profiteering to impress his father. Could Junior's motivation for meeting with the Russkies be his way of trying to buy his father's affection? Well I doubt it. In the movie James Dean's dad refuses the blood money, hard to imagine Trump refusing the goods on the big girl.
When you delete something on a computer, what the computer does is lose the address where the data is on the hard drive, but the information is still there. Eventually the computer will overwrite that part of the drive, but in a sort of skipping pattern where some of it will still remain and some programs can read the drive byte by byte and reconstruct what is still on the drive. Also when you send the email and it goes through the tubes I think bits and pieces of it are left in server farms and can be recovered. I am not so sure of the last part, but I expect Old Dog knows more about that,
The story on Tricky Dick's tapes is that he put them in because he didn't trust anybody and wanted to have a record of what was said. He thought they would prove he was a great man. At some point, late in Watergate he must have known they would sink his ship, and he had a window where he could have burned them on the White House lawn, and it's always been a bit of a mystery why he didn't. He was notoriously clumsy in dealing with the tapes and I suspect he just didn't know how to destroy them.
We have had several incidents in Chicago where people have done horrendous things and been caught because they put them on facebook. As to why they did that I can only shrug my shoulders. As for those guys from Onaway (what a cool name for a town) the answer is the usual one whenever somebody does something unbelievably stupid: alcohol.
Ruby Dew is coming to town Monday and Tuesday we are shuffling off to Buffalo and not getting back until Thursday, and I probably won't be posting until Monday July 24th. I will have my super phone with me so I will be able to follow the blog, you guys carry on without me.
And you may be wondering why Buffalo. Well there is a Louis Sullivan skyscraper there, and all kinds of architecture and history. And there is Niagara Falls just up the river. Not that I am big on the falls, but I am kind of interested in going to Canada and tasting authentic poutine and not the Americanized pap they serve in local restaurants.
Thursday, July 13, 2017
What Was the First Clue?
Okay, I have a better understanding of this Russian thing than I did before. What I would like to know now is what prompted the investigation in the first place. I'll see what I can find on Wiki this weekend. I would have done it tonight, but I clicked on Old Dog's link to that sad clown. I suppose he is good at what he does, but it's not my cup of tea. Tiny Tim was never my cup of tea either, I just was reminded of the song about the ice caps when I read that article in National Geographic.
I understand that when you delete an email it goes into the deleted file and, if you want to really get rid of it, you have to go to the deleted file and re-delete the message all over again. I am using my Gmail account directly now and not running it through the Windows program because I wasn't able to get that to work. With Gmail, anything in the deleted file or the spam file is supposed to go away after 30 days unless you delete it sooner. I have not checked to see if that actually happens, I'll have to do that one of these days. Uncle Ken, are you saying that, even after you delete the message from the deleted file, that it still exists in your Permanent Record? Not that it matters because I have nothing to hide, I just wondered.
The thing is, why would anybody want to make any kind of record of something wrong that they did? The first time I remember that happening was with Nixon and those Watergate tapes. The right wing nuts with whom I was associating at the time believed that Nixon either was unaware of the tapes or was powerless to stop them, but they were just paranoid. So what's the opinion of my esteemed colleagues? Why would Nixon, or anybody, deliberately produce material evidence that could be used against them? I seem to remember hearing on the news some years ago that some guys killed some people in a drive by shooting spree. They might have gotten away with it too, if they hadn't videotaped the whole thing and posted it on You Tube. Closer to home, decades ago, there were some guys from nearby Onaway who were driving down a woods road with parts of an illegally taken deer in their trunk, incorrect license plates on the car, a burned out tail light, no valid driver's license, and no proof of insurance. I don't remember if they had open intoxicants in the car, but that might have explained their actions. Anyway, the road was narrow, so they pulled over to let an approaching car get by them. When they saw that it was a DNR (conservation) officer, they decided to turn around, catch up with him, run him off the road, and moon him out the side window as they went by. They were subsequently apprehended......Duh!
I understand that when you delete an email it goes into the deleted file and, if you want to really get rid of it, you have to go to the deleted file and re-delete the message all over again. I am using my Gmail account directly now and not running it through the Windows program because I wasn't able to get that to work. With Gmail, anything in the deleted file or the spam file is supposed to go away after 30 days unless you delete it sooner. I have not checked to see if that actually happens, I'll have to do that one of these days. Uncle Ken, are you saying that, even after you delete the message from the deleted file, that it still exists in your Permanent Record? Not that it matters because I have nothing to hide, I just wondered.
The thing is, why would anybody want to make any kind of record of something wrong that they did? The first time I remember that happening was with Nixon and those Watergate tapes. The right wing nuts with whom I was associating at the time believed that Nixon either was unaware of the tapes or was powerless to stop them, but they were just paranoid. So what's the opinion of my esteemed colleagues? Why would Nixon, or anybody, deliberately produce material evidence that could be used against them? I seem to remember hearing on the news some years ago that some guys killed some people in a drive by shooting spree. They might have gotten away with it too, if they hadn't videotaped the whole thing and posted it on You Tube. Closer to home, decades ago, there were some guys from nearby Onaway who were driving down a woods road with parts of an illegally taken deer in their trunk, incorrect license plates on the car, a burned out tail light, no valid driver's license, and no proof of insurance. I don't remember if they had open intoxicants in the car, but that might have explained their actions. Anyway, the road was narrow, so they pulled over to let an approaching car get by them. When they saw that it was a DNR (conservation) officer, they decided to turn around, catch up with him, run him off the road, and moon him out the side window as they went by. They were subsequently apprehended......Duh!
Send in the clowns
I don't know how it is today, but way back when you could go to the Board of Election Commissioners in City Hall and get any list of registered voters you wanted. They were listed by precinct and included the address (but not phone number, you had to look those up) of the voter. I think they were free but the memory is fuzzy. I know this because I was involved in a campaign with a pal of mine; he wanted to set up a business doing polling, research, and fund raising for a local guy running for state rep against the Democratic Machine. His guy lost, so that was the end of that.
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Uncle Ken mentioned putting a movie in his Netflix queue, and I asked him about this at one of the seminars. As a Netflix customer, can he not also view streamed movies? Netflix is starting to develop it's own original programming and I don't know if it is available on DVD. They have a TV show which should be right up his alley, a program called GLOW, which deals with the world of ladies' professional wrestling. Another Netflix original is the film Okja, a curious hybrid of a movie that has received much favorable critical response. It was directed by the same Korean guy who directed The Host and Snowpiercer and I thought the movie was much better than average. I like movies that go into directions that are unpredictable.
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The previous discussion about Tiny Tim got me thinking about another unique performance artist, but this one is current and has a growing fan base. I first saw him about a year ago on one of early morning WGN newscasts. Imagine a 6' 7" tall clown, of the sad, white clown, variety. He is totally mute except when he sings, which he does quite well. There are plenty of YouTube videos, including his America's Got Talent audition. Gentlemen, I present for your enjoyment, Puddles Pity Party: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vlgzsJjOVG4
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Uncle Ken mentioned putting a movie in his Netflix queue, and I asked him about this at one of the seminars. As a Netflix customer, can he not also view streamed movies? Netflix is starting to develop it's own original programming and I don't know if it is available on DVD. They have a TV show which should be right up his alley, a program called GLOW, which deals with the world of ladies' professional wrestling. Another Netflix original is the film Okja, a curious hybrid of a movie that has received much favorable critical response. It was directed by the same Korean guy who directed The Host and Snowpiercer and I thought the movie was much better than average. I like movies that go into directions that are unpredictable.
-----
The previous discussion about Tiny Tim got me thinking about another unique performance artist, but this one is current and has a growing fan base. I first saw him about a year ago on one of early morning WGN newscasts. Imagine a 6' 7" tall clown, of the sad, white clown, variety. He is totally mute except when he sings, which he does quite well. There are plenty of YouTube videos, including his America's Got Talent audition. Gentlemen, I present for your enjoyment, Puddles Pity Party: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vlgzsJjOVG4
The White Shadow revealed
The White Shadow is my nickname for Mike Pence (you know how I like nicknames) because of his appearance and the way he is kind of there and not there, and yet he could become president if Trump gets dumped. A long time ago there was a tv series about a white coach for a black basketball team and that's where I first heard the the phrase, but that show has nothing to do with my current incantation. Pence appears to be something of a dumbass and a boy scout and very loyal, which may be why Trump chose him, but who knows.
But he is a politician, and I don't think anybody gets to be governor without, well making a move or two, and he has such a perfect cover, who would expect him, and lately he has to begun to distance himself from Trump's pirate ship, though you would have to be a pretty close follower of the news to pick up on that.
I meant a more figurative definition to being taken to court, by which I meant the investigations. The investigations are theoretically into Russian influence in the elections, but from what the public can see Trump's short fingerprints are found all over the evidence, so the real story here is how actively did the Trumpist's collude with the Russkies. Did they coordinate with them? Did they agree to tread easy on the Russkies in exchange for their help? Did the Russkies have so much blackmail evidence against them that they are now doing their bidding?
I hear a lot of Trumpists complaining about there is no evidence of any wrongdoing by the Trumpists so they should shut them down, and when Beagles complained that he was tired of hearing about it I thought he was echoing that. The response to the demand to shut down the investigations is that there is plenty of evidence and you don't find the evidence until something is over. If Beagles is saying only that he is tired of hearing about it, well shit, I get tired of celebrity news (except for fake butt stories) but I don't expect it to ever cease.
And it's kind of a thing here. There is kind of a cycle going on here. Trump tweets something outrageous and generally false in the morning and the media chew on it all day, and Trump watches them chewing on it and gets increasingly pissed off so the next morning he tweets his displeasure and then the press chews on that, and so on, and so on, and doobie doobie doo on.
I suspect that probably since the seventies Beagles' polling place has had their records on computer and what he is seeing is the printouts from the computer. I'm a little puzzled by why all these computers are connected with each other and to the internet,but they are. And if Beagles thinks because he has hit the deleted button on the computer that his email has left this world, he is mistaken.
But he is a politician, and I don't think anybody gets to be governor without, well making a move or two, and he has such a perfect cover, who would expect him, and lately he has to begun to distance himself from Trump's pirate ship, though you would have to be a pretty close follower of the news to pick up on that.
I meant a more figurative definition to being taken to court, by which I meant the investigations. The investigations are theoretically into Russian influence in the elections, but from what the public can see Trump's short fingerprints are found all over the evidence, so the real story here is how actively did the Trumpist's collude with the Russkies. Did they coordinate with them? Did they agree to tread easy on the Russkies in exchange for their help? Did the Russkies have so much blackmail evidence against them that they are now doing their bidding?
I hear a lot of Trumpists complaining about there is no evidence of any wrongdoing by the Trumpists so they should shut them down, and when Beagles complained that he was tired of hearing about it I thought he was echoing that. The response to the demand to shut down the investigations is that there is plenty of evidence and you don't find the evidence until something is over. If Beagles is saying only that he is tired of hearing about it, well shit, I get tired of celebrity news (except for fake butt stories) but I don't expect it to ever cease.
And it's kind of a thing here. There is kind of a cycle going on here. Trump tweets something outrageous and generally false in the morning and the media chew on it all day, and Trump watches them chewing on it and gets increasingly pissed off so the next morning he tweets his displeasure and then the press chews on that, and so on, and so on, and doobie doobie doo on.
I suspect that probably since the seventies Beagles' polling place has had their records on computer and what he is seeing is the printouts from the computer. I'm a little puzzled by why all these computers are connected with each other and to the internet,but they are. And if Beagles thinks because he has hit the deleted button on the computer that his email has left this world, he is mistaken.
Wednesday, July 12, 2017
The White Shadow?
I looked it up on Wiki, and all I could find were references to fictional characters in a few old movies and a TV show. I assume that the current White Shadow was named after one of them, probably by Uncle Ken himself. It would be helpful if he would tell us this person's real name so we can look it up and find out who he is talking about. When I said that I was tired of hearing about this Russian thing, I meant in the news reports, which are mostly repetitive and redundant. I wouldn't mind discussing it on this forum, but first I have to be brought up to speed.
When you say that the matter has already been brought to court, does that mean that one or more people have been arrested and formally charged with a crime? It is my understanding that there is an investigation in progress, but I haven't heard about anybody being charged with anything yet. In a previous post I asked what those nasty Russians have allegedly done to tamper with our elections, and Uncle Ken said that they posted some fake news on the internet. If that's a crime, then they'd better start building more prisons because lots of people do that every day, and I doubt that many of them ask Trump's permission before they do it.
I seem to remember hearing somewhere that there is a concern that the Russians, the Islamic terrorists, or the Republicans might be able to hack into the voting records. What good would that do them? Those records show who voted, but the don't show how they voted. Until a few years ago, our local voting records were kept in a loose leaf binder at the county clerk's office, and I think that anybody could ask to see them if they wanted to. I have observed the election workers using that book, and there was no attempt to keep it a secret. There was a printed list of the names of all the registered voters and, when you voted, the lady crossed out your name with a yellow magic marker to prevent you from voting more than once. The last time I voted, I saw that all that stuff has now been put on a computer. Nothing wrong with that, but I hope they back it up with a hard copy, or at least a CD, because computers can be hacked. Well, I don't know, can a computer be hacked if it's not connected to the internet? Why would they need to connect this one to the internet anyway? The old loose leaf binder certainly wasn't connected to the internet, and it worked just fine.
And what's with all those email scandals? I delete all my emails when I'm done with them, and I assumed that everybody did, especially ones that might be incriminating, or even just embarrassing. It's like Nixon with those Watergate tapes. Why did he make them in the first place, and why didn't he destroy them as soon as the heat was turned on? Speaking of Nixon, I don't think he was ever formally charged with anything. He resigned before he could be impeached, and his successor Gerald Ford issued a blanket pardon for anything he might have done.
When you say that the matter has already been brought to court, does that mean that one or more people have been arrested and formally charged with a crime? It is my understanding that there is an investigation in progress, but I haven't heard about anybody being charged with anything yet. In a previous post I asked what those nasty Russians have allegedly done to tamper with our elections, and Uncle Ken said that they posted some fake news on the internet. If that's a crime, then they'd better start building more prisons because lots of people do that every day, and I doubt that many of them ask Trump's permission before they do it.
I seem to remember hearing somewhere that there is a concern that the Russians, the Islamic terrorists, or the Republicans might be able to hack into the voting records. What good would that do them? Those records show who voted, but the don't show how they voted. Until a few years ago, our local voting records were kept in a loose leaf binder at the county clerk's office, and I think that anybody could ask to see them if they wanted to. I have observed the election workers using that book, and there was no attempt to keep it a secret. There was a printed list of the names of all the registered voters and, when you voted, the lady crossed out your name with a yellow magic marker to prevent you from voting more than once. The last time I voted, I saw that all that stuff has now been put on a computer. Nothing wrong with that, but I hope they back it up with a hard copy, or at least a CD, because computers can be hacked. Well, I don't know, can a computer be hacked if it's not connected to the internet? Why would they need to connect this one to the internet anyway? The old loose leaf binder certainly wasn't connected to the internet, and it worked just fine.
And what's with all those email scandals? I delete all my emails when I'm done with them, and I assumed that everybody did, especially ones that might be incriminating, or even just embarrassing. It's like Nixon with those Watergate tapes. Why did he make them in the first place, and why didn't he destroy them as soon as the heat was turned on? Speaking of Nixon, I don't think he was ever formally charged with anything. He resigned before he could be impeached, and his successor Gerald Ford issued a blanket pardon for anything he might have done.
The White Shadow distances Himself
Damn I was looking forward to putting that Russians Are Coming movie into my queue, but Old Dog proclaims it flat and dull, and I am going to take him at his word. So many of those movies of that time were incurious and formulaic.
I am surprised that my colleagues are so bored by that Russian thing as they dismissively call it. To me it's like fireworks and to them it is like nothing going on. And now it appears that we have a smoking gun with Son O Trump's emails. Whenever there has been another damning piece of evidence I have switched over from the indignant and gleeful CNNers, to Foxworld where it is another sunny day in America which is getting greater in its greatness every day in every way, but this time even they were doubtful, with some of them even showing signs of irritation.
And it's not just that the Russians fucked with our election, it's that they did so with the cooperation of the guy running for president who is now rewarding them by trying to eliminate the sanctions against them and just generally being their international toady.
Stuxnet was sent to screw the centrifuges of Iran. Remember Iran, the great satan of the mideast? It looked like the reps were going to go full bore at them, but now that has sort of sputtered out.
I'm no engineer, but it seems likely that a sockslider, maybe with the addition of some adapter, could easily become an asswiper. Was that an old folk's channel that Colombo was on? Watching the Foxies in stunned amazement as they seemed to recognize the same world that I lived in, I caught some commercials for gold, but the one that surprised me a little was for some device that could freeze dry all the delicious meals that you cook, because who wouldn't want a year or two's worth of delicious freeze dried foods stocked amongst the board games in their bunker?
I think Beagles may be wrong about all this talk not leading to action, because I recall Nixon boarding that helicopter. He is right about the twenty second clip though, it is annoying the way they play it over and over. And when they have the talking heads in the foreground and the clip in the loop in the background it sets my teeth on edge.
But whither hence with the probes? Does anybody not think that it is going to lead eventually to the pistol in the short fingered hand? But what then? I think the regular reps would dearly love to be rid of this guy and most of the Trumpists are only on the train for their own advantage and would have no problem jumping off and dusting themselves off and pretending that they were never on the train. And remember the White Shadow? He is quietly edging himself away from the Donald, don't stand, don't stand, don't stand so close to me.
But what of the proud deplorables, the mad 35 percent? Do the reps want to be seen killing off their god? I just don't know, let me tune into CNN to see what they think.
I am surprised that my colleagues are so bored by that Russian thing as they dismissively call it. To me it's like fireworks and to them it is like nothing going on. And now it appears that we have a smoking gun with Son O Trump's emails. Whenever there has been another damning piece of evidence I have switched over from the indignant and gleeful CNNers, to Foxworld where it is another sunny day in America which is getting greater in its greatness every day in every way, but this time even they were doubtful, with some of them even showing signs of irritation.
And it's not just that the Russians fucked with our election, it's that they did so with the cooperation of the guy running for president who is now rewarding them by trying to eliminate the sanctions against them and just generally being their international toady.
Stuxnet was sent to screw the centrifuges of Iran. Remember Iran, the great satan of the mideast? It looked like the reps were going to go full bore at them, but now that has sort of sputtered out.
I'm no engineer, but it seems likely that a sockslider, maybe with the addition of some adapter, could easily become an asswiper. Was that an old folk's channel that Colombo was on? Watching the Foxies in stunned amazement as they seemed to recognize the same world that I lived in, I caught some commercials for gold, but the one that surprised me a little was for some device that could freeze dry all the delicious meals that you cook, because who wouldn't want a year or two's worth of delicious freeze dried foods stocked amongst the board games in their bunker?
I think Beagles may be wrong about all this talk not leading to action, because I recall Nixon boarding that helicopter. He is right about the twenty second clip though, it is annoying the way they play it over and over. And when they have the talking heads in the foreground and the clip in the loop in the background it sets my teeth on edge.
But whither hence with the probes? Does anybody not think that it is going to lead eventually to the pistol in the short fingered hand? But what then? I think the regular reps would dearly love to be rid of this guy and most of the Trumpists are only on the train for their own advantage and would have no problem jumping off and dusting themselves off and pretending that they were never on the train. And remember the White Shadow? He is quietly edging himself away from the Donald, don't stand, don't stand, don't stand so close to me.
But what of the proud deplorables, the mad 35 percent? Do the reps want to be seen killing off their god? I just don't know, let me tune into CNN to see what they think.
Tuesday, July 11, 2017
No News is Good News
You guys know that I don't follow the news like you do (How do you find the time?) so I don't know enough about this Russian thing to argue with you about it. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that I don't believe it, and I'm not saying that I believe it either, I'm just saying that I'm getting tired of hearing about it. I was the same way about Watergate, and I followed the news even less in those days than I do now. I guess I just don't have the tolerance for repetition that some people have. Watching an old re-run that you haven't seen in years is not the same thing as hearing the same news over and over again day after day, and watching the same 20 second film clip play over and over again in the same broadcast.
Another thing is that all this talk seldom leads to any kind of action. I like to talk as much as the next guy but, at some point, I get tired of just talking and I want to do something. My friend and I talked about going to Alaska all through high school. We recruited a few accomplices in our senior year, and one of them got so excited about it that he couldn't wait till we graduated, he quit school and set out on his own hitchhiking. I ran into him years later when I was home on leave from the army. He told me that he only got as far as Kansas, ran out of money, had no job prospects, and joined the army just to get something to eat. I told him that he should have looked at a map before he started out, because Kansas is not on the way to Alaska. As graduation day approached, the other guys seemed less and less interested. I couldn't get any of them to make any concrete plans with me, so I went by myself. It was easy, I bought a one way ticket on a non stop flight from Chicago to Anchorage. I don't remember what it cost, but it was cheaper than going any other way because I didn't have to pay for food and lodging. When I got back, my original friend said, "I can't believe you really did it.", and I responded, "I can't believe that you didn't."
I'm pretty sure that no whales were harmed in the filming of "Moby Dick". I seem to remember seeing a thing on TV about how the movie was made. Some wild whales were filmed from a distance, but the close up action scenes were all done with fake whales. I think they won some kind of award for the way they made Moby and his pals look so real.
Another thing is that all this talk seldom leads to any kind of action. I like to talk as much as the next guy but, at some point, I get tired of just talking and I want to do something. My friend and I talked about going to Alaska all through high school. We recruited a few accomplices in our senior year, and one of them got so excited about it that he couldn't wait till we graduated, he quit school and set out on his own hitchhiking. I ran into him years later when I was home on leave from the army. He told me that he only got as far as Kansas, ran out of money, had no job prospects, and joined the army just to get something to eat. I told him that he should have looked at a map before he started out, because Kansas is not on the way to Alaska. As graduation day approached, the other guys seemed less and less interested. I couldn't get any of them to make any concrete plans with me, so I went by myself. It was easy, I bought a one way ticket on a non stop flight from Chicago to Anchorage. I don't remember what it cost, but it was cheaper than going any other way because I didn't have to pay for food and lodging. When I got back, my original friend said, "I can't believe you really did it.", and I responded, "I can't believe that you didn't."
I'm pretty sure that no whales were harmed in the filming of "Moby Dick". I seem to remember seeing a thing on TV about how the movie was made. Some wild whales were filmed from a distance, but the close up action scenes were all done with fake whales. I think they won some kind of award for the way they made Moby and his pals look so real.
Nyet? Da!
When Uncle Ken mentioned the movie The Russians are Coming, The Russians are Coming I thought, Hey! I saw that when it came out! So to determine how well it withstands the test of time I found it online and watched it again, hoping it would be as good as I remembered. Sadly, it's not too good, although it does have it's moments. I thought it was pretty flat, almost dull, and not very entertaining.
The "good" version of Moby Dick is a different story; I got half way through it before I screwed up and lost the connection but what I saw holds up very well. A little scenery chewing by some of the actors at times but it still an impressive film, even with the 1950's era special effects. I'm convinced that a few whales were killed during production. And you can never go wrong with a screenplay that was partially written by Ray Bradbury.
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The Big Bang Theory is one of those shows that I avoid at all costs but if Mr. Beagles and the hypothetical wife enjoy it, well, more power to them. I find the laugh track particularly annoying, which is why I like shows that forgo it like Veep, Silicon Valley, and Brooklyn Nine-Nine. I think one of the first comedies shown without a laugh track, as opposed to shows filmed before a live audience, was Malcolm in the Middle, but I could be wrong on that one.
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All the blather about the Russians is becoming tiresome. Folks are reacting as if the United States has never meddled in the affairs of other sovereign nations but the big difference is the Russians got caught in the act. Isn't imitation the sincerest form of flattery? Mr. Beagles inquired about the situation in the Ukraine and it looks like they are the lab rats for Russian cyber attacks; see this for more info: http://www.cbsnews.com/news/russian-hacking-of-ukraines-power-grid-test-run-for-us-attack/
More imitation, the precedent possibly being the US and Israeli deployment of Stuxnet to screw up the centrifuges in one of those Mid-Eastern countries, I forgot which one.
So we're in a real Cyber War now, and if you follow the money, it leads to trade and the price of oil. Russia is getting nailed because of the low oil prices, and disruption of any kind to drive up the price may be their goal.
But some of the current flap can be traced to the perceived lack of respect given to the Russians. Americans tend to ignore the fact that the Russians had the biggest impact, and lost more people, in defeating Hitler. We talk about the US landing on the moon but forget to mention Sputnik or Yuri Gagarin. Considering their level of technology and manufacturing infrastructure their accomplishments were astounding. They are a proud people and will go to great, often extreme, lengths to achieve their goals. Didn't Stalin once say something like "one death is a tragedy, a thousand deaths is a statistic?" The US should tread lightly in dealing with those guys; they don't dick around.
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I still enjoy watching Columbo, even if I've seen the episode before, usually many times before. But the programmers know their audience, which is geezers like myself. The ads are mostly for old people stuff: retirement insurance, pills for this or that, and most troublig, catheters. But a new ad caught my eye and I wonder what the world is coming to. For about 20 bucks you can buy the Sockslider, a gadget that helps you put on your socks without bending over. Hell, if things are that bad you probably can't wipe your ass either, but there is surely a gadget coming to market that will solve that problem, too.
The "good" version of Moby Dick is a different story; I got half way through it before I screwed up and lost the connection but what I saw holds up very well. A little scenery chewing by some of the actors at times but it still an impressive film, even with the 1950's era special effects. I'm convinced that a few whales were killed during production. And you can never go wrong with a screenplay that was partially written by Ray Bradbury.
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The Big Bang Theory is one of those shows that I avoid at all costs but if Mr. Beagles and the hypothetical wife enjoy it, well, more power to them. I find the laugh track particularly annoying, which is why I like shows that forgo it like Veep, Silicon Valley, and Brooklyn Nine-Nine. I think one of the first comedies shown without a laugh track, as opposed to shows filmed before a live audience, was Malcolm in the Middle, but I could be wrong on that one.
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All the blather about the Russians is becoming tiresome. Folks are reacting as if the United States has never meddled in the affairs of other sovereign nations but the big difference is the Russians got caught in the act. Isn't imitation the sincerest form of flattery? Mr. Beagles inquired about the situation in the Ukraine and it looks like they are the lab rats for Russian cyber attacks; see this for more info: http://www.cbsnews.com/news/russian-hacking-of-ukraines-power-grid-test-run-for-us-attack/
More imitation, the precedent possibly being the US and Israeli deployment of Stuxnet to screw up the centrifuges in one of those Mid-Eastern countries, I forgot which one.
So we're in a real Cyber War now, and if you follow the money, it leads to trade and the price of oil. Russia is getting nailed because of the low oil prices, and disruption of any kind to drive up the price may be their goal.
But some of the current flap can be traced to the perceived lack of respect given to the Russians. Americans tend to ignore the fact that the Russians had the biggest impact, and lost more people, in defeating Hitler. We talk about the US landing on the moon but forget to mention Sputnik or Yuri Gagarin. Considering their level of technology and manufacturing infrastructure their accomplishments were astounding. They are a proud people and will go to great, often extreme, lengths to achieve their goals. Didn't Stalin once say something like "one death is a tragedy, a thousand deaths is a statistic?" The US should tread lightly in dealing with those guys; they don't dick around.
-----
I still enjoy watching Columbo, even if I've seen the episode before, usually many times before. But the programmers know their audience, which is geezers like myself. The ads are mostly for old people stuff: retirement insurance, pills for this or that, and most troublig, catheters. But a new ad caught my eye and I wonder what the world is coming to. For about 20 bucks you can buy the Sockslider, a gadget that helps you put on your socks without bending over. Hell, if things are that bad you probably can't wipe your ass either, but there is surely a gadget coming to market that will solve that problem, too.
Russkies love that freehold marmalade.
Well apparently I need not worry about the Red Menace and their
Republican allies sneaking up on the freehold on a dark and moonless
night. Beagles has already invited them in, well the Russkies, the
Republicans, ever docile in the face of a conquering power, are standing
outside holding their hats, not wanting to get in the way in the crowded kitchen where Beagles bustles about distributing steaming cups of coffee and fresh doughnuts, threading his way through the Kalashnikovs leaned casually against the kitchen chairs. "So," he inquires brightly, "I understand you guys aren't commies anymore, just gangster totalitarians, welcome to the freehold. Would you like some of this marmalade? How about meddling with our elections? That whole thing about democracy, about voting, it's not that big a deal. Our Republican buddies are even now working to knock Americans who are likely to vote against them off the polls. Do take whatever doughnuts you don't finish back out to them. They will eat right out of your hand."
Sometimes I think that whatever radio or tv Beagles gets the news over is maybe being blocked by the Russkies the way they used to block The Voice of America, not that Beagles would mind since they aren't commies anymore, and that Putin guy seems a lot like a thinner, more manly (longer fingers one supposes), less hairy, Trump. And even though Beagles turns up his nose (don't beagles have a great sense of smell?) at Trump, he likes most everything Trump is doing, which ok, is not a hell of a lot outside of undoing Obama's executive orders, so he is kind of a little caboose trailing behind the Trump train and glad for the ride.
All the experts, all the dems, all the independents, most of the republican party, most of Trump's cabinet, pretty much everybody except for that inner circle of Trumpsters, the Bannons and that Conway woman (typing this I wish I had a less acute sense of smell) and Trump believe the Russians are meddling in out elections. I guess now we can admit Beagles into that elite circle of those who don't..
And I guess Beagles hasn't heard that this is all being taken to court. There's cagey Mueller, the house and senate committees, sundry other committees, and I am sure there are lawsuits and whatnot. Is Beagles aware that Trump obstructed the investigations by firing Comey, and sending that clown Nunes on a keystone kops errand? It's like five days into a trial and no verdict yet, we might as well let the guy go and shut up about it because nothing is proved yet.
And shut up about it? Is that the American Way? Why listen to the news when you can watch the same stuff you watched forty years over and over again through the magic of dvds?
Sometimes I think that whatever radio or tv Beagles gets the news over is maybe being blocked by the Russkies the way they used to block The Voice of America, not that Beagles would mind since they aren't commies anymore, and that Putin guy seems a lot like a thinner, more manly (longer fingers one supposes), less hairy, Trump. And even though Beagles turns up his nose (don't beagles have a great sense of smell?) at Trump, he likes most everything Trump is doing, which ok, is not a hell of a lot outside of undoing Obama's executive orders, so he is kind of a little caboose trailing behind the Trump train and glad for the ride.
All the experts, all the dems, all the independents, most of the republican party, most of Trump's cabinet, pretty much everybody except for that inner circle of Trumpsters, the Bannons and that Conway woman (typing this I wish I had a less acute sense of smell) and Trump believe the Russians are meddling in out elections. I guess now we can admit Beagles into that elite circle of those who don't..
And I guess Beagles hasn't heard that this is all being taken to court. There's cagey Mueller, the house and senate committees, sundry other committees, and I am sure there are lawsuits and whatnot. Is Beagles aware that Trump obstructed the investigations by firing Comey, and sending that clown Nunes on a keystone kops errand? It's like five days into a trial and no verdict yet, we might as well let the guy go and shut up about it because nothing is proved yet.
And shut up about it? Is that the American Way? Why listen to the news when you can watch the same stuff you watched forty years over and over again through the magic of dvds?
Monday, July 10, 2017
Let 'Em Come!
I still don't understand why everybody is making such a big deal about the Russians these days. They gave up Communism a long time ago, and they never were as much of a threat as we were led to believe even when they had Communism. Are they still fooling around with the Ukraine? We haven't heard much about that lately, but that doesn't mean it's not still going on. Then there's that thing in Syria, which is such a mess anyway that I don't see how the Russians can make it any worse. If I was in charge, I'd just let them have Syria as well as the rest of the Mideast, except for Israel. That whole region was better off when it was being ruled by outsiders, but I doubt that the British or even the Turks want it back now, so give it to the Russians. I'm getting really tired of hearing about their alleged interference in our elections too, just like I did with that ruckus about Hillary's emails. If anybody has any actual proof that a crime was committed, they should take it to court. If not, they should just shut up about it already.
I found the old "Meeting of Minds" show on You Tube, and I watched one episode the other night. I intended to just check it out, not watch the whole thing but, once I got into it, it held me spellbound for the entire 58 minutes. This wasn't the first episode because they made reference to a previous episode. I also seem to remember that, in the first episode, Steve Allen explained the format, and he didn't do that in this one. I understand that they only made a total of six episodes and spaced them out over several years. It must have been re-runs that we saw because they ran one episode a week, leading us to believe it was a regular show, but then it was replaced by something else. The more I think about it, it must have been after 1980 that we saw them because my hypothetical wife seems to remember that we were living in our house on Townline Road at the time. I tend to agree with her because we had better reception there than we did at our previous house in Indian River. Our PBS channel was a weak signal anyway wherever we lived, and sometimes we couldn't pick it up at all in Indian River. The reception at Beaglesonia was the worst of all and, after a couple years of that, we got our satellite dish.
Like I said, we don't watch as much TV as some people, and we won't watch something that we don't like. There are maybe a dozen shows over they years that we have really liked, and we have most of them on DVD. If we could find "Meeting of Minds" on DVD, our collection would be complete, except for "The Big Bang Theory". We have all nine seasons, and will pick up the tenth when it becomes available this fall. I heard somewhere that they have been promised at least two more seasons, and I'm sure that we'll buy them as well.
I found the old "Meeting of Minds" show on You Tube, and I watched one episode the other night. I intended to just check it out, not watch the whole thing but, once I got into it, it held me spellbound for the entire 58 minutes. This wasn't the first episode because they made reference to a previous episode. I also seem to remember that, in the first episode, Steve Allen explained the format, and he didn't do that in this one. I understand that they only made a total of six episodes and spaced them out over several years. It must have been re-runs that we saw because they ran one episode a week, leading us to believe it was a regular show, but then it was replaced by something else. The more I think about it, it must have been after 1980 that we saw them because my hypothetical wife seems to remember that we were living in our house on Townline Road at the time. I tend to agree with her because we had better reception there than we did at our previous house in Indian River. Our PBS channel was a weak signal anyway wherever we lived, and sometimes we couldn't pick it up at all in Indian River. The reception at Beaglesonia was the worst of all and, after a couple years of that, we got our satellite dish.
Like I said, we don't watch as much TV as some people, and we won't watch something that we don't like. There are maybe a dozen shows over they years that we have really liked, and we have most of them on DVD. If we could find "Meeting of Minds" on DVD, our collection would be complete, except for "The Big Bang Theory". We have all nine seasons, and will pick up the tenth when it becomes available this fall. I heard somewhere that they have been promised at least two more seasons, and I'm sure that we'll buy them as well.
The Russians Are Coming, The Russians Are Coming
Oh I don't know, just something very square about tv, well about all those families sitting home and feeding their faces from their tv trays when they should have been doing something, I don't know what. Anybody remember Married with Children? I remember Peggy once nagging Al about how they never go out and do anything anymore, "Why don't we have a social calendar?" she implored, "Don't need one we have this," Al replied, showing her a copy of TV Guide.
I seem to remember those more elaborate standalone ashtrays. I think they had a like a handle, something protruding from the top where you could bang your pipe to knock out the ashes. Pipes, a big pain in the ass with their whole rigmarole of devices, although some people dig that crap. As soon as it became apparent that my pipe filled with cherry blend, jutting from my jaw Hef-style wasn't going to get me any chicks I discarded it. It took longer for me to realize that my English Leather wasn't doing the trick either. I reckon I reeked.
We still talk about something being bigger than a breadbox, or I think we do, I'll have to check next time I am around people who aren't old. Sometimes a young person strolls into the Ten Cat. Sometimes even a hot young babe, over at the geezer's corner Old Dog and I may elbow each other as we pick our eyeballs up off the bar. Could this be the pickup line we have been waiting all our lives for? We shall see, we shall see?
Meanwhile The Russians Are Coming, The Russians Are Coming. That was a movie from 1966, kind of a gentle movie it appears. Can there be a handsome Soviet submariner and a winsome little New England farm girl? More likely an exotic Russian sub girl and a chiseled jawed New England cop or something. We would just be happier, even in a friendly affair, if we got one of their women rather than they got one of ours. Later we got the Red Dawns and the Wolverines.
And now we have Donald Trump. Why prepare an invading armada when all you really have to do is flatter a fat man? Of course the Trumpsters are all like, no problem here, what a pal is that Putin. The ever thinning crust of republican Never Trumps bleat, but the wish washies between the Trumpists and the Nevers are alarmingly willing to go along for a ride on the Trump train to Moscow.
Late at night in the freehold Beagles may hear a creak and grab Old Betsy and note a movement in the bushes and blam. Was that a Red or a Republican? Ah, what's the difference?
Sunday, July 9, 2017
TV Trays
My hypothetical wife and I still eat supper off of TV trays. We got a sturdy solid wooden set of them at Walmart when we moved to this house in 2000. Before that we had those flimsy metal ones, and these are a big improvement. There isn't much on TV that we like anymore except "The Big Bang Theory", so we mostly watch DVDs of old shows and the occasional movie. It usually takes us at least two suppers to complete a movie because we only watch it while we're eating. Other than that, I watch a little news and weather, and that's about it.
I said that I didn't watch much TV as a kid but, the more I think about it, I probably watched as much as anybody when I was in elementary school. It wasn't until high school that I got too busy to sit around in the evenings with my family and watch TV. We didn't get TV reception where I was in Alaska, or radio either, because the surrounding mountains blocked the signal. They had towers on some of the mountain tops, but that was only for telephone service. Cell phones hadn't been invented yet, but the Alaskans used to to run their land lines up the mountain and broadcast to other towers all over the state. All calls within Alaska were billed as local calls, and they had one small telephone book for the state. There were only 200,000 people in Alaska at the time, and 10% of them lived in Anchorage. Last I heard, Anchorage now has more people in it than the whole state did when I was there.
We had a TV set in our day room when I was in the army, but I don't remember ever seeing it turned on. The guys told me that was because all the shows were in German. We had an American radio station, The Armed Forces Network, but no American TV station in Berlin. So, from about 1959 to 1967, I got out of the habit of watching TV, and I never missed it. I did not own a TV set until 1975, when my daughter started school and people kept telling me that she would be a social outcast if she couldn't discuss her favorite shows with her little friends. My daughter is now 47 years old, still doesn't own a TV, and is far from being a social outcast. Of course she has a computer and one of those magic telephones, and they give her all the screen time she wants or needs.
I said that I didn't watch much TV as a kid but, the more I think about it, I probably watched as much as anybody when I was in elementary school. It wasn't until high school that I got too busy to sit around in the evenings with my family and watch TV. We didn't get TV reception where I was in Alaska, or radio either, because the surrounding mountains blocked the signal. They had towers on some of the mountain tops, but that was only for telephone service. Cell phones hadn't been invented yet, but the Alaskans used to to run their land lines up the mountain and broadcast to other towers all over the state. All calls within Alaska were billed as local calls, and they had one small telephone book for the state. There were only 200,000 people in Alaska at the time, and 10% of them lived in Anchorage. Last I heard, Anchorage now has more people in it than the whole state did when I was there.
We had a TV set in our day room when I was in the army, but I don't remember ever seeing it turned on. The guys told me that was because all the shows were in German. We had an American radio station, The Armed Forces Network, but no American TV station in Berlin. So, from about 1959 to 1967, I got out of the habit of watching TV, and I never missed it. I did not own a TV set until 1975, when my daughter started school and people kept telling me that she would be a social outcast if she couldn't discuss her favorite shows with her little friends. My daughter is now 47 years old, still doesn't own a TV, and is far from being a social outcast. Of course she has a computer and one of those magic telephones, and they give her all the screen time she wants or needs.
Something for Sunday
I can't believe that you guys are nostalgic about that crap.
It might be crap today, as viewed through the lens of a life well lived, but it wasn't crap then. Nostalgia is almost the right word, but not quite. I don't detect any yearning for the "good old days," more like a reflection on how things have changed, slowly, without our noticing it. It amuses me to see Uncle Ken rhapsodize about his days as a hippy, even as he gazes across the realm from the lofty heights of his not quite ivory, more like cast concrete, tower.
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One trick I use with YouTube is to download the content and view it at my leisure. Well, not view it, exactly, but listen to it. Most documentaries are like that, the narrative is the main thing and the images are usually superfluous. There's a funny word for you: superfluous. I wonder if there is a regular fluous, as opposed to Super Fluous; something I should find more about. Looks like Latin, but we've had enough of that.
Anyhow, after I'm done with the content I delete it; those hundreds of megabytes add up, don'cha know. One thing I've learned, more useless information, is that one of the rules of the Inquisition was that blood must not shed. You could apply red-hot irons, crush their limbs, but don't you dare shed a drop of blood. Maybe it worked better in theory than in practice and a trip to the Vatican Library would sort out the details. The Church has been historically very big on rules but enforcement varied, as in many large bureaucracies. They rigidly adhere to the rules they want to and ignore the rest.
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Some local hoopla in Wittenberg, Germany this year as they observe the 500th anniversary of Martin Luther's bit with the church door. I was listening to a clip about what a vulgar dog ol' Luther was, big on scatalogical terms. Telling someone to "lick my ass" was a popular form of expression back in the day, at least in that part of Europe. Mozart was another potty mouth, enthusiastic with anal references. Maybe the German language lends itself well to that sort of thing, combining words to make new ones. Any scholars present?
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TV trays, huh? I was surprised that they are still being made; a big selection on Amazon, but the new ones look a lot sturdier. They were always flimsy as I recall, and never seemed to be right size for the plates and glasses that we had at home. But they were fine for snacks.
Ashtrays are another throwback item still being made. The height of fashion (in my memory) was the pedestal type that stood next to Dad's easy chair. My uncle had one with a fancy built-in lighter. Very swank. In the not so distant future when you describe something as being the size of a pack of cigarettes people won't know what you are talking about. You don't see people smoking on TV anymore although they do in real life. More fake media.
It might be crap today, as viewed through the lens of a life well lived, but it wasn't crap then. Nostalgia is almost the right word, but not quite. I don't detect any yearning for the "good old days," more like a reflection on how things have changed, slowly, without our noticing it. It amuses me to see Uncle Ken rhapsodize about his days as a hippy, even as he gazes across the realm from the lofty heights of his not quite ivory, more like cast concrete, tower.
-----
One trick I use with YouTube is to download the content and view it at my leisure. Well, not view it, exactly, but listen to it. Most documentaries are like that, the narrative is the main thing and the images are usually superfluous. There's a funny word for you: superfluous. I wonder if there is a regular fluous, as opposed to Super Fluous; something I should find more about. Looks like Latin, but we've had enough of that.
Anyhow, after I'm done with the content I delete it; those hundreds of megabytes add up, don'cha know. One thing I've learned, more useless information, is that one of the rules of the Inquisition was that blood must not shed. You could apply red-hot irons, crush their limbs, but don't you dare shed a drop of blood. Maybe it worked better in theory than in practice and a trip to the Vatican Library would sort out the details. The Church has been historically very big on rules but enforcement varied, as in many large bureaucracies. They rigidly adhere to the rules they want to and ignore the rest.
-----
Some local hoopla in Wittenberg, Germany this year as they observe the 500th anniversary of Martin Luther's bit with the church door. I was listening to a clip about what a vulgar dog ol' Luther was, big on scatalogical terms. Telling someone to "lick my ass" was a popular form of expression back in the day, at least in that part of Europe. Mozart was another potty mouth, enthusiastic with anal references. Maybe the German language lends itself well to that sort of thing, combining words to make new ones. Any scholars present?
-----
TV trays, huh? I was surprised that they are still being made; a big selection on Amazon, but the new ones look a lot sturdier. They were always flimsy as I recall, and never seemed to be right size for the plates and glasses that we had at home. But they were fine for snacks.
Ashtrays are another throwback item still being made. The height of fashion (in my memory) was the pedestal type that stood next to Dad's easy chair. My uncle had one with a fancy built-in lighter. Very swank. In the not so distant future when you describe something as being the size of a pack of cigarettes people won't know what you are talking about. You don't see people smoking on TV anymore although they do in real life. More fake media.
Friday, July 7, 2017
when tv was king
When I was doing my Ed Sullivan research I came across a pic of the Rolling Stones at the time and there they were poised like the early Beatles in a little square or pentagram with each of them maybe ten feet from the other standing alone in front of a microphone wearing some kind of sports jacket, standing straight, not slouching.
Still for all that the blokes were edgy, they openly smoked cigs and just had kind of an attitude that no American pop star had. Maybe Elvis had an attitude while he sang with the hips and the sneer and all but afterwards he was all Yes Ma'am and No Sir.
And Ed Sullivan was such a fucking square. Maynard G Krebbs would have called him a cube. /I can't believe that you guys are nostalgic about that crap. We became hippies to get away from that crap. Our stuff may have been crappy too, but we were stoned while we were enjoying it.
I do wonder about Doby Gillis though. It was kind of a breakthrough comedy in its day, I think because Doby's dad threatened to knock his block off instead of delivering some hokey message at the end of the show. Still probably would not hold up.
There was a whole tv culture though wasn't there, with the whole family assembled in the living room after supper, each in their assigned spot as the knob was turned and the tv fired up (as I recall it wasn't a blink like we have now but it was a circle in the center that expanded, something like that, something mystic) and then they were bathed in pale blue light like pod people or something. The family was all together but nobody spoke.
And then there were TV Dinners and that little rickety tray you could put in front of them to eat your dinner while you were glued to the tubes. We never ate them at my house, they seemed too decadent. What kind of Mom doesn't have time to make her family dinner? Later on as a hippy I ate them (while not watching square tv), because they were cheap, and even to this day I indulge sometimes. A couple tamales from the guy who comes through Ten Cat at 9 PM over a Santa Fe rice and beans is a south of the border treat that cannot be beat.+
There have been mishaps in the super phone, at one point it turned its ringer off and for awhile my keyboard only printed out Asian Indian letters. Stuff happens chaotically, it updates itself, it moves stuff around, it tells you the weather with kind of a good boy beam like what a clever lad it is, when you never asked and don't care. When I was riding the grey dog down to Champaign and was on the wrong side of the bus and couldn't read the green signs Google Maps told me where I was, but then it was constantly asking me if I wanted to take a photo of wherever I was.
I first got it when I was to meet my sister for lunch and I went to Pizzeria Uno while she went to Due, and we eventually ate and went home alone wondering where the other one was. A phone call would have remedied that situation. I only take it with me when I am traveling or meeting someone where wires could get crossed.
I do love the camera though. It takes great photos. It won't let you name them or organize them, but if I connect it to the computer with a cable I can deal with its photos the way I can with the computer.
Still for all that the blokes were edgy, they openly smoked cigs and just had kind of an attitude that no American pop star had. Maybe Elvis had an attitude while he sang with the hips and the sneer and all but afterwards he was all Yes Ma'am and No Sir.
And Ed Sullivan was such a fucking square. Maynard G Krebbs would have called him a cube. /I can't believe that you guys are nostalgic about that crap. We became hippies to get away from that crap. Our stuff may have been crappy too, but we were stoned while we were enjoying it.
I do wonder about Doby Gillis though. It was kind of a breakthrough comedy in its day, I think because Doby's dad threatened to knock his block off instead of delivering some hokey message at the end of the show. Still probably would not hold up.
There was a whole tv culture though wasn't there, with the whole family assembled in the living room after supper, each in their assigned spot as the knob was turned and the tv fired up (as I recall it wasn't a blink like we have now but it was a circle in the center that expanded, something like that, something mystic) and then they were bathed in pale blue light like pod people or something. The family was all together but nobody spoke.
And then there were TV Dinners and that little rickety tray you could put in front of them to eat your dinner while you were glued to the tubes. We never ate them at my house, they seemed too decadent. What kind of Mom doesn't have time to make her family dinner? Later on as a hippy I ate them (while not watching square tv), because they were cheap, and even to this day I indulge sometimes. A couple tamales from the guy who comes through Ten Cat at 9 PM over a Santa Fe rice and beans is a south of the border treat that cannot be beat.+
There have been mishaps in the super phone, at one point it turned its ringer off and for awhile my keyboard only printed out Asian Indian letters. Stuff happens chaotically, it updates itself, it moves stuff around, it tells you the weather with kind of a good boy beam like what a clever lad it is, when you never asked and don't care. When I was riding the grey dog down to Champaign and was on the wrong side of the bus and couldn't read the green signs Google Maps told me where I was, but then it was constantly asking me if I wanted to take a photo of wherever I was.
I first got it when I was to meet my sister for lunch and I went to Pizzeria Uno while she went to Due, and we eventually ate and went home alone wondering where the other one was. A phone call would have remedied that situation. I only take it with me when I am traveling or meeting someone where wires could get crossed.
I do love the camera though. It takes great photos. It won't let you name them or organize them, but if I connect it to the computer with a cable I can deal with its photos the way I can with the computer.
Thursday, July 6, 2017
Long Live You Tube!
I had no idea that all that old stuff was on You Tube, I though it was just amateur videos posted by ordinary people. Well, I did find some old Bo Derek movies on there once, but the quality was poor and I figured that somebody had posted their pirated copies. According to Wikipedia, they have rules about posting copyrighted material, nudity, and explicit sex, but they are seldom enforced. The You Tube people do not monitor or screen the postings but, if somebody complains about a particular video, they will take a look at it and take it down if it doesn't meet their standards. If the actual copyright owner registers the complaint, they will offer to either take it down or share the advertising revenue with them.
When Old Dog mentioned that they have some clips of the Ed Sullivan Show, it made me remember Senor Wences. You know, the Spanish guy with the puppets who did, among other things, "Difficult For You, Easy For Me". I typed his name in the search box and, sure enough, he was there. Looking at those clips after all those years caused me to see them in a different light. As a kid, I just thought it was a cute puppet show. Now it dawns on me that this guy had to do all those voices, including his own, and operate the puppets, sometimes while spinning a plate on a stick or juggling several balls. In one scene, his hand puppet, Yanni, is supposed to be sick, so Wences tells him to stick out his tongue. Yanni opens his mouth, which is Wences' thumb, and out comes another finger on the same hand. He made it look easy, but I tried it myself, and I couldn't do it.
Like I said, I didn't watch a lot of TV when I was young, or a lot of movies either. One of my friends talked me into seeing "Moby Dick" with him, the good version with Gregory Peck. He had already seen it, but he wanted to see it again, which puzzled me. Why would anybody want to see the same movie twice? Okay, fast forward about 30 years: VCRs had been out awhile, but we didn't have one yet. One of our local stores had the machines for rent, so we decided to try that to see if we even liked it. As luck would have it, "Moby Dick", the good version with Gregory Peck, was on display and caught my eye, so we rented it. Shortly after that, we bought our own VCR machine, and "Moby Dick" was one of the first films we bought. All I remembered from my earlier viewing were the action scenes, most of the dialog went right over my head. This time, however, I must have paid more attention because the whole movie kept me spellbound from start to finish. I guess there is something to be said for the wisdom of age.
When Old Dog mentioned that they have some clips of the Ed Sullivan Show, it made me remember Senor Wences. You know, the Spanish guy with the puppets who did, among other things, "Difficult For You, Easy For Me". I typed his name in the search box and, sure enough, he was there. Looking at those clips after all those years caused me to see them in a different light. As a kid, I just thought it was a cute puppet show. Now it dawns on me that this guy had to do all those voices, including his own, and operate the puppets, sometimes while spinning a plate on a stick or juggling several balls. In one scene, his hand puppet, Yanni, is supposed to be sick, so Wences tells him to stick out his tongue. Yanni opens his mouth, which is Wences' thumb, and out comes another finger on the same hand. He made it look easy, but I tried it myself, and I couldn't do it.
Like I said, I didn't watch a lot of TV when I was young, or a lot of movies either. One of my friends talked me into seeing "Moby Dick" with him, the good version with Gregory Peck. He had already seen it, but he wanted to see it again, which puzzled me. Why would anybody want to see the same movie twice? Okay, fast forward about 30 years: VCRs had been out awhile, but we didn't have one yet. One of our local stores had the machines for rent, so we decided to try that to see if we even liked it. As luck would have it, "Moby Dick", the good version with Gregory Peck, was on display and caught my eye, so we rented it. Shortly after that, we bought our own VCR machine, and "Moby Dick" was one of the first films we bought. All I remembered from my earlier viewing were the action scenes, most of the dialog went right over my head. This time, however, I must have paid more attention because the whole movie kept me spellbound from start to finish. I guess there is something to be said for the wisdom of age.
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