Author: sean

Free-Write

There’s too much going on, but I’m not going to write about that publicly.

The SNL Digital Short last night was pretty damned good, but not for the reasons they intended.

My instant response was that I’d bet the writers voted without compunction for Officer Harris and Komisar Walz.

Also had this gem from Reason.

With the Internet, the scarcity argument for broadcast spectrum goes away. Why do we still have the FCC?

So nitpickers can report people to the cops.

Can you not find something better to do?

*checks NFL since the For(mer)skins lot on Thursday night*

I guess the Pittsburg-Baltimore game could be worth watching.

Falling towards the bird. Well, part of it, at least. I think I’ve pretty much gotten the major obstacle at work cleared, so I should try to enjoy myself some.

I know, I know, good luck with that.

Write About Begin Sixteen

Sixteen was a strange year for me. I would imagine that a lot of people are kind of settled in to the whole being-a-highschoolers thing.

Trying to think of the best way to tie all of these things into a bit of a bundle.

School

Sixteen saw me start my fourth-different school in four years. Trying to figure out how different districts’ curricula mapped was frustrating, but they managed to stitch it all together. I ended up being about a half a year ahead of the other people entering my class in Bad Newz. Because of that, I knew I was going to have a somewhat-strange senior year.

I started getting prepared for college applications. My first shot at the SAT wasn’t great, but good enough to get me into most state schools that might be of interest. My first test would have been mid-fall. I took it again in the spring, and saw something like a 90-point increase in my score. Most of that increase was on the math side.

Computers

i was still really enthralled with Linux. Various telnet talkers, Usenet, email. I’d gotten somewhat proficient with elm early in my use of email, but there was this program floating around that was much easier to use. It also allowed for easy NNTP access allowing me to read and write messages about various topics. I’d also gotten pretty adept at reassembling, then decoding binaries from various Usenet groups. Mix of warez and pr0n; I was sixteen, after all. I think I started doing things to network around the house. Mainly RS232/SLIP. I didn’t have the money for any hardware. I think I set up a few personal websites, and assisted with setting up email.

Cars

I was scouring around for one, but there was only so much money I could raise bagging groceries at the Commissary a few days a month. Much to my amazement, after I did something, my parents bought me a Jeep. I would go on to put something like 150,000 miles on that Jeep. 4.0 I-6. 5-speed. The first owner had been an Army diver, so it was kind of set up for exploring sandy environments.

Human Stuff

I had a lot of the typical sixteen-year-old stuff going on. Too-long/unkempt hair. Acne. Bad teeth. Being the mid-90s, I had more than my fair share of flannel. Kind of my typical outfit was jeans, a black T-Shirt, a flannel, and usually combat boots. I met my longest-friend at the new student orientation at school. Fellow Army brat, but his, and his parents’ path was completely different than mine. His dad was stationed at a different post, and they were living off-post near the school. While we’d go on to interact quite a bit junior and senior years, our friendship really became a thing after high school, after he’d gotten back from a not-so-good fit at a different college. I wasn’t playing any sports, really, but I’d started doing things like JROTC. Stag to various events on color guard. I do kind of remember dancing with a girl at the dance where we got our high school rings, “Ring Dance,” but really not much on the relationship front. Where I was was temporary. My dad was still on active duty, and I figured I’d be leaving for college where life would begin. So, in the meantime, listen to the radio, mess around with computers, and take care of my Golden Retriever buddy. Watch football, etc.

And that’s about enough for today.

Halftime

So, I’m halfway through this streak, and have been actually having a lot of trouble finding time, especially since I got back from Biloxi, to sit and write.

It’s not so much that I don’t feel like doing it, but because I’ve been so thoroughly-consumed with work that I don’t have time.

I would say that it’s a nice situation to be in, but I do wonder if my body is telling me to stop. Thankfully, it appears that all of my work might actually lead to a good open period over the holidays where I don’t actually have to do anything.

Can I bring myself to just relax?

I kinda doubt it.

But since the election, as busy as I’ve been with work, I’ve kind of been keeping news at an arm’s length. I did hear a good one today, where the guy from The Blaze expressed some very similar sentiments to mine.

I need to email Heaton welcoming him back to the Beltway Swamp. But, before I do that, I’m going to watch the Tyson fight.

Seems pretty much everybody wants to see him beat the everloving shit out of the guy. I have no idea who he is, but why not?

Nintendo should re-release his Punch-Out!

I wouldn’t last nearly as long as Tyson on that.

I almost called him “Iron Mike,” but that could also be Ditka. Does anyone have a better precedent than “Iron?”

Where You Spend Your Mondy

This is kind of a replacement for “Small Business Saturday,” which falls this year on the last day of the month, so the day of my wrap-up.

Honestly, probably the two big things for me lately have been food and recreation. Obviously we spent quite a bit on the trip to Biloxi recently. While I was able to pay a good part of it via points, we did end up having to spend some extra.

I’m trying to figure out what I might want to spend my money on locally, but I don’t really know. With the family wanting to do the potluck-style Thanksgiving, won’t be as much purchasing.

I’ve also been spending money on the house in Biloxi to keep that up. I need to figure out getting my mom’s stuff out of there, and back to Virginia.

Very, very long few days, and my body is not happy with me for overdoing things lately.

Thanksgiving Plans

These are coming a bit better into focus. My wife, and her family, are doing a multi-cook effort culminating with dinner here in NoVA. It’s fine with me; I don’t think there’s much for me to do.

*checks NFL Thanksgiving schedule*

Bears at Lions

Giants at Cowboys

Dolphins at Packers

What? Only the night game is cross-conference, and probably three very bad games — five not-very-good teams.

That’s fine I guess.

I think the folks coming through are taking my wife away to a hockey game or something, so I’ll probably have a couple of days to myself.

We’ll see how it goes.

Thankfully work actually might be somewhat calm through the holidays.

I can hope, at least. Can I figure out how to relax some?

Relax. I’m not sure I really remember how to do it. But I need to go do some work stuff now. Pfftt.

I had a topic for today, and had started plunking away at it. But I really don’t feel like finishing it.

First full day back at work. Progress made in places. But the big takeaway is that the overly-aggressive schedule for a rather big effort.

Just so much to do, and a lot of it is complicated by some decisions made against my recommendations previously.

I don’t like saying “see I told you,” but I did.

I’m bad about that, myself. I trade maintainability for familiarity.

Shouldn’t do that.

Otherwise, it’s still reaction to last week.

Things move forward…..

Veterans’ Day

I’ve been thinking about how I might want to address this one since the birthday dinner for my grandfather last weekend.

He was interwar Navy. My cousin, who was at the dinner, was also Navy. Along with his brother. My uncle, one of the people at the party, was Army Nat’l Guard (and retired from that after his final trip to Iraq). My father-in-law was career Navy. My dad was career Army. (His marker at ANC says “Vietnam” and “Persian Gulf,” even if he wasn’t boots-on-the-ground in either…)

So, lots of military alignment here.

I wonder how much realignment is going to be happening with the return of President Trump.

This isn’t directly-related to US military policy, but I do wonder if it’s a bit of a failure of Western Europe.

The US paid a not-insignificant amount of your defense bills, and your countries have turned to absolute garbage since the Soviet threat ended.

Seriously?

One of the school trips I really remember was going to the Anne Frank House in Amsterdam, then Bergen-Belsen.

Can anyone ever really say “never again,” with pogroms happening in Amsterdam, and the perpetrators are being released?

Free-Write

Circling into the NFL after missing pretty much everything since last week.

It’s okay. There’s not a lot to be optimistic about when it comes to the Saints. Guess I could try to get excited about the RedskinsCommanders. If anything, what I’ve seen so far is at least interesting. I still haven’t quite figured out the offense the Commanders are running.

So many other teams are running the exact same stuff. Let’s look like the Chiefs and Niners. yawn

Otherwise, I’ve just been trying to assess what happened with the election Tuesday.

I feel like What Happened??!? was a 2016 thing.

Fair, expected, amount of despair from the left-leaning outlets I follow. Not a lot of satisfying self-reflection yet, but there’ll probably finally be some after the shock abates.

In spite of paranoid MSNBC bits coming into the house, I’m trying to figure out if there might be a small place for me to contribute. While I might not see a direct path, if it’s something I could do while maintaining my safety valves, why not? I think I have to update my CV for work, anyway. Maybe the updates will feed multiple uses.

But I was kind of struck by President Trump’s description of Elon Musk during his acceptance speech was great.

Musk is doing the sorts of things that the authoritarian state say he can’t. Then he has to rescue people stranded in a conventional spacecraft.

What I don’t know is whether he’s doing any of Business School stuff of “That’s proprietary information” stuff. I do see bits of it, but I also see what he seems at least willing to share information with competitors when it comes to compatibility. Can’t find the story I saw a few days ago about how they’re making other manufacturer’s vehicles compatible with Tesla’s “Supercharger.”

Electricidal Engineering isn’t rocket surgery.

So, maybe I have a bit of sunny optimism about all this?

I don’t know.

While I may not particularly like the upstream beneficiaries, at least something might get done.

In so many cases, what’s in place isn’t what anyone with half a brain would built today.

So, a bit of optimism? Maybe.

I do have a lot of other stuff to do this coming week. We’ll see how it goes. I’m gonna go watch football.

Travel Recap

Sunday. We flew to NOLA without many issues. While I do like the direct to MSY from DCA, the ride from New Orleans seems a lot longer these days, even if the rides are remarkably smooth. I would say that the roads are actually the summation of all the things that have been done since Katrina, but it’s something I’ve noticed all over the place. Check-in at the hotel was generally uneventful. Room wasn’t great, but it did work. Dinner at the place across the place across the parking lot.

Monday: We went over to see my mom for a bit. Installed the rails to help her get in and out of bed. She’s in a thoracic brace after her last fall. Figured out her phone, but she’s still mainly at the point where she can’t use it. The chargers were missing. Thankfully, I still had one in my laptop bag that we could use to charge it once the staff finally located it. Tried to show her how to use Siri for voice command, but she still has problems seeing well enough to do much of anything, or hold down the button to activate much of anything. Her TV isn’t working. This is the flat screen my brother and I got in something like 2009. I think it’s like 32 inches, which was the biggest thing that would fit inside the giant cabinet that my parents had bought for their big CRT. My wife was bothered by the disarray in her closets, and set out to buying organizaers. Back to the hotel a bit, then out for my grandfather’s birthday dinner. My wife had some sort of stuffed fish that was absolutely amazing. I wasn’t terribly hungry, so I got the Cajun shrimp tacos. Fried pickles, etc. But it was nice having a nine-person party there to celebrate my grandfather’s birthday.

Tuesday: W0w-oh-wow. I was kind of keeping my thumb on the pulse of what was going on with the election results using X and various websites. After a nap, we went to Gen Z’s favorite fast casual restaurant, Chili’s. As with the situation the night before, I couldn’t come close to finishing what I’d ordered. Draft Bud Light, shot of Fireball. When we got back to the hotel, in to watching the election results roll in. While there was a TV in the room, I watched pretty much of all of it at first on The Free Press‘s livestream, and trying to follow the results in Virginia. Obviously, I knew that there was basically no chance of winning. Jerry Torres for the House in a district that’s been “blue” since the Northern Aggressors finally left in 1877. Hung Cao in the Senate. With the endorsement of Trump from some of the people who’ve destroyed the Libertarian Party jumping over to endorse Trump, I decided to vote for the candidate they’d ended up with after their Jersey Dave replacement was too stoned to speak even halfway coherently during the convention. After the TheFP livestreams ended with it appearing Trump had won, I went to BlazeTV for a few more hours.

Wednesday: I went to my mom’s house so I could do landlord tasks. Generally in good shape, and the the guy who’s been doing the lawn. My wife was really suffering from the effects of whatever allergy/sinus issue she was having. The arrangement can continue as it currently is. Back to the hotel room to spend some time with the girls. Dinner delivered to the hotel.

Thursday: Over to the home to have lunch with my mom for her birthday. The dog was a hit among the staff and other residents. My wife installed the closet organizers, and my mom got to hold the leash to keep the dog from investigating furniture assembly too closely. Had lunch delivered from a local Po’Boy shop run by one of my parents’ high school classmates.

Friday: Trip home. There was a traffic issue on I-10 in New Orleans. The nav app my wife was trying to get her to get off the Interstate, and take back roads to get around….because staying on the Interstate was going to have about a seven minute delay. Stay on 10, or go through stop-and-go local traffic. The logistics of returning rental cars at MSY is not good. If you’re looking for how COVID really fucked an industry, look no further than the rental car industry.

Overall impression? In so many aspects of life, things are much better today than they’ve ever been. The Intertubes at my mom’s house in Biloxi, Mississippi are actually a bit better than what I get inside the Beltway. Highways are in amazingly-good shape. I will probably write more about my mom’s health, but that’s not going to be for general consumption; check OD.