You want a good time

So, the four asses of the white supremacy apocalypse pulled a couple of stunts this week to distract attention from the House committee investigating the events of 6 January at the Capitol.

On Tuesday morning, as the committee was convening and swearing in two US Capitol Police officers and two from MPD, the Republican 4G crowd with a combined IQ of 97 (Matt Gaetz, Louie Gohmert, Marjorie Taylor Greene and Paul Gosar) held a “press conference” in front of the Department of Justice to decry the totally-made-up “injustice” of 1/6 rioters being held in jail. The presser lasted less than five minutes because the self-styled freedom fighters for the RWNJ constituency felt dissed by protestors, particularly one guy who was blowing a whistle. Some beard hustled the asses away (with Gaetz dodging one reporter’s “Are you a pedophile, Congressman?” all the way to his SUV) and then flounced about the whistle being an assault.

A reporter for one of the RWNJ outlets confronted the whistler (who—total props—was blowing it behind his mask), trying to…well, I don’t know, exactly, except that it got her airtime. Gaetz later tweeted video of that, repeating the assault claim, because he’s a moron.

On Thursday, Gaetz, Gosar, Gohmert and Greene were refused entry to the D.C. jail (jail, mind you, not prison) where some of the insurrectionists are being held pending trial because they’re batshit crazy and have demonstrated their intentions to continue with their acts of violence. This was another stunt intended to get them media attention, because they had to know all along that they’d be denied admittance. They’re neither criminal lawyers (although they certainly should become acquainted with some) nor are they freakin’ Amnesty International or the Red Cross. No whistles this time; Gohmert flapped about the outrage of being turned away and then it was over. Greene did go full Karen and asked to speak to the supervisor, but the people with actual jobs to do told the three loons to leave or be admitted on a more formal—arrested—status. It had the same effect being whistled at had..

(Honestly—I expect the woman who told them to buzz off scared them all. I certainly would not mess with her.)

Any roads, in honor of the whistle guy who scattered the 4G Know-nothings, today’s earworm is Donna Summer’s “Bad Girls”. Crank up the volume.

 

 

 

Nature's mysteries 5

It’s time for another chapter of plant identification, even though I still haven’t learnt what the last one was.

These guys—well, they look like hibiscus, but they don’t have the shiny leaves of hibiscus, so I dunno. They're fairly largish shrubs, if that's any help.

#IDme

 

 

Frankly...

Several households in the ‘hood seem to like Saint Francis in their yard. I showed you one of them covered in cicadas last month. Here’s another, doing his thing:

But this one—I really wonder about the story behind this:

 

Secure delivery

I don’t know when this started, but apparently FedEx isn’t quite so fussed about getting signatures for package delivery.

When my company shipped me a new laptop because my old one was trying to kill me, the notification email told me that delivery would be NLT noon on last Friday and that someone would have to sign for it. I saw the truck pull up from my desk at the front window, so I trotted over to the door. I opened it just as he finished knocking; he seemed surprised, handed the package to me and turned around.

So much for signature.

But earlier in the week, I had an identical experience. My shipment of wine from Cellar 503 (wonderful samplers of Oregon wines) came with a voicemail notification specifying delivery date and the requirement for a signature by someone over 21 years of age. Again, I saw the driver and hopped to the front door. By the time I got it open, he was halfway back to his truck.

If you think I’m imagining it, here’s the sticker covering half of the top of the carton:

 

‘Ssup, FedEx?  

 

 

Gratitude Monday: back to work

Pursuant to my discovery that my company laptop was trying to kill me, IT sent me a new one, for which I am grateful. As you can see: the lid closes, and no gaping maw in the lower case:

I will have to spend some time today transferring files off my old machine to the new one (I swear, all Microsoft OneDrive does is hide my data). And then ship the old one back to IT, where I presume it will be given a humane finish.

That’s my gratitude for today: less-than-lethal technology, just about on-demand.

 

 

Can't keep from cryin'

Practically the entire lower 48 is expected to be under what meteorologists call a “heat dome” all next week. Basically, as I understand it, that means we’re all going to cook, with temperatures 10 to 15 degrees above normal.

But climate change is a hoax, right? Right along with the pandemic in which we’re spending our second summer. Yay, science deniers!

Anyhow, I sort of feel that Linda Ronstadt’s take on “Heat Wave” is appropriate. She's talking about a different kind of heat, but still.

I hope you can enjoy it in a climate-controlled environment. Also: hydrate.

 

Solomon in all his glory

Well, I spent an hour of my day yesterday listening to a customer moan about how our product is terrible, and whenever someone suggested an approach that would answer one of his issues, he batted it away with, “But it doesn’t solve ALL THE THINGS!!”

So here are lilies from my neighbor’s garden.

 

Taking a bike

The “sharing” economy is truly permeating the People’s Republic. As witnessed by this bike-share installation I found on last Friday’s walk:

It’s across the street from a small park (tennis courts, picnic tables and baseball diamond; also a drinking fountain that I really need by the time I hit that point in my circuit), on a street otherwise relentlessly residential. No shops, no businesses, just single family houses, townhomes and one multi-occupancy building of half-million-dollar condos.

Also—it was decidedly not there on the Thursday, so it was installed in a single day. That must have been a thing.

I saw on Monday that word has got out, as the configuration of available bikes had changed:

 

Swell

It turns out there’s something called “swelling battery/keyboard” on laptops. I found this out because someone posted it on the business unit Teams chat and told us to be on the lookout for it. The latest victim was on a Mac, but evidently this is not unknown to the HPs that the company uses for Windows-based machines.

Someone said that when it happened to his HP, the first signs were the touchpad and shift key rising, preventing him from being able to shut the laptop. Well, I use an external keyboard, so I have no idea if keys are sticking, but that machine has run hot since the day it was issued to me in September 2019. I mean what-the-hell hot.

Well, when I looked at my laptop, here’s what I saw:

That didn't seem good. Then I looked again:

Well, crap. I sent pix to IT and they’re shipping me a new laptop. Evidently Li-on batteries are not something to mess around with.

I have to say that this is a first: I mean, I’ve had colleagues who wanted to kill me, but this is the first time a laptop tried it.